Heaven Knows, Mr Allison Posted 23 August 2008 in Screening log with No comments 1957 US Dir John Huston Cast Deborah Kerr, Robert Mitchum IMDb

With a plot that could easily play as trite (Marine and nun are stranded together on a deserted island, fighting their attraction to one another and the stray Jap) and a sense of humor that borders on the absurd (the turtle hunt; putting a line like “They don’t seem to beat their guns on very hopeful poop, do they?” in Deborah Kerr’s mouth), this could have verged on the unbearable. But with such seasoned veterans involved, and with this playing as a greatest hits package (Huston’s African Queen meets Kerr’s Black Narcissus crossed with From Here to Eternity meets… every role Mitchum ever played), it fundamentally works. By stages a war film, a black comedy and a halting romance, it is at least throughout an effective character and relationship piece for its two stars, and mismatched though they are (in terms of both their characters’ backgrounds and the actors’ types) their growing and restricted relationship is generally believable and compelling. Although at times they seem to speak different languages altogether, they share a sense of duty, fidelity and self-sacrificing purpose; even if the ends and means of those drives diverge wildly at times, their devotion fosters a kind of mutual respect and the possibility of something deeper. Huston does justice to his beautiful and wild landscapes with energetic direction and appropriately majestic use of his surroundings, effectively narrowing his focus in Mitchum & Kerr’s more intimate moments with some nice counterpoints and reserved interplay. If this all sounds like unqualified praise then I should probably underline the words trite and absurd and caution one that there is not, perhaps, very much depth of development in this. But if one’s aims are set at a gorgeous location shoot and a genuine, minimalist portrait of an abortive relationship in the midst of war and duty, the film basically succeeds.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona Posted 22 August 2008 in Screening log with No comments 2008 US Dir Woody Allen Cast Scarlett Johannson, Javier Bardem, Penelope Cruz, Rebecca Hall, Patricia Clarkson IMDb

A pleasant surprise, more like old-school Woody than anything he’s done in ten years, in the same vein as his best wry irony pieces. Light and lovable throughout, ending up somewhere deeply depressing and true. Still kind of hopelessly awkward & weak in places, resorting to a tired joke or trite observation here, marred by overplayed Woodyish acting there. Woody’s been fortunate to work with some actors who take his writing and make it sound like it’s coming from both an authentic human being and the pen of Woody Allen all at once (Dianne Wiest, Judy Davis, Alan Alda). Scarlett Johansson and Rebecca Hall do not have that knack, so many scenes end up playing as flat pastiche. Then Penelope Cruz shows up and blows Scarlett out of the water in what must be her best (half-) English-speaking performance. And I enjoyed the fact that half of what Allen’s making fun of in the two girls is me, or anyway who I was a couple years ago. A good time; not his best work, but an Allen film through and through.

The Great Lie Posted 17 August 2008 in Screening log with 2 comments 1941 US Dir Edmund Goulding Cast Bette Davis, Mary Astor, George Brent, Hattie McDaniel, Lucile Watson IMDb

I don’t know whether it’s contingent upon something as superficial as my mood or something rather unnameable — yet particular and profound — in the mixture of story, interpretation and tone, but these undeniably silly and shallow melodramas tend to either completely flop and aggravate me or transcend all their faults and inducements to eye rolling to instead captivate and entertain me unreservedly. Whatever the explanation, this film fits the latter category. Perhaps there is nothing meaningful to redeem it where others fail: truly, the story is an absurdity, the characters explain themselves with maddening explicitness, and emotional appeals are made to only the most superficial and easy planes of human experience. The script is quite weak (the first draft reportedly so terrible that Davis and Astor took it upon themselves to rewrite it), the conclusion somehow both foregone and jarringly unearned. Why should I enjoy it so much? Was it just the right trifle for a lazy summer afternoon, no more?

No, no, I must believe there is some magic in this — not only for self-respect, to go on believing (foolishly) I possess any kind of critical discernment, but because, against my will, I feel it. It feels much too good to believe it could be bad. To place this among Bette Davis vehicles, certainly this is not on a par with That Certain Woman, which tests the outermost limits of one’s patience, indulgence and toleration. Just as certainly, it is neither on a par with the really great melodramas like Dark Victory, Now Voyager, or even the recently rediscovered In This Our Life. These are the kind of films that don’t deserve the condescending implication the term “women’s picture” confers because they present authentic struggles realized along a cohesive, surprising, illuminating story arc. The best of them fit the tonal conventions that may turn some people off all melodramas, but for the receptive viewer they can be as deeply moving as anything with a higher pedigree.

