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Post by Fading Fast on Feb 1, 2023 16:53:25 GMT
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Hollywood doesn’t make these kinds of movies anymore. Absent from screens are stories that present the lighter side of romance and uplift us as we watch them. It occurs to me how much skill goes into crafting a motion picture that is so airy and delectable. Other films are like heavy entrees. But this is a low-calorie confection, and sometimes we need these cinematic snacks to get us through the day.
Even the directors/producers/etc., who might be inclined to make lighter fare are scared that if they don't check certain boxes/don't virtue signal the right things, then they and their movies will be ostracized. To wit, you see movies where these messages have clearly been shoehorned in or grafted on just, I'm guessing, to appease the morality police. |
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Post by topbilled on Feb 1, 2023 21:06:06 GMT
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Hollywood doesn’t make these kinds of movies anymore. Absent from screens are stories that present the lighter side of romance and uplift us as we watch them. It occurs to me how much skill goes into crafting a motion picture that is so airy and delectable. Other films are like heavy entrees. But this is a low-calorie confection, and sometimes we need these cinematic snacks to get us through the day.
Even the directors/producers/etc., who might be inclined to make lighter fare are scared that if they don't check certain boxes/don't virtue signal the right things, then they and their movies will be ostracized. To wit, you see movies where these messages have clearly been shoehorned in or grafted on just, I'm guessing, to appease the morality police.
I am not exactly playing devil's advocate, but the production code from 1934 to 1968 meant that there was unavoidable virtue signaling from the right side of the aisle, as each mainstream film was tailored to reflect conservative family values.
The best films and TV series, in my opinion, are the ones that allow characters to be fun and even engage in philosophical discussions without trying to force the audience to think one pre-determined way. The audience has to make up its own mind what its values are and if the characters adhere to their own personal beliefs. |
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Post by Fading Fast on Feb 1, 2023 23:30:59 GMT
Yes, and in part, I think it's because Hollywood is too busy virtue signaling and making angry message pictures. I agree with some, not all, of the messages, so my point isn't really a political one, it's that Hollywood today doesn't make movies that show, to quote you, "the lighter side of romance and uplift us as we watch them," because almost every picture today has an angry political message as an undertone.
Even the directors/producers/etc., who might be inclined to make lighter fare are scared that if they don't check certain boxes/don't virtue signal the right things, then they and their movies will be ostracized. To wit, you see movies where these messages have clearly been shoehorned in or grafted on just, I'm guessing, to appease the morality police.
I am not exactly playing devil's advocate, but the production code from 1934 to 1968 meant that there was unavoidable virtue signaling from the right side of the aisle, as each mainstream film was tailored to reflect conservative family values.
The best films and TV series, in my opinion, are the ones that allow characters to be fun and even engage in philosophical discussions without trying to force the audience to think one pre-determined way. The audience has to make up its own mind what its values are and if the characters adhere to their own personal beliefs.
Yes, not all movies are angry message movies, but many are and many have a bias. And as you point out, the ones from '34-'68 (or so) had their biases too.
I sometimes find myself exhausted with the classic era's biases - come on, unmarried adults had sex back then - just as I am with the biases of today, especially since it's mainly one way.
The best is what you say, movies that lay out both sides ("Wild River" from 1960 is a good example), but it would be better if, at least, the message movies today weren't 99% one way (and again, I agree with many of those messages, but I don't want to hear even a message I agree with preached at me all the time).
I think one reason film noir was popular was because, even though the Code forced their endings to comply with the accepted biases of the Code, it was clear to audiences that those endings were often snapped-on to make the censors happy, so even with the "correct" ending, the audiences could see in those noir movies a much more complex morality at work.
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Post by kims on Feb 1, 2023 23:53:49 GMT
while you're talking virtue messages and restrictions of the code, I always wondered why films and later tv had only one parent of main characters. I thought must be easier to have fewer characters. What I still can't understand is during the '30's and 40's that often it was a grandparent-no parents at all. I jumped on here before I looked up examples, but if you've seen a lot of films from those years, you must have noticed. Any ideas why a grandparent and not a parent was presented?
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Post by topbilled on Feb 2, 2023 7:38:53 GMT
while you're talking virtue messages and restrictions of the code, I always wondered why films and later tv had only one parent of main characters. I thought must be easier to have fewer characters. What I still can't understand is during the '30's and 40's that often it was a grandparent-no parents at all. I jumped on here before I looked up examples, but if you've seen a lot of films from those years, you must have noticed. Any ideas why a grandparent and not a parent was presented? |
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Post by kims on Feb 3, 2023 0:02:25 GMT
while trying to remember the grandparents, I only remember LOVE AFFAIR, Charles Boyer only seems to have a grandmother. But I can recall aunts and uncles. THEODORA GOES WILD raised by spinster aunts; Janette MacDonald in STUDENT PRINCE OF OLD HEIDELBERG, her uncle owns the tavern; LET US BE GAY Norma Shearer (if I remember right) has a grandmother; AFTER THE THIN MAN Nora's family seems to consist of ancient uncles and aunt; Joan Crawford has an Aunt in FORSAKING ALL OTHERS. Possibly story lines explain what happened to parents, but why were aunts, uncles, etc better for the storyline than a parent?
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Post by topbilled on Feb 3, 2023 0:09:02 GMT
while trying to remember the grandparents, I only remember LOVE AFFAIR, Charles Boyer only seems to have a grandmother. But I can recall aunts and uncles. THEODORA GOES WILD raised by spinster aunts; Janette MacDonald in STUDENT PRINCE OF OLD HEIDELBERG, her uncle owns the tavern; LET US BE GAY Norma Shearer (if I remember right) has a grandmother; AFTER THE THIN MAN Nora's family seems to consist of ancient uncles and aunt; Joan Crawford has an Aunt in FORSAKING ALL OTHERS. Possibly story lines explain what happened to parents, but why were aunts, uncles, etc better for the storyline than a parent? |
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Post by topbilled on Feb 8, 2023 15:17:01 GMT
This neglected film is from 1955.
All that Sirk allows
It’s all so effortless. The relationship between Ron Kirby (Rock Hudson) and Cary Scott (Jane Wyman) starts innocently enough over a cup of coffee.
Ron’s taken over his late father’s yard maintenance business and he’s at the Scott home one fall afternoon pruning branches. When Cary’s girlfriend Sara (Agnes Moorehead) is unable to stay for lunch, Cary invites the handsome gardener to join her, so the food won’t go to waste. They strike up a conversation about the trees in her yard, and an instant bond forms. Their subsequent romance will become a scandal in Cary’s community.
The film is intended for other Carys in the audience. Douglas Sirk’s direction is so smooth that you get caught up in the story. What people tell Cary in the movie, and what she even tells herself, seems like something a viewer can appreciate. The more philosophical speeches do not come across as preachy or unrealistic in any way. Even Sirk’s use of Thoreau is expertly weaved into the proceedings, telling us there’s a natural order in life. Especially in ways of the heart.
Cary is struggling to let go of the past, and she is also struggling to simplify her life. For years, she’s tried to please others and has been restricted by what everyone expects. Her friend Sara witnesses the awakening of her spirit. And while Sara will remain firmly entrenched in suburbia, bound by its inhibiting code of conduct, she supports Cary’s need to break away from it. Other members of the community are not as supportive, which we see at a cocktail party in Sara’s home. Cary has decided to introduce Ron to everyone, but many of the guests are unfriendly. One old gal is downright cruel.
Sirk likes to use reflecting surfaces in his melodramas. And we see many of them in this film, often in the form of mirrors and windows. His careful use of mise-en-scene (staging and scene composition) allows us to glimpse the internal states of characters, as their facial expresses bounce off these reflecting surfaces. In some instances, there is an added use of shadow. Or pieces of furniture and doors are used to conceal things or separate Cary from the people who are opposed to her.
Cary’s two college-aged children think she needs a television. It will keep her from being lonely, they reason. It will help distract her when she decides to break up with Ron. While Cary was getting to know Ron, she had no desire to sit at home and watch television. But after she ends things with him, the kids give her a fancy new set at Christmas, and she is forced to contend with this symbol of her loneliness. Again Sirk uses a reflecting surface, this time the TV screen, to display her emotions.
