Warren Hull and Isabel Jewell in "Desert Escape", and "Should a Girl Marry?" starring Warren Hull and Anne Nagel (plus The Nice)

We're on a mini-Warren Hull kick lately, he being the handsome chap who co-starred with Anne Nagel in our last two films. Tonight he's got top billing in a prison break movie called "Desert Escape"(1940), in which he plays "Bill Carver", a convict with two more months on his sentence who is nevertheless forced to escape with a gang of convicted bank robbers. The prison must be pretty lax, because three of the gang walk into a storage room where their leader "Mallon" (Paul Bryan) and Bill are taking a cigarette break. The three are dressed in suits and carrying packages like they just returned from an afternoon of shopping. I guess the guards are asleep and they left the cells unlocked. We don't even see the escape, but that's okay because it's a Sam Newfield flick and he's gotta save time (and money) by keeping the running time close to one hour (66 mins). But the boys have made their breakout, and we see Bill alone in the desert, walking and walking. He seems to know his way out of there, and he has an unexplained bedroll. I guess he must've taken it from the joint.

He sleeps under the desert stars, and awakens to a frightful howling sound. As the sun is coming up, he sees a pack of wolves keeping vigil on the hillside. They know he's alone and are waiting to strike. Somehow, they resemble German Shepherds, haha, so it must be a canine actors union thing, playing a different ethnic group, like Boris Karloff playing Mr. Wong. Luckily for Bill Carver, one of the "wolves" really is a German Shepherd, who somehow found himself tagging along with the pack. But by nature he's man's best friend, so when the "wolves" stalk Bill that morning, he rebels and fights them off. Bill is grateful and takes the dog on as a sidekick, naming him "Wolf." Now they are traveling buddies, and they make their way to Tempe, Arizona. While strolling down a sidewalk, they randomly bump into "Linda Harkness" (Isabel Jewell), who is walking her small dog Hercules. He and Wolf become instant pals, and Wolf follows Hercules as he breaks leash and runs back home, close by, to have a bite of dog food for lunch, which he shares with his new buddy Wolf.

All of this is a romantic bonding exercise for the humans, Linda and Bill. Because their dogs have buddied up, they will fall in love, and they do, after having lunch themselves at her house. She offers Bill a job as her Dad's assistant, mowing the lawn, running errands. Dad is the town doctor, and all the locals like the new guy Bill "Grey" (as he calls himself), because they love Linda and have been waiting for her to find a boyfriend. You know how small towns are; everyone fixates on the pretty lass. The trouble for Bill - a genuinely nice guy - is that he doesn't want any attention. He's a prison escapee, for cryin' out loud. When the Shurff (i.e. Sheriff) sees him on the schtreet and calls him over, he's nervous as heck. But it's no big deal. The Shurff just tells him he needs to get Wolf a dog licence.

However, in the Shurff's office, Bill notices a wanted poster...for himself! Lordy Moses. And the Shurff keeps saying, "I could swear I've seen you somewhere before."

At a town picnic, Bill becomes a hero when he rescues a girl from the lake. He saves her from drowning and makes the front page of the paper. That's when the Shurff realises he's the guy in the wanted poster. He calls Bill in again, and Bill cops to the truth: "yes, I escaped, but I was forced to. And I didn't shoot that bank guard, and I was also tricked into driving for Mallon's gang." The Shurff (pronouced ala Gabby Johnson) believes him, but still has to turn him in. "I'll give you 24 hours to go see Linda and explain it to her. Then you've gotta come back here and surrender." Bill agrees to those terms, but has a plan. With Wolf the dog assisting him, he sends a message to Linda, telling her to meet him on the Tempe highway with her car. Then he locates and tracks the Mallon gang in the desert. Recall that they were his fellow escapees. He tricks Mallon into thinking he's still on their side. "I was always gonna catch up with you guys." He also tells Mallon he knows a way to the Mexican border, so Mallon takes him on, but Bill's actual plan is to lead the gang back to the highway, where Linda and the cops will await. Then, Mallon and the gang will be sent back to prison and Bill will have proved his innocence. "Desert Escape" is one of the better Sam Newfield movies, with actual location shooting in Tempe. That's big budget stuff for Newfield. His Western regulars Al St. John and Budd Buster both make appearances. Two Big Thumbs Up, then, and a high recommendation. The movie is also known as "Marked Men", so keep that in mind when searching it. The picture is razor sharp.  //// 

The previous night, Anne Nagel was back, this time in a crime film called "Should a Girl Marry?"(1939). Given the title, I thought it was another comedy. Also, she was teamed with Warren Hull again, though she didn't have as much to do as she did in "A Bride for Henry". Here, Nagle is "Margaret Wilson", who lives with her kind older parents. She's engaged to "Dr. Robert Benson" (Hull), a brilliant up-and-coming surgeon at a prestigious hospital. The movie opens in a woman's prison, where "Betty Gilbert" (Mayo Methot) is about to be paroled. Before she leaves, she visits a friend in the infirmary, an inmate named "Mary Winters" (Helen Brown). Winters was on Death Row, but now she's very ill and will soon die a natural death. She reveals to Betty, her only friend in prison, that she had a daughter she gave up for adoption. The daughter was born in the prison, but the secret can never be told because it would ruin her life. "Look out for her if you can. I've seen in the newspaper that she's getting married." Mary gives Betty some news clippings she's saved on her daughter's impending marriage. "But never tell her about me."

Betty takes the clippings with her as she leaves prison and goes to the apartment of her husband "Harry" (Weldon Heyburn), a small-time crook who has no intention of going straight. Betty wants to do just that; she's had enough of prison life. They argue, and the clippings fall out of her pocket. "What're these?" Harry asks. When she won't tell him, he does some research on his own. Then he finds out who Margaret Wilson is, and he goes to her house to blackmail her adoptive parents. He threatens to tell Margaret's doctor fiance that her mother was a convict and she was born in prison. In 1939, that would be a scandal that would derail the doctor's promising career. After chiseling a few thousand bucks out of "Mr. Wilson" (Gordon Hart), Harry tries to force Wilson to mortgage his house for even bigger money. But then Harry is injured in a car accident, and lo and behold, it is Dr. Robert Benson who is called to operate on him, the very object of his blackmail!