But The Great Lie is not that, either. It’s silly and wonderful. I won’t disparage it or say it is elevated merely by the talent involved. Simply, it is blissfully and unpretentiously what it is — and perhaps that is exactly the problem with the bottom-barrel soapers: they lack that joy entirely, and they maintain lofty ideas of greatness. So unbelievable plot twists irritate in a poor example of the genre, senselessly compounding misfortune upon misfortune, where they can heighten the pleasure in a another that one is prepared to embrace because it doesn’t take itself too seriously. (And if one can measure pleasure thusly, then by the time [spoiler: Brent returns from the dead] the film reaches a plateau of ecstasy.) The film is never morose, always sparkling with catfights and scheming glances and outbursts that by rights should stand among the great camp lines (”I’ve been lying awake in there thinking about food and now I’m going to have it!!”).

Pitted against Bette Davis in a love triangle, I doubt anyone ever held her own as well as Mary Astor does here, and she really has the meatier role as the icy and conflicted concert pianist and “woman of the world,” one moment attached to her freedom, the next determined to bind herself permanently to the man they’re warring over. Her Sandra is almost a very interesting character, hinting at a study of a woman living like a man in an ambivalent society, but she states it too categorically to make anything of it (”I’ve been a bachelor too long”). In a more sophisticated film, her motivations could have been much harder to pin down, and I may not have known for which woman I wanted to root. Instead, one happily settles for an insecure bitch of a woman, a role to which Astor brings her characteristic regal quality and which she clearly enjoys inhabiting, undeniably earning her Oscar along the way. It’s the role one could more easily imagine Bette Davis in, who instead plays delightfully against type as the comparatively innocent and down-to-earth rival, her unique energy unusually restrained, even though the role could have easily accommodated histrionics. Naturally, it’s just a treat to see the two women trade sarcastic barbs, erupt in fits of rage, and briefly depend upon one another, but it’s also when they share the frame that their skills are showcased at their simplest and most pure. Just watch their posture: Astor stiff, practiced, self-consciously elegant where Davis is relaxed, at times a little slumped over, always ready to spring into action. They need do no more than stand next to one another to show how well they understand and embody their characters. And as to George Brent — you know, once in a while it occurs to me that people do read this blog, and then I am embarrassed to realize I’ve spent the past half-dozen entries affectionately bashing this man, so I will say only that in The Great Lie he is the same as he ever was. All three work hard to make this a successful film, and for the most part succeed: despite its many weaknesses, it is thoroughly engrossing, satisfying fare for compulsive consumption.

In This Our Life Posted 9 August 2008 in Screening log with 1 comment 1942 US Dir John Huston Cast Bette Davis, Olivia De Havilland, George Brent, Dennis Morgan, Charles Coburn, Frank Craven, Billie Burke IMDb

Recommended pre-reading: my first review of this film from 2005. Or, here’s the general idea:

A couple blurbs I read before watching this movie:

A neurotic southerner steals her sister’s husband then vies with her for another man.
(Turner Classic Movies)

A vile woman schemes to destroy her sister’s marriage and her subsequent engagement to another man.
(TV Now)

Neurotic. Vile. Can we find no way to talk about an unsympathetic female character without questioning her mental health or calling her physically disgusting? …

It’s hard to put my thoughts into perspective, having once felt so strongly about it and carrying that opinion with me for the last few years — if I watched the film fresh now, I doubt my initial reaction would be the same. So while I can’t shake my impressions entirely, parts ought to be refuted:

Davis’ character is pretty much a clinical psychopath, and while I would prefer to see the film — or its reviewers — articulate that, it still does not necessarily posit Stanley Timberlake as “Woman” writ large or as a caution to women in modern society. For truly there is Roy as a counterpoint, and if anything her story is a cynical and progressive response to the notion of a “woman’s proper place”: after setting up a nontraditional living arrangement and an agreement to mutual freedom in her marriage and getting fucked over for it, she picks up the pieces and makes a new philosophy of getting what she wants out of life. Yes, it’s with cynicism and wariness that she remarks, “[intelligence] is a trait every man admires in another man,” but she makes sure for herself that everything is right and understood between them before she marries Craig — I was much too flip about all that in my first review. De Havilland’s Roy is a complex and fascinating character in her own right, not an innocent and pure stock figure to set next to Davis, but a woman of similar background and inclinations who does much the same things, only with a sane and ethical bent.