Of course, the film would not have a happy ending if Cary gave in and resigned herself to being a lonely widow. When she realizes her children are moving on with lives of their own that no longer directly involve her, Cary knows she deserves more. She has to battle her way out of a depression that has enveloped her. It’s time to look towards the future and embrace it.
A subplot in the film involves the refurbishing of an old mill that Ron is turning into a home. It’s a place he intends to share with Cary, if she will let him. The living room in the renovated mill features a large window that looks out on to the pond and an area where deer roam during the cold winter months. It’s Walden personified. It’s a world with natural order, and it’s somewhere that Cary and Ron can both find happiness.
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Post by topbilled on Feb 14, 2023 16:17:49 GMT
This neglected film is from 1949.
Exodus in the desert
Dana Andrews was loaned to Universal for this thoughtful war film. He plays an American sea captain who navigates a vessel in the Dead Sea. In order to make a quick buck, he agrees to smuggle a group of undocumented people into Palestine. At times it seems like Andrews is channeling Bogart, since the role requires a certain toughness.
The other leads of the picture are Universal contractees Marta Toren and Stephen McNally. They are cast as a couple of Jewish freedom fighters who are not only in love, but in incredible danger. Toren especially does a swell job as a radio commentator who often criticizes the British military. The Brits are policing Palestine in the months before its liberation.
At one point Toren goes to visit refugees at a remote camp on the outskirts of the desert. A short time later, she gets left behind when a truck takes off without her.
While she is stranded and figuring out what to do, she is apprehended by the British authorities. They recognize her voice and come up with a way to prove that she is Sabra, the well-known agitator of the airwaves. Her interrogation ends with her being transported to jail. Along the way she is intercepted by her pals, who’ve set a clever ruse in motion. As a result, she is able to escape the Brits.
Another on-air agitator is a Jewish resistance leader portrayed by Jeff Chandler. This was an early supporting role for Mr. Chandler, and it was a star-making turn for him. Studio execs were impressed by his performance, and they offered him a long-term contract. He would become one of Universal’s biggest box office draws in the 1950s alongside Rock Hudson, Tony Curtis and Audie Murphy.
As for Mr. Andrews, his character spends much of the story being in the wrong place at the wrong time. While bringing refugees from eastern Europe to the coast of Palestine, he gets caught up in the intrigue between the resistance group and the British military.
Andrews goes from being in it for the money, to actually developing a conscience. Later he has a chance to betray Chandler and McNally but decides at the last minute not to be a Judas.
There’s a climactic get-away sequence at the end, which takes place on Christmas Eve. As a holiday song is heard, tidings of comfort and joy are far from the reality of such a grave situation. The story concludes on a hopeful note, and the filmmakers’ attempts to evoke biblical parallels about people in exodus do not seem too heavy-handed.
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Post by topbilled on Feb 19, 2023 9:26:53 GMT
This neglected film is from 1948.
His next wife
In this classic Universal film Jessica Tandy plays a refined woman cast aside by a handsome man (Charles Boyer). And as her subsequent behavior demonstrates, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.
The story might have worked better if Tandy was playing a mentally unstable wife or a hostile ex-wife. Or if there had been a huge backstory where she was his first love, things didn’t work out, and he moved on but she never got over it. Instead, Boyer has a perfectly refined wife played by Rachel Kempson who becomes ill and dies. After a sufficient period of mourning, Boyer realizes he has fallen in love with a much younger woman (Ann Blyth).
Their May-December romance is unconventional to say the least, and it sets tongues wagging in the couple’s upper crust community. This drives Tandy’s character to emotional extremes since she secretly hoped he would have chosen her after his wife’s death. She is harboring her own unrequited feelings. But since there is no real backstory, we don’t really learn how these intense feelings on her part even came about in the first place.
In spite of the various inadequacies of the plot, Tandy has more than enough skill to etch out a strong characterization. She gives us a despondent woman who only wants to be loved. It is the curse of her character, Janet Spence, to be in the same socio-economic circle as Henry Maurier (Boyer). She wouldn’t have been able to avoid him if she tried, since they share a lot of the same friends and acquaintances.