Now then: Dr. Benson is in a subplot of his own, and it's a major one. At the hospital, Benson is up for a promotion to become Chief of Surgery. But a long-time surgical staffer is jealous and feels he should get the nod. So, when Benson operates on Betty's husband - Harry the blackmailer - and Harry dies due to extensive injuries, the jealous older doctor then tries to blackmail Dr. Benson! "You let him die on purpose because he was blackmailing you. he knew your fiancee's secret!" Now there's a double blackmail plot going on, and all because the town would be shocked if they found out Margaret was born in prison. For her part, Margaret couldn't care less what anyone thinks. When her parents tell her she was adopted, and that her birth mother was a criminal, she says "You two are my parents." They all wish the birth mother well, though she's going to die soon. But what to do about all these blackmailers? Harry Gilbert is now dead, but the jealous surgeon is blackmailing Dr. Benson, threatening to expose his "motive" for "botching" Harry's surgery. But Benson didn't botch it, deliberately or otherwise. Harry would have died anyway, his injuries were too severe. Betty Gilbert feels guilty about all the trouble Harry caused, so she visits the jealous surgeon, to ask him to back off. "Dr. Benson has suffered enough, and so has Margaret". The surgeon has robbed her of her newspaper clippings and is threatening to expose the prison secret, so she pulls a gun, they struggle, and he gets shot in the head. Now he faces brain surgery, with the slimmest chance to survive. Well, who should be his surgeon, but Dr. Benson, the very guy he was blackmailing because he wanted Benson's promotion. Benson, taking the noble high road, operates on the surgeon. But does he save his life? You'll have to discover that part. I've told you enough as it is.

As for Anne Nagel, though the movie is about her character "Margaret", she has only half the screen time of the male stars, and half as much as she did in "Bride for Henry." She's still very good, but for the first 35 minutes, Harry the blackmailer is the star. Then Dr. Benson. The movie gets Two Big Thumbs Up, however, for an excellent, jam-packed script. The picture is very good.  ////

That's the whole shootin' match for tonight. Have you noticed that David Lynch has stopped doing his daily Weather Reports? It took me a few days to realize. Then, during the week before Christmas, I went, "what happened to David Lynch?" I checked his Youtube channel, and his last report was December 16th. It was a couple days after Angelo Badalamenti died, so maybe that had something to do with it. He also stopped "Today's Number", so you won't be able to Swirl the Numbers anymore, unless he starts it up again. I've been watching the Weather Report most days since the beginning of the pandemic (ditto the numbers) so I'm gonna miss DL if he doesn't come back. His videos were a substitute for his lack of recent movies.

My blogging music tonight is two albums from The Nice: "Five Bridges" and "Ars Longa Vita Brevis". Confession: I had never heard "Five Bridges". Tonight was the first time. You may not have heard it either, but H.O.L.Y. S.M.O.K.E......it's like the long-lost ELP album. Man, is it great, especially the orchestral Five Bridges Suite, which Keith scored and also added some jazz inflections. He's all over this record, and his Hammond playing is as good as it ever was with Emerson, Lake and Palmer. That's also true of the "Ars Longa" album, which I hadn't heard in eons, but now I need to buy both. Go back and listen to 'em. I had no idea The Nice were this great.

My late night music is the "Belshazzar" oratorio by Handel. I hope your New Year is going well. Can you believe it's January 4th already? (here it comes, oh no........) : Man, the year is just flying by.

I'm supposed to make that joke on January 2nd. Sorry for the delay. I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)  

Anne Nagel in "A Bride for Henry", and "Night People" starring Gregory Peck and Broderick Crawford

Last night we discovered a fantastic comedic actress named Anne Nagel. Have you heard  of her? Looking at her credits on IMDB, we've seen her in a few movies over the years, but never in a starring role. Anyhow, she was so great in "A Bride for Henry"(1937), that I'm surprised she wasn't a major star. She's hilarious as "Sheila Curtis", a socialite who's been stood up on her wedding day by her nitwit fiance "Eric" (Henry Mollison), who chose that morning to go to a movie. Because the press are going to be covering the wedding (they follow Sheila's every move), she needs a groom to go through with it. She can't be seen as being left at the altar; it would be humiliating.

But by now it's the last minute. What to do? Thinking quickly, she calls her lawyer, "Henry Tuttle" (Warren Hull). "Henry, get over here!" When he arrives, she tells him what she needs. "What?!" He's flabbergasted. Then she explains that the marriage will only be temporary. "Until I find Eric and give him what for." Sheila and Tuttle go through with the "replacement" marriage, and the press follows them back to their honeymoon suite. Soon after they arrive, her fiance shows up. He's found out she married another man and is ready to fight him. "But Eric, you went to the movies!" "Yes," agrees Tuttle "and what kind of man goes to a movie in the morning anyway?" Let alone on the morning he's getting married. But behind his pompous exterior, Eric is kind of a numbskull. Sheila diffuses the situation by telling Eric that the marriage to Tuttle was only for show, to placate the press and avoid bad publicity. "We're going to get a divorce tomorrow. Then I can marry you. That is, if you stay away from the movie theater." Tuttle then departs, saying "I've done my job. I'll leave you two lovebirds to yourselves."

Sheila and Eric leave their hotel room and are accosted by reporters snapping pictures. "That isn't the man we saw her marry!" says one. To escape, they steal two nearby bicycles and ride off into the woods. But Eric is a clumsy rider. They crash in some scrub brush and are discovered by a man and his two daughters. "I'll thank you to give those bikes back" says the man. 

Now they have to walk back to their hotel. On the way, they trespass over a farmer's pasture, ending up penned with his cows. A cop arrests them and they wind up in jail. Meanwhile, Henry Tuttle (who's secretly in love with Sheila), has remained at the same hotel, and has taken up with a blonde bombshell (Claudia Dell) with the intent to make Sheila jealous. He's betting she likes him more than the doofus Eric. The whole screwball show is a showcase for Anne Nagel, who has a 1980s look and comedic sensibility, with the voice, hairdo and body language of an SNL comedienne. I was wondering, "why wasn't this woman huge?", and then I read her IMDB bio, and.........her life was tragic. It's a shame, because you'd never guess it from her performance. Two Big Thumbs Up for "A Bride for Henry", a perfect movie to start the year. The picture is very good.  //// 

The previous night, on New Year's Eve, we had a Technicolor widescreen spy film called "Night People"(1954), starring Gruggery Puck as "Col. Steve Van Dyke", an MP officer stationed in Berlin during the Allied occupation. He's got a problem on his hands, because bad guys from the Russian sector are sneaking over and kidnapping soldiers. No one knows exactly who they are. Are they mobsters? Independent criminals? Or perhaps Nazis who've so far escaped capture? As the movie opens, they nab an American corporal who's out for a date with his German girlfriend.  

