Last night's movie was "An Old-Fashioned Girl"(1949), adapted from a book by Louisa May Alcott. The story is along the same lines as "Little Women". Gloria Jean plays "Polly Milton", a small town girl about to leave for the big city to start her own life. The year is 1870 and this is unheard of. Young women are expected to stay close to home and get married, but as Polly explains to her parents, times are changing. "I want to paint, to study the arts, and I want to earn my own money by giving vocal lessons." Polly is an accomplished coloratura soprano singer who admires the songs of Stephen Foster (the melody of "Beautiful Dreamer" is heard throughout the movie). Her mother can tolerate Polly's artistic ambitions, but not her desire to work. Women didn't do such things in 1870.
But indeed, times were changing, and Louisa May Alcott wrote abut such women in those times. She was a liberated woman and a member of the cultured Alcott family of Concord, Massachusetts, who were immortalized in the legendary Concord sonata of Charles Ives. 1870 seems so long ago, and yet, my great grandmother was 11 years old in that year. She could've been in this movie, and there is a photo from about 1925, showing her as a very modern 65 year old woman with a haircut and dress sense that would not look out of place today, almost 100 years later. So, as we see, people have been "modern" for a long time. But the modern era really started after the Civil War, and in 1870, women wanted their emancipation, too. We see them wanting to express themselves artistically. When Polly comes to stay in the city, near her friends The Shaws, she impacts their lives and the lives of everyone around them, because she is "good at everything she does". Women had never had the chance to show what they could do, (although there had been exceptions throughout history; women have always had a hand in running the world).
Polly's natural aptitude and confidence shake up the Shaw family, most notably "Frances Shaw" (the stunning Frances Rafferty), a girl so beautiful that she downplays it by putting on an air of superiority. This turns off her young suitors. They're more impressed by Polly, who is pretty as well (though not like Rafferty), but it comes through in her confident nature. She isn't afraid to be herself.
She goes to live at a boarding house similar to The Three Arts Club (where my Mom first lived on her own), where she's among peers. One lengthy scene shows a young virtuoso violinist named Saundra Berkova playing the Mendelssohn concerto. It's a brilliant performance, accentuated by close up shots of her fingers flying over the fingerboard. In an earlier time, it was thought that only men could be virtuosos. Then, when women like Fanny Mendelssohn disproved that notion, it was said they couldn't (or shouldn't) write music. Fanny's brother Felix took credit for writing many of her piano works with the thought that it was the only way for her to get them published. However, at the boarding house, the young female artists are training to compete on an even playing field with men. Polly is booked solid with her vocal lessons, and takes up other causes in her spare time, trying to interest the Shaws in charity work, which they "agree" to participate in because it looks good on their resume. Really they are more interested in maintaining tradition, and Irene Ryan, as the matriarch of the Shaw family, is a riot. As a mother of the arrogant Frances, she's a nervous wreck - always about to get the vapors over one issue or another. She so wants Frances to get married, but despite her outstanding beauty, Frances scares away the men. Polly gets her to see her inner beauty, and to realise that her snobbishness is a defense against being herself. This helps Frances become more down to earth. A young entrepreneur named "Mr. Sydney" (John Hubbard) takes a liking to the "new, improved" Frances. Sydney is ahead of his time, designing ironclad ships and fifteen story buildings. Mr. Shaw calls him a dreamer, and doesn't want him wooing Frances, but within ten years we'd have the ships, the buildings, the telephone, and within 20 years we'd have electric lights.
Have you ever stopped to consider that less than 150 years ago, there were no electric lights? They didn't come into common use until just 70 years before I was born, which is almost the length of my lifetime.
So the world became modernized very recently, and very quickly, and women were right there at the forefront. Polly is ahead of her time in daring to assert herself, yet she goes about it in a natural way, non-confrontationally. She simply declares what she plans to do and then does it. But there's still the age-old tradition of children and family. Will she make room in her busy, independent life for marriage? That's the central question of the movie, which I thought was excellent on all counts. I found it on a Youtube list of Christmas movies, and there is a brief Christmas theme toward the end. Let's give "An Old-Fashioned Girl" Two Huge Thumbs Up and a very high recommendation. It's long, 82 minutes, but it never drags, and the picture is razor sharp. ////
The previous night, we had Ronald Reagan and Spring Byington in "Louisa,"(1950), a crazy comedy about a grandmother who finds true love. Ronnie plays "Hal Norton", an architect who's just been promoted to vice-president of his firm. Byington is his mother "Louisa", who lives with him and his family. To celebrate his promotion, Hal has brought home presents for everyone in the family, but when he hands them out, everyone seems morose. What should be a happy occasion is turning out to be a downer. When Hal asks what's wrong, his wife says "it's your mother". In short, Louisa is a demanding housemate who derides everyone, saving special ire for the parenting efforts of Hal's wife (Ruth Hussey), who has had it up to here. She pleads with Hal to talk to his mother. He does, and suggests that she get out more. "Find a hobby, Ma. Something to get you out of the house." His pep talk makes Louisa feel guilty. She apologises to Mrs. Norton, then promptly joins a Women's Club. On her way there one day, she happens to bump into a man on the street. He's "Mr. Hammond" (Edmund Gwenn), the Norton's grocer. Mr. Hammond is about Louisa's age (65, when 65 year-olds looked 80). He has an English background and is a man of refined taste. He and Louisa have things in common: both are widowed, both are lonely. They hit it off and start seeing each other, with Louisa skipping her Women's Club meetings to meet Mr. Hammond at the park. This isn't what Hal had in mind when he asked him Mom to find a hobby.
Soon, Mr. Hammond asks Louisa to marry him. Hal and his family are taken aback. Why are the old people getting romantic? Why don't they just act their age? A family friend suggests loneliness as the cause. This much is true, but the old folks come alive in love, and soon are making the younger Nortons look like squares. Hal's 17 year old daughter "Cathy" (Piper Laurie) is particularly offended and responds by acting prudish. Louisa tells her to stop being so old-fashioned. Cathy has a boyfriend, "Jimmy" (Scotty Beckett), who's an intellectual snob. He approves of Louisa's engagement, which irritates Hal. "How dare this kid stick his nose in the family business!"
The issue at hand is, do "old people" have "the right" to fall in love? How about those who've been widowed? It freaks families out, because the elderly are not supposed to have such feelings. And again, in this movie, elderly is 65 years old, which was indeed considered old age in 1950. But what happens is that, at Hal's architectural firm, there is a big project coming due that involves the completion of a design for a housing development. Hal's boss "Mr. Burnside" (Charles Coburn) says it must be completed over the weekend. Hal suggests working Saturday and Sunday at his house, and invites Burnside over for dinner, where he meets - and is charmed by - Louisa. Now he wants her, too. Mr. Hammond is also at the dinner, and a rivalry begins. Burnside is rich; Hammond owns one lowly grocery store. Burnside figures he can win Louisa by sheer status. He shows her a grand old time, driving her fast in his car like a teenager. The older folks are acting like they are back in high school, and that's the message we are all learning as we age, that we are indeed the same people we always were.There is no such thing as the aging of the spirit; only the body gets older. So, all of a sudden, the young people are the ones with the hang-ups, they are the conventional fuddy-duddies. Now Louisa has two boyfriends, and they're fighting it out over her. Mr. Burnside even hires a private detective to find out about Mr. Hammond's Liverpool background. It comes back that he's a bigamist!
And from there, the plot twists and turns into a screwball comedy. President Reagan is a great comedian, and after everything America has been through since he was in office, ya gotta love him. The world was a better place in his time. You've gotta love Charles Coburn, too. He's 74 in the movie but has the roguish swagger of his college self. He and Byington go on a whirlwind dating binge and the family is about to lose their marbles. Besides Jimmy, the intellectual high school punk, only the Norton's youngest kid and the family dog think the relationship is cool. They're watching the whole thing like it's a popcorn flick. Two Huge Thumbs Up, then, for "Louisa", an energetic and very funny movie with a legitimate romantic message and realistic sentiment. There's no such thing as "old people", just people in older bodies. We are learning that ourselves, and Neil Peart had an interesting observation that a person finds their "perfect age" (the one they are most comfortable living in), and that is their spiritual age all their adult life. Ronald Reagan is a riot in this movie, having conniption fits trying to keep his family from freaking out about his Mom, while also trying to keep the two older gents from fighting over her. Ronnie is only 39 here, he's very good! The picture is once again razor sharp, and despite their different themes and period settings, the two pictures in tonight's blog would make a great double feature. But if not, make sure you watch 'em one at a time. ////
That's all I know for tonight. My blogging music is "Fresh Cream" by Cream and "Warzawa" by Porcupine Tree, and my late night is Bach's "Mass in B Minor" by the Netherlands Bach Society. Because I won't be writing again until Christmas night, I'll take the opportunity now to wish you a very Merry Christmas. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas Eve tomorrow night, and I send you Tons of Love as always.
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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