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Post by jamesjazzguitar on Feb 16, 2023 20:46:58 GMT
GALLANT LADY was remade as ALWAYS GOODBYE (1938) with Barbara Stanwyck and Herbert Marshall. It's a great story. I haven't seen Gallant Lady or Always Goodbye. These films would be good to discuss at the remake thread. I find it interesting to compare a pre-code film with a post-code film that were based on the same source material. While both films are based on the same source material (story by Doty and Emery), they have different screenwriters. Both films have ties to 20th Century Fox, so I assume Fox owned the rights to the story. Often when that occurs and a remake is made within the same decades as the prior film, the same screenwriter is used with the prior screenplay just revised instead of rewritten. Thus I wonder is the pre-code screenplay was the main reason a new screenplay was written by different individuals. |
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Post by topbilled on Feb 16, 2023 23:59:45 GMT
GALLANT LADY was remade as ALWAYS GOODBYE (1938) with Barbara Stanwyck and Herbert Marshall. It's a great story. I haven't seen Gallant Lady or Always Goodbye. These films would be good to discuss at the remake thread. I find it interesting to compare a pre-code film with a post-code film that were based on the same source material. While both films are based on the same source material (story by Doty and Emery), they have different screenwriters. Both films have ties to 20th Century Fox, so I assume Fox owned the rights to the story. Often when that occurs and a remake is made within the same decades as the prior film, the same screenwriter is used with the prior screenplay just revised instead of rewritten. Thus I wonder is the pre-code screenplay was the main reason a new screenplay was written by different individuals.
Zanuck left Warner Brothers in 1933 and formed his own independent production company called 20th Century Pictures. All the films he made under this banner between 1933 and 1936 were released through United Artists. But when he took over Fox in late 1935, he merged the two entities, which is how 20th Century Fox was created.
All the films he made at 20th Century Pictures are now owned by Fox. But I put them in the United Artists thread here since that is how they were originally exhibited to audiences.
In 1938, Zanuck probably thought the film could be easily remade with just minor adjustments under the production code. |
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Post by topbilled on Feb 22, 2023 7:19:12 GMT
This neglected film is from 1938.
Breezy escapade
TRADE WINDS is a breezy romantic escapade that casts Joan Bennett as a wanted woman. This is the film where the actress last appears as a blonde. Her character dyes her hair brown when a disguise is needed; and Bennett decided to stay a brunette for the rest of her life.
The action gets underway almost immediately. When Bennett is informed her sister is dead, she goes to confront the man responsible for it. She shoots at him, and goes on the lam, ditching her car and anything else that can be linked to her. When a police detective (Ralph Bellamy) thinks she committed suicide, she is able to assume a different identity by getting rid of her blonde hair and taking a new name.
In the next part, Bellamy and his boss (Thomas Mitchell) learn she’s still alive and hiding out in Hawaii. So they decide to hire a bounty hunter (Fredric March) to bring her to justice. Bellamy will tag along, and so will March’s wacky girl Friday– played by scene-stealing Ann Sothern.
The film hops from one international setting to the next. It starts in San Francisco, goes to Hawaii, then to Japan followed by Singapore and Bombay. There are many rear projection shots, with the actors working on a studio sound stage. But a crew was sent on location to photograph exteriors for the various overseas locales we see in the background. It becomes a travelogue of sorts for the audience, and in that regard, it holds up quite nicely.
The plot is all over the map, literally– but TRADE WINDS has considerable charm and abounds in energy. Misunderstandings occur when March and Bennett meet and get tangled up in situations that involve Sothern and Bellamy. But we know that while both couples are on the run, they are also headed for romance and marriage. Eventually, they all forget where they’ve been and where they thought they were headed.
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Post by topbilled on Mar 9, 2023 14:37:36 GMT
This neglected film is from 1937.
Storm survival skills
THE HURRICANE is one of the finest action films of the 1930s, but it is not the result of one person’s brilliance. There were quite a few individuals responsible for the finished product…people like producer Sam Goldwyn; director John Ford; authors James Norman Hall & Charles Nordhoff; screenwriters Dudley Nichols & Oliver Garrett; as well as the talented cast and crew.
