Watchingwell 

                                                                              

                                                             Curated classic films

If you need a break from reality…..

        Although, I see the value of the arts, especially in tough times, I sometimes think it can seem a little frivolous to be talking about classic films when Planet Earth is spinning out of control.  That said, the way I deal with it all is to bury myself under the metaphorical blanket of what I call comfort movies.  Present reality can only be absorbed in limited doses.  Then I feel the need to take a break with films that offer more than mere escape, films that wrap me in a quilt of familiar things, of stylish people who inhabit a world of order and reason, where damage is limited and repaired, and I can detox for a brief time.  

       It may seem strange, but I find a lot of comfort in mysteries, and a mystery series in particular, has very comforting characteristics.  In a series, we know what to expect, and right always prevails. The Thin Man (1934) is the first of six films featuring detective, Nick Charles, and his wife, Nora. This series is one of the best because of the chemistry between stars, William Powell and Myrna Loy, and their lighthearted banter that contrasts with the murders in which they find themselves embroiled. It makes murder seem less violent, somehow. It is adapted from the Dashiell Hammett novel and co-stars Maureen O'Sullivan. Although all six are fun, the first three titles are the freshest in terms of style and wit, coming out in the thirties, while the fourth through sixth were less carefree, reflecting the changing life of the couple and the different mood of the forties.

 After the Thin Man (1936), the second in the series, is cleverly titled to appeal to the audience that liked the first, by inferring that  'The Thin Man' was the William Powell character, even though in the first film (and in the novel), it was the corpse.  It co-stars newcomer, James Stewart, in an early role, and takes place in San Francisco.

Nick and Nora travel back to New York for the follow-up, Another Thin Man (1939), where Nick does not want to get involved in another mystery, but does, because he can't refuse to help a family friend.  In this one, they have a baby, as well as Asta, the dog, in a recurring role for Skippy.

           William Powell also lent his stylish manner to two other favorite comfort mysteries.  The Ex-Mrs. Bradford (1936) with Jean Arthur is a neat little mystery that drops into Powell's life along with his ex-wife.  I don't pay much attention to the actual plot, which has a typical pay-off scene with all the suspects gathered, because it's so comforting to watch the sets and Jean Arthur's costumes, and the way the two stars work together.

The other film, Star of Midnight (1935) has a mystery that's even harder to follow, but it's very stylish, especially Powell's apartment -- look for the scene in his bathroom.  His co-star is Ginger Rogers, who plays the daughter of a friend, who had decided that she will marry him one day.  Fun banter, not as fun as with Myrna Loy, but a good time.

          Another series that I find amusing and stress-free is the five Saint mysteries starring George Sanders and the Falcon films, four with George Sanders and ten with his brother, Tom Conway.  George plays the Saint and the Falcon with essentially the same suave and witty sophistication, with a bit of a cad thrown in.  And he puts it all together with that superior, upper-class voice.  Brother, Tom, took over the Falcon role when George was anxious to leave to do more demanding roles.  Tom looks and sounds very much like his brother -- who can forget the voice of the collie in One Hundred and One Dalmatians (1961)? 

-- and he went on to make the Falcon series even more successful.

Check out The Saint Takes Over (1940) with Wendy Barrie as the love interest 

and The Saint in Palm Springs (1941), also with Ms. Barrie.

The Falcon and the Co-eds (1943), 

 

The Falcon in Hollywood (1944), 

The Falcon in San Francisco (1945),

and The Falcon's Adventure (1946) give a pretty good flavor of this series.

    

        A fun murder mystery (I know -- a contradiction) from 1938 starring Barbara Stanwyck and Henry Fonda, The Mad Miss Manton, has Barb playing one of group of rich girlfriends playing amateur sleuths to solve a murder mystery and getting in reporter Fonda's way.  Amateur sleuths comfort me -- a remembrance of my Nancy Drew days. Not as memorable as their pairing in The Lady Eve (1941), but it is easy to watch.

       A whole series with a female sleuth that is quite entertaining was adapted from the novels by Stuart Palmer.  The character, Hildegarde Withers, is an unmarried schoolteacher of a certain age who uses her superior intelligence to help police inspector, Oscar Piper, solve mysteries.  My favorites are the first three starring Edna Mae Oliver as Hildegarde:  The Penguin Pool Murder (1932) which takes place in the New York Aquarium,

Murder at the Blackboard (1934), which occurs in Ms. Withers' school,

and  Murder on a Honeymoon (1935), where Hildegarde is called to Catalina Island to help James Gleason, who stars as Oscar Piper.

