All About Eve, The Women & The Music Man

I went to the Castro twice during the last week in December.  On December 27, I saw All About Eve and The Women.  On December 29, I saw The Music Man.  I considered seeing the 2nd half of The Music Man double bill but at three hours with an intermission, I decided My Fair Lady was too long for that evening.  When I exited the theater, I was amazed at how many people were in line waiting to see My Fair Lady.  It was an 8 PM screening on a Monday night and the line went up Castro Street and turned around the corner at the Twin Peaks Tavern.

All About Eve starring Bette Davis and Anne Baxter; with Gary Merrill, Celeste Holm, George Sanders, Hugh Marlowe & Thelma Ritter; directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz; (1950)
The Women starring Norma Shearer & Joan Crawford; with Rosalind Russell, Paulette Goddard & Joan Fontaine; directed by George Cukor; (1939)
The Music Man starring Robert Preston & Shirley Jones; with Buddy Hackett; directed by Morton DaCosta; (1962)

These are three all-time classics but I've only seen All About Eve previously.  In fact, I recall seeing at the Castro several years ago.

§§§

I don't think there is much need to recount the plot of All About Eve.  Bette Davis is great in the role of Broadway star Margo Channing.  George Sanders (as the theater critic Addison DeWitt) is the center of attention in every scene he is in.

I've long known that All About Eve has a large following among gay men.  I assumed that George Sanders portraying Addison DeWitt as a bitter queen who uses Marilyn Monroe as a beard and Davis in full Queen Bitch mode were the attractions.  This was the first time I watched All About Eve looking for the hidden clues that Eve Harrington was a lesbian.

Toward the beginning of the film there is a party at Margo's apartment.  This is the party where Davis delivers her famous "Fasten your seat belts..." line.  As the party winds down & Margo erupts, she turns her drunken anger towards Eve who has yet to fully reveal her true intentions.  In front of the remaining guests, Margo announces she is going to bed.  Her boyfriend Bill (Gary Merrill) asks if she needs any help.  Margo responds "To put me to bed? Take my clothes off, hold my head, tuck me in, turn off the lights, tiptoe out?  Eve would. Wouldn't you, Eve?"  Eve softly says "If you'd like."  Margo responds emphatically "I wouldn't like."

I'm not sure if the preceding exchange implies that Margo is aware of Eve's sexual orientation.  It could be implied that Margo's assistant Birdie (Thelma Ritter) has picked up on it but I thought the inference is ambiguous.  The exchange is definitely odd but the audience must remember that Margo is three sheets to the wind by this point of the party.

There is a later scene which I found more convincing.  When Eve wins the lead role in Lloyd's play and Karen's misgivings become more pronounced, Eve makes a preemptive strike.  She has her "neighbor" call up Lloyd late at night and claim that Eve is hysterical.  Lloyd agree to come over immediately,  As the camera pans out, we see that Eve is standing beside the woman and she is anything but hysterical.  They share a knowing smile with each other and then walk back up the stairs with their arms around each other.  By this point, Eve has designs on Lloyd and the phone call is intended to get Lloyd over to Eve's place and drive a wedge between Lloyd and Karen.  However, the look between the two women and the way their arms are draped over each other imply they are more than just friendly neighbors.

The final scene also has some lesbian overtones.  Phoebe (who admits to DeWitt that that is not her real name) is a young fan of Eve.  She sneaks into Eve's apartment and falls asleep.  When Eve arrives home, she is upset to find a stranger in her home.  As the scene progresses, Eve seems more at ease.  The key aspect of this scene is to show Phoebe is to Eve and Eve was to Margo.  The cycle repeats with one manipulative actress displacing another.  Lost in that message is the decidedly sexual tone of Eve towards Phoebe.  Her pose on the couch and her leading questions are meant to invite Phoebe to spend the night without explicitly asking.

It's far from obvious that Eve is a lesbian.  I'm on the fence.  She makes a pass at Bill on screen and references are made to her enticing Lloyd from Karen and marrying Lloyd so her sexuality would appear to be a tool in achieving whatever her goals are..."gay or straight for pay" I guess.  Why couldn't she have been making overtures to Margo & the girl making the phone call to further her career?  The final scene does hint that her proclivity is towards same sex since she doesn't have much to gain by taking in Phoebe but perhaps like Margo, at some level she wants the audiences' adoration to be personal.  It is interesting watching the film from this perspective although it would be distracting for a film I had not previously seen.

I've seen All About Eve at least three time all the way through and I've caught portions of it on television probably another dozen or more times.  The film holds up exceedingly well to multiple viewings.  I think it is likely due to Joseph L. Mankiewicz's memorable dialogue.

§§§

I've seen portions of The Women on television.  The Women was screened at the Castro on a beat up 35 mm print.  The ends of the reels were particularly damaged.  At times it was difficult for me to make out the dialogue.

Based on a play by Clare Booth Luce, a screenplay by Anita Loos and F. Scott Fitzgerald (uncredited), directed by George Cukor and with an all-star cast, The Women has a high pedigree.  The opening credit indicate what kind of film this will be.  The actresses images are preceded by images of animals:  Norma Shearer is a doe, Joan Crawford is a cheetah, Rosalind Russell is a black cat, Joan Fontaine is a sheep, Paulette Goddard is a fox, etc.

The Women is a farce that centers around Mary Haines (Norma Shearer).  Mary is upbeat and quite satisfied in her marriage when the film starts.  Her friend and cousin Sylvia Fowler (Rosalind Russell) deliberately upsets her wedded bliss by sharing with Mary's friends some gossip she has heard at the spa.  Mary's husband Stephen is having an affair with department store perfume saleswoman named Crystal Allen (Joan Crawford).  To goose the situation, Sylvia sends Mary to the spa and recommends the manicurist who shared the gossip with her.