Originally Goldwyn wanted Joel McCrea for the lead role, but then changed his mind and hired Jon Hall, nephew of the aforementioned Hall who co-wrote the novel on which the film is based. Jon Hall certainly has the right skin tone and physique for the character of Terangi, plus he’s a decent enough actor. Dorothy Lamour who plays the female love interest was borrowed from Paramount.
While the two attractive stars get the most screen time in THE HURRICANE, an exemplary supporting cast is featured prominently. Third-billed Mary Astor provides the story with the requisite amount of class as a French governor’s wife. She would repeat her role in a 1939 radio adaptation with Orson Welles and his famed Mercury Players. On screen, Raymond Massey is her husband, a man whose dedication to politics and a strict interpretation of the law impacts others.
Mr. Massey gives one of the better performances. In fact I was surprised that Thomas Mitchell, who plays the doctor and narrator of the tale, was Oscar-nominated instead of Massey. I didn’t feel there was anything particularly magnetic about Mitchell’s work…but Massey provides a look at a man whose position of authority is used for his own narcissistic purposes.
We also have dependable support from C. Aubrey Smith as the island priest– another splendid performance I preferred over Mitchell’s. Mr. Smith also should’ve been nominated for an Oscar. Who will ever forget his last scene in the middle of the storm– trying to calm others with organ music, while facing death?
The hurricane sequence lasts about twenty minutes and is justifiably famous. Considerable time and energy has been put into building Goldywn’s idyllic church set…before wrecking it.
Disaster movies often make a common mistake: when wind machines beat down mercilessly on actors who are positioned in the foreground, close to the camera, the trees remain still in the background in the long shots. This problem could be solved in post-production with strategic cropping.
When Ford and his special effects crew unleash the torrents of water that flood the shoreline and topple the church, everything is uniformly affected in the more climactic moment of destruction.
I took slight issue with the governor’s wife not fastening the shudders or finding some way to close the windows when the storm begins and the wind is howling outside. Nobody stands around and lets a storm come inside their home this way. You would think she had never dealt with a storm before. At the same time we have locals walking outside, not running, when the wind turns violent.
Oh, and none of these characters ever lose an article of clothing when the wind is whipping against their bodies. Yes, I know the production code’s in full force, and I don’t mean they would be stripped of significant garments…but something. I’ve been in windstorms and dry monsoons, when a scarf or a hat blew off, and I chased after it. None of that happens in this picture. The chaos is too neatly choreographed.
It seemed stereotypical that most of the islanders would seek the priest for help during the ensuing drama…do they all belong to the same church? This didn’t just include poor parishioners, but also the governor’s wife after her husband had gone off to nab a criminal.
Interestingly, the old priest tells her to find refuge somewhere else as the storm rages. So she ends up joining Lamour, Hall and their child who are tied outside to a large tree. They survive because of their knowledge about nature, not because of a religious structure that won’t withstand the fury of the storm.
The calm epilogue that follows is a suitable way to end the story. In these concluding scenes we learn the doctor, his patient, a recently birthed infant, and the governor are alive. The part where the governor is reunited with his wife is certainly very poignant; and his change of heart is gratifying to watch.
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Post by Fading Fast on Mar 9, 2023 15:02:32 GMT
⇧ That is a really good review of a really good movie. "The Hurricane" gets very little attention today, but it is, as you noted, one of the best action films of the 1930s and a darn good film even if action isn't your genre as the story and, also as you noted, characterizations are that strong. Plus, Lamour looks freakin' incredible.
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Post by topbilled on Mar 24, 2023 15:38:56 GMT
This neglected film is from 1937.
Obstacles in their way
It’s interesting to see Jean Arthur sink her teeth into a meaty dramatic role on loan out from her home studio. At Columbia Pictures, she typically was placed into romantic comedies, her stock in trade. Joining her on this assignment for producer Walter Wanger is Charles Boyer who had recently come to Hollywood and was already making quite an impression.
