Nothing but the Classics

"There can be no understanding between the hand and the brain unless the heart acts as mediator. "

2009-02-24T10:39:00.000-08:00

When silent films are discussed today, if they are even discussed at all, only a few directors are mentioned. There was D.W. Griffith, F.W. Murnau, Sergei Eisenstein, Alfred Hitchcock gets lumped in with the silents, all those great comedic directors (Chaplin, Keaton and Lloyd) and then Fritz Lang. The great German director, probably had the best transition to sound of any real silent director, Hitchcock doesn’t really count as a silent director since he made only a handful of silent pictures.

The masterpiece of Lang’s silent work is a 1927 science-fiction movie that has influenced other movies as far as style goes and has allowed film theorists to debate its allegorical message. The movie is Metropolis, the first film to deal with the utopian society.

Before getting into the allegorical aspects of the story involving a world literally divided into two halves, the upper and lower, with the workers in the lower half and the elites on the upper and how a mediator is the only one who can bring the two together – lets look at the stylistic achievements of the movie.

Metropolis is a German Expressionism film so it has all those great shadows we associate with the style. Although it is not as good as say Nosferatu (1921) for shadows. What separates this movie from others like it is the art deco architecture. The towering cities and the Tower of Babel of the upper class are brought to full life. All futuristic cities in fiction owe a little something to this movie for their design. The movie Blade Runner (1983) is a good example of a movie that has copied some of the skyscraper features from Metropolis.

Now for a modern audience it is a little hard to watch and see Model T’s roaming the streets in the year 2027. Also the single engine planes look out of date, but the large highways that roam around the tops of the skyscrapers still haven’t happened and are closer to being a reality than any sort of flying car.

A lot more attention could be paid to the different shots Lang got in the movie, but that would turn into a technical discussion of lighting and camera work and I am not qualified to discuss in great detail how Lang got some of this breathtaking shots. All I know is Lang was a perfectionist who demanded the most from his cast and crew. The cast especially.

At the end of the movie a robot named Hel is being burned at the stake. The evil villain in this story is a scientist named Rotwang, who all mad scientists seem to be based off of. He has created a robot who looks a lot like the angelic girl who is going to keep the workers from starting a revolution until a mediator is found. This girl’s name is obviously Maria, a variation of Mary. The mediator’s name is Freder. Freder happens to be the son of the man who owns all of Metropolis and lives above the workers. Obviously there is one allegorical reading of the movie.

Getting back to the fire scene though. The actress who plays Maria, Brigitte Helm, was strapped to the stake and Lang had extras move in and actually set the wood around her feet on fire. Lang was disappointed because there was not enough smoke the first time he shot the scene. So the fire was put out and Helm was subject to more smoke inhalation and the possibility of being burned before Lang was satisfied with the final product.

For his part, Lang wanted a machine like quality from a lot of the actors in the film. To get this effect he made them do the same scene over and over until they were too tired to care what they were doing. This technique is either brilliant or cruel and unusual punishment. Whatever you call it, it worked and looks great on-screen.

Any time a German movie from the 1920s is discussed, it has to be looked at in the contest of what would happen to the country in the next decade. Unfortunately for Lang the movie was Hitler’s favorite. In fact Hitler’s minister of propaganda gave Lang the opportunity to make movies for the Nazi government. Upon receiving the offer, Lang took the next train he could out of the country and left for America. He left behind him his wife, Thea von Harbou, who wrote the movie and was deeply involved with the Nazi party.

Lang himself did not care much for the allegories the film would receive after it was learned that Hitler enjoyed it so much. Some thought it was the perfect Nazi propaganda movie. As the city is basically controlled by one man. Hitler believed if the man had actually been him, there would have been no revolution by the workers, as there is in the movie.

What Lang did care about and what hurt him for many years is the way the movie’s ending was received. It ends with Freder taking the hand of the foreman of the workers and joining it with his father’s. The message of the movie is that the head (Frederson) and hands (workers) can only be joined by the heart (Freder). It is rather anticlimactic and critics said so. Lang would go back and forth throughout his life as to whether the idea for the ending was his or not. Depending on which interview you read you’ll see him defending it or condemning it.

Metropolis is a silent movie. It is also a long one that has pieces of the original missing. This may make it hard for some to watch, but the cinematography is so good that is overshadows the time spent watching and the terrible acting.

"The truth is: I do not know... I seek... I have not yet found. Only with this in mind can I feel alive and look at you without shame. "

2009-02-12T14:56:00.000-08:00

Federico Fellini does not seem like a director I would like. Most of his stuff is about film as art and focused more with images than story. But 8½ (1963) is a definitive movie that others can be modeled on. Like The Godfather (1972) is the definitive gangster movie or Star Wars (1976) is the definitive space movie. It is the movie we first think of when we think of the genre. 8½ is the definitive movie made about a director.

Unlike writers, who seem to be obsessed with writing stories that feature writers as their main characters, directors seem to be less concerned with directors as characters in movies. That is except for Fellini here. Maybe this is why no other directors have taken on the movie about making a movie, at least in a dramatic sense. There have been many made in a comedic way.

The movie is about a famous Italian director who is supposed to make another great movie. He faces what appears to be "director block." It is writer's block just transferred to a director.

Obviously this famous Italian director is supposed to stand for Fellini himself. He could have suffered from director block himself and just threw this movie together to be something, much like the director in the movie does. But with Fellini this is all very complex and open to great meaning that could take forever to discuss. So let us keep to the basics.

Like all of Fellini, the movie is filled with beautiful images. Fellini is considered by some to be the greatest director ever, particularly because of the beautiful images that fill his movies. But Fellini was not an outstanding technical director like Fritz Lang or Alfred Hitchcock. He was brilliant at setting up shots and shooting them like a painting, but there are not a lot of pans, crane shots or dolly shots. The beauty of Fellini is static.

Because Fellini is more interested in images than story, his movies tend toward the weird side. This is the case here as there are random images and flashbacks that are included. They work here because the director's mind is so cluttered and indecisive that the whole thing works. Since it works this is called genius, if it didn't it would be called trash.

Images in the movie have been imitated. The beginning of Falling Down (1995) was modeled after 8½'s. The ending has often been imitated as well. The large circle of people involved with the production of the movie's movie and of the movie itself. Fellini as a boy ran away to join the circus. This is why the circus plays a large role in his movies and why we are graced with the presence of the clowns and circus music at the end.

8½ is an autobiographical movie. It is also a movie that defines what it is like to come up with a movie when you are famous. The stresses it puts on the director and his relationship if he happens to be married. It is a movie that needs to be watched more than once so it can take on deeper meaning each time. Constructing a movie like this might not take so long if it was unintended to turn out like this. Fellini wants the audience to think this is a natural progression of the director's thoughts, not that it has been preplanned by him.

Fellini was famous for remarking that he was a liar and to never believe a word he said. So the jury is still out as to how much Fellini meant to show in the movie and how much has been interpreted as greatness simply because it was made by Fellini. Whatever it is, it is a worthwhile movie to watch.

"It can only be attributable to human error."

2009-02-04T19:17:00.000-08:00

Movies can be made to entertain people. They can also be made to entertain the director. Those movies that are given a mass release, but were made as a director’s pet project are either huge hits or major disappointments with audiences. One such movie that falls into the huge hit department is 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968).

Granted, not everyone who has seen the movie like it. Most don’t even understand it. It is doubtful that Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick even knew what it was about. Perhaps Kubrick, but his collaborator Clarke, probably was in the dark about a lot of stuff.

Kubrick and Clarke teamed up to make the ultimate space opera. Clarke was a great science fiction writer. Kubrick was interested in space at the time and respected Clarke’s work. Kubrick and Clarke came up with the basic idea for the story, if you believe the movie has a narrative. Anyway, the two worked on a screenplay in which the movie was made.

While Kubrick was shooting the movie, Clarke was working on the novel of the movie. The two were supposed to come out soon after the other. It is one of those rare movies where the novel comes out after the movie. The bad thing for Clarke, but the good thing for audiences, is that Kubrick was making changes to the script while he was shooting. None of these changes were discussed with Clarke and because of this the two are different in ways.

This is a good thing for those who have seen the movie because a lot of what happens is explained in greater depth by Clarke. As Clarke said after the movie was released: “watch the movie, read the book and repeat as often as necessary in order to understand.”

Our movie opens up with a group of human beings in their ape form. Kubrick shows us how humans learned to kill. It appears that a big monolith from some alien civilization gives the apes/humans the spark to discover brutal force. This monolith has been commented on by just about every theorist and critic who has looked at the film. One of the more popular beliefs, and endorsed by Kubrick, is that the monolith acts as a guide for human beings in their evolution. The monolith comes from an alternate civilization that we don’t even know about. Something that can not be seen by human beings. This obviously makes it tough to show on film, but according to Kubrick this is what the movie is about.

After the largest flash forward in film history we arrive at the year 2001 when human kind is colonizing the moon. Obviously this was not an accurate prediction, but Kubrick and Clarke choose a date sometime in the next century when they were writing the movie and it ended up being 2001.

There really are no definable human characters in the movie, which makes this movie rather unique since it is all live-action, not animated. Anyway, some important scientist from the US has been sent to study something on the moon that has recently been discovered. This is another monolith. The alternate beings have told humanity that they have reached another step in evolution – that step is interplanetary travel.

The next segment takes place on a ship and features the most memorable character in the movie, the computer HAL. HAL has been studied ever since the movie was released. He has also been extremely influential in popular culture. There is a Jared jewelers ad running on TV right now that features a GPS system that goes crazy when Dave does not give her the jewelry he just bought. Dave of course is a crewmember of the ship Discovery that has been sent to investigate a monolith transmission on Jupiter.

HAL is a supercomputer that is incapable of error. This is why he is the only one who has been entrusted of the ships true mission – going out into the unknown to meet something that could be potentially dangerous. The humans on Earth believe this mission is too stressful on human nerves, so they don’t tell the crew about it. They misjudged the effect this mission would have on the computer. The computer expresses doubt to both his active crewmembers, other members of the crew have lived in hibernation and will be woken up once the crew gets to Jupiter.

The crew, Dave and Frank, become concerned at the computer’s weird behavior and discuss the possibility of taking him off line. This doesn’t sit well with the paranoid computer. He becomes homicidal and kills everyone onboard except Dave, who happens to kill the computer in a slow, painful death.

From here it is anyone’s guess what happens. Dave leaves Discovery for Jupiter and then there are lots of lights before he ends up in a room where he happens to age rapidly before becoming a Star Child. Kubrick wanted audiences to draw their own conclusions of this section of the movie. He did say that the Star Child was the next step in human evolution in the movie.

2001 is not the typical space movie. It isn't even the typical movie. It lacks dialogue. It lacks definable human characters It lacks a cohesive narrative. It is interesting enough to watch and make you think though.

"Let's just live."

2009-01-30T10:58:00.000-08:00

An all-star cast is a dream for both producers and audiences. Only rare movies can afford to have tons of big name stars who are guaranteed to make a box office success no matter what. This is true of The Misfits (1961). The title says it all about the movie’s story and the cast involved in it. It was one of those rare movies that included stars at every position, from director to screenwriter to lead actor to lead actress to supporting actors and actresses. It is also a story that is not the greatest when you consider who wrote the screenplay.

Arthur Miller was married to Marilyn Monroe at this time. Miller and Monroe were expecting a baby, but Marilyn had a miscarriage. This devastated her. As sort of a present, Miller decided to write a screenplay for his wife. That screenplay was The Misfits.

Miller had conquered Broadway with Death of a Salesman and The Crucible by this point. Critics of Marilyn Monroe say Miller’s creativity dried up while he was married to her, but defenders point out that he was starting to wane at the end of his first marriage. Anyway, he would never reach the success of Death of a Salesman and The Crucible for the rest of his career – which lasted many years after Marilyn Monroe divorced him and died.

Miller was not a big screenwriter. He had done a couple screenplays in the ‘40s, but had focused instead on what he knew – the play. So any deficiencies in the story, and there are some, could be attributed to Miller’s inability to master the screenplay format, which forces writers to be more tied to reality than the stage does.

The director of the movie was John Huston. Huston was a man’s man who jumped at the opportunity to direct a movie about the death of the cowboy’s lifestyle. He loved to drink, gamble and on this trip to location shooting in Reno – gamble. Huston was rugged enough to put a macho stamp on the picture even if others involved in the company were not.

One man not afraid of adventure was Clark Gable. Gable was cast as the lead cowboy, Gay. This was Gable’s final film role. A few days after shooting finished, he died of a heart attack. Those who hate Marilyn Monroe blame his death on her. They say because she took so long to get on the set, she made Gable stand around in the heat when he was not feeling well. Whatever they might say, Gable treated Monroe like a daughter. He was respectful of her and always was there to reassure her. This makes it odd to see the two become lovers in the movie. Monroe grew up calling Clark Gable her father, because her real father, who she never met, looked a lot like the actor.

This was also Marilyn Monroe’s last movie. She would divorce Arthur Miller shortly after production finished. Miller and Monroe would arrive on the set in separate cars at times during the shooting. Marilyn’s erratic behavior is what finally drove Miller away. It is also what finally drover her to commit suicide after being fired from Something’s Got to Give in 1962. Fox fired her from that movie because they believed she was making up the fact that she claimed to be sick. She felt better for a few days to continue shooting, but then left the company to sing “Happy Birthday” to President Kennedy at Madison Square Garden.

Another misfit in the cast was Montgomery Clift. Clift, the Method actor, was cast as Perce, a rodeo cowboy. Now Clift doesn’t seem like the typical actor to play a cowboy, but he was able to adapt to any role. He was great opposite John Wayne in Red River (1948), even knocking the Duke down in a fight scene. He had been in a terrible car accident and never really recovered after that, always drinking and feeling sorry for himself.

Eli Wallach plays Guido, the cowboy who falls for Marilyn first, but is unable to do anything about because Gay overrides him due to age. If this were a Marx Brothers’ picture he would be Zeppo.

Thelma Ritter plays the role of Marilyn’s guardian for a period in the movie. The great character actress who was nominated for six Academy Awards runs a boarding house in this movie. Marilyn stays there while waiting to get a divorce in Reno.

With stars all around it doesn’t really matter what they are doing on-screen. The basic story is Marilyn’s character, Roslyn, goes to Reno to get a divorce. She meets Guido and the two have some fun together. Guido introduces her to Gay and they all have some fun together. On their way to a rodeo they meet Perce, who wants to compete, but doesn’t have the entry fee. Perce competes and gets knocked around a bit. The cowboys say he is fine, while Roslyn desperately wants to see him go to a doctor. The main fight here is Roslyn, who cares deeply about any sort of living thing, versus the old cowboys, whose way of life demands that they kill living things to survive. Eventually Roslyn’s way wins and Miller wants us to think that this is the end of the cowboy. Maybe he was right.

The movie was the final chapter of Marilyn Monroe’s career. It ended with her appearing in a movie directed by John Huston, just like her first big break did a decade earlier with The Asphalt Jungle.

In the years since her death, Marilyn Monroe has become more of an image than anything. She has been criticized unrightfully, stories have been made up about her, people try to imitate her. But they all can’t stop talking about her. In a way she has not died and as long as people still admire physical beauty, she will always have a place in our society.

"Well, nobody's perfect."

2009-01-28T16:25:00.000-08:00

Some Like It Hot (1959) holds a special place in film for me. It was the first movie I had ever seen with Marilyn Monroe in it. Like everyone else, I had heard stories about her beauty and seen publicity images of her throughout my life. But when she appeared on the screen as Sugar Kovalchick – I was disappointed. By the end of the movie I had become delighted.

I learned through the course of Some Like It Hot that Marilyn Monroe was not the most beautiful woman to ever walk the face of the earth, like her image portrays her to be. She was an actual person. This realization led me to delve deeper into her life story and eventually led to me writing a book about her.

So Some Like It Hot is not only a great comedy that irritated censors when it was released, it is the perfect introduction for anyone who has not seen a Marilyn Monroe movie.

It was her must successful picture and the one she is most associated with. The American Film Institute ranked it the number one comedy of all-time during its 100 Years… series. It is constantly ranked in most critics top 50 movies of all-time.

Now you might not agree with the AFI about it being the best comedy of all-time, I certainly don’t, but it is good enough to be mentioned in the top 10.

This year happens to be the 50th Anniversary of the movie’s release. For more on the back story of the movie, I have written an article for Classic Images Magazine that should appear in the March issue or sometime around the original release date.

For now I will just discuss the story. Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis play musicians in Prohibition Chicago. Their club is raided by the police, leaving the two in need of work. They go around to the musical agencies, but all they are able to find is a gig in Champagne, IL. Curtis and Lemmon are without a car and have to borrow one.

Unfortunately for them, when they get to the garage to pick-up the car they are witnesses to the St. Valentine’s Day massacre. The Al Capone character is Spats Colombo, played by veteran of the gangster picture, George Raft. Of course gangster hate it when there are witnesses, so Spats and his gang search for Lemmon and Curtis.

The only escape it seems for these two musicians is to join a band destined for Florida. The only problem is the band happens to be an all-girl one. So, the two dress in drag and get new names. Lemmon becomes Daphne and Curtis is Josephine.

On the train down to Florida, which happens to look a lot like Coronado Beach, the “girls” meet Sugar Kovalchick, a ukulele player and singer for the band. It doesn’t take long before Daphne has to be reminded by Josephine that he is a girl. While Josephine keeps Daphne away from Sugar, he moves in on her.

This does not sit well with Daphne who ends up carrying their bags into the Hotel Del Coronado, or whatever the hotel is supposed to be called in the movie. Daphne gets some help with the bags from Joe E. Brown’s Osgood Fielding III. Osgood has it bad for Daphne. So instead of a love triangle we have two couples. Daphne and Osgood and Sugar and Josephine, or at least Tony Curtis.

In another change of characters, Curtis impersonates a millionaire who talks a lot like Cary Grant. He tries to seduce the materialistic Sugar Kane.

Things seem to be going well for the two men. Each is happy with his mate. Things become a bit complicated though when Spats and his gang make an appearance at the Florida Hotel as part of an Italian Opera convention. Writers Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond are not going long-hair artsy with this stuff. But it doesn’t matter as audiences love it.

From here, Lemmon and Curtis run away from Spats and his gang. Their only escape is Osgood’s boat. Before leaving though, Curtis explains to Marilyn that he is a man and she still loves him. Lemmon does the same thing and gets the same reaction from Osgood in one of the best closing lines in all of cinema.

"Well I had to do something, he was making a fuss in front of all those people. "

2009-01-26T17:26:00.000-08:00

One of the movies that has aged the poorest has to be Bus Stop (1956). The movie is about an innocent cowboy who has never been exposed to anything off his ranch in Montana. He and his friend, the owner of the ranch, go to Phoenix for a rodeo competition. They take a bus, hence the name.

Now I don’t know what audiences thought of the movie at the time it was released, perhaps they thought it was a believable portrayal of an inexperienced cowboy, but for today’s audience this is not the case. In the age of the Internet and massive automobile transportation, not to mention the amount of changes in the ranching industry since 1956, this movie does not seem real. It is like a cartoon, a very annoying one at that.

Don Murray plays cowboy Bo Decker, who seems to yell anytime he speaks. John Wayne, James Stewart, Gary Cooper and Clark Gable he is not in his portrayal of a cowboy. It is an over-the-top performance that really annoys the audience. At the time it annoyed the producers at 20^th Century Fox who wanted Murray replaced or at least have his voice turned down.

The producers were told no by director Joshua Logan, who because of a court order had to make a movie for Fox. They were not happy with Logan’s choice of lead actor, but were pleased with the female lead, Marilyn Monroe. At least until she appeared on-screen in torn clothes.

Bus Stop is Marilyn Monroe at her grimiest. She is not glamorous, like her image portrays her. She had recently left New York to start her own company, Marilyn Monroe Productions, and studied at the Actors Studio. The Actors Studio was home to Marlon Brando, James Dean, Montgomery Clift and other Method actors. So Marilyn was in her artsy phase. This explains the costume, but it doesn’t improve the movie.

Bo makes the trip in the bus to Phoenix. In his first night in the metropolis he meets Cherie, played by Monroe, who is a nightclub singer. Bo falls for Cherie and calls her his angel, his one true love. Being a cowboy, who is used to bossing around cattle, Bo determines he will rope Cherie and carry her off to Montana. Being a person Cherie, and the audience, wish Bo would go back to Montana alone.

For the most part the audience is satisfied, as Cherie keeps Bo from roping her. Bo’s friend Virgil, keeps telling him he can’t act like he is when in the city. Then the inexplicable happens. Bo ropes Cherie and takes her on the bus back to Montana.

Of course Cherie determines she will escape. A snowstorm blocks the road and the bus has to stop off at an inn, causing Cherie to abandon her escape plans.

Bus driver Carl sticks up for Cherie and knocks Bo out. Unfortunately for the audience and Carl, Bo’s knockout causes Cherie to fall in love for him. So things work out for Bo. Things did not work out for the money though.

"I think it's just elegant to have an imagination. I just have no imagination at all. I have lots of other things, but I have no imagination."

2009-01-21T11:13:00.000-08:00

Controversy was never far from Marilyn Monroe. Her career was filled with scandals and her personal life was far from perfect. She was able to do on-screen what no other actress was capable of doing, despite her problems.

The role she is most associate with today, or at least the image that is most associated with her, is of The Girl in The Seven Year Itch (1955).

The Seven Year Itch began as a successful sex comedy on Broadway. It was one of the hot properties of its Broadway season. But there were going to be some problems for any studio that picked the project up. Some of the dialogue from the play was too racy for censors at this time period.

Fox won the bidding war and went to work on rewriting the play. Director and writer Billy Wilder worked with playwright George Axelrod to tone down the dialogue. It was Wilder’s idea to keep the dialogue mild, but use the actors to create the sexual tension present in the play. There was no actress who exhibited sexuality like Marilyn Monroe. She got the part of The Girl and Tom Ewell reprised his lead role from the Broadway play.

Fox made an agreement with Axelrod that the movie would not be released until the play had finished its Broadway run. This didn’t work out quite how Fox had hoped. When the public found out that Marilyn Monroe was going to be in the movie – they rushed to see the play again. When they saw what she was going to be doing the movie – they rushed to see the play again. Fox ended up having to pay Axelrod a lot of money so they could release the movie because Marilyn Monroe’s unintended publicity prevented the play from closing.

One of the most iconic images in movies is Marilyn Monroe in a white dress, having her skirt blown up by a subway train while she and Tom Ewell are leaving a movie. Wilder and company intended to shoot the scene at 2 a.m. when they thought no one would be around the theater. They were wrong as location of the site was released and people learned what the scene was going to be about. After much trouble, Wilder was able to calm down the hundreds of spectators so he could get the scene shot.