Of course, Davis is the heart and lack-of-soul of the film, an uncontrollable firestorm, and even if I did persist in finding the characterization offensive I could not help but delight in her portrayal of it. Davis gives another unique take on the half-mad heroine, steadily driving toward ruin. Early, more controlled scenes are wonderful in planting tension and unease: she has a way of dropping a hurtful remark or lie with just a hint of enjoyment, then watching with cruel satisfaction to see how it lands. And Stanley is just charming and high-spirited enough to see that she nevertheless genuinely endears herself to everyone around her. Like her sister, she gets what she wants — but with no thought to the cost. Her path of destruction is far-reaching and cuts deep, her mood vacillating between crazed outbursts and cold disregard, each heightening in intensity with every incident, and always marked by her need to drive fast and dance wildly (”I’d rather do anything than keep still”).

Obviously, this is a deeply troubled woman, and if the film doesn’t explicitly voice it it certainly provides a root cause: the overt depiction of an incestuous relationship with her uncle. I cannot believe I failed to address this in my first review, as it is easily the most disturbing and fascinating part of the film. Charles Coburn plays a jolly and just-vaguely creepy old man who has no greater joy in life than his niece, whom he showers with presents and kisses, his hands always grasping for her, his plans to be near her ever-grander in scope. Stanley is clearly uncomfortable with his attentions from the very first scene when she repeatedly turns her cheek to him every time he tries to kiss her full on the lips, but she’s dependent on him, too, for both money and understanding. Two of the great and memorable scenes in the film are between these two: the night she laughs and canoodles with him in an attempt to find out about his will, and he ends up proposing they live and travel together; later, in a last desperate act, she submits to his proposal — “And I’ll do anything you want!” — but finishes in a hysterical eruption of hatred. If Stanley is indeed crazy, or for that matter vile and neurotic, perhaps she has been pushed to it not by something innate and not by the suffocating constraints of patriarchal society, but rather by a confusing and terrifying life-long cycle of abuse at the hands of her beloved uncle.

At the same time, I have to disclaoom my earlier charges against the story, screenplay and acting, and can only guess that my animosity to its “message” colored my judgment. This time I found all to be quite effective. The pace & performances are equally electric and engaging, nothing falling under the force of Bette’s domineering, raving — and very, very intelligent — work. A melodrama par excellence. I almost completely retract my original statements!

(As to the small matter of George Brent, I conclude he IS the most boring goon, and the pencil mustache he adopted in the 40s doesn’t help him a bit. How can it be, when he was such a dude in real life: an IRA guerrilla, slept with most of his costars. How can a man with a price on his head and a starlet in bed be this boring??? It’s painful. Still I have an affection for him I can’t quite name, and every once in a while a brogue-tinted word slips into his ordinarily impeccable American English, and this endears me. Maybe that’s it… he’s so boring because he’s trying too hard not to sound Irish. He should sound Irish. I wonder if he did any movies with his real accent, I must know…..)

Brent’s permanent expression:

The Crash Posted 7 August 2008 in Screening log with No comments 1932 US Dir William Dieterle Cast Ruth Chatterton, George Brent, Lois Wilson, Barbara Leonard, Paul Cavanagh, Henry Kolker IMDb

Terse & intense as all good WB pre-Codes, and chilling in its depiction of a pathological fear of poverty. Linda & Geoff Gault grew up in poor families, but made their fortune in the twenties with an “unspoken conspiracy”: he whores her out for stock tips, which he converts into all the trappings of the high life. Geoff has so completely conflated love and money and is generally too drunk to discriminate further, while Linda finds her dependence on money has quite thoroughly drained from her any love she once felt — resulting conversations and actions are uniformly stunners. In a moment of feminine pride, Linda tells a lie that brings the worst of the stock market crash on them with a rather ingenious trickle-down effect to just about everyone they know. Certainly cast in the mold of Eve, this one. She turns her charms on a few more hapless men before she, and a sobered Geoff, learn to put love and money in proper perspective. In the meantime, it makes a fairly rich psychological study, and certainly a compelling watch, here frothy entertainment, there spiraling horror show.

But as to my other source of enjoyment: though neither the age nor the type for it, Ruth doesn’t leave a shred of doubt that she’s capable of seducing men out of inside information and whole fortunes. That’s total confidence and command, y’all, with that stage-perfect elocution and bored dismissiveness constantly belied by and giving way to girlish giggles and devilish grins. I can only confess she could probably persuade me to do anything she might want. And George Brent, ugh, he’s turning into an interesting special case. The man is so, so boring, and always does look bored (though does the giggle thing, too, from time to time, and I must admit it’s disarming) — NO, he’s boring and awfully pretty with eyebrows Joan Crawford would envy and has the primmest sitting posture and yet! And yet, the reflection of him in the eyes of a fascinating woman is enough to make me fall quite soundly in love with him. Simply through contract negotiation and having affairs with the right women George Brent is earning a place in my affections… it feels like such a cheat, a free pass. But it’s working for me.