Back home in the good ol' USA, "Charles Leatherby" (Broderick Crawford) gets the news while playing golf. "Your son's been been abducted". Leatherby's a big-time corporate honcho who names Senators among his friends. He hops on a plane and flies straight to Germany to get his boy back. He's gonna do it his way and call the shots, because he thinks the Army are a bunch of idiots while he's a self made millionaire. He goes over there and demands to see Gregory Peck, assuming Peck will receive him with all due honor and respect. He's stunned when Peck shines him on. After a lengthy meeting in which Peck cuts Leatherby down to size, he lifts him up again because Peck knows he's just scared for his son. Leatherby then becomes an observer, mostly, as Peck and his team, which includes German informers, tries to get his boy back. The Brittney Griner trade is pertinent here, because that is what the Germans (or is it the Russians?) want: a trade. In exchange for Corporal Leatherby, they want a married couple - a middle-aged cabaret pianist and her elderly husband. Peck can't understand why until he talks to his female German go-between, who tells him that during the war, the couple were double agents abetting the English.

The go-between is an absinthe drinker, which will lead to complications later on. The important point midway through, is that when Broderick Crawford learns what will happen to the couple if they are traded for his son, and sent to the Russian sector (where the Nazi kidnappers are hiding), he backs off and asks to stop the trade. "I think we should let Johnny work it out for himself", he says of his son. "Even is it takes him a few years to get free, it'll save that couples' lives." Indeed, the old man has already been tortured during the war. Peck describes it to Crawford in graphic detail.

Two things must be noted here. First of all, Gregory Peck is one of the greatest actors of all time. Secondly, screenwriter Nunnally Johnson invented Aaron Sorkin. Watch this movie and see. The espionage confusion combined with idiosyncratic, bantering characters, and minor attempts at humor. You can't handle the truth, Aaron Sorkin! Nunnally Johnson invented you.

Man, we've talked about some convoluted plots lately. This one takes the cake, but you just have to go with it. Peck knows whats going on, but you and Broderick Crawford do not. Buddy Ebsen is Peck's assistant, tagging along for the ride. He's constantly sneaking off to a barracks office to listen to the World Series on the radium. He's got money on the Yankees. Is it Sorkin enough for you yet?

It's a really good movie that would like to be great, but the best part is Peck's performance. The absinthe stuff is overplayed. We get it already: it's cool to mention absinthe, because no one knows exactly what it is, though everyone will say they do, because it sounds hip. So forget the absinthe, already. It would've been better if Johnson concentrated as much on the kidnap as he does on the rescue, but this is the guy who wrote "Three Faces of Eve" and "The Grapes of Wrath" (among others), so maybe this was an afterthought script. Still, Two Huge Thumbs Up based on Peck's performance, but we could've done without the full-length confusion. The picture is dvd quality.  ////

And that's all I know for tonight. My blogging music is "The Thoughts of Emerlist Davjack" by The Nice. Some of it sounds like early Pink Floyd. My late night is Handel's "Joshua" oratorio. I know we were gonna do a Top Ten for last year's movies, but - like all of us tonight - I'm distracted by Damar Hamlin's injury. We'll get to the list in our next blog. I send you Tons of Love, as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)     

Rudolfo Acosta in "The Tijuana Story", and "Roses are Red" starring Don Castle and Joe Sawyer (Happy New Year!)

Last night's movie was "The Tijuana Story", a you-are-there crime drama, complete with Jackwebbian narration, in which a brave newspaperman goes up against a local TJ mobster to expose drug trafficking and corruption in the border city. The narrator informs us that Tijuana means "Aunt Jane", and we're off to the races. Rudolfo Acosta of "High Chaparral" fame plays "Manuel Acosta Mesa", an incendiary columnist who writes accusatory screeds against "Peron Diaz" (Paul Newlan), the silent partner/owner of a nightclub nominally run by ex-jazz pianist "Eddie March" (Robert McQueeny). Eddie is only fronting for Diaz, who operates behind the scenes, and he doesn't like it in TJ. He's an American who's only there because his piano career went nowhere. But now his wife is pregnant, and he needs the money. He also can't quit on Diaz without risking his life. The club is a money laundering cover for Diaz's narcotics business; young American kids drive down there on weekends to buy marijuana and goofballs.

The ante is upped when Diaz has his men beat up one of Acosta Mesa's news colleagues. The guy dies, and now Acosta Mesa (pronounced like Costa Mesa, California) is no longer content with just accusing Diaz and The Syndicate, he's out to put them in prison. But the Syndicate extends way beyond Diaz and his nightclub. It has ties in the Mexican government and threads it's way up into Los Angeles (pron. Lowss Ang-less). Marijuana joints, known as "sticks", are a prime source of income for The Syndicate, and they don't appreciate Acosta Mesa's crusade. 

Then a young American boy (James Darren) drives down to TJ for a lark. He meets and falls in love with Acosta Mesa's assistant, a pretty, young good girl he meets on the street. But Darren gets hoodwinked in a bar by a savvy older prostitute. Soon, he's mixed up in buying and smoking pot, and the next we see him, he's running into the ocean to get away from the Mexican police. He drowns after hitting his head on the rocks.

After that, Acosta Mesa runs a column calling Diaz a "vulture". Eddie Marsh finally decides he's had enough also, after Diaz bribes a prison guard to let a hitman out of the slammer for 24 hours, to do away with Acosta Mesa once and for all. Eddie didn't know what he was in for when he signed on to be Diaz's nightclub boss, and now he's caught in the middle of a Mexican drug war and murdalization. He tries to go to the cops, to inform on Diaz, but Diaz has eyes and ears on every street corner. Acosta Mesa is set up to be assassinated, and I can't tell you what happens, but his son Robert Blake (doing a perfect Spanish accent) is in line to succeed him at the newspaper, regardless.