One of the spectators was Marilyn’s husband, Joe DiMaggio. The group of people snapping pictures and whistling at his wife did not sit well with him. He would leave the city for the West Coast the day after. The marriage between Monroe and DiMaggio would end soon after as well because of the incident. DiMaggio did not want Marilyn to have a movie career, especially one that subjected her to being whistled at by all kinds of men.

The footage from the New York street was unusable for Wilder because of all the noise. It had to be re-shot in the studio. It was a much tamer version of what people on the New York street saw.

As for the story of the movie, Tom Ewell plays a husband and father who has been married for seven years. His wife and son leave New York for New England to escape the summer heat. Ewell has to stay home and get work done. He works for a dime paperback company and is reading over the manuscript a psychologist has written that describes “the seven year itch” married men have. The psychologist believes that after seven years of marriage, the male gets the itch to have an affair with another woman, but he still loves his wife.

Ewell has the unfortunate luck of meeting Marilyn Monroe, who is an aspiring actress and happens to be renting out the apartment above Ewell’s for the summer. The summer heat is particularly hot and Marilyn does not have any air conditioning in her apartment. Ewell happens to have some, so Marilyn spends a lot of time there trying to cool down. Ewell of course believes she is there because she likes him.

Ewell makes advances that Marilyn rejects. Eventually he realizes that what he is trying to do is wrong and begins to think of his family. His son forgot his paddle for his kayak and Ewell finally remembers he has to mail it. The movie ends with Ewell vowing to take the paddle to his son while Marilyn waves goodbye to him from his apartment window.

"One thing about this, the longer you last the less you care."

2009-01-16T16:50:00.000-08:00

CinemaScope brought a whole new form of filmmaking to Fox. It was not a better brand of filmmaking either. With the new aspect ratio studio heads figured they could pack in more scenery that would impress audiences. This of course detracted from the story, but the studio bosses figured audiences would pay money for just about anything. One such example of a movie that stresses scenery over acting and story is River of No Return (1954).

River of No Return is probably one of the most frustrating movies to watch. There are talented people associated with it, but the story is severely lacking. The scenery looks nice though.

The movie was directed by Otto Preminger. He was a talented director, but it was the last movie he had to make on his contract with Fox. It looked like he was just going through the motions. There were no interesting camera movements, it was basically shot from as far away as possible thanks to the bulky CinemaScope cameras that made it hard to shoot close-ups.

Marilyn Monroe stars in the movie and if there is one thing you want with Marilyn Monroe it is close-ups. She plays Kay, a saloon singer in the Old West around 1875. She befriends a young boy, Mark. Mark’s father, Matt, played by Robert Mitchum, arrives in the small town Kay sings in to claim his son after spending a year in jail for shooting a man. Now the names Mark and Matt should tell you that the screenwriters were lazy. It is hard to tell either name apart because they are so similar. For those watching the movie they know the little boy’s name starts with an M and his father’s name starts with an M, but they don’t know who is Mark or who is Matt.

Anyway, Mitchum brings his son to live on a ranch down river that he has. Father and son get along well. Mitchum tells the boy that he will teach him to do many things, like hunt, that the boy has always wanted to learn.

Things look good for the two until a troubled raft comes downstream. Mitchum and the boy rescue the raft’s contents – Kay and her would be husband Harry. Apparently Harry has won some money downriver and has to go to the town to claim it. The raft has been totaled and he needs a gun for protection, just in case the man doesn’t want give him the money. He tries to go for Mitchum’s gun, but Mitchum says he needs it to fight Indians.

Well, the two get in a fight and Harry wins. Kay is so upset at seeing the little boy cry over his injured father that she tells Harry to go on without her. He does and she nurses Mitchum back to health. Lo and behold Indians come by and torch the ranch. With no gun, the party of Kay, Mark and Matt have to escape on the river.

What follows is a trip down a river that is supposed to be unmanageable. So the movie is a bit like The African Queen (1951), only it is much worse.

In the end, Mitchum gets his gun back. Harry losses Kay and Kay and Mitchum gain a better respect for each other. Most importantly for the heads at Fox, the scenery looked great.

"Look at Roosevelt, look at Churchill, look at old fella what's his name in The African Queen."

2009-01-15T19:23:00.000-08:00

With hits like Niagara (1953) and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), Marilyn Monroe stepped into the big time of movies when she costarred with Betty Grable and Lauren Bacall in How to Marry a Millionaire (1953).

Actually she wasn’t the costar on the set, she was the star. Publicity men and news photographers would gather around Marilyn any time they were on the set. This didn’t sit well with the veteran actors at first, but they eventually took her under their wing and became like older sisters to Marilyn.

Besides catapulting Marilyn to the top of Fox’s box office attractions, and marking the beginning of the end of the acting career of Betty Grable, this was the first movie shot in CinemaScope. The studios were all developing new widescreen techniques to make their pictures seem bigger. The aspect ratios on CinemaScope and Vistavision and all the other widescreen forms made scenery such as mountains look majestic. Here it just makes Marilyn Monroe, Lauren Bacall and Betty Grable look bigger. That might not be a bad thing.

Bacall plays divorcee Schatze, who decides she will do it different this time around by marrying a wealthy man. She and her two friends, Loco and Pola, played by Grable and Monroe respectively, take up residence in a New York penthouse apartment. The apartment they are renting belongs to man who is in trouble with the IRS and has to flee for Europe.

So Schatze gets a deal on the place, but things don’t go well for the trio at the beginning. The wealthy bachelors aren’t flocking to their place and the bills are piling up. To raise money, Schatze decides to sell some of the furniture in the apartment.

The apartment becomes bare, but a man comes inside. Tom Brookman helps Loco bring in groceries one night. Tom has it bad for Schatze, but she thinks he is just another low-life, like her first husband. He tries to get her to go out with him, but she never returns his calls.

The trio takes a night out on the town and find three wealthy men. They don’t exactly like the men, but they are rich and that is all the girls are looking for. Schatze is with widower J.D. Hanley, played by William Powell, who happens to be much older than Schatze.

Loco becomes acquainted with a businessman with a bad temper. He takes her for a weekend to his cabin in Maine. She finds out he is married and wants to leave, but he ends up coming down with the measles. She helps take care of him and in the process meets a park ranger, Eben, who she falls in love with.

Pola ends up with an Arab oilman who is actually a speculator. She is nearsighted and refuses to wear her glasses in front of men. Monroe hated this part of the character, but director Jean Negulesco said audiences would feel more sympathy with her character if she bumped into things. He was right and audiences found her charming to go along with her beauty.

Pola ends up misreading an airport sign and gets on the wrong plane. She is supposed to be going to Baltimore to meet the speculator so they can go off and be married. Instead she ends up on a plane to Kansas City and meets a man who also wears glasses and says she looks great with glasses on. With this infusion of confidence she becomes interested in the man.

The three gather once more when Schatze announces she is going to wed J.D. despite the age difference. At the wedding it is revealed that the younger Tom might be a better match for Schatze. J.D. respectfully bows out to Tom and Schatze marries him despite her better judgment.

The final scene occurs at a hamburger stand where it is learned that Tom is actually a very wealthy man. Schatze and her friends can’t believe it. They faint and the movie fades to black.

Writer Nunnally Johnson was capable of providing some funny stuff. There are flashes here, but nothing gut busting. The real reason to watch this movie is the three women who star in it.

Diamonds are a girl's best friend.

2009-01-09T15:39:00.000-08:00

There might not have been a better screen tandem, at least for males, than Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953). The two were well known for their sex appeal. Russell was brunette. Marilyn was blonde. Their effects on men were the same though.

Groucho Marx remarked that the movie Double Dynamite (1951), in which he starred with Russell and Frank Sinatra, was so named by Howard Hughes in honor of Jane Russell’s breasts. Considering there is no dynamite in the movie and the metaphorical meaning of the title could be lost on most audiences, Groucho might have a point.

The two got along brilliantly on and off-screen. Marilyn had a tremendous inability to get to places on time. Jane would stop by her house every day and drive her to the set so she would be on time. Marilyn was involved in Freud at this time and she tried to get Jane to read some of his work. She didn’t quite take to it. She was more religious and tried to help Marilyn find a religion. Marilyn didn’t quite take to this either.

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is a musical. Musicals aren’t typically known for their plot. This one revolves around Marilyn and Jane who are best friends. Marilyn is Lorelei Lee, a blonde who covets diamonds and money. Jane is Dorothy, a brunette who is more concerned with true love rather than material love. Lorelei and millionaire geek, Gus are planning an engagement. Gus’ father is not too happy with Lorelei’s lack of brain power. When the two showgirls head out for a European tour, Gus’ father sends out a detective to spy on Lorelei. Comedy and music fill the voyage across the pond. Charles Coburn is wonderful as Sir Frances Beekman “Beekie” to Lorelei. He is a rich man who is enamored with Lorelei’s beauty. She in return, is enamored with the diamonds his wife possesses.

But like in all musicals, it is the music that matters. Three songs from the movie still survive today. “I’m Just a Little Girl from Little Rock,” “Bye Bye Baby,” and most famously, “Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend.” The later is most associated with Marilyn, but the version we all know was sung by Jane Russell in the movie. Still the Technicolor rendition of Marilyn’s version is most frequently replayed when Marilyn Monroe tributes occur on T.V.

The three songs were all taken from the Broadway musical of a book written by Anita Loos. Carol Channing performed the role of Lorelei on the stage. Some believe that Fox missed out when they didn’t get one of the greatest musical performances ever on film by not casting Carol Channing. But Anita Loos stated that Marilyn was the perfect Lorelei.

The only original song included for the movie was “When Love Goes Wrong.” The two actresses did a brilliant job on the number. Audiences came to like it as one of the best in the movie.

With the success of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes came the ultimate success for any actor. Both Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe got to put their foot and hand prints in the cement in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. Legend has it that Marilyn said instead of hand and foot prints, the two should have placed their breasts in the wet cement. Anyways, Marilyn put a diamond over the “i” in her name. It was stolen a few days latter. Today a rhinestone is in its place.

"Why should the Falls drag me down here at 5 o'clock in the morning? To show me how big they are and how small I am?"

2009-01-08T15:13:00.000-08:00

The big break is something every actor is waiting for. Today it is amazing to think of some of the movies yesterdays Hollywood stars appeared in that were considered their “big break.” For Marilyn Monroe that movie is Niagara (1953). This is surprising because it is not a typical Monroe vehicle. It is not a comedy and her character does little to arouse sympathy in the audience.

There are two things about this movie that make it different from other Monroe movies and would be duplicated throughout the rest of her career. These two things are what make Niagara the break-out movie for Monroe. First, this is the first time she appeared in Technicolor. After seeing the rushes Marilyn wanted a clause in her contract stating that she could only appear in color movies. After seeing the box office returns, Fox gladly accepted. She was made for color movies. The difference between her in color and her in black-in-white is startling.

Secondly, the movie brought Marilyn’s famous walk into movie theaters across the country. Although she never got the big commotion made over her walking style, male audience members had no problem trying to dissect it. On the first day of shooting, director Henry Hathaway stuck the camera right behind her and had it follow her as she walked around a tourist overlook at the Falls.

These two firsts in Marilyn Monroe films helped make her a superstar. She had already been a hit with audiences, but this movie made the studio heads at Fox notice that she was also bankable in a starring role. Today the movie is still loved by Marilyn Monroe fans. I am not one of these though. I struggle with reasons why. Perhaps it is because this is a movie based around murder and the movie is just not tight enough to hold audiences in constant suspense, like an Alfred Hitchcock movie.

Speaking of suspense and Alfred Hitchcock, Joseph Cotton stars opposite Marilyn here. The veteran actor was probably taking a step down when he appeared in this picture. He had been with Orson Welles in Citizen Kane (1941) and The Third Man (1949). He had also worked with Alfred Hitchcock in Shadow of a Doubt (1943) and Under Capricorn (1949).

Here, Cotton plays George Loomis, a retired solider who has just gotten out of a mental hospital. His wife, Rose, played by Marilyn, believed that it would be good for him to take a trip to Niagara Falls in order to rekindle their marriage. This doesn’t happen and Rose becomes bored with George. She decides to take up a new lover and secretly meets with him while George struggles to find some path in life.

She plots with her lover to have George killed. The plot nearly works as the idea is to have George pushed over the Falls. Someone is pushed off, but it isn’t George. The lover dies and George realizes that Rose wanted him dead. He sets off on a path to kill her.

George and Rose’s relationship is contrasted by the Cutlers, Ray and Polly, a couple who is on their second honeymoon/business trip as the headquarters of Ray’s office is located just across the Falls in Canada.

The Cutlers are probably a big reason why I don’t like the movie. They are static characters who have not aged well. It is hard to watch when they are on-screen. It is also hard to watch Joseph Cotton. He is a much better actor than this. Not enough time is given to his character, which is why there seems to be a lack of explanation for the things he does in the beginning. Marilyn Monroe, however, looks great and steals the show, like she did in every movie she was in.

It wasn’t the most memorable movie, but it was the beginning of superstardom for Marilyn Monroe. The movie is special for its place in her career. It also features some firsts that would later be used to great success in some of her future movies. Although she does die in this movie -- something that would not be repeated in another one of her pictures.

"What's a confidence man without confidence?"

2009-01-05T15:39:00.000-08:00

Short stories typically make good movies. At least that is the belief of many directors as, unlike a novel, short stories are meant to be read in one sitting much like a movie. The problem with short stories though, is that they tend to be too short for movies that run 90 minutes, unless the screenwriter decides to add something more to the story. In 1952 Fox decided to make a movie that is a combination of short stories. The movie, O. Henry’s Full House is much like watching a series of anthology television episodes. The only real difference is that there is someone, John Steinbeck, who introduces each of the O. Henry short stories before we see it onscreen.

Fox brought out all the star power it had for this collection of shorts from the master of the unexpected ending. John Steinbeck introduces each story, as mentioned above, by pulling out a book from a bookcase and reading the first few sentences in the O. Henry story before we fade in to the visual story.

The first of the five stories shown is called “The Cop and the Anthem.” It stars Charles Laughton as a bum who wants to get arrested so he can spend the winter months in a warm jail cell. He tries to do everything he can to get arrested. He breaks a window, he attempts to assault a police officer but ends up tripping himself, he even orders a huge breakfast and doesn’t pay for it. All these attempts end up not working. Marilyn Monroe makes a brief appearance as a streetwalker, who Laughton attempts to pick-up. This attempt also fails. Finally Laughton stumbles into a church where he is so moved that he decides he does not want to be arrested, but rather he wants to become a working member of society again. He exclaims that he has seen the light. As he does this, a cop walks by and arrests him for loitering.

Henry Hathaway directed the next installment, called “The Clarion Call.” Here a police officer discovers the suspect to a murder, but since the two were friends, and the murderer has some knowledge about the police officer’s past that isn’t too good, he is unable to make the arrest.

Finally the cop asks his former friend if he could pay him to turn himself in. The murderer says sure, knowing that the cop can never afford the price on his petty salary. The murderer plans on getting his former friend back into the other side of the law. But this plan fails when the friend brings the money to the murderer, who is arrested. The murderer wonders why this happened and the cop explains that a local newspaper was offering a reward for the exact amount agreed upon.

“The Last Leaf” is one of my favorite O. Henry stories. It is brought to life by director Jean Negulesco, Anne Baxter and Jean Peters. The story revolves around two sisters. One who it appears is on her death bed, the other, Anne Baxter, who will not allow her to die. Baxter enlists an upstairs neighbor, who is a wannabe painter, into her fight to make her sister believe that she isn’t dieing. The sister believes that when all the leaves outside of her window have fallen, she will die. Baxter and the doctors know this is not going to happen, but her sister still believes this. It takes some work, but after a rough and brutal night, the sister lives. Amazed at what has happened, the sister asks to see out the window. The window shade is opened and there is one leaf remaining on the branch. Or so it seems. The old painter happened to spend all night outside painting the leaf perfectly so that it would match. The joy of the sisters is interrupted with the news that the painter had caught pneumonia and died.

“The Ransom of Red Chief” is directed by Howard Hawks and written by Nunnally Johnson and Ben Hecht, so it is going to be funny. This humorous tale is about two city thugs who believe it is easier to commit crimes in small towns. They ask around a small town in Arkansas about who the richest man in town is. When they find out who it is, they decide to take his young son and hold him for ransom. This is a great idea until they meet the son, who is too much for the city thugs to handle. The parents are overjoyed that their son has been taken off their hands. They refuse to pay the ransom and demand that they are paid in order to take their son back. The city thugs agree to this, but the son, “Red Chief” as he likes to be called, has taken a liking to them and refuses to go. The thugs are finally able to leave the boy, but they head out of town a lot poorer than they were.

The final story is probably O. Henry’s most famous, “The Gift of the Magi.” It is Christmas time and a struggling young couple has to decide what to get the other for Christmas. The wife has great flowing hair, so the husband decides to get her some combs that she has always wanted. The husband has a great gold watch, so the wife decides to get him a gold chain to match the watch. In typical O. Henry style, the wife sells her hair to buy the chain, while the husband sells the watch to buy the combs. It is the spirit of Christmas at its best.

O. Henry the man was an interesting person. O. Henry the short story writer was one of the best America ever produced. This movie is a fitting tribute to such a great storyteller.

"Mr. Oxley's been complaining about my punctuation, so I'm careful to get here before nine."

2008-12-25T13:18:00.000-08:00

The screwball comedy genre was at its peak in the 1930s. The master of the screwball comedy was Cary Grant. His proper English accent and refined manners went perfectly with scripts that were absurd. By the time 1952 rolled around though, Grant was known equally for his comedic abilities and his dramatic acting skills. Monkey Business (1952), not to be confused with the Marx Brothers movie of the same name released in 1931, is a return for Grant to the genre that made him famous.

Howard Hawks was brought on to direct the picture. Like Grant, Hawks was capable of directing both great comedies and outstanding dramas. Hawks had the distinction at this time as being one of the few Hollywood directors who was not typecast, such as John Ford and westerns. Hawks made westerns, film noir, screwball comedies and just about anything else.

Playing opposite Cary Grant was the great musical actor, Ginger Rogers. The two are great as Barnaby and Edwina Fulton. Our story revolves around the couple. Barnaby is a scientist who is working on a drug that will make people young. The idea of becoming young through a drug or potion seems to be a popular one even today.

Barnaby believes he has found the correct formula. His absent mindedness prevents him from remembering just what it was though. Luckily for him chance, and a screenwriter, helped him out as a monkey in the lab decided to mix some chemicals together and then pour them into the water cooler. This concoction is just what Barnaby was looking for. He takes a sip from the tainted cooler and immediately acts young again.

He no longer needs his glasses. He runs out and buys a sports car. He takes his bosses secretary, Lois Laurel, played by Marilyn Monroe, on a joy ride. The two go swimming and roller skating together and Barnaby even gets a young man’s haircut. All this thrills Barnaby and Lois. It frightens his boss, Mr. Oxley. It disgusts his wife Edwina, who becomes very jealous of the relationship Barnaby and Lois have.

Of course since the formula was not discovered by Barnaby, but actually present in the water cooler, anyone has access to the formula. Edwina is the next to become young after Barnaby regains his age and poor eyesight. She becomes a young troublemaker who wants to relive her honeymoon night with Barnaby. Of course the couple spent their honeymoon down in La Jolla. Barnaby does not want to make the long drive down, but Edwina insists and the couple speeds down the coast.

When they arrive at the hotel, Edwina finds out there is a ballroom where swing dancing is going on. Of course she wants to do this and the aged Barnaby can not keep up with the teenage acting Edwina. This allows the audience to see Ginger Rogers dance though, which is something everyone expects when they see a movie with Ginger Rogers in it.

After some troubles that night, in which Edwina calls her mother and old boyfriend and wants to divorce Barnaby, the effects of the potion wear off. Edwina and Barnaby make up, but the damage Edwina did to their relationship that night still has to be resolved as her mother and former boyfriend along with the press are at their house when they arrive around midday.

From here the formula for the potion is torn up by Barnaby, as he feels the public is not ready for such a drug. Of course we know the reason why everyone is behaving so oddly is because of the water cooler. This is lost on Barnaby and Edwina. They both turn younger and it is up to Mr. Oxley to try and find out what the formula was from the young Barnaby so that he can make his own transformation as well as a ton of money by marketing the product.

The movie ends, as most screwball comedies do, with a huge climatic scene filled with zaniness. Then everyone lives happily ever after once the problem, in this case the tainted water, is discovered and rectified. The water is poured out and the cooler cleaned so nothing like this would happen again.

Although the stars of the movie were Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers, Fox made sure Marilyn Monroe appeared in as many advertisements as possible. At this point she was a hot commodity with fans and a huge moneymaker, no matter how much studio executives doubted she had talent. It would still be a couple more pictures before the studio would decide to let her star in a color picture, but the rise to stardom for her was certainly moving faster than it was even a year prior to this point.

The same old story

2008-12-23T15:21:00.000-08:00

Couples who think they are married, but really aren’t, is a storyline popular among Hollywood farces. Classic Hollywood has dealt with this subject many times. Even a director like Alfred Hitchcock made a movie using this storyline with Mr. and Mrs. Smith (1941), not to be confused with the Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt movie.

Fox decided to make a movie along similar lines about a decade later with the aptly named We’re Not Married (1952). The twist here is that there is more than one couple that isn’t married. So instead of focusing on the decision one couple will make, to remain married or go their separate ways, we get to see five such couples. A short movie like this does not allow time for deep character development though.

Bumbling justice of the piece Melvin Bush ends up learning that he did not have the authority to marry five couples when he believed he was justice of the piece. He in fact had not been approved and only discovers this mistake two years later. So he has to send out letters to the five couples in order to tell them they aren’t married.

Ginger Rogers appears as Mrs. Steve Gladwyn. The Gladwyns were the first couple the justice married and they have ended up despising each other, despite appearing in the opening scenes as a happy couple. They eventually decide to remain married in order to keep their lucrative radio show, in which they give advice to other couples, on the air.

Marilyn Monroe is a beauty contest winner. She earns the title of Mrs. Mississippi. When she learns that she isn’t married, she faces the probability that her crown will be lost. This doesn’t deter her though as she decides to compete in the Miss Mississippi pageant, which is much more prestigious. Her “husband” and baby look on in delight, as do hundreds of other males, when she wins the Miss Mississippi crown.

The best comedy of the movie occurs when the “husband” Jeff Norris overhears someone admiring his “wife’s” looks. He asks the man if he likes what he sees. The man replies yes. Then Mr. Norris explains that the woman the man so likes is his wife. The admirer is embarrassed, but Mr. Norris says it is alright. He has to get used to it. This is something Joe DiMaggio never got used to when he married Marilyn Monroe.

