"You've got the cutest little...holy crap!"

"Babyface." This is the movie I'm currently mini-obsessed with. I got the Turner Classic Movies "Forbidden Hollywood Vol. 1" DVD set for Christmas (thanks, Dad!) and I watched all three movies within a few days.

"Waterloo Bridge" kind of grew on me; I liked it well enough from the beginning, although I wasn't wowed by it. "Red Headed Woman" was very good. I had never seen Chester Morris before, and I liked him right away. I can see why the movie was shocking in its time (and helped promote the wrath of the censors) and it's even kind of shocking today, in some ways. In one scene, Morris slaps Jean Harlow across the face, and she gasps, "Do it again! I like it! Do it again!" Yeah...I don't think you'd see that, even today. And the cuts between Una Merkel (she's always funny) and Harlow as Una sheds Jean's pajamas to give them back to her...very well done; racy without being at all explicit. Ah, being subtle is a lost art in today's films, what with boobs and butts flying out all over the place.

But "Babyface"...that took the cake. Ted Turner, bless his heart, put both versions on the DVD set: the theatrical release, and the pre-cut version. One is shocking enough; the other blows right off the chart. TCM's review of the movie talks about the differences between the two here. When they say the cuts change the whole tone of the film, they're not kidding. The character of Adolf Cragg does a complete 180, from a "Nietzsche-quoting local cobbler" to a "spokesman of morality." His scenes with Barbara Stanwyck make a lot more sense in the original form; when he's being all preachy to her, you wonder why she's agreeing with him, because she obviously has other (less savory) ideas. In his original form, Cragg and Lily are of the same mind, and so her attitude feels much more natural. I watched the theatrical version first, then the pre-cut. I found the pre-cut version superior. I've watched it a couple times since then, and it just gets better. I don't think they'd remake this movie even today; at least not with the same level of cynicism. Which is sort a shame, and yet a good thing, because no remake could top the original.

TCM ends their review by saying, "In all, this is an excellent, entertaining movie, and comparing the two versions is tremendously interesting. This DVD is one of the most notable of 2006 and belongs on every collector's shelf." I couldn't agree more.

P.S. I'm slowing going back and adding tags to my previous posts. Thanks for the nifty feature, Google.

Golllllllllllllld Diiiiiiiiiiiggerrrrrrrrrrr

That's what happens when you watch "Goldfinger" immediately following "Gold Diggers of 1937." You keep singing the GF theme, but with the word digger instead of finger (yes, I am insane).

It's been so long since I posted, I had no idea Blogger had merged with Google. Oops.

Anyhow, I had recorded Gold Diggers on DVR, so I watched that last night. I love Dick Powell and Joan Blondell together, and this movie had the added bonus of no Ruby Keeler (not that I hate her...but I don't like her a lot, either). After seeing this one, though, I can see why they stopped with 1937. The plot is boring (when a movie opens with a song about insurance salesman, you know you're in for a slow ride), and you wait waaaaay too long for the Busby Berkeley musical number, which, face it, is pretty much the main reason to watch a movie like this anyway. (Well, the first GD is pretty funny, what with Aline MacMahon ("Oh, Fanny!") and Guy Kibbee; plus, you get a musical number right off the bat, and a famous one, at that: "We're In The Money.") One bright spot was Victor Moore as JJ Hobart; he was a total hoot. He along with Glenda Farrell have just been added to my Find A Grave What A Character! virtual cemetery.

After that Dad and I were channel surfing, and we came across Goldfinger, about half way through, so we watched that until the end. I've seen it a bunch of times, but never all the way through at once. I think it's my favorite Bond movie by default; it's the one I've seen the most times. Plus, I like Goldfinger. He's evil, but he has style. ;)

Gable vs. Gable

I received my Gable box set right on time, and I've been working my way through the movies since then. Some of them I had already seen: Dancing Lady, China Seas, and Wife vs. Secretary (now I can sell my VHS tapes on eBay). The other weekend was an action double feature with Boom Town and San Francisco. Last night was Mogambo, which of course I had to compare with its previos incarnation, Red Dust.