This is one ruthless crime story, similar in theme to "Traffic" and shot on location in Tijuana. On a side note, actor Robert McQueeny later became a Catholic priest and led the Padre Pio Foundation. Padre Pio was a miracle worker and healer who was canonized by the church in 2002. Read up on him, he's pretty far out. Two Huge Thumbs Up for "The Tijuana Story". The picture is widescreen and razor sharp.  ////

The previous night, our pal Don Castle was back in a dual role in "Roses are Red", a Noir featuring crooked cops, crooked lawyers, and crooked mobsters. There aren't many people in this flick who aren't crooks, and only DA "Robert Thorne" (Castle) can name 'em all without a scorecard. The movie opens with the murder of a woman found dead in her apartment. Police lieutenant "Rocky Wall" (Joe Sawyer) investigates, then goes straight to wheelchair-bound Mafia boss "Jim Locke" (Edward Keane), in whose pocket he resides, to report on a surprising discovery: a photograph was found in the dead woman's purse, of DA Thorne himself! Locke wants to know: "What's a dead floozy doing attached to our straight-laced DA?" "I have no idea," Lt. Wall replies, "but it's good blackmail bait. We can use it."

As a well-connected cop, Lieutenant Wall knows there's a convict named "Don Carney" (also Castle), who's just about up for parole. He looks exactly like DA Thorne, and because Wall and boss Locke are now in a position to blackmail the DA, Wall approaches Carney in prison.

Meanwhile, early on, one of Locke's henchmen (Douglas Fowley) is upset. He feels he's been hung out to dry for a murder rap and is threatening to talk to DA Thorne. Locke has him rubbed out (a rare early exit for Fowley), and the low-level hoodlum who does the killing is then also abandoned by Locke and sent to prison. Lieutenant Wall tells Don Carney that Locke wants to use him as a double for Thorne, so they can get the loser henchman out of the slammer and prevent him from talking. The plot gets very convoluted here, and it takes a while to sort things out, but once they kidnap the DA, and replace him with Carney the convict, the situation starts to become clear. Only their girlfriends can tell Thorne and Carney apart, and after Thorne is kidnapped by Locke's henchmen, the two lookalikes are confined together, with Carney the ex-con studying Thorne the captive DA, memorizing his history and mannerisms to impersonate him. 

Jeff Chandler (Pete Best) appears midway through, to stage a car accident in which Thorne is badly injured. But then he recovers in the hospital, and recruits a team of investigators, one of whom is a young James Arness, who - at 6'9" - is taller than Chandler! Man, did you know Arness was 6'9"? I didn't. Anyhow, he is one gigantic son-of-a-bee. He out-bigs Chandler (which isn't easy to do), and intimidates him into surrendering. Then, Thorne puts his plan into action, which is to make the mobsters and crooked cop Wall think he's convict Carney, still doing his impersonation. The impersonation plot is super convoluted, but it resolves during the last twenty minutes of the film. This is the best part, when everything comes together and only the girlfriends know who is whom. You might remember Joe Sawyer as the overbearing Army Sergeant in the "Private Doubleday" films we saw and enjoyed last Spring. We observed at the time that Sawyer was a talented comedian and that he was a core member of the Pasadena Playhouse. He shows his versatility here, as a sociopathic detective who thinks nothing about shooting a DA in the back. Two Big Thumbs Up for "Roses are Red", the picture is very good.  ////

Since this is the last blog of 2022, we need to do a year-end review. 60 minute Westerns were without doubt the biggest thing that happened. We discovered Tim McCoy, Tom Tyler, Johnny Mack Brown, and Buster Crabbe, to name a few of our new favorite cowboy stars. Charles King is definitely our Actor of the Year (and probably of all-time). Can you believe we saw 387 movies this year? Yep, I just looked at my list and counted 'em. Some days we watched more than one. We saw some cool franchises, like The Five Little Peppers (who we loved), and The East Side Kids (ditto) and Nancy Drew and Boston Blackie (double ditto). Man, this is the most movies we've ever seen in one year. I'll look over my list again for the next blog and we'll mention some more and do a Top Ten. 

And that's all I know for now. My blogging music tonight is "Beck, Bogert & Apache Live", my late night is various Handel choral music. I'm excited about 2023 and I hope you are too. Happy New Year!

I send you Tons of Love, as always.  xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)

Tom Tully, John Gavin and Sylvia Sidney in "Behind the High Wall", and "Tough to Handle" starring Frankie Darro (plus Clapton was God)

Last night's movie was "Behind the High Wall"(1956), a prison-break drama starring Tom Tully as a morally compromised warden. He doesn't start out that way. In fact, as the movie opens, he's closer to being the Saintly Warden of prison film prototype, arguing before a state board for better treatment of his convicts. His reasoning is sound: that better treatment not only leads to less recidivism but saves the state money in the bargain. The board disagrees, and Tully, weary of fighting losing battles, is ready to resign from his job. He goes home that afternoon to commiserate with his wheelchair-bound wife (Sylvia Sydney), and as they're having lunch, he gets a call that there's trouble at the prison. He leaves immediately and when he gets there, a massive brawl is taking place in the mess hall. But it's all a distraction for what's really afoot; a plot by four lifers to kidnap Warden Tully and use him as a hostage for their breakout.

With the warden in a prearranged getaway car, the convicts then change vehicles at an auto shop off the highway. The switch is preplanned also, with a mechanic from the shop doing the driving in a company truck. As the hours pass, the owner of the garage calls the cops to alert them to his missing vehicle and driver, and the state police put out an all points bulletin. A motorcycle officer sees the truck pass, he gives chase, and the convicts shoot him dead. But as this happens, their driver - the auto shop mechanic (John Gavin, later the US Ambassador to Mexico) - loses control of the truck and it rolls down a hillside, killing three of the four escaped convicts and ejecting the warden and the fourth con, in addition to himself. Gavin is knocked unconcho. The warden is groggy but alive. He sees the fourth convict trying to run away up a mountainside and shoots him. The guy falls, and as he tumbles, the suitcase he was carrying opens and a boatload of cash falls out.