Crushed when she hears the rumor, Mary begins to suspect her husband of infidelity.  She is counseled by her mother (Lucile Watson) to ignore the gossip and take an extended trip to Bermuda with her.  The hope is that the rumor will die by the time she returns.

Rather than fade, it appears that Stephen & Crystal's affair has deepened.  Attending a fashion show with her friends, Mary spots Crystal in attendance.  Goaded by Sylvia, Mary confronts Crystal.  Rather than being contrite or embarrassed, Crystal is defiant and even suggests that she is comfortable with the status quo and threatens to steal Stephen outright unless Mary behaves herself.

Once again, Sylvia stirs up the scandal even more by indirectly getting Mary's confrontation with Crystal in the newspapers.  Humiliated, Mary decides to go to Reno to get a divorce.  She stays at a kind of dude ranch for married women fulfilling Nevada's residency requirements for divorce.

It was around this point that I realized I had seen a single male in the film.  Stephen is never seen and even his voice is never heard.  Not only was there not a single male speaking part, I didn't even see a single male extra.  The Women is about women whose identities are closely tied to their husbands (they all refer to themselves as "Mrs. Stephen Haines" or such) but the film never shows them interacting with men.  Like ellipsis in an Ozu film, we only see the effects of male-female interaction and we have to infer the actual interaction.

En route to Reno, Mary meets a whole slew of soon-to-be-divorcees including the oft married Countess De Lave (Mary Boland) and Miriam Aarons (Paulette Goddard) who is married but having an affair with Sylvia's husband.  When in Reno, Mary meets up with two of her "friends" from New York:  the shy Peggy Day (Joan Fontaine) and eventually Sylvia herself shows up.

Mary gets her divorce although she has second thoughts about it.  Stephen marries Crystal and couple of years pass.  Crystal is having an affair with the Countess' husband, Stephen is miserable, Mary & Sylvia are estranged while Crystal & Sylvia are best friends.  Eventually Mary learns of Stephen's unhappiness with Crystal and schemes to get him back.  Mary tricks Sylvia in to revealing Crystal's affair.  Mary then informs the Countess of the affair prompting her to plan another trip to Reno.  Crystal is ready to trade up from Stephen to Buck (the Countess' husband) but when informed that the divorce will leave Buck penniless, Crystal is resigned to the fact that she'll have to return to the perfume counter.  Crawford has the last word in the film; leaving the assembled women with this bon mot "By the way, there's a name for you ladies, but it isn't used in high society...outside of a kennel."

Although The Women is a comedy, I found it horribly depressing.  These women are incredibly cruel to each other.  Mary, the one woman who refuses to get down and dirty with the crowd, triumphs in the end by using the same tactics have have waylayed her marriage.  Although their behavior was exaggerated for comic effect, The Women seemed to have just enough truth in it to be uncomfortable for me.  I'm not an expert on feminist issues in the 1930s but these characters were wealthy educated women who spent their time finding their next husband and undermining their so called frineds' marriages.  Even as satire, The Women is a sad commentary on what passed for the leisure activities of the wealthy.  That's not to say that I didn't laugh at the absurdity of some of the situations.

In my opinion, Rosalind Russell & Paulette Goddard had the most memorable roles.

§§§

The Music Man features Robert Preston as Harry Hill, a con man/travelling salesman who pulls into River City, Iowa with the goal of conning the townspeople with the marching band scam.  Although he has no musical knowledge, he convinces the town to get behind his scheme to create a boys marching band.  Among his chief obstacles are the level-headed Marian the librarian (Shirley Jones), the susceptible to flattery mayor (Paul Ford) and his indescribable wife (Hermione Gingold who was also memorable as the grandmother in Gigi).  Gingold and Maurice Chevalier sang my favorite song from Gigi, "I Remember it Well."

The plot was predictable and at 2.5 hours, some of the songs fell a little flat.  I think the film version of The Music Man is faithful to the stage version but may have benefited from 30 minute of edits.  Among the my favorite musical numbers were "Rock Island", "Ya Got Trouble", "Shipoopi" (given a renewed interest due to an episode of The Family Guy) and of course "76 Trombones".

The difference between a good musical and a great musical is that there must be some pathos and empathy/sympathy with the characters.  Because they break into song & dance, a musical cannot achieve the same level of emotional investment from me as a drama or dramedy but the plot and acting have to carry some of the load.  I didn't get that feeling with The Music Man.  Preston was ok but it was the romance between Preston & Jones that never hooked me.  I just didn't believe that Marian would fall for him or that Hill wouldn't skip town with the money.

Buddy Hackett has a role as a former con man who helps Preston in River City.  "Shipoopi" is his big number.  A very young Ron Howard plays Marian's sullen younger brother.

I Wake Up Dreaming 2013 - 99 44/100% Noir

I saw 17 films at I Wake Up Dreaming 2013 which was held at the Roxie from May 10 to 23.  I Wake Up Dreaming is programmer Elliot Lavine's spring event.  His late summer/autumn event is typically called Not Necessarily Noir.  The 2013 edition of I Wake Up Dreaming had the subtitle of "99 44/100% Noir."  I wonder how many people under the age of 50 picked up the Ivory soap slogan.

Of the 30 films on the program, I had seen 12 before including All Through the Night which I saw again during the 2013 festival.  The two films which I had not previously seen and did not watch during the festival were My Gun is Quick (1957) and The Tattooed Stranger.