Mary Astor vs. Grace Kelly? Eh, I could take or leave either of them. Grace was a little too uptightly British, I thought. Mary Astor did the shooting scene better. It was easier to believe her outraged emotions. Grace just screamed and twirled around and hid her face in her hands in a cliched bit of overacting.

Jean Harlow vs. Ava Gardner? This one was closer, but I'm going to have to give it to Jean here, because I just adore her. Her character, as a prostitute, was tougher and in a way, more interesting, and therefore more of a contrast to the other woman (Grace/Mary) than Ava's society lady character was.

Gene Raymond vs. Donald Sinden? I guess we'll call this one a tie. I like Gene as an actor better mainly due to his role in Sadie McKee, but Donald did a good job as the husband. He seemed alittle less clueless than Gene Raymond sometimes. But only a little.

Philip Stainton was quite likeable as Gable's sidekick, Brownie. I don't remember the equivalent character in Red Dust, if there even was one (it's been a few years since I saw it) so Stainton wins by default. He was jolly and fun but also serious about his job and the dangers of the jungle.

As far as the love story goes, I'm about even with both versions of Gable pining away after the saintly English wife. Even though I prefer Harlow to Gardner, I did like Gable's relationship with the latter better. There seemed to be more fondness between the two. In RD I got the impression Gable thought of Harlow as little more than a warm body. He's so mean to her sometimes, you wonder how she can go on loving him. There was more genuine liking and tenderness between Gable and Gardner.

As it stands, the box set is an excellent one. I stand by my earlier thought that I would have substituted one of the Gable action movies with Spencer Tracy for the great gangster film Manhattan Melodrama. Since Jeanette MacDonald doesn't do much for me, I would have pulled San Francisco for MM.

So many of Jean Harlow's movies have now been released on DVD on their own and as part of other people's box sets, that there aren't a whole lot left (she only made 41, and that's generously including the bit parts) for a "signature collection" set of her own (and she absolutely should have one). Here's what I would include in her set:

Bombshell
The Girl From Missouri
Hold Your Man
Red-Headed Woman
Reckless (well, maybe not; not such a great film)
Suzy (I'm kind of lukewarm about this one; her undying love for cad Cary Grant kind of annoyed me)

A lot of her other movies I have never seen, so I can't really say for sure which ones I would include. Additional options include:

Saratoga
Personal Property
Riffraff

I'm only counting movies that aren't on DVD already (and there's more than I thought). Of course some could be rereleased, like they did with Mildred Pierce when they made the Joan Crawford box set.

Again I ask: Ted Turner, are you listening? ;)

It's Alive!

No, no, not Frankenstein. The Clark Gable Signature Collection! He should have been the first to get one, being the "King of Hollywood" and all, but at least he has one now. Or he will, come June. I've already pre-ordered mine.

I found the selection of movies somewhat surprising:

Dancing Lady
China Seas
San Francisco
Boom Town
Wife vs. Secretary
Mogambo

First, I thought I was the only one who adored Dancing Lady and thought it a great example of Gable's work. He is good in that film (everyone is), but I think instead I would have selected Forsaking All Others, which is a fabulous witty drawing-room romatic comedy with some great zingers in the dialogue. It's just a joy to watch. I've talked about it before.

China Seas I like, but I would have picked Red Dust for a Jean Harlow/Gable pairing for this set, especially since Mogambo was also chosen, and it's a remake with Ava Gardner and Grace Kelly in the female roles. Maybe that would have seemed repetitive, but on the other hand, it could be interesting to compare the two.

I love Wife vs. Secretary and would have chosen that one myself. It's another great example of Gable being wonderfully happy-go-lucky, and it also has romance and some drama. Also great costars in Myrna Loy, Jean Harlow, and Jimmy Stewart. It was one of Harlow's rare "good girl" roles, and her favorite, so that makes it doubly a good choice.

I've never seen San Francisco or Boom Town, so I'll have some comments about those after I get my boxed set in June. I'm counting the days. ;) If they wanted a "tough guy" role, which I suspect these are, I would have chosen Manhattan Melodrama in place of one of those.

Next up, I would LOVE to see a box set of Joan Crawford/Clark Gable movies. This set would include:

Chained
Possessed
Strange Cargo
Dance, Fools, Dance
Laughing Sinners
Forsaking All Others
Love on the Run

Come on, Ted Turner. Make my day. :)

Pilgrim? Duuuuude!

Last night I watched The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, which I think has become my new favorite Western (a close second behind Dodge City). I'm going through a John Wayne phase right now, and Jimmy Stewart is always a winner in my book, so I decided to give this one a viewing. Rounding out the cast are Vera Miles, Andy Devine, and the uber-macho Lee Marvin (who, I was interested to discover, was a Marine and is buried at Arlington). When I saw the Netflix sleeve, I thought, "oh, geez, two hours," but the time flew by with this one.

I didn't realize this was the movie that started a million John Wayne imitations with "howdy, pilgrim." That's his nickname for Jimmy Stewart, and it sticks all through the movie; I couldn't help but giggle every time he said it, because it has become such a staple of the John Wayne persona. Also sort of darkly amusing yet also menacing is Lee Marvin's nickname for Jimmy, "dude," which he bullfrogs in a suitably sinister way. There was a decent amount of action and suspense; although I figured out right away who shot Liberty Valance, and not too long after realized how the rest of the plot would unfold, I did find myself tensing up in a few of the most dramatic scenes. When John Wayne goes home and throws the lamp into the half-finished addition to his house, it's such a painful moment, emotionally. You don't think of Duke as going to piece over a woman, but he does it here; knowing from the start of the movie how he ended up makes it even more difficult to watch, because you know this is the beginning of his downward spiral in that moment.

One thing that stuck in my mind, because I am obsessed by these kind of small details: the hairstyles. Duke looked all right, but Jimmy's hairpiece looked like a dead badger with an Elvis curl over the forehead. And Vera Miles, with her 60's bouffant with two braids clipped to the ends...not very frontier. Yes, I am insane.

Another movie, which I ended up spacing out over the course of the entire week, was one of my favorite Joan Crawford/Clark Gable pairings, Possessed. I'm a sucker for a good romance story where one person does something noble for the benefit of the other; here Joan pretends to be bored and sick of her lover Clark so she won't ruin his reputation when he runs for governor in the near future. The look on her face, which we see over his shoulder as he embraces her and proposes marriage (which she has long waited for) goes through so many emotions so beautifully, from a flash of joy to regret to steeling herself to hurt him so he'll let her go. And Clark's face, as he goes from laughter to disbelief to an angry resignation that Joan has made a fool of him...you can almost feel the ice hardening around his heart. Oh, I know I'm talking like a bad romance novelist, but I do love those two, best of all when they act together.

Again, with the laxness

The movie viewing has gone on as usual. The blogging, as you can see, has not. I've watched a ton of movies since I last updated. Instead of one or two giant entries talking about them all, I think I'm going to stick with short, more frequent entries. (Famous last words.)

Here's a list of what I've seen lately:

The Lives of a Bengal Lancer
On the Beach
Crash Dive
Brief Encounter
Laurel & Hardy: This Is Your Life (so cute...they were really surprised)
The Hustler
Love Laughs at Andy Hardy
Gunga Din
Shall We Dance (1937)
The Barefoot Contessa
Laura
They Were Expendable

And the entire Greta Garbo box set, when I got snowed in over a weekend. The silents were great, as were the talkies, of course.

So hopefully we'll have some updates, sooner rather than later.

One more thing

I've created a "virtual cemetery" at Find A Grave of all my famous character actors; you can pay your respects here.

In the Christmas Mood

The title has nothing really to do with the movie I watched today, The Glenn Miller Story. It's just that now I'm mini-obsessed with Miller, and I'm listening to In the Christmas Mood, Vol. 1 while I type this. And I've added a book about him to my Amazon wish list, which I'll delete in a week when my interest wanes back to normal levels (I've loved Miller's brand of big band music for awhile now).

So, the movie. I liked it. I love Jimmy Stewart in pretty much everything I've ever seen him do, even the cheese (read: Airport '77). Bonus points for appearances by George Tobias and Harry "Col. Potter" Morgan. I didn't recognize him until I heard him talk. Coincidentally, I had seen another minor player, Sig Ruman, in another film this weekend, To Be or Not To Be, which we'll get to in a minute. Now, back to Glenn...