In his dazed state, the warden makes a decision that will alter his life. Because all the escaped convicts are now dead, and the only other survivor of the crash - the mechanic/getaway driver - is knocked out, Warden Tully decides to gather up the cash and bury it, with the idea of returning later to take it home. When he and the Gavin are rescued, Gavin ends up on trial as the driver of the getaway truck. Warden Tully is called as a witness, but provides no help, pro or con. "I don't remember much of anything due to the accident" he tells the court. Gavin has no evidence to prove he was forced into helping the convicts, and because the motorcycle cop was killed in the act of the getaway, he goes down for the death penalty as the only surviving member of the escape crew.

Gavin will soon be sitting in the gas chamber. The only man who can prove his innocence, if he is innocent, is Warden Tully, who is now compromised because of his misguided decision to hide and steal the stolen cash the prisoners escaped with. Tully explains to his wife that its a no-brainer to take the money. "It's untraceable; we need it cause I'm losing my job, and from now on I won't have to work in the prison system anymore, with all those short-sighted board members always threatening my job." His wife, paraplegic from an auto accident, begs him to turn the money in. "It's wrong to keep it. And what will happen to me if you're caught and sent to prison?"

As to the social aspects of the script, this is an Abner Biberman film, so you've gotta have moral dilemmas, it was in his contract. If a script has anything to do with unions or prisoners, Biberman's your director. He was very good, though (a good actor too), and here he has the warden so tangled up in burying and recovering the stolen money that his wife is completely traumatised, because Tully is willing to let John Gavin die in the gas chamber even though he knows Gavin's innocent. Trying to prove Gavin's innocence is his girlfriend Betty Lynn, the daughter of the auto shop owner, who gives her five thousand dollars to hire a high-powered appeal lawyer. They need new evidence to get Gavin a new trial, and in their search, they'll discover Warden Tully's secret. I wasn't happy with the ending, but the movie still gets Two Huge Thumbs Up. In addition to the stolen money theme, there's a major subplot involving another lifer who makes a separate escape. With nothing to lose, he wants the money, too, and that's all I can tell you. It's 85 minutes long but very involving and the picture is widescreen and razor sharp.  //// 

Now then: do you remember Frankie Darro? We saw him in "Irish Luck", sometime last Summer, right around the time we were discovering The East Side Kids. We said Darro reminded us of Leo Gorcey (or maybe it was the reverse). Both are feisty and short in stature. Darro worked a lot with Mantan Moreland, and I think we mentioned they were the first interracial "buddy team". The previous night, Frankie was back, in "Tough to Handle"(1937) as "Mike Sanford", a sidewalk newsboy whose grandfather buys a winning lottery ticket worth sixteen thousand clamatos. The problem is that it may not be legitimate. In the newspaper, a woman is listed as being the winner, with the same ticket number as Mike's grandpa.

Mike decides to investigate, with the help of one of his customers, a reporter named "Joe MacIntyre" (Kane Richmond). We in the audience know that Mike's suspicions are correct, because we've already seen nightclub owner "Tony Franco" (Harry Worth) talking to his henchmen about his counterfeit lottery ticket scam. Franco has a printing press replicating tickets. The upside is that 99.9999% of lotto tickets never win, so they generally have no crossovers with the real tickets and make a buck off each one. In the big city, it's a million dollar racket. But this time, Grandpa Radford's ticket happens to line up with an actual winner. Franco panics, because he stands to get caught; Grandpa bought the ticket from one of his hoodlums. So, he tells the hood to get the ticket back. "But no rough stuff. Just trick him into handing it over." They try this, but Grandpa won't give the ticket up. "Its my only proof that I won the lottery". The hoods end up killing him, exactly what Franco didn't want. Grandpa's death looks like a heart attack, but the cops suspect foul play. Mike tells them about his lotto ticket, and the resulting confusion about the winner.

Mike's reporter friend Joe MacIntyre asks around at Franco's nightclub about ticket sales, but no one will talk. For his part, Mike can't believe Joe would even suspect Tony Franco. "Why? He's a real nice man, Joe. He even gave my sister Gloria a job as his singer." Tony always treats Mike and Gloria like family, with the utmost courtesy, so Mike can't believe Franco would ever have anything to do with crime, let alone murder. But Joe MacIntyre is a hard-boiled reporter. He knows people have false fronts, especially guys like Tony Franco.

The story is padded with nightclub singing scenes, and because we know from the start that Franco is behind the fake lotto scheme, there's no mystery involved. The twist is that there's a Mr. Big above Franco, someone who is running the scheme statewide. We only see this man in shadow. He advises Tony to pay off the occasional winners. "You should've given the old man his 16,000 bucks. We don't need the scrutiny, and it's a small price of doing business when compared to the million dollars a year we're making." In addition to the mysterious Mr. Big, there's another curious character, a drunk who is always at the nightclub. He wears a suit and pays for his drinks, so we know he isn't a bum, but who is he? Joe MacIntyre finds out, when Franco puts his henchmen on Joe's tail. Is the drunk an undercover agent? It appears so.

Take out the musical padding and the needless, wide shot punchouts, and you'd have an excellent, Frankie Darro-driven crime movie. It runs 58 minutes, should've been 52 or 53, but it's good enough to still warrant Two Big Thumbs Up. You just have to like Frankie's cartwheeling energy, with his long, backcombed hair always falling in his face. We'll go on a Darro binge sooner or later. The picture is razor sharp.  ///// 