Boyer oozes charm as a headwaiter in this story, and he is right at home opposite Miss Arthur. They play a possibly doomed couple who meet under very unusual circumstances while she’s married to someone else (Colin Clive). Since we know that true love conquers all, we can be assured they will overcome the biggest obstacles in their path to happiness.
The obstacles include her inability to obtain a divorce. There’s also a frame-up and a murder rap thrown in. Oh, and if these things weren’t enough, they sail on an ocean vessel named after Arthur’s character which, wouldn’t you know, happens to hit an iceberg a la the Titanic. Yes, there’s never a dull moment for these two.
In case it all gets a bit too serious, there is some amusing comic relief provided by costar Leo Carrillo. His dialogue seems to consist of an endless stream of malapropisms.
Mr. Carrillo plays a world famous European chef. Interestingly, Carrillo had played a gangster in the Columbia romcom IF YOU COULD ONLY COOK where he put Jean Arthur and Herbert Marshall in charge of his kitchen.
Kudos to writer Gene Towne for the well-constructed screenplay. Nothing is done or added to the story without there being a significant consequence or satisfying payoff for the viewer. Also, while I loved-loved-loved watching Boyer and Arthur interact, especially during a nicely staged tango number in a French restaurant, I found Colin Clive the actor who gave the best performance.
The picture is given just the right amount of gravitas when he’s on screen wreaking havoc and putting his character’s sinister plans in motion to make Arthur’s life with Boyer a misery. Mr. Clive does a fantastic job with a suicide scene at the end, when everything finally catches up with him. After the bad guy is finished and is no longer a threat, our lovely couple gets their happily ever after.
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Post by Fading Fast on Mar 24, 2023 17:15:56 GMT
⇧ That's a fun review that sold me on seeing the movie, especially with this well-done line, "Also, while I loved-loved-loved watching Boyer and Arthur interact, especially during a nicely staged tango number in a French restaurant, I found Colin Clive the actor who gave the best performance."
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Post by topbilled on Mar 24, 2023 20:06:19 GMT
⇧ That's a fun review that sold me on seeing the movie, especially with this well-done line, "Also, while I loved-loved-loved watching Boyer and Arthur interact, especially during a nicely staged tango number in a French restaurant, I found Colin Clive the actor who gave the best performance." |
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Post by topbilled on Mar 31, 2023 13:56:09 GMT
This neglected film is from 1933.
Take my advice
Nathanael West had published a scathing satire about the newspaper business called ‘Miss Lonelyhearts.’ Effectively mixing humor with pathos, the story was adapted by Darryl Zanuck for his 20th Century Pictures banner as a screwball comedy-drama. Zanuck had just left his post in charge of production at Warner Brothers, so this independent effort resembles a WB precode.
Zanuck hired Lee Tracy for the main role of a fast-talking reporter who suffers from foot-in-mouth disease. It is the type of character that Mr. Tracy excelled at playing. This time the actor is much more manic than usual. The moment we first see him on screen he is drying out in a drunk tank when an earthquake hits. This spurs him into action. His convalescence now over, he’s ready to resume work for a tyrannical editor (Paul Harvey).
Since Tracy missed an important deadline while on a bender, Harvey decides to punish him by putting him in charge of an advice column. The regular writer has suffered a personal crisis and quit the paper. Tracy is made to continue the column under the Miss Lonelyhearts byline…something he is loathe to do. But since he is under contract and would be blackballed in the industry if he walked, Tracy has no choice. He sits down at his typewriter and starting pounding out words of wisdom for the many lovelorn readers who follow this column each day.
Assisting Tracy in the endeavor is a secretary played by Sterling Holloway. I don’t recall Mr. Holloway getting so much screen time as he does in this picture. He and Tracy have an oddball chemistry that works perfectly for this sort of offbeat material. Holloway’s character is loyal to a fault. On one occasion, he even takes a sock in the eye that’s intended for Tracy.