The 17 films I saw during the festival were:

Blues in the Night starring Priscilla Lane, Richard Whorf, Betty Field, Jack Carson & Lloyd Nolan; with Elia Kazan & Howard DaSilva; directed by Anatole Litvak; (1941)
I Wake Up Screaming starring Victor Mature, Betty Grable, Carole Landis, Laird Cregar & Elisha Cook, Jr.; directed by H. Bruce Humberstone; (1941)
The Monster and the Girl starring Ellen Drew, Robert Paige, Paul Lukas & Joseph Calleia; directed by Stuart Heisler; (1941)

Fall Guy starring Leo Penn; with Elisha Cook, Jr.; directed by Reginald Le Borg; (1947)

Club Havana starring Tom Neal; directed by Edgar G. Umer; (1945)

Island of Doomed Men starring Peter Lorre, Rochelle Hudson & Robert Wilcox; directed by Charles Barton; (1940)

Nightmare starring Diana Barrymore & Brian Donlevy; directed by Tim Whelan; (1942)

All Through the Night starring Humphrey Bogart; with Kaaren Verne, Peter Lorre, Conrad Veidt, William Demarest, Jackie Gleason & Phil Silvers; directed by Vincent Sherman; (1942)

Bewitched starring Phyllis Thaxter; directed by Arch Oboler; (1945)

Five  starring William Phipps, Susan Douglas, James Anderson, Charles Lampkin & Earl Lee; directed by Arch Oboler; (1951)

All Night Long starring Patrick McGoohan, Marti Stevens, Paul Harris & Richard Attenborough; directed by Basil Dearden; (1961)

Autumn Leaves starring Joan Crawford & Cliff Robertson; with Vera Miles & Lorne Greene; directed by Robert Aldrich; (1956)

Killer at Large starring Robert Lowery; directed by William Beaudine; (1947)

Key Witness starring John Beal; directed by D. Ross Lederman; (1947)

Bluebeard's Ten Honeymoons starring George Sanders; directed by W. Lee Wilder; (1960)

Death of a Scoundrel starring George Sanders, Yvonne De Carlo & Zsa Zsa Gabor; directed by Charles Martin; (1956)

The Crooked Way starring John Payne; directed by Robert Florey; (1949)

§§§

Although I enjoyed several of the films, overall I was slightly disappointed with the program.  Granted, I missed two films in the program which are among the all-time great noir films - Sweet Smell of Success and Criss Cross.

The best double feature was a George Sanders' pair on the penultimate night.  Bluebeard's Ten Honeymoons was a dark comedy which reminded me of Sweeney Todd with a dash Hitchcock cheekiness.  Sanders plays a used furniture dealer who is in love with a chanteuse.  Unfortunately for him, she has expensive tastes and monogamy is not exactly her strong suit.  One thing leads to another and Sanders ends up a killing series of women whom he is romancing.  Now that sounds very harsh but director W. Lee Wilder handles it with a deft touch.  Sanders is very frugal and keeps track of all his costs in a little ledger.  When he buys train tickets to take his victim to his country cottage, he saves money by only buying her a one-way ticket.  How does he dispose of the bodies?  Fortunately, his cottage has a large stove that custom built to cook large game animals.  A better man would be offended but the film tickled my admittedly perverse funny bone.

Whereas Bluebeard's Ten Honeymoons was a fun little film, Sanders strives for the epic in Death of a Scoundrel.  Oddly, Sanders with his RP accent plays Sabourin, a Czech refugee in New York by way of South America.  Having survived a Nazi concentration camp, Sabourin calls on his brother only discover he has married his true love.  Undeterred, he sells his brother out to the police in exchange for passage to New York.  Once in NYC, he spots Yvonne DeCarlo pulling a scam.  Seeing a chance to scam the scammer, he steals her stolen loot.  For his trouble, he gets shot but that leads to better things. The back alley doctor tips him off to penicillin which he promptly buys on the stock market.  With his insider tip, he makes friends with the wealthy Mrs. Ryan (Zsa Zsa Gabor).  Eventually, Sabourin sets up a company and parlays unscrupulous and fraudulent deals to great wealth.  Juggling amorous intentions towards Mrs. Ryan, her secretary cum actress, his sister-in-law, Sabourin is a scoundrel in every sense of the word.  Only DeCarlo understands and even appreciates his flaws and strengths.  Sanders is magnificent in the role.  His performance is even more incredible given that Sanders and Zsa Zsa Gabor were less than 2 years divorced in real life at the time of the filming.

About 15 years after making Death of a Scoundrel, Sanders married (and divorced) a second Gabor sister (Magda).  If he hadn't committed suicide in 1972, Sanders might have been able to pull off the Hungarian Hat Trick given his apparent partiality towards the Gabor sisters and their collective propensity for marriage.  Magda, Zsa Zsa and Eva had something on the order of 20 marriages between them.

§§§

I Wake Up Screaming features one of the iconic images in film noir:  Victor Mature standing with the shadow of an elevator cage partially obscuring his face (see program below).  The film was quite good but not in the pantheon of noir.  Victor Mature is a Broadway producer who "helps" young actresses.  Together with newspaper columnist Allyn Joslyn and Broadway actor Alan Mowbray, the three seem to make sport of building up the next big thing.  Carole Landis is a waitress who is the latest object of the trio's attention.  However, she ends up dead and creepy cop Laird Cregar thinks Mature is the prime suspect.  Betty Grable shows up as Landis' sister who develops an unusual attraction to Mature, who was in love with her sister and is the prime suspect in her murder.  Elisha Cook, Jr. is the front desk worker at the apartment building where Landis & Grable live.  Most memorable for Cregar's menacing performance, I Wake Up Screaming is a solid film.

Autumn Leaves was paired with Female on the Beach which I saw at the 2011 edition of Not Necessarily Noir.  Both films feature Joan Crawford as vulnerable woman.  In Autumn Leaves, she is a lonely spinster who is won over by Cliff Robertson.  At least they acknowledge the age difference in the film.  Crawford was 20 years older than Robertson.  Interestingly, Lorne Greene played Robertson father despite only being 8 years older than Robertson.  In true noir fashion, Robertson's Burt turns out to have serious psychological issues and Vera Miles shows up claiming to be his ex-wife.  Crawford's Millie has a strong nurturing streak due to childhood trauma.  Desperate to personally care for her husband, Millie rejects all entreaties that she commit Burt to a mental sanatorium.  As you see, Autumn Leaves is fairly melodramtic.  In addition, Crawford is vulnerable and I think she is at her best when she has a bitchy role.  We do get to watch Robertson chew up the scenery when he is in one of his fugue states.

Peter Lorre seems to be one of those actors whose presence elevates a film.  Such was the case with Island of Doomed Men.  Lorre plays the warden of an off-the-books private island prison which is kind of cross between Devil's Island and a slave plantation.  Lorre takes sadistic pleasure in lording over the prisoners and his beautiful but captive wife.  A G-man goes undercover to break up the racket but needs the help of the wife.  Lorre is the best thing about the film and makes it worthwhile.

The final film of the festival was The Crooked Way, another amnesia film.  John Payne is a soldier convalescing (at Letterman Hospital in the Presidio) after WWII.  Permanently unable to regain his memory, his doctor decides to send him back home to Los Angeles where familiar surrounding may help him adjust.  What doctor & patient are unaware of is that he is a former gangster who joined the army under an alias and his return stirs up old feuds with the cops, other gangsters and his ex-wife.  It's a run-of-the-mill plot with above average performances.  Sonny Tufts as the gang boss and Rhys Williams as the hard-nosed cop stand out among the cast.

§§§

I had never heard of Arch Oboler before this festival.  Lavine programmed a Oboler double bill one night.  Bewitched was about a young woman who "hears voices in her head" and whose fiancé ends up murdered.  Technically, she only hears once voice but that's enough to lead to multiple homicides.  It was a nice try but ultimately the film fell flat.  Phyllis Thaxter gives it her all as the lead character.

Five was more interesting for me.  The premise is that a nuclear holocaust has killed everyone in the world except for five people.  Interestingly, the buildings are still standing and the nuclear fallout doesn't seem to be particularly fatal.  Even more amazing is that these five people find each other but contrived situations and incredible coincidences are part and parcel of cinema.

Anyway, the five consist of Roseanne (Susan Douglas), a woman who turns out to be pregnant.  She goes to take refuge at her aunt's remote home only to discover her aunt is missing and man is living there.  His name is Michael (William Phipps) and  I believe he was an architect.  Later, two men drive down the deserted road near the house.  The younger man is Charles (Charles Lampkin), an African American who worked at a bank.  The older man is Oliver (Earl Lee) and also worked at the same bank.  The four of them survived due to chance - Roseanne was in lead lined X-ray room, Oliver & Charles were accidentally locked in the bank vault and Michael was in an elevator in Empire State Building.  Wouldn't the EMP knock out the elevator?  As Oliver shows signs of radiation poisoning, they take him to the beach to recuperate where they meet the fifth survivor.  Eric (James Anderson) is a mountain climber was trapped at the top of Mt. Everest at the time of the nuclear detonation.  After the blizzard passed, Eric flew back to the US (despite having a French accent) where his plane ran out of fuel just off the coast.

With the quintet set, we see societal ills played out in a microcosm.  Eric brings discord to the group.  He and Michael both have romantic intentions towards Roseanne.  He is also a racist which causes tension between him & Charles.  His greed and selfishness causes problems for the small group (by this point, Oliver has died of his illness).  From a rational perspective, Eric's behavior is counterproductive.  Everyone knows that all three of the men should impregnate Roseanne to created the large gene pool but I guess that would be a little risque for 1951.  Eric's desire to go to the city and "steal" jewelry and money is ridiculous in a post-apocalyptic world as is his destruction of the crops Michael & Charles have cultivated.  Human foolishness knows no bounds.  The film was a little predictable and pedantic but interesting nonetheless.

§§§

Lavine appears to have an affinity for the obscure and B-films.  Sometimes this results in unearthing hidden gems.  Other times, I feel as though these films were obscure for a reason.  I wouldn't say the films were "bad" but they were largely forgettable.

As I scan the list of films I saw, I cannot recall the full plot for many of them.  A scene or two is as much as I can remember per film.

Blues in the Night - a jaxx band gets mixed up gangsters at a roadhouse.  Jack Carson played the trumpeter, Elia Kazan played some instrument.

The Monster and the Girl - a human brain in a gorilla; enough said.

Fall Guy - a guy has no memory of the previous night but he is covered in blood and a woman is dead.

Club Havana - a large cast and multiple subplots set in a nightclub.  There was a shootout in the parking at the end.

Nightmare - Brian Donlevy breaks into a house and makes himself some fried eggs.  A woman in the house confronts him and the next thing you know, they rooting out Nazi spies in wartime England.  There were explosives in marked bottles of wine or some liquor.

Key Witness - a guy has no memory of the previous night but he is covered in blood and a woman is dead.  Sounds like Fall Guy, eh?  I liked this one more because the guy goes on the lam and eventually switches identities with a dead man whose face is disfigured.  It turns out the dead man is the estranged son of a wealthy industrialist.  The older man has not seen his son since he was boy so he doesn't recognize the man claiming to be his son.  Actually, now that I started writing I think I liked Key Witness more than the other films in this section.  The man's achieves success as the rich man's son which brings him to the attention of his wife who has assumed he was dead.  The ending was pure hokum but it was fun ride until that point.

Killer at Large - two newspaper reporters (one male & one female) investigate the murder (suspicious suicide) of a city leader.  Eventually, the trail leads back to the female reporter's father.

All Night Long - I forgot I saw this at the 2009 I Wake Up Dreaming.   A retelling of Shakespeare's Othello set in a London jazz club in the early 1960s.  An impressive array of jazz musicians appear as themselves over a long night at the club. Patrick McGoohan's performance stood out.  He always seems to stand out from the cast.

§§§

All that is left is All Through the Night.  About as noirish as a Bowery Boys film, the film is essentially a screwball comedy.  It was embarrassing to see Humphrey Bogart ham it up and sprout gibberish.  I guess I've typecast Bogie but he seemed to want to have it both way - part tough guy, part comedian.  Growing bored with the film about halfway, I wondered how Bogie & Gleason got along.  Gleason was infamous for his all night parties and the prodigious amounts of money & alcohol he consumed.

Not Necessarily Noir II

In November, the Roxie brougt Elliott Lavine and Johnny Legend back to program Not Necessarily Noir II.

The film I most wanted to see was The Killers (1964) with Lee Marvin, Angie Dickinson, John Cassavetes and Ronald Reagan in his last role. Based on a Hemingway story and a remake of the classic Burt Lancaster/Ava Gardner film (1946), this was a made for TV film which was deemed too violent and released in the theaters. It was paired with Clint Eastwood's directorial debut Play Misty For Me (1971) which I had seen before. Unfortunately, I was more tempted by a Jeanne Moreau double feature at the PFA.

Actually, I had seen a number of the films at Not Necessarily Noir II before including Blow Out and Johnny Guitar.

I ended up seeing four films.

Brainstorm starring Jeffrey Hunter, Anne Francis and Dana Andrews; with Strother Martin; directed by William Conrad; (1965)
Female on the Beach starring Joan Crawford & Jeffrey Chandler; (1955)
Girl Gang; (1954)
Teenage Gang Debs; (1966)

The series closed with three Ed Wood film (Jail Bait, Glen or Glenda? & Plan 9 From Outer Space) and Johnny Legend's Woodworld, a documentary on Ed Wood. I didn't think I was up for four hours of Ed Wood so I passed on the final evening's program.

§§§

None of these films were what you would call masterpieces. Each of them had some serious flaws.

Brainstorm (directed by the actor William Conrad) was about a man (Jeffrey Hunter) who pretends to be crazy to justify a murder but then actual becomes insane with a little help from roundheel Anne Francis. The setup was solid but the film lost my interest midway.

Female on the Beach star Joan Crawford as a vulnerable widow living in a beach house next to some cardsharks and beach bum Jeffrey Hunter. I've noted before that Crawford plays the weakling or the bitch. In this one, she tried go half and half but the film had B picture written all over. A predictable script with Jan Sterling looking beautiful and future Gilligan's Island co-star Natalie Schaefer looking out of place. Girl Gang was notable for its explicit depiction of heroin use; I would even say it was a tutorial on how to mainline coke.

That leaves Teenage Gang Debs which was by far my favorite. Even at a modest 75 minutes, the film had a lot of filler in the form shots of motorcyclist riding around and dance sequences. The plot was essentially Lady MacBeth Joins a Motorcycle Gang. Actually, she (Diane Conti) is just the girlfriend of the gang leader but she is one pulling the strings and acting Machiavellian. Conti shines in the film. I'm surprised she didn't go on to bigger and better things.

Teenage Gang Debs is an unusually rough-edged, juvenile delinquency film featuring not one but two gang rape scenes, multiple murders and a biker gang that dresses like they're in a college fraternity.

Although the film was clearly padded out to get to 75 minutes, one dance sequence deserves a mention because the tune was great. Lee Dowell's The Black Belt had me tapping my feet and smiling.

Teenage Gang Debs deserves cult film status.

Near the Intersection of Grant & Crawford

The title does not refer to streets in San Francisco but rather the two Hollywood legends, Archibald Alexander Leach and Lucille Fay LeSueur; better known by their stage names, Cary Grant and Joan Crawford. They never appeared together on screen. However, they appeared within a week of each other at the Castro Theater

The Castro had a week long Cary Grant series starting on August 31. I saw:

Philadelphia Story starring Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn & Jimmy Stewart; directed by George Cukor; (1940)
Holiday starring Cary Grant & Katharine Hepburn; directed by George Cukor; (1938)
His Girl Friday starring Cary Grant & Rosalind Russell; with Ralph Bellamy; directed by Howard Hawks; (1940)
Only Angels Have Wings starring Cary Grant & Jean Arthur; with Richard Barthelmess, Rita Hayworth, Thomas Mitchell & Noah Beery Jr.; directed by Howard Hawks; (1939)
Notorious starring Cary Grant & Ingrid Bergman; with Claude Rains; directed by Alfred Hitchcock; (1946)
Suspicion starring Cary Grant & Joan Fontaine; directed by Alfred Hitchcock; (1941)

North by Northwest, Charade & Monkey Business are among the films I passed on because I had seen them previously. North by Northwest is one of my favorite films but I ended up seeing something else that night (a topic for another entry).

Two days after the Cary Grant series ended, the Castro ran a Joan Crawford double feature.

Humoresque starring Joan Crawford & John Garfield; with Oscar Levant; (1946)
Daisy Kenyon starring Joan Crawford, Dana Andrews & Henry Fonda; directed by Otto Preminger; (1947)

The primary reason I keep this blog is to chronicle the films I watch in theaters. I should have consulted the blog because I saw Humoresque in 2009 at the PFA. Although I didn't write about it then, it was immediately recognizable to me as a film I had previously scene. The boy who play John Garfield's character at the beginning of the film was familiar to me but I couldn't place the name. I looked him up afterwards; it was Robert Blake.

§§§

I don't really need to recap the Cary Grant films. They are all classics except perhaps Only Angels Have Wings. A few of my observations.

Philadelphia Story & Holiday were released at the tail end of the Great Depression but before WWII. There is some debate as to when the Great Depression ended but I always use Pearl Harbor Day as the cutoff. My general 20th century US timeline for history and movies are:

1918 WWI
1919 Spanish Influenza Epidemic
1920 to 1929 Roaring 20s/End of the Silent Era
1929 to 1941 Great Depression
1941 to 1945 WWII
1946 to 1952 Post WWII/HUAC-Red Scare/Korean War/Film Noir
1952 to 1960 Eisenhower Administration
1960 to 1966 Mad Men era, Kennedy/Camelot
1967 to 1973 Hippies/Counterculture/Vietnam/Social Unrest
1974 to 1980 Nixon/Watergate/1970s excess/cinema I don't typically understand or appreciate
1981 and onwards - I can remember this period so i don't need crib notes to put a film in its historical context

Getting back to Cary Grant, Philadelphia Story & Holiday were set among the ultra wealthy in the Northeast US. I wonder how many people in the audience could relate to the characters. I guess it's not much different from today with reality shows like The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills but I have always thought that making movies about the fabulously wealthy and beautiful during the Great Depression was a in poor taste. The counter argument is that the nation needed films like that to escape their real-life troubles.

Philadelphia Story seemed to imply Katharine Hepburn's character had some psychological issues which left her frigid (I believe that was the term used at the time). In other words, the character had issues with men that left her unable to be fully satisfied with the most intimate aspects of her marriage. I can see how a woman married to guy looking like Cary Grant could have that trouble. I hadn't picked up on that although its been years since I saw Philadelphia Story.

In Holiday, Lew Ayres turned in a nice performance as Hepburn's sympathetic but constantly sloshed brother.

His Girl Friday is full of self-references. When asked to describe his ex-wife's (Rosalind Russell) fiancé, Cary Grant says "He looks like that fellow in the movies - Ralph Bellamy." Ralph Bellamy is playing the role in the film. At another point Grant says "Listen the last man that said that to me was Archie Leach just a week before he cut his throat." Archie Leach is Grant's real name. Grant and Russell were fully conversant in the rapid fire patois of the period. I'm not sure if people really spoke that way or it was just in the movies.

Suspicion had a horrible ending which made the film terribly disappointing. It was changed from the source material (a novel titled Before the Fact). I thought it was the hand of the Hays Code but it was the direct result of the studio (RKO) being protective of Grant's debonair image. Suspicion really left a sour taste in my mouth but it did produce an iconic image of a (presumably) malevolent Grant carrying a glass of milk to his wife (Fontaine). The audience is led to believe the milk is poisoned. The pure and creamy white milk directly contrasting with the poison and evil within; nicely done Mr. Hitchcock.

I was unfamiliar with Only Angels Have Wings prior to seeing it. I immediately recognized Sig Ruman who 14 years later would give a memorable performance as Sergeant Schulz in Stalag 17. Only Angels Have Wings is about a freight airline operating in Brazil. They have to fly through a narrow pass in the mountains because their planes cannot climb high enough to go over the top. The weather, the antiquated planes and even birds, cause many injuries and fatalities among the pilots. As a result, they develop hardened emotions and fatalistic attitudes. Cary Grant is the manager and chief pilot of the airline. He's a tough nut but seems to have a lot of ex-girlfriends including Rita Hayworth. The plot is ok but a few devices look silly 75 years later. In addition to Sig Ruman as the jovial owner of airline and Thomas Mitchell as Grant's fellow pilot and best friend, Jean Arthur shows up as a woman in love with Grant while Hayworth shows up married to another man.

Notorious was my favorite film of the series. Claude Rains delivers Oscar nominated performance as Bergman's Nazi husband. Bergman plays the part of a confused and conflicted woman well; not altogether different than Ilsa in Casablanca. Grant dispenses with his persona to play a callous spy handler. Notorious was daring for its sexually provocative plot. Ilsa basically sleeps with and marries Rains' character to infiltrate the Nazi spy ring. Less than five years later, Bergman caused a scandal by having a public affair with director Roberto Rossellini and comparisons were drawn to the character she played in Notorious.

§§§

I should have given Humoresque some commentary back in 2009. I appear to have been more taken by No Man of Her Own and A Letter to Three Wives; both of which I vividly recall with fond memories. I don't recall my initial impression of Humoresque. The most lasting impression is of John Garfield. While he was only 33 years old at the time of filming, it was a hard 33. Garfield wouldn't live out his 30s; dying at age 39 in 1952. Allegedly, the stress of being blacklisted (he was called before HUAC and refused to "name names") contributed to his death. However, six years before his death in Humoresque, Garfield was looking worn out.

Ironically, Garfield was in the midst of the most productive period of his film career. Humoresque opened on Christmas day 1946. Earlier in the year, Garfield starred opposite Lana Turner in the noir classic, The Postman Always Rings Twice. In 1947, Garfield costarred in Gentleman's Agreement, the Academy Award winner for Best Picture. Garfield also made Body and Soul in 1947, for which he received an Oscar nomination. That film, which played at the 2007 San Francisco Jewish Film Festival, was a hard hitting exposé of the corrupt boxing rackets and an ambitious fighter (Garfield).

In Humoresque, Garfield plays Paul Boray, a concert violinist from a working class family. Unable to get a break, he is introduced to Helen Wright (Crawford) a wealthy matron of the art. Despite her being married, a dozen years older than him and an alcoholic, Boray & Wright begin a tempestuous romance. As Boray's musical career improves, his relationship with Wright falters.

The best part of Humoresque is the talented Oscar Levant. A skilled pianist and composer, Levant plays Sid Jeffers, Boray's piano accompanist whose wry and alcohol induced comments serve as a Greek chorus for the audience. My favorite is after watching Boray & Wright frolic at the beach, Jeffers asks Mrs. Wright, "Does your husband interfere with your marriage?"

The second best part of the film is the music. I have read that Levant performed on the piano for all the pieces whereas a violinist were just off screen for Garfield's pieces. There are several extended musical pieces including "Flight of the Bumble Bee" and portions of Bizet's "Carmen." The musical performances were top notch and drew applause from the Castro audience.

The film falls into the category of a mid-century, sophisticated drama. To me, that is shorthand for a film made in the 1940s and 1950s, typically set in New York, where wealthy people and artists live and party in tastefully decorated apartments and penthouses. Usually everyone drinks to excess although they are never sloppy drunks. Most of the dialog sounds like it was quipped at the Algonquin Round Table. Although the characters are so witty, the dialog barely conceals deep-seated resentment and hostility between the characters. That pretty much sums up Humoresque. The film looks like a dinosaur in 2011 but its always nice to see Joan Crawford being Joan Crawford.

In Humoresque and Daisy Kenyon, Crawford hadn't quite reached überbitch status. Although she throws in some catty comments, it's very clear that Helen Wright and Daisy Kenyon have insecurities which they cope with by verbal sparring. The title character in Daisy Kenyon is a interior designer who is in a long-term relationship with a wealthy lawyer (Dana Andrews). Although dissatisfied with the relationship, Daisy doesn't move off the ball until Henry Fonda shows up. He plays a former yacht designer, current NCO in the US Army and a widower who quickly falls for Daisy despite the presence of Daisy's married lover.

A love triangle develops and ultimately leads to Kenyon marrying Peter Lapham (Fonda), O'Mara (Andrews) leaving his wife and cuckolding Lapham. That's quite a bit of wife swapping for 1947. O'Mara's wife (Ruth Warrick) is a particularly pathetic woman who resorts to beating their daughter. None of the three leads had much in the way of self-respect and the ending left was a bit outlandish.

Unlike Helen Wright in Humoresque, Daisy Kenyon puts up little defense and is essentially at the mercy of the men in her life. It didn't feel like a Joan Crawford role. Barbara Stanwyck or Ida Lupino are two obvious casting choices I would have chosen before Crawford. Daisy breaks down and weeps on a few occasions and never shows the inner strength or bravado one associates with a Joan Crawford role.

A few weeks ago, I watched Mildred Pierce which was the film Crawford made immediately before Humoresque. Neither Humoresque or Daisy Kenyon were as satisfying as Mildred Pierce but they were still worthwhile films of the era. One definitely needs to be a fan of the Golden Age to enjoy Humoresque or Daisy Kenyon. Otherwise, the absurdity of the situations become distracting.

So Cary Grant and Joan Crawford's screen personae haven't aged that well but Grant's alter ego was so mischievous and exuberant while Joan Crawford played a bitch. The Castro series hewed closely to Grant's image while presently something fundamentally different for Crawford's films.

What Do They Have in Common?

I recently saw the following six films at the Castro Theater. Before the series, I couldn't have identified the common denominator between the films. The answer is Max Steiner who composed the original score for those films as well as Gone With the Wind and The Big Sleep. The Steiner films were part of the Castro ongoing "Legendary Composer" series.

Mildred Pierce starring Joan Crawford, Zachary Scott, Ann Blyth & Eve Arden; directed by Michael Curtiz; (1945)
The Letter starring Bette Davis & James Stephenson; directed by William Wyler; (1940)
White Heat starring James Cagney, Edmond O'Brien & Virginia Mayo; directed by Raoul Walsh; (1949)
Angels with Dirty Faces starring James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, Pat O'Brien, Ann Sheridan & the Bowery Boys; directed by Michael Curtiz; (1938)
King Kong starring Fay Wray & Bruce Cabot; (1933)
The Searchers starring John Wayne, Jeffrey Hunter, Ward Bond, Vera Miles and Natalie Wood; directed by John Ford; (1956)

I can't remember the last time a classic film series entertained me more. I had seen King Kong and The Searchers on television before. Parts of Angels with Dirty Faces also looked familiar. Any familiarity I had with the films did not dampen my enthusiastic response.