Café Metropole Posted 5 August 2008 in Screening log with 2 comments 1937 US Dir Edward H Griffith Cast Tyrone Power, Loretta Young, Adolphe Menjou, Gregory Ratoff, Ferdinand Gottschalk IMDb

Solid comedy, good stuff.

In a very good film it doesn’t make a bit of difference, but in one that’s just-good I still find I can’t really care about an Old Hollywood film full of actors I don’t care about. I don’t much care about Loretta Young and Tyrone Power. Nicey-nice Young has always grated on my nerves, and her pouting, screaming and crying bit brought it almost up to the level of loathing — and never would I have guessed she was 24 filming this, would have sooner believed 44, with her bizarrely plastic features diffused in comically dense soft focus; here on my first real acquaintance with Power he does nothing for me particularly (and seriously, he looks like her son). The first half hour or so is much more Adolphe Menjou’s show, and I was correspondingly more engaged then, not surprisingly. (He really is the cutest — and brings all the class here.) Anyway, a good but unremarkable comedy that genre/actor fans should find satisfying at the least.

Dodsworth Posted 1 August 2008 in Screening log with 3 comments 1936 US Dir William Wyler Cast Walter Huston, Ruth Chatterton, Mary Astor, David Niven, Maria Ouspenskaya, Paul Lukas IMDb

A couple months after I first fell in love with it, this film has the same power over me. It’s just so smart, the combined effort of class-A talent in every department all at the top of their game. Every scene in this film is inventively blocked and choreographed; Wyler uses space and movement to greater effect than perhaps any of his contemporaries, and I really ought to give his work a close look sometime soon. And next to its contemporaries, the film is utterly mature in every sense of the word, giving voice to real human emotions and predicaments, specifically those experienced by that marginalized set in 30s Hollywood: the late-middle-aged.

The three protagonists are creations almost unparalleled in films of this kind, from the sparkling page to the intelligent and nuanced realization by three of the greatest and most underrated actors of the Golden Age. Walter Huston’s Sam Dodsworth, a self-made auto magnate and self-described hick, is newly retired and rather at a loss, equally so in facing the years before him as the customs of European society. He is taking his wife on a tour abroad, hoping to get to know both her and the world better now that he has the time to, and with a child’s dogged enthusiasm that invariably turns to an old man’s resignation, he learns much more about both than he bargained for. “I’ll have to get used to that idea now,” he muses, with chilling acceptance of a hard blow. “I guess I can.”

As his wife Fran, Ruth Chatterton gets probably the most complex assignment of her career, playing a woman who is pathologically afraid of growing old. Clinging to the notion that she was “just a child” when they married and hiding from the lines of age and her new role of grandmother, she embarks upon at least two very public affairs with continental charmers. In many ways a frivolous and petty woman, it is nevertheless clear that she has lost the best years of her life to Sam’s career, that she has been neglected and has seen her own life’s desires go unfulfilled, so that it’s difficult not to sympathize with her when in a moment of desperation she yells, “I’m fighting for life — you can’t bring me back!” Mary Astor has been similarly wearied by life’s disappointments, an American expatriate divorced and settled into an isolated existence in a lovely Italian villa, but her experience has instead led her to become wise and unselfish, and thoroughly a realist. The triangles formed between them, and between the Dodsworths and Fran’s revolving door of men, are as well-choreographed as everything else in the film.

There are shocking elements in this film, but they don’t register as carry-over from ribald pre-Code naughtiness, nor as the *nudge nudge wink wink* look-what-we-got-past-the-censors! impression one gets from the best comedies of the period; rather, what’s shocking is the same as what’s terrifyingly, almost mundanely normal in the film. The first scene that made me perk up and notice Wyler’s staging and choreography is just a perfectly normal event: husband and wife, alone at the end of the day, undressing nonchalantly in front of one another, the camera moving deftly just to miss real nudity. This is shocking only in context, because you don’t expect to see it in a 1936 American film, but really what a breath of fresh air it is to see such an everyday event handled as such, and without the usual pretensions of separate sleeping arrangements, the illusion of always being dressed, the false glamor of going to bed with one’s make-up on and so forth. Then there is Fran’s frank pursuit of her lovers, and Sam’s equally frank discussion of it. None of this is intended to shock, but it does. It’s intended to reveal more and more about the characters’ psychology, and it does that, too.

On second viewing, I’ve lost none of my original feeling that this is a film set far apart from most of its contemporaries, and far above them, too. What it moves away from are things I will never fault old Hollywood for: the pure style, the sly or inadvertent commentary on society, the absolute joy of 90 minutes in that lovely other world. But just the same, I can’t help but praise something like Dodsworth for going a different route, for being something manifestly and thoroughly lifelike, for revealing without jokes or coded meanings some deeply affecting insight into the human condition.