These might see a little primitive, but Hildegarde is entertaining with her sharp tongue and insulting remarks, usually directed at Inspector Piper.  Gleason continues in the role when Helen Broderick takes over the role of Hildegarde in Murder on the Bridal Path (1936),

and when Zasu Pitts play Hildegarde in the last two of the series, The Plot Thickens (1936),

 and Forty Naughty Girls (1937).

So turn off the news. Spend an hour or two with some old mysteries. Be comforted.  

 

 

Watchingwell 

                                                                              

                                                             Curated classic films

More on Sacrifice

    Looking back, I see that I thought that last December was the right time it to talk about sacrifice – because we were all in that place where we had to forego many parts of a normal life for the common good – the health of the community.

 

     This year I was thinking about sacrifice in a different light, having heard a lot of whining from the folks who are tired of foregoing normal life.  In fact, some have declared that they are done with the whole health-of-the-community thing – and they are declaring it in very unfortunate ways.  This made me think of my parents’ generation and how I was so glad that they fought Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan and we don't have to.  I don’t know – maybe, people today would come through if push came to shove, but let’s remind ourselves of what another generation had to forego and was willing to do for the common good.

 

     Some people, in Europe and Asia, were meeting life-and-death decisions daily and demonstrating how ordinary people act in extraordinary circumstances. American audiences were fed inspiring tales of their suffering and sacrifice to boost public support of the war effort.

A village in an unnamed country, which seems a lot like occupied France, is the setting for a fine drama from 1943 directed by Jean Renoir.  In This Land is Mine, Charles Laughton plays a timid schoolteacher, babied by his mother, played by Una O’Connor, who secretly loves Maureen O’Hara, and endures fear and scorn under the German occupation of his village until he finds courage at the very end.  It is the tale of a quite ordinary man who undergoes a transformation when the situation requires.  Good supporting performances from George Sanders and Kent Smith.

 

Norway is the setting for two films of resistance to Nazi occupiers, both from 1943. The first, Edge of Darkness, is one of Errol Flynn’s best roles as a fisherman who leads his village in action against the invaders.  Directed by Lewis Milestone, and also starring Ann Sheridan as Flynn’s fiancée, with Walter Huston and Ruth Gordon.

The other film deals with resistance in a less violent, but possibly more dangerous form.  Merle Oberon stars as a woman who is hated as a collaborator, but in reality, is getting information from the Germans that she passes on to the Norwegian underground.  The film, First Comes Courage is notable also because it is directed by Dorothy Arzner, the only female director of her time in Hollywood.

Perhaps the best-known film of ordinary people doing the extraordinary in times of war, Mrs. Miniver, from 1942, swept the Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Actress (Greer Garson), Best Actress in a supporting role (Teresa Wright), and best director (William Wyler), as well as Best Cinematography, Black and White, and Best Writing, Screenplay.  It has been said that it is pure propaganda (and Winston Churchill was supposedly in agreement) – one perfect, plucky English family being bombed, participating in the Dunkirk evacuation, capturing a downed German pilot, and losing a family member, and still winning a prize at the garden show – all designed to win support for U.S. aid to Britain, holding out against Germany.  Nevertheless, one can’t help getting caught up – Greer Garson is so convincing – in this family’s story.

Before we leave the subject of Europeans responding to extraordinary times, I would draw your attention to a little film that I saw in the sixties, while not from the Golden Era, is pretty old and I thought it quite inspiring when I saw it. The film, Conspiracy of Hearts from 1960 is the story of a group of nuns in Italy, led by Lili Palmer, and featuring a fine cast, who hide of group of Jewish children from deportation.  It is actually very exciting, directed by Ralph Thomas.

     

      Sometimes, it was necessary to put Americans in Europe to illustrate the dangers of Nazi occupation.

Cary Grant is a reporter in Once Upon a Honeymoon (1942) who tracks down Ginger Rogers, a Burlesque star, who has just married a German ambassador played by Walter Slezak. It seems that bad things happen wherever Slezak goes and Cary wants an interview to find out his Nazi connections.  Directed by Leo McCarey, who can’t resist a few touches of comedy inserted into the dire situation. But even so, when is Cary Grant not worth watching? 