The Melrose couple is composed of Louis Calhern and Zsa Zsa Gabor. Calhern is a wealthy businessman who has Gabor as his trophy wife. Gabor decides that she will divorce Calhern to get half his estate. Calhern hates this idea, but when the letter comes stating that the two aren’t married, he goes along with the plot. He gets the last laugh and Gabor ends up fainting when she finds out they were never legally married.

The movie spends most of the time on Monroe and Rogers, as they were the two Fox players in the movie. The other two couples are not developed well enough and don’t contain the name power like Louis Calhern and Zsa Zsa Gabor do.

Nunnally Johnson, who was good friends with Groucho Marx, wrote and produced the movie. Unfortunately, there are no Groucho Marx moments here. The pacing is stilted and the characters are not completely developed. This wouldn’t be the last time Johnson and Monroe would work together. They teamed up again on How to Marry a Millionaire (1953). Johnson wrote and produced the movie, but could not stand working with the new star Monroe. As for this teaming up, the movie has some bright spots, but not enough to warrant more than one viewing.

"Home is where you come when you run out of places."

2008-12-18T15:28:00.000-08:00

For the third time in her career, Marilyn Monroe would play a bit part in a movie from a major director. Clash By Night (1952), was less successful than The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and All About Eve (1950). It was not because it lacked star power though. The failings of this movie come in its story.

Clash By Night began as a Broadway play written by Clifford Odets and starring Tallulah Bankhead. The play was a flop on Broadway, but that didn’t stop Hollywood producers from grabbing it. In the play there was a murder and the action was set on Stanton Island. In the movie there is no murder and the location has changed to California.

The movie and play both revolve around a love triangle. There is Mae Doyle, who has gone off to find her fortune and fame only to return back to her brother’s house with nothing. Her brother Joe works on a fishing boat owned by Jerry D’Amato. Jerry has the hots for Mae and because feels like she can’t do any better, she decides to marry Jerry. Things go alright for the married couple. Jerry feels like he has everything in the world. Mae is content with her life, but not happy.

Happiness comes into Mae’s life in the form of Jerry’s best friend Earl. The two begin sneaking behind Jerry’s back. In the play Earl was murdered when Jerry found out about the relationship. In the movie Mae is forgiven for her wrongdoing by Jerry and the two live reasonably happily ever after.

As mentioned above, the star power present in Clash By Night is the biggest reason to watch the movie. Barbara Stanwyck plays the role of Mae. She is her usual tough and scrappy self. It was not a stretch for her to play the part.

Marilyn Monroe appears briefly as Joe’s girlfriend, a cannery worker who contrasts the personality of Mae perfectly. Marilyn’s character has similar aspirations as the young Mae did, but instead of leaving town for the big city, she remains to marry Joe.

Of course when publicity cameras came around to take shots of the cast, there was a lot of attention paid to Marilyn. This did not sit well with Paul Douglas who plays Jerry. Not only is he getting screwed over in the movie, but in the publicity as well. He was not happy that some unknown bit player who appeared on screen for a few minutes was getting all the attention from the cameras.

Rounding out the love triangle is Robert Ryan who plays Earl. He became Marilyn’s only real ally on the set. Paul Douglas did not like her, even before the publicity incident. Barbara Stanwyck was basically indifferent to the young actress. And director Fritz Lang could not stand her.

Lang was a tremendously successful filmmaker in Germany. His movies Metropolis (1927) and M (1931) were critically acclaimed. The odd thing is that Lang’s films were praised by the Nazis. Hitler was a huge fan of Metropolis. His wife was even a big supporter of the party. But in the face of fascism, Lang decided to make the move to America. He arrived in Hollywood and turned out some decent movies, such as Fury (1936) and The Big Heat (1953).

He was an extremely controlling person. He was notorious for being hard on actors. This did not sit well with the shy Marilyn Monroe. She was scared of him. Her acting coach Natasha Lytess would give Marilyn pointers after every take. Lang did not like this as he felt his authority was being undermined. It was not a pleasant experience for Marilyn once Lang got Lytess thrown off the set.

Today Lang is not as well known as he probably should be. He was a pioneer in the silent cinema and his first sound picture dealt with the murder of children. But like Sergei Eisenstein something happened when he left his home country that prevented him from continuing to be a great filmmaker. That being said, he still deserves a place with the elite directors of cinema.

Back from overseas.

2008-12-17T15:39:00.000-08:00

At this point in her career, Marilyn Monroe was typecast as either a dumb-blonde secretary or girlfriend or her own woman in a B-comedy. The first example of the later is Love Nest (1951).

Love Nest is not that bad of a movie for being a B-comedy. It breaks no new ground, but it is good entertainment. The story revolves around the Scott couple, Jim and Connie. Connie, played by June Haver, has bought an apartment building in New York. This is a huge surprise to Jim, played by William Lundigan, when he arrives home from the army. He expected a nice quiet apartment. Instead he has become landlord for an apartment building that needs a lot of fixing up.

The comedy comes as the couple tries to improve their love nest and as Jim is continually interrupted from his writing by problems that occur in the apartment building.

As with any apartment building, single tenants become interested in each other. This is the case for Eadie Gaynor, played by Leatrice Joy. Eadie falls for Charley Patterson, played by Frank Fay. Charley is an older gentleman, while Eadie is Connie’s best friend. It appears that the love next is expanding to include two happy couples. Here are where complications are thrown in.

First with Connie and Jim. Jim tells Connie that his friend, Bobby, from the army has written him and wants to stay in their apartment building. Connie says alright, as she wouldn’t want to look like she discriminates against veterans. Connie is shocked when “Bobby” shows up and is actually Marilyn Monroe, who plays Roberta Stevens, known to friends as Bobbie.

Connie doesn’t like what her husband has done to her and is jealous of Roberta. But she can not worry too much about this problem as it is discovered that Charley is not a rich old man, but rather a con artist. Connie fears for her best friend Eadie, as the two are planning on getting married. Jim can’t believe that the nice old man is really a criminal.

Charley admits that he is a criminal, although he pledged that he would not revert to his old ways once he married Eadie, as he believes he has finally found true love. Eadie feel bad for Charley, as do Jim and Connie, but things work out for the couple. Connie has the apartment building running well and Jim gets an opportunity to be a writer. Charley offers to tell Jim his life story for a biography. The book ends up being a best seller and the couple ends up happily ever after.

The acting is hit or miss here. That probably has something to do with the characters though. Charley and Roberta are the most interesting characters and Frank Fay and Marilyn Monroe give the best performances. Leatrice Joy is also good, but June Haver and William Lundigan are nothing special. Their characters might be the focus of the story, but the story is about two common people trying to make things work. So the actors don’t have to be of the Shakespearian quality to make this work.

Will you love me in December?

2008-12-15T12:17:00.000-08:00

Like any aspiring star in the studio system, Marilyn Monroe had to make her fair share of B-movies with a small role for her and a stock story. One such movie is As Young as You Feel (1951).

The movie is about a man who has reached the age of mandatory retirement at his big company. The company is so big that it is called the Acme Company, this originally is what made the studio system great. Anyway, the man wants to remain on the job as he has nothing to do in retirement and his family can’t stand having him around. So he decides to dress up as the president of the company and do a routine inspection of his branch’s plant in order to change the company policy.

Here is where the story has a bit of social value. It is an indictment of the big businesses in the capitalist system. No one at the branch knows what the president of the company looks like, so they believe the imposter. The head of the branch has a secretary who is played by Marilyn Monroe. She tries to calm her boss, but he is frantic and flustered when he meets the “president” of the company.

Things go well for our formerly retired hero as he tours the plant and makes sure the policy is rewritten. Things begin to go wrong though when he is asked to speak at a local business meeting and accepts. Newspapermen are there and snap the imposter’s picture. They run an article praising the “president” of the Acme Company for his great speech. Well, the real president of the company sees this and wants to know what is going on.

In the end, the man is exposed as an imposter, but gets to remain on the job even after the age of retirement because he likes it and has done a good job. Everything ends happily.

At least on the screen that is. In Marilyn Monroe’s personal life, some troubles occurred during the making of the movie. Her long time friend and agent Johnny Hyde took ill and died. Hyde was an agent at William and Morris and he got her the part in All About Eve (1950) and a nice seven-year contract with 20^th Century-Fox. He even offered to marry her and leave all his money to her, but she didn’t accept as she didn’t truly love him. She did, however, make all the funeral arrangements.

One bright spot in Monroe’s personal life came while she was shooting a scene one day. Elia Kazan and Arthur Miller walked onto the set. Kazan wanted Miller to see Monroe. Why Elia Kazan would care a thing about an unknown bit-player is anybody's guess, but Miller was quite impressed by Marilyn Monroe. She felt the same about him. This first impression each got of the other lasted a long time and when both were available, they married.

"Why do they always look like unhappy rabbits?"

2008-12-12T14:09:00.000-08:00

Few movies have been accepted better by the Motion Picture Arts and Sciences than All About Eve (1950), which received 14 Academy Award nominations. Only Titanic (1997) has received that amount. The movie won six Oscars, including best picture. It is similar to Titanic in that way. It is dissimilar because the audience doesn’t know what will happen in the end, unlike the ship that is destined for an iceberg.

Ironically, for a movie about two competing Broadway actresses, Bette Davis and Anne Baxter competed against each other for the Best Actress Oscar. Neither won. In fact in a year in which Sunset Blvd. also was released, and Gloria Swanson was nominated for her performance, no actress who played an actress in a movie won the award. It went to Judy Holliday for Born Yesterday. It is believed by some that Baxter and Davis split the votes, and had they not then one of them would have won the award.

On the surface it appears that All About Eve is a heartwarming story about a young actress, Eve Harrington, played by Baxter, who comes of age to become the star of Broadway. But in the realm of the theater, and Hollywood, appearances aren’t everything. There is a nasty underbelly to the theatre world and it is captured perfectly here by Joseph L. Mankiewicz who wrote and directed the picture.

Margo Channing, played by Bette Davis, is an aging Broadway star. She knows it, the critics know it, the producers know and her friends know it. The fans might know it, but they are always the last to figure these things out – or so the belief is in Hollywood and Broadway.

One night after giving a stellar performance, Margo retreats to her dressing room where she meets an adoring fan named Eve. Eve tells Margo a sob story about how she is an actress from Milwaukee who saw Margo one night in San Francisco and was so impressed with her performance that she has followed the actress around ever since. The ushers at the theater can vouch for Eve because they have seen her attend every one of Margo’s performances.

Margo is flattered and Eve is brought on as her secretary. Soon Eve becomes Margo’s understudy. Margo gets a kick out of this because she adores the attention. She also gets an opportunity to be young again through Eve. But soon understudy becomes actress and actress will become competitor for Margo. This Margo doesn’t like. But there isn’t much she can do about it.

Eve has met all of Margo’s theater friends. There is the critic Addison De Witt, played brilliantly by George Sanders. Sanders was an odd man who won an Oscar for his role as the theater critic, a role in which he was perfectly cast as his personality and De Witt’s match well.

Hugh Marlowe plays Lloyd Richards, a successful Broadway playwright. Richards’ wife, Karen, played by Celeste Holm, is Eve’s biggest supporter in the beginning. She encourages the actress to continue on. Like Margo, things backfire on Karen as she finds herself competing with the young actress for her husband’s attention.

Margo and her friends are stuck having to watch the monster Eve take over Broadway and become a huge star. They seem powerless to stop her, all that is except De Witt. He is similar to Eve. He does some checking in Eve’s past and finds out that she really isn’t an actress from Milwaukee, but just some conniving woman who had to leave Milwaukee because of a scandal involving her boss, a married man.

De Witt is as conniving as Eve and does not blow her cover. He sits back and watches Eve get all the rewards that come with being a Broadway star. The movie ends with Eve getting an award and then being confronted by an adoring fan, who happens to be an aspiring actress. The whole cycle begins again.

Marilyn Monroe made an impression of Joseph Mankiewicz with her performance in The Asphalt Jungle. He cast her as De Witt’s girlfriend, another aspiring actress. Her style to getting jobs is different from that of Eve’s. Miss Caswell is unsure of herself. Eve is not. This is the reason why Eve is the star and Miss Caswell is not. Marilyn Monroe at this point was unsure of herself and this might be a reason why it would be three more years before she became a star, although all the star qualities she possessed were present for the short time she was on screen.

"One way or another, we all work for our vice."

2008-12-11T14:12:00.000-08:00

The perfect crime is a topic many stories and movies have dealt with. The perfect crime doesn’t necessarily have to be perfect at all. Things can go wrong with the plan, but as long as the criminals get away with their crime then the crime can be considered perfect. Robbery is a popular subject in fiction because it allows for the perfect crime, but also allows the author to create a moral story if the crime happens to go wrong.

The Asphalt Jungle (1950) is one of those movies that deals with the perfect crime. Like Ocean’s Eleven and Seven Thieves (1960), this movie brings a group of the top criminals in the area together for a job.

Since this is a pretty typical story, with the brains of the operation bringing various personalities together in hopes of scoring a big load, there is not much to describe about the movie. Other than the brains of the operation has just come out of prison, wants one last big job before retirement and uses his connections to find someone who will finance the operation. With finances in place the brains brings together the people he needs for his plan. The robbery is then executed. In The Asphalt Jungle the criminals get the money. It isn’t until they have the movie that things go wrong. The noise from the nitroglycerin blast to open the safe is so loud that alarms from other buildings in the area start ringing, bringing the cops. One of the officers wounds one of the robbers. With the criminal in custody it is only a matter of time before the bunch is found and brought to justice.

John Huston brought this story to the screen. The Asphalt Jungle was originally a novel written by W.R. Burnett. Burnett was one of Huston’s favorite writers. The two first worked together on High Sierra (1941), when Huston was just a screenwriter.

The movie was nominated for four Academy Awards, including best picture. It is still a good watch, but there have been similar movies that have come out in the past 50 years, so the subject matter doesn’t seem so fresh today.

The movie is best remembered today as being Marilyn Monroe’s first big break into Hollywood. She had been an actress for over a year and had appeared in a couple movies before The Asphalt Jungle. But this movie would establish her in Hollywood.

She plays the “niece” of the lawyer who puts up the financing for the crime job. She does not appear on screen for very long, but she does make an impression. When the police come to the lawyer’s house they find him with his mistress Monroe. Marilyn is in fits over what is going to happen to her “uncle.”

This role would lead to similar roles throughout her career as the elegant, dumb blonde. Of course this was the case with most actors who made it as stars in Hollywood. Boris Karloff was always typecast in horror roles, as was Bela Lugosi. Humphrey Bogart in gangster roles and John Wayne in westerns.

It should be noted that John Huston directed Marilyn Monroe in what many consider her first major role, in The Asphalt Jungle, and in her final role, as Roslyln in The Misfits (1961). Both came a long way between the two pictures.

"Scotland Yard was baffled; the FBI was baffled. They sent for me and the case was solved immediately: I confessed."

2008-12-10T08:54:00.000-08:00

Classic Hollywood is filled with movies that could’ve been. The teaming of Humphrey Bogart and Marlon Brando for Knock on Any Door is one of them. Or Gary Cooper and Alfred Hitchcock on Suspicion. These didn’t work out, but sometimes dream combinations do occur. Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton appeared together in Limelight. The two screen legends didn’t quite live up to audience expectations in the scene they both appeared in. This has been the case for several dream combinations though. Like Marilyn Monroe appearing in a Marx Brothers movie.

On the surface this seems like a great combination. One thing the Marx Brothers like is beautiful females. There is no question that Marilyn Monroe fits that definition. So the match seems perfect doesn’t it? Well, the movie they appeared in together, Love Happy (1949), was made over 15 years after the Marx Brothers had their peak in movies and about five years before Marilyn Monroe would become a huge star.

Timing is everything in movies and this one didn’t quite work out. Had the movie been made during the peak of the Marx Brothers’ ability, it would have been great. It also would not have included Marilyn Monroe because at the time she would have been a seven-year-old orphan in Los Angeles who went by the name Norma Jeane Baker.

Love Happy is like a lot of later Marx Brothers movies, it was done because Chico needed money. Actually this movie is all about money, as the production ran out of financing and had to resort to product placement advertising in the movie in order to finish production. The climax of the movie occurs on New York rooftops with Harpo racing around various advertisements.

Speaking of Harpo, if you happen to be a fan of his, then this movie is wonderful. Unlike the other Marx Brothers movies, which tend to focus a majority of the time on Groucho, this movie is basically all Harpo. He came up with the short story in which the movie was based.

As with all the Marx Brothers movies, the plot is always unimportant. The Brothers were on the screen to make people laugh. Harpo has some of his best gags in this movie. Unfortunately, when you are known as one of the Marx Brothers, it hurts the movie when the other family members don’t have any great gags.

The other two Marx Brothers take on Zeppo roles in this movie. They provide the backdrop for Harpo to star. I believe this was alright to Chico, as he was just in it for the money he needed to pay his constant gambling debts. Groucho I’m sure was offended by such a small role, but then again he might not have cared since he was a huge success with his radio quiz show program.

This brings me to Marilyn Monroe. If you look at the DVD cover, you will see Marilyn Monroe and Groucho on the box. It is billed as the teaming of Monroe and the Marx Brothers. Well, if Groucho and Chico can’t get much face time in this movie then you know some unknown blonde will get next to none. And Monroe gets only one quick scene. It might be the best in the movie though -- for those who are not Harpo fans.

Groucho plays a detective who introduces the movie and then stays out of everything for a majority of the picture until the end. He happens to be stuck in a sticky situation, there is a man who has come into his office who says he will kill him in a certain amount of time. It seems like there is no hope for Groucho until a knock at the door comes. Happily, Groucho goes to the door, opens it and sneaks out as someone comes in. That someone is Marilyn Monroe. So, a few seconds later Groucho opens the door and comes back into the office to leer at Monroe.

That was it for Marilyn Monroe in the movie. And that was it for the Marx Brothers together on screen. They would never make a movie together again, although they all appeared separately in The Story of Mankind (1957).

Having wrapped up the Humphrey Bogart movies last week, I will be looking at the movies of Marilyn Monroe from Love Happy till the end of her career.

"Money's not evil in and of itself. The purpose for which it's used is the determining factor."

2008-12-05T15:22:00.000-08:00

Corruption in boxing is not a new topic in movies. It seems that ever since the invention of the medium, there have been tales about boxing and the corruption in the sport. In fact, boxing is probably the most popular sport movies have dealt with. Of course in recent times, as the sport has lost a lot of popularity, there have been few boxing movies. But in the 1950s, the sport was still going very strong. The last appearance made by Humphrey Bogart on screen came in the boxing movie The Harder They Fall (1956).

The movie was based on the best-selling novel written by Budd Schulberg. It tells of the corruption of the boxing business, certainly not a new topic. As with most corruption in boxing stories, this one deals with greedy managers exploiting uneducated fighters and paying off boxers who will take a fall.

The Harder They Fall follows around washed-up newsman and boxing reporter, Eddie Willis, played by Bogie. He still has a lot of connection in the boxing world and when manager Nick Benko asks if he wants to be a part of his PR staff, Willis says he possibly will if the fighter is any good. Well the fighter is not. The fighter, Toro Moreno, is an import into this country. He looks great when he walks by people, as he is so much bigger than everyone, but he has no boxing skills at all. Willis hates the fighter and doubts his ability, but needs the money so he agrees to help Benko by being a public relations man.

Willis draws up interest in the tomato can’s fights and Benko makes sure the fighters Toro faces are paid to take a fall. Of course, this being the era with no television broadcasting, much less pay-per-view, the only medium covering fights is the newspaper. So Toro becomes a sensation of the newspaper world and the boxing world, despite not being seen by many people.

As Toro works his way up the boxing hierarchy he begins to believe that he has some boxing skills. Of course he has improved, but so have the fighters he is facing. They can easily knock him out, but they are paid better to take falls.

Eventually, Toro befriends Willis, who begins to feel sorry for the foreigner. He is a man in a strange land who has some talent, but has been taken advantage of. Willis agrees to help protect Toro. Of course Benko figures out that Toro is having other ideas – like leaving the boxing world and America. Benko can’t let his cash cow leave, so he takes action to keep Toro in the United States, despite his being exposed as a fraud of a boxer. Toro depends on the friendship of Willis and even though he does betray him the first time, Willis does get Toro safely out of the country.

With Willis going against the will of the Benko mob, it is only a matter of time before he is eliminated. In the waning moments of his career, life and the movie, Willis sits down at his type writer and begins to pound out the whole story under the title, “The Harder They Fall.”

This was not the best send off for one of Hollywood’s greatest stars. Bogie is the narrator of the story, but the Benko character, played by Rod Steiger is a better part. Steiger was a Method actor, while Bogie was a naturalistic one. By the time the late50s rolled around, the Method actor was replacing the naturalistic one in all the best parts, this movie is an example of that. With Bogie’s death a year later, the naturalistic style of acting would be dealt a severe blow.

The legacy of Humphrey Bogart is one filled with characters who were idealist, but not completely ignorant of the imperfect world they lived in. Even Bogie’s gangster characters of the 1930s had traces of this in them. His most famous characters, Rick Blaine, Charlie Allnut, Sam Spade, are filled with this quality.

Bogie is not mentioned today as much as contemporaries like Marlon Brando or John Wayne, yet when AFI created a list of the 50 greatest stars, Bogie was at the top of the leading man category. He might not be as well known today as he should be, but those who have seen Casablanca or The Big Sleep know that he will never be forgotten.

"You don't have it in ya, Pop."

2008-12-04T15:40:00.000-08:00

The Desperate Hours (1955) is a movie that was based on actual events. This story originally appeared in the newspaper as it was developing, then was gobbled up by Joseph Hayes who wrote a novel about the story. He then wrote a play about it. Finally, the story was turned into a screenplay by Hayes and shot by Paramount.

While he was in charge of Santana Productions, Humphrey Bogart saw the novel for The Desperate Hours and wanted to buy it. His small production company, although successful, still couldn’t compete with the major studios in a bidding war. He lost to Paramount. But Paramount knew he would be a good fit in the role of Glenn Griffin, the main gangster bad guy.

The story begins on a typical morning in suburban America in the 1950s. The Hilliard family is getting ready to attack the day. There is Eleanor, the housewife who sees everyone off, Dan, her husband who has to go to work, and finally Cindy and Ralphie, the two children of the family who have to go off to school. Once this all-American family disperses, things start to happen.

In a story that has been used over and over again by writers of all mediums, a group of gangsters invades the home when everyone but the housewife is away. They have broken out of prison and are waiting for something, typically it is money or a girl as in The Petrified Forest (1936). Bogie plays the groups leader, Glenn Griffin, who is a similar character to Bogie’s Duke Mantee in The Petrified Forest. The only difference is Glenn is more grizzled, a man with no ideals so to speak like Duke possessed. Also new is Griffin has a brother, Hal, so the hardened gangster has some sort of heart as he cares for his younger brother.

