Tonight I unwrapped a new dvd set that I bought from Amazon around Christmastime, "The Falcon Mystery Movie Collection Volume 2", featuring six movies with the debonair Tom Conway in the starring role as "The Falcon", a detective with a knack for solving murders while looking and acting suave (hmm, have we seen this type of guy before, by any chance?). :)
I discovered "The Falcon" movie series via an Amazon recommendation. I purchased Volume 2 instead of Volume 1 just because I like Tom Conway, who starred in "Cat People" and a couple of other Val Lewton films. His more famous brother George Sanders was the original "Falcon", from the first movies of the series released in Volume 1. In the words of Ray Davies, "If you covered him in garbage, George Sanders would still have style", but as stylish as he is, his brother may just have the edge. They were a couple of wealthy Russian boys who grew up in England and became big stars in Hollywood. Now that, is Suave, as I'm sure you'll agree.
I didn't know what to expect with the "Falcon" series, I bought it on a whim. Tonight I watched the first movie on disc one, "The Falcon Out West" (1944), which ran about 65 minutes, as do all the films. I think that films of this duration were produced to fill out double features in the 1940s, or possibly as Saturday Matinee Serials. I love short movies, as you know, because I am on a tight shedge-yule. I've got books to read, drawings to attempt, walks to complete, football games to predict, and a 24/7 job.
So I love to find "programmers", as I think they were called (meant to "fill out a program", as it were), that run a little over an hour. Last year's "Mr. Moto" series was a case in point, the best one of this 65 minute type that I've seen so far.
"The Falcon Out West" was a good start to this series. He is heading out west (meaning The Valley) to attend a pre-wedding bash at the ranch of an old cowboy friend who is engaged to a blonde babe half his age. The old cowboy turns up dead at the party (and sumbliminal message rams beat cowboys), and wouldn't you know it, "The Falcon" is there on scene to solve the crime, which he proceeds to do with no hesitation because he's only got 50 minutes left.
You know how these short scripts go, however. They pack a Truckload Of Stuff into a short time frame. I think a lower budget prevented "The Falcon" from being as polished as were the "Moto" films, and it was not nearly as developed a story as are any of "The Thin Man" movies that it clearly emulates. Still, the presence of Tom Conway goes a long way toward making up for any minor shortcomings, and you also have the bombshell Carole Gallagher and a young Barbara Hale to hold your interest. And if those three aren't enough, you've got the endless scenery of Corriganville to look at. Nearly the entire film was shot there. And for a brief moment you even get to see Stoney Point in Chatsworth. The locations in the rural Valley of 1944, before it was massively subdivided, are worth the price of admission alone.
So there you have it, my first "Falcon" movie. You can file it in the "just for fun" category, but it gets two lower case thumbs up anyhow, just because it was indeed a lot of fun, with great Chatsworth footage. //////
We had good singing in church this morning, but we also said farewell to out excellent pianist of the last three years, who - having graduated CSUN with a master's degree - has been hired as a full time instructor at Los Angeles City College. Leon is a fantastic musician. We were lucky to have him, and we'll be fortunate if we find someone even half as good as his replacement. Wow.........
Pats beat Chargers, Saints beat Eagles, which means Rams will meet Saints for the NFC Championship next Sunday. I know the Saints are considered unbeatable, especially after the way they came back against the Eagles today. But I think the Rams are gonna win that game and go to the Super Bowl, where they will play - and defeat! Brady and the Patriots (who will beat the Chiefs next week), in revenge for the stolen Super Bowl from 2001, when Kurt Warner and company had the game locked up.........until the rookie Brady ran his first ever clutch two minute drill to set up the winning field goal. I lived with Mom then, and she could attest......I didn't sleep too well that night.
That Super Bowl against the Rams began the Brady legend, but - if the same two teams play in this SB - the Rams will end it. Brady is closing in on 100 years old. It will be a fitting end to his storied career.
But if the Chiefs end up playing The Saints, I'll probably go to Disneyland. I can't stand those two teams.
Yeah, sports......etc., etc., the usual disclaimer.
Supposed to rain all week but I will try to get in a hike and take some pics before next Friday.
See you in the morning. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo (big love) :):)
Monday, January 14, 2019
Sunday, January 13, 2019
"Song Of The Thin Man" + Rams
Tonight I watched "Song Of The Thin Man" (1947), the sixth and final film in the series starring William Powell and Myrna Loy as classy crime sleuths "Nick and Nora Charles" (a side note : I screwed up and ordered the wrong film from the Libe. I had thought "Song" was the fifth one, and "The Thin Man Goes Home" was the last, but I got it backwards). In any event, the film opens on the water, aboard a luxury casino ship. The first thing you notice about Nick and Nora is how much older they look, thirteen years since the original "Thin Man" was released in 1934. But as the movie progresses, you notice this less and less, and they seem to be as they always were. Whether that is a result of makeup or acclimation on the part of the viewer is unknown, but unquestioned is that once the plot begins to unfurl - which in a "Thin Man" movie is right from the get-go - the audience slips into the company of Nick and Nora as if into a pair of comfortable satin pajamas. They are older, so are you, and.....wait a minute.
You haven't even been born yet. I myself wasn't born for another 13 years after the series ended. But you know what I mean. We love Nick and Nora, they define Hollywood Class and Style of the Golden Era, and as we watch them throughout the series of six films, we become comfortable in their presence, so real are they to us.
So there you have it.
In another aside, there was an article today in the Daily News, a full page review of the life of Wyatt Earp, who died 90 years ago today, in Los Angeles. You know how I have been talking lately about how close in time I suddenly am realizing I am to such "ancient" things as Silent Film, and the birth of radio, or the advent of TV (only a decade before I was born).
Well here is a weird one, because we associate Wyatt Earp with the Wild West, and yet he wound up living out his life in Los Angeles, semi-wealthy and as an advisor to Silent Movies of the Western variety. And he lived until 1929, just 31 years before I was born.
I am amazed at how, at almost 60 years of age, I am feeling myself closer in time to things of the past that seemed like ancient history when I was a kid. When I was little, the Wild West might as well have been from a different eon. Ditto Silent Film. But now we see how close these things are.
And the 80 Million Year Old Rocks out at Santa Susana have been sitting there the whole time.
So all of this stuff makes me pause and contemplate, just for a moment.
I won't get any more philosophical on ya, but the Wyatt Earp article got me started this morning.
As for the movie, it is another successful entry in the "Thin Man" franchise. This time the theme is jazz music. A stylin' combo is playing in the ship's main room, featuring a shredding clarinetist with a strong female following. His popularity with one girl in particular has caused a rift with the bandleader, himself a ladies man with an ego to match. But the bandleader has another more pressing problem. He owes a Ton Of Dough to a sociopathic mobster. A concert promoter is onboard the ship, so the bandleader goes to him for a loan. Soon after that, he winds up dead.