A professor and his new wife are recruited to contact a colleague in Germany while on their honeymoon, a man who has vital information about a German secret weapon. Above Suspicion (1943), adapted from the novel by Helen MacInnes, stars Joan Crawford and Fred MacMurray, with Basil Rathbone and Conrad Veidt playing his usual villain role. Directed by Richard Thorpe.

Note:  Conrad Veidt, pictured above, in between MacMurray and Crawford, recognizable to those familiar with films from the World War II era as the actor most often cast as the Nazi commandant.  His claim to fame before this was starring in the 1920 silent classic, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.  But when the Nazis came to power in Germany, he chose to leave and relocate to England with his wife, and eventually became a British subject.  He was actively anti-Nazi, donating the major portion of his personal fortune to the British government for the war effort, and had it in his contract that he only play Nazis as villains.

Back on the home front, Americans were adapting to shortages of goods and men diverted to the war effort. Women went out to work in factories and tried to manage alone. In Tender Comrades (1942), several women doing war work decide to pool their resources and share a house and housekeeper.  Although the major part of the story is about Ginger Rogers and her romance with new husband, Robert Ryan, who is now fighting overseas, Kim Hunter and Ruth Hussey add different experiences to their little community. Although we can laugh about it now, at the time, it was examined by the thought police of the House Un-American Activities Committee, as a possible endorsement of communism (‘Comrades’ right in the title!) because of the concept of sharing resources and contributing what one is able being so un-American. After hearing this, Ginger Rogers made statements criticizing the picture, even though she turned in a rather good performance. Directed by the very suspect director, Edward Dmytryk.

Housing shortages were most acute in Washington D.C. where the population swelled, directing the war effort.  Jean Arthur thought it was her patriotic duty to sublet a room in her apartment, but hadn’t planned on it being Charles Coburn, or that he would sublet part of his room to Joel McCrea.  So begins the hilarious problems for Jean in The More the Merrier, directed by George Stevens in 1943.  Charles Coburn won an Oscar for actor in a supporting role. One of the great screwball comedies.

Robert Cummings was working in a west coast arms factory in Saboteur, the 1943 Alfred Hitchcock film, when circumstances force him to flee cross-country from a charge of murder. Along the way, he encounters Priscilla Lane, a network of spies, and a plan to do damage to a naval launch, which he decides to foil. Pretty exciting all the way, especially the ending at the Statue of Liberty.

In addition to working in factories, some unlikely sorts become patriotic when they are made to see what is at stake.  Humphrey Bogart stars in All Through the Night from 1942, directed by Vincent Sherman. Bogart is part of a Damon-Runyan-type of New York with a cast of characters who have avoided being bothered by the war. One day, they find German spies are responsible for a murder in their neighborhood and they become involved in uncovering the ring.  A sort of serious approach with touches of comedy from Bogart’s gang:  Frank McHugh, Phil Silvers, William Demarest, and Jackie Gleason, while the menace comes from Peter Lorre and, of course, Conrad Veidt.

Also from 1942, Alan Ladd plays a gangster who is drafted and does all he can to get out of it, to no avail, in Lucky Jordan, directed by Frank Tuttle. Also starring Helen Walker and Sheldon Leonard, Ladd’s character goes AWOL and gets involved with marketing some secret plans to foreign agents. But along the way, he comes to realize that he really doesn’t like the guys on the other side and starts to think it’s worth fighting for something besides himself.

 

While the war was being fought, there were many fine films that paid tribute to the fighting men who had volunteered or been drafted to serve. This certainly was a war of ordinary men being called upon to do extraordinary things.  But there were ordinary women who did extraordinary things at the battlefront.  Two films from 1943 that I have mentioned in previous posts are an illustration of this.  Cry Havoc starring Margaret Sullavan, Joan Blondell, Ann Southern, Fay Bainter, as nurses on Bataan in the days before the surrender.  Directed by Richard Thorpe, its gritty depiction of the conditions under which they worked really affected me as a child when I saw it on TV. Until then, women war heroes were few:  Clara Barton and Florence Nightingale.  

I didn’t see the other film on the subject, So Proudly We Hail until much later, and it has a slightly better reputation because of the production values and the star power of Claudette Colbert, Paulette Goddard, and Veronica Lake. Directed by Mark Sandrich.