We’re not really supposed to root for Janet, but Tandy does such a good job drawing us in, that we cannot help but feel sorry for her…even when her more heinous deeds come to light.
Ann Blyth, lovely as she may be, is the weakest link in the cast. She does not have the acting chops or experience that Boyer or Tandy bring to the proceedings. And when you put her alongside other supporting players like Mildred Natwick, Cedric Hardwicke and John Williams, plus Kempson, she pales even more by comparison. Still, I think Blyth projects the requisite amount of naivety.
Getting back to Jessica Tandy, she gives a dark performance. And it is no surprise that she would do electrifying things on Broadway– for example, playing Blanche Dubois in Elia Kazan’s original stage version of ‘A Streetcar Named Desire.’
In the 50s & 60s Miss Tandy would occasionally turn up in films or on television shows. She experienced a career resurgence in the 1980s, and eventually received an Oscar for DRIVING MISS DAISY (1989). But I think she gives her very best performance as jilted, demented Janet whose ability to exact vengeance makes Cruella de Vil look like an amateur.
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Post by topbilled on Feb 27, 2023 15:26:10 GMT
This neglected film is from 1938.
Deluxe comedy
Constance Bennett had reinvented herself with several Hal Roach comedies. She went from precode vamp to screwball comedienne. TOPPER, its first sequel and MERRILY WE LIVE re-established her in Hollywood. Other actresses were not able to transition from one-note talkies to more sophisticated fare, but Constance Bennett did. She left those squalid tearjerkers behind but she didn’t drop the glamour. So what we have in something like Universal’s SERVICE DE LUXE is a serviceable farce where Miss Bennett retains a sense of grace and elegance.
It all starts in a most amusing way. We learn, without a lot of stilted exposition, that Bennett is a Martha Stewart for the upper classes. She has gone into business doling out advice and providing fixes for wealthy clients whose lives are in disarray.
Mostly she gives advice over the phone and has a fleet of operators carry out her instructions when she is not in the office. Sometimes she goes directly to the client if they are in an awful jam. The film starts with her arriving to help poor schmuck Chester Clute on his wedding day. He will not be able to stand up straight, walk down the aisle or even utter those two simple words without Miss Bennett’s encouragement and help in saying “I do.”
Clute’s best man, a manufacturer of farm equipment played by Charlie Ruggles, is impressed with Bennett and hires her to look after some of his domestic affairs. He is widowed and needs help with his unruly daughter (Joy Hodges). Of course the daughter resents Bennett the buttinsky and tries to appeal to daddy’s logical side. But Ruggles isn’t listening…he is most pleased with a Russian cook (Mischa Auer) that Bennett sent over to teach him how to make omelets.
The main plot gets underway when another client (Lionel Bemore) prevails upon Bennett and her trusted right hand (Helen Broderick) to help with a domestic issue of his own. Belmore’s namesake nephew is coming for a visit, and he suspects the young man is after his money. He implores Bennett to intercept the nephew on a boat en route to the city and send him back where he belongs.
In a hilarious mix-up Bennett assumes a bum on the boat is the nephew and sends him ‘home.’ A short time later she strikes up a conversation with the actual nephew (Vincent Price in his motion picture debut) and of course they fall for each other.
Part of the humor involves them assuming the wrong things about each other. For instance, Price thinks Bennett is a submissive female who needs a bossy man to tell her what to do. He is completely unaware that she is a career girl who tells others how to live their lives! She allows him to believe what he wants to believe about her, because he is assertive in a way that her clients fail to be which she finds kind of refreshing. She doesn’t tell him upfront what she does for a living, and the ‘game’ continues for quite awhile.
Mr. Price is very good at playing romantic comedy, and it’s a shame he would become typecast in the horror genre. Though his character is obviously a sexist, we still find him charming…probably because of the chemistry he has with Miss Bennett. Price also works well the fine supporting players and this picture is a lot of fun to watch. Even if the ultimate message will be that Bennett can only be happy surrendering her career and becoming a housewife.