Bring on Nick and Nora, who as usual would rather be partying in high style that solving murders (Nick, anyway, Nora likes crime solving). They, along with co-star dog Asta, and child Nick Jr., played by a ten year old Dean Stockwell (of "Blue Velvet" fame), proceed to jump into the world of jazz to try and solve the killing of "the reedman" (the clarinetist). They have to wade their way through a thick swamp of lingo to begin to formulate some clues. Helping as a hip translator is jazzbo Keenan Wynn, a fellow reedman from the same band, who knows all the players and clientele, and who can talk a blue streak of hepcat phraseology.
The plot in this sequel is one of the best, sticking to the formula of course, but with rapid plot development and lived-in performances by Powell and Loy, who have become the Charles by this point. They are one of the greatest of screen pairings, right up there with Astaire and Rogers, and really surpassing them because of their deft comedic ability.
The only thing I found deficient in "Song Of The Thin Man" was the ending. As noted previously, I always try to guess "whodunit", choosing from the standard number of potential culprits in the "Ten Little Indians" format. I was wrong in my guess this time, but the ending and the "reveal" seemed a little bit too quick, not as thoroughly developed and well written to expose the killer as they usually do.
Still, the too-quick ending was not enough to detract from the film, and as a result I give "Song of The Thin Man" my usual Two Thumbs Up, my standard for the entire series. I mean, you could have William Powell and Myrna Loy just standing there mixing drinks and reciting marital dialogue for 90 minutes and it would be a winner, as long as Asta the dog was running around behind them, and as long as he got in the last word, which he does in every "Thin Man" film. /////
Watch the whole series, every movie is classic.
Man, it was cold today. I wore two sweatshirts and a flannel, but if this keeps up I am gonna switch to three sweatshirts......and a flannel.
Rams beat 'Boys, big time. Tomorrow morn, Chargers will beat Pats, and Saints will beat Philly in the afternoon.
I think Rams are Super Bowl bound. Maybe Chargers, too.
See you tomorrow after church. Thank you for singing.
Tons of love. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
You haven't even been born yet. I myself wasn't born for another 13 years after the series ended. But you know what I mean. We love Nick and Nora, they define Hollywood Class and Style of the Golden Era, and as we watch them throughout the series of six films, we become comfortable in their presence, so real are they to us.
So there you have it.
In another aside, there was an article today in the Daily News, a full page review of the life of Wyatt Earp, who died 90 years ago today, in Los Angeles. You know how I have been talking lately about how close in time I suddenly am realizing I am to such "ancient" things as Silent Film, and the birth of radio, or the advent of TV (only a decade before I was born).
Well here is a weird one, because we associate Wyatt Earp with the Wild West, and yet he wound up living out his life in Los Angeles, semi-wealthy and as an advisor to Silent Movies of the Western variety. And he lived until 1929, just 31 years before I was born.
I am amazed at how, at almost 60 years of age, I am feeling myself closer in time to things of the past that seemed like ancient history when I was a kid. When I was little, the Wild West might as well have been from a different eon. Ditto Silent Film. But now we see how close these things are.
And the 80 Million Year Old Rocks out at Santa Susana have been sitting there the whole time.
So all of this stuff makes me pause and contemplate, just for a moment.
I won't get any more philosophical on ya, but the Wyatt Earp article got me started this morning.
As for the movie, it is another successful entry in the "Thin Man" franchise. This time the theme is jazz music. A stylin' combo is playing in the ship's main room, featuring a shredding clarinetist with a strong female following. His popularity with one girl in particular has caused a rift with the bandleader, himself a ladies man with an ego to match. But the bandleader has another more pressing problem. He owes a Ton Of Dough to a sociopathic mobster. A concert promoter is onboard the ship, so the bandleader goes to him for a loan. Soon after that, he winds up dead.
Bring on Nick and Nora, who as usual would rather be partying in high style that solving murders (Nick, anyway, Nora likes crime solving). They, along with co-star dog Asta, and child Nick Jr., played by a ten year old Dean Stockwell (of "Blue Velvet" fame), proceed to jump into the world of jazz to try and solve the killing of "the reedman" (the clarinetist). They have to wade their way through a thick swamp of lingo to begin to formulate some clues. Helping as a hip translator is jazzbo Keenan Wynn, a fellow reedman from the same band, who knows all the players and clientele, and who can talk a blue streak of hepcat phraseology.
The plot in this sequel is one of the best, sticking to the formula of course, but with rapid plot development and lived-in performances by Powell and Loy, who have become the Charles by this point. They are one of the greatest of screen pairings, right up there with Astaire and Rogers, and really surpassing them because of their deft comedic ability.
The only thing I found deficient in "Song Of The Thin Man" was the ending. As noted previously, I always try to guess "whodunit", choosing from the standard number of potential culprits in the "Ten Little Indians" format. I was wrong in my guess this time, but the ending and the "reveal" seemed a little bit too quick, not as thoroughly developed and well written to expose the killer as they usually do.
Still, the too-quick ending was not enough to detract from the film, and as a result I give "Song of The Thin Man" my usual Two Thumbs Up, my standard for the entire series. I mean, you could have William Powell and Myrna Loy just standing there mixing drinks and reciting marital dialogue for 90 minutes and it would be a winner, as long as Asta the dog was running around behind them, and as long as he got in the last word, which he does in every "Thin Man" film. /////
Watch the whole series, every movie is classic.
Man, it was cold today. I wore two sweatshirts and a flannel, but if this keeps up I am gonna switch to three sweatshirts......and a flannel.
Rams beat 'Boys, big time. Tomorrow morn, Chargers will beat Pats, and Saints will beat Philly in the afternoon.
I think Rams are Super Bowl bound. Maybe Chargers, too.
See you tomorrow after church. Thank you for singing.
Tons of love. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
Saturday, January 12, 2019
"Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea" w/ Robert Duvall + Prismacolors + "The Polka Dot File"
No movie tonight. Instead I watched an episode of "Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea" that guest starred a young Robert Duvall as an Alien who is rescued from the ocean floor when he is discovered by Admiral Richard Basehart and crew amidst the debris of an ancient underwater city. What happens is that the Seaview (the "Voyage" megasubmarine) is cruising along in the deep, when a strong earthquake strikes. The seismic wave roils the sea. The massive sub is tossed around, as are gigantic ocean boulders. An enormous amount of silt is lifted, revealing the gridlike patterns of the lost city. Strewn about are dozens of metallic tubes. Baseheart sends his divers down to retrieve one.
Man, was that ever a huge mistake.
The divers bring the tube back to the Seaview, and of course - owing to the Rules Of Alien Construction - it is made of some unknown alloy that cannot be cut, nor melted. Finally Basehart, a genius engineer as well as an Admiral, gets the idea to deep freeze the tube. This does the trick, they are able to crack the thing open, and out pops an extremely weird-looking, weird-acting, bald headed and no-eared Robert Duvall, one of the last survivors of a 20 Million Year Old Civilization who lived on Earth before the Biblical Flood. He has been ensconced in his metallic coffin for all of that time, in a state of suspended animation.