The column becomes more successful, and the paper’s circulation increases exponentially. Of course, Tracy doesn’t really respect his readers and often his advice is tongue-in-cheek. He occasionally slips in references to a discount seller of pharmaceuticals. For his efforts plugging the knockoff drugs, he earns an extra $1100 a week. It’s money Tracy intends to use to buy a new home for his ma (Jean Adair). He is also going to marry his girlfriend (Sally Blane).
Miss Blane, who very much resembles sister Loretta Young, does a most credible job providing romantic sparks. She’s a nice gal that brings out the best in Tracy and helps look after his ailing mother. However, the story takes a dramatic turn when the elderly woman suffers a heart attack and is given some of the inferior medicine that Tracy’s been pushing in the column. A doctor is summoned, but she dies.
This causes Tracy to declare a word of words on the drug company each day in the paper, advising his readers to boycott the chain and its products. A tragedy has turned him into the type of crusading reporter he started out to be. What I found interesting about this dramatic segment of the film was how bootleggers had switched to drug rackets after prohibition ended. So in a way, we get additional commentary about social conditions during these years of the Depression.
West’s book is much bleaker in tone than this film. It was adapted again in 1958 by Dore Schary. That time Montgomery Clift played the lead character, and the script was a bit more faithful to the novel. Either way both films are fairly well-made, and in this case, Lee Tracy gives a marvelous performance that keeps us engaged. Take my advice, you will enjoy watching this one.
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Post by Fading Fast on Mar 31, 2023 15:03:15 GMT
Advice to the Lovelorn form 1933 with Lee Tracy and Sally Blane
"There never was an Adolf in history that was anything but a menace." - Lee Tracy to his girlfriend who's dating an Adolf. A quite-prescient quote for a movie made in 1933
The fast-talking wiseguy was a thing in the 1930s, with actors like Pat O'Brien, James Cagney and, the lead of Advice to the Lovelorn, Lee Tracy all creating personal brands as guys who could deliver dialogue faster than the human brain could process it, usually, in service to some scam, scheme or angle to get ahead, get the girl or pull something over on someone.
That's basically the plot of this sixty-one minute wash-rinse-repeat vehicle for hugh-star-at-the-time Tracy. In Advice to the Lovelorn, he plays a reporter who is, after his sloppy cockiness causes him to miss a big story, demoted to the "advice column" for the love sick. He's angry at the demotion, but he can't quit as he's under contract to his paper.
Tracy is also trying to convince his fiancee, played by Sally Blane, the very pretty, less-successful sister of Loretta Young, not to leave him as she wants Tracy to join her father's business. Trying to get fired, Tracy then gives flippant advice in his column like, (paraphrasing) "yes, you should sleep with your boyfriend," that is a hit with the public.
Now stuck writing the column and having lost Blane - she gave him his ring back - Tracy takes a bribe from a shady businessman to plug the businessman's cut-price drugstores in his column. With that money, he buys Blane a big engagement ring and wins her back. He also tells his mom he's going to buy her a big house now that the (bribe) money is flowing in, but of course, he doesn't mention the bribe part to his mom.
From there, the movie climaxes, as most of these pre-code morality tales do with all the threads - the bad advice in the column, the bribe, his engagement - crashing down around Tracy (or Cagney or O'Brien). But being a pre-code, judgement and punishment is uneven and messy, with our dicey hero usually coming out okay.
It's amazing to see what was allowed on screen, and not punished, before the Motion Picture Production Code was enforced after 1934. In Advice to the Lovelorn, a newspaper advice columnist takes a bribe as he blithely tells young women to sleep with their boyfriends or bosses, while a woman returns to her fiance because he buys her a more-expensive engagement ring. It's a very recognizable, if not particularly attractive, world.
You watch Advice to the Lovelorn today for the same reason audiences watched it in the 1930s, to see Tracy rip through the silly plot as dialogue, stupid ideas and frenetic energy pour out of him at lightspeed. It's not subtle, but it's an impressive and entertaining performance wrapped around a lot of fun pre-code shenanigans. |
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Post by topbilled on Mar 31, 2023 15:12:58 GMT
Great review Fading Fast.