*Recently, I found this fascinating 27-minute film about the nurses. Check it out to get the real story. https://archive.org/details/WeAllCameHome

Speaking of Claudette Colbert, I will finish with one my favorite holiday films that also could be called the American equivalent to Mrs. Miniver.  Sure, the family in Since You Went Away, is too perfect, too upper-middle class to have to take in a lodger, with the perfect, devoted maid (Hattie McDaniel) who works for no pay, but with the polish of these actors and filmmakers -- director, John Cromwell, music by Max Steiner, cinematography by Stanley Cortez and Lee Garmes, one is drawn into their story.  Colbert's husband is serving overseas, Jennifer Jones and Shirley Temple are her daughters. Joseph Cotten is a friend of the family who visits while on leave and Monty Woolley is the disgruntled lodger whose grandson, Robert Walker, is a great disappointment to him, and who nevertheless becomes romantically involved with Jennifer Jones (At the time, his real-life wife and shortly to separate, but convincing as a couple here.) Agnes Moorehead is the voice of the not-so-patriotic home front, presented as a contrast to Colbert and her girls, who are happy to be doing their part. For all the contrivances to win our sympathy, I defy anyone to watch this completely dry-eyed, especially, the train station farewell.

Happy Holidays!

 

 

Watchingwell 

                                                                              

                                                             Curated classic films

Mind Games

        

       Oh, the various ways the misguided, or the frankly evil, try to fool you! They try to make you believe something that isn’t true, make the truth a lie, see something that isn’t there, or doubt your own sanity. From films that deal with this kind of behavior, can we learn from how the characters hang on to reality?

   One of the best known of these titles has even entered our vocabulary to describe just such a situation. Currently when someone is trying to make you doubt your sanity, you can say they are gaslighting you, from the 1944 classic, Gaslight, directed by George Cukor. Ingrid Bergman, in an Oscar-winning performance, is being driven mad by husband, Charles Boyer, who although evil, still has this enchanting accent – the way he pronounces “Paula” like “Pola”. Swoon. If you haven’t seen this, you should.

    

      Using an inexplicably-popular plot device, there are at least five films that use twins as a vehicle for playing with your mind. Maya Angelou famously said, “When someone shows you who they are, believe them.” Clearly not in these films.

 

No less than the most famous face of the silver screen, Greta Garbo, tried to convince us that she was herself and her sister in her last film, Two-Faced Woman from 1941.  Actually, she tries to convince co-star, Melvyn Douglas, who plays her husband, so that she could see if he was being unfaithful. Not the comedy caliber of their earlier work from 1939, Ninotchka, directed by Ernst Lubitsch, this effort, directed by George Cukor, had the reputation for being so mediocre that it was the cause of Garbo’s early retirement.  But that turns out to be a myth because she was planning another project after this but it fell through, and then the country was going to war, so maybe it seemed to her that audiences would be wanting a different kind of movie. So the film gets a bad rap. Not that Two-Faced Woman is a great movie, but any film with Garbo is interesting.

     Well, we can suspend a lot of disbelief for a comedy, but in dramas, not so much. It’s strange to me that filmmakers thought people seriously can look so much alike that no one in their lives, except the dog, notices that a substitution has been made.  Bette Davis made not one, but two films, where she played twins.  The first, in 1946,  A Stolen Life, directed by Curtis Bernhardt, features Bette as both an evil twin who sets her sights on Glenn Ford, the good sister’s sweetheart, and also the good sister.  Glenn doesn’t know which one he’s dealing with half the time.  The dog knows.

 

    The second one was Dead Ringer from 1964, directed by her co-star from Now Voyager, Paul Henreid, which is given a slightly more realistic treatment.  The sisters have spent a lifetime apart, with very different fortunes. When the rich one dies, the other tries to step into her life. There are more complications than she realizes. And there is the dog.

     Olivia de Havilland plays twins in The Dark Mirror from 1946, directed by Robert Siodmak. A murder is committed by one of them, but neither is telling. The police use a psychiatrist, played by Lew Ayres, to determine which.  Further confusing complications ensue when he falls in love with one of them.

 

     Both actresses appear in the 1942 drama, In this Our Life, directed by John Huston (with an uncredited Raoul Walsh). Bette Davis is the devious sister of Olivia de Havilland and operates as a spoiled, southern belle, indulged by her family, especially her uncle (Charles Coburn), who seems to admire her ruthlessness.  This was a rather bold film for its time, in that there is a character played by Ernest Anderson, a young black man with ambition, who is encouraged by the good sister but set up by the other to take the blame for a crime she commits.  The way Davis plays this is rather chilling, pretending to be his friend, all the while contributing to the case against him. The deception in this case is not from the sisters – they are not twins, but from the Davis character alone.  

