Roxy Music Review, and "Air Liner" starring Rochelle Hudson

9/29/2022: Most of this review was written last night when I got home; I finished it up just now.

The last time I saw Roxy Music, I was 15 years old and Gerald Ford was President. That kind of blows my mind. Brian Ferry turned 77 two days ago, Andy McKay is now 76, Phil Manzanera and Paul Thompson are the youngsters of the group at 71 years apiece, and the Time Thing continues to amaze me. Tonight, Grimsley drove us down to The Forum. We got there with minimal traffic, but it was a different story getting into the show because Grim walked across the street to the SoFi Stadium to buy a ticket for the upcoming Mercyful Fate concert at the Youtube Theater, which is part of the SoFi complex. Well, SoFi was entirely fenced off, so he had to walk half a mile around the perimeter to find an entrance. Then, when he purchased his ticket, it wouldn't upload onto his phone. As an aside, I should mention that I'm sort of deliberately a Cell Phone Luddite who still has a flip phone, because I don't like Device Culture. And, because of the ubiquity now of paperless ticketing, I've decided I won't be attending a lot of concerts if they're gonna make it a hassle for me to get in, because I can't upload QR codes on my Flippie. With a paper ticket, it's a piece of cake to go to a concert: you walk up, an usher tears it in half and you're in the door. If I was part of the whole cell phone deal (and I admit I'm a cave man in that regard, but I also genuinely don't like it), I suppose I'd have no problem with uploading a code onto my device and having it scanned, but the whole thing reminds me of something I once read (whether apocryphal or not) about NASA once trying to develop a pen that would write upside down in zero-gravity. The punchline of that story was "the Russians use a pencil," and it's the same thing with "paperless" ticketing. All it is, is a needless hassle. But of course, there's data mining to be done, and gadgets to be sold. 

You: "But c'mon, Ad! How was the doggone Roxy Music show?"

Okay. Well, when Grim got fenced in at the So Fi complex, he couldn't find a way out, and we almost missed the beginning of the concert. We did miss half of the first song. I waited an hour for him to return from SoFi, and by the time he got back, the music was starting. But once I got to my seat, in the middle of "Remake/Remodel", everything was pretty cool. Grim didn't sit with me; he rarely does when we attend together. He likes to walk around in whatever venue he's at, to see if he can find a better (meaning "open") seat. Me, I'm happy to sit in the seat I paid for. 

Roxy Music was really good, though the band was padded out with an ensemble of nine extra musicians, three singers and six instrumentalists on a back line. One third of the 18 songs were from "Avalon," and while that's not a bad thing, because it's their most well-known album, it had an effect on the arrangement and delivery of some of the earlier material. A couple of songs were "Avalonised" into a more hypnotic rhythm, i.e. laid back with some of the edge taken off. But having said that, despite the homogenization of sound (due to the number of musicians), there were also moments of kick-ass shred, especially when they turned Phil Manzanera loose. Boy, can he whip up a guitar solo. Same with Andy McKay's wailing on the woodwinds.

For me, I did miss the clear plexiglass violin solos of Eddie Jobson, who was in the band in their mid-70s incarnation. Manzanera played the Jobson solo on "Out of the Blue", and it was killer, but it didn't have that "liftoff" of Eddie's violin.

As for Bryan Ferry, he will always be himself, The King of Suave. Just the way he waves to the crowd is iconic and has never changed. I can still picture him at the Santa Monica Civic in 1975. His voice is good for a 77 year old man, and I mean, c'mon. People talk about Paul McCartney not being able to hit the high notes anymore, and Ferry has to choose his registers carefully, but he still pulls it off, and with all the emotion of his youth if not moreso. It just bugs me when some knucklehead makes dumb comments on Facebook or wherever; imagine feeling the need to point out that an older artist has "lost it."

Man, what an astute observation! "Look what I discovered! A man in his late 70s can't sing like he used to! Look at me instead! I'm a genius for figuring that out!"

Sorry for the tirade. All told, Ferry and the band were fantastic, the sound was Most Excellent, and Paul Thompson pounded the drums. It's just that, overall, a lot of the material was a tad smooth. But that's a minor complaint. My only other one is that they didn't play anything from "Stranded". This was likely their last tour, and for all intents and purposes, they did an admirable job. But on the off-chance they tour again, don't miss 'em and I know you won't. It's not just that they don't make bands like this anymore, it's that they'll never make 'em again because the era is gone. The creative outburst, in music and style, of the 1960s and 1970s will likely never be matched. See these groups while you still have the chance.  ////

And now, we'll do one movie, seen two nights ago:

The flick was "Sky Liner"(1949), a nice little Airplane Thriller from Lippert Pictures, the independent B-Studio whose releases we've previously extolled. Naturally, since the setting is a plane, we know going in that Lives Are Going To Converge. Not as much as in, say, a Roadside Diner, but enough to affect the outcome of the plot, which in this case is pretty much telegraphed. But don't let that deter you. This is the best film of it's kind besides "Airport" (no kidding), and at 49 minutes, it clocks in short and tight.

A State Department attache is set to board a flight to New York with his secretary, to give an important speech. He's practicing it before they leave, while the secretary (Rochelle Hudson) takes leave to make a phone call. She's a spy, talking to a fellow commie on the other end. In the next scene, we see that guy in shadow as he enters the office to murdalize the attache. Then he assumes the man's identity on the flight. A wide variety of passengers are boarding, because.......well, you know the reason by now. How can you have an Airplane Movie (or one with a Roadside Diner), if Lives Do Not Converge? Simple answer; you can't. So stop hoping.

On the plane you've got businessmen, the required Bickering 50ish Husband and Wife. You've got the Paranoid Criminal Trying To Keep a Low Profile, who sneaked onto the flight to escape from a robbery. You've got the Capable Stewardess, and the two pilots, and you've got the Nervous Wimp who is traveling with his Aunt. So all the necessary types are in place. The passengers are filled out with a selection of widespread mugs, but the focus is on the secretary to the State Dept. attache, who is dead in his office and never got on the plane. An FBI agent is also on board and knows that the secretary is a spy.

Besides her, and her contact (the man who is now impersonating the attache), there is also another diplomat on the plane, an ambassador from an upstart Eastern Bloc country who has made a deal with an unseen General to start an internecine war. The ambassador has designs on becoming a dictator, and very early on, he bargains for classified information that was stolen from the State Department attache, which may contain nuclear secrets.

For a low budget movie, there's some great airborne footage, including two Lockheed Constellation airliners, filmed flying in the fog (Google the "Star of Cairo"), and also a scene at the end that looks like it was filmed at Van Nuys Airport, which was known as Metropolitan Airport at the time (and called that in the movie). As noted, the plot is telegraphed and there's never any question who the bad guys are. Thus there aren't any twists, but this is a good one because of it's execution. The tension is maintained by vignette: switching from character to character as Lives Converge to a Thrilling Climax. Director William Berke keeps you off balance throughout, even though you know whodunit. "Air Liner" is top notch and has a Cold War "Manchurian" riff happening. I give it Two Big Thumbs Up and a very high recommendation. The picture is razor sharp.  ////

Because this blog is a day late, I'll try to post another one tomorrow to get us back on schedule (pron. Shedge-yoole). Once again, I'll be going to a concert (Porcupine Tree at the Greek), so it'll be late night when I post, but I'll try not to miss it like I did last night. I hope your week is going well, and I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):) 

   

Marcia Mae Jones and Jackie Moran in "Barefoot Boy", and "Five Little Peppers in Trouble", starring Edith Fellows and Ronald Sinclair

Last night, the teen team of Marcia Mae Jones and Jackie Moran was back, in "Barefoot Boy"(1938). Moran plays "Billy Whittaker", a country boy whose father, as the movie opens, is awaiting the release from prison of his friend "John Hale" (Ralph Morgan), who's finished a sentence for larceny. They seem an unlikely pair. Calvin Whittaker and his family are poor, John Hale is a millionaire. But Calvin, a farmer, supplies the Hales with eggs and milk. This is how they know each other. The plot aesthetic is similar to that of the Five Little Peppers, in which the worlds of rich and poor are combined, and as in that series, it's the poor folks who are virtuous and down to earth. John Hale has a son, "Kenneth" (Bradley Metcalfe), a world class brat who attends military school, and when they first meet, while Billy and his Dad are making a delivery to the Hale mansion, he challenges Billy to a fight, to show his superior class status, and because he knows ju-jitsu, which he uses to knock Billy on his butt. But Billy wrestles him down and they break the pail of eggs meant for the Hale kitchen. The result is that Mrs. Hale, a snob who's avoiding her husband's release from prison, throws the Whittakers off her property. "Get your brawling son away from my boy!".

When Calvin Whittaker returns home after being paroled by the Saintly Warden, we see that he's a very decent man. He hints that he is innocent of the crime he was convicted of, but tells Kenneth "we won't talk about that now." What concerns him is Kenneth's behavior. He sees that it's atrocious, and if it continues, he'll turn into a regular Meghan Markle. To prevent this, and because his wife doesn't want him in the house, he and Kenneth go to live on Calvin Whittaker's farm. So again, we have a similar setup to the Five Little Peppers, where the rich go to live with the poor.

Billy Whittaker has a crush on neighbor girl "Julia Blaine" (Marilyn Knowlden), but she puts a note in his mailbox saying she loves Kenneth. Billy is heartbroken, but then Marcia Mae Jones steps in. If she was a sweet sixteen young lady in the recently reviewed "Haunted House", she's a rough-and-tumble tomboy here. She likes Billy, and she knows a secret about Kenneth, that he took credit for rescuing her sister Julia from the lake one night, when it was really Billy who pulled her from the water. Marcia Mae sides with Billy, and becomes his confidante. She likes to scare the other kids in the neighborhood by reading ghost stories to them around a campfire, and the next thing you know, she's daring them to go inside an old log cabin in the middle of the night, which she says is a haunted house. Marcia Mae Jones and haunted houses seem to go together, but anyhow, what she's doing is showing Kenneth up. To prove he's a coward, she dares him to go in the log cabin first. She wants him to admit he took credit for Julia's rescue. 

What none of the teens know (but we do) is that two crooks are using the cabin for a hideout. They're the ones who committed the crime that John Hale went to prison for. When Marcia Mae dares Kenneth to go into the log cabin, she follows him inside, to prove he's a chicken, and they stumble upon a 1000 dollar bond that was part of the larceny loot. Kenneth then uncovers the entire stash of bonds that the crooks have hidden in the cabin (40 Grand worth), but instead of telling his father, he keeps the find a secret, because he likes having his Dad beneath him as a convicted "jailbird". If he told the truth, it would come out that his Dad was framed, but Kenneth is too proud, too spoiled and too troubled, to do this. It is interesting to see that, in the context of a teenage comedy drama, made for depression audiences, that the subject of a developing sociopath is shown in Kenneth's worsening behavior. He's a rebel without a cause 19 years before James Dean, but at least Dean had a reason: his folks were "tearing (him) apart!" In Kenneth's case, it's his embarrassment that his Dad went to prison, but he's entitled by his mother.

But who needs psychoanalysis when Marcia Mae Jones is around? We've only just discovered her, but she's a kick, and she's already shown range, from being the ultimate 1940s Pretty Girl (in "Haunted House) to a tomboy who'll kick you in the shins.

The movie ends in potentially tragic circumstances, when Billy's dog (Terry, who played "Toto") dies in the haunted log cabin, and Billy himself gets shot by the criminals! But do you really think we're gonna have an unhappy ending in a movie like this? Two Big Thumbs Up for "Barefoot Boy" and a high recommendation. You have to hear the ghost stories as read by Marcia Mae Jones. The picture is very good.  ////

The previous night's film was "Five Little Peppers in Trouble"(1940), the fourth and final entry in the series, and as always, the movie opens with Phronsie, the littlest Pepper, who is practicing a recitation for her kindergarten class. The other Peppers come home from school to check on the construction progress of the new, larger house Mr. King is building for them in Gusty Corners. If you remember, in the second movie he decided he wanted to live with them instead of moving back to his mansion on the hill. He also likes the ordinary people in town better than the snobs on the hill, which plays into the plot here, because after the kids all get home (following some hijinx where Davie Pepper and Martin the Butler fall into a paint trough), Mom and Mr. King inform them that they're all being sent away to boarding school. They aren't told why, but we know the reason: Jasper King's horrible Aunt Martha is back, demanding that he come to live with her. She's the worst snob of all, and is horrified that Jasper is living in a place like Gusty Corners. When her brother Mr. King (who's as rich as she is but is a down-to-earth person) tells her Jasper doesn't want to live with her and he won't turn him over, she threatens to get a court order.

The next day, two process servers show up, with papers for Mr. King. Butler Martin holds them off, stalling on the front steps while Mom and Mr. King put Jasper and the Pepper kids into Mr. King's limo. The chauffeur drives them away to the private school they'll be attending, but they haven't been told the reason they're being sent there: to hide Jasper from Aunt Martha. The middle boys try to get an answer out of Martin the night before they leave, with a rigged up scheme to scare him into revealing their destination. When they arrive at the school and meet the uptight headmistress, they know they are in for a disciplinary nightmare. And almost all the students are blue-blood brats; the girls are a bunch of Heathers who pick on Polly mercilessly, because she's viewed as poor and thus "less-than". She tries out for the school play at the urging of the drama teacher, the one nice lady on campus. Polly also has one friend, an English girl who sticks up for her.

But the mean girls have a ringleader, who is determined to get rid of Polly and her siblings. This girl is evil, and she works up a plan to drain the swimming pool and blame it on Polly. The Heathers steal one of her scarves, and leave it by the pool house, and the next morning when the headmistress gets the news, she blames the draining on Polly, as intended.

But the evil girl's plan goes wrong and a near tragedy occurs, which I can't reveal because it's the main twist of the plot. But you've really gotta love The Five Little Peppers, so Two Big Thumbs for this movie, and Two Huge for the series as a whole. We're gonna miss the Pepper family, and we wish they made more than four movies. "Five Peppers in Trouble" returns to the formula of sentiment and crisis that made the first two films so successful and heartwarming. The picture is razor sharp.  ////

And that's all for tonight. My blogging music is James Gang once again, the album with Tommy Bolin called "Bang", and my late night listening is Mahler's 3rd by Bernstein. The next blog might be posted a little later at night on Wednesday, as I'll be going to see Roxy Music at The Forum. I'm excited: it'll be the first time I've seen them since 1976, at the Hollywood Palladium when I went with the late, great Mike B. Roxy Music will now hold the distinction, for me, of the band with the longest time span between the first time and most recent time I saw them. My first Roxy show was in March 1975, and it was also one of the first ten concerts I ever went to. So Wednesday's show will be 47 and 1/2 years later, imagine that. Almost a half century. All the band will be there, except Sir Edward Jobson, and they'll be beating Rick Wakeman's former record by one month. I first saw Rick in September 1974 at the Hollywood Bowl (my third concert ever), and most recently in February of this year. I think Rick will eventually reclaim the record, because I can't imagine Roxy Music touring again, but for now they're the champs. Stay tuned on Wednesday, and I'll see you late night. I send you Tons of Love as always.  xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):) 

Marcia Mae Jones and Jackie Moran in "Haunted House", and "That Hamilton Woman" starring Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier

Last night we saw a fun murder mystery from Monogram Pictures called "Haunted House"(1940). The title is misleading; it sounds like a spookfest but it's not. Teenagers Jackie Moran and the delightful Marcia Mae Jones star as "Jimmie Atkins" and "Mildred Henshaw", he a printer's apprentice at a small town paper, she the editor's niece. As the movie opens, Jimmie is complaining to anyone who will listen that his friend "Ole" (Christian Rub), an old man in town, is being framed for the murder of the lady he worked for, the wealthy Mrs. Blake (who we never see). Mrs. Blake kept her money well hidden; Ole is supposed to have killed her for it, but Jimmie believes he's innocent. "Ole wouldn't hurt a fly, everyone who knows him knows that." Jimmie's boss "Albert Henshaw" (George Cleveland) used to agree with him, but, as editor of the newspaper, he attends the trial every day and he says the testimony is not in Ole's favor. Not long after this, Ole is convicted of the Blake murder and sentenced to die. Jimmie continues to proclaim him innocent, and wonders why no one cares.

At this time, Mildred Henshaw arrives in town for the Summer, to stay with her Uncle Albert the editor. She and Jimmie hit it off when she shows up at the newspaper office, and Jimmie drives her around in his jalopy, which makes for some goofy hijinks. But besides having motor oil splash her in the face, Millie genuinely takes interest in Jimmie's crusade. She wants to know everything about the Blake murder, and after they run out of gas (and Jimmie pushes Millie to a gas station for a fill up), they overhear a conversation between the station owner and a customer, which gives Jimmie a clue to reexamine evidence from Ole's trial. He's been following the details by listening in at the courthouse.

They confront the man from the gas station, which leads them to question the station owner. Now they've invested everything in solving the case, and besides falling in love in a 1940s teenaged way, they go out on a limb in boldly questioning their suspects in person, which - when Jimmie miscalculates and accuses the wrong man - gets him fired from the newspaper. Now he and Millie set out to solve the case on their own, and they find a clue in a note given to Jimmie that leads them to Mrs. Blake's deserted, cobwebby house. Here's where the "haunted" part comes in, during the last ten minutes of the movie, only it isn't really haunted. There's lightning and spooky shadows, but the real fright comes from the murderer who's hiding inside. He knows the two teen sleuths are closing in on him, and he's out to stop them in their tracks. "Haunted House" has a tight, layered script and good location shooting in a small town that I'd guess is in Ventura County (no info on IMDB). The real charm of the movie, though, is in the "gee-whiz" performances of the two leads, whose excitement at playing detective rubs off on the viewer. Marcia Mae Jones is especially good, and very pretty, looking not unlike a grown-up Shirley Temple. We're gonna have to find more of her movies. "Haunted House" gets Two Big Thumbs Up and a very high recommendation. The picture is slightly soft.  ////

The previous night, we had a tremendous film from Criterion: "That Hamilton Woman"(1941), starring Vivien Leigh as the heroic but tragic Emma Hart, who was forced to marry Sir William Hamilton, the ambassador to Naples, but loved and had an affair with the great Admiral Horatio Nelson, who fought Napoleon Bonaparte when no one else in Europe would stand up to him. The movie opens when Lady Hamilton is a broken old woman, living on the street in France and reduced to stealing wine from a store. When caught by the gendarmes, she is jailed and from there, she tells her story to a cellmate. And what a story it is.

In flashback, we see her as a girl from an upper class family - the Harts - who has traveled to Naples to meet her fiance, an assistant to "Sir William Hamilton" (Alan Mowbray) the Ambassador. Sir William informs her, to her crushing dismay, that her boyfriend won't be arriving after all. He's been shipped off to foreign shores on an assignment, and he also won't be able to marry her. Emma sees the look in Lord Hamilton's eye and knows at once she's been purchased. "How much did you pay them?" she demands, regarding the boyfriend's family. "Five thousand pounds," the Lord matter-of-factly admits. "But I can and will give you a life he never could have, being just an ordinary boy." Young Emma is devastated, but the next time we see her, in a time-lapse cut, she's grown into her role as a Lady abroad, and she's even become friendly with the Queen of Naples.

Then comes "Admiral Nelson" (Laurence Olivier), warning of Napoleon. He tells the ambassador he needs money to build up the British navy, but the ambassador shrugs off the threat. "Napoleon doesn't care about England. Just leave him alone and he'll run out of steam." Nelson tries to tell him that dictators should never be ignored, but his advice falls on deaf ears. Then, when her husband is out of earshot, Lady Hamilton steps in and offers to help. "I know the Queen. Let me talk to her, I'll get you your money." She does so, and Nelson subsequently defeats Napoleon's navy at Naples. Over the next several years, they engage in other battles, and Nelson loses an eye and and arm. Even after all of this naked aggression, Nelson still has to come begging the leaders of England and Europe to take Napoleon's megalomania seriously. By now, he's in love with Lady Hamilton. They start seeing each other, and she makes no secret of it. Lord Hamilton knows she detests him, after all, he bought their marriage, but it's one of those Royal Deals where they agree to get along in polite company to avoid a scandal, even though everyone knows she's with Admiral Nelson. And also by now, Nelson is a damaged war hero. He's the only one standing between Napoleon and world domination, and finally comes the legendary Battle of Trafalgar. 

In reading about this movie on Wiki and IMDB, I learned that it was Winston Churchill's favorite film of all time, and it's not hard to see why. Laurence Olivier plays Nelson as the quintessential patriotic hero, and to this day, Admiral Horatio Nelson is considered the greatest naval officer in English history. There's a reason there's a Trafalgar Square in London. But Lady Hamilton was a heroine too. Without her support, Napoleon might have taken over Europe. The thanks she got for it was to be left penniless and put on the street when Nelson was killed at Trafalgar. This takes us back to the prison cell where we saw her at the beginning of the movie. Though Vivien Leigh is one of the most renowned actresses in motion picture history, we haven't seen much of her. "Waterloo Bridge" is the only movie I can think of (and I've never seen "Gone With the Wind"). But watching her in this film, there's no doubt she was one of the most talented actresses ever to hit the silver screen. She has a charisma that jumps out at you, which may be an extension of her reported bipolarity. According to Wiki, she was severely afflicted, which put a strain on her marriage to Olivier. She died young also, and only made 21 films. But absolutely don't miss her or Sir Laurence in "That Hamilton Woman", which gets our highest rating - Two Gigantic Thumbs Up. Directed by Alexander Korda, it has the look and production design of an Academy Award winning picture, which it was (for sound). You'll have to watch it on dvd or Netflix, but whatever you do, don't miss it.  ////

And that's all I know for tonight. My blogging music is "Thirds" by James Gang (man, they're really good!), late night is Wagner "Die Meistersinger". I hope your weekend is off to a good start and I send you Tons of Love as always.  xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)

Veddy Brrrittish! "Things Happen at Night" (a poltergeist comedy), and "Tales of Robin Hood" starring Robert Clarke

We've been on a Brit kick of late, just by chance, not design, and we've also been watching a lot of Funny Ghost Movies, and last night we combined both, with a bonus precursory Exorcist motif, in "Things Happen at Night"(1948). Once again, as with "Three Live Ghosts" (reviewed in the previous blog), the Brrrittisshness is over the top, but at least it's not obnoxious this time. The one consistent problem is that, when a film like this made for English audiences, they don't have to care if us Yanks can understand their accents or slang terms, so the very fast jabbering in the first ten minutes of this movie makes for some rocky going. Even if you can't understand the characters, however, it's easy to see what's taking place. A family running a small dairy farm is beset by a very prankish poltergeist. Mum "Hilda Prescott" (Olga Lindo) doesn't want to live in their house anymore, after waking up to lumps of coal strewn all over the floor. Upstairs in the attic, the sound of chains dragging can be heard at night, combined with terrifying moans and groans. "Dad Prescott" (Alfred Drayton), who runs the dairy business, is sure it's a burglar or vandal. He doesn't have time for supernatural stuff, but Mom and "Mrs. Venning" the cook (Joan Young) have seen things happen: pictures turned around on their hooks, flowers wilting before their eyes, then blooming again.

"Audrey" (Gwyneth Vaughan), the Prescott's teenage daughter, is depressed. An emotional girl, she hates school and wants to quit. She spends a lot of time sleeping in her bed. Dad has an important meeting coming up with an advertising agent for a prominent milk company. He wants to make a good pitch for his cows (who we never see), but when the advertising rep shows up, spooky things start happening, big time. A bedroom catches fire. Dad calls his insurance man to report the damage and they send out an inspector the next day. The milk representative is still at the house, not having had a chance to hear Dad's pitch. The insurance inschpector can't find any cause for the fire, and doesn't believe Mum's explanation of a poltergeist.

By now, a psychic researcher has shown up - entirely on his own, unsolicited - and he's got an 8 x10 box camera, along with primitive electronic gear and a hand held "bug spray" fumigator, which he says helps to "calm" the ghosts. He mentions the word "exorcise", possibly for the first time in motion pictures. The word is then used for a moment of punning as the insurance man says "I already get plenty of exercise!" "No, not exercise, exorcise!" and so forth, hardy har. 

At around this time, the psychic researcher, who is also a psychologist, exschplains that poltergeists sometimes need human bodies to act through, to facilitate their shenanigans. Now here comes the Exorcist part: the "emotional teenage girl" theory. Audrey the depressed daughter tells the researcher that she controls a spirit in the house. "All I have to do is think of him and he appears". Calling Regan McNeil and Captain Howdy! All of a sudden, wine bottles start levitating, lamps get smashed over heads, all in a light comic manner, but menacing. Toward the end all sorts of stuff is floating and spinning in the air, just like in The Haunted Mansion, and everyone is running around skeered. This is a goofy little movie, but I wonder if William Peter Blatty or William Friedkin saw it. Audrey the daughter has the power to control the whole house, which is why she wanted to stay home from school all along. But then she gets cured, just like Linda Blair, but in a very humorous way.

"Things Happen at Night" gets Two Big Thumbs Up. It takes a while to get going, and you have to deal with the accents and odd mannerisms (English people really are very different from Americans......duuude.) But once it starts clicking, it's very, very good. The picture is soft but watchable. //// 

The night before we found a lesser-known entry in the Robin Hood canon, "Tales of Robin Hood"(1951), starring Robert Clarke. I thought it was an excellent version, though almost like a Cliff Notes Robin Hood at 58 minutes. All the most notable elements are there, starting with the killing of Robin's father by "Sir Alan de Beaulieu" (Keith Richards). Robin is then spirited away to Sherwood Forest by "Will Stutely" (Whit Bissel in his only non-science fiction role), where he comes of age. Then we see him reappear with the first of his Merry Men and they meet Little John by the stream. That meeting results in the famous Battle of the Staffs, which in the Errol Flynn version pitted Flynn (as Robin) versus The Skipper's Dad and was the stuff of cinematic legend. While Flynn and Alan Hale can't be topped, Robert Clarke (who looks a bit like Errol) does an excellent, dashing job, and Wade Crosby as Little John is appropriately hearty. When you jostle over a stream with staffs, it is imperative that you laugh properly - aHa! - then grin as you continue to jostle. When you are done, you put your hands on your hips, throw your head back and laugh some more - aHa! - then you proclaim brotherhood after your foe falls into the water. aHa! This is all part of being in a band of Merry Men, so be sure to take pains with the details. 

The next man they meet is of course "Friar Tuck" (Ben Weldon), who is guarding the fair "Maid Marian" (Mary Hatcher). Tuck has a huge spread of food they dig into, for when you are in a Merry Band, you must feast with great gusto. Marian at first detests Robin, because she's heard he steals and is uncouth. But of course he's also super handsome, so get ready for some slap-handed romantic friction when Marian delivers Robin a whack with her open palm because she thinks he's getting a little too frank. Because in a Robin Hood movie, you denounce any female who dares question your dashing motives. Then whammo! She slaps him a good one, and his cheek remains sore for the next ten minutes, which adds up to days in movie time.

But by now, the business at hand is to get revenge against "Sir Gui (pronounced Gee) de Clairmont" (Paul Cavanaugh), who ordered the killing of Robin's dad at the beginning of the movie. Sir Gee is the leader of the Normans, who conquered England in the 12th century. Friar Tuck leads a ruse to get the men into Sir Gee's castle, where a disguised Robin Hood gets a seat at the dinner table. Sir Gee has kidnapped Maid Marian by this time, so in addition to killing Gee, Robin has to rescue her from the executioner's block. Of course, they're in love by now. Ahh, swordfights and chivalry, and lots of good cheer, you can't go wrong with a Robin Hood movie. I give "Tales of Robin Hood" Two Big Thumbs Up. The picture is razor sharp. Now we need to see the Disney version. ////

And that's all for tonight. My blogging music is James Gang "Rides Again". Late night is still "Tristan und Isolde." I hope you had a nice day, and I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):) 

Beyond Brrrittissh! "Three Live Ghosts" (directed by H. Bruce Humberstone), and "Lucky Ghost" starring Mantan Moreland and Flournoy Miller

Last night we watched a British/American comedy called "Three Live Ghosts"(1936). Considering it was released by MGM at the height of that studio's glory, and directed by the great H. Bruce Humberstone (whose name by itself is worthy of a star on Hollywood Boulevard), you do have to wonder who green lighted this flick. MGM was the headquarters for the glossiest productions of all time, yet this one looks like it was made just up the street from Poverty Row. And while that's not a bad thing in itself, because we love PRC movies, the other and more important consideration is it's oddness. The key word here is Eccentric with a Capital E. The movie has a quirky Brrrittisshness that goes beyond what we usually consider Veddy Brrrittish, and I think it would've played better in Merry Old than here in America, and that may in fact be the case. I wonder if it was a made specifically for a UK release?

As it opens, three servicemen returning from a World War One POW camp are at the depot requesting their discharge papers. "Sorry", says the clerk, "ain't got any for ya. According to my logbook, yer all dead." The incredulous soldiers ask him to recheck it and he does, going through the KIA list individually with each man. Then he says, "yessir, it's like I told ya. Yer all dead. Sorry but I can't discharge ya."

The three leave, laughing that they "must be ghosts now" (hence the title), but they're minus the money that would've come with a discharge, and so - being broke - "Jimmie" (Charles McNaughton), one of the two Englishmen of the trio, suggests they go and stay with his stepmum "Mrs. Gubbins" (Beryl Mercer). Now the eccentricity begins, as Mercer chews scenery with a vengeance. No doubt she's talented, and maybe I was tired (I stayed up til 4am the night before, watching The Queen's funeral live), but a little bit of Beryl Mercer went long way. Her stepmum character is Cockney; she likes her gin and talks a blue streak. She's confused but certain about every little thing, in that Cockney dumb-but-cocksure way, and because she's always looking for more income, she has a picture from the newspaper of an American soldier, fighting for England, who has a criminal record in the USA. He's "William Jones" (Richard Arlen), and he's also one of the three ghosts. There's a one thousand pound reward out for him, and Mrs. Gubbins is hoping to claim it. When her stepson Jimmy returns to ask if he and his two friends can stay with her, she accepts, but then finds out that the American is William Jones.

Now the quirky Brittishness goes into hyperdrive, as the third member of the group is a shell-shocked vet named "Spoofy" (Claude Allister). Spoofy ain't playing with even half a full deck. He's a Long-Gone-John who grins through staring eyes. He's got a thing for stealing anything that isn't nailed down and can't wait to do that and commit other illegalities. He's like a catatonic crime robot. The other two guys have been trying to manage Spoofy, but every time they take their eyes off him, he goes crazy. Once they become distracted by Mrs. Gubbins in her effort to collect the reward for William Jones, they don't notice that Spoofy has left the house. Now he's broken into a mansion, where he exchanges his baggy clothes for the tailored suit of the dandified gent who lives there, then proceeds to kidnap that man's child, whom he takes for a walk in his stroller. Spoofy strolls the local park with the infant, as if he hasn't a care in the world. Then he goes back and steals all the jewelry in the house and brings it back to Mrs. Gubbins' place, along with with the baby in the stroller.

The cops show up, looking for the jewelry, and while they're there, Mrs. Gubbins tries to turn in William Jones to collect the reward. But the coppers tell her "we have no jurisdiction over that. He's wanted in America, not England." Then Beryl Mercer goes off. It's worth noting that Richard Arlen, who was a big star after appearing in "Wings" (the first Best Picture), gets steamrolled here. Though he's top-billed, he gets run over and flattened by the performance of Mercer, who won't let up with the Cockney yammering, alternating bellicosity with soused charm. He looks like he decided to give up and collect his paycheck, lol. Shellshocked nutjob Spoofy grows on you, though, and Jimmy the stepson is good in a roguish way. He stands up to his stepmum Mrs. Gubbins in support of his two war buddies.

But I mean, geez louise, enough already. I'm still gonna give "Three Live Ghosts" Two Thumbs Up, but they're Ordinary Thumbs this time, not Two Bigs (a rare lower level rating, when's the last time that happened?) While I still recommend the movie to you, because at the end of the day I did like it, I do so with the caveat mentioned several times above. It appears to have been made for British audiences. I don't know how well it would've played in America, or if it played here. Usually, for an American-British movie, they toned down the over-the-top ethnic quirks, but in this movie they let it flow like Gilbey's Gin. We're talkin' Veddy, Veddy, Triple Veddy Brrrittisssh, or more specifically Veddy Cockney. (last minute edit: I see now on IMDB that Three Live Ghosts was initially a play that ran on Broadway for 250 performances. That sort of explains everything, especially the unrestrained performances. If only H. Bruce could've reined them in, just a smitch, it might've been a more tolerable movie. Watch it anyway, the picture is very good. ) ////

The previous night we had something a little different: an almost all-black cast in the spooky comedy "Lucky Ghost"(1942), starring the legendary Mantan Moreland. We know Mantan from his "who me?" bulging-eyes persona and his recurring role as "Birmingham Brown" in the Charlie Chan films. Here, he's paired with another comedic actor named Flournoy Miller, and together they're a riot as a couple of guys who've been "thrown out of town and told to keep walkin'" by a judge, whose edict they've taken literally. As the movie opens, we see them walking down Devonshire Street. Mantan is hungry: "we been walkin' for four days, when we gonna eat?" He's also got a hole in his shoe. "You ain't got no sole!" Miller tells him. That kind of banter goes on for several minutes, with Miller (the brains) lording it over Mantan (the dummy), until they sit down to take a rest.

While they're resting (and still jawing), a car rolls up out of gas and parks a little way down the road. This is no ordinary ride, it's a chauffeur-driven saloon car, with two high rollers in the back seat (remember, it's an all black cast). Mantan and Flournoy, seeing the car and the way the passengers are dressed, know they must be loaded, so Mantan pulls out his trick dice, and - while the chauffeur is away getting gas - he lures the rich men into a craps game. Of course, he and Miller clean them out, and the next shot we see is of the rich guys in their skivvies, walking down the road, broke, and Mantan and Miller wearing their clothes, and riding away in their car, with their chauffeur behind the steering wheel.

He takes them to a nightclub, oblivious that there's been a change of passengers. The rich men were originally destined for this club, but Mantan and Miller go instead. It's a shady joint, subject to police raids, and it's run by a very large, imposing man named "Blake" (Maceo B. Sheffield), and hosted by a bubbly nitwit named "The Hostess" (Florence O'Brien). Now it's time for the hijnx to begin, as The Hostess takes a shine to Mantan, and Mantan tries, with his loaded dice, to clean out the bankroll of the house. Blake doesn't appreciate Mantan taking his money, let alone cutting in on his gal, so he makes every attempt to clobber him but they all go wrong. Most of the next 30 minutes is schtick, and very funny. Then, at around the 40 minute mark, a Caucasian drunk guy gets 86ed from the premises by the linebacker-sized doorman "James" (Jess Lee Brooks). James kicks the guy in the butt and he lands across the street in a cemetery, knocking his head on a tombstone. When he wakes up, he's in blackface, thinks he's dead and maybe he is. One thing is for certain: there are ghosts in the cemetery - a whole family of 'em - and they don't approve of what Blake has done with the building across the street - his illicit nightclub - which used to be their house.

This ghost family are straight-laced Baptists. Uncle Ezekiel is the patriarch, but he's henpecked by his wife, a stern ghost who hates gambling, jazz music, and anything sinful. She demands that Uncle Zeke go over across the street and shut that nightclub down. The rest of the family ghosts agree, so Zeke wafts his way over there. James the doorman sees the club door open and close, but no one appears to walk through it. Inside, a skeleton plays piano and Uncle Ezekiel's ghostly voice is heard, telling Blake the owner to get out. But by this time, he doesn't even own the place any longer. Mantan Moreland has cleaned him out with his loaded dice. Now everyone is fleeing the club, at the orders of Zeke's ghost. All heck is breaking loose as Mantan and Miller try to hold on to the small fortune they've won, in addition the the club, but remember: the ghosts don't like gambling! Two Big Thumbs Up for "Lucky Ghost". I found it very funny, but it may not be for the politically correct. But that's not you, so don't worry. Watch and enjoy, the picture is razor sharp.  ////

That's all for tonight. My blogging music is the first Egg album, late night is Wagner "Tristan und Isolde". I hope your week is off to a good start and I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)

They're Back: "Out West with the Peppers" (the third installment), and "The Ghost and the Guest" from PRC (plus Marwyck and 9032)

Last night, we watched the third installment in the Five Little Peppers series, entitled "Out West with the Peppers"(1940). It's the first of the films that wasn't adapted from one of Margaret Sidney's books, so the script has a looser feel, as if the screenwriter set out to rely on hijinx rather than story to fill out the 62 minute running time. Whereas the first two films grabbed you right away with plight and heartfelt sentiment, this time the movie opens with the Peppers on an ocean cruise. The two middle boys nearly give old Mr. King a heart attack when they are caught tighrope-walking the ship's guardrail in the middle of the ocean. This is merely a Pepper set piece, though, because the real issue is that the cold ocean air causes Mom to get sick. When the family gets home, her doctor recommends they move west to a dry climate, telling them: "She'll need at least a year to recover."

The Peppers say goodbye to Mr. King and Jasper (see last week's Pepper blog to refresh on their characters), and that's the last we see of them in this movie. Now, at the end of the second film, if you remember, a mother lode of copper had just been discovered in the mine co-owned by Polly and Mr. King. Therefore you'd think the Peppers were in the money. And, they were just on a cruise, which isn't cheap. But when they move west (to Oregon by way of Big Bear), they move into a boarding house run by Mrs. Pepper's sister. The screenwriter didn't study his previous Pepper movies, apparently, so it's all a setup, to have the kids antagonize sister Alice's husband "Uncle Jim" (Victor Killian) a mean, drunken logger who hates children. All the other boarders are loggers, too, and much of the middle of the film features little "Phronsie Pepper" (Dorothy Anne Seese) interacting with these gruff men; teaching them table manners at the communal supper, and generally talking her little head off in a cute but insistent way. After mean Uncle Jim lets her pet bird out of it's cage, kindly "Ole" (Emory Parnell), a big Swede, tries to help Phronsie catch a new bird. The other Peppers help, too, but end up trapping a skunk, which they bring back to the house thinking it's a squirrel. The skunk sprays all over Uncle Jim, who now demands that Aunt Alice throw the Peppers out. She vetos that order, however, and - to get the kids away from Uncle Jim - Ole takes them down to the logging camp to build a pirate ship out of timber. After he puts together a raft worthy of Tom Sawyer, the Pepper kids (minus Polly who stays ashore), wind up launching it before Ole is ready, and just as the logging flume is opened up on the river. Now comes the movie's big crisis, 45 minutes in, which would've been presented earlier in the first two, better written, films. The resolution teeters on the hope that Ole can save the kids from certain death in a river filled with onrushing logs, that might clobber him while he's swimming to their rescue. But Uncle Jim is nearby, sleeping off a hangover. Something tells me he will have to help Ole and the children out, in order to redeem himself.

While not on the dramatic or storytelling level of the first two films, which are certified classics, "Out West with the Peppers" nonetheless gets Two Big Thumbs Up simply because it's the Peppers, and the Peppers are a guaranteed good time at the movies. One bad thing: there's not enough Mr. King and Jasper, and Mr. King is played by a different and younger actor. But one good thing: there is an amazing and lengthy scene at the Chatsworth train station! It's mostly a hijinx movie with a modicum of friction-based plot (kids vs. grumpy adults), but it's still very highly recommended. The mess-making scene with molasses in the general store is worth the watch by itself, and the picture is razor sharp.  ////

The previous night's flick was "The Ghost and the Guest"(1943), a haunted house comedy from PRC that would've benefited from better direction. The screwball script is by Morey Amsterdam of "Dick van Dyke Show" fame, so the jokes are flying a mile a minute, but the usually reliable William Nigh, who made many good b-movies including "The Ape", "The Strange Case of Doctor Rx" and the Boris Karloff "Dr. Wong" series, overlooks here an emphasis on scenes that delineate plot, in favor of the goofy repartee, and we are left wondering what the heck is going on. Broadly, we have the gist of it ; a recently married couple (James Dunn & Florence Rice), after bickering about where they're gonna schpend their honeymoon, decide on a house left to Rice by her grandfather.

When they get there, an old Creepo is on the property testing nooses. Here we go with high (or low, depending) concept. The old guy's a retired hangman, who claims to live in a guest house on the property.

"That isn't possible" says Florence Rice, the wife. "I inherited this house from my grandpa." Cue a passel of hanging jokes, featuring necks as punchlines, with the upshot being that not only does the skinny old hangman live there, he's also apparently a psycho. Thanks, Morey, for clearing that up. Well, five minutes in, you know you've got an Old Dark House movie. Instead of a nice honeymoon, the couple are in for chaos as some cops show up, trying to solve a murder. Just before that, a team of movers has brought a coffin and stashed it upstairs. The hangman says it belongs to the body of the former owner, a Mob hoodlum who he hanged (cue more neck jokes), and who, in his will, decreed that he would be "buried" upstairs in his house.

"But it isn't his house, it's my house" says Florence the wife. You get where this is going, to Crazyville, and it would've worked a lot better - because Morey Amsterdam was known for quick quips - if they'd just taken a moment here or there to explain what the plot is. All of a sudden, the coffin opens upstairs and a prison convict gets out. This presumes a smuggle job, of the supposedly "deceased" Mob boss. Then a whole slew of swindler crooks show up; two tough guys and their molls, one a hilarious nitwit. Then Charles King makes an appearance 45 minutes in and we're rescued somewhat; his credit says he's a "Dumb Detective". I think Charles King is my favorite movie star of all time.

The bottom line is that there is some very funny/scary business going on in this nuthouse, but it's hampered by incoherence, and - unfortunately - a print that is soft and very murky in places. Still, having said all of this, I give it Two Big Thumbs Up. It's fun, and supporting player Sam McDaniel has a great scene at the beginning, commiserating with James Dunn about his wife talking non-stop on the phone. It's a riot, and the movie as a whole is very inventive with it's off-the-wall black comedy. It's another one of those films with a style that presages SNL, so for that reason I recommend it, and maybe you can find a better print than the one I saw. If you can't, watch it anyway, in the name of Charles King.  ////    

That's all I know for tonight. If you saw my photo post on FB, you know that I visited Marwyck. The house was open to the public for a few hours yesterday, for self-guided walk-through tours. I'd been inside once before, in 2010 when the property was first acquired by the city's Parks & Recreation Department. That time was awesome, too, but it was with a group led by a docent. This time, I was in there walking around by myself, as in a museum. There were only a handful of people inside, so there was really a chance to linger, and I wound up having a lengthy conversation with a gal who was with the conservatory group that is restoring Marwyck. She was as big a fan as I am, of Barbara Stanwyck and Hollywood in general, and it was amazing to be talking about Barbara with this lady, in Barbara's house that she shared with Robert Taylor. At one point I was standing over the sink, and I imagined them doing their dishes. It was pretty doggone cool.

Last night, I also walked by another house, the legendary 9032. I was returning a dvd to the Libe, and a little bird told me "you should detour around the block". So I did, and I was confronted by an absolute tragedy. Whoever owns it is remodeling the house, and they've not only walled-up the original front windows and changed their location, but they've changed the direction of the front steps, and walled off the back porch, too. It looks like it's gonna be another Extravaganza in Stucco when they get done with it. The horror and the sadness. Imagine being a knucklehead who thinks he or she knows better than the original architect. Well anyhow.......

My blogging music is Magma "Kohntarkosz" and my late night listening is "Parsifal" by Wagner. I hope you had a nice weekend and I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):) 

Two Rom/Com Musicals from the 1930s : "Sitting on the Moon" starring Grace Bradley, and "Rhythm in the Clouds" with Patricia Ellis

This time we have two musical romantic comedies, both from the Art Deco/Glamour period of the mid-to-late '30s. Last night's was called "Sitting on the Moon"(1936), and starred Roger Pryor as "Danny West", a songwriter who, as the movie opens, is awakened in the back of a taxi by a cabbie who wants his fare. Danny doesn't know where he is, when he got in the cab or how he came to be with the blonde sitting next to him. The driver explains, in Screwball slang, that Danny's been on a multi-day bender. "I've driven you and the dame all over the joint, from Mexico to Malibu. You'll remember it better it when your head unswells a few sizes."

Remembering he's got a gig to report for, Danny shakes off his hangover, ditches the blonde, and heads to a nearby recording studio. He's late for the rehearsal, he owes the producer a song and he's got nothing written so he plays something spontaneous, a ragtime sampling of Wagner's Tannhauser. The producer thinks its an original composition. "Needs polishing," he says, but at least Danny is off the hook until he can sober up. When he does, hes got another problem; he's late on his rent. His landlord is understanding, but ultimately it's pay or get out.

So he heads to Regency Movie Schtudios where he once worked on a picture, and there, at a cattle call for dancers, he meets "Polly Blair" (Grace Bradley), a blacklisted actress. No, she's not a HUAC victim (this is 15 years before that) but she's on the outs in Hollywood because she's been labeled temperamental (she once stormed off a picture). Danny knows of Polly from the old days. Though they've never met, she once sang one of his songs in a movie, before he, too, became washed up. Both of them get kicked off the lot this time, and they end up back at Danny's apartment, where he's got the landlord staved off for the time being. Inspired by their meeting, he starts writing a new song in her presence,which they end up calling "Sitting on the Moon". Polly takes it to a radio promoter she knows, and the next thing you know, it's a hit. Suddenly, she's on a radio tour with the tune, making a thousand bucks a week. She and Danny are in love by now and thinking of getting married. But then Danny gets a telegram informing him that Little Miss So-and-So is coming to town to visit him. "Who is she?", he wonders. Well, holy-moly, she's the blonde bimbo from the taxicab at the beginning of the movie. She tells him "not only did I ride around with you for two days, but we also got married in Mexico, don't you remember?" She shows him the ring and the papers to prove it. That was one hell of a drunken bender Danny was on, worse than even the cab driver told him. Sweet Polly Blair, who is now his his fiance, overhears his convo with the blonde and is heartbroken. "You two timer!" she yells, and leaves Danny. Polly's still making a grand a week for singing "Sitting on the Moon" in nightclubs, but Danny's too ashamed of his Mexican marriage to show his face. In the end, though, he has to get Polly back, and his chance comes in the form of another hit song. Just when it looks like her short radio career is over, Danny shows up and she's a star again. The twist is that he's out of his marriage to the bimbo. I absolutely loved this movie, it gets Two Big Thumbs Up, and you'll enjoy not only the music but the voice of Grace Bradley, who, according to Wiki, was a popular singer of the era. "Sitting on the Moon" is highly recommended and the picture is very good.  ////

Our other rom/com, seen the night before, was "Rhythm in the Clouds"(1937), starring Patricia Ellis as  songwriter/pianist "Judy Walker", who's been turned down by every publishing house in the city. When her money runs out and she can't pay her rent, she writes a letter to a well-known composer, offering to apprentice for him. He doesn't respond, so she goes to his apartment to ask him in person. That's when she finds out that he's on vacation, and she just moves in, like a squatter. She eats his food and composes on his piano - hey, what's a gal supposed to do, starve and whistle tunes in the street? Everything is good now for Judy, and she's wearing her evening dress so she looks glamorous. The only problem is that her piano playing is bothering her neighbor. He starts pounding on the wall. She answers by pounding back, and pretty soon both of them are at war and throwing everything but the kitchen sink at their walls, in order to get the other to shut up.

But what Judy doesn't know is that her neighbor is a singer/lyricist with radio show connections, and when she finally gets potential publishing for her songs, by forging the name of of the apartment owner, his manager wants to set her up with a singer/lyricist, and guess who it turns out to be? A nightclub show is all set up, sponsored by a wealthy perfume manufacturer named "The Duchess" (Zeffie Tilbury). She's ancient but wants to stay hip and the old fuddy duddy who runs the radio station isn't providing the new talent she wants. This gets Judy a shot at playing live, with her songs. But what she doesn't know yet is that she'll have to play them with her neighbor the noisy singer/lyricist who she's at  war with. She doesn't even know he's her neighbor, and when he shows up at the audition, he wants his girlfriend to sing with him. This increases the romantic friction that's already been brewing from the Apartment Noise War, and then the capper is that the famous apartment owner/songwriter comes back from vacation to find out Judy has been squatting at his pad. He wants to have her arrested, but by now, The Duchess, who is loaded and is sponsoring the radio show, insists that Judy be the live act. The neighbor who detests her and the apartment owner who wants her arrested are going to have to go along with the wishes of The Duchess, while the middleman publishing agent needs a new tube of Rolaids for the ulcer he's developed. The two movies reviewed tonight have similar titles, themes and styles. The music in "Rhythm in the Clouds" is good as well, and it also gets Two Big Thumbs Up. Patricia Ellis is delightful as the Screwball pianist Judy, and Zeffie Tilbury, who plays The Duchess, is one of our very earliest actresses, born in 1863, when Abe Lincoln was still alive. My goodness! The picture is razor sharp.  ////

That's all for tonight. We finished "Terry and the Pirates" (a must-watch) and have started two new serials, "Zorro's Fighting Legion"(1939) starring Reed Hadley and Sheila Darcy, and "The Phantom"(1943) starring Tom Tyler. Both are off to awesome starts, the episodes are about 17 minutes long. My blogging music tonight is "The Geese and the Ghost" by Anthony Phillips, late night music is Spanish Organ Music by E. Power Biggs. I hope your weekend is off to a good start and I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)  

Buster Crabbe and Sheila Darcy in "Jungle Man", and "In Love With Life" starring Lila Lee and Claude Gillingwater (plus Jean Luc Godard)

Last night, we went on an adventure with our old pal Buster Crabbe, into the heart of Africa in "Jungle Man"(1941). Buster plays "Dr. Robert Hammond", on a mission to find a cure for the dreaded Malaka disease, which has reached the epidemic stage and is decimating the local tribesmen. He has a serum awaiting delivery from America and believes it will be the magic bullet. Meanwhile, on an oceanliner at sea, young "Betty Graham" (the stunning Sheila Darcy from "Terry and the Pirates") complains to her Dad, the "Rev. James Graham" (Charles Middleton) that they do the same thing every vacation. "We go on a cruise, sit on deck, play shuffleboard and go home. Can't we do something else this year?" Dad asks for suggestions, and when she reads a headline about an expedition into the City of the Dead in Africa, where the ship is heading anyway, she wants to go. A colleague tells Dad that no one has ever returned from the City, but that makes it all the more challenging to Betty. Dad can't say no to her, so the next thing you know, they're in Africa and part of the safari.

Once we get to the jungle, we're treated to stock footage shots of lions and tigers but not bears, oh my! (what'd ya expect? There aren't bears in the jungle, c'mon). There's also big ol' boa constrictors, 20 or 30 feet long, and monkeys, too, but the safari leader doesn't want Betty coming to the City of the Dead because "it's no place for a woman." She insists, however, and on the way she meets Buster Crabbe. Because this is a low- budget PRC flick, and because they have Sheila Darcy, now's the time to fill ten minutes with Sheila walking around in a sarong. Buster likes her, but his priority is medicine, and now he's dismayed to learn that the cargo ship bringing the Malaka serum has sunk off the coast. To make matters worse, the headhunting Kobi tribe is on the attack, and here I had to laugh and cheer, because of the legendary Kobi the Dog who was my right hand man at Pearl's. I had a whole mythology constructed around Kobi, that he was in fact not a small white Bischon but actually a ferocious Doberman Pinscher. So when they brought out the deadly Kobi tribe in the movie, I pictured a tribe of Kobedogs running amok and terrorizing everyone in sight, including the lions and tigers.

The safari presses on to the City of the Dead, and the leader catches Malaka. Heroic Buster tries to save him, and the members of the peaceful tribes, by swimming out to the offshore shipwreck where the Malaka serum is underwater. Sharks are in the area and have recently chewed a rescue team to ribbons. Cue stock footage of Makos. But this is a chance to show Buster Crabbe in his element - he was an Olympic swimmer (one of the greatest ever), and with his shirt off, he is one buff honcho. So naturally, he swims, dives and brings back the serum, outrunning the toothy Mako sharks who'd like to have him for a snack.

He doesn't make it back in time to save the safari leader, but the serum works on Sheila Darcy who has come down with Malaka in the meantime. The tribesmen are cured also and Buster's medical mission is successful. He doesn't take advantage of Sheila's gratitude, though, giving her only a Sleeping Beauty kiss at the end. We mentioned Frances Rafferty the other day, and it must be noted that Sheila Darcy gives her a run for her money. I mean, good grief Charlie Brown. We do get to see the City of the Dead, and it resembles Angkor Wat, but not much happens there except the rampage of the Kobedog tribe, which is over very quickly. Plotwise, "Jungle Man" is not one of the more cohesive films in recent memory, but it still gets Two Big Thumbs Up because it's fun and because of.......well, c'mon, because of Sheila Darcy. We aren't trying to kid anyone here, although we genuinely like Buster Crabbe, too. Ignore the 3.6 rating on IMDB (trust me; ignore it) and watch "Jungle Man" in spite of the less-than perfect picture. You'll be glad you did, and if you want to see Sheila Darcy in a better production, watch her as The Dragon Lady in the fantastic serial "Terry and the Pirates", which we mentioned a few blogs ago. I'm now 14 episodes in with one more to go. The whole thing is just shy of five hours long and it's incredible, Two Huge Thumbs Up in every respect with an awesome cast including William Tracy, Dick Curtis and Charles King. Don't miss it, the picture is razor sharp. ////

The previous night we found an absolute gem of a Depression-era movie called "In Love with Life"(1934), made by a studio called Invincible Pictures Corporation. The look resembles a Poverty Row production but with lots of inventiveness and heart, which is often missing even in the best PRC releases. As it opens, "Professor John Applegate" (Onslow Stevens) is being let go by his University. They can't afford to keep him on staff and, needing a job, he accepts an invitation to meet with a millionaire, hoping it will lead to a grant for writing or research. Instead, to his surprise and initial dismay, the rich man, "Mr. Morley" (Claude Gillingwater), wants him as a tutor for his grandson (Dickie Moore), who has come to live with him under tragic circumstances. It's the height of the Depression, and the boy's mother is broke. Mr. Morley is her father but they are estranged because she eloped years ago with a young man he didn't like. The guy turned out to be no-good, just like her father warned, so she's come back to try and reconcile with her Dad, in hopes that he will help her and her son. But he tells her in no uncertain terms to get lost and never come back. "You deserted me when I needed you, and you ran off with your lover. Now you have the nerve to come asking for my help." He agrees to take in her son, and raise him in wealth, with every need provided for, so long as his daughter (Lila Lee) never shows her face again.

Old man Morley is certainly a crab apple, unforgiving and remorseless, but his daughter is destitute, and he is her son's only hope, so she agrees to let him take the boy and she leaves broken-hearted. 

This is one of those spiritual movies where fate steps in and the Scrooge character is forced to show a soft side. Morley shows it right away, if curmudgeonly, to the boy, who observes him and says: "Grandpa, you must have lost someone too, to feel the way you feel, so you know what it's like for me to lose my mom". His tutor the Professor intervenes, and when he is given carte blanche to look after the boy in the daytime, and spend whatever money is required for his needs, he takes him to a children's restaurant/nightclub, which is like a fantasy world for little kids. There's a floor show featuring a five year old Betty Boop, followed by a troupe of child performers called The Meglin Kiddies who do a dance number. There's kid food and desserts on the menu, and there's a wishing well where the young patrons can make wishes, by telephone, to a Wish Fulfilling Fairy Godmother, who is stationed in a back room unseen. Well, unbeknownst to the little boy, the Professor has arranged for his Mom to have a job back there, as one of the Fairy Godmothers. The benefit for both is that it's a way for Mom to hear her son's voice, because she's been forbidden by Grandpa Morley to ever see him again. A warning: you'd better own stock in Kleenex when this scene rolls around. By now, the Professor is in love with Mom and wants to marry her, but she wants to wait because she still needs to reconcile with her Dad.

Grandpa Morley won't budge, though. He does love the boy but won't talk to his daughter, no matter how much she pleads through notes delivered by the Professor. Morley makes excuses: "She abandoned me once and that's that. I never want to hear from her again!" But now the date is October 29, 1929 and the stock market is about to crash. Morley loses all his money. He loses the bank he owns, his mansion, everything. But he's still got his grandson, and by now the boy loves him. But he also wishes his Mom was part of the family. Yet Grandpa still won't budge. He's hurting from Mom's long-ago "desertion" and won't give up his pride. But when he goes broke, he gets sick too. Finally, when he's bedridden and needs someone to take care of him, his daughter comes pleading one last time. Now you'd better own the Kleenex company or you'll be toast. It's a beautiful scene of reconciliation, pre-Code and realistic. Onslow Stevens is effective as the bookish Professor, who takes the boy under his wing and arranges for him to reconnect with his mother, while Lila Lee in that role pulls out all the emotional stops. Two Huge Thumbs Up. I think that if a movie like this were released now, not remade but in it's original form and with the right publicity, it would be huge. Simply put, it's as great as movies get, end of story. I can't recommend it highly enough, and the picture is very good.  ////    

That's all for this evening. The passing of Jean Luc Godard takes me back to September 2009 and the first semester of the CSUN Cinematheque, which I attended for 9 years and was one of the charter members. Professor Tim said he started the Cinematheque after hearing more than one film student ask, "who is Jean Luc Godard"? I shant get into the subject of history (cinematic or otherwise) and today's educational culture, but for instance I have never taken a film class and I was aware of Godard, just from following movies, since I was about 16 years old. I won't pretend I was a huge fan. I have "Breathless", "Masculine/Feminine" and "Alphaville" on dvd. I think I started coming to the Cinematheque after the second or third week of the Godard retrospective, so I saw about 14 of the 16 films screened, and my favorites, besides the dvds mentioned, were "Les Caribiners" and "Band Aparte". I didn't care much if Godard was some kind of political or cinematic rebel (in fact, I rebel when any artist poses as "cool") but I liked his movies because a lot of them were fun, and many were entirely different because they made no sense, plotwise. But that was Godard's point, I think, just having fun with the format, and in that way they were darn good movies. If nothing else they were highly original. The Godard retrospective was our first at CSUN, and we went on to do 17 more over the next 8 1/2 years. I was proud of the fact that Professor Tim did a Robert Bresson season at my suggestion. The professor hadn't seen much Bresson, who I think is the greatest French filmmaker of all time (and one of the greatest directors ever, period). So it was an amazing run we had, with our little film family of regulars who would come every Thursday night, from 2009 -2018, when we got cancelled because of Cancel Culture. It turned out that Professor Tim wasn't adhering to the required "quota" of directors, gender and otherwise, no matter if the desired directors even existed let alone had a body of work worthy of a retrospective. Would Jean Luc Godard have approved, considering that Cancel Culture comes from the Far Left Wing? I think not. I think he'd have protested the decision just as we did, and would have lampooned the University in a movie. Well, anyhow......

My blogging music is Gong "Angel's Egg", late night is Mahler by Bernstein. I hope you are having a good week and I send you Tons of Love as always. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)

Veddy Brrrittish! : Frankie Howerd and Petula Clark in "The Runaway Bus", and PRC's "Double Cross", a good crime flick

Last night's movie was a Veddy Brrrittish comedy classic called "The Runaway Bus"(1954), directed by Val Guest, who also helmed the first two Quatermass movies as well as "The Day the Earth Caught Fire". I'd heard of this film and remembered the title when it popped up on my Youtube recommendations, but I didn't know it was regarded as a long lost English classic, and, because of his sci-fi rep, I wouldn't have figured Guest as its director. It's rare to see an older movie (black and white, pre-1960s) with well over a million views, and in fact I'm not sure we've seen any of our Youtube movies with even half that amount. Most have 50-120K. I didn't even notice the view count until the movie was over, but it's proof enough of its well-loved status. One thing to know going in, however: it's Brrrittish as all get-out. Lets add an extra Veddy and call it Veddy, Veddy Brrrittish. It starts off with the kind of quirky humor you'd expect from such a film, but in the first 15 minutes, the quirkiness is turned up to a rolling boil, which - if you aren't from the UK - can make the movie feel like its off to a slow start. We're talking about eccentric characters, and in this case there's an obnoxious older woman who just has to get to Dublin, and.....oy! But when the Runaway Bus gets going, there's a whole different feel as the plot builds.

It involves the robbery of a ton of gold bullion, planned during the opening credits. The gold is in a storage building located at the London Airport. The robbers wait for a night of heavy fog to carry out their deed, and we never see them steal the gold or load it onto the BOAC bus that normally transports airline passengers to nearby towns. However, the passengers on this bus have all been rerouted due to the fog and the resulting airport shutdown, and it isn't clear to anyone where its going. The old obnoxious lady isn't happy and spends all of her time complaining. Then there's the young, beautiful, constantly grinning gal (the tragic Belinda Lee, who we saw last year in "The Secret Place"), who can't get enough of her horror comic books. She likes to read them aloud to the other passengers: tales of zombies and graveyard murders, the gorier the better. This is Belinda Lee's first movie, it's just awful what happened to her.

Because of the airport shutdown, and the woman who won't stop complaining (Margaret Rutherford), a replacement bus and driver are brought in to take the stranded passengers to Blackbushe Airport, which will deliver them to their various destinations. It's the middle of the night, the fog is like pea soup, and replacement driver "Percy Lamb" (Frankie Howerd), who doesn't even work for BOAC, is a total Nervous Norvus as he tries to drive blindly through the fog while dealing with the bickering passengers. He does have a stewardess to assist him, and I was stunned to learn when the movie was over that she was played by a 22 year old Petula Clark. Wow! When I was five years old, "Downtown" was one of my favorite songs. But she's an excellent actress too, and keeps the passengers safe while the driver is losing his mind. He can't see where he's going, Belinda Lee is scaring everyone half to death, and the driver has been told, by a mysterious gun-toting passenger, not to say anything about the gold to the police.

Frankie Howerd, I read later, was a beloved English comedian. He's great as the hapless bus driver, and the movie turns into a "Spooks Run Wild" mystery, when the bus stops in a village that appears to be deserted. Then someone starts trying to pick them off with an automatic rifle, and they end up in a haunted house. This is where the Brrrittishness pays off, and the hijinx kick into gear. After a ten-minute series of plot twists, the crooks are finally caught, but they turn out to be absolutely ruthless and............ you'll see why it got over a million views. Two Big Thumbs Up for "The Runaway Bus". Have patience with the goofiness and allow it to develop. The picture is very good.  ////

The previous night, we watched a solid crime drama from PRC called "Double Cross"(1941), about a disgraced cop who's thrown off the force, then takes down a crooked nightclub owner to restore his reputation. "Jim Murray" (Kane Richmond) is a motorcycle officer who's the son of the chief of police. He's a top cop when the movie starts, but his fiance "Ellen Bronson" (Pauline Moore) is the sister of Jim's colleague "Steve" (Richard Beach), who's girlfriend is the moll of "Nick Taggart" (John Miljan). Taggart owns the Silver Slipper nightclub, out of which he runs a gambling racket and a freight robbery scheme. Steve the cop knows he shouldn't be hanging around Taggart's club, but he's sweet on "Faye Saunders" (Wynne Gibson), the moll. To make matters worse, she's using Steve as a puppet, to warn Nick about upcoming police raids. She gets Steve to tip her off, and it ends up getting him killed, when - during a shootout - she grabs his gun and shoots a cop. Steve gets the gun back, but this makes it look like he was the shooter. Then he gets shot and dies, disgraced, but not before telling his friend Jim Murray what actually happened.

Jim is trying to get his Dad the chief to quit, saying its only a matter of time before the mobsters kill him, too. Jim also wants out, to live a safe life and marry his fiance Ellen. His Dad calls him a wimp, so he sticks it out for a while. But he's secretly formed a plan to get thrown off the force so he can go undercover and bust the guys who killed Steve. When he's found cavorting with Faye the bimbo, his Dad strips him of his badge and he's fired. Now he gets serious about busting Nick Taggart, and suckers Nick into letting him join the gang. After all, he's now a disgraced cop who seemingly "hates his dad". Surely he's a rebel who can be trusted.

During his infiltration, Jim discovers that the mayor is controlling Nick Taggart. Or is it the other way around? They're certainly in cahoots, so Jim offers to pull a fur coat robbery for Nick, at a warehouse, which he hopes will set him up for a bigger jewelry job that will also involve the mayor. Then he can expose the whole gang. But Faye the bimbo has figured Jim out by now; she tells Nick Taggart, but he thinks she's out to blackmail him, so he plays her a vinyl recording he surreptitiously made, of her confessing to the shooting of Steve Bronson. Faye loses her cool and does blackmail Nick to his face, saying that if she goes to trial she will implicate him in numerous murdalizations. This turns out to be a stupid move on her part, because ten seconds later, that's the end of Faye. Now Jim has no allies undercover, and his butt is on the line in the jewel robbery truck. Nick is going to finish him off. The script is surprisingly good, but the execution feels stagey or overly expository because of the extremely low budget. 90% of the scenes take place in rooms so stripped down that it looks like they cleared out the PRC offices and filmed in there. There is a hospital, a police station, and Jim's home, but rudimentary is the operative word as far as production values are concerned.

Still, it's doggone good, so Two Big Thumbs Up for "Double Cross". Make sure you specify the 1941 version because of the oft-used title. Supporting stalwart Mary Gordon, always good, is on hand as the Irish mother. The picture is soft but watchable. //// 

That's all for tonight. My blogging music is Tangerine Dream "Rubycon", and Ty Tabor's new solo album "Shades". In honor of the late, great Marsha Hunt, you can re-watch her in "The Accusing Finger", which we just saw last month. I hope your week is off to a good start, and I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxooxoxoxoxoxo  :):)

The "Five Little Peppers" Movie Series : The first two, "How They Grew", and "At Home", starring Edith Fellows, Ronald Sinclair and Clarence Kolb

This time, we have to review our films in reverse order because they're the first two in a franchise, and we watched the first one two nights ago, so instead of saying "Last night we watched", as we usually do, we'll start with: The previous night, we found a Depression-era classic called "Five Little Peppers and How They Grew"(1939). How's that for a title? It's from a 1881 children's book by Margaret Sidney, a fact I learned on Wiki, so it was written long before the Depression (and the movie release was actually at the tail end), but the story - of a poor family's interaction with a wealthy man, and how it affects both parties - is apt for the era and is a slice of Americana we could use right now. When we talk about How They Don't Make 'Em Anymore But They Should, a film like this could be Exhibit A. As it opens, a lawyer for millionaire "Mr. King" (Clarence Kolb) informs him of the pending sale of a copper mine, owned by a family named Pepper. Being a wheeler-dealer, King instructs his lawyer to find the Peppers immediately, before a bidding war can start. "Make them the lowest possible offer," he says. "If they're selling, they must be broke. They'll take whatever we offer at the bottom."

Then we cut to the Peppers themselves. "Mrs Pepper" (Dorothy Peterson) is a widow. Her late husband, a mining engineer, was a half-owner in the mine but was killed in an underground collapse. Now she's trying to raise her five children on a seamstress's salary. Today is her birthday and her kids want to bake her a cake. 15 year old Polly, the eldest Pepper child, is a substitute mother to her siblings while momma is at work. She wants the cake to be special; she's going to bake it, but her brother "Joey" (Tommy Bond) has eaten all the raisins. In order to buy more, she and Joey try to collect $1.50 for a shirt Mom patched for a neighbor, but the woman isn't home. They track her to the mansion of Mr. King on the hill, but she's just left. Joey is crying on the steps, because it's his fault for eating all the raisins, when out of the house walks young "Jasper King" (Ronald Sinclair), the old man's grandson. Jasper, despite being brought up with butlers and boarding schools, is just a kid like the Peppers. He's Polly's age and tired of being cooped up in a stuffy mansion. It looks to him like the Pepper kids are having all the fun, with their homemade wooden "sailboat" on wheels. He wants to play with the Peppers, and he's been raised to be gracious, so - seeing Joey's distress, he offers to give him and Polly all the ingredients they need to make their mom a deluxe cake. "It's my birthday also", he mentions.

Jasper asks if he can ride on their sailboat, and ends up coming to their house, where all of them bake the cake together. Jasper stays for the birthday party, but after it's over, some of the Pepper kids come down with measels, and Mr. King, who has come looking for Jasper, is quarantined by his doctor in the Pepper's house, along with Jasper and the Peppers themselves. This is a dramatic device to get rich and poor together, in the poor folks' house, so Mr. King can see how the other half lives. It turns out that he enjoys their company - he's actually a kindly man - and he ends up informally adopting the Pepper family, for he sees that, in some ways, they live better than he does. Then there's also the matter of the copper mine. While living with the Peppers, he confesses to them that his initial plan was to purchase the mine for a fire-sale price. Realising how wrong it was to want to do that, he now decides to protect the Peppers from other unscrupulous buy-outs, so he becomes the business partner of Polly Pepper, who stands to inherit the mine when she turns 18. The mining plot will develop further in the second film. This one is mostly about the Peppers themselves, and how family togetherness overcomes poverty. Edith Fellows steals hearts as Polly Pepper, the daughter everyone wishes they had, and Ronald Sinclair is perfect as her genteel, English mannered boy-friend (not quite boyfriend but close). Little Dorothy Anne Seese is a gem as four-year old "Phronsie", the youngest Pepper. She makes it her cause to nurse Mr. King back to health with his measles, and they become pals for comic relief. If you like Americana movies, they don't come any better than this. Remember "The Fighting Sullivans" from a few weeks ago, about the real life brothers who went off to World War 2? This movie is in the same vein but without the war as a context. But every bit of the sentiment is in place. When I found out there were three more Pepper movies in the series I was happy. Two Huge Thumbs Up for this first one, the picture is razor sharp. ////

The second movie in the series, which we watched last night, was titled "Five Little Peppers at Home"(1940). Home is now Mr. King's mansion, where the family has gone to live after King and Polly become partners in her copper mine. Mr. King has taken the Pepper family under his wing, they're all living together, and the first ten minutes are taken up with hijinx when little Phronsie floods the bathroom while giving her doll a bath. Then it's on to serious business, as Mr. King learns that he's bankrupt! His lawyer informs him that, because the mine has yet to produce any copper, the bank is pulling their investment. As a result, he's going to lose his mansion, which he mortgaged to finance his half of the deal.

Polly Pepper offers to let Mr. King, Jasper and their butler "Martin" (Leonard Carey) all come to live with them back at their small house, down the hill in Gusty Corners. Turnabout is fair play, and Mr. King accepts. After moving into the Pepper house and living in much humbler surroundings, he decides he likes being poor. "The people are nicer and they have more fun," he says. Mr. King spends a lot of time with Phronsie, who sees him as the grandpa she never had. Phronsie gets most of the good lines in this film (Dorothy Anne Seese steals the show with her deadpan but earnest line readings), and teenage Jasper King, with his English good manners, spends more time with Polly, doing dishes and talking in the yard, while the middle boys argue and scheme. Eventually, Mr. King gets sick again. This time, it looks like he might die, but as in the first movie,  Phronsie prays for him and he recovers. Then his mean sister "Martha" (Laura Treadwell) takes Jasper away to live with her. She's affronted that they're living in poverty. Meanwhile, it turns out that Martin the butler majored in mining engineering in college, and he knows a lot about copper. The kids take him down in the mine, at night, to try and discover a mother lode, but older brother "Ben Pepper" (Charles Peck) starts pounding away on the mine wall with his chisel, and the next thing you know there's a cave-in and everyone is trapped.

Just when it looks like they're all gonna suffocate, rescuers break through with an oxygen line. Everyone is saved, and Mr. King is informed that, during the rescue, it was discovered that the mine is indeed full of copper. He isn't bankrupt after all, and in fact is richer than he was before. But does he want his mansion back? No. "I'm gonna stay right here in Gusty Corners" he says, "and maybe build a bigger house because we've got a double family now, but I don't wanna live up on that hill with all of those phonies".

We're two movies in, with two more to go, and the verdict is this is one of the best film series we've ever seen. Two Huge Thumbs Up for The Five Little Peppers with the highest possible recommendation. The whole cast is fantastic, and all of America would like to revert to living in this simpler way, I think, which is why the nostalgia factor for times gone by is skyrocketing. Absolutely do not miss these movies, the picture on both is razor sharp, and we'll do the other two next week.  ////

That's all for now. I'm listening to "Yesterday Meets Today", a new album by Eric Johnson, perhaps his best since "Venus Isle". I just got a Babe Ruth book from the Libe, so that's on deck while I continue to read Elvis. I'm also working on my Charles Ives book in the morning, but only one page at a time. The minutia of breaking down his Concord Sonata, measure by measure, over the course 360 pages, is not easy to sift through. The book is meant for a music theory scholar (which I am not), but I like Charles Ives and I sometimes like reading stuff I don't understand, if only to absorb it. The Elvis book on the other hand is a total kick. Things get really far out when he starts going to the Self-Realization Center in Pacific Palisades, then takes his one and only LSD trip. Elvis on acid! Who knew?

Late night is Wagner as usual. I hope your weekend is off to a good start, and I send you Tons of Love as always.  xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)

William Powell and Kay Francis in "For the Defense", and "Who KIlled Doc Robbin?" with The Curley Gang (a Hal Roach Streamliner)

Last night, we watched an early sound, pre-Code crime flick from Universal, "For the Defense"(1930), starring, William Powell (before he was The Thin Man) and the great Kay Francis. Powell is "William Foster", a defense attorney who not only never loses a case, he specialises in retrials of lost-cause cases where the defendant is thought to have no chance. This is because Foster doesn't miss a trick, and thinks of evidentiary angles the cops and the D.A. always miss. He's cleared five convictions attributed to one detective, who hates his guts and is looking for payback, thinking that Foster is soft on criminals. But Foster points out that the cops send a lot of innocent guys to the pen. "I'm just doing my job" he says. "And it looks like I do it better than you guys". He loves his young girlfriend Kay Francis (we all do) but she wants to get married and he doesn't. "Listen baby, it'll be bad for my career and you won't like it cause I'll never be at home. Lets keep things the way they are." Foster knows though, that Kay has a young pup after her named "Jack DeFoe" (Scott Kolk), and he's a rich kid too. Jack does want to marry her, and she agrees, but asks to break the news to Foster on her own time. "After all, he's done so much for me. I'd be nobody without him." What she was before, or how they met is never specified.

While Jack and Kay are deciding this, they are at a bar, and he gets hammered. William Foster has a drinking problem, too. Kay doesn't like this in either man, and tonight Jack is very drunk, so she decides to drive him home. But on the way, a car is pulled over on the side of the road. Kay is distracted by Jack in the passenger seat and she plows into the driver of the broken down car, who was outside checking his engine. He dies, and a witness is on scene, but he pulled up too late to see who was driving.

Jack doesn't want Kay to go to prison, cause he'll lose her, so he takes the rap when the cops show up. He says he was driving and gets charged with manslaughter. Now things get complicated, because he wants to hire Foster as his attorney, thinking that -  between his family money and Foster's legal reputation - he'll surely be acquitted. This time, however, Foster tells him that's not a likely outcome: "Look son, this is drunk driving, and juries hate rich people." Jack didn't figure on that, but even more, Foster doesn't believe his story that he was out driving by himself at 5 am. He knows Jack's in love with Kay, and he confronts her about it. The kicker is this : if Kay admits she was driving the car, and was out with Jack that night, will a jealous William Foster deliberately tank Jack's case? Man this is one tight script, layered and puzzle-pieced. Kay Francis wants to admit the truth, that she was driving the car, but both Jack and lawyer Foster won't let her. Foster wants to make a deal to preserve his acquittal record, so he bribes a juror........or does he? It's rare to see a plot twist that's purposely left ambiguous. There's also a subtheme involving the sly detective and a jewel thief. It's one of those scripts where a Ton of Stuff is jam packed into 63 minutes. Also, I think Universal Studios jumped out of the pack when sound started, as far as production values went. As for the technology itself, we've encountered sound problems or unusual "tics" in other 1930 movies, like slow and/or paused dialogue, which we've encountered in many films. But in this flick its as modern as today in all aspects. There was a cynical edge to many pre-Code stories that is present here (though I won't say how) and the glamour is emphasized in both the diction and dress of actors Powell and Francis. I don't think you'd see an ending like this in a movie made five or six years later, but again I'll give no hints. Two Big Thumbs Up for "For the Defense". William Powell was one of the great actors of any cinematic age, and Kay Francis (ravishing here in an ultra-short hairdo) was the unsung star who should've been as big as any of her contemporaries. Don't miss them in this movie, the picture is razor sharp.  //// 

The previous night, we had more laughs with the kids from "Curley", in "Who Killed Doc Robbin?"(1948), a Hal Roach Streamliner in which the gang are trying to prove an adult friend innocent of the murder of "Dr. Hugo Robbin" (George Zucco), a local physician. The movie opens in a courtroom, where "'Fix-it' Dan Cameron" (Whitford Kane) is being tried for the crime. Various witnesses are called to testify, but the judge can't keep order because five-year-old "Ardda" (Ardda Lynwood) crawls through the window, followed by the rest of the gang, and interrupts the proceedings to tell all present that Fix-it Dan is innocent. The judge pounds his gavel, but its bangs are overruled by those from a roll of caps, being hammered on the sidewalk outside by "Dis" and "Dat" (Rene Beard and Donald King). Fix-it stays in jail while the trial continues, but the kids overhear evidence about a "trigger mechanism" for a nuclear device that was used as the murder weapon. So, they set out to find it in the ruins of Doc Robbins' mansion, which has been partially destroyed by the blast in which he was killed.

In flashback, we see that Fix-it Dan is more than a handyman. In fact, he's an atomic scientist, working out of a garage lab, who builds his trigger mechanism in a partnership with Doc Robbin, the project's financier. Dan thinks that the trigger, when integrated with it's radiation device, will be going to further the cause of medicine. He makes Doc promise never to use it for nefarious purposes, but because Doc is played by George Zucco, it's like asking the scorpion not to sting the frog. George Zucco can't not do evil. Not only is it in his contract, the world would spin off its axis if he did otherwise. So, Zucco, I mean Doc Robbin, steals the trigger mechanism, but then Ka-Blammo!, there's an explosion in his laboratory and Doc is presumed dead. His glasses are found, Fix-it Dan is blamed, and Curley's kids think "Ann Loring" (Virginia Grey) did it. She was Doc Robbin's nurse. The gang's search for clues causes them to become trapped in Doc's mansion, where they are toyed with by a chimp and terrorised by a killer ape. "Speck" (Dale Belding) the freckled geeky kid does a lot of high-pitched screaming. Dis and Dat fall through a trap door and end up in the mansion's industrial-strength laundry room, where Dat gets trapped in the washer.

Curley, as usual, leads the gang in their search, but its a spooky one, and from the half-hour mark onwards, the film is a haunted house movie. Joe the dog is back too (from last week's "The Fabulous Joe"). Little Ardda Lynwood is cute when she gives the judge a lecture on right and wrong. The only problem is the print, which is dark and quite soft. It's watchable but you've gotta hang in there. The effort is worth it though, because the cast is so lovable, and again, as we say so often, they just don't make movies like this anymore. They should, but they don't. Two Bigs Thumbs Up and a high recommendation for "Who Killed Doc Robbin?" I hope we can find more movies with the Curley gang.  ////

That's all for tonight. As for today's sad news, what can even be said about Queen Elizabeth? She was there for our whole lives. I think the world needed her more than it needs any ridiculous politician of any stripe. She was one of the handful of great leaders in world history, as much for what she didn't do (talk a lot, display a huge ego, make endless proclamations) as what she did do (lead quietly, with unmatched dignity and strength). For someone my age, it's hard to imagine a world without The Queen in it (and when you said The Queen, no one had to say "which Queen?"). My Mom loved her, so did Pearl (she got a kick out of The Queen fixing her own car), and that alone means a lot to me. God Bless Queen Elizabeth, I'm sure we all agree.

My blogging music is "Third" by Soft Machine. That Rams game was a joke that I'm trying hard to forget, my late night music is "Das Rheingold" by Wagner, and I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):) 

Fan Halen in Thousand Oaks, "Terry and the Pirates" (a classic serial) , and "The Sun Sets at Dawn" starring Sally Parr and Patrick Waltz

I don't have a movie for last night - I'm slackin'! - but again I have a reason: I went to see Fan Halen in Thousand Oaks at a free concert in a park. No, you read that right, it's not a typo. Fan Halen is a VH Tribute Band, and a good one. Man, they've got the music down note-for-note (as tribute bands do these days), but even more than that, the singer even sounds like DLR when he's talking. And the guitarist not only plays like Eddie, he plays with EVH's energy and coverage. I looked the guy up when we got back, his name is Derek Fuller, and in a Youtube interview, he says that no one can play exactly like Ed (true), so the best anyone can do is approximate. I don't know if I mentioned watching the clip of Wolfgang at Wembley, but while Wolfie can do Dad on guitar, note for note, he doesn't quite match Dad's voltage the way Derek Fuller does. What really struck me as I was watching Fan Halen, though, was how fortunate I was to see the real thing 18 times. I saw VH very early in their post-club career, at the Santa Monica Civic on New Years Eve 1976 (opening for Sparks). I went with friends that night, and it's interesting that we actually saw them before Ted Templeman did. This is before the record industry was onto them, and Edward wasn't tapping yet, or at least did not do so that night. To bookend my VH concert history, I also saw their next to last show on October 2, 2015 at the Hollywood Bowl, five years before Ed passed away. In the last blog, I mentioned King's X as a band that felt like family. Before them, Van Halen felt like family and still do. I think they feel like that for all fans, and it's apt that the band we saw call themselves Fan Halen. As I wrote in a long ago blog, when you saw Van Halen in concert, they made you feel like you were in Van Halen. That's the best way I can put it. There were several hundred people in the park despite the heat. It was fun and I must say, Thousand Oaks is a very nice community.

As for movies, in addition to our nightly fare, I've been watching a serial called "Terry and the Pirates"(1940). Did I already mention it? It stars William Tracy of "Dodo Doubleday" fame, only he's a kid here, playing a the son of an archaeologist working in the jungles of Africa. Terry is an exuberant boy in safari clothes and a pith helmet; "Gee Willikers" is his favorite exclamation. He and his friend "Pat Ryan" (Jeff York) are searching for Terry's father "Dr. Lee" (John Paul Jones of Led Zeppelin fame), whose team of archaeologists have been kidnapped by a half-caste chieftain named "Fang" (Dick Curtis). They've been seeking an ancient treasure they were planning to take to a museum, but Fang wants it for himself. By threat of torture, he tries to force Dr. Lee to tell him where the treasure is located. The choice of Dick Curtis in the role of Fang is both classic and hilarious because he usually played slit-eyed Western hard guys. Here, he's playing an Asian/African warlord, and the accent he uses - foppish and highly articulated - is one for the ages. His Fang is a bit of a fruitcake.

And Fang has an enemy to fear himself: "The Dragon Lady" (Sheila Darcy), a stunner who matches Fang in ruthlessness if not duplicity. Dragon Lady dishes out Proclamations of Death like candy: "Seize them! Throw them in the hungry volcano!" But she isn't without procedural mercy. So long as you can prove you were doing things by the book - her book - or you have a henchman who will vouch for you, she'll let you off the hook to blame someone else. Sitting on her throne in the Temple of the Dawn, she typifies the Indiana Jonesness of it all, and there's also a tribesman in charge of a crazed, killer ape, which he sets loose to kidnap "Normandie Drake" (Joyce Bryant), Dr. Lee's blonde assistant. For character support, you've got "Big Stoop" (Victor deCamp), a Lurch-like giant in a King Tut hat, and "Connie" (Alan Jung), his Asian sidekick. You've even got Charles King, though he has to play it totally straight as one of Fang's many henchmen. He does get in several of the endless punchouts, however. "Terry and the Pirates" is awesome, I think. It's 4 hours 45 minutes long, 15 episodes, all between 15 and 20 minutes. Watch one or five at a time; heck, binge watch the whole thing if you want, in one go, but you'll never see moviemaking like this again, where make believe meets adventure, with a dash of naivete. It's no wonder Spielberg made the Jones flicks after seeing this stuff as a kid. I'm only four episodes in, but Two Huge Thumbs for "Terry and the Pirates". The picture is very good.  ////

The previous night we watched a capital punishment flick called "The Sun Sets at Dawn"(1950). We've seen a few from that genre in recent months, and "Dawn" was perhaps the most rugged, but it also had the type of supernatural, Miraculous element found in films like "The Enchanted Cottage" and "Portrait of Jennie", where shots of sun rays piercing thunderheads are meant to show God on High, accompanied by Wagnerian music. Think Douglas Sirk on a barrel scraping budget, but with a surprisingly strong cast and script. A young man, wrongly convicted in the murder of a hoodlum, is set to die in the electric chair. His chaplain pays a visit to his cell; the Heroic Warden, a symbol of compassion, allows his long-time girlfriend to sleep in a prison broom closet, so she can be near him in his final hours. The young man maintains his innocence throughout (warden and chaplain believe him), as newsmen set up a war room in a local cafe, where the old-timer owner serves up eggs, ham and coffee. The scribes talk blues streaks around one another while feigning cynicism about the execution. One young writer wonders why "they're going through with it, when everyone knows he's not guilty".

"Look kid", he's told by a veteran, "this mug is a dime a dozen. They kill his like twice a month at this joint. The real reason we're here is the new technology. This is the first execution since the gallows was outlawed; The Chair's the real story. That kid is just the co-star." At the prison, they keep testing The Chair and it doesn't work, presaging the gruesome executions of recent years (and remember the National Enquirer pic of Ted Bundy). There's a gut-wrenching performance from Sally Parr as the condemned man's girlfriend. Boy oh boy, even Meryl Streep couldn't have pulled this off. The close ups on Parr are like real life. The scenes with the padre and the kid are deeply affecting, also. But in the cafe is an old prison trustee, who brings the mail. On the night before the execution, he recognises a customer named "Blackie" (Lee Frederick), who wears a suit and owns a truck company. The mail trustee believes Blackie is actually a former convict, who escaped years ago but is thought dead. It turns out that Blackie really is this guy, and has a record for five murders. Now it's looking like he did the one the kid is set to die for. Lots of time is spent trying to get The Chair up and running. It keeps short circuiting and the electrician can't figure out why. The assistant warden is furious (a subtheme is how execution stress affects prison staff) and he gets so mad at the electrician that he threatens to test The Chair on him! Meanwhile, the girlfriend is collapsing from a broken heart, the condemned boy is stoic, the padre is earnest, and Blackie the hoodlum is sitting in the cafe, about to be called out by the prison mailman.

This is some heavy duty, well-directed-for-a-low-budget stuff. There's an aspect of Lives Converging in a Roadside Cafe, a context we've examined before, most recently when we were doing our Ron Foster mini-marathon last year. To recap, once you set a Roadside Cafe as your location, Lives are going to Converge, and when they do, they will be Varied and Desperate. Soon, they will Entwine, and Existentialism will play out (or Nihilism, take your pick). In this case, the kid gets his execution delayed, because The Chair won't work, but that's all I'm gonna tell you. Keep in mind the God angle. The standout performance by Sally Parr gives the story real weight. Though unknown (even by me), Parr was once featured on the cover of Photoplay with Liz Taylor and Natalie Wood with the caption "Three Actresses to Watch", but unlike the other two, she never made another movie. It's too bad, because she had Oscar level talent. See this film for proof. Two Big Thumbs Up for "The Sun Sets at Dawn". The picture is soft but watchable.  //// 

That's all for tonight. I'm listening to "Two Rainbows Daily" by Hugh Hopper and Alan Gowen. My late night music is "Die Feen" by Richard Wagner, his first opera, tremendous. I hope you had a great holiday weekend, despite the endless heat, and I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)