§§§

Mildred Pierce was one of the most celebrated films of its era. It garnered six Academy Award nominations including Best Picture, Crawford for Best Actress and Arden & Blythe for Best Supporting Actress. Crawford won the Best Actress award which was deeply satisfying to her. Unceremoniously dropped by MGM in 1943, Crawford signed on with Warner Brothers where she competed with Bette Davis for parts. Davis was the first choice for Mildred Pierce but turned down the role. With the supporting roles cast, director Michael Curtiz forced Crawford to shoot screen tests for the role which was certainly not the way Hollywood stars were treated back in the day. Of course, Crawford's career was thought to be washed up so she was treated like a has-been bitch, but Crawford proved they were only half right. Mildred Pierce relaunched Crawford's career and put her back on top at the box office.

I've seen Mildred Pierce characterized as film noir. That's a bit of a stretch for me; tearjerker and melodrama are two labels I'd attach to Mildred Pierce. Mildred Pierce is the story of a conniving woman who lies, sleeps and betrays her way into getting what she wants. Amazingly, Crawford doesn't play that woman; Ann Blythe does. Crawford plays Mildred, the mother of Veda (Blythe). Pierce's character flaws are more selfless. Mildred is desperate for her daughter's affection and approval. Mildred being a successful restaurateur is too declasse for Veda to tolerate so Mildred marries a playboy (Zachary Scott) from a prominent family which has lost their wealth. Scott proceeds to empty Mildred's bank account and bed her daughter.

Crawford loses some of her appeal by playing the sacrificing mother. That's more than made up for by Ann Blythe. She looks like she could appear in an Andy Hardy film but her performance out bitches the Queen Bee at the best. By the time Crawford got to her bitchy stage, she looked like a middle aged, drag queen desperately trying to hang on. As Veda, Blythe looks like a sweet and well-scrubbed teenager but she's rotten to the core and we all know it by the end. Mildred Pierce should have made Ann Blythe a star.

Eve Arden provides some laughs in a smaller role as Mildred's wise-cracking assistant at the restaurant. The three main supporting actors play characters which give men a bad name. Bruce Bennett as Pierce's ex-husband is the least contemptible. Morose and taciturn, Mr. Pierce did his wife a favor by divorcing her although his strengths shine through by the end of the film. Jack Carson plays the lecherous and opportunistic financier who has long longed for Mildred and whom Mildred attempts to frame for murder. Finally, Zachary Scott is delightfully slimy as the amoral, gold digging 2nd husband of Mildred who can't help or attempt to change his distasteful nature.

I can't imagine how the story of Mildred Pierce could be adapted for modern day circumstances. Even the recent HBO mini-series was set in the 1930s. Mildred Pierce is a product of its era; the same era of Joan Crawford. The ending of the film differs from the novel which is again a product of the Hays Code era. Despite the 65 year span between the release of film and today, I was able to put aside my modern sensibilities and enjoy Mildred Pierce unequivocally.

§§§

Let me start by saying that Jimmy Cagney looks too old for his part as a crime gang leader in White Heat. A few weeks shy of fifty years old when he filmed the part, Cagney looks ridiculous paired up with the delicious Virginia Mayo as his wife. That's about all the criticism I can level at White Heat.

In White Heat, Cagney plays Cody Jarrett, a cold blooded gang leader who rules his gang through fear. His gang pulls off a train robbery in LA and Jarrett has the ultimate alibi. He cops to a lesser crime committed in Chicago at the same time. One of Jarrett's underworld allies pulled the job so Jarrett could plea to a lesser charge to alibi him with the train robbery in which two or three people were killed.

The downside is Jarrett has to do a two year stretch prison for the crime he confessed to. Jarrett could do the time standing on his head and he has his trusted mother to keep an eye on the stolen loot. Still, Jarrett has problems he hasn't even considered yet. The Feds put an Treasury agent undercover in Jarrett's cell. Going by the alias Vic Pardo (Edmond O'Brien), T-man Hank Fallon is anxious to put away Jarrett for the murder of a fellow agent. Adding to Jarrett's troubles is his roundheeled wife (Mayo) who takes up with Jarrett ambitious lieutenant, Big Ed (Steve Cochran). The two of them conspire to bump off Jarrett and his mother but are only half successful. If that's not enough, Jarrett has debilitating headaches and insanity runs in his family.

When Jarrett hears about his mother's death, he goes berserk in the prison mess hall (all-time classic scene). This results in him being taken to the prison infirmary which is an easier location to escape from. Having developed a rapport with Pardo, Jarrett takes him along when he escapes. Jarrett also takes along the prisoner who tried to kill him by dropping an engine block on his head. In another memorable scene, Jarrett asks the man (who is locked in the trunk of their car) if he can breathe. He replies it's kind of stuffy in the trunk to which Jarrett replies by emptying his revolver into the trunk ("I'll give you a little air").

After bumping off Bid Ed (whom Mayo has betrayed), Jarrett plans a payroll heist at a oil refinery. By now, Pardo is Jarrett's most trusted associate. When he discovers that Pardo is an undercover cop, it drives Jarrett over the edge which leads to the explosive climax.

The plot is standard caper fare but the performances by Cagney and Mayo are outstanding. Cagney has some decidedly oedipal feelings which seem to impair his relationship with his wife. Of course, Mayo's crass and vulgar Verna is a woman that should be handled at arms length. The two combined form one of the more dysfunctional cinematic couples from the period.

White Heat has this big, oversized performance from Cagney which gives the film an epic feel even though it is ultimately about a two-bit, psychotic, Mama's boy gangster. Lather on a tanker truck disguised as a Trojan horse and some other heist elements and White Heat reminded me of French New Wave film or an inspiration for Martin Scorsese.

§§§

The Letter & The Searchers deserve some space so I'll postpone my thoughts on them until next time.