About a week ago, I watched a Warner Brothers picture called HI NELLIE! (1934) starring Paul Muni that seemed to borrow some of the same plot elements. While Muni was excellent as always, he seemed a bit miscast...we do expect guys like Tracy, O'Brien and Cagney to essay these types of characters known for their schemes and rapid fire dialogue.
What I think Lee Tracy has over the others in ADVICE TO THE LOVELORN, is his sense of 'go for broke' almost to the point of being a maniac. In some ways his interpretation of the corrupt newsman in this film is a precursor to Kirk Douglas' character in Billy Wilder's ACE IN THE HOLE (1951).
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Post by Fading Fast on Mar 31, 2023 15:48:42 GMT
Great review Fading Fast.
About a week ago, I watched a Warner Brothers picture called HI NELLIE! (1934) starring Paul Muni that seemed to borrow some of the same plot elements. While Muni was excellent as always, he seemed a bit miscast...we do expect guys like Tracy, O'Brien and Cagney to essay these types of characters known for their schemes and rapid fire dialogue.
What I think Lee Tracy has over the others in ADVICE TO THE LOVELORN, is his sense of 'go for broke' almost to the point of being a maniac. In some ways his interpretation of the corrupt newsman in this film is a precursor to Kirk Douglas' character in Billy Wilder's ACE IN THE HOLE (1951).
Another example of miscasting for these type of movies is "Is My Face Red" from 1932 in which Richard Cortez plays a "fast talking" Walter Winchel like character, but he doesn't have the rapid-fire delivery needed for the role.
Tracy, O'Brien and Cagney were just born to play that character.
All this also shows you just how big a part of the popular culture newspapers were back then. Every city had several "dailies" in brutal competition with each other putting out several editions a day with newsboys fighting for corners. Newspapers were the internet of that time and fought ferociously for their customers.
Rosalind Russell, Bette Davis, Ginger Rogers and other actresses all played a female version of the fast-talking reporter, delivering dialogue as fast or faster than the boys.
If I had the time, money and wanted to research and write a book that only ten people in the world would read, "Newspaper in the Movies" would be a fun one to do. |
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Post by kims on Mar 31, 2023 19:52:51 GMT
Why not write a short version of "Newspaper in the Movies" for us? I'm sure you'll have more than ten readers?
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Post by topbilled on Apr 11, 2023 14:36:26 GMT
This neglected film is from 1944.
Today such drama!
The gimmicky story exploits the fear of an American audience. It goes like this– what if a seemingly innocent child had been indoctrinated by the Third Reich and came into a peaceful suburban community then proceeded to turn everything upside down..? It’s a big what if– where the enemy has brainwashed a minor to do destructive and harmful things.
A similar tale was told with RKO’s juvenile drama HITLER’S CHILDREN (1943). But that one took place in Germany. In TOMORROW THE WORLD! (1944), a preteen menace (Skip Homeier in his screen debut) is the half-American nephew of a liberal professor (Fredric March) who’s brought to the U.S. because he’s now orphaned.
We’re not told much about the boy’s mother, but the father is said to have defied Hitler with anti-Nazi writing. He was jailed and executed. Homeier has been led to believe his father was a traitor and committed suicide, which March and his fiancee (Betty Field) know isn’t true. At one point, Homeier slashes a portrait of dear old dad. The audience understands, without a doubt, he has the furor of Der Führer in him.
There are interesting scenes that involve Miss Field’s character, a teacher. We see Homeier attend her class at the local public school, along with March’s precocious daughter (Joan Carroll) who’s the same age.
At the school, Homeier tussles with other boys, with plenty of insults and punches exchanged. Field and Carroll try to intervene.
Most of Homeier’s slurs against the Jewish and Polish population are watered down insults. But we know what he means in these instances. There aren’t any black characters, but we can imagine what he would think of that non-Aryan race. The one person he likes initially is March’s German housekeeper (Edit Angold) whom he assumes to be a fellow Nazi in hiding.