And that's all I've got for tonight. My blogging music is Cream's "Wheels of Fire". I've been on a major Cream binge, and I don't think it can be overstated how incredible they were. Notwithstanding later virtuosos like Chris Squire and Geddy Lee (whose styles were different anyway), it's gotta be said that Jack Bruce was the greatest bassist ever. While I loved Cream's hit singles as a kid, I'm just now listening to Bruce's playing in depth for the first time, and there's just no one in his league from that era (except Paul McCartney, whose style was also different), and so many players from the 70s onward emulated him. Bruce is off the charts, especially on live recordings, ditto Ginger Baker, but the guy whose playing really needs to be re-examined in depth is Eric Clapton, who has kind of been given a back seat as a Guitar God after all these years, when he probably should be driving the car. Over the past ten days or so, I've been listening to all the Cream albums repeatedly (and the live 1968 Farewell Concert), and EC just lets loose. He goes off on some blistering jams, and again, as I noted in another blog, nobody was playing like that in 1967. Well, Jimi was, but Jimi was a different kind of player, and it must be also noted that, as incredible as Jimi was, and a great songwriter in many styles and a great singer, he was more prone to experimentation with his guitar playing and thus could be sloppy live, when he got too far out on a limb. Also. though he had excellent sidemen in Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell, Clapton had Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker. I'm not knocking my Uncle Jimi by any stretch. There was no Other, at the time, for experimentation, innovation, and taking the guitar to the next level. But for sheer lead playing, and the monster tone to end all monster tones, Clapton in Cream was the man. Keep in mind that I'm specifying "when he was in Cream." I don't think he ever approached that level again, although he was great playing a mellower kind of music in Blind Faith and somewhat scorching with Derek and the Dominoes. But with Cream? Fuggeddabboudditt. Clapton was God, as was claimed. Then came Sir Richard of Blackmore in 1972, four years after EC, to take lead guitar playing into the stratosphere with his solo on "Highway Star". Following the Man in Black was young Edward Van Halen six years later, who took things to mind-boggling heights. He came along "ten years after" Clapton (see what I did there?), and EC was his hero, so that brings us full circle. But yeah, go on a Cream binge and see.

My late night music is Bach, various cantatas and chorales. I need a new book to read. I hope you're enjoying the last few days of 2022, and I send you Tons of Love as always.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)         

Lew Ayers, Laraine Day and Basil Rathbone in "Fingers at the Window", and "A Christmas Memory" starring Geraldine Page, written by Truman Capote

Last night's thriller operates on the concept "bigger is better": why have one axe murderer on the loose when you can have six? The more the merrier, right? That's what's happening in Chicago, in "Fingers at the Windum"(1942), oops I mean "Window." There's a rash of axe murders, and murderers, and it's gotten so bad that no one will go outside. Businesses are closing up, including theaters. "Oliver Duffy" (Lew Ayers), a stage actor, finds himself out of work and, as he heads home, still dressed in top hat and tails, he sees a young woman walking alone and notices that she's being followed. As Oliver is acutely aware of the axe murder spree, he can't in good conscience let her proceed by herself, so he approaches to accompany her home, and at first she thinks he's a pick-up artist. Romantic repartee ensues for the next five minutes as they walk together, and during this time, in an intercut scene, we see a psychotic man being examined by a psychiatrist at a police station. The cops think surely they've caught their axe murderer, but the shrink assures them there's more than one man.

Next, a shadowy figure enters the apartment of another schizophrenic. He gaslights the schizo, telling him "you know what I need you to do." He's programming the poor man to kill a woman with an axe. It appears he's the mastermind behind the axe killings, but who is he?

Back with Oliver Duffy and "Edwina Brown" (Laraine Day), they are now at her apartment. He concocts a ruse to stay the night on her fire escape, because he fears for her safety. It turns out he was right, because that night a psycho climbs through her window with an axe. Edwina and Oliver catch the guy, pin him down and call the cops, but the detectives on the case don't believe in psychological explanations or "mastermind" theories. They just think that, for some inexplicable reason, the city has succumbed to an epidemic of axe murders. 

But now, it's gotten so bad that the newspaper has put out a 25,000 dollar reward for the capture of the man, or men, who are committing the murders. Oliver and Edwina could sure use the money. They think the police are out to lunch on their "one man" theory and decide to solve the case themselves. Oliver, being a talented actor, decides to pose as a schizophrenic so he can gain access to a mental hospital, where he encounters a stern doctor played by Basil Rathbone. 

The plot was extremely layered, maybe a tad too much, and Lew Ayers' portrayal of Oliver was what I will call fancy, even precious in places. Ayers had a distinct and slightly eccentric acting style that included some cute or affected mannerisms. He was very good , don't get me wrong, especially in the Dr. Kildare series where he was paired with Laraine Day as his nurse, so they were a team before this film. He was excellent in the sci-fi classic "Donovan's Brain" in which he starred alongside Nancy Davis. Here, he's playing a theater actor, so I guess some of his mannerisms can be forgiven. With a less talky script, it might've been less obvious. Still, even with the over-drawn-out plot, when Rathbone appears, all is right with the movie, and even from the beginning it has a unique calling card. Two Big Thumbs Up for "Fingers at the Window". The picture is dvd quality.  ////

The previous night, we had one last Christmas film, actually a TV movie, entitled "A Christmas Memory"(1966). Written and narrated by Truman Capote, it's his own memory of a Christmas season during the Depression in Alabama, when he was seven years old and living with an eccentric female relative. She doesn't have a name in the movie, he just calls her his "friend". Geraldine Page plays her as an elderly but childlike free spirit. She has two older cousins who own the house she and "Buddy" (Capote, played by Donnie Melvin) live in, relegated to a back room. The cousins, responsible and churchgoing, tolerate but look down on the pair, who haven't any money save for the pittance they win by entering contests; any contest they can find, like naming a new coffee for a national brand. They hope that one will net them fifty thousand bucks. Mostly, though, they win nickle-and-dime contests like puzzlers and box top mail-ins. They've done well enough this Fall, in what must be the early 1930s, to have saved up 13 dollars, enough to buy the ingredients for the fruitcakes they bake and mail out every Christmas. The real Capote explains in voiceover that the fruitcake recipients are mostly strangers. His "friend"  isn't social, she's never been but five miles from their house, and she likes people she barely knows, such as the postman, or a married couple from California who once drove through town and later sent them a postcard. These are the kind of people she makes the Christmas fruitcakes for, and of course First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt gets one every year. This year, Friend and Buddy are going to bake thirty fruitcakes, their new record.

Friend is proud as they enter the small grocery store in town. She reads off her list of cake ingredients to buy, then she and Buddy take the goods home on their improvised sleigh, a baby buggy with a baggage compartment. Their terrier Queenie tags along. They are three of a kind, and when they are done baking the fruitcakes after a full day's work, Friend decides they should celebrate by drinking small glasses of the whiskey they bought on their way home from "Mr. Ha-Ha" (Josip Elic), an American Indian bootlegger. The whiskey was for the fruitcakes, but there's a little bit left, so Friend pours even amounts for herself, for seven year old Buddy, and for Queenie the dog, mixing Queenie's whisky with some coffee. All three get to feeling pleasant, dancing around their tiny kitchen. Then the older cousins come home and scold Friend for giving a alcohol to a child.