I don't know anything about Glenn Miller's life, so I can't say how much is fictionalized or prettied up, but I still enjoyed the film. I read on IMDB that he never actually saw his adopted daughter; she was adopted while he was overseas, and he died only days afterwards, never having seen her. In the film, she's adopted as an infant while he's still in the States, and is about 2-3 when he leaves on his band tour; there's a sweet little scene where he sees her for the first time and gives her a bottle. The music, of course, was a delight -- I enjoyed the way they portrayed him composing his best known pieces (especially "Moonlight Serenade"); although I realize that may not be how it happened at all, the music wove its way into the movie very nicely.

As I mentioned, I also watched To Be Or Not To Be this weekend. Carole Lombard and Jack Benny: now that's an interesting combination. The movie is ostensibly about a group of Polish actors rebelling against the Germans, but of course the cast couldn't be more American. Robert Stack as a character named Stanislav Sobinski? Yeah, don't expect to be dazzled by that performance. I mean, he was good; everyone was. Carole was a delight, as always, and Benny was a big ham, again as always. The plot reminded me a bit of the Joan Crawford movie Reunion in France, which is even more ridiculous, plot-wise. Having glamorous Hollywood starlets, dressed to the nines, playing Europeans oppressed by the Nazis just never flies, at least not in any of the movies I've seen. Now, let one of them strip off the make-up and dress down like Norma Shearer did at the end of Marie Antoinette, and I'll be more inclined to suspend my disbelief. But you don't look terribly downtrodden when your lashes are three inches long. I'm just saying.

As you can see...

...I have been shamefully lax about updating this blog. Part of the reason is that I took a vacation from classic movies to watch most of the first season of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, which was recently released on DVD. I also plowed my way through all six seasons of Sex and the City, which I became addicted to instantly once I started watching. I also rented a few SNL "Best of" discs, namely John Belushi, Gilda Radner, and Dan Aykroyd ("You're spending the night with Fred Garvin, male prostitute!"). I will also admit, with much shame, that I rented Batman & Robin. Okay, don't judge me! I was curious to see the crazy villains. I didn't know the whole movie was going to be a big ball of cheese!

There have been a few classic movies scattered in there, though. (I had to stop taping them from Comcast for awhile as I was gathering more than I could possibly watch, and using up all the space on my dad's DVR.) As I mentioned at the end of my last post, I did rent Airport '77, if only to see how aging Hollywood legends would survive trapped in a plane at the bottom of the ocean in the Bermuda Triangle. Dun dun dun! I'm happy to report that Olivia de Havilland, Joseph Cotton and Jimmy Stewart all survived (well, especially Jimmy, since he wasn't even on the plane). Sadly, Christopher Lee did not make it, but he sacrificed his life for the greater good.

Back in October I watched Kim, mostly because it had Errol Flynn in it. Not as much Flynn as I was expecting, though, and I've never been a huge fan of curly-headed moppets, although Dean Stockwell did a fine job.

After that came Sin Takes a Holiday, which lasted only about five minutes, as it was a very poor transfer to DVD. I'm beginning to realize a lot of these old, old movies are in the public domain, which allows any rinky-dink production company (Macady, I'm looking in your direction) to slap them onto to a DVD. Which is a shame, because I think there should be some kind of studio control over how their movies are released. Then again, they probably wouldn't put the effort into restoring and/or releasing copies of every old movie they find in the vaults, so maybe it's a draw.

January 21, 2006 will be my third anniversary with Netflix. In honor of that, I'd mention every movie I've rented, but the list is so long it would bore you to tears. One early rental I will mention is The Cat's Meow, about the mysterious death of Thomas Ince on William Randolph Hearst's yacht in 1924. Because if there's anything that fascinates me more than classic films, it's modern movies about classic film stars.

I Heart Comcast

And their digital cable with DVR. Now I can easily pluck movies from Turner Classic Movies with the onscreen guide and record them with a click of a button! No more painstaking calculations of how long the movie's really going to run, with introductions by Robert Osborne and whatnot. (My last attempt to tape several movies in one week was a miserable failure, as I missed the last 5-10 minutes of each movie.) I was on my own for the holiday weekend, so I settled down to watch a bunch I had taped (and one from Netflix today).