In addition to this there’s a subplot involving March’s spinster sister (Agnes Moorehead). She’s disturbed by the presence of a German youth in their home. Also she is worried that her own place in the family will be threatened after March marries Field and he no longer needs her to dote on him.
She’s a middle class version of Fanny Minafer. Most of this plot gets short shrift, with an expedient resolution after she decides to accept the household changes and stay put.
While a lot of the action feels stage bound, the filmmakers attempt to open it up with outdoor scenes that involve Homeier running off. This occurs after he nearly kills his cousin (Carroll) in a fit of temper. I haven’t read the play but have a feeling that incident was more violently depicted in the theater, where there would be no Hollywood production code to soften it.
Miss Carroll’s character does not die, and Homeier is found and brought back to the house. In the last part, March and Field try to figure out what to do. Do they call the police and have the boy sent off to reform school? Or do they give this deranged Nazi child another chance to reform under their own roof?
It all leads to Homeier having a breakdown, where conditions of his brainwashing are revealed. Suddenly we are meant to have sympathy for him since he was a victim of the Third Reich just like his father was. The turning point here is when March, in a fit of rage himself, nearly chokes Homeier to death!
Blacklisted writer Ring Lardner adapted the play. His idea of drama is subversive, where conservative white Americans are indirectly compared to the Nazis. The central idea is that only liberals have a firm grasp on what’s right for the country.
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Post by topbilled on Apr 21, 2023 15:12:00 GMT
This neglected film is from 1945.
Dishonesty is the best policy for laughs
This is a smart sophisticated comedy starring Claudette Colbert. It was the first one she made after her long contract at Paramount. Produced in mid-1945 by Jack Skirball and released through United Artists, it reunites the actress with her leading man from 1939’s MIDNIGHT, Don Ameche. In fact it was the second of three pictures the duo made together…their third venture would be the thriller SLEEP MY LOVE in 1948.
The premise for GUEST WIFE is as follows…Colbert is married to banker Dick Foran and they live in a small Ohio town. Ameche is Foran’s buddy dropping in for a visit. The guys were college football stars, and we learn that Foran had run interference for ball carrier Ameche on the field, something he still does in a metaphoric sense even now.
Ameche works as a reporter in foreign locales. He is a playboy who has never been married. However, he told his New York-based boss (Charles Dingle) that he finally settled down and married a nice woman. He sent photos of his “wife” from Asia. And yup, you guessed it, he sent a pic of his pal’s wife– Colbert.
Because Dingle is anxious to meet the lucky bride in person, Colbert must pose as the wife to help out her husband’s friend…even though she would rather not. So off they go to New York, where they end up staying at a posh hotel.
Silly situations occur after they check in at the hotel. Foran has been delayed and is stuck back in Ohio. Ameche’s boss really believes Ameche is wed to Colbert. One hilarious running gag involves a businessman from back home (Chester Clute) staying at the same hotel. He knows Colbert and doesn’t understand why she now has a different husband on her arm.
He keeps stalking them trying to prove Colbert is Colbert, not someone else that Ameche is passing herself as, to remain in good standing with the boss. Finally Foran shows up, and Dingle catches him making a move on Colbert, whom he still believes is Ameche’s “wife.” So the plot gets more outlandish and even funnier, as Dingle tries to save Colbert’s “marriage” to Ameche.
Since Colbert spends so much time with Ameche, and the ruse is not yet over, Foran starts to get jealous of Ameche being with his wife. The situation escalates with additional misunderstandings, involving a suspicious hotel detective (Grant Mitchell). As well as an attractive female (Marlo Dwyer) that Ameche is interested in, but can’t have because he’s still “married” to Colbert.
Meanwhile Colbert contrives to be reunited with Foran, and this sets up the third act that takes place at Dingle’s country estate. Ultimately, the only way out is for Colbert to “run away” from Ameche, and to jilt him for Foran.
This film has an original screwball premise, and the leads pull it off superbly. There are several laugh-out-loud moments, and Claudette Colbert is as glamorous as ever. A real winner.
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