Admiral Basehart and his Commander David Hedison soon come to regret their decision to free Duvall from his tube, because he is a Nutcase Extraordinaire. He has it in for modern humans, and in the pocket of his silky one piece getup he carries a small electromagnetic weapon of the type that we are now reading about in Tom Bearden books.
Soon he is using his device to zap the Seaview's high voltage communications system, leaving them without the ability to navigate.
I loved this episode, mainly because of Robert Duvall's high pitched and eerily modulated voice, and because he is Robert Duvall playing an Alien. But I had to admit that my credulity was strained at certain points.
I mean, if it was your sub, and you were driving it around on The Bottom Of The Sea, would you stop to pick up a twenty million year old tube with a bald guy inside? And even if you did, would you allow him to walk around the interior of your submarine unsupervised?
That's what Richard Basehart did, and I was surprised at him. For shame, Richard Basehart!
He does redeem himself, though, so don't worry. Duvall gets what's coming to him (in a big way), and they leave that tube-strewn ancient undersea wasteland for good......and they never look back, as you undoubtedly would refrain from doing yourself, in your own submarine. ///
Tomorrow night I will be back with a movie, probably another "Thin Man" sequel. I actually had some unwatched dvds on hand at home, but I wanted some time this evening to start a new drawing, because I just received in the mail yesterday a set of colored pencils I was eager to try out. They are Prismacolors, a 48 pencil set, and Elizabeth, I remembered that brand from several years ago when you mentioned you had used them for your own drawings. I finally bought some for myself, and on first try tonight - just doodling - I really like their saturation and ease of use. Nice creamy colors, not dry like ordinary colored pencils. Tomorrow night I will begin my first new drawing of 2019, and I will also watch a movie.
I am reading a new book, too : "The Polka Dot File" by Fernando Faura, who was a newspaper reporter on scene during the immediate aftermath of the Bobby Kennedy assassination. In the circumstances he found himself in during the chaos, he specifically wound up, as a reporter, searching and tracking down leads for the infamous "Girl In The Polka Dot Dress", who was seen with Sirhan prior to the assassination and also in the company of a major witness named John Fahey, who Faura interviewed extensively in June 1968 as he tried to ferret out the truth of what had taken place on the night of June 4th.
Fernando Faura, a graduate of CSUN when it was still SFVSC, has written an on-the-spot book of the type I hope to eventually publish myself about 1989, a detailed, blow by blow, moment to moment eyewitness account of the investigation that he was not only a part of, but that he initiated, using informants that had not yet been stifled by the police.
Man, what a book. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
See you in the morning. Colts over Chiefs, Rams over Cowboys. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
Man, was that ever a huge mistake.
The divers bring the tube back to the Seaview, and of course - owing to the Rules Of Alien Construction - it is made of some unknown alloy that cannot be cut, nor melted. Finally Basehart, a genius engineer as well as an Admiral, gets the idea to deep freeze the tube. This does the trick, they are able to crack the thing open, and out pops an extremely weird-looking, weird-acting, bald headed and no-eared Robert Duvall, one of the last survivors of a 20 Million Year Old Civilization who lived on Earth before the Biblical Flood. He has been ensconced in his metallic coffin for all of that time, in a state of suspended animation.
Admiral Basehart and his Commander David Hedison soon come to regret their decision to free Duvall from his tube, because he is a Nutcase Extraordinaire. He has it in for modern humans, and in the pocket of his silky one piece getup he carries a small electromagnetic weapon of the type that we are now reading about in Tom Bearden books.
Soon he is using his device to zap the Seaview's high voltage communications system, leaving them without the ability to navigate.
I loved this episode, mainly because of Robert Duvall's high pitched and eerily modulated voice, and because he is Robert Duvall playing an Alien. But I had to admit that my credulity was strained at certain points.
I mean, if it was your sub, and you were driving it around on The Bottom Of The Sea, would you stop to pick up a twenty million year old tube with a bald guy inside? And even if you did, would you allow him to walk around the interior of your submarine unsupervised?
That's what Richard Basehart did, and I was surprised at him. For shame, Richard Basehart!
He does redeem himself, though, so don't worry. Duvall gets what's coming to him (in a big way), and they leave that tube-strewn ancient undersea wasteland for good......and they never look back, as you undoubtedly would refrain from doing yourself, in your own submarine. ///
Tomorrow night I will be back with a movie, probably another "Thin Man" sequel. I actually had some unwatched dvds on hand at home, but I wanted some time this evening to start a new drawing, because I just received in the mail yesterday a set of colored pencils I was eager to try out. They are Prismacolors, a 48 pencil set, and Elizabeth, I remembered that brand from several years ago when you mentioned you had used them for your own drawings. I finally bought some for myself, and on first try tonight - just doodling - I really like their saturation and ease of use. Nice creamy colors, not dry like ordinary colored pencils. Tomorrow night I will begin my first new drawing of 2019, and I will also watch a movie.
I am reading a new book, too : "The Polka Dot File" by Fernando Faura, who was a newspaper reporter on scene during the immediate aftermath of the Bobby Kennedy assassination. In the circumstances he found himself in during the chaos, he specifically wound up, as a reporter, searching and tracking down leads for the infamous "Girl In The Polka Dot Dress", who was seen with Sirhan prior to the assassination and also in the company of a major witness named John Fahey, who Faura interviewed extensively in June 1968 as he tried to ferret out the truth of what had taken place on the night of June 4th.
Fernando Faura, a graduate of CSUN when it was still SFVSC, has written an on-the-spot book of the type I hope to eventually publish myself about 1989, a detailed, blow by blow, moment to moment eyewitness account of the investigation that he was not only a part of, but that he initiated, using informants that had not yet been stifled by the police.
Man, what a book. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
See you in the morning. Colts over Chiefs, Rams over Cowboys. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
Friday, January 11, 2019
Clifton Webb in "Dreamboat" + Aliso
Tonight's movie was another Clifton Webb comedy, "Dreamboat" (1952), discovered in my recent search for Webb movies in the Library database. The last time we saw him (about a week ago), he was playing a Guardian Angel in "For Heaven's Sake". This time, he is an erudite English Professor at an exclusive college somewhere in the Eastern US. He lives with his 21 year old daughter (Anne Francis), who idolises him for his sophistication and his dedication to a non-frivolous life. She is a young, female version of her Dad : smart, well dressed and dead serious.
She attends her Dad's college, and one night - as the movie opens - her student friends invite her to a party. The invitation is a set up, though, because her friends only want to see her reaction to a show that is being aired on a newfangled television set. Yep, TV was a new thing only a decade before I was born. Heck, movies were still Silent a mere 31 years before. Holy Smokes! It makes me realize how fast technology has developed in the past century. I mean, good grief! - radio was brand new just 100 years ago....
So Anne Francis goes to this party only to discover that her student friends intended to put her on the spot when they showed her a new TV program that features a former Silent Film star hosting broadcasts of her old movies, sponsored by maker of cheap perfumes. Here you get a taste of what television was like in the early days, with commercials performed live in-studio. The plot was kind of neat on a personal basis for me too, because when my Dad first came to Hollywood in 1953, his first job was as a buyer for ABC Channel 7. He was supposed to find packages of films that would fill air time, because there were not enough TV shows in those days to do so. A TV schedule back then was made up of old movies, live boxing matches that came in super fuzzy, and the handful of early shows that were commercially produced with high production values like "I Love Lucy". The plot of "Dreamboat" shows this emergence of TV just as it was, an upstart technological medium that was a threat to the movies. The motion picture industry in return belittled "the Idiot Box", as it was called. Another personal anecdote is that my Dad, who was working as a junior executive in TV as early as 1953, called it The Idiot Box himself! Dad hated TV so much that he put the family television set in our garage for many years when my sisters were little.
By the time I was born, the TV was back in the house and I was allowed to watch to my heart's content. I grew up on early 60s television and loved all of the shows, so Dad must have had a change of heart.
At any rate, all of this attitude is depicted in the movie. Clifton Webb, the college professor, has been discovered by his students (who pass it on to his daughter, as described), that he was once a famous Silent Film Star. The students have mocking revenge in mind against their serious and stern teacher. Now, through the miracle of TV, they have discovered his secret : that in a former life he was a pompous movie star, and a Ham Actor at that.
He is threatened with termination by the college board, but is then saved by the president of the college (Elsa Lanchester, aka "The Bride Of Frankenstein"), who is not so secretly in love with him, in his movie persona. Now that she knows who he is, or was, she will not leave him alone.
Poor Webb is now besieged on every front. He feels he must go to New York to file an injunction against the woman who owns the rights to his old movies, and who is also the host of the tv program.
She is Ginger Rogers, so you know she has a lot of charm at her disposal, and she uses every bit of it against Clifton Webb to get him to drop his lawsuit. As she and her lawyer wine and dine him in New York - and as his daughter begins to loosen up after some time spent in the big city - Webb is reminded of just how big a Star he once was : second in Box Office popularity only to a "police dog" (likely Rin Tin Tin). He slowly begins to take pride in his former career.....but he still hates the way his movies are portrayed on this new thing called television.
And therein is the story of this 83 minute feature, which as noted has a lot to say about the crudity of the upstart tv industry at that time (which Dad concurred with, even though he worked in the medium, haha).
The cheesiness of "box office" Silent Film is also skewered, but Webb points out that there is a difference. In the movies, there are no commercials (at least at that time, lol). But in TV, the show is secondary to the ads....
I didn't see it that way myself when I was five years old. I just loved all the shows and the characters. To me, the ads must have just seemed part of the whole experience.
Now, of course, it's a whole different story.
Two Thumbs Up for "Dreamboat", then, because you can always count on Clifton Webb to deliver a strong comic performance, and in the movies I've seen him in, he is always surrounded by a strong supporting cast, as with Anne Francis and Ginger Rogers here, and Jeffery Hunter in a smaller role.
Mostly, though, Two Thumbs Up because these comedies are light and tight. They move their stories forward with verve and witty scripts that allow a personality like Webb to do his thing, and they quick edit the physical comedy and banter so that things never lag.
These are pros who know what works in a film, which is again what made Old Hollywood so great. ///
In other news, I went for my first hike of the year today at Aliso Canyon. Hooray! I hadn't been out there in the wild since my December 23 hike at Santa Susana, a span of 18 days. That length of time between hikes is unacceptable, and so I am setting a goal of 100 Hikes Minimum for 2019. A lot of them might be local jobs, like Aliso, Santa Su or O'Melveny. But I will also try to get out to Santa Clarita and Simi Valley at times, perhaps when temperatures reach into the triple digits in the Summer, which is not too far off.
i can't wait to take some pictures, and get back into shape also. All of this will take some time, given my work hours these days, but I will do it, and I will reach 100 Hikes.
See you in the morning. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
She attends her Dad's college, and one night - as the movie opens - her student friends invite her to a party. The invitation is a set up, though, because her friends only want to see her reaction to a show that is being aired on a newfangled television set. Yep, TV was a new thing only a decade before I was born. Heck, movies were still Silent a mere 31 years before. Holy Smokes! It makes me realize how fast technology has developed in the past century. I mean, good grief! - radio was brand new just 100 years ago....
So Anne Francis goes to this party only to discover that her student friends intended to put her on the spot when they showed her a new TV program that features a former Silent Film star hosting broadcasts of her old movies, sponsored by maker of cheap perfumes. Here you get a taste of what television was like in the early days, with commercials performed live in-studio. The plot was kind of neat on a personal basis for me too, because when my Dad first came to Hollywood in 1953, his first job was as a buyer for ABC Channel 7. He was supposed to find packages of films that would fill air time, because there were not enough TV shows in those days to do so. A TV schedule back then was made up of old movies, live boxing matches that came in super fuzzy, and the handful of early shows that were commercially produced with high production values like "I Love Lucy". The plot of "Dreamboat" shows this emergence of TV just as it was, an upstart technological medium that was a threat to the movies. The motion picture industry in return belittled "the Idiot Box", as it was called. Another personal anecdote is that my Dad, who was working as a junior executive in TV as early as 1953, called it The Idiot Box himself! Dad hated TV so much that he put the family television set in our garage for many years when my sisters were little.
By the time I was born, the TV was back in the house and I was allowed to watch to my heart's content. I grew up on early 60s television and loved all of the shows, so Dad must have had a change of heart.
At any rate, all of this attitude is depicted in the movie. Clifton Webb, the college professor, has been discovered by his students (who pass it on to his daughter, as described), that he was once a famous Silent Film Star. The students have mocking revenge in mind against their serious and stern teacher. Now, through the miracle of TV, they have discovered his secret : that in a former life he was a pompous movie star, and a Ham Actor at that.
He is threatened with termination by the college board, but is then saved by the president of the college (Elsa Lanchester, aka "The Bride Of Frankenstein"), who is not so secretly in love with him, in his movie persona. Now that she knows who he is, or was, she will not leave him alone.
Poor Webb is now besieged on every front. He feels he must go to New York to file an injunction against the woman who owns the rights to his old movies, and who is also the host of the tv program.
She is Ginger Rogers, so you know she has a lot of charm at her disposal, and she uses every bit of it against Clifton Webb to get him to drop his lawsuit. As she and her lawyer wine and dine him in New York - and as his daughter begins to loosen up after some time spent in the big city - Webb is reminded of just how big a Star he once was : second in Box Office popularity only to a "police dog" (likely Rin Tin Tin). He slowly begins to take pride in his former career.....but he still hates the way his movies are portrayed on this new thing called television.
And therein is the story of this 83 minute feature, which as noted has a lot to say about the crudity of the upstart tv industry at that time (which Dad concurred with, even though he worked in the medium, haha).
The cheesiness of "box office" Silent Film is also skewered, but Webb points out that there is a difference. In the movies, there are no commercials (at least at that time, lol). But in TV, the show is secondary to the ads....
I didn't see it that way myself when I was five years old. I just loved all the shows and the characters. To me, the ads must have just seemed part of the whole experience.
Now, of course, it's a whole different story.
Two Thumbs Up for "Dreamboat", then, because you can always count on Clifton Webb to deliver a strong comic performance, and in the movies I've seen him in, he is always surrounded by a strong supporting cast, as with Anne Francis and Ginger Rogers here, and Jeffery Hunter in a smaller role.
Mostly, though, Two Thumbs Up because these comedies are light and tight. They move their stories forward with verve and witty scripts that allow a personality like Webb to do his thing, and they quick edit the physical comedy and banter so that things never lag.
These are pros who know what works in a film, which is again what made Old Hollywood so great. ///
In other news, I went for my first hike of the year today at Aliso Canyon. Hooray! I hadn't been out there in the wild since my December 23 hike at Santa Susana, a span of 18 days. That length of time between hikes is unacceptable, and so I am setting a goal of 100 Hikes Minimum for 2019. A lot of them might be local jobs, like Aliso, Santa Su or O'Melveny. But I will also try to get out to Santa Clarita and Simi Valley at times, perhaps when temperatures reach into the triple digits in the Summer, which is not too far off.
i can't wait to take some pictures, and get back into shape also. All of this will take some time, given my work hours these days, but I will do it, and I will reach 100 Hikes.
See you in the morning. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
Thursday, January 10, 2019
More Bogey in "The Great O'Malley"
Stop the presses! I know I said last night that, with the screening of "Across The Pacific", I had come to the end of my Humphrey Bogart marathon, but I spoke too soon. Consider this a retraction. Today I went to the Libe to pick up some newly arrived dvds that I'd put on hold, and one of them was a movie called "The Great O'Malley" (1937). I had reserved this title several weeks ago, before Christmas, and in the length of time it took to acquire it, I had forgotten what it was about or who the leads were.
It stars Pat O'Brien, an actor famous in the 30s for playing mostly "good guy" roles associated with authority; Irish priests and cops were his specialty. He was known as "Hollywood's resident Irishman" and he came across as authentic because of a slight accent, though he was actually from Milwaukee.
Here, he is "O'Malley" of the title role, a cop in New York who is a stickler for rules and regulations, so much so that he has the city ordinance book memorized. He is an officious police officer who cites the citizens and shopkeepers on his beat for any infraction he can find them in violation of : a store awning that hangs too far over the sidewalk; a junkman who has too many bells on his truck. The citizens who encounter O'Malley can't stand him, and actually, neither can his precinct captain, played by the great character actor Donald Crisp. Captain Crisp dresses O'Malley down, tells him that his trivial and daily citations are hurting the working folks in the area. The film takes place in the deep dark middle of The Depression, when a man was lucky to even have a job, and here is Officer O'Malley, ticketing folks for laws that were written over a century ago, equivalent to spitting on the sidewalk. The cityfolk are poor enough as it is. They haven't enough money to put food on their tables let alone pay expensive police fines.
Enter Humphrey Bogart, who does not star in the film but has the pivotal supporting role. He plays a man down on his luck, driving an old jalopy through O'Malley's sector on his way to a new job he has tenuously secured. His car has a broken muffler. It is loud, and as Bogart stops for a red light, the hard-line O'Malley notices the noise. He orders Bogey to pull over and cites him for the muffler, and while doing so he also delivers a lecture on the importance of obeying the law. Bogart asks him to please write the ticket and be quick; he doesn't want to be late for his new job. He is fortunate to have gotten hired at a time when so many men are out of work. But to Officer O'Malley, the law is more important, and so is his lecture. He is the epitome of the sanctimonious cop. Everyone hates him, even the other cops and the police chief (who is looking for a reason to fire him).
Well, so Bogey is indeed late for his new job - by only five minutes - because of the time taken by O'Malley in writing the muffler ticket. The factory boss doesn't want to hear an excuse. Bogey is fired on the spot.
Now we see the real time consequences of O'Malley's actions. Bogart has a family but is broke. He needed that job but now has to drive to the local pawn shop with just his Army medals to offer for sale, and a pistol. The pawnbroker offers him three bucks for the lot.
At this point the plot is launched, and I shall not divulge much more. However, because of a plot development, Police Chief Crisp is now so disgusted with O'Malley that he demotes him to working as a crossing guard for elementary school children. At first O'Malley is peeved. He thinks he has been doing a great job. But surprisingly, the movie turns as he takes to the children whose safety he is now in charge of. One little girl takes a shine to him in return, and she becomes the motivating force for O'Malley to turn his life around. Here we have a similarity to the Scrooge Story. O'Malley has been a heartless prick, going by the book, regardless of the effect his actions have on real people. But this little girl, a pupil at the school, can see something good in him. She has a gimpy leg (ala Tiny Tim), and this disability brings out the latent humanity in the seemingly uncompassionate officer.
The girl is played by the child actress Sybil Jason, whom I had never heard of before tonight, but she is a gem, on par with the likes of Shirley Temple and Margaret O'Brien. She turns the entire movie around, with help from the screenwriter of course, as she keeps after Officer O'Malley to keep his promises, to visit her at school and to attend her school play. Now with a child to look after he is realizing his human feelings.....
But there is something about this child he isn't at first aware of.
"The Great O'Malley" runs only 71 minutes, yet the script tells a story twice that length. Pat O'Brien is the star throughout, it is his movie, and he is so great as he undergoes his emotional transformation that you want to stand up and cheer. This is a Depression-era feel good film, and it has the required heart to uplift audiences in need of a boost. Little Sybil Jason alone raises the height of the story. Pat O'Brien turns it around toward a positive ending, and Humphrey Bogart.........
Well, I cannot tell you what he does.
"The Great O'Malley" is a story of the need for compassion in the law, where it concerns ordinary citizens. The writers make a critique of overzealous police work where the matter at hand is trivial.
It is a Depression-era tale about the importance of families, and how difficult it was at the time to hold a family together.
Directed by the great William Dieterle, a studio legend who also made "Portrait Of Jenny" (one of my favorite movies of all time), and "A Midsummer Night's Dream", a theatrical masterpiece reviewed last August. Dieterle made several other great movies and specialised in stories about the way in which belief, love and kindness came together to create a magical ending for his protagonists.
Though short in duration for the story it wants to tell, "The Great O'Malley" gets it message out.
At the end I found myself thinking "20 stars"!, but I'll cut it to 10, just to be realistic.
I loved this movie, and now I have to look for more with Pat O'Brien.
Ten Stars, Two Gigantic Thumbs Up for "The Great O'Malley", which does in fact end my Bogey marathon for the time being.
See you in the morning. Much love until then. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
It stars Pat O'Brien, an actor famous in the 30s for playing mostly "good guy" roles associated with authority; Irish priests and cops were his specialty. He was known as "Hollywood's resident Irishman" and he came across as authentic because of a slight accent, though he was actually from Milwaukee.
Here, he is "O'Malley" of the title role, a cop in New York who is a stickler for rules and regulations, so much so that he has the city ordinance book memorized. He is an officious police officer who cites the citizens and shopkeepers on his beat for any infraction he can find them in violation of : a store awning that hangs too far over the sidewalk; a junkman who has too many bells on his truck. The citizens who encounter O'Malley can't stand him, and actually, neither can his precinct captain, played by the great character actor Donald Crisp. Captain Crisp dresses O'Malley down, tells him that his trivial and daily citations are hurting the working folks in the area. The film takes place in the deep dark middle of The Depression, when a man was lucky to even have a job, and here is Officer O'Malley, ticketing folks for laws that were written over a century ago, equivalent to spitting on the sidewalk. The cityfolk are poor enough as it is. They haven't enough money to put food on their tables let alone pay expensive police fines.
Enter Humphrey Bogart, who does not star in the film but has the pivotal supporting role. He plays a man down on his luck, driving an old jalopy through O'Malley's sector on his way to a new job he has tenuously secured. His car has a broken muffler. It is loud, and as Bogart stops for a red light, the hard-line O'Malley notices the noise. He orders Bogey to pull over and cites him for the muffler, and while doing so he also delivers a lecture on the importance of obeying the law. Bogart asks him to please write the ticket and be quick; he doesn't want to be late for his new job. He is fortunate to have gotten hired at a time when so many men are out of work. But to Officer O'Malley, the law is more important, and so is his lecture. He is the epitome of the sanctimonious cop. Everyone hates him, even the other cops and the police chief (who is looking for a reason to fire him).
Well, so Bogey is indeed late for his new job - by only five minutes - because of the time taken by O'Malley in writing the muffler ticket. The factory boss doesn't want to hear an excuse. Bogey is fired on the spot.
Now we see the real time consequences of O'Malley's actions. Bogart has a family but is broke. He needed that job but now has to drive to the local pawn shop with just his Army medals to offer for sale, and a pistol. The pawnbroker offers him three bucks for the lot.
At this point the plot is launched, and I shall not divulge much more. However, because of a plot development, Police Chief Crisp is now so disgusted with O'Malley that he demotes him to working as a crossing guard for elementary school children. At first O'Malley is peeved. He thinks he has been doing a great job. But surprisingly, the movie turns as he takes to the children whose safety he is now in charge of. One little girl takes a shine to him in return, and she becomes the motivating force for O'Malley to turn his life around. Here we have a similarity to the Scrooge Story. O'Malley has been a heartless prick, going by the book, regardless of the effect his actions have on real people. But this little girl, a pupil at the school, can see something good in him. She has a gimpy leg (ala Tiny Tim), and this disability brings out the latent humanity in the seemingly uncompassionate officer.
The girl is played by the child actress Sybil Jason, whom I had never heard of before tonight, but she is a gem, on par with the likes of Shirley Temple and Margaret O'Brien. She turns the entire movie around, with help from the screenwriter of course, as she keeps after Officer O'Malley to keep his promises, to visit her at school and to attend her school play. Now with a child to look after he is realizing his human feelings.....
But there is something about this child he isn't at first aware of.
"The Great O'Malley" runs only 71 minutes, yet the script tells a story twice that length. Pat O'Brien is the star throughout, it is his movie, and he is so great as he undergoes his emotional transformation that you want to stand up and cheer. This is a Depression-era feel good film, and it has the required heart to uplift audiences in need of a boost. Little Sybil Jason alone raises the height of the story. Pat O'Brien turns it around toward a positive ending, and Humphrey Bogart.........
Well, I cannot tell you what he does.
"The Great O'Malley" is a story of the need for compassion in the law, where it concerns ordinary citizens. The writers make a critique of overzealous police work where the matter at hand is trivial.
It is a Depression-era tale about the importance of families, and how difficult it was at the time to hold a family together.
Directed by the great William Dieterle, a studio legend who also made "Portrait Of Jenny" (one of my favorite movies of all time), and "A Midsummer Night's Dream", a theatrical masterpiece reviewed last August. Dieterle made several other great movies and specialised in stories about the way in which belief, love and kindness came together to create a magical ending for his protagonists.
Though short in duration for the story it wants to tell, "The Great O'Malley" gets it message out.
At the end I found myself thinking "20 stars"!, but I'll cut it to 10, just to be realistic.
I loved this movie, and now I have to look for more with Pat O'Brien.
Ten Stars, Two Gigantic Thumbs Up for "The Great O'Malley", which does in fact end my Bogey marathon for the time being.
See you in the morning. Much love until then. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
Wednesday, January 9, 2019
'Across The Pacific", starring Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor and Sydney Greenstreet
Tonight I finished my Humphrey Bogart mini-marathon (six movies in twelve days) with a film called "Across The Pacific" (1942), directed by John Huston and co-starring Mary Astor and our favorite Bogey movie villain, Sydney Greenstreet. Because we had recently watched and reviewed Bogart in "Action In The North Atlantic", I allowed myself to expect more WW2 naval adventure in "Pacific" due to the similarly themed title. Same war, different ocean. But while "Across The Pacific" does take place in the WW2 timeframe, beginning in the weeks leading up to Pearl Harbor, it is not a war film per se, but a wartime spy movie, an espionage thriller.
As the movie begins, Humphrey has just been drummed out of the Army. In the military, you don't get kicked out, you get drummed out, which is a little more formal. We see the end of the court proceedings against him. He is dishonorably discharged, though the reason is not presented. Later it will turn up that there may have been a deception taking place behind this dismissal.
After packing his bags, he heads up to Canada to try and enlist with their corps. He has top qualifications as an artillery expert, but the Canadians (them again...) have knowledge of his American discharge and want nothing to do with him. So, feeling no loyalty to the United States, he signs up to sail for the Philippines on a small cargo boat. He just wants to get paid and is willing to be a mercenary.
On the boat, he meets fellow passenger Mary Astor, herself a carefree Canadian - or so she says. A romance quickly ensues, kindled by Motion Picture Society approved banter. You know the kind, where the male and female leads pretend to detest one another but twenty minutes later wind up in The Clinch (you know.....the famous wraparound kissing pose of 1940s movies).
The story develops slowly and the first 35 minutes or so are devoted to the shipboard meanderings of Bogart and Astor. But soon enough, Sydney Greenstreet enters the picture. He claims to be a professor of economics at a Manila university. He says that, really, he is devoted to Japanese culture, but being that he is Sydney F. Greenstreet, and that he is always looking to get "one-up" on you, you really can't trust a thing he says.
In addition to Bogart, Astor and Greenstreet - each of whom may not be who they say they are - there are several Japanese nationals on board the ship. Some are from the ship's crew and trustworthy, but one young man is a slick talker with a California accent. He calls himself a Nisei, a second generation Japanese with American values. He speaks in hipster lingo and inserts himself in Bogart's business, albeit slyly. He pretends to be a friend.
So here you have all of these character types on board a ship bound for the Philippines on December 6, 1941. Paramount for Bogey is his romance with Mary Astor. He is smitten with her, but.......
It turns out he is a spy. Now he is in the Philippines meeting with a handler, and he is wondering if Astor is who she claims. He already knows that Sydney Greenstreet has been BS-ing him. I can't tell you how; it would be a major spoiler, but c'mon.....it's Sydney Greenstreet.
I mean, just having a name like that makes you a person of intrigue. How in the world could a person have such a name? Perhaps you can tell me. One thing is for sure, though. The name and the man match up. One look at Greenstreet and one listen to his voice will convince you, though in your subconscious you already knew this to be true.
"Across The Pacific" is different than I thought it would be, more of a witty, dialogue based Spy Caper than a WW2 combat film, with a focus on romance and a backstory of treason and conspiracy. The first hour is light and breezy, and the treachery is not exposed until the final twenty minutes.
The tension is always present, however, mostly because of the Nisei Japanese man, who may not be as jovial as he seems....
My initial thought was not to give it Two Thumbs Up, just because I was expecting a full on war film and I got a John Huston character based international intrigue flick instead. overloaded with snappy dialogue. But overall, it was too doggone good to be stingy about, due mainly to the chemistry between Bogart, Mary Astor, Greenstreet, and the slick Japanese/Americano, and in lesser part because of Huston's competent direction.
So "Across The Pacific" gets Two Thumbs, mostly because the cast was so good.
I will keep looking for more Humphrey Bogart movies, but for now that was all I had.
He is the absolute best, as I am sure you will agree. /////
Super chilly tonight, I've got my Two Sweatshirts on, with t-shirt underneath. The other night I added a Gortex longsleeve to the above, for four layers, and then I added a Pendleton flannel for my walk, to make it five.
I hope you had a good day and I will see you in the morning. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
As the movie begins, Humphrey has just been drummed out of the Army. In the military, you don't get kicked out, you get drummed out, which is a little more formal. We see the end of the court proceedings against him. He is dishonorably discharged, though the reason is not presented. Later it will turn up that there may have been a deception taking place behind this dismissal.
After packing his bags, he heads up to Canada to try and enlist with their corps. He has top qualifications as an artillery expert, but the Canadians (them again...) have knowledge of his American discharge and want nothing to do with him. So, feeling no loyalty to the United States, he signs up to sail for the Philippines on a small cargo boat. He just wants to get paid and is willing to be a mercenary.
On the boat, he meets fellow passenger Mary Astor, herself a carefree Canadian - or so she says. A romance quickly ensues, kindled by Motion Picture Society approved banter. You know the kind, where the male and female leads pretend to detest one another but twenty minutes later wind up in The Clinch (you know.....the famous wraparound kissing pose of 1940s movies).
The story develops slowly and the first 35 minutes or so are devoted to the shipboard meanderings of Bogart and Astor. But soon enough, Sydney Greenstreet enters the picture. He claims to be a professor of economics at a Manila university. He says that, really, he is devoted to Japanese culture, but being that he is Sydney F. Greenstreet, and that he is always looking to get "one-up" on you, you really can't trust a thing he says.
In addition to Bogart, Astor and Greenstreet - each of whom may not be who they say they are - there are several Japanese nationals on board the ship. Some are from the ship's crew and trustworthy, but one young man is a slick talker with a California accent. He calls himself a Nisei, a second generation Japanese with American values. He speaks in hipster lingo and inserts himself in Bogart's business, albeit slyly. He pretends to be a friend.
So here you have all of these character types on board a ship bound for the Philippines on December 6, 1941. Paramount for Bogey is his romance with Mary Astor. He is smitten with her, but.......
It turns out he is a spy. Now he is in the Philippines meeting with a handler, and he is wondering if Astor is who she claims. He already knows that Sydney Greenstreet has been BS-ing him. I can't tell you how; it would be a major spoiler, but c'mon.....it's Sydney Greenstreet.
I mean, just having a name like that makes you a person of intrigue. How in the world could a person have such a name? Perhaps you can tell me. One thing is for sure, though. The name and the man match up. One look at Greenstreet and one listen to his voice will convince you, though in your subconscious you already knew this to be true.
"Across The Pacific" is different than I thought it would be, more of a witty, dialogue based Spy Caper than a WW2 combat film, with a focus on romance and a backstory of treason and conspiracy. The first hour is light and breezy, and the treachery is not exposed until the final twenty minutes.
The tension is always present, however, mostly because of the Nisei Japanese man, who may not be as jovial as he seems....
My initial thought was not to give it Two Thumbs Up, just because I was expecting a full on war film and I got a John Huston character based international intrigue flick instead. overloaded with snappy dialogue. But overall, it was too doggone good to be stingy about, due mainly to the chemistry between Bogart, Mary Astor, Greenstreet, and the slick Japanese/Americano, and in lesser part because of Huston's competent direction.
So "Across The Pacific" gets Two Thumbs, mostly because the cast was so good.
I will keep looking for more Humphrey Bogart movies, but for now that was all I had.
He is the absolute best, as I am sure you will agree. /////
Super chilly tonight, I've got my Two Sweatshirts on, with t-shirt underneath. The other night I added a Gortex longsleeve to the above, for four layers, and then I added a Pendleton flannel for my walk, to make it five.
I hope you had a good day and I will see you in the morning. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
Tuesday, January 8, 2019
Bogey In "The Two Mrs. Carrolls", with Barbara Stanwyck
Tonight I was back with Bogey again, in "The Two Mrs. Carrolls" (1947), a psychological thriller also starring Northridge's own Barbara Stanwyck as one of the "Mrs." in question. This was a weird one! The movie opens on a riverbank in the Scottish countryside. Humphrey Bogart, an artist, is there on vacation with his fiancee Stanwyck. They sit near the river. He is sketching her portrait and also has a fishing pole nearby with it's line in the water. Bogey and Barbara are in love, they talk as he draws, all is well and very Scottish (pronounced Sskietissh!). The exclamation point is part of the pronunciation. I know it's not as rigorous as you are used to from me, but please understand that it's doggone difficult to even understand a word of Scottish, let alone translate it, so the above will have to do. Just make sure you use the exclamation point and you should be good to go.
Okay, so Bogart and Stanwyck are there by the river. Suddenly, stormclouds gather overhead. It begins to rain and rain hard. Bogey and Babs hightail it for the nearest cave, following hard to understand directions provided by the local Skitsman.
In the shelter of the cave, Bogart gives Stanwyck his coat for she is wet and cold. The rain lets up a minute later, so he heads back to the river to retrieve his fishing pole and art supplies.
That's when Barbara Stanwyck happens to find a letter in the pocket of Humphrey's coat, addressed to "Mrs. Geoffrey Carroll". Humphrey has been lying to Barbara, his fiancee. He is already married.
She is temporarily devastated, but she marries him anyway, because - you see - Bogart's wife has suddenly died shortly after his return home from Scotland. Home is in England. Bogey is an expat American, his deceased wife was English. And now we cut to a few months in the future, and all is well again. Bogart and Stanwyck are now married. She is the second "Mrs. Carroll".
It isn't long, though, before cracks begin to appear in the new marriage. Third parties present themselves in the form of a "Mr. Pennington", Stanwyck's former fiance who comes round to visit. He is still in love with her and she seems to have a small flame burning for him, too. Bogey notices this, and so when "Penny"'s wealthy friends come calling at a dinner party - a society woman and her statuesque daughter (Alexis Smith) - he first pretends to ignore them, which is a sure sign that he is attracted to the tall, cool Smith, who is using her charms on him. She straight up hits on Bogart the first night at the party. Then her mother offers him a generous sum to paint Smith's portrait.
Wife Barbara Stanwyck naively ignores all of this, but in her heart she knows. And she has Penny to fall back on.
But suddenly Barbara takes ill. She has been feeling weak, unable to get out of bed. Her doctor tells her it's "just nerves".
But conversations with Bogart's precocious 12 year old daughter (from his first marriage) begin to reveal some curious details as to how the first Mrs. Carroll died. And if all of this weren't enough, there is now a suspicious man lurking in the mix, who keeps calling the Carrolls at odd times, insisting to talk with Humphrey.
And Alexis Smith is not about to leave him alone. Ruing a marriage is right up her alley.
Bogey is in a big time jam, and all he wants to do is paint. But the walls, and the women, are closing in.
Okay, so this is me again. That's the end of my review. We have been on a Humphrey Bogart marathon of moderate length, and we've seen him play a sea captain, a District Attorney, a newspaper editor, and tonight - a psycho.
He is always Humphrey Bogart beneath the role, but this one really stretched him, and I think it is the best role I have seen him play, because at certain points it was really sinister and very, very creepy.
With Bogart I always say "watch his eyes". I mean, like all great movie stars he generally gives the same delivery no matter the movie, but his eyes reveal his talent. And in "The Two Mrs. Carrolls" he genuinely inhabited the character. There are a couple of scenes near the end where......
Well, I mustn't tell you. It wouldn't be the Scottish thing to do.
What's the deal with Scotland, anyway? How come we never hear anything about them? Are they like Canada, and not a real country? I don't think that's quite accurate. I mean, it is accurate in the case of Canada, but didn't Scotland once have their own.....hmmm, what did they have?
Well I don't know. I suppose I should study it and I shall perhaps make an attempt to do so if my interest is maintained. It does seem that at some point, a lot of Scottish people moved to Canada, maybe back in the 19th Century. So there you have it, at least for tonight, a Canadian/Scotch mashup, two countries that may or may not be real, joining as one.
I jest of course, so please don't pound me, you Canadians and Scottish people. If we were speaking in person my intent would be clear, but on the internet, the humor 'tis different.
Just make sure to use your exclamation point and I will see you in the morning. oxoxoxoxoxo :):)
Okay, so Bogart and Stanwyck are there by the river. Suddenly, stormclouds gather overhead. It begins to rain and rain hard. Bogey and Babs hightail it for the nearest cave, following hard to understand directions provided by the local Skitsman.
In the shelter of the cave, Bogart gives Stanwyck his coat for she is wet and cold. The rain lets up a minute later, so he heads back to the river to retrieve his fishing pole and art supplies.
That's when Barbara Stanwyck happens to find a letter in the pocket of Humphrey's coat, addressed to "Mrs. Geoffrey Carroll". Humphrey has been lying to Barbara, his fiancee. He is already married.
She is temporarily devastated, but she marries him anyway, because - you see - Bogart's wife has suddenly died shortly after his return home from Scotland. Home is in England. Bogey is an expat American, his deceased wife was English. And now we cut to a few months in the future, and all is well again. Bogart and Stanwyck are now married. She is the second "Mrs. Carroll".
It isn't long, though, before cracks begin to appear in the new marriage. Third parties present themselves in the form of a "Mr. Pennington", Stanwyck's former fiance who comes round to visit. He is still in love with her and she seems to have a small flame burning for him, too. Bogey notices this, and so when "Penny"'s wealthy friends come calling at a dinner party - a society woman and her statuesque daughter (Alexis Smith) - he first pretends to ignore them, which is a sure sign that he is attracted to the tall, cool Smith, who is using her charms on him. She straight up hits on Bogart the first night at the party. Then her mother offers him a generous sum to paint Smith's portrait.
Wife Barbara Stanwyck naively ignores all of this, but in her heart she knows. And she has Penny to fall back on.
But suddenly Barbara takes ill. She has been feeling weak, unable to get out of bed. Her doctor tells her it's "just nerves".
But conversations with Bogart's precocious 12 year old daughter (from his first marriage) begin to reveal some curious details as to how the first Mrs. Carroll died. And if all of this weren't enough, there is now a suspicious man lurking in the mix, who keeps calling the Carrolls at odd times, insisting to talk with Humphrey.
And Alexis Smith is not about to leave him alone. Ruing a marriage is right up her alley.
Bogey is in a big time jam, and all he wants to do is paint. But the walls, and the women, are closing in.
Okay, so this is me again. That's the end of my review. We have been on a Humphrey Bogart marathon of moderate length, and we've seen him play a sea captain, a District Attorney, a newspaper editor, and tonight - a psycho.
He is always Humphrey Bogart beneath the role, but this one really stretched him, and I think it is the best role I have seen him play, because at certain points it was really sinister and very, very creepy.
With Bogart I always say "watch his eyes". I mean, like all great movie stars he generally gives the same delivery no matter the movie, but his eyes reveal his talent. And in "The Two Mrs. Carrolls" he genuinely inhabited the character. There are a couple of scenes near the end where......
Well, I mustn't tell you. It wouldn't be the Scottish thing to do.
What's the deal with Scotland, anyway? How come we never hear anything about them? Are they like Canada, and not a real country? I don't think that's quite accurate. I mean, it is accurate in the case of Canada, but didn't Scotland once have their own.....hmmm, what did they have?
Well I don't know. I suppose I should study it and I shall perhaps make an attempt to do so if my interest is maintained. It does seem that at some point, a lot of Scottish people moved to Canada, maybe back in the 19th Century. So there you have it, at least for tonight, a Canadian/Scotch mashup, two countries that may or may not be real, joining as one.
I jest of course, so please don't pound me, you Canadians and Scottish people. If we were speaking in person my intent would be clear, but on the internet, the humor 'tis different.
Just make sure to use your exclamation point and I will see you in the morning. oxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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