But no harm has been done. Friend and Buddy and Queenie are life mates, a team; they listen to the lecture and shrug it off because they've got more important things to do. The next day, they need a Christmas tree, so they go out to the woods and find a perfect one, twice as tall as Buddy, so he won't be able to steal the silver star off the top. Buddy clearly adores his Friend, who it is also clear could never live on her own without the support of her cousins. Friend is an adult child, but she has wisdom (and responsibility, and dedication) far beyond what they offer. She's the kind of person who is a life-shaper for a child of artistic bent, which is why Truman Capote wrote his Christmas Memory about her. If you saw "The Fabelmans", and saw how the eccentric Uncle Boris influenced young Steven Spielberg, it's the same thing here. Friend is actually very industrious when she's doing what she's good at, things like baking cakes, decorating Christmas trees, or making homemade kites for presents. Buddy worships her, and the kites have symbolic significance.

In real life, Capote was sent off to military school, taken away from his Friend who was really his soulmate. He only lived to be 60, and was very eccentric himself but became the toast of New York and a friend of Jackie Kennedy. I've never read "In Cold Blood", but he is said to be a brilliant writer, and this is a beautiful Christmas story, without the cynicism one might expect given Capote's later reputation, and devoid of religious and sexual politics. It's Capote at his most earnest. That's the reason it has an 8.9 on IMDB, a rare score indeed. It gets our highest rating of Two Gigantic Thumbs Up. If there was ever a great actress, it's Geraldine Page. Next Christmas, make sure to watch this classic.  ////

That's all I've got for this evening. My blogging music is "Fresh Cream" and my late night is "Mass in B Minor" by Bach (again). I hope you are easing into the post-Christmas week and looking forward to the New Year. I send you Tons of Love, as always.  xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)         

Jeanne Crain and Jean Peters in "Take Care of My Little Girl", and "The Great Rupert" starring Jimmy Durante and Terry Moore

Last night, we saw Jeanne Crain in "Take Care of My Little Girl"(1951), a look at the dark side of college sorority life. Crain is "Liz Erickson", who is off to Midwestern University with her heart set on joining the prestigious Tri-U sorority. Her Mom was a member, which gives her a leg up on acceptance as a Legacy Pledge. Before she leaves, Mom extols the lifelong benefits of being a Tri-U alum. Liz arrives and meets the sisters and the house mother, Mrs. Howell, who was her Mom's best friend in Tri-U (we've seen a lot of Mr. and Mrs. Howell recently). Right away, Liz - a nice girl - can see that the sorority president "Dallas" (Jean Peters) is pretentious and dictatorial. After the first few days, she knows she'll be accepted, not only as a Legacy Pledge but because she fits in; she's beautiful and outgoing.

The difference between Liz and Dallas is that Liz isn't a phony. Dallas and her lieutenant "Marge Colby" (Betty Lynn) decide in private which pledges "deserve" to be Tri-U members, and which don't, and their choices don't include girls who can't afford fancy clothes, or who come from the wrong towns. You get the idea: their sorority is based on status. Oh yes, they do charity work, we've seen a lot of that in our recent movies, but they do it because it's good to be seen doing it. Liz, a sincere girl, takes all of this in. Her roommate "Adelaide" (MItzi Gaynor), a tennis protege from Arizona, opts out of Tri-U early on. She's from the country - a ranch girl - and even though she'd be accepted based on her looks and charm, it's all too fake for her. She just wants to study and play tennis.

Liz meets a student counselor named "Joe Blake" (Dale Robt-sn for Carp-teria). Joe offers advice on her selection of a major. Liz chooses languages. They hit it off, and go out for lunch. Joe is older, 28, his education deferred by six years of military service. He thinks sororities and fraternities are silly, not because of the brotherhood/sisterhood experience, but because of the juvenile games that are played for acceptance. Nowdays it's called hazing. This will get serious later on. There is never any question that Liz will be accepted. Other sororities are courting her, too, she's a prize catch. But she sees how some of the other girls are treated, the ones less beautiful or not from well-known families. One girl, "Ruth" (Lenka Peterson) stands out in this way and gets talked about behind her back. She's so nice and tries so hard to be liked, but she's a mousy girl who wears old baggy dresses. Dallas and Marge (the Tri-U president and vice president) have a system of blackballing a pledge anonymously, and they do this to Ruth, who wants more than anything to be accepted.

Meanwhile, Liz is wooed by "Chad Carnes" (Jeffery Hunter), a BMOC fraternity boy who takes her attention away from Joe Blake for a while. Chad is the male equivalent of the Tri-U girls, a guy from the "right" family, who got into Northwestern on connections, but who in reality can't make the grade. He's a F student and wants Liz (who has an A in French) to help him cheat on the final exam. She agrees to do it and then feels guilty. All of this is turning her off to sorority life.

Then comes Hell Week, in which the pledges are demeaned and made to do exhausting, ridiculous tasks. Dallas and Marge single Ruth out for particularly rough treatment with the idea that she'll wash out, which will save them the trouble of rejecting her. But she's so determined to become a Tri-U member that she stays awake for three days running to complete her Hell Week assignment. I can't tell you any more than that, but it's the climax of the movie. The question is how Liz will react to all of this, especially after seeing what happens to Ruth. Jean Peters is very good as the arrogant sorority leader Dallas. In real life, she was the girlfriend of Howard Hughes, and in a coincidence, we have in our next movie Terry Moore, who was secretly married to him for the last years of his life. Our favorite Movie Dad - John Litel - has a small role as Liz's father. But the best supporting role goes to Betty Lynn as Marge, the sorority vice-president who is caught in between Dallas and the blackballing of "unapproved" girls, and her guilt feelings for doing so. It's Jeanne Crain's movie, she's in every scene, and besides being an outstanding beauty, she was also a very good actress in movies like "A Letter to Three Wives" and "Pinky". She also stars in one of our perennial favorites, "State Fair". Two Huge Thumbs Up for "Take Care of My Little Girl", which was once again found on a Christmas Movie list, though it has just the briefest holiday scene. The picture is in color (a tad muted) and is very good.  //// 

