AT THE CIRCUS
***½
BACHELOR MOTHER
*****
USA
A department store worker ends up taking
care of an abandoned baby, which her boss mistakes for her own child.
It's surprising that this wasn't desecrated into a Meg Ryan vehicle in
the mid-1990s. It's pure fluff, lacking much of the zeal and
sophistication of the screwball masterpieces of the era, but it definitely
bears that warm, irresistible glow which would soon after disappear from
Hollywood comedy as mysteriously as it ever came to it. This particular
picture also manages to
balance the fluff with an affecting sense of subdued desperation left over from
the Depression Era, adding an ingredient of realism to the proceedings
that somehow never intrudes upon the fun.
dir: Garson Kanin
wr: Norman Krasna, Felix Jackson
cast: Ginger Rogers, David Niven, Charles Coburn, Frank
Albertson, E.E. Clive
CONFESSIONS OF A NAZI SPY
**
The first Hollywood anti-Nazi
exposé gets a superfluous, wonderfully earnest voiceover narrator to
highlight "the efficient German concept of mass stupidity" and
Edward G. Robinson to track down those "half-wit, hysterical
crackpots who go Hitler-happy" from Nazi propaganda. What's really
terrifying though is how all that propaganda by them 'Nazzies' is so much
more sophisticated and never quite as hilariously heavy-handed as this
particular curiosity.
dir: Anatole Litvak
cast: Edward G. Robinson, Paul Lukas, George Sanders, Francis Lederer,
Henry O'Neill, Lya Lys, Sig Rumann, John Deering
DARK VICTORY
***
USA
Bette Davis is diagnosed with a terminal illness. George Brent is her
doctor. Inevitably he also
becomes
her
lover. The trouble with their romance is that the only people the two seem
visibly and genuinely infatuated with are themselves. Furthermore, as far
as love interests go, Brent is a pretty clammy one. But of course, Brent
is irrelevant here. This is Davis’ chance to play a disease and,
predictably, she devours it.
dir: Edmund Goulding
cast: Bette Davis, George Brent, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Humphrey
Bogart, Ronald Reagan, Henry Travers, Cora Witherspoon, Dorothy Peterson
DESTRY RIDES AGAIN
*****
USA
This raucous, buoyant Western
satire may well be the greatest of all Westerns in general. It's certainly
the most joyous. As the young gun-less sheriff determined to clean up the
lawless town of Bottleneck, Jimmy Stewart is very appealing. And truly it
was a master stroke to let Dietrich loose as the corrupt saloon performer.
She's never been better. In one legendary scene, she gets involved in a
cat fight (another master stroke) and it's a thrill to watch her face
tense up in the throes of battle.
dir: George Marshall
wr: Felix Jackson, Henry Myers, Gertrude Purcell
cast: James Stewart, Marlene Dietrich, Mischa Auer, Charles
Winninger, Brian Donlevy, Allen Jenkins, Warren Hymer, Irene Hervey,
Una Merkel
DODGE CITY
****½
THE FOUR FEATHERS
***
GONE WITH THE WIND
*****
USA
Classical Hollywood's crowning
achievement, not likely to ever be surpassed in terms of sheer visual
grandeur. Just about every set is an ode to man's preoccupation with size,
photographed in that rich, early Technicolor that makes people's faces
look orange and all the prettier for it.
Everybody now knows the spiel
about Scarlett and Rhett, and Melanie and Ashley, and Mammy and Prissy.
Sure, it's soap opera but it's soap opera on a grand, overwhelming scale
with a remarkably strong sense of storytelling.
And these days everybody forgets this
picture has a wonderful sense of humour: its small army of uncredited
writers included several of Hollywood's best and wittiest after all
(including Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur and none other than F. Scott
Fitzgerald). "Now, Miss Scarlett, I can't go all my life waiting to
catch you between husbands." Gold.
dir: Victor Fleming (and George Cukor, Sam Wood, William
Cameron Menzies)
wr: Sidney Howard (and many, many others - we're talking more
than a dozen)
ph: Ernest Haller, Lee Garmes, Ray Rennahan
ed: Hal C. Kern, James E. Newcom
m: Max Steiner
pd: William Cameron Menzies
cast: Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable, Olivia de Havilland, Leslie
Howard, Hattie McDaniel, Butterfly McQueen, Thomas Mitchell,
Barbara O'Neil, Laura Hope Crewes, Harry Davenport, Ona Munson, Jane
Darwell
GOODBYE, MR. CHIPS
***
GUNGA DIN
***½
THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME
*****
IN NAME ONLY
***½
INTERMEZZO
**½
JAMAICA INN
***
LE JOUR SE LÈVE
***½
A murderer trapped by police in
his apartment recalls the lead-up to his crime.
A celebrated 'poetic' melodrama, well-acted, well-crafted,
intelligent and atmospheric but with a muted dramatic impact.
dir: Marcel Carné
cast: Jean Gabin, Jules Berry, Jacqueline Laurent, Arletty
MIDNIGHT
****½
MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON
*****
|
NINOTCHKA
*****
USA
Much as the ads in 1930 (for "Anna Christie")
proclaimed "Garbo Talks!", nine years later they announced
"Garbo Laughs!" "Don't pronounce it, see it" was
another clever tagline for this very clever, very sophisticated farce from
Ernst Lubitsch, the master of clever, sophisticated farce. You could argue
that Garbo herself was never better than as Ninotchka, the dour, pragmatic
Communist agent won over by Parisian champagne and romance, and she
receives great support from a bunch of marvelous character actors. The
intermittent sociopolitical theorising is utter garbage but thankfully
easy to ignore.
dir: Ernst Lubitsch
wr: Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder, Walter Reisch
cast: Greta Garbo, Melvyn Douglas, Ina Claire, Sig
Rumann, Felix Bressart, Alexander Granach, Bela Lugosi
ONLY ANGELS HAVE WINGS
***½
LA RÉGLE DU JEU
*****
France
"I wanted to depict a society dancing on a volcano" said Jean
Renoir in regards to this wise, worldly and intricate comedy of pre-war
upstairs-downstairs parallels and vicissitudes. He plays it wry and
cheeky, but don't underestimate his bite. He paints an outwardly elegant
though charred milieu, where characters know all there is to know about
their own as well as each other's caprices and shortcomings, and have
learned to be quite relaxed about them - those that haven't are bound to
suffer. And though Renoir is eager to inject wherever possible his famous
generosity of spirit, he's too shrewd to be at all optimistic. You could
accuse him of cynicism, but you'd be misguided. He's long past cynicism.
Either due to Renoir's guile or due to the decades-worth of
mishandling of its prints (it was suppