First viewings:
Sin Takes A Holiday (1930) Constance Bennett, Basil Rathbone, Kenneth MacKenna, Zasu Pitts. Secretary Sylvia, enters into a marriage of convenience with her boss, who sends her off to Paris to live. She becomes a fashionista and romantic partner of bon vivant Reggie. Interesting early pre-code film with all the players in various illicit activities. Bennett has her usual great wardrobe which is what her fans wanted to see. Rathbone is lots of fun to see as a romantic lead. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021377/combined
Monte Carlo (1930) Jeanette MacDonald, Jack Buchanan, Zasu Pitts. Jeanette sings "Beyond The Blue Horizon" which becomes sort of her theme song, it became so popular during the early days of the depression. Story of Counts, Countesses and Princes, was directed by Ernst Lubitsch with his light touch. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021153/combined
Ladies They Talk About (1933) Barbara Stanwyke, Preston Foster, Lilian Roth. Strange pre-code film of bank robbers, gun molls, evangelist Dave Slade who loves but gives up Nan and sends her to prison. Stanwyke is tough and walks into prison like she owns it. Roth, a lifer, befriends her and shows her the ropes. Not a favorite early film of Missy, but she is always worth watching. 5/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0024238/combined
A Man's Castle (1933) Loretta Young, Spencer Tracy, Marjorie Rambeau, Glenda Farrell. Trina is homeless and hungry. Bill takes her in to his shack in a squatters camp. She fixes it up and loves him but he is a rolling stone who is about to jump a freight train when he finds out she is going to have a baby.. Early look at the way young people had to live in the early years of the depression. Cast is very good, and Loretta is luminous. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0024302/combined
Purchase Price (1932) Barbara Stanwyke, George Brent, Lyle Talbot. Barbara as a torch singer and mistress to a racketeer grows tired of the life and runs away and eventually takes the place of another woman who sent a picture of our singer instead of one of her own, to a farmer looking for a mail order bride. So out to North Dakota she goes and to marry said farmer. Not one of the stars best - I found it strange and unlikable. 3/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023362/combined
Me & My Gal (1932) Spencer Tracy, Joan Bennett. Tracy as a cop and Joan as a waitress with a meandering story that was not very interesting or charming. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023202/combined
Ladies With A Past (1932) Constance Bennett, Ben Lyon, David Manners. Connie is a rich girl who is nice and seems unable to interest men. So she hires a guy to squire her around and make her seem naughty. Silly story but Connie dresses in gorgeous frocks and looks beautiful all the same. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023110/combined
Cross Country Romance (1940) Gene Raymond, Wendy Barrie, Hedda Hopper. Immediately reminds you of It Happened One Night because of the runaway heiress bride. Not as good and the gal is rather an unpleasant spoiled brat so the question is - why is he putting up with her? Oh yeah - he a good guy! 5/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0032369/combined
23 Paces To Baker St. (1956) Van Johnson, Vera Miles, Cecil Parker. Okay thriller about a blind man who overhears a conversation about murder. Van is good as the author of a play in London who tries to find out who has been killed and who did it. Not as suspenseful as it could have been. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048919/combined
ENCORES:
Nicholas & Alexandra (1971) Michael Jayston, Janet Suzman, Irene Worth, Tom Baker. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067483/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Contender (2000) Joan Allen. 9/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0208874/combined
The Phantom Of The Opera (2004) Gerard Butler, Emmy Rossum. Love it. 10/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0293508/combined
The Proposal (2009) Sandra Bullock, Ryan Reynolds. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1041829/combined
In The Valley Of Elah (2007) Tommie Lee Jones, Charlize Theron, Susan Sarandon, Jason Patric, James Franco. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0478134/combined
January 31, 2013
January 27, 2013
ENCORES:
The Love Parade (1929) Jeanette MacDonald, Maurice Chevalier. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0020112/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Merry Widow (1934) Jeanette MacDonald, Maurice Chevalier. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025493/?ref_=fn_al_tt_2
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) Chow Yun Fat, Michelle Yeoh, Zhang Ziyi. 10/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0190332/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Love Parade (1929) Jeanette MacDonald, Maurice Chevalier. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0020112/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Merry Widow (1934) Jeanette MacDonald, Maurice Chevalier. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025493/?ref_=fn_al_tt_2
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) Chow Yun Fat, Michelle Yeoh, Zhang Ziyi. 10/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0190332/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
January 24, 2013
2 pre-code films; The Saint; Flynn; and a noir---
First Viewings:
The Easiest Way (1931) Constance Bennett, Adolph Menjou, Robert Montgomery, Anita Page. Poor shopgirl Laura, helps support her parents and sister by working at a store and does some modeling on the side. She catches the eye of a rich ad executive and soon moves into a great apartment with him. Her sisters husband (Clark Gable in a early role) looks down on her and won't let sisters be together. After meeting a a newspaper reporter at a picnic, they eventually fall in love and she moves out of her digs and gives up her cushy life. But her guy doesn't get back from his assignment and she runs out of money and it's back to lover Menjou. Connie wears beautiful fashions, her hair and makeup perfect, which is what her fans demanded. Early precode look at the depression poor, and the wealthy. It wasn't pretty or fun for the people on the lower rungs of the ladder. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021825/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Power & The Glory (1933) Spencer Tracy, Colleen Moore, Ralph Morgan, Helen Vinson. Original screenplay by Preston Sturges, who writes this story specifically for Spencer. He plays a rags to riches tycoon, who starts out walking the rail lines, and marries a schoolteacher who teaches him to read and write. His ruthlessness comes through when his wife wants him to rise in his railroad job, and he becomes what she wants, a workaholic who neglects her and their only child. He keeps rising higher and higher and gets richer and richer. But by the time his son is grown, he hardly knows his family and hardly cares. He has become a man who values only power and when he marries his second wife, even she cannot keep him from his ruthless ways. Years before Citizen Kane, this is almost the same story and may have been the model for Orson Welles John Forster Kane. The film itself is disjointed, jumping from the present to the past and bringing the story forward in pieces. Acting is good. 6/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0024465/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Saint In New York (1938) Louis Hayward, Jack Carson, Sig Ruman, Kay Sutton. Only time Hayward played Simon Templar and he makes him a jaunty fixer for the police. The film is fast and lots of fun with dark rooms, shooting, doors slamming, screams, fist fights, etc. Typical "b" movie stuff but Hayward is fun. Carson and fellow trigger man, Paul Guilfoyle, are sort of dim bulbs that make it amusing talking philosophical as they go about doing the dirty work. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030709/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Never Say Goodbye (1946) Errol Flynn, Eleanor Parker, Patti Brady, Forrest Tucker, Lucille Watson, S.Z.Sakall. The couple has been divorced for a year and their daughter is sad and wants them together again. She has been writing to a serviceman, which was encouraged during WWII, but she send a picture of her beautiful mother to the guy who comes home on leave and wants to come see his pen pal. She encourages his interest, hoping to make the ex jealous. It works. Light and fun. 7/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038773/?ref_=fn_al_tt_3
The Racket (1951) Robert Mitchum, Lizabeth Scott, Robert Ryan, William Talman. In a small role, a voice from radio -Les Tremayne. In my youth, he was on a show almost every day and night. Wonderful radio actor. This film is about crooked cops on the payroll of the mob who are running things in town. Capt. McQuigg is incorruptible and finds one honest cop in his precinct to help bring down boss Nick Scanlon. A good cops and mob story. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043955/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Transit (2012/I) Jim Caviezel. Awful heist movie about a family on vacation getting involved with bank robbers escaping from the law. In the Louisiana swamps, with gators, and viney trees and murky water and - lions and tigers oh! my. Really is a mess and only redeeming virtue is the location filming in Louisiana. 4/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1059836/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Tower Heist (2011) Ben Stiller, Eddie Murphy, Casey Affleck, Alan Alda. A group of workers at a high rise luxury apartment are victims of a Ponzi scheme and their retirement funds are gone. Their efforts to pull off a robbery of the financier who was the cause of it, and lives in the penthouse, is the story. Entertaining enough heist film. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0471042/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Descendants (2011) George Clooney. Film begins with a woman on water skis suddenly having a horrible accident. How it affects her husband and 2 daughters, and what they find out about her is the story. Clooney as the husband is okay but this is not his best. The best thing in the film is the location filming of Hawaii and the music score. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1033575/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Wanderlust (2012) Jennifer Aniston, Paul Rudd. Married couple lose their jobs so decide to go on a road trip and end up at a commune with some very strange people. Their reactions to the different lifestyles and what they end up doing is the film. Not either stars best work. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1033575/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Easiest Way (1931) Constance Bennett, Adolph Menjou, Robert Montgomery, Anita Page. Poor shopgirl Laura, helps support her parents and sister by working at a store and does some modeling on the side. She catches the eye of a rich ad executive and soon moves into a great apartment with him. Her sisters husband (Clark Gable in a early role) looks down on her and won't let sisters be together. After meeting a a newspaper reporter at a picnic, they eventually fall in love and she moves out of her digs and gives up her cushy life. But her guy doesn't get back from his assignment and she runs out of money and it's back to lover Menjou. Connie wears beautiful fashions, her hair and makeup perfect, which is what her fans demanded. Early precode look at the depression poor, and the wealthy. It wasn't pretty or fun for the people on the lower rungs of the ladder. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021825/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Power & The Glory (1933) Spencer Tracy, Colleen Moore, Ralph Morgan, Helen Vinson. Original screenplay by Preston Sturges, who writes this story specifically for Spencer. He plays a rags to riches tycoon, who starts out walking the rail lines, and marries a schoolteacher who teaches him to read and write. His ruthlessness comes through when his wife wants him to rise in his railroad job, and he becomes what she wants, a workaholic who neglects her and their only child. He keeps rising higher and higher and gets richer and richer. But by the time his son is grown, he hardly knows his family and hardly cares. He has become a man who values only power and when he marries his second wife, even she cannot keep him from his ruthless ways. Years before Citizen Kane, this is almost the same story and may have been the model for Orson Welles John Forster Kane. The film itself is disjointed, jumping from the present to the past and bringing the story forward in pieces. Acting is good. 6/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0024465/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Saint In New York (1938) Louis Hayward, Jack Carson, Sig Ruman, Kay Sutton. Only time Hayward played Simon Templar and he makes him a jaunty fixer for the police. The film is fast and lots of fun with dark rooms, shooting, doors slamming, screams, fist fights, etc. Typical "b" movie stuff but Hayward is fun. Carson and fellow trigger man, Paul Guilfoyle, are sort of dim bulbs that make it amusing talking philosophical as they go about doing the dirty work. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030709/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Never Say Goodbye (1946) Errol Flynn, Eleanor Parker, Patti Brady, Forrest Tucker, Lucille Watson, S.Z.Sakall. The couple has been divorced for a year and their daughter is sad and wants them together again. She has been writing to a serviceman, which was encouraged during WWII, but she send a picture of her beautiful mother to the guy who comes home on leave and wants to come see his pen pal. She encourages his interest, hoping to make the ex jealous. It works. Light and fun. 7/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038773/?ref_=fn_al_tt_3
The Racket (1951) Robert Mitchum, Lizabeth Scott, Robert Ryan, William Talman. In a small role, a voice from radio -Les Tremayne. In my youth, he was on a show almost every day and night. Wonderful radio actor. This film is about crooked cops on the payroll of the mob who are running things in town. Capt. McQuigg is incorruptible and finds one honest cop in his precinct to help bring down boss Nick Scanlon. A good cops and mob story. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043955/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Transit (2012/I) Jim Caviezel. Awful heist movie about a family on vacation getting involved with bank robbers escaping from the law. In the Louisiana swamps, with gators, and viney trees and murky water and - lions and tigers oh! my. Really is a mess and only redeeming virtue is the location filming in Louisiana. 4/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1059836/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Tower Heist (2011) Ben Stiller, Eddie Murphy, Casey Affleck, Alan Alda. A group of workers at a high rise luxury apartment are victims of a Ponzi scheme and their retirement funds are gone. Their efforts to pull off a robbery of the financier who was the cause of it, and lives in the penthouse, is the story. Entertaining enough heist film. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0471042/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Descendants (2011) George Clooney. Film begins with a woman on water skis suddenly having a horrible accident. How it affects her husband and 2 daughters, and what they find out about her is the story. Clooney as the husband is okay but this is not his best. The best thing in the film is the location filming of Hawaii and the music score. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1033575/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Wanderlust (2012) Jennifer Aniston, Paul Rudd. Married couple lose their jobs so decide to go on a road trip and end up at a commune with some very strange people. Their reactions to the different lifestyles and what they end up doing is the film. Not either stars best work. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1033575/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
January 17, 2013
One very good; one questionable---
Thunderheart (1992) Val Kilmer, Sam Shepard, Graham Greene, Fred Ward. Based on events that happened in the Dakota's Sioux Nation. There has been a murder and no one will talk to local officials. An FBI agent, who is one-quarter Sioux, is assigned to see if he can do better. But he is conflicted, not knowing or caring about his heritage. The local sheriff and Indian law man are opposites. Once into this interesting story, it is hard to see an ending that is not clear cut, but just as messy as life. Which way will he go? The actors are all fine. Best Kilmer role I've seen. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0105585/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Two Lovers (2008) Gwyneth Paltrow, Joaquin Phoenix, Isabella Rossellini. All I can say it fugeddabotit! Ridiculous loser lives with Mom, works for Dad's cleaners, is a failed suicide, meets two women who are inexplicably charmed by him, things happen, he is turned down by one gal and then gives the ring to the other. OMG! Phoenix is watchable, Paltrow okay. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1103275/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Two Lovers (2008) Gwyneth Paltrow, Joaquin Phoenix, Isabella Rossellini. All I can say it fugeddabotit! Ridiculous loser lives with Mom, works for Dad's cleaners, is a failed suicide, meets two women who are inexplicably charmed by him, things happen, he is turned down by one gal and then gives the ring to the other. OMG! Phoenix is watchable, Paltrow okay. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1103275/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