The previous night, we watched "The Great Rupert"(1950), about a squirrel who doles out manna from heaven. Wait a sec; make that money instead of manna. As the movie opens, Rupert is living with his trainer and sidekick "Joe Mahoney" (Jimmy Conlin), a vaudeville performer who is too broke to pay his rent. Joe has to leave his little apartment, so he sets Rupert free in a park. But Rupert runs right back to their former abode to live rent-free in the attic. Meanwhile, Joe runs into his old pal "Louie Amendola" (Jimmy Durante) on the street. Louie and his family, also vaudevillians known as the Triple Pyramid, are looking for a place to live. Joe suggests his former building, but warns Louie that the landlord, "Mr. Dingle" (Frank Orth) is a tightwad who demands his money up front and grants no favors. Mr. Dingle has a son named "Pete" (Tom Drake) who's a composer. He has an artistic spirit and is more forgiving, especially when he meets Louie's young daughter "Rosalinda" (Terry Moore), who plays the harp. Pete talks his Dad into letting the Amendolas live there, in the basement apartment, even though they don't have the rent money. Louie promises him they'll pay it by the end of the week.

Mr. Dingle reads Pete the riot act about giving out free rent, but soon forgets the transgression when he receives a letter from his bank, telling him a gold investment is set to pay off, to the tune of 1500 bucks a week. He forgets all about the Amendolas' rent, and every week when he receives his gold dividend check, he cashes it at the bank and stuffs the bills through a hole in the wall at home because he's a "money under the mattress" kind of guy. He doesn't trust banks or institutions. Well, right about this time, Christmas is coming up. The Amendolas have no money for Rosalinda's shoes, let alone presents. Mrs. Amendola (Queenie Smith) starts praying for money, with the words "Rosalinda needs shoes". Suddenly, hundred dollar bills begin floating from the ceiling! Where are they coming from? Why, from heaven of course. Momma's prayer has been answered. Only we the audience know that Rupert, the little squirrel who made his home in the Dingles' attic, is pushing the money out of a hole in the ceiling to get at his winter store of walnuts.

Momma tells Louie about the money from heaven; not knowing about Rupert, she has no other explanation. "I prayed and the money came down!" Louie is thrilled. He pays three moths rent in advance, now all is good with Mr. Dingle. Meanwhile, Rosalinda and Pete are falling in love. He composes a suite for the two of them, but then Rosalinda meets an agent who wants to use her looks to advance her career, and a romantic subplot ensues, based on the theme of artistic integrity versus advantageous opportunism. It appears to Pete that Rosalina has chosen the latter, as she runs off with the fast-talking agent. Pete has no use for the status of showbiz, he's all about his music. If it makes money, fine, if it doesn't, he'll keep composing regardless. However, he does have one chance to invest in an oil scheme, if he can come up with two thousand dollars. Who else to ask but Mr. Amendola, whose wife seems to have a barrel of money all of a sudden. Every time she prays for money for "Rosalina's shoes", sitting in her rocking chair on Thursdays at 3 o clock, Rupert pushes 1500 bucks out of the hole in the roof. All of a sudden the Amendolas are rich, and the Dingles are getting poor, though Mr. Dingle doesn't know it yet because he hasn't seen how Rupert has redistributed his wealth. Then one day Dingle learns that his gold mine will be paying no more dividends. That's when he decides to remove his stash of cash from the wall, and finds that it's all gone. 

"The Great Rupert" is once again ostensibly a Christmas movie; in truth there is only a single scene near the holiday where a brass band plays carols on the street. There is a lament about not being able to afford presents, but that's it. Still, it has that "greed" message, Mr. Scrooge. But the best parts are when Rupert dishes out the dough. These scenes are staged by George Pal (who produced), and he was of course the special effects wizard behind the use of models and stop-motion. It's a hoot to watch Rupert throw hundred dollar bills out the hole in the roof while looking for his walnuts. Jimmy Durante sings and plays a couple songs on piano, and we very much like Terry Moore, who is a sweetheart as Rosalinda. Tom Drake, who plays Pete Dingle, was Judy Garland's boyfriend in the Christmas Classic "Meet Me in St. Louis". Two Huge Thumbs Up for "The Great Rupert". The picture is very good. That will be all for our Christmas movies this year. We tried, with varying success, to find ones we'd never seen. Mostly we got films with minimal holiday themes, but the good part was that they were all excellent (except "Magic Christmas Tree"), and many of them scored Two Huge Thumbs Up. I'm sorry we didn't have a Dickens mini-series this year, it kind of slipped my attention, but we'll make up for it next Christmas, and we'll double up on our holiday movies.  ////

And that's all I know. I hope you had a Merry Christmas today. On my two walks this evening, I was amazed to see all five visible planets. I saw Mercury for the first time ever, at 5:30 when the sky darkened. I was blown off the map by seeing it, as Mercury doesn't appear often, and when it does, it's only up for a little while. I saw a tip on an astronomy website last night, saying that Christmas night would be a chance to observe it (near Venus, the brightest planet in the sky), and so I made a point to look for it. I saw Mercury and Venus on my early walk, then on my 10 pm walk (just now), I saw Venus again, Mars (straight overhead), and Jupiter and Saturn in the southeast. To have it happen on Christmas night made it especially amazing. I also have a bonus movie, "The Fabelmans," which I saw this afternoon in Encino. I'm not gonna review it, because you're gonna want to see it for yourself, but I will say it's an eye-opener. As you probably know, it's the life story of Steven Spielberg, who we've tried to de-mythologize here at the blog (all of that business about him "walking on to the lot at Universal" was a made-up PR story). The movie gives you what I assume is the real deal of how he became a filmmaker, and his family life, and it's a revelation and shocking in places. The ending is classic Hollywood, featuring an appearance by someone entirely unexpected. It's a long movie, two and a half hours, but I thought it was one of Spielberg's best.

My blogging music tonight is various Christmas music on KUSC, my late night is the "Christmas Oratorio". Merry Christmas once again, and let's look forward to a Happy New Year and all good things in 2023. I send you Tons of Love, as always.  xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)

Gloria Jean and Frances Rafferty in "An Old-Fashioned Girl", and "Louisa" starring Ronald Reagan and Spring Byington

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  :):)