In stark contrast to the role that Bennett is playing, we have the character played by Hodges. She is a vapid society girl and is probably the submissive type of female Price’s character would enjoy. And in fact the writers do go in that direction for a bit. The middle section of the film has Price pitching an idea for a new tractor to Ruggles, then his going to work for Ruggles and getting acquainted with the daughter. However, she is clingy and has no real sense of self the way Bennett’s character does.
In a cute twist, Auer’s character is revealed to be displaced Russian royalty. He has developed feelings for Hodges and conspires to get Hodges for himself, even after Hodges and Price have become engaged. Auer wears his medals to a dance and sweeps the girl of his dreams off her feet.
Meanwhile Price has to get over the fact that Bennett misrepresented herself.
The film ends the way it starts…with Bennett showing up at a wedding. She has been hired to oversee the nuptials between Price and Hodges, not realizing Hodges just dumped Price for Auer. Of course, Price will have her as his wife, if she agrees. It is no surprise that she does. We can be sure their marriage will be a series of power struggles and compromises. Somewhere in all that domestic madness they might even find happiness.
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Post by topbilled on Mar 8, 2023 15:01:58 GMT
This neglected film is from 1931.
Good, bad and in-between
Sidney Fox and Bette Davis each had their motion picture debuts in this Universal talkie, based on a story by Booth Tarkington. The neophyte film actresses portray sisters from a middle-class family in the midwest. Miss Fox is the titular bad one, while Miss Davis is the good one.
The picture could just as easily be called GOOD SISTER, since they get slightly the same amount of screen time. But since it’s a precode, the emphasis is on bad.
In the beginning of the tale, the two siblings are involved in a triangle with a handsome and respectable doctor (Conrad Nagel). He’s dating Fox, who all of a sudden dumps him for a slick con artist (Humphrey Bogart, in an early role). Davis is shy and spends time pining for Mr. Nagel, though she keeps her thoughts and desires confined to a private diary.
When a mischievous younger brother (David Durand) lets Nagel read the pages in the diary, Nagel realizes which sister he is fated to be with.
Meanwhile, Fox is head over heels in love with Bogart, but she is manipulated by him to use her dad (Charles Winninger) to push a scam that will gyp the other well-to-do men in town.
The story reaches a climax when Fox runs off with Bogart and the money, only to be abandoned by him on the eve of their marriage.
She must go back home, eat humble pie and help restore her father’s reputation. Oh, and she also must face the fact that good sis Davis snagged the nice doctor, and she now has nothing to show for her troubles.
So that the film will have a happy ending, there’s another man (Bert Roach) who’s been pining after Fox that steps forward. He has the funds to cover the losses incurred by Winninger and the other men of the community. Roach will marry Fox, and all will be right with the world.
BAD SISTER is not a great movie. Sidney Fox has a somewhat mousy voice, and it’s fairly easy to see why her motion picture career didn’t last anywhere near as long as Bette Davis’s did. Film buffs will find it interesting to see Davis and Bogart while they were under contract at Universal, before they achieved fame in the years that followed at Warner Brothers.
I should note that while Davis and Bogart appear in group scenes, they have no dialogue or real interaction with each other, since most of Davis’s interaction is with Nagel, and Bogart is paired off with Fox.
The supporting cast is great. Charles Winninger does a fine job as the family patriarch, turning in the most naturalistic performance since a lot of the other cast were new to sound film or new to filmmaking in general.
Emma Dunn plays the mother, and she has several excellent moments. Also, ZaSu Pitts is on hand as a buoyant housekeeper. Miss Pitts manages a few scene stealing moments. But the best scene stealer is David Durand as the young brother. Shades of Mickey Rooney in AH WILDERNESS!, only better.
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Post by Fading Fast on Mar 8, 2023 16:52:25 GMT
Bad Sister from 1931 with Sidney Fox, Charles Winninger, Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart and Zasu Pitts
Bad Sister is an entertaining run-of-the-mill Depression Era soap opera most notable today for the screen debut of Bette Davis and an early appearance by Humphrey Bogart. But even away from that aborning star power, the movie offers enough melodrama and 1930s cultural insight to be well worth a watch for modern audiences.
Set in a small town in middle America, the bad sister, played by Sidney Fox, is the bored flirty late-teenage daughter of a once-comfortable upper-middle class family now struggling, but still holding on in the Depression. Bette Davis, playing Fox's sister, is the dowdy-looking but kind, sweet and shy daughter of the family.
Fox has several beaus - including the local handsome doctor and a wealthy older insurance broker - whom she toys with and strings along, while also cajoling money for frivolous things out of her generous but obviously financially stressed father played by Charles Winninger. Davis, meanwhile, silently pines away for the doctor who only has eyes for Fox.
Rounding out the household is a mother, played by Emma Dunn, who basically offers kind motherly advice and support, a prepubescent son who's an annoying prankster, a married-and-pregnant older sister who, with her now out-of-work husband, is about to move back home and Zasu Pitts, playing to her personal brand, as the whining housekeeper.
Fox then meets a flashy and handsome newcomer to town, played by Bogart, who presents himself as the representative of a large manufacturing concern looking to open a factory in the town assuming he can get local businessmen to invest in the deal.
Bogart wants Winninger, a respected business leader of the community, to provide a letter of endorsement attesting to Bogart's integrity and business bonafides as that will encourage other businessmen in town to invest in the factory. Separately, Bogart tells Fox that he'll marry her and take her out of her small town once the deal goes through.
Up until now, "bad sister" Fox has been nothing more than a selfish spoiled teenage girl, but then she crosses a line that puts her father's business reputation at risk, while also putting her personal reputation for "respectability" at risk.
When Fox crosses that line, the tension and drama in Bad Sister amps up. After it is all revealed, the movie's money moment includes a very unconditional-love-like response from her father and a come-to-Jesus moment for Fox.
Surprisingly for a pre-code, there's an easy and rushed solution at the end, but maybe that tested well with audiences, as the movie's value is in its earlier insightful reveal of the passions and stresses sitting just below the surface in this "typical" American family.
Neither Davis nor Bogart, both still new to Hollywood, lift off the screen, but signs of their budding talents can be seen: look for Davis' diary-burning moment for an early peek at her acting skills.
Based on a Booth Tarkington novel, director Hobart Henley adroitly covers a lot of story in sixty-five minutes. Movie making then often benefited from the studio's limited budgets and short production schedules as those restraints didn't allow for the artistic flourishes that often turn modern movies into turgid affairs.
The Depression ripped through all classes in America at a time when "keeping up appearances" and being "respectable" (it was paramount for young women) were culturally and socially important, especially in a small town.
For modern audiences, Bad Sister shows the desperation and heartbreak incurred by a family about to lose its status and, worse, by a young woman about to lose her "respectability."
Today, we are, thankfully, a much-more forgiving society about these things (but much-less forgiving about many other things), which makes Bad Sister a valuable reminder of a different era.
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Post by topbilled on Mar 8, 2023 17:01:30 GMT
Good review Fading Fast. I will slightly disagree about Bogart not quite lifting off the screen. I think he gives us a very memorable turn as a slick con artist, one step above a gangster. I found his work much more compelling than either Fox or Davis.
One thing that also stood out to me was how Winninger had already patented his lovable but stressed father routine, which he would repeat in countless films through the 30s, 40s and 50s.
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Post by Fading Fast on Mar 8, 2023 17:13:53 GMT
Good review Fading Fast. I will slightly disagree about Bogart not quite lifting off the screen. I think he gives us a very memorable turn as a slick con artist, one step above a gangster. I found his work much more compelling than either Fox or Davis.
One thing that also stood out to me was how Winninger had already patented his lovable but stressed father routine, which he would repeat in countless films through the 30s, 40s and 50s.
Bogart is noticeable, so he does "lift" off that screen that way, but his acting felt forced to me as if he was trying to act like a slick conman versus just being a slick conman as he would have had he played the part later in his career.
It didn't feel, to me, as if he was comfortable in the role.
I should have said that you can see that he was still learning his craft. Part of that was because he was still making the transition from stage to film.
Good point too on Winninger, he knew what worked for him and stuck to it. |
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