January 15, 2013
Three almost B's---
Paris Interlude (1934) Madge Evans, Robert Young, Oto Kruger, Una Merkel, Ted Healy. A rather dull film of ex-pats in Paris, left bank, right bank and all around the town. Merkel can't save this film with her tough as nails and all-knowing-dame persona. Young is okay. Rest of cast - nondescript. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025629/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Four's A Crowd (1938) Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Rosalind Russell, Patric Knowles. Screwball comedy about a newspaper, millionaires, and assorted characters. Not funny enough or interesting enough for me to remember much about it. They try hard. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030151/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Saint In Palm Springs (1941) George Sanders, Wendie Barrie. The case of the missing stamps, worth $200 thou and Simon Templar on the case, gets them back. Mild and uneventful entry; the last for Sanders as he whistles as he fades into the sunset. 5/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034145/
Four's A Crowd (1938) Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Rosalind Russell, Patric Knowles. Screwball comedy about a newspaper, millionaires, and assorted characters. Not funny enough or interesting enough for me to remember much about it. They try hard. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030151/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
The Saint In Palm Springs (1941) George Sanders, Wendie Barrie. The case of the missing stamps, worth $200 thou and Simon Templar on the case, gets them back. Mild and uneventful entry; the last for Sanders as he whistles as he fades into the sunset. 5/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034145/
January 14, 2013
Rita & Glenn; & The White Countess
Affair In Trinidad (1952) Rita Hayworth, Glenn Ford, Alexander Scourby. He comes the aid of his brother when he gets a message from him. He finds his brother has died before he gets to Trinidad, not from natural causes. Is gorgeous wife, Chris, involved? Is her friend Max Fabian, who wants to marry her? She sings hot Latin songs and dances each night at the club, and Steve is getting as hot as the songs. Not bad but no where near as riveting and tightly wound as the stars hit "Gilda." Rita still has the magic of one of the most gorgeous creatures on the planet, and Glenn is still good as the tight jawed man of few words. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044331/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
White Countess (2005) Ralph Fiennes, Natasha Richardson, Lynn Redgrave. Shanghai in the mid 1930's has many refugees from the many revolutions and invasions going on in that part of the world. The blind American Todd Jackson, who was a diplomat, meets dance hostess Sofia and they become friends. She supports not only herself but various relatives of her late husband. They are a worthless lot who still think they must observe all the protocols and class distinctions of Imperial Russia. And they snub and treat badly the one who is supporting them. Typical.This part of the story is what I felt made slogging through it worth while. How crazy/silly/stupid humans become holding onto delusions of grandeur. The rest of the story of how the blind man and the Countess turn out in the midst of the Japanese invasion of Shanghai is worth watching but it is a very slow film and you have to pay attention. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0384686/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
White Countess (2005) Ralph Fiennes, Natasha Richardson, Lynn Redgrave. Shanghai in the mid 1930's has many refugees from the many revolutions and invasions going on in that part of the world. The blind American Todd Jackson, who was a diplomat, meets dance hostess Sofia and they become friends. She supports not only herself but various relatives of her late husband. They are a worthless lot who still think they must observe all the protocols and class distinctions of Imperial Russia. And they snub and treat badly the one who is supporting them. Typical.This part of the story is what I felt made slogging through it worth while. How crazy/silly/stupid humans become holding onto delusions of grandeur. The rest of the story of how the blind man and the Countess turn out in the midst of the Japanese invasion of Shanghai is worth watching but it is a very slow film and you have to pay attention. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0384686/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
January 13, 2013
The Lookout
The Lookout 2007 Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Jeff Daniels, Mathew Goode, Isla Fisher. A high school hockey star drives drunk and kills his friends and permanently damages his mind so that he cannot remember much for long enough to have a meaningful job. So, after some years go by, he is working as a janitor at the bank. He is recruited by a gang to be the lookout and enabler for entrance the night they plan their robbery. Fairly interesting story and wind up of all the parts so we can feel sort of good at the end. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0427470/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
January 08, 2013
Day Of Reckoning (1933) Madge Evans, Richard Dix, Una Merkel, Stuart Erwin. Interesting pre-code film that has a grasping, luxury loving woman who takes her husband to ruin by embezzling from his firm. Off to prison he goes and wifey is immediately given help by 'friend' and soon they are living together. Through all the trouble, the housemaid/nanny (Mercle) takes care of hearth and home and the kids. Pre-code film shows all the warts and seamier sides of life at the beginning of the Great Depression. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023932/?ref_=fn_al_tt_2
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