     Let’s not forget the most devious mind-twister, twin plot, The Other, the 1972 film directed by Robert Mulligan. This is an unsettling adaptation of Tom Tryon’s novel. I can say no more without spoiling the effect – if unsettling is the effect you like.

 

     Mind games are played for definite purposes – sometimes criminal, sometimes for pure self-interest, and some for more noble motives.

     James Stewart is targeted for deception because he has a useful malady (acrophobia) for a crime that is planned in Vertigo (1958), directed by Alfred Hitchcock.  Since the deception involves Kim Novak playing two characters, we, the audience, are never fooled, and always wonder why James Stewart is.

But perhaps he is just the kind of actor who can pull it off – look at how he made us believe he was hanging around a giant rabbit in Harvey (1950), directed by Henry Koster. 

 

    There are many instances of deception in the political sphere.  Sometimes it seems there is little else. A prime example is the character, Willy Stark, in All the King’s Men (1949),  directed by Robert Rossen, who begins his political career as a genuine populist, but deceives himself and the public, ultimately betraying all the people who believed in him.  From the Pulitzer Prize winning novel, by Robert Penn Warren, Broderick Crawford, in an Oscar-winning performance, portrays the main character, loosely resembling the career of Huey Long.

 

    The career of crooner-turned-media star on the verge of political influence is a tale of complete deception – a manufactured stardom.  Even though created by those who saw a phenomenon they could use, there is little doubt that Lonesome Rhodes, the character in A Face in the Crowd (1957), is an equal partner in the con.  Directed by Elia Kazan, and played brilliantly by Andy Griffith, who astounds you if you’ve only seen him in his Mayberry persona. Budd Schulberg’s script, as fresh as the headlines, is aided by great supporting performances by Walter Matthau, Patricia Neal, Anthony Franciosa, and Lee Remick.

 

     For deception in pursuit of a worthy cause, Clifton Webb stars in The Man Who Never Was (1956), the true story of British attempts to convince Germany that the Allies would be invading Greece, and not Sicily, as they believed.  The plan was to acquire a corpse and plant him in the sea off Spain, as if his plane had crashed, with credentials and secret plans. Also starring Gloria Grahame, with skilled direction by Ronald Neame.

     Religion is often so fervently felt that it can arouse great public passion and so is vulnerable to the deceiver -- the charlatan who claims piety and sells salvation for personal gain, as in the case of Elmer
Gantry (1960). But sometimes, the deception mesmerizes the seller as much as the audience. Directed by Richard Brooks, Burt Lancaster won the Oscar for his portrayal, as did costar, Shirley Jones.

 

Burt’s competition that year in the Best Actor category was Spencer Tracy for his portrayal of a fictionalized  Clarence Darrow who triumphed over the defender of the Bible’s version of creation in Inherit the Wind (1960), directed by Stanley Kramer. We can take a lesson on how to combat self-deception from the way Tracy’s character logically made his case for the compatibility of freedom of thought and Christian beliefs.

     The one area where you’d think there was no room for deception would be science.   Science has agreed upon principles of determining what is known and what is only hypothesized. And yet, sometimes the scientific evidence supporting a hypothesis is disputed when the theory is inconvenient to the powerful.  Henrik Ibsen’s play about this subject, An Enemy of the People was made into a motion picture in 1978, directed by George Schaefer, with Steve McQueen in the role of the main character, a doctor who discovers the water supply for the town’s tourist attraction is dangerously polluted, and is prevailed upon to keep it quiet for the fortune of the town and its powerful people. Considering that the play was published in 1882, we seem to have progressed very little in how these competing interests are weighed. Substitute climate change for polluted springs.

    Last, we come to what is, in my opinion, the most inspiring tribute to the responsibility of scientists to seek the truth, The Story of Louis Pasteur, from 1937. Directed by William Dieterle, it stars Paul Muni as Pasteur, in one of his best “biography” roles, winning an Academy Award for the portrayal. This is a respectable account of Pasteur’s research and the resistance of the medical and scientific community to his theories about “microscopic” causes of disease. In one scene, he is forced to renounce his own theories about bacteria in exchange for the medical services for his daughter from one of his most scornful critics. He asks only one favor – that the doctor washes his hands. In this scene we have a microcosm of how self-interest often thwarts progress, and the lesson that we should never display such hubris as to believe that we know all there is to know.