First up was Suzy, with Jean Harlow, Franchot Tone (and can he rock an Irish brogue), and Cary Grant. Rounding out the cast was character actress Inez Courtney as Maisie (who looked familiar to me because she played another Mazie in one of my favorite Jean movies, Hold Your Man), Una O'Connor, and Lewis Stone. I don't think this was oneof Harlow's more popular movies, and I suppose I can see one reason why...her devotion to Cary Grant is incomprehensible to me, after all the dirty tricks he plays on her. Plus he was just all-around not a nice guy. I mean, who doesn't write to his ailing father when he goes off to war? I thought Suzy's devotion to the Baron was very touching, however. I was hoping for a nice romantic reunion with Terry at the end of the film, not Suzy and Terry dragging Andre's body out to the plane so France will think he died a hero. I say, let him die as what he was -- a philandering playboy pilot who was duped and shot by a spy. Oh, well. I guess Suzy is a bigger person than I.

Next was The Unknown, with Lon Chaney and a very young and almost unrecognizable Joan Crawford. Silent films are a taste recently acquired, and I liked this one. The soundtrack was gorgeous. Lon Chaney was delightfully creepy as "Alonzo the Armless." Joan was very pretty, but didn't have the usual "face" that I think most fans associate with her. If I hadn't know ahead of time it was her, I'm not sure I would have known her. Her famous beautiful eyes are rather unremarkable here. And here's an interesting bit of trivia from IMDB: For many years, this film only existed in murky 9.5mm dupes on the black market. In March 1973, at a screening of this film at George Eastman House, archivist James Card said that Henri Langlois and his staff at the Cinematheque Francais discovered The Unknown in 1968 among other miscellaneous cans of film marked "l'inconnu" (films "unknown" due to missing titles, etc.). I could tell that the titles were of a modern era, but I'm not sure about the music. I guess, looking back on it, that it did have an electronic quality to it that would indicate it's not original to the film.

I made it a Joan Crawford double feature with the next movie, The Story of Esther Costello. It was heavy-handed in parts, and of course Joan chews her share of the scenery in places. Overall, though, I enjoyed her performance, and the movie as a whole, very much. Heather Sears was excellent as Esther, and Rossano Brazzi appropriately slimy as Joan's estranged husband. The ending is a little abrupt, with the eventual fate of Joan and her dastardly husband relayed in one sentence, and the last shot of Esther walking away to, I assumed, speak to a crowd gathered for an Esther Costello Fund benefit. (There's a blink-and-you'll-miss-her appearance by Bessie Love, she of Broadway Melody fame, as "Matron in Art Gallery.")

Last on the bill was Beau Geste, which I had a hankering to see after watching Lawrence of Arabia last weekend (which I know is this great epic, but to me it was just...okay). Gary Cooper and Ray Milland together was quite a lot of eye candy to handle at once. I thought Robert Preston was an odd choice as the third brother; he'll always be Professor Harold Hill to me, and the pencil mustache didn't suit him at all. It made him look rather sleazy, I thought. I'll admit that I didn't see the ending coming at all, specifically the last scene at the house with Aunt Pat reads the letter. Look closely and you'll see a very young Donald O'Connor playing Beau Geste as a young boy. This was the first Gary Cooper movie I'd ever seen, and I liked him enough that I think I'll be adding some of his movies to my Netflix queue, along with some more Ray Milland. I could listen to Ray just read the phone book -- a lovely, cultured voice.

Coming attractions include a double feature of Airport '77 and The Concorde: Airport '79, two of those movies in a category I like to call "disaster movies featuring aging Hollywood legends." Hey, I rented Airport 1975 for the sole purpose of seeing Myrna Loy, who did not disappoint as a sensible, calm but cute little old lady. Let's see how Olivia de Havilland handles being trapped in a plane at *snicker* the bottom of the ocean, in the Bermuda triangle! *cue dramatic music*

Also, arriving in the mail this week is The Bela Lugosi Collection on DVD. Yay!