When the family returns from their hard day at school or work, they are shocked to find the gangsters in their home. A battle of wills ensues between Glenn and Dan to see who will breakdown first. Will Glenn make good on his promises to leave when he gets what he wants or will Dan manage to get these gangsters out of his house so his family can live a normal life. I think we know how this will end.

On Broadway, Paul Newman and Karl Malden where the stars who matched wits. Newman as Glenn and Malden as Dan. In the movie version, Bogie was supposed to match wits with Spencer Tracy. The two were good friends who hadn’t appeared in a movie together in over 25 years. They wanted to appear together one more time before they died. For some reason, it is suspected because of an issue with top billing, Tracy backed out of the production and Fredric March stepped in.

The story is classic and the movie is as well. For a major Hollywood star, who had developed into a romantic lead at one point in his career, Bogie still enjoyed being the bad guy. Glenn Griffin is a fitting tribute to Bogie’s other gangster characters who he played when he was first starting out.

This was the penultimate movie in Bogie’s career. The movie was not as successful as Paramount originally hoped it would be, but it was the last great movie of Bogie’s character. His final movie, The Harder They Fall (1956) will be looked at tomorrow.

"If crime showed on a man's face, there wouldn't be any mirrors."

2008-12-02T15:21:00.000-08:00

With the success of Sabrina (1954), Humphrey Bogart proved that he was adept at comedy. This fact was not lost on the people at Paramount, who cast him again in a comedic role, this time in We’re No Angels (1955).

This movie is not really all that funny or all that great, but it is one of those movies about the spirit of Christmas. It is about three Devil’s Island convicts who are on work release. They decide that there is a chance to make a break for it and take it. They would have been successful in escaping, had they not slipped up at a local shop. Here they witness a shopkeeper, who they were going to rob, have some of his own problems. Bogie and his two other convicts take pity on the shopkeeper and his family once they see them.

The three who had volunteered to help patch up the shopkeeper’s roof decide to make a long stay and forget their chances of escape. They get to really like the family. The mother, played by Joan Bennett is attractive enough to catch Bogie’s eye, while the family’s daughter, Isabelle, is attractive enough to catch the eye of the two other convicts, played by Peter Ustinov and Aldo Ray.

They help prepare dinner for the family, Bogie manages to “borrow” a turkey from a local farm after making his best attempts to buy the bird with no money. They make themselves great servants for the family that has fallen on hard times. The father’s cousin wants to take over the shop and when he arrives to claim the shop that the father has run into the ground because of his generosity, the three convicts rush to cook the books.

They fail in this attempt and seems like the nice people will lose their shop. Of course, this being a funny, sentimental story, the three convicts use their associate named Adolph to help them save the day. Adolph happens to be an adder who escapes from the box he is kept in and miraculously gives anyone who happens to be mean to the family a nice bite.

I probably made the movie more complex than it really is in my description above. Really it is just a lavish Christmas picture that is filled with some laughs, but a lot of sentimentality. The movie was shot in color with a big budget and directed by Michael Curtiz, one of Bogie’s favorite directors.

Bogie is good as the straight man of the group. Basil Rathbone is good as the cousin to Leo G. Carroll’s shop owner/father of the family. The mother, Joan Bennett has an interesting story though. She had been blackballed in Hollywood for many years. Her husband was Walter Wanger, a neighbor to Bogie and big shot producer in Hollywood. In 1951, the Wanger family was involved in a bit of a scandal when Wanger took exception to his wife having an affair with her agent. Wanger took matters into his own hands and shot the agent in the groin. The agent recovered and Wanger spent a few months in jail. Bennett was the one who got the worst of this deal. She was unable to find work, despite having over sixty-five film credits to her name including playing the mother in Father of the Bride (1950). When We’re No Angels was shot, it was only her second screen appearance in the past three years. The producers at Paramount did not want to use her, but buckled when Bogie stood by her and said he wouldn’t do the picture unless she was cast as the mother. Bogie and Paramount were rewarded when she gave a great performance.

We’re No Angels is a nice, family, holiday movie. It is good clean fun and something enjoyable for all.

"What she's got you couldn't spell - and what you've got, you used to have."

2008-11-28T10:07:00.000-08:00

In his second screen appearance in color of 1954, Humphrey Bogart appeared as a director who is washed up, that is until he finds a young dancer in the streets of Madrid who he helps make a star.

The Barefoot Contessa (1954) is many things. It is long. It is only the second color movie Bogie appeared in up to this point. It features Ava Gardner and Joseph Mankiewicz. Its biggest drawback though, is its characters. None can be rooted for, except maybe the Contessa, played by Gardner. This makes the movie hard to watch since it is so long, at over two hours.

Mankiewicz had been famous for his behind-the-scenes look at Broadway in All About Eve (1950). Here he tried to expose the behind-the-scenes world of Hollywood. It doesn’t work quite as well as something like In a Lonely Place (1950). Instead of taking a hard look at all the evils of Hollywood, like Mankiewicz did for Broadway, this movie seems to be lacking the same punch. It isn’t because of the characters though. There are plenty of evil doers here, it is just that the Cinderella Contessa is meant to feel too much audience sympathy. This isn’t quite on the level of Charlie Chaplin sentimentality, but at least in Chaplin you had great comedy, this is still too sentimental for most people.

Bogie is washed up director Harry Dawes, who makes a trip to Madrid in order to see Maria Vargas. In a typical move, Vargas is in a tough situation at home, but Bogie promises the opportunity to star in a Hollywood movie. Actually this promise is made by press agent, Oscar Muldoon, played by Edmond O’Brien. Bogie promises to watch out for the young girl in America.

He keeps his promise and even though he happens to be a drunkard with a tough personality, he is the most sympathetic character to the new star. O’Brien, who won an Oscar for his performance, is great as the press agent who has no guts. The movie’s producer, Kirk Edwards, is a bully. Now, to the cynic this might seem like a perfect portrayal of the typical Hollywood types. These old men with no talent are taking advantage of a young girl. That is all true, but it gets worse for our Contessa.

She happens to become a huge star who is known throughout the world. She happens to be smitten by someone she believes to be a charming prince. He happens to be a count, thus she becomes a contessa. Anyway, this marriage made in heaven is not so. The count has his own problems and our friend the contessa develops her own. The movie doesn’t end pleasantly.

During the shooting, the mood on the set between the two stars Gardner and Bogie was not pleasant either. Gardner was on the outs with husband Frank Sinatra. Bogie happened to be good friends with Sinatra. The two were in the Rat Pack together. Or the Holmby Hills Rat Pack as it was known at this point. The group was named by Lauren Bacall one night after a hard night of partying in Vegas. She said the group she saw in the hotel room looked “like a damn rat pack.” The name stuck and the group became famous after the passing of Bogie and Sinatra took over the reins.

Anyway, the tension on the set did not make it onto the film stock. Bogie was the best friend the Contessa had. Mankiewicz wanted to make a movie about the evils of Hollywood. He succeeded in doing this, but there just isn’t enough bite in the Contessa to make the movie seem completely believable. There was plenty of bite in the Eve character Mankiewicz created four years prior. That was lacking in this movie and it hurt it as a result.

"And how do you say I wish I were my brother?"

2008-11-26T15:21:00.000-08:00

Sabrina is not really a Humphrey Bogart movie. It’s a comedy that is stolen by Audrey Hepburn. This is a rare occurrence for Bogie. Typically he’s playing some sort of cynical idealist in a drama, here he is the rich businessman without a heart in a comedy. He performs well, but not as well as Hepburn does in the role of Cinderella or Sabrina.

The 1954 film was written and directed by Billy Wilder. It was based on the hit play Sabrina Fair by Samuel Taylor. It involves a chauffeurs daughter, who growing up has been madly in love with the younger brother of a rich family on Long Island. She travels to Paris for cooking school and when she gets back, it is the older brother who she falls in love with. Of course the only reason why the older brother, who has never been in love before, pretends to like Sabrina is because dissolving her crush on the younger brother would allow a major business deal to go through.

Bogie did not fare well on the set. He was out of his element with the people around him. There was no John Huston to drink with after hours. There was no Peter Lorre to help play practical jokes with. There was Billy Wilder, Audrey Hepburn and William Holden on the set. All three knew each other and got along wonderfully. Bogie basically felt left out and stuck to himself while on the set.

He had a great respect for Billy Wilder. Wilder was a master at the farce, his movie Some Like It Hot (1959) was named the number one comedy of all time by the American Film Institute. He had already come off success with Sunset Boulevard (1950) and The Lost Weekend (1945). His comedic touch was perfected here in Sabrina and carried over throughout the rest of the 1950s.

The relationship between Bogie and Hepburn was not a good one. Bogie despised her on the set. He complained that she never knew her lines and that it took too many takes to get her scenes right. Because Hepburn was familiar with Wilder, he felt the director was not hard enough on the actress. This further alienated him.

As for Holden, Bogie didn’t really get along with him because they came at it with two different acting styles. Holden was a Method Actor, while Bogie was a naturalistic one. Since the Method style was replacing the naturalistic style at this time, Bogie became paranoid. He figured that since Holden and Wilder were friends, Hepburn would end up falling for Holden’s character at the end of the movie. Of course everyone, including Bogie, realized that this would be the smart thing for Hepburn’s character to do. The only reason why this didn’t happen is because, as Wilder pointed out, Bogie was the highest paid actor on the set. He had to walk away with the girl if he was being paid that much money.

Once the movie was finished shooting, Bogie was surprised at how good it was. Critics were surprised that Bogie could actually pass as a comedic actor. The fans absolutely loved the movie. It is still a special film to watch today. It was remade recently by Harrison Ford, but you can’t tell me that a movie with Harrison Ford is going to be better than one starring Humphrey Bogart, Audrey Hepburn, William Holden and directed by Billy Wilder.

Sabrina has good acting for the stars and great writing, but the secondary characters stand out as well, especially Walter Hampden as the father of the rich family. Hitchcock fans will also recognize the chauffeur as John Williams, who appeared in the most Hitchcock movies.

"Ahh, but the strawberries that's... that's where I had them."

2008-11-24T10:07:00.000-08:00

The year 1954 would be a great one for Humphrey Bogart. He would have four movies released that year. It would be the last time in his career that he would have so many movies released in one year. The first to be released was the quirky Beat the Devil. The next was probably the best of the four, The Caine Mutiny. The other two were stellar as well and will be looked at this week.

Herman Wouk won a Pulitzer Prize for the book, “The Caine Mutiny.” It was an enticing project for any production company. Stanley Kramer was fortunate enough to acquire the rights to the book. He got a distribution deal through Columbia Pictures and was immediately in business. Two major stars, Bogie and Fred MacMurray, were signed on. Van Johnson and Jose Ferrer were added to make the cast something special. It is interesting to note, that much like The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), Bogie is surrounded by talented male actors. The typical Hollywood formula dictates that there needs to be a big male and big female role in order to make a success. This movie didn’t need that.

What it has is great performances. Bogie, who was nominated for his third Academy Award, is perfect as the paranoid Captain Queeg, new commander of the U.S.S. Caine, a destroyer/mine sweeper in the Pacific.

Queeg is the new sheriff in town. The Caine had been run by a lax commander. The crew of the ship understood that the Caine wasn’t going to see much action, due to it being an ancient ship. So things were relaxed before Queeg appeared. MacMurray and Johnson play officers on the ship who clash at times with Queeg’s paranoid personality.

Queeg happens to do everything by the book and allows these strict regulations to interfere with important tasks. Such as his first task as new captain of the Caine involves tugging targets out so that destroyers can practice. Queeg gets so angry at one of his men for an untucked shirt, that he doesn’t realize his ship has cut its tow line, costing the government money.

MacMurray’s character, the wannabe novelist, Lt. Keefer, picks up quickly on Queeg’s perceived paranoia. He gets the other officers to believe that there is something psychologically wrong with their captain. This point is perfectly demonstrated when the Caine is involved in leading an invasion of an island. While the other boats in the Caine’s class continue toward the island to help support the drop boats, the Caine pulls up short as Queeg becomes afraid of the ship being damaged by enemy fire. This earns Queeg the nickname of “Old Yellow Spot.”

Things don’t get better for the crew of the Caine though. The captain makes a big deal over what he believes is some stolen strawberries. This comical scene is famous and it also helps prove Keefer’s point that the captain is crazy.

That is not all though, because during a terrible storm, Queeg is forced to make a decision about what to do. He wants to stay the course and whether the storm, even though his advisors have told him that it would mean certain suicide. This is where the movie gets its name from, spurred on by Keefer, the leadership on the Caine switches from Queeg to executive officer Maryk, played by Van Johnson. The Caine mutiny has occurred and Queeg makes sure Maryk is brought before a court marshal.

Here Lt. Greenwald, Jose Ferrer, defends Maryk. Expecting some help from Keefer, Maryk is disappointed when Keefer acts just as cowardly as Queeg does when he testifies. So in a desperate attempt to save his client, Lt. Greenwald has to push the unstable Queeg, to prove the instability present in the ships commander. This is the best scene in the movie and the one that earned Bogie his Oscar nomination. Rolling steel balls in his hands, Queeg breaks down on the stand. The speech is one of the best acted in film history.

Of course, Queeg’s testimony proves that he is missing something upstairs, so Maryk isn’t court-martialed. The ending involves a bittersweet crew of the Caine drinking champagne. Maryk knows Keefer is a coward and Greenwald is disappointed that the Navy is losing one of its most loyal captains. It is a fitting ending to a movie that has been well crafted throughout. The Caine Mutiny is a fantastic watch today and has been restored well on DVD.

"Do you know what I say? I say time is a crook."

2008-11-21T09:02:00.000-08:00

By the year 1953 things were winding down for Humphrey Bogart. He had won his only Academy Award. It had been over a decade since he played Rick Blaine in Casablanca (1942). It would be time for him to end his film partnerships with John Huston and Peter Lorre.

The successful cast and crew of The Maltese Falcon (1941) would join once again for 1953’s Beat the Devil. At least, that was the idea. Beat the Devil is more of a parody of the classic film noirs in which Bogie, Lorre and Huston made. It would be the final time for the three to work together. Sydney Greenstreet, the normal rotund bad guy, had retired from acting. He is replaced in this movie by Robert Morley, who had appeared in The African Queen (1951) with Bogie as Katherine Hepburn’s missionary brother.

Here the cast is in Italy. The story is odd and all over the place. This is probably because the script was being written day by day. Truman Capote worked with Huston on the script. For the most part, the movie is just about Bogie, Morely and Lorre having a good time together. Huston focuses much more on this than an actual story. The three seem to enjoy each others company and Jennifer Jones and Gina Lollobrigida seem to go along for the ride. Lollobrigida was making her American film debut.

Basically, Bogie is a con man. He happens to team up with a group of four men, led by Lorre and Morely, who are after uranium deposits in Kenya. Actually, “team up” isn’t the right phrase. Apparently Bogie isn’t the suave gentleman he acts like while interacting with wife Gina Lollobrigida. He happens to be a low-life who doesn’t have any money. He owes the four men some money. He placates them by saying they can go to Kenya with him to claim the uranium. Of course the four agree and the majority of the movie is spent waiting for a steamer to take the group to Kenya.

Once on board, high jinks ensue and when they arrive in Kenya, it is not what they expect. Here is The Maltese Falcon reference. It is not about the jeweled bird, or the uranium in this case, but about the quest for something unattainable and what human beings will do to get it. It is a common theme throughout Huston’s work. It is at its most comical here. The group is arrested by natives, but Bogie happens to sweet talk the chief and the group escapes. They end up back in Italy and the movie comes to a close.

When it was released, Beat the Devil did not do well at the box office. In later years, the movie became appreciated for the people who appeared and worked on it. It never made money for Bogie and he was disappointed in that. He himself never liked the film. In fact, it did so poorly, the copyright was not renewed and the movie is currently in the public domain. This might be one of the reasons why the prints of the movie are not of high quality, even on DVD.

This seems to be a movie that you are either a fan of, or you can’t stand. Personally, I think it has some strong points, but the talent associated with it deserved better. Not a great final picture for the trio of Lorre, Bogie and Huston.

"One thing in the world I hate: leeches. Filthy little devils."

2008-11-19T09:45:00.000-08:00

The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences is odd. Every year the Oscars seem to be more political than about who is the most talented. People like Humphrey Bogart, John Wayne and Alfred Hitchcock won only an Oscar apiece. Hitchcock received his for lifetime achievement, not best director. Groucho Marx is the same story. For some reason, these legends of the screen were only allowed to win one Oscar. Their work has lasted over 75 years in some cases, yet they were underappreciated by the Academy when they were alive. Maybe that is because they were too popular with the public and the Academy preferred to reward “artistic” performers.

No matter though, the Academy does some great work. For Humphrey Bogart though, like the others, it was hard to see your name at the top of box office lists year in and year out, yet never be able to hold an Oscar. He had been nominated before, for Casablanca (1942), but didn’t win. He gave his best performance in Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), yet didn’t even get nominated. So when he was nominated for The African Queen (1951), there was much doubt as to Bogie’s winning the award. The favorite to win was Marlon Brando for his performance in A Streetcar Named Desire (1951).

As the Academy tends to do, there was an upset and the favored Brando would have to wait three more years before winning his first Academy Award. Bogie received the award for playing the drunken, yet lovable Charlie Allnut.

The story surrounding The African Queen is famous. It was recounted brilliantly by Bogie’s co-star, the tremendous actress Katherine Hepburn in “The Making of The African Queen – Or How I Went to Africa With Bogart, Bacall and Huston and Almost Lost My Mind.”

Before arriving in Africa though, there were some things that needed to be changed in the screenplay that had appeared in C.S. Forester’s novel. Namely, the Allnut character had to become Canadian and not English. In the novel, Allnut was written to have a strong Cockney accent. Bogie was unable to do this, so the screenplay was rewritten so that he could speak “normally.” That’s how you win an Academy Award.

John Huston was famous for taking his cast and crew to the farthest ends of the Earth during location shoots. Traveling through Africa was a dream for him. He had a blast on the trip. While not shooting the picture, he was off shooting game. At nights, he and Bogie would take shots, much to the annoyance of Katherine Hepburn.

Bogie and Huston got the last laugh. Everyone on the location shoot ended up getting sick because of the mosquitoes and tainted water. Bogie and Huston only drank Scotch on the trip. The Scotch provided protection for the two whenever a mosquito bit them, Bogie joked.

The African Queen is a fairly interesting because of the interaction between Hepburn and Bogie. There really is no change in Bogie’s character from previous movies. He is the cynical, drunkard who is inspired by a woman who he falls in love with to change his ways and join the side of right. Hepburn plays the idealistic sister of a British missionary. The chemistry between the two is great.

On a rather tragic note, Bogie and Bacall had a death in the family while filming began. Bogie and Bacall left for London, where studio work was done for The African Queen. As the plane left, Stephen, their son, and his nanny stood waving at the plane. Unfortunately, the nanny had a stroke, collapsed, and died right there. It was the first time his parents had ever left him alone and his nanny died minutes after their plane left. Needless to say, that probably had a serious affect on Stephen. He has managed to be a fairly successful author, but has struggled to come to grips with his famous father. Perhaps this is a reason why.

The African Queen is a great movie because there is a small cast. Bogie and Hepburn control most of the screen time. Because we go on a thrilling journey through the heart of Africa, with such wonderful guides, we remember this movie. Maybe that is why the Academy remembered Bogie come Oscar time.

"It was his story against mine, but of course, I told my story better. "

2008-11-13T16:48:00.000-08:00

A Humphrey Bogart movie that is often overlooked, but tremendous is In a Lonely Place (1950). The movie was produced by Santana Pictures. I don’t quite know why it is overlooked by those writing about Humphrey Bogart. It is almost as if his career went from Treasure of the Sierra Madre to The African Queen (1951). There were a string of movies in between, most not worthy of mention, but In A Lonely Place is certainly worth noting.

Perhaps it is worth noting because according to most people who knew Bogie, the Dixon Steele character he played in the movie was the closest to the real person. At least when Bogie got drunk that is.

Dixon Steele is a washed-up screenwriter. He still has connections in the business though and actually gets an offer to adapt a novel for the screen. The problem is, Steele doesn’t want to read the book. So he has the hat check girl at the restaurant his meeting is being held at finish reading the book and then tell him the plot. Of course, being a writer, Steele can’t work in a restaurant, he wants the comforts of home. So he takes the girl home with him.

She has to break a date with her boyfriend, but doesn’t seem to mind the chance to help a Hollywood screenwriter. The girl recites the novel’s plot to Steele, who is not amused. Anyway, it is late and Steele is tired, so he sends the girl out into the cruel night with some money for a cab.

A few hours later, there is a knock on Bogie’s door and the police come to question him. Apparently the girl was murdered and Bogie was the last one to see her. He has to fight off the police and his only friend is neighbor Laurel Gray, played by Gloria Grahame. The small-time actress takes a liking to Bogie’s face and the two fall for each other.

This inspires Steele to write and the couple plans on getting married after this unfortunate incident with the police is cleared up. Unfortunately for their plans, Steele posses a temper. One that can inflict violence on another person. So the question is posed to the audience, did Dixon Steele commit murder? He certainly seems capable of doing it.

This is a good film noir. It is directed by Nicholas Ray, who directed Bogie in Knock on Any Door. It was based on the novel written by Dorothy B. Hughes, who wrote crime novels. This one takes place in Los Angeles, but the author spent most of her life in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

One of the reasons why this movie might not get as much attention as it should have, is because it came out in a year when movies about the underworld of Hollywood were popular. Sunset Boulevard and All About Eve got all the attention that year. Perhaps it was because they had more established stars and directors working on them. Plus they had the benefit of being produced by Paramount and 20^th Century Fox respectively. Had Bogie’s company not produced the movie and had there been bigger stars to join him on screen, the movie would have gotten more attention. Of course it might not have been as good as it turned out to be. At least today’s audiences have an opportunity to see this forgotten classic.

"Live fast, die young, leave a good-looking corpse."

2008-11-12T12:37:00.000-08:00

As mentioned previously, Humphrey Bogart was a huge star who could dictate what roles he wanted to play and who directed his pictures. This was a rarity in the 1940s. With the coming of the 50s, the old Hollywood studio system began to fall apart. Independent production companies were sprouting up as Congress began to investigate the monopoly in the movie industry. A select few stars created their own production companies during this period. Humphrey Bogart was one of them. His company, Santana Productions, produced four movies before being ruled a failure commercially. Santana was taken from Bogie’s yacht, not the guitar player.

The idea behind Santana was to have Bogie take a good story and include talented young actors and directors in the making of the movie. He would star to add box office weight and provide guidance to the younger people. The first movie produced by Santana was Knock on Any Door (1949).

