Wow! Whattaya know? Fake News is nothing new! Who knew? I found this out last night, while watching "Power of the Press"(1943), the story of a corrupt New York City publisher who uses his newspaper to spread lies and accusations against the government during World War Two. The publisher, "Mr. Rankin" (Otto Kruger), has no actual background in reporting and doesn't care about the truth, but he's the majority stockholder at the paper and calls the shots behind the owner's back. He uses shock headlines to increase readership and profit. His aim is to bring Washington to it's knees.
As the movie opens, the paper's owner (Minor Watson) calls a press conference to announce he's stepping down. He's been accused of yellow journalism by a fellow newsman, and in front of reporters he admits it. Just as he's about to name the crook behind this policy (i.e. Rankin), he's shot from the audience. There aren't any witnesses, so the shooting is blamed on a disgruntled former employee, who's detained by an in-house detective (Victor Jory). Rankin uses the investigator as his personal Gestapo agent to supersede the police. Before the owner dies, he wills his paper to the man who called him out, "Ulysses Bradford" (Guy Kibbee), who publishes in a small town in Iowa.
Kibbee doesn't think he can make it in the big city. He's old, his own paper has only 1000 readers. But his secretary (Gloria Dickson) talks him into accepting the inheritance and goes along to support him. Now he's at the helm of the Big Show.....or so he thinks. The cunning Mr. Rankin undermines him at every turn, with the help of the circulation editor (Lee Tracy), who knows what it takes to sell papers. Kibbee, though, is honest to a fault. He won't publish any article unless both sides of the story are told. The first thing he orders is an investigation into the previous owner's murder. Several employees have vouched for the suspect, who swears he didn't do it. Kibbee feels he owes the deceased owner that much, as he willed Kibbee the paper for altruistic reasons.
It's when he begins to seek the truth about the murder that the trouble begins. A witness shows up with an airtight alibi for the suspect, and that's all I can tell you about the murder plot. But what makes this film so good is that it exposes the kind of trickery we've just recently seen so much of, and it might as well have been titled "Donald Trump". He actually reversed the process of yellow journalism, yelling "fake news" at anyone who tried to expose him. In this movie, that phrase is actually used, several times : "fake news"! Only in this case, it's used against the Trump character "Mr Rankin". In real life, Trump turned it around backwards, so that we were living in an Alice in Wonderland reality.
Ar any rate, Kibbee continues to push for an answer in the former owner's murder. He knows he's outmatched by the more powerful Mr. Rankin, but he uses his own "power of the press" to get out what truth he can. As for Rankin, he seems like he's supporting Germany in the war, though it's never specified. But he rails against the Brits, calls us slaves to the English war machine. Doesn't that sound like Trump again, supporting Putin while denigrating NATO and our allies? Rankin's an isolationist because it pits his readers against Washington, thus making him more powerful. In the movie they actually say "he's trying to destroy democracy". Total Trump! Trump must've seen this movie, it's straight out of his playbook.
Guy Kibbee is fantastic as "Ulysses Bradford", the small town newsman who aims for truth in the big city. Kibbee was in a million movies (Mom was a fan of his), and had a naturalistic style of acting, like he was speaking his own words instead of dialogue. Gloria Dickson is heartwarming as his loyal secretary. Screwball stalwart Lee Tracy (known for his mile-a-minute speaking style) provides contrast as the conflicted circulation editor, and Victor Jory is menacing as the in-house private eye. As for Mr. Rankin himself, he's played with style and sinister panache by Otto Kruger. One reviewer at IMDB claims this role ruined Kruger's career, but I can't see how. The movie does seem controversial, however, noting the number of folks who judge it purely in political terms. It's a shorty, running just 64 minutes, but boy does it say a lot in that time. Two Big Thumbs Up for "Power of the Press", a patriotic picture that is just as fitting today as it was 80 years ago. Highly recommended! ////
The previous night we watched a Noir from Douglas Sirk, presented in the form of a Melodrama, his forte. "Shockproof"(1949) stars Cornel Wilde as "Griff Marat", a parole officer in Los Angeles. His latest client is "Jenny Marsh" (Patricia Knight), a blonde beauty who's just been released from prison after serving five years for murder. Griff lays down the rules for her, the most important being "no weapons" and "no marriage". If she violates either, her parole will be revoked. She has to report twice a week.
Griff arranges a job for Jenny and gets her an apartment, but when he drops by to visit there's a man at the door. His name is "Harry Wesson" (John Baragrey), a tall, debonair chap who's part of Jenny's past. In fact, he's the reason she was put away; she shot a man at his behest. Wesson is a professional gambler, wealthy and sophisticated. Griff is aware of him. Wesson's who he meant when he told Jenny "no marriage". Griff orders Harry from her doorstep. "She's trying to go straight. Don't ever come back here again".
But Jenny's attached to Wesson, out of loyalty and an inferiority complex. "He waited five years for me", she tells Griff, never considering that Harry's to blame for her predicament. "I'll never meet another man like him. He taught me how to dress and to talk, introduced me to people in society. I was in the gutter when he met me. I owe him my life".
"Yes, but do you love him"? asks Griff.
"I.....I think so. What does it matter"?, she replies. "He loves me! He proved that by waiting so long".
"That may be so, Jenny, but he's still no good for you. I hope you see that. And anyway, you can't get married. Remember, it's a violation of your parole. You'd be sent right back to prison".
But Jenny stays in contact with Harry, phoning him to meet at the library. (I have to step in to say, "The Library! How Sirkian is that"? Only Douglas Sirk, with his penchant for emotional complexity, would have a paroled murderess and her man meet in a quiet library. And in the stacks, no less! It's really cool, however, because the Libe in question is real and very old. I'm trying to track down it's location).
Back to the plot, Jenny tells Harry she can't deal with straight life. "I'm going crazy with this job and all the meetings. He's trying so hard to be nice to me and I just can't stand it, like I'm his pet project or something". She means Griff, who besides being her parole officer is a genuinely good guy. He does want to help Jenny but she can't deal with his kindness. It's another emotional alley for director Sirk to explore.
Harry comes up with a solution. He knows a shady lawyer. "I can have him get you a transfer. We'll move you to San Francisco, say you have relatives up there. Then you'll be away from Mr. Nice Guy".
They try this but Griff finds out. "That transfer scheme was a scam. What were you thinking, Jenny? Do you want to go back to prison"? She breaks down, confused and conflicted over Griff's caring attitude versus Harry's manipulation. "Oh Griff, I'm so sorry. I know you want to help me but I'm just no good and never have been. I don't think I can make it in the real world".
Griff takes the next step by inviting Jenny to live at his house. "It's not what you think. I'm single, but I live with my family - my mother and two younger siblings". They're nice Italian Catholic folks. Griff's mom is blind; he's remained at home to help her. He isn't extending the offer to put the make on Jenny. He's really as straight-arrow as he seems. But it happens anyway. Griff does start falling for her. The family welcomes Jenny too, and she starts to feel at ease, helping out around the house and making friends with Mama and the children. She continues with her job as well, but can't break free from Harry Wesson. One day he calls, for another clandestine meet-up at the library.
"Listen baby, I've got a whole new plan. This time it's certain to work. You say he's in love with you? Well encourage him! Pretend you love him too. Pretty soon he'll propose, and when he does, we've got him! Once you say "I do", he's on our hook for blackmail. Remember, you're forbidden to marry, so by marrying your parole officer, he'll do whatever we say once you're hitched"!
So Jenny does say yes when Griff proposes. They get married and Griff swears to keep it secret. "Only me and you and Mama know. We can't tell anyone about it. Then, when your parole is up in two more years, we can live right out in the open. Oh Jenny, this is the happiest day of my life". By now, she feels the same way. She's truly come to love Griff and their normal, straight life.
But Harry Wesson knows their secret, and won't leave Jenny alone. "What about our plan, my dear? I thought we were gonna put the screws to Mr. Clean".
At this point, Jenny wants no part of any blackmail scheme. She rebuffs Harry, who decides to go it alone. "Nobody walks away from Harry Wesson, baby"! He now plans to blackmail them both, which will ruin Griff's career and send Jenny back to prison. But then something happens that I cannot reveal, which turns the whole situation on it's head. Griff and Jenny are forced to flee in distress, choosing love over practical considerations.
Turn on the Sirkian String Section.
Griff's rapid departure from conventional life, as he chooses Jenny over career and family, is representative of Sirk's ongoing theme of repressed emotion. He explores this in each of his films. Here, Griff's a good guy who expresses himself through his deeds, by helping ex-convicts. But he's never experienced romantic love, and when he does, the sheer power of it causes him to lose all concern for the values he'd previously believed in. He becomes irrational and breaks the law himself. The telling of this in the movie borders on the mythological, i.e. "desperate lovers on the run", but that is what Sirk's trying to get at, the notion that Love Conquers All. It's interesting that in his movies, even the bad guys are never unredeemable. He always tries to reconcile good and bad. I shant give away the ending, 'cept to say it's quintessential Sirk, and this time it has a twist you'll never see coming, all wrapped up in a virtuous bow.
There are a number of great L.A. locations, including the Bradbury Building and old Bunker Hill, before it became a center for high rise office buildings. Here, we get to see the old wooden house that Griff and his family live in, an actual dwelling of the type still standing at the time. There's also an oil field, likely in the Wilmington area, that appears toward the movie's conclusion. All these things are long since gone in Los Angeles - it's a miracle of motion pictures that they are preserved this way on film.
"Shockproof" gets Two Big Thumbs Up. Watch it to restore your faith in humanity. /////
One final note : Cinematic hard guy Samuel Fuller wrote both flicks in this blog, and had a "Griff" in each one. Besides Cornel Wilde's character in "Shockproof", Lee Tracy's circulation editor in "Power of the Press" is named "Griff Thompson". Just a small curiosity worth mentioning.
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Well, I've had a three day Earworm of "No Rain" by Blind Melon, a song that used to crack me up back in the early 90s because of Shannon Hoon's voice. God Bless the poor guy (he died), but he was amusing in a Grunge-era Hippy Way, and even though the song was "funny-cute", I liked it. It had a great hook. However, I've always thought the lyrics went, "Y'know I like to keep my teenage tragedy". So because of the earworm, I looked up the chords for guitar (figured I might as well play along), and lo and behold, I've had the words wrong all these years. He actually sings "You know I'd like to keep my cheeks dry today". So I played the video on Youtube (love the Bee Girl), but I'm still hearing "teenage tragedy".
So I Googled my version, and apparently I'm not the only one who heard it that way! Check it yourself and see, lol. Anyhow, Hoon is great in the video, too, with his super long hair and hippy hand gestures. He was a real character, too bad he died.
That's all I know for the moment. Gonna head out for a Super Hot Hike. Have a great afternoon, I send you tons of love as always. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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