Bogie plays a defense lawyer who has the tough task of proving career criminal Nick Romano, played by John Derek. Romano has come from the slums, just as Bogie’s character, Andrew Morton, has. Romano’s father died while in prison, Morton had been hired to defend Romano’s father, but failed to get him off. The Romano family blamed Morton for the father’s death. Morton felt terrible for what happened, but it wasn’t good enough for Nick. Nick quickly joined the wrong crowd and we see how Morton tried to step in each time to help Nick out. It didn’t work and now Nick is on trial for his life. He has been accused of shooting a police officer.

This is all standard film-noir, courtroom stuff. What makes this different is the fact that Bogie is playing the lawyer, not the criminal. When Bogie was Derek’s age he probably would have been Romano’s character, while Edward G. Robinson or James Cagney would be Morton. It just shows the growth of Bogie’s career in a decade.

As with most Hollywood movies that are not outstanding, this one suffers from what might have been. Originally, Marlon Brando was slated to play the role of Nick Romano. John Derek gives a capable performance, but he is no Brando. It would have been one of those rare movies in which you could see two greats with opposite styles of acting come together on-screen. Brando was famous for The Method technique, while Bogie was a naturalistic actor.

Anyway, had the Brando and Bogie tandem worked, the movie would have been produced by Mark Hellinger, not Santana. Hellinger had the rights to the book and had both Brando and Bogie on board. He unfortunately passed away before the movie could be made. Santana acquired the rights and made the movie with John Derek, since Brando’s man Hellinger was no longer involved in the project.

Nicholas Ray was brought on to direct. This was one of his first films, yet he seems completely comfortable in the film noir genre. He would go on to direct James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause (1955).

Overall, Knock on Any Door is a quality picture. It is perfect for the film noir fans. But all the attention paid to the Romano character just doesn’t seem worth it when he isn’t played by Marlon Brando.

"Show it your gun, why don't you? If it doesn't stop, shoot it."

2008-11-06T15:58:00.000-08:00

The screen tandem of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall only appeared in four movies. The last of these four was Key Largo (1948). It can be argued that it is the best of the four, but even if it is not, the movie doesn’t lack star power in front of the camera or behind it.

Key Largo is basically a recycled gangster picture from the 1930s, just set in the 1940s. What makes this movie so different from the other gangster pictures Bogie made or those pictures in which he is the cynical hero, is that this movie features tremendous performances and on-point camera work and direction.

Bogie plays Frank McCloud, a decorated World War II veteran who comes to Florida to find the father and widow of a soldier McCloud served with. The widow is played by Lauren Bacall. The father, who happens to be the owner of a hotel in Key Largo, is played by Lionel Barrymore. Of course this little family reunion of sorts, actually it is more of a remembrance, is a touching event, but doesn’t make for a good story. What is missing is a bad guy. The bad guy shows up in the form of Edward G. Robinson as Johnny Rocco.

Robinson plays a similar character to his Little Caesar. It is as if we see what might have happened to Little Caesar 15 years later had he not been killed. Rocco is the last gangster out there. He has been on the run for a few years, but has now decided to make his return to America. He is waiting at the out-of-season hotel in order to buy time while his friends stop by to make a deal that will get Rocco enough capital to restart his empire.

As is typical in gangster pictures, the gangster begins to bark out orders and dominates the place he is staying at. He holds Bogie, Bacall and Barrymore hostage. Claire Trevor won an Oscar for best supporting actress as the drunken ex-girlfriend of Rocco. Since Rocco has been away for so long, he can’t believe the changes he has seen in the once beautiful girl.

In Key Largo, Bogie is the only one who can stop the gangsters. Barrymore is confined to a wheelchair, Bacall and Trevor can’t take on Rocco and his gang and there are no other guests in the hotel. To make matters worse, there is a hurricane, so no police can be called. Bogie decides at first not to fight the gangsters, figuring it isn’t worth the price he could pay. But like Rick Blaine and many other characters Bogie played, Frank McCloud turns over a new leaf and fights back.

Key Largo was a play written in 1939 by Maxwell Anderson. It involved a Spanish Civil War veteran who was a coward and deserted. He went to seek out the family of a great hero who had died in the war. When the gangsters appear, the coward sees this as a chance to regain some respect. He ends up being killed by the gangsters and when the police come to ask who the dead man is, the father replies he was his son who had been a great Spanish Civil War hero.

This is all very nice and touching, but would never fly in Hollywood. So John Huston went to work on a more Hollywood story. He came up with some good changes and brought his story to life through the great cast. His direction is good, but the cinematography is special here. Karl Freund, who was cinematographer on Dracula (1931) and Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927), did a masterful job of creating eerie shadows during the hurricane. The black-and-white cinematography is well done.

Key Largo is packed with some of the best of Hollywood’s Golden Age. Bogie, Bacall, Barrymore, Trevor and Robinson are all great in their roles. There is even a brief appearance by the Native American actor Jay Silverheels, who would go on to become Tonto, the friend of the Lone Ranger. The quality isn’t just in front of the camera though, the original story was written by Maxwell Anderson, John Huston co-wrote the screenplay and directed and Karl Freund put his skills with the camera to good use here. This makes Key Largo and great sendoff to the screen tandem of Bogie and Bacall.

"Badges? We ain't got no badges."

2008-11-05T17:38:00.000-08:00

Humphrey Bogart was the biggest star in the world in 1947. He used his box office stardom as a vehicle to get him the largest contract in Hollywood history at that point. He also received some power from Warner Bros. – namely script and director approval. His first major movie with the new power was The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948).

The script for the movie had been on the shelves of the Warner lot for many years. They were just waiting for the right writer to come along and work out some kinks. The writer would be John Huston, who had returned from working for the government making films during World War II. This was a movie he wanted to make before the war, but was unable to.

Sierra Madre was based on the book by B. Traven. Traven was a mysterious man who never showed his face and enjoyed great fame by being anonymous. He was rumored to be a Communist and one of his stipulations in selling the rights to any of his books was that it could not be sold to any capitalist country. Some how, Warners got the rights.

For a major star, the role of Fred C. Dobbs was a risk. Even the movie itself was a risk. There is no female lead and really no females in the story at all – the only ones who appear do so in the background of the Indian camp. This is a male dominated movie, which might turn some people off. It is also a deeply moralistic one, which makes it worth watching.

Three American prospectors: Howard, Curtin and Dobbs, traverse the wilderness of Mexico in search for gold. Upon reaching the mountains and finding their fortune, some strange things happen to the characters. Howard, played by Walter Huston, is the old man who has been through the battles. He knows how to prospect and is only brought along by the two younger men because of his knowledge. He predicts that once the gold is found, the power of it will change the two younger men. He is right in his prediction, but is basically powerless to stop the greed. He volunteers to help a group of Indians who have a sick child. He saves the child’s life and is asked to be the medicine man for the Indians. Howard enjoys his role as the sage with the Indians more than he did with the young Americans.

Curtin is a different man. He seems to be the same type of man as Dobbs in the beginning. The two of them meet while working in the town of Tampico. The two are American outcasts, so they join forces. When the man who hired them doesn’t pay them, Dobbs and Curtin take the boss for a little ride to get their money. With their money, they find Howard and take off for the Mexican mountains. Curtin reacts the most admirably of the two youngsters. The gold takes hold of him, he even thinks seriously about Dobbs’ suggestion that they take Howard’s gold while he is off at the Indian camp. But in the end, Curtin is not corrupted by the gold. In fact, when the gold is lost in the wind, Curtin looks at it as a blessing. He is now free to pursue his dream of a farm, while not having to worry about protecting his fortune.

Dobbs is pure evil. This is a change that most major Hollywood stars would never make. Bogie did it, playing the bad guy, and was successful in it. Dobbs is what makes the movie. His decent into madness is something special to watch. It is also something that would not have happened had another actor played the role. Bogie had plenty of experience playing the evil gangster and the man with morals. In Tampico, Bogie has some morals. He fights for his money when he and Curtin are taken for a ride by their employer. He seeks out Howard and puts up Curtin’s half for the expedition. But when that gold power comes rolling in, Dobbs becomes paranoid. He believes the two other men are trying to take his gold. In order to prevent this, he decides to take theirs.

He encourages Howard to go to the Indian camp. Then when Howard is away, he tries killing Curtin. Believing he has been successful, he takes Howard’s and Curtin’s gold, along with his, and tries to make it back to Tampico. He almost makes it, but some Mexican bandits stop him and kill him. The bandits are after guns and money; they believe the pouches the burros are carrying are filled with sand. So they dump all the gold out of the pouches in order to make it into town to sell the burros.

Their plot is stopped and they are rounded up and executed. By the time Curtin comes around and finds Howard at the Indian camp, none of the gold can be found as a wind storm has scattered the power throughout the desert.

Sierra Madre is the best performance of Bogart’s career, yet he was not nominated for an Academy Award. The picture won two awards. John Huston took home the best director Oscar and his father, Walter, took home the best supporting actor award.

"He went for a little walk! You should have seen his face!"

2008-10-31T14:14:00.000-07:00

Happy Halloween. The last major Universal horror picture produced in the 1930s and 40s that I have not discussed is The Mummy (1932). It has become the most successful modern franchise as the Brendan Frazier remake and sequels have been huge hits in the late-90s and early-00s.

The Mummy was the first classic horror picture from Universal that was not based on a book, or even a myth for that matter. Egypt and mummies have always fascinated the Western world. For many centuries the tombs have been dug up in the name of science or looted in the name of greed. In 1922 the tomb of King Tut was uncovered. This sparked a new wave of interest in Egyptology.

The interest in Egypt was still strong a decade later when Carl Laemmele Jr. decided to add another monster to the Universal rogues gallery. He commissioned some writers to find a novel about something scary in ancient Egypt. There was no such book in print, so Laemmele had the writers come up with an original story.

Like most things in Hollywood, the writing process was long and took a number of writers to accomplish. But when it was all finished, Laemmele had his mummy story. John L. Balderston was a writer involved with the project. He had also received writing credits on Dracula (1931) and Frankenstein (1931). He also covered the discovery of King Tut’s tomb for the “New York World” in 1922. So he was somewhat familiar with Egypt and its ancient traditions. He was sure familiar with the excitement and tragedy surrounding the opening of a tomb.

Karl Freund was brought in to direct. He had been cinematographer on Dracula. Jack Pierce once again did the make-up. This was a much more challenging role for him, at least during the beginning scenes when Boris Karloff is covered in bandages and his skin is so wrinkled with age. Karloff was the mummy of course and he had to endure more long hours in the make-up chair. He is great in this movie as he was in Frankenstein.

There isn’t much else that can be said about The Mummy that hasn’t been said about the other Universal movies. It is more interesting than scary. Eerie in places, comical in others to today’s audiences. Still, it is worthwhile to watch, especially on Halloween night.

"Even a man who is pure in heart and says his prayers by night, may become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms and the autumn moon is bright."

2008-10-29T13:57:00.000-07:00

Unlike Frankenstein, Dracula and The Invisible Man, The Wolf Man (1941) was not based on any book. The roots of Curt Siodmak’s screenplay come from folklore. Just like vampires, a person turning into wolves was, and still is, a popular legend in central and Eastern Europe. From these legends, Siodmak wrote the screenplay for The Wolf Man.

To be accurate, it should be noted that The Wolf Man was not the first werewolf movie to make it onto the movie screen. In 1935, Universal made the Werewolf of London. Unlike Nosferatu (1922), the first incarnation of the Dracula myth on the screen, Werewolf of London was not successful at all. So what changed this time?

Typically the tastes of an audience are a big reason why a particular movie fails. But Universal released the first werewolf tale during their first string of classic horror pictures. Dracula and Frankenstein had been made four years before, The Mummy just three and The Invisible Man two. By the time The Wolf Man was released, all of Universal’s major monsters were running out of sequels. Perhaps adding a new monster, the werewolf, to enhance the stale sequels of Universal is a reason for the success of the second foray into werewolf land.

Another major reason for the success of the movie was the inclusion of a star and a well-known, yet less established, name. Claude Rains got the role of Sir John Talbot. He demanded he get top billing and a nice addition to his bank account in return for his services. The people at Universal agreed to Rains’ terms and they were rewarded with a solid performance, but more importantly, a big name.

Another big name in horror movies was Lon Chaney. Chaney was a tremendous talent with make-up during the silent era. His Quasimodo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) and his Phantom from The Phantom of the Opera (1925) are still capable of sending chills up the spins of audience members. He had a son named Creighton, better known as Lon Chaney Jr. For the most part, Chaney Jr. had an unspectacular film career up to 1941. He was not in the same league as his father.

In 1939 he got the role of Lennie in Of Mice and Men. He was critically acclaimed. He had his big break and Universal didn’t feel as if it was much of a risk to cast him as Larry Talbot in The Wolf Man. Chaney Jr. would go on to play the werewolf role in the sequels Universal made. He also got to play many of the other horror monsters in the long string of sequels.

The supporting cast is stellar in this movie. Bela Lugosi plays Bela, the fortune teller and first werewolf. Evelyn Ankers is good in the female lead. Maria Ouspenskaya is brilliant as a gypsy. It seems odd watching the movie today and seeing gypsies in it. There just aren’t that many gypsies in today’s world.

It would be hard to remake this movie today because of the relative lack of belief today’s audiences have regarding gypsies. But that doesn’t stop Hollywood, because a remake has been announced. The movie is expected to be released in 2009, probably around this time.

Much like the remake of King Kong (1933), I expect this remake to upgrade the special effects of the movie, but completely miss the boat when it comes to the story. That is what typically happens in today’s Hollywood. Jack Pierce was in charge of the special effects on this movie. He did a great job turning Lon Chaney Jr.’s body into a wolf’s. The costume worn by Chaney was made of yak hair. It took him hours of make-up each day to pull off the look. You have to hand it to people like Jack Pierce who were talented enough to make a believable costume without the aide of computers. It is unfortunate that today’s filmmakers are too lazy to figure out creative ways to deal with similar problems. They just hand their problems off to computer geeks who CGI it all.

"The whole world's my hiding place!"

2008-10-28T15:32:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I mentioned that I preferred the movie version of Frankenstein to the book because the movie shows me the steps Dr. Frankenstein went through to create his monster. Today’s movie is the exact opposite of this. I prefer the book to the movie.

Motion pictures are aptly named. They rely almost completely on sight for a moviegoer to understand the story. So when your title character happens to be invisible -- things might not be too good for the movie. That is the case with The Invisible Man (1933), another Universal horror movie directed by James Whale.

The book by H.G. Wells is much better than the movie. One of the biggest differences between a book and a movie is that in a book you can get inside a character’s head easily. This has to happen when your character spends the majority of his time being invisible. Even third person narration allows the reader to “see” where the invisible man is going because of the words written by the author. These are not present in the movie. All we see are footprints in the snow or indentions in the carpet. It is hard to see where the invisible man is – obviously.

The movie is good in that it visualizes the fantasy of being invisible. This is a fantasy that everyone has had at some point in their life. Beginning with the innocence of reeking havoc on a small village through bottles being thrown across the room and bicycles being peddled by no apparent person. Then the fantasy turns dangerous as Dr. Jack Griffith, our invisible man, begins plotting a race of super-humans who are invisible and unstoppable by armies or police.

The Invisible Man also stands out because it is the first screen appearance of Claude Rains. The famed character actor got a staring role here. He would also appear in another Universal horror picture, The Wolf Man (1941). He was cast as Dr. Griffith, not because of his ability to act, but because of his voice. He is only clearly seen at the end of the movie when the invisible man becomes visible.

Rains had been injured by mustard gas in World War I. Because of this, he was nearly blind in one eye. His injuries didn’t help him act at first. He had made a screen test that was viewed by the people at Universal. Everyone there agreed that Rains couldn’t act, but James Whale insisted on using him. Rains’ unique voice was the reason Whale citied.

Rains got the part. His voice became the star. The bandages that he wore must have helped his acting because he would go on to have a long and distinguished Hollywood acting career that spanned four decades.

Although the movie is very similar to the book, much to the delight of H.G. Wells, there are some differences. In the novel, Griffith was portrayed as a mad scientist from the beginning with no regrets. He is not completely mad in the movie. It is a decent into madness, as mentioned above, that transcends the innocent scientific reasons for invisibility and turns them into vicious motives for murder. The other major, although certainly acceptable, difference between the book and the movie is the book takes place in the 1890s, while the movie occurs in 1933. Nothing wrong with the modernization of the story.

The Invisible Man is a pretty faithful adaptation of the hit novel. It is also the first starring role for Claude Rains. For these reasons, and the fact that everyone has had the fantasy of being invisible, this movie is well worth watching.

"It's alive, it's moving, it's alive, it's alive, it's alive, it's alive, IT'S ALIVE!"

2008-10-27T15:42:00.000-07:00

I haven’t gotten through all the Humphrey Bogart movies yet, but since Friday is Halloween, I thought I’d take a break and discuss some of the classic Universal horror pictures.

I have already discussed Dracula (1931). Another movie was released in 1931 and like Dracula it is more interesting than scary to watch. Frankenstein (1931) redefined the Frankenstein monster created by Mary Shelley in 1818. Today, the monster is called Frankenstein and he is portrayed as a dangerous mute.

Personally, I like the movie much more than the book. I wouldn’t say it is better than the book, it is just that when scientific things are discussed, I’d rather see them to believe them, rather than be told that these processes actually can happen. In the movie I can see the monster being made and the steps taken by Dr. Frankenstein to create him. In the book, this is not really present.

Of course the biggest reason why I prefer the movie to the book is probably because I had seen the movie before reading the book. The movie is so ingrained in our culture that when I read the book, I had a hard time believing the two were the same story. Why is this? Why has the Frankenstein monster, or creature as Boris Karloff liked it to be called, been associated more with the movie than the book? As mentioned in the previous sentence, Boris Karloff might be a big reason.

Karloff is known today for his horror roles. He played characters in horror movies and horror spoofs throughout his career. There are not many well-known movies in which he doesn’t appear in either of these roles, one exception is Scarface (1932). He is masterful here as the creature. Like the previous king of the horror movie, Lon Chaney, Karloff had the perfect bone structure for make-up. He could transform his face easily. This is one of the reasons why his portrayal is so successful. He looks scary. If you can get a monster to look scary, there isn’t much more that needs to be done.

The role was hard on Karloff. He ended up needing a couple back surgeries throughout the rest of his life because of damage done to it during the filming of this movie. He wore all black when the crew was filming outdoors in 90 degree heat. He had to arrive hours early each day to have make-up applied to his face. He then had to wait around after the long shooting day to have the make-up removed. It is all worth it though. His portrayal of the creature has lasted over 75 years and shows no signs of slowing down. His effect on popular culture is the same as Bela Lugosi’s Count Dracula.

Frankenstein was directed by James Whale and starred Colin Clive as Dr. Frankenstein. Whale was a talented director and gave the movie its great atmosphere. The atmosphere is still present in the movie after 75 years. This is another reason why Frankenstein is still a nice movie to watch – the atmosphere is eerie. Whale used some German expressionistic techniques in this movie. It would become a staple of the horror film at Universal. It would also be a staple of film noir in the 1940s. Darkness and long shadows along with rain and nighttime are hallmarks of the German expressionism technique. Whale and Clive are mentioned in the same paragraph because they each met tragic ends. Whale committed suicide. Clive died when he was 37.

Colin Clive and James Whale are probably only remembered because of their work on Frankenstein and The Bride of Frankenstein (1935). Clive was a great Dr. Frankenstein. Unlike the doctor in the book, Clive’s has a sense of madness about him. You know anyone who would attempt to recreate life has something missing upstairs, but you never really felt that in the book. Here we see Clive descend into madness. He is obsessed with finishing his project, that was never the case with Dr. Frankenstein in Miss Shelley’s book. Unfortunately, the actor’s life mirrored the doctor’s. Clive descended into his own sort of madness, becoming an alcoholic and dieing of pneumonia because of his chronic alcoholism in 1937.

Despite what might have happened to its cast and crew members after making it, Frankenstein remains relevant over 75 years after its initial release. It is not scary, but it is still worth watching, just so you can see where all the popular culture references come from. Jack Pierce, who did make-up on the movie, needs to be mentioned. He did a fantastic job on all of the Universal horror movies, but his job with Boris Karloff here is special. Also Dwight Frye and Edward Van Sloan make appearances here. They had been members of the Dracula cast.

"I have a feeling this is going to be the beginning of a beautiful hatred."

2008-10-24T15:24:00.000-07:00

Humphrey Bogart and Barbara Stanwyck were two huge movie stars. They also happened to be under contract to Warner Brothers for many years. It is amazing that they only made one movie together. That being The Two Mrs. Carrolls (1947).

The movie has been dismissed by most critics. Bogie plays a painter who lives in England. He doesn’t even try to use an English accent. Neither does his creepy daughter from his first wife or his new wife, played by Barbara Stanwyck. Basically they are act American because that is what their audience expects them to be and the setting was moved to England because the director thought the scenery would go better with the story.

Basically the story involves Bogie painting his wives as the Angel of Death before killing them with a glass of warm milk. Suspicion (1941) this is not. It is not as good as the Hitchcock movie, but for someone who is a fan of Bogie and Stanwyck, this does not matter.

Bogie has a wife in the city. He also has a daughter, but he has fallen for a rich woman from the country played by Stanwyck. So Bogie paints the first Mrs. Carroll as the Angel of Death and then kills her. He takes himself and his daughter to the countryside where they are to live happily ever after. That is, until Bogie gets other ideas about the new Mrs. Carroll. She seems to have the hots for one of her former childhood friends. Bogie doesn’t like this and he doesn’t like him. Unlike in future roles, for instance The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) or The Caine Mutiny (1954), we don’t see the slow decent into madness. This might be why those two movies are superior to this one. But really if the man will kill his first wife -- he is probably already mad, so there would be nothing to descend into.

I have always been a fan of Barbara Stanwyck. She could be tough in movies, Double Indemnity (1944), but she could also be sexy, The Lady Eve (1941). Through it all though, it seemed like she always played a conniving woman. Here she doesn’t do that. She is the loving housewife and is actually pretty stale when you compare her character here to the other ones of her career. It doesn’t matter; it is still Barbara Stanwyck and Humphrey Bogart on the screen together for their only time.

Watching this makes me think of what might have been. Stanwyck and Bogie would have made a great team in a real film noir. Instead of putting murder in the countryside among the rich, they would have been a lot more successful playing characters in the dark alleys of any major American city.

The typical Stanwyck character would have meshed well with the typical Bogie character. Both were smart, witty and pigheaded. We see none of that here. It is a huge disappointment considering the talent of each actor.

Of course it could have been worse. The two might never have made a movie. There were many talented people in Hollywood’s Golden Age who were at the same studio, but were never assigned to the same picture. Alfred Hitchcock is my favorite director. He once remarked that he enjoyed the subtle acting style present in actors like Humphrey Bogart. The two were at Warner Brothers during the same time period. Even if they weren’t, the two could have come together through another studio as each was big enough to dictate some terms of the movies they made. I don’t know if Bogie and Hitch would have gotten along. But I do know that the two had enough box office draw to make whatever they produced a success. Bogie could have been the perfect foil to James Stewart or Cary Grant in a Hitchcock picture. It just was never to be.

At least film fans get to see Bogie and Stanwyck on the screen together, even if they have not been cast to their strengths.

"It's a blue, sick world, Rip."

2008-10-22T16:37:00.000-07:00

After finishing the huge hit, The Big Sleep (1946), Humphrey Bogart went to work on an undistinguished pictured called Dead Reckoning (1947). Like many Hollywood Golden Age stars, this would be a common theme of Bogie’s career. Making one outstanding picture, but then following it up with one or two that had stories and directors below his talent level.

With actors not being able to choose which movies they could appear in, the studios controlled an actor’s career. This is one of the main reasons why the studio system was abolished. Today, modern stars have the ability to choose which movies they want to appear in. If they decide to act in a movie that is below their talents, then that is a decision they can make. People like Bogart never had that option.

At this point in his career, Bogie had script approval. He also had a deal where he could movies with other companies outside of Warner Brothers. Now, if Warners gave Bogie a script and he rejected it, he could be suspended without pay. He would be out of a job until Warners came up with a new story for him, or if he decided to make the original movie he was offered. Also Warners had the ability to override any other studios commitment to Bogie. If they wanted him to play a role in their own movie, he couldn’t go to Columbia and make a picture. So the actor had very little power in the days of the studios. Of course there were many advantages to the studio system, but that can be saved for another day.

In Dead Reckoning, Bogie plays Captain Rip Murdock, who is about to be rewarded with the Distinguished Service Cross. He is on a train with Sergeant Johnny Drake, William Prince, who is supposed to receive the Medal of Honor. On their trip to Washington, Drake disappears.

Being the smart military man that he is, Bogie tracks Drake to Gulf City, FL. Here he finds out that Drake has been killed -- incinerated in a car. In Florida we learn that Drake had joined the Army under an assumed name. He had to change his name because he had murdered a rich man. He had been in love with the rich man’s wife, Dusty, played by Lizabeth Scott. When he was set to receive the Medal of Honor, people in Gulf City would know that he was not who he claimed to be and the whole situation would blow up in his face so to speak.

So Bogie teams up with Coral to find out who was behind the Drake murder. A little hint for you all, film noir has an archetypical bad person. We all have The Maltese Falcon (1941) to thank for introducing this archetype into the culture.

This is a standard film noir. It has an interesting twist with the murdered person being a Medal of Honor recipient, but I would think the rise and fall of Drake would make for a better story than having Bogie run around Florida looking for Drake’s killer.

Florida has changed a great deal since this movie was made. There really is no other reason to watch the movie but to see the vast difference in the state. Of course if you are a film noir or Bogie fan, it still might be worth the watch.

"You're not very tall are you?"

2008-10-20T15:32:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite authors is Raymond Chandler. His most famous character is Phillip Marlowe. As great as the Chandler novels and stories involving Marlowe are, he is only remembered because of Humphrey Bogart’s characterization in The Big Sleep (1946).

Like The Maltese Falcon, this private eye seems to have been written with Bogie in mind. Marlowe is every bit as tough, shrewd and cynical as Sam Spade. Really the only differences between them are that Marlowe lives in Los Angeles and tackles those in high society, while Spade maneuvers around San Francisco and his cases revolve around less well-off people. Marlowe also carries a gun. Spade does not.

Although the book of The Big Sleep is better than the book, the same can’t be said of The Maltese Falcon, this is still a great movie. It might not have pioneered the genre of film noir or introduced the world to the direction of John Huston or the acting of Sydney Greenstreet, but The Big Sleep has plenty going for it.

It is much funnier than The Maltese Falcon, which is one of the reasons why I prefer Raymond Chandler to Dashiell Hammett, at least in regards to the Marlowe and Spade stories each wrote. The Big Sleep also has an adult plot, albeit one that is convoluted. This one involves sex and drugs; The Maltese Falcon was about jewels. The book is easier to follow than the movie, but that doesn’t seem to matter.

In The Big Sleep, the audience goes on the ride that Bogie and Lauren Bacall take us. All we know is Bogie has been hired by a rich man to figure out why he is being blackmailed by someone because of his daughter doing something wild. From there we meet the two daughters of old Mr. Sternwood. Lauren Bacall is Vivian, Mr. Sternwood’s oldest daughter who has already lost her husband. He ran out some time ago. The movie really doesn’t explore why, but the book does.

The part of Carmen Sternwood fell to Martha Vickers. She was so good in her role that Warner Brothers had to re-shoot some of the movie in order to beef up star Lauren Bacall’s part. The re-shot version is the one that was distributed to everyone in 1946. The original version has only recently been released. Bacall plays a larger role in the 1946 release version and because of this; it has become a film classic. The other version was good, but Warner Brothers made the right call when they released the re-shot version.

So basically Bogie as Marlowe is on a case to figure out why there is blackmail going on. The blackmailer gets shot, so the Sternwood family tells Marlowe to leave the case. He can’t he says, because he has fallen for Vivian. This is about as far as I will take the plot summery because I would hate to ruin the ending. I would also hate trying to figure out all the twists in the plot. Just watch the movie and enjoy the quality acting and chemistry of Bogie and Bacall.

This movie was also directed by Howard Hawks. His touches are present in the movie, as he was an extremely talented slapstick director. He does well with the one-liners that were provided by Raymond Chandler in the book, but he also adds some more of his own.

Arthur C. Clarke said about 2001: A Space Odyssey: to watch the movie and then read the book. Then watch the movie again and read the book again to make sure that you understand everything. That advice would work with The Big Sleep. The movie is great and contains most of the plot of the book, but the book is better and explains more. Everything is tied up into a little bow at the end of each, but, to me, the book does a better job of this. This is also the best movie made from a Raymond Chandler book. Just another reason to watch.

"Was you ever bit by a dead bee?"

2008-10-17T14:12:00.000-07:00

To Have and Have Not (1944) is a movie that needs to be watched multiple times. On the first watch it seems like an imitation of Casablanca (1942). Humphrey Bogart is an American in a foreign land. There is a pro-Vichy element in the government that is trying to stop a freedom fighter from starting a revolution. Bogie has to wrestle with the decision of whether he should join the fight of the rebels or remain on the sidelines. Like Rick, Bogie’s Harry ‘Steve’ Morgan makes the jump into the game on the side of the rebels.

Now this story is nice and everything, but what really makes this movie memorable is the chemistry between Bogie and the 19-year-old, Lauren Bacall, who is making her film debut here. The chemistry between them is tremendous. In later years Bogie would remark that the most fun of his life came during the making of this movie because he spent all the time he had off the set trying to impress Bacall, while trying to keep his relationship with her secret from his wife, Mayo Methot.

As much as Methot might object, there is no doubt that the two had a chemistry together. They became the Brad and Angelina of the 1940s. The power of the couple isn’t just something created by Hollywood hype, they were actually very talented actors. It is most prevalent here. In her first scene with Bogie in Bogie’s apartment, Bacall goes toe-to-toe with the veteran actor who had been nominated for an Academy Award two years earlier. Not many rookie actors could have handled it like she did.

The story of how the movie got made and how Bacall was involved and what other big names were involved make this one of the richest movies for film historians. Ernest Hemingway, who created Bogie like characters in his stories, wrote the novel To Have and Have Not in 1937. It is not one of his best, and he admitted that. In fact, when it was announced that the movie was going to be made and Bogie was going to star in it, he was disappointed. He felt there could have been better stories of his turned into movies and that Bogie could have been a better character than his Henry Morgan. Not much was used from Hemingway’s novel though for the film. Howard Hawks made sure only the best elements of the rambling novel were included in the movie. He constructed the rest with a little help from another well known author, William Faulkner.

I have gotten a bit ahead of myself. Warner Brothers was not the first studio to own the rights to To Have and Have Not. Those were bought by Howard Hughes, the eccentric American businessman. He couldn’t get the movie made so he agreed to sell the rights to Howard Hawks. Hawks had a protégée named Betty Bacall, who he wanted to start in movies. He had a property he could build on and just needed a studio. He took the idea to Warner Brothers and they accepted. Bogie was cast as the Hemingway hero Harry Morgan. Hawks changed Bacall's name to Lauren, as she hated the name Betty, and then went to work on the story with various writers including opposites Hemingway and Faulkner.

The end result is a great movie and one of the best first appearances in movies by a new actress in Bacall. The two characters of Bogie and Bacall call each other Steve and Slim. Steve was the nickname Howard Hawks’ wife called him. Hawks called her Slim.

The assortment of talent and big names who were involved in this movie make it a classic. It is a foreshadowing of the three other movies Bogie and Bacall appeared in together. They have a Spencer Tracy-Katherine Hepburn type chemistry here, except it has a deep vein of cynicism under the love. Walter Brennan is tremendous as Bogie's hard-drinking sidekick.

Capitalizing on Casablanca

2008-10-14T15:19:00.000-07:00

Flashbacks are considered to be cheap gimmicks in screenwriting. In modern movies there the technique is rarely applied. But in the movies of classic Hollywood, the flashback was an effective storytelling technique. One that some writers and producers fell too much in love with. A movie that employs the flashback to death is Passage to Marseille (1944).

The story begins with Claude Rains showing a group of English reporters around the English countryside. Or at least what looks like the English countryside during the day. At night all the livestock, hay and shrubbery is moved to create a miniature airbase in which Free French fighters fly missions to defeat the Nazis. Of course the reporters want to know how this all started and who is involved. So Rains starts off in flashback.

We are taken to a passenger ship in which Rains is traveling. Another traveler on the ship is the Pro-Vichy Major Duval, played by Sydney Greenstreet. On the way the ship picks up five convicts who have escaped from the French prison colony at Cayenne. Of course everyone knows they are dangerous criminals and Greenstreet is opposed to allowing them on. Rains says they should listen to the stories of the prisoners and if they are alright then they should be kept on.

So we go to another flashback. Each prisoner gets his story told. We learn that all the prisoners have special skills and because of those special skills they were able to escape the colony.

The star of the movie is Humphrey Bogart, so his story is told in the most detail. It is also told in flashback, but not by Bogie himself. It is the Peter Lorre character, Marius, who does the honors. We learn that Bogie ran a small newspaper that was anti-Nazi. When the Nazi’s invaded France the Vichy government cracked down on all opposition. So the paper run by Bogie was shut down and Bogie was framed for murder. He was sent to the prison colony at Cayenne. He had been well known in Paris and was well respected in the colony.

As we return from this flashback we are back on the ship. The ship is raided from the air by German planes. Of course Greenstreet is happy about this, but Bogie and friends come to the rescue of the ship. They shoot down the Nazi plane and Greenstreet. Everything seems great as we return to the present and Rains says the flyers are due to land soon.

When the reporters arrive, every plane has come in except for Bogie’s. The plane has been shot at and labors to the ground. There the pilot gets out, but not Bogie. Bogie has died and everyone becomes sad. The movie ends with Rains giving a patriotic eulogy.

What is more interesting than this movie is the story behind it. Of course having Claude Rains, Humphrey Bogart, Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre in the movie mean that Warner Brothers wanted to capture the chemistry of Casablanca (1942). Hal B. Wallis was brought in to produce. Michael Curtiz was brought in to direct. The costumes and lighting were done by the same people who worked on Casablanca. This movie doesn’t work though because the story is nowhere near as good as that of Casablanca.

Politics at the studio was also involved. Wallis and Jack L. Warner were on bad terms after the Casablanca episode described in one of my earlier posts. Wallis had a deal where he could produce any story he wanted and have full control over that production. He wanted to do Passage to Marseille with Humphrey Bogart. Bogie said alright, but Warner wanted him to do Conflict (1945) before that. Bogie didn’t want to do it. After threatening their biggest star and using him as a pawn in their own political game, it took death for Bogie to accept Warner’s movie.

Leslie Howard was a huge influence on Bogie. Bogie credited him for giving him the chance to break into movies. The two actors had the utmost respect for each other and kept in frequent contact. One day in 1943, on his way home from Lisbon, Howard’s plane was shot down. Everyone aboard died. Through the death of his friend, Bogie learned that movies are just movies and anyone is fine. He accepted his roles in Conflict and Passage to Marseille and did the best he could with those characters.

Stuck in the desert

2008-10-10T17:55:00.000-07:00

For me, the movie Sahara (1943) is similar to Lifeboat (1944). The two deal with being stranded in World War II. Obviously one is in the North African desert, while the other is in the Atlantic Ocean. In Sahara the only thing the characters have is a tank. In Lifeboat it is the boat. In both a group of allies: American, English and French are introduced to a German who needs to be rescued. In Sahara the German has been shot down by the tank commanded by Sergeant Joe Gunn, played by Humphrey Bogart. The Allies discuss among themselves about whether or not to accept the German prisoner. Despite Bogie’s wishes, it is decided that the German will be kept. In Lifeboat the characters encounter a German who has been shipwrecked, much like themselves, and decide to bring him on.

Now the two have tensions between the Axis powers and the Allied powers, but they become different near the middle. In Lifeboat, the German actually helps rescue them as he is the only one with capable seamanship. Later on, he is found to be sneaking water when everyone else thought there was none left. Because of this, he is thrown overboard. Alfred Hitchcock was sharply criticized by reviewers for painting what they thought was a sympathetic picture of the Germans. They felt that the murder had made the German officer a martyr.

On the other hand, Sahara descends into something else. Something lesser than that of Lifeboat. In the quest for water, Bogie and Co. are shown to what becomes a miniature Alamo. This oasis provides the company with water and shelter during a sandstorm. When the storm is over they learn that a company of Germans is headed their way, looking for water and shelter. Of course they have their own natives with them, so they know about the oasis.

As I mentioned above, it becomes a bit like the Alamo. The small band of Allies stands up to the German company. In the end, the Allies suffer many losses, but they are successful in driving the German’s away from water and shelter. This is thanks to the great ingenuity of the American spirit, according to the movie.

Sahara is not a particularly great movie. It does however, depict perfectly the amount of propaganda present in American movies of the World War II time period. Because of this it is still worth the watch.

A little side note on the production: this movie was filmed in the desert just outside of San Diego in the winter. The temperatures were in the mid-90s during the time of production. It seems like a believable substitute for the real Sahara.

Also, Bruce Bennett, who played Waco Hoyt, had a college degree from the University of Washington. In Hollywood a college graduate actor was and still is a rarity. To make him even more different than the typical actor, he was also a champion athlete. He won the silver medal in the shot put at the 1928 Olympics. He doesn’t give a bad performance for being someone who is in movies as a second career.

"Here's looking at you, kid."

2008-10-07T16:19:00.000-07:00

Perfection. It is what we all strive for. It is what movies want to be. There are only a handful that can claim to have perfected an aspect of the filmmaking process. There has never been a perfect movie that features a perfect cast, a perfect story, perfect cinematography, perfect realism, perfect director and perfect editing. If it were easy, then there would be no point in striving for perfection. Casablanca (1942) has two perfect elements. It has the perfect cast and the perfect story.

The American Film Institute voted in 1999 on the best screenplays ever written. Casablanca, written by the Twins (Julius J. and Philip G. Epstein) and Howard Koch, was voted the best story ever. It is hard to disagree with the Institute. If you want comedy, it is here. If you want romance, Rick and Ilsa have it. Danger: how about a Resistance fighter in the midst of Nazis. Twists: for those who have never seen the movie, the point when Rick pulls the gun is shocking. All these elements are wrapped up in a convincing drama about the struggles of three little people whose problems do add up to more than a hill of beans in this world.

The casting is probably the greatest in the history of movies. There have been rumors that a remake would be in the process, but even if they kept the same story, the acting would not be superior in this new movie. Much like in the remake of Psycho (1998) that followed the story and most of the shots exactly. The acting just isn’t as good in today’s Hollywood as it was during the Golden Age.

Playing the role of the lost soul Rick Blaine is Humphrey Bogart. Bogie could be tough, he played numerous gangster roles, and he could be witty with the one-liners, see Sam Spade. He was perfectly cast as Rick. Being the romantic lead was something new for him. He didn’t have to be the suave lover in this movie though. He just had to play a man who had a broken heart. Nothing we all haven’t gone through.

Ingrid Bergman is the elegant Ilsa Lund. Miss Bergman did not want the role in this movie, but she would not have gotten the role she wanted in For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943) had she not agreed to play in Casablanca. She excels as “the most beautiful woman in Europe.”

In the case of Ingrid Bergman, and many of the others in the cast, the new Hollywood movie would never work because Casablanca featured many actual European actors. It was not a stretch for Bergman to play a beautiful woman from Europe, because that is what she was.

Claude Rains as Louie can not be improved upon. Rains was an accomplished character actor who even starred in some Universal horror pictures. Sydney Greenstreet was great as Senor Farrari, as was Peter Lorre as Ugarte. If there is one criticism of the screenplay, it is that these two actors were not seen more. Greenstreet was an accomplished Shakespearian actor. Lorre had starred as the evil Hans Beckert in Fritz Lang’s M (1931).

Another immigrant from Germany who excels is Conrad Veidt, who plays Major Strasser. Other immigrants who fled from Nazi occupation include S.Z. Sakall, Leonid Kinsky and Madeleine LeBeau. You see this is such a perfect movie because it was made at the perfect time. Those actors who were playing characters trying to flee the Nazis had already gone through the pain of leaving Europe for America. They knew what their characters were feeling. That would not be present in a remake, thank goodness!

Casablanca would not be the same without the wonderful performances from Paul Heinreid as Victor Laszlo and of course Rick’s would never be the same without Dooley Wilson playing Sam.

The movie should be watched by everyone. The story has been imitated many times and the lines have become commonplace in our culture. The stories surrounding the making of the movie are interesting as well and could fill up a whole book. In fact there was a book about the making of Casablanca, ironically called “The Making of Casablanca.”

One thing that might not be known is what happened after the movie was released and became a huge success. On Oscar night the movie won for best picture. Typically the producer of the movie accepted on behalf of the studio they worked for. But in this case Jack L. Warner and Hal B. Wallis were not on the best of terms because Wallis had a deal with Warner Brothers in which he could personally oversee the production of a specific movie. One of those was Casablanca. So when the movie won for best picture, Warner and Wallis each got up to accept the award. Warner was the quicker to the podium though and took all the credit for the picture’s success. This of course finalized the breaking of the relationship between Warner and Wallis. Because this happened, now every best picture award is accepted by the producer only.

"Any of your friends in Tokyo have trouble committing hari-kiri, those boys'd be glad to help them out."

2008-10-03T13:02:00.000-07:00

When The Maltese Falcon (1941) became a huge success, Warner Brothers did what every movie studio in the past and present have done after a successful movie – tried to make a sequel. The sequel to The Maltese Falcon was supposed to have Humphrey Bogart return as Sam Spade with Mary Astor and Sydney Greenstreet making appearances as well. Unfortunately, the writers couldn’t come up with a good story for Spade and the idea was dropped.

Instead, it was replaced with a new story involving new characters, but the same actors. This movie would become Across the Pacific (1942). It is a war movie starring Bogie, Astor and Greenstreet. John Huston was signed on to direct and Peter Lorre even made an appearance on the set when the movie was shooting. It was a lot like the mean streets of San Francisco that were explored in the Falcon, except this time the major players were on a boat.

The original idea for the story, thought of in the late fall of 1941, was to involve a Japanese strike the U.S. forces located at Pearl Harbor. Of course Bogart was going to save the day just before the Japanese attack. A thing called history interfered with this storyline when the Japanese in fact attacked the American forces on December 7. Since the story’s location had to be changed, but not much else, the scriptwriters decided on the Panama Canal. Bogie famously remarked that production of the picture should begin as soon as possible “while we still have the Canal.”

With World War II many in Hollywood enlisted in the military. Bogart was not one of them. He had served at the end of World War I and was too old for service. Much like another famous actor who didn’t serve in World War II, John Wayne, this inability to fight for the United States made Bogie feel terrible. But like Wayne, Bogie was encouraged to win the war on film. And Bogie did just that in Across the Pacific.

The movie begins with Bogie being court-martialed because he stole some money from the Navy. In disgrace, Bogie moves out of the United States and tries to get into the Canadian army. They won’t take him. So Bogie figures the only way he can use his skills as an artilleryman is to go to Japan and see if they need him. He books a passage on a boat bound for the orient.

When he gets on he meets Sydney Greenstreet, who is a professor specializing in the Oriental culture. Also on the ship is Mary Astor, who claims to be a girl from Medicine Hat looking for an adventurous vacation in the Orient.

Of course we soon learn that Bogie is secretly working for the U.S. government, that Greenstreet is plotting for the Japanese and that Astor is not as innocent as she claims to be.

Eventually the boat is stopped at the Panama Canal. Since it is unable to go through, the passengers disembark. Ironically, Panama happens to be a place where Bogie was stationed with the Navy. Greenstreet tries his best to destroy the Panama Canal, while Bogie resists his temptations of money and eventually saves the day.

This is a standard World War II war movie. It includes many great actors. But the story behind it is more interesting. The fact that the original location was going to be Pearl Harbor. Also John Huston was signed as the director, but midway through shooting the picture he was called off to join the Army’s Signal Corps. Vincent Sherman finished shooting the movie, but Huston was the only one to get screen credit for being the director.

When I order cheesecake, I don't expect to get mucilage!

2008-10-02T13:14:00.000-07:00

The name Humphrey Bogart is not synonymous with comedy. Although Bogie was known for giving some good one-liners, he was no Groucho Marx. This is why All Through the Night (1941) is different from other Bogie movies. It is a comedy that features many actors who were known for their dramatic abilities.

Joining Bogie in the cast is Peter Lorre, who would spoof some of his horror characters later in his career, but was known for his dramatic roles. Conrad Veidt is in the cast as well. Of course he was a famous actor in Germany, known best for The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920). With a cast like this a great drama could have been made, but not a comedy. All Through the Night is a spoof on the gangster film, but it is not one that is well done. The drama in which all three appeared in was much better than this comedy.

The story revolves around Bogie as Gloves Donahue. Gloves is the leader of a smalltime gang, mainly interested in gambling. One day Glove is unable to eat a piece of the cheesecake he so likes because the man who delivers it had not arrived. This gets Gloves mad and he goes on the hunt to find the cheesecake man. Well, he finds the man, but he’s dead. So Gloves and his gang try to find the killer. What they end up finding is a Nazi spy ring here in America. It is headed by Veidt. He is assisted by Lorre, who plays the piano player Pepi. The female lead is played by Kaaren Verne. She begins as a Nazi spy then converts to Bogie’s side.

Comedies aren’t known for their plots, so this weak plot should not be much of a surprise. The lack of laughter this movie draws from an audience should be surprising. It is only a worthwhile watch for those fans of Humphrey Bogart, who would like to see him do something different. He tries, as do the rest of the actors, but he is just not Bogie on the screen here.

The exchanges in German between Lorre and Veidt are great to see. As is Bogie’s attempt to speak German near the end. Overall though, it is better to see the three in Casablanca (1942). Jackie Gleason fans might want to see this as well. This was his second screen appearance.

Peter Lorre might disagree with my assertions that the movie was meaningless. This was the movie in which he would meet his second wife, Kaaren Verne. Verne had immigrated to the United States, like many Germans during Hitler’s rise to power. She would never become a well-known actress, but she was able to meet her future husband here. The happy couple would break-up after five years of marriage.

A new peak for screen excitement!

2008-09-30T10:43:00.000-07:00

I’ve made many references to High Sierra (1941) in my posts. Much to my surprise, I have not written about the movie completely. Today will be the day that it is looked at, as it was the biggest break of Humphrey Bogart’s career on so many levels.

The Maltese Falcon (1941) is often thought of as the “big break” in Bogart’s career. That is true in the fact that it established him as the antihero in Hollywood for the 1940s. The Petrified Forest (1936) could also be considered his “big break” because it assured him a permanent spot in Hollywood. But for me, the biggest break of Bogart’s career came when he was cast as Roy Earle in High Sierra.

Roy Earle is basically Sam Spade. Spade happens to be fighting on the side of the law, although that side in white contains shadows. Earle is a gangster, but he isn’t all bad. He has his own personal code, something found in every great Bogart character. He isn’t the perfect man, and he admits it, but he makes sure everything he does is in step with his code.

Besides giving credit to Bogart for making these characters malleable, John Huston needs to be admired for the job he did in writing them. Especially in the case of Roy Earle. Huston, still a screenwriter at this time, worked on High Sierra. As mentioned previously, George Raft was originally going to get the role, much to the chagrin of Huston. When Raft didn’t want it, Huston got to work with Bogart. Huston tailored the part for Bogie. His expectations were met and exceeded by Bogie’s performance. This is one of the reasons why Huston lobbied to have Bogie return as Sam Spade when he was given the reigns of The Maltese Falcon.

The story of High Sierra involves the newly paroled Roy Earle leaving the Midwest for the Sierra Nevada mountains in California. Earle seems to be the last gangster around. When he arrives in town, his old boss is on his death bed. He laments to Earle that if he still had the old gang, the upcoming robbing of a hotel would be easy. But everyone in the gang was either dead or in San Quentin. Earle is the last and it is his job to make sure everything goes smoothly.

Of course, the job is the least of Earle’s worries. His new partners have brought along a girl, played by Ida Lupino. Earle believes the job should be one done by men only and dames only get in the way. It is up to Lupino to show Earle that she is tough enough for the job. In the end, she seems to be the only tough one around. In order to counter the tough girl Lupino, there is a girl named Velma who strikes Earle’s eye. She happens to have a cleft foot, but Earle enjoys her company and loves her family, who also happen to be from the Midwest. Earle says he wants to get Velma the money for her foot operation.

The operation goes well and Thelma is hardly thankful to Roy. She shuns him and the helpless maiden is abandoned by Earle in favor of the low life played by Lupino. The two take a liking to a dog, who people say is cursed, named Pard, played by Bogie’s dog Zero.

In the end, the job doesn’t go over well. Lupino and Bogie have to go on the lam. Bogie’s boss dies and no one is able to give him the money he is promised. He is chased into the Sierra’s where he is fatally shot. It is a fitting tribute to the gangster from the studio that specialized in that picture.

More importantly than the tribute to America’s gangster, is the effect this movie had on Bogart’s career. He became a star after its release. When he made The Maltese Falcon he became a superstar. Here his relationship with Huston is solidified. On their next movie, the two would be regarded as one of the best teams in Hollywood.

This is a movie that should be watched by those who are fans of The Maltese Falcon, as Bogie is basically the same character in each

"If we go over a cliff, wake me up"

2008-09-26T15:55:00.000-07:00

George Raft has gotten a bad rap on this blog. He has been repeatedly criticized by me for his poor judgment in which roles to take. His inability to foresee the possibilities of a role have led to him being relatively unknown today. It also paved the way for Humphrey Bogart to become a star. The truth is, Raft was a talented actor who was great in gangster pictures. He made his big break in 1932’s Scarface (1932), opposite fellow gangster picture actor, Paul Muni. Today though, Raft is probably best known for his role in Some Like It Hot (1959).

Bogie and Raft starred together in the movie They Drive By Night (1940). It would be the last movie in which Bogart was not featured in the starring role. After this, because of Raft’s inability to take chances and see the possibility of a role, Bogie would star in High Sierra (1941) and The Maltese Falcon (1941). It is interesting to see They Drive By Night because of what would happen to the two actors after the movie. This would be the final time Raft had any leverage over Bogart.

In the movie the two are brothers who happen to be truck drivers. Not much has changed in the truck driving industry since the movie was released. The product, in this case fruit, needs to be delivered on time no matter what. So the brothers have to drive all night and all day to make their deliveries. Being America, the brothers think of what life would be like if they had their own trucking business. After making their latest delivery, Raft decides it is time to start their own business. They still have to pay off their truck, but Raft uses the money he has gotten from the delivery to buy more fruit and use that to pay off the truck and start their own company.

He does all this without Bogie, who happens to be a married man and enjoys spending his limited time off with his wife. Raft makes the trek up to Bogie’s to get him, as the two begin their journey back on the road. Bogie isn’t ready, but goes anyway. That night, he gets too drowsy and drives the truck off the road. The truck explodes, the produce is gone and Bogie losses his arm. He is unable to continue in the trucking business and Raft is up a creek without a paddle.

This is when Ida Lupino enters the scene. She is married, but Raft courts her. I’ll leave the story at that, as the ending is worth seeing and shouldn’t be ruined by reading about it on the Internet. Instead, I’ll turn to Lupino. She was one of the most talented actresses to ever grace the Hollywood screen. She was tough, beautiful and cunning. She portrayed these qualities well on screen. She is amazing in this movie. Her follow-up would be opposite Bogie in High Sierra.

Although Lupino was a good actress, what makes her so remarkable is that she made the transition to the director’s chair. This position had been and still is traditionally dominated by males. To have a female in the chair was something different, especially one who had been a former actress. Actresses typically aren’t held in high esteem for their brains, while directors have been.

Now, Lupino didn’t direct anything as revolutionary as Citizen Kane (1941), but she was a competent director who specialized in film noir. One movie that stands out is The Hitch-Hiker (1953). She also did some Alfred Hitchcock Presents episodes. The fact that she was the only female director at the time of Hollywood’s studio system is an accomplishment in itself. The fact that she was capable of giving good performances, like in They Drive By Night, is secondary.

I've always been fond of orchids

2008-09-24T15:47:00.000-07:00

Brother Orchid (1940) starred Edward G. Robinson. Getting second billing was Humphrey Bogart. This is odd because Bogart is barely on the screen. Unfortunately for him, this was an occurrence that happened far too often before he made it as a star. In the over 50 movies Bogart appears in, the majority feature him in bit roles where his character can not be easily defined. The write-ups on previous Bogart movies are the exception to Bogie’s pre-stardom casting. Brother Orchid is more in line with what happened to Bogie most often.

The story is obviously a gangster one. It was made by Warner Brothers, the gangster studio, starred Edward G. Robinson, the gangster star, and featured Humphrey Bogart, the lieutenant of the gangster forces who wishes he could be number one.

In this movie Robinson makes a trip to Europe, for a vacation. He leaves the organization in the hands of Bogart and feels that once he gets back, everything will be alright. Bogie loves the power he has and starts to get a gang together that will break free of Robinson once he gets back in the country. Of course when Robinson arrives back in New York, Bogie passes everything off as being fine. He plots how he wants to bump Robinson off and carries out the plan. Just one thing doesn’t go as Bogie plans, he fails to kill Robinson. He believes he has and leaves Robinson alone in a forest.

When Robinson awakes, he realizes he no longer has his gang and he is wounded. He is able to hobble to a convent where he is embraced by the monks. They nurse him back to health and he becomes one of them. Although he fakes his work, paying kids to hoe the fields, he seems to be making a genuine effort at piety. He adopts the name Brother Orchid and even gets recognized by his fellow monks as an outstanding example of the work they are trying to accomplish. This all goes over well with Robinson, but he still has plans at getting his gang back.

He gets that opportunity one day when he joins a fellow monk on the monthly trip to the city in order to sell what they have harvested. Robinson drops the monk off and says he’ll be back with the trunk when the monk wants him. He is able to enter his old building and find some of his own gang. He finds Bogie and they tussle. He wins and everyone goes home happy.

The ending sequence between Bogie and Robinson is mainly carried off-screen through dialogue. We only see Bogie for about 3 minutes at the end and then the beginning sequence takes about 20 minutes, with Bogie on screen for about 10 of those. In a movie that lasts an hour and thirty minutes, to only see the second billed star for 13 of those is a rip-off for the audience. But it is what happened to Bogart for a lot of his early career.

"Nothing can hurt us now"

2008-09-23T15:50:00.000-07:00

In one of his oddest roles, Humphrey Bogart played an Irish stableman in Dark Victory (1939). The movie stars Bette Davis as a socialite who loves horses, but has a brain tumor and George Brent, as the doctor who doesn’t tell her about the tumor as he has fallen in love with her.

Bogart played in more movies with Davis than any other actress. Here, Bogie has an interest in Davis, but she continually rejects his advances. The only real love scene in the whole picture comes at the end of the movie with the two in the stables together. It seems like Bogie has finally won and Davis is ready for him, but she tells him that she is dying instead. This crushes Bogie and sets up the gallant death of Davis.

Bogart’s performance is not bad, considering he wasn’t Irish. His accent is a bit odd at first, but for the most part is faithful. He doesn’t try to make a mockery out of the accent. Like he did his whole career, he acted as naturally as possible. When words he felt needed to be stressed by the accent, he did so. At other times he felt it was inappropriate to use a heavy accent, so he dropped it.

The movie is also interesting because it features a young Ronald Reagan in it. Reagan, the small-town Irishman, plays a wealthy New York socialite. Had Warner Brothers been casting with the actor’s background in mind then Reagan and Bogart would have switched parts. Bogie had grown up in an upper-middle class family in New York, while Reagan came from a small Midwestern town and loved horses. Since Bogart had been at the studio for 4 years, he got the more prestigious role over the youngster who had only been in Hollywood for 18 months. As it is, Reagan does not give a very good performance. His screen time is limited, but nothing in that time really stands out except that it is Ronald Reagan drinking heavily and trying to woo Bette Davis.

This movie is similar to Marked Woman in that when Davis and Bogart are not on the screen together, the movie seems to lull. That is not to say that either story is bad, just that the other actors are not up to par with those two. Few were. Geraldine Fitzgerald is good as Davis’ faithful secretary and friend. George Brent gives a good performance as the love interest. There just isn’t that spark that you find between Davis and Bogart. Maybe it is because no other actors in the cast were as headstrong as those two. They were not afraid to speak their mind and although their dialogue does not convey this as it did in Marked Woman, there is still a feeling of dynamic chemistry between them. Maybe this is because Bogie longs desperately for Davis, but she does not return his affection.

Overall, the movie is good and tells an interesting story of a woman who disbelieves she is actually terminally sick. She lives life to what she believes to be the fullest and her friends all go along with it because it makes her happy. It isn’t until the end that she realizes she will in fact die. With this realization she is able to gallantly accept her fate. As she dies the picture makes sure the audience floods the theater with tears. It is a well crafted movie and good story. A must watch for fans of Davis and Bogart as well as those who want to see a young Ronald Reagan.

Crime and research

2008-09-18T14:20:00.000-07:00

To make it in Hollywood an actor needs some luck. Humphrey Bogart was lucky that George Raft didn’t have the perception to choose roles that would help his career. Besides luck, there needs to be someone with vision around an actor, someone who can get the most out of them. For Bogart that person was John Huston. The two worked together for the first time on The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse (1938).

The movie itself is standard gangster fare from Warner Brothers. It is interesting to compare the work of four main players in this movie with that of Key Largo (1948). A decade later, the careers of Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, John Huston and Claire Trevor would be different.

For Bogie, he would no longer be the second in command of the underworld. He had transformed himself into the hardboiled, sentimental hero. His character in Key Largo would be a continuation of Sam Spade and Rick Blaine.

Robinson played the amazing Dr. Clitterhouse in this movie. He believed that by acting like a criminal he could figure out how the criminal mind works. He researches the subject thoroughly and then goes out on a series of cat burglaries. He is wildly successful and needs to find someone who can handle the stolen jewelry he has. He meets Jo, who is played by Claire Trevor. Jo shows the doctor the underworld and the doctor finds it all fascinating. He becomes head of Jo’s gang, renamed the professor. He devises the plans and the gang is successful in every plot. Of course this doesn’t sit well with Jo’s second in command, Bogie. He gets jealous and tries to kill the doctor. He fails and is killed himself.

Robinson ruled the gangster picture since 1931 when he made Little Caesar. He would remain a star throughout the 40s, but not as big a one as he had been in the 30s when the gangster picture was alive and well. In Key Largo he becomes the last gangster, Johnny Rocco. He does well in the movie, but does not command this like he did Dr. Clitterhouse. Bogart had become too big of a star compared to Robinson.

John Huston helped write Dr. Clitterhouse. He and Bogart met in the Warner Brothers green room. The two got along great. Both were considered a man’s man. Huston helped develop the Bogart character as both a writer and director. In 1938 Huston was just a typical screenwriter for Warner Brothers. Ten years later he would be an Academy Award winning director. He won the award for The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, made with Bogart as well. This came in the same year as Key Largo was released.

Claire Trevor had been a great supporting actress. She had been nominated for an Academy Award in Dead End (1937) a year earlier. She does well in her role as Jo. Her other roles between Dr. Clitterhouse and Key Largo were all solid. Stagecoach (1939) being the one that stands out. She would win the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress under the direction of Huston in Key Largo.

The growth in the careers of Humphrey Bogart and John Huston was tremendous from 1938 to 1948 when they were reunited with two other artists from The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse. In those ten years, Edward G. Robinson had seen his star drop, but not fade completely. Claire Trevor remained a solid performer, but would not be recognized for her greatness until Key Largo.

Cradle of Crime

2008-09-12T15:35:00.000-07:00

During the late Depression, the American public was introduced to a group of unruly, yet lovable kids in the MGM movie Dead End (1937). Oddly enough, the group would be known as the Dead End Kids for the remainder of their career. The main reason for the movie’s relevance today is because of the kids, but it can stand on its own merits as it was nominated for four Academy Awards including best picture. It also tells a story that is still poignant today. The cast and crew are outstanding as well.

The basics of the story are that a sister and brother do not get along. The sister, played by Sylvia Sidney, cares for the brother, but the brother doesn’t appreciate her and goes and joins a gang of fellow kids. These kids roam the docks of New York’s Lower East Side. They have a good time picking on any new kid who arrives in the neighborhood. If the new kid can accept the ribbing, then they are in to the group. If they can’t then they continue to be made fun of. The Dead End Kids find someone else to get after when local kid turned gangster, Baby Face Martin (Humphrey Bogart), shows up. He walks through his old haunts to see if anything has changed. He finds his mother’s door closed to him and his former girlfriend has turned into a prostitute. The only joy he gets from his homecoming is the ability to razz a former schoolmate who has remained in the slums with goals to become an architect. There is a love story between Dave, the wannabe architect, and Trina, the sister. In the end, Martin is killed and Trina’s brother turns over to side of good. It is a happy ending all around.

As mentioned above, the cast and crew is top notch. This should be no surprise as the producer was Samuel Goldwyn who did everything first class. The director was William Wyler who would be known for his great epics, Ben-Hur (1959), being the greatest example. It was written for the screen by Lillian Hillman, who was romantically involved with Dashiell Hammett, who would have ties to another Bogie movie called The Maltese Falcon(1941). .

The cast includes Sylvia Sidney, who was a Hollywood veteran and a capable lead actress to play a strong woman. Bogie plays the gangster well, as he was typecast in this part at this time. Joel McCrea plays the part of Dave and does it well. He is both passive around Martin, but can become aggressive when needed. Claire Trevor was recruited to play Francey, the former girlfriend turned prostitute. She did not appear on the screen for more than 10 minutes, but her performance earned her a nomination for best supporting actress. She didn’t win here, but would later on in another Bogie movie Key Largo (1948).

The role of Baby Face Martin was one coveted by most in Hollywood. Sidney Kingsley, who wrote the play for the stage, had wanted to use Bogie for the role, but Warner Brothers was hesitant to loan him out to MGM. They knew that he was being paid too low and didn’t want another studio to cash in on him. So MGM looked to George Raft for the part of Martin. As would be the case many times in the careers of Raft and Bogie, Raft could not make up his mind about the part and refused it. Warner Brothers found someone on the MGM lot who they wanted and the two studios swapped actors. The results of the swap were in MGM and Bogie’s favor. Bogie appeared in his second most prestigious role up to this point, the other being that of Duke Mantee in The Petrified Forest (1936). MGM came away with a box office hit that earned the studio four Academy Award nominations. When Warner Brothers got their gangster back on the lot, they put him to work on more gangster pictures. They also managed to get the Dead End Kids away from MGM. The team of Bogie and the Dead End Kids would be present in Warner Brother movies for the next few years.

"I'll get even if I have to crawl back from the grave to do it!"

2008-09-10T16:36:00.000-07:00

Before 1937, Bette Davis was a huge star. So big that she felt that she could buck the studio system by opting out of her contract and leaving to England. She did, but she underestimated the power of the Hollywood Studios at the time. While in England, she was taken to court by her studio, Warner Brothers. She eventually lost her trial, which caused a huge commotion both across the pond and in America. She returned home to Warner Brothers, but instead of disciplining their star, the studio decided to give Davis a desirable role in Marked Woman (1937).

The story itself is not too great. It is about a nightclub that is taken over by gangsters. They change the place a bit by trying to squeeze their patrons for as much money as they can, not that normal owners don’t try the same tactics. One of their more interesting and effective ploys to get money from customers, is by using waitresses/escorts/prostitutes, pick your choice, to tend to a very rich and very drunk male. Bette Davis and a group of girls, including Mayo Methot, play the escorts.

Since this was made during the days of the production code, there has to be some moralistic change by the main character, Mary Dwight Strauber, played by Davis. These moralistic changes come in the form of a younger sister who has grown up idolizing Mary and believes that she has been in New York this whole working toward a degree and a respectable job. She is sorely mistaken when she sees that her sister lives with a bunch of prostitutes and is one herself. This strikes a chord in Mary and she vows to make sure her little sister doesn’t end up like her. So she stands up to the mob boss and gets beaten for it. There is another character, D.A. David Graham, who says he can help Davis and her friends get away from the abusive gangsters. After fighting Graham, who is played by Humphrey Bogart, she decides to see his way of thinking and turns over a new leaf. The audience leaves happy as Davis has beaten the gangsters and the studio is happy as well to have their big star and her box office draw back.

Besides being the return of Davis to Hollywood, this movie also marked the end of Mayo Methot’s marriage and the beginning of her next one. She and Bogart had been running around together and Methot had recently gotten a divorce. Bogart’s current wife, Mary Phillips, didn’t trust Bogie as the rumors from Hollywood were heard all the way in New York. She tried to break-up the romance, but was unable to. The two were on the set together and their love turned into marriage, which would ultimately turn into what would be known as the Battling Bogarts.

Both Bogie and Methot drank a lot. Methot had a tendency to be a jealous person as well. So any time Bogie was making a movie, and Methot was not, which was frequently because Bogie was an ascending star at the time and Methot was a falling one, she would get jealous of any female lead Bogie was playing opposite. The two would fight constantly. Furniture being thrown back and forth in their house. Utensils thrown around when they were at a restaurant. It was an interesting relationship to say the least. Bogie even gave Methot the nickname of “Slugo.”

One of the most harrowing examples of the Bogart battles occurred one night when the two were having an argument in their home. Somehow Methot got a knife and cut Bogie with it. She chased him into the bathroom where Bogie had to call one of his friends. The friend promptly arrived and managed to get the knife away from Methot. Had there not been a phone in the bathroom we might not of had Bogie around to play Rick Blaine and Phillip Marlowe.

"I got just the thing to straighten you out."

2008-09-08T16:04:00.000-07:00

For the following weeks or months, depending on how frequently I post, the movies of Humphrey Bogart will be looked at. Bogie was named the greatest male star of all time by AFI during their century celebration of the art form. His movies have become timeless and the persona he created has outlived the man by 50 years.

His first staring role occurred in 1937 in a drama called Black Legion. The movie was based on true events that occurred the year before in the Midwest. A group of white supremacists, called the Black Legion, banded together to eliminate minorities who they believed were stealing their jobs and promotions. They were basically a northern branch of the KKK. A country wide craze developed around the organization when it was learned that one of the gang had been caught and was willing to turn in fellow members of the organization. As with most crazes of the time that occurred outside of the law, Warner Brothers was around to make a movie about the man who blew the whistle on the Black Legion.

The studio known mostly for its gritty gangster pictures handed the lead role over to Humphrey Bogart. Bogie had achieved success on his second try in Hollywood thanks to his role as Duke Mantee in The Petrified Forest (1936). Despite his critical acclaim in that picture, he did not rise above bit parts. He did stay in Hollywood though, which was a change from his first trip right after talkies were introduced and Hollywood producers looked to Broadway actors for the new sound pictures.

For fans of Bogie, the character of Frank Taylor is much different from ones he would play in later years. It is even different than the gangsters he played in B-movies. Taylor is a blue-collar worker in a factory. This is typical Bogie. He has been at the plant for a long time and is expected to be the next person promoted to foreman. He doesn’t get the job as it goes to someone else who is more qualified, but also a minority. This doesn’t set well with Bogie, who has to go home and tell his loving wife that he was passed over for the job. He is about to get over the rejection when a coworker asks him if he is tired of seeing under qualified people get promoted because they have a different skin color or a different faith from the majority. Bogie says sure and the coworker tells him to stop by for a meeting.

Bogie goes and becomes a part of the Black Legion. The Legion goes on raids, including one that burns down the new foreman’s barn. The new foreman leaves town and Bogie gets promoted. Everything seems to be going well in Bogie land, but his brain has become warped and he believes everything is a slight against him by some minority. Unlike future Bogie characters, who are either completely evil (the gangsters) or likable tough guys who are sentimental, it is hard to classify Taylor. He is evil at times, but you also see him at home with a loving wife and young boy. There is a screenwriting trick called “pet the dog,” which is used to get the audience on the side of the character. Bogart movies are the best at this. The most literal use of this technique comes from a John Wayne movie, The Searchers (1956), in which Wayne delivers a racist diatribe about Comanche’s and then walks out of the house and pets the family dog. In this case, the writers who developed the character and Bogie for his performance need to be credited for the ambiguity of Frank Taylor. Although he does not seem comfortable portraying a racist at times.

As in Hollywood at that time, and for once real life, the bad guy ends up being punished. At the trial for the murder of his best friend, Bogie breaks down and calls out the people who were parts of the Black Legion. Bogie’s breakdown occurs because of his love for his wife. He had been told by his defense lawyer, who had been hired by the Legion, that he was having an affair with a woman Bogie’s best friend liked. The two got in a tussle and a gun went off killing the friend. But in typical Hollywood style, the bad guy breaks down for no real good reason in order to appease the Hayes Office.

All in all, the movie is good. The ending is contrived and Bogie looks awkward at times. The best thing about the movie is that it shows the potential Bogie had for being a lead actor. It has recently been released on DVD and is a must for all Bogie fans to see. It is also a good watch for those not familiar with the Black Legion and their reign of terror over Depression Era Ohio and Michigan

The world's champion blind lady

2008-09-04T15:51:00.000-07:00

In a previous post, I mentioned that Frederick Knott should be considered the Master of Literary Suspense. He only wrote three plays in his career. One was Dial M for Murder (1954), which became the most suspense filled Hitchcock picture. The other one to be made into a movie was Wait Until Dark (1967).

Like the Hitchcock picture, this one directed by Terence Young stayed close to the original play. Like all good movies made from good plays, the producers made sure all the action was contained in the same setting as that of the play. The only real deviation from the play comes at the beginning when we see the doll being packed with heroin and the girl handing over the doll to Sam before meeting Roat. This is important to see because we have some back story to go on. We know that the doll exists when Roat asks Mike and Carlino to find it for him.

The star of this picture, besides Alan Arkin as the evil Roat, is the normally elegant Audrey Hepburn. She is not elegant here as Susy, the self-proclaimed “world’s champion blind lady.” She looks much older in this movie than she does in some of her early roles. As she should since it had been almost 15 years since she played Princess Ann in Roman Holiday (1953). It had only been six years since she played Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961), who is the definition of elegance. Although she might have aged some here, she is still a brilliant actress. She doesn’t need a little black dress or some witty lines from Billy Wilder to be great. She does it with skillful looks of fright and terror in her voice. She earned her fifth Academy Award nomination for best actress for her performance here.

Alan Arkin as Roat is also a standout here. In a script and play that only included five real characters, there had to be strong performances. Hepburn delivered as Susy. Arkin does the same as Roat. Roat is a suave bad guy. But unlike a lot of the suave ones, he does not mind getting his hands dirty and killing someone. This contrasts sharply with Knott’s Tony Wendice from Dial M, who was just as suave, but did not do the dirty work. Of course the situations were probably different in each case. Wendice wanted his wife killed, Roat just wanted a doll and had no care about who got in his way in the quest to get it.

The climax between Roat and Susy is what makes Wait Until Dark last today. Susy has finally caught on to what all these men walking around her house want. She has prepared to fight Roat, but still has the huge disadvantage of not being able to see. This of course enhances the suspense of the confrontation. We as the audience can see everything, but Susy can not. We scream to her that Roat is coming after her, but she can not hear us or see him. Ironically, the moment that gets most audiences to jump occurs when we believe Roat has died. He has been stabbed and left for dead in the dark. We are as blind as Susy to what is about to happen. He makes a final leap out of the darkness and onto Susy. This scene never fails to make at least a few people jump, even when they know it is coming.

Wait Until Dark is a little talked about movie today. This is odd as it includes one of the biggest stars in Hollywood history, Audrey Hepburn. It tells a story that is relevant today. It still possesses the ability to spook people. Like most classic movies, maybe in a couple of years people will look at this movie as something special. It is not a typical Audrey Hepburn movie, but it is still filled with the quality performance you expect from her.

"I am married to an American agent."

2008-08-26T16:01:00.000-07:00

François Truffaut once told Alfred Hitchcock that he felt Hitch made one movie over and over throughout his career. There is a strong case to be made in Truffaut’s favor, especially when one looks at Notorious (1946).

A personal favorite of many critics, namely Roger Ebert and Robert Osborne, Notorious is short on suspense, but large on love. It also takes pieces of film from past Hitchcock films and gives the audience a peek at pieces of film from later Hitchcock films.

The opening shot is of a courtroom. We see inside of the courtroom because a member of the press has opened the door to allow the camera a view. This is similar to the courtroom scene in Frenzy (1972). In that movie the door is opened to the courtroom and we hear the guilty verdict. The drunken driven scene echoes a similar scene involving Cary Grant in North By Northwest (1959). The same film is echoed later when the American agents are gathered in Rio to discuss how best to infiltrate the Nazi scientists. It is reminiscent of the discussion in Washington over the nonexistent agent George Kaplan.

The Birds (1963) is invoked when Ingrid Bergman and Grant embrace on the hill in Rio. There is also the first implementation of Hitch’s revolving of the camera around lovers in this movie. It was made famous in Vertigo (1958) as well. Bergman swipes the key to the wine cellar from Claude Rains in a suspenseful situation, similar to that of Ray Milland in Dial M for Murder (1954). The fact that Milland is stealing the key from Grace Kelly in Dial M, while Bergman takes it from Rains is a point that will be discussed in greater detail below. Of course when one thinks of the cellar or basement of a Hitchcock movie, one always thinks of Psycho (1960). There is also the ever present, overbearing mother figure in the movie that is found throughout all of Hitch’s American films.

What about the movies preceding Notorious? If you check the films above, you will notice that every one of them was made after Notorious. So where are the old Hitchcock references? Well, Suspicion (1941), also made with Grant, is present in the poisoning scenes. Instead of using a glass of milk to poison the wife, cups of coffee or tea are used. Rebecca (1940) is also prevalent, as Sebastian’s house seems to become another character in this movie. When Ingrid Bergman first arrives in the mansion, she seems overwhelmed, much like Joan Fontaine was when she first arrived at Manderley.

The most famous shot in Notorious is the long crane swoop during the party. The camera begins at the ceiling in the chandelier and comes all the way down, through the guests, into Bergman’s hand where she is holding the magical key. There is a similar shot in Marnie (1964). There are also similarities between both movies during the horse riding scene and at the race track. But the crane shot was first used in a Hitchcock film in 1930’s Murder. In that one the camera swept along a ballroom to focus on a drummer in blackface who had a tendency to twitch his eyes. He was the murderer in the movie and the heroes had to find him.

Above I mentioned the significance of Ingrid Bergman taking the key from Claude Rains. This is a different sort of movie because Bergman essentially plays a stereotypical male character. She is an alcoholic who has a talent for seducing men into giving her what she wants. Typically this is a role that would go to a male heartthrob, but this movie is different in that it puts a female into the role. It makes for a much more interesting and unique story. It is similar to what we have seen before, but different because instead of a male playing with a woman’s emotions, we get the opposite. We also don’t feel too bad for Claude Rains when his fate becomes sealed after Grant takes Bergman from his house. Perhaps we would if the roles were different. I do know that we wouldn’t remember this movie as much had the role been played by a male.

"There ain't no Sanity Claus!"

2008-08-25T13:26:00.000-07:00

In 1935 the country was in the midst of the Great Depression. The people had little relief. There seemed to be no room for laughter. That is, until MGM released their first Marx Brothers picture A Night at the Opera (1935).

Much like the rest of the country, by 1935 it appeared that the Marx Brothers had had it. They had been huge in vaudeville and on Broadway during the 1920s. They made a smooth transition into movies and did well making four pictures for Paramount. But their last one, Duck Soup (1933), hadn’t been as big a box office smash as all involved would have liked. This seems odd today as Duck Soup is always found in lists of the best comedies ever made, it is the one most commonly associated with the Marx Brothers. Although that might be the case today, in 1935 Groucho and his two brothers needed to find someone willing to take a chance on them. Those familiar with the Marx Brothers will know that there were four brothers who performed in the Paramount films. After receiving nothing more than straight-man parts, Zeppo decided to leave the group to become a successful Hollywood agent.

As would happen often in the future, the Marx Brothers got back into movies thanks to Chico. This time though Chico didn’t need the money to pay off some gambling debts. Instead he used his card playing skills to wow the most powerful man in Hollywood, Irving Thalberg. Both were avid bridge players and over a game one night, Chico explained to Thalberg that the Brothers were in need of work. Thalberg said the Brothers were funny, but that they hadn’t made a great picture yet. He believed he had what the Paramount pictures were missing: a plot.

A Night at the Opera has Thalberg’s fingerprints all over it. He believed that a story could be woven into the comedy routines of the Brothers. He told George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind, the two screenwriters, to build the story around big blocks of comedy. The plot would carry the viewer from one block to the next. This is easily seen in the movie as some of the most famous routines of the Marx Brothers are present here. There are the famous contract scene, the stateroom scene, the movement of beds in the hotel room and the grand finale in the opera house. Thalberg also wanted the audience to have sympathy for the Brothers. This is why Harpo is beaten up in Lassparri’s dressing room and why Groucho loses his post with the opera company when Gottlieb arrives in New York. With the audience possessing a rooting interest, the Marx Brothers can become more than comedians – they become heroes.

A Night at the Opera was considered by Groucho to be the best picture done by the Marx Brothers. It is filled with comedy routines that have become classics, but it is more toned down than the Paramount movies. It has a story, but the appeal of the Marx Brothers was never the plot, it was always the comedy. This movie did save their career, but it was the last great Marx Brothers movie ever made. Midway through their next movie A Day at the Races (1937), Thalberg passed away. With him gone and a transformation already in place, the Marx Brothers could not change back to their Paramount zany days. They had to remain comedians restrained by a plot and their later movies suffered because of this.

Will I be pretty?

2008-08-24T15:32:00.000-07:00

Remakes are a part of Hollywood. So are projects that are announced, but then scrapped. A remake that has been announced, but hopefully won’t be made is The Birds (1963). From what I have read the people involved with the project totally miss the point of the movie. It isn’t about birds attacking people, but families. Anyways, The Birds is a movie that will be talked about sometime in the future. For now, I’ll go back to remakes and those trendy remakes of Alfred Hitchcock movies. Psycho (1998) is a good example of a poor Hitchcock remake. Hitchcock even decided to remake his own movie in 1956 when he redid The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934).

Being the most popular director in the world, Hitchcock movies were always in demand. Because of this demand, producers pressured him to come up with stories quickly. It wasn’t his style to rush into anything so at certain points in his career he would take on an easy project just to “recharge the batteries” as he called it. One such project was Dial M For Murder (1953), another The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956). Universal came to Hitch and asked him to remake one of his earlier British movies. After much deliberation, Hitch and his associates decided on The Man Who Knew Too Much. The original is fairly good, but could definitely be improved. The remake is in color, which makes it more acceptable to modern audiences and it does feature James Stewart. Other than that, though, there isn’t much that makes this remake special.

Besides asking Hitch to remake one of his films, Universal requested that a catchy song be put in so that they could sell records on top of movie tickets. Bernard Herrmann, who composed the score and played the role of the Albert Hall conductor in the movie, was not known for catchy lyrical music. So some songwriters were brought in and wrote “Whatever Will Be, Will Be (Que Sera, Sera)” for Doris Day to sing. Her singing is about the only bright spot of her time on screen. The title of the song was derived from a line in the Ava Gardner movie The Barefoot Contessa (1954). The song, of course, has become a hit and associated with Doris Day more so than with the movie.

Hitch and Stewart made a good team and Stewart performs well here. His performance is superior to Leslie Banks’ in the original. The biggest defect, other than Doris Day, is the absence of Peter Lorre as Abbott. In the original, Abbott is a suave bad guy who is extremely cultured. The epitome of the white-collar criminal. There is not hint of a cultured villain in this one. It is tough to watch after seeing the masterful job done by Lorre.

For the most part, the original and the remake follow the same path, once arrived in London that is. The beginning of the remake in Morocco is interesting, especially the scene in the restaurant where Stewart and the tourists have difficulty with the local customs. There is also the famous scene where the black make-up comes off of the murdered Louis Bernard, Daniel Gelin, onto the hands of James Stewart.

In London, the Albert Hall performance is longer, probably to give Herrmann some more screen time. There is scene in the taxidermy store, which echoes the scene in the back of the Bates Motel. The ending is also redone a bit, in order to get Doris Day’s voice and the popular song some more screen time.

I guess you could say, like all remakes, this one was done for purely commercial reasons. Perhaps that is why it is not superior to the original.

The lace isn't the only old thing here

2008-08-23T15:32:00.000-07:00

Normally I try to use this space to discuss the behind-the-scenes of classic movies or focus on the characters in one of the movies. But today I will express my severe displeasure with a movie that has not aged well.

A few months ago I was flipping through the channels. I stopped at TCM, like I usually do, just to see if I recognize the movie and if I do then I decide if it is worth watching more than 5 minutes. This time I saw Peter Lorre on the screen with Cary Grant. I was intrigued and watched some more. I dislike coming into a movie in its middle, so I decided to switch the channel. Once I found that there was nothing else on, I went to my computer and found out that the movie I had seen was Arsenic and Old Lace (1944).

Much to my disappointment, when I recently saw the full movie, I had seen the best part of the movie where theater critic Cary Grant explains to Peter Lorre’s Dr. Einstein about a terrible play he had recently saw in which what happened to the main character in that play was occurring at that exact same time to Cary Grant. It was the biggest highlight of a movie that has aged poorly.

It appears that the actors have tried too hard to be zany. Cary Grant acts just like he does in Monkey Business (1952) or His Girl Friday (1940), yet there is something in these Howard Hawks movies that has aged better than what he does in Frank Capra’s Old Lace. Peter Lorre is always a terrific actor, probably the most underrated in movie history because he was a character actor and not a star. He excels here, but there aren’t many other highlights. Raymond Massey is interesting as Cary Grant’s disfigured brother. But in the stage version, Boris Karloff had the part. Since there are numerous references to Massey looking like Karloff, it would have been much funnier had Karloff been in the part. As it is, the make-up on Massey does make the two seem similar.

The two old aunts are interesting for a bit. Their act of complete innocence while killing old men is funny for the first hour. Unfortunately the movie is almost two hours and they two aunts lose their luster as they aren’t well drawn characters. I won’t even begin to talk about how bad Priscilla Lane’s performance looks 60 years after the movie was originally released.

Overall, there is enough talent in the movie to make it work. The Twins, who wrote Casablanca (1942), could certainly write. Frank Capra could direct. Lane, Massey, Lorre and Grant could all act. They just haven’t aged well and that is unfortunate for modern audiences. As good as the Twins and Capra are, I kind of wish the movie had been written by Ben Hecht or made by Billy Wilder or Howard Hawks because their movies have stood the test of time. Obviously, at the time the movie was made no one involved in production was making it so that the movie could be enjoyable over 60 years later. They were contract players working on another movie, trying to give their best. I’m sure they gave it and the 1946 audience appreciated it. I just wish I could.

Knock, knock, knock, come on in!

2008-08-20T15:57:00.000-07:00

She can’t act. She doesn’t have what it takes to be a dramatic actress. Let her be the comedienne. She looks so great in those dresses she’s been sown into. All she has to do is wiggle and walk and the audience will go crazy. These are phrases “critics,” movie insiders, and “experts” used to describe Marilyn Monroe and her aspirations to be a dramatic actress. These “critics” and “experts” never saw her in Don’t Bother to Knock (1952). As a matter of fact, not many of her fans have seen the movie even today. But it is by far the best performance she ever gave on film. Those around her mention her portrayal of Sugar Kane in Some Like it Hot (1959) or Cherie in Bus Stop (1958). She herself mentioned her portrayal of Angela in The Asphalt Jungle (1950) as her best. But that was a bit part. As for staring roles, she was the best as the psychotic Nell Forbes.

Don’t Bother to Knock would make an interesting remake in today’s Hollywood. For the most part the suspense is great in the picture. There are a few scenes that could be tightened to enhance the suspense. There is a very real fear present in the story, that of a mother who leaves her only child alone with a stranger while she and her husband go out for the night. This is something that occurs every night in America. A woman calls a babysitter and trusts the sitter to take good care of the child until she comes back. Of course there has to be some fear in the back of every mother’s mind that the babysitter turns out to be a psycho and the child is put into danger. This is what happens to Ruth Jones. She leaves her only child, Bunny, to be watched by Nell, who is fresh out of an Oregon mental institution. We aren’t told this, but learn it from Nell’s uncle Eddy, Elisha Cook Jr., who works at the hotel the ?’s are staying at.

The basis for the movie was a rather dull novel called “Mischief” written by Charlotte Armstrong. The book is too spread out for the story to seem plausible. In the movie both Jed, Richard Widmark, and the Jones' stay at the same hotel. They don’t in the book. Because they don’t it seems less likely that the two will ever cross paths. In the movie though everything is tied together. Jed stays at the same hotel as his “girlfriend” Lyn Lesley, played by Anne Bancroft in her first screen appearance. Jed rides up and down the elevator run by Nell’s uncle. He has a room directly across the courtyard from the Jones family, which makes him a perfectly logical person to be caught up in the drama with Nell and Bunny. Like The Maltese Falcon, Don’t Bother to Knock happens to be one of those rare movies that is better than the book. In this case it is far superior.

What is interesting about Marilyn Monroe’s performance as Nell is that she is playing essentially someone from her own family. Her family had a history of psychotic and suicidal behavior. Both her mother and her grandparents on her mother’s side died in mental institutions. In fact, while Marilyn was making this movie her mother was in an institution. It had to be hard for her to wake up every morning and having to prepare herself to play a disturbed woman. Although the cynic would say since she has been around mental illness all her life, she would be perfect for the part.

Being a Hollywood movie, the suicidal Nell is talked out of slashing her wrists and given the hope of treatment in New York. There have been many conspiracy theories regarding Marilyn’s death. To add another one, how about saying that Marilyn’s role in this movie awakened the demons of her family history. She would attempt to commit suicide numerous times throughout the rest of her life after completing this movie, but there was always someone there to save her. Namely, Arthur Miller. There was no Arthur Miller or a Hollywood ending on a Saturday night in August of 1962.

Niagara (1953) is often looked at as Marilyn’s big-break as a star. She plays a conniving woman in that movie, which stars Joseph Cotton as well. It is lauded because it is in color and she looks stunning in her dresses and near the falls. The movie isn’t superior to Don’t Bother to Knock though. In her first leading role Marilyn delivers a great performance as do her co-stars. Don’t Bother to Knock is a must see for those who consider themselves Marilyn Monroe fans. But be warned this isn’t Sugar Kane or The Girl from The Seven Year Itch (1955), this is Marilyn as you’ve never seen her before.

"You know the story. Most of my life in jail; the rest of it dead! "

2008-08-19T16:30:00.000-07:00

In 1936 a new edition to the Warner Brothers rogues gallery appeared. He was an old face both literally and figuratively. He was getting his final chance in Hollywood to become an actor. If this man failed he would be stuck in New York acting stage plays for the rest of his life and his performances would be unseen by audiences today. As it happened, the man in question turned in a brilliant performance, and became one of the biggest movie stars of the 1940s and 1950s.

The story of The Petrified Forest (1936) takes place almost completely inside a diner in the Arizona desert. Here vagabonds come and gather to forget their sorrows. Some feel like they know what they wand from life, others are unsure. It is an interesting story as it follows the lives of seemingly different people, who all happen to be the same. There is Leslie Howard’s character, Alan Squier, who is a writer with great talent. At least that is what everyone said when he was in Europe years ago. Now the writer does not know what he wants and is just content spending his time wondering around the United States. Bette Davis plays Gabrielle, a girl who works as a waitress in her father’s diner. She dreams of going to Europe to study painting. Her mother lives in France and that is the one place Gabrielle wants to visit. She can’t stand being stuck with her ultra-nationalistic father and rich, but full of old-world values grandfather. Her grandfather longs for the old west where Billy the Kid used to roam. Gabrielle doesn’t take to this and spends her life reading a poetry book. When Alan enters her establishment, her whole world changes. She becomes deeply interested in him. He likes her, but doesn’t feel like he is adequate enough to become anything closer than a mentor.

The little world and people of the Arizona diner are in for a big surprise when it is learned that gangster Duke Mantee has escaped and is heading for Arizona. When Mantee arrives he becomes a symbol for Gabrielle’s grandfather of someone who embodies the old gangster. Alan believes he and Duke are cut from the same cloth, each looking for something in life. Mantee, who is played wonderfully by Humphrey Bogart, does a nice job in letting the people he meets carry on with their lives. He is only concerned with leaving the diner alive and with his girl. The troubles of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in his world. Of course the movie ends predictably as Mantee gets captured and Leslie Howard gets to die heroically in the arms of Bette Davis.

Today this movie is remembered as Humphrey Bogart’s first big break in Hollywood. The actor had previously been in movies with Warner Brothers, but hadn’t caught on so he went back to New York. When Robert E. Sherwood wrote the play of The Petrified Forest, he remembered Bogart from another play he saw. Sherwood believed Bogie would make a perfect Mantee. Although Bogie had his doubts he agreed to play the part and was terrific. At this time the country was fascinated with John Dillinger. Bogie looked a bit like Dillinger and with his mechanical walk and unshaven look, he terrified audiences on Broadway.

A huge stage hit is always a hot commodity in Hollywood and Warner Brothers scooped in to buy the rights to it. Leslie Howard was to reprise his role from Broadway. Bette Davis was to make her return to Hollywood after her nasty break-up with Warner Brothers. The two stars would be reunited after appearing together in Of Human Bondage (1934). There was just the issue of casting Duke Mantee. After receiving word from Leslie Howard that he would not appear in the movie if Jack Warner didn’t hire Bogie for the part, Warner extended a second chance to the Broadway actor. The rest as they say is history. Bogie became a huge star and never forgot Howard for sticking up for him. He would name his daughter Leslie.

All the characters in this movie are well drawn. From the main ones to the bit players, like Gabrielle’s supposed boyfriend, Boze, who can’t give up his past football glories or the rich man who is only concerned with money and neglects his wife even when bullets start to fly around the diner and he might be killed. Like all good adaptations of stage plays, the movie keeps what worked on Broadway intact. It is contained to one set and lets its characters do the rest. There are no Fellini or Hitchcock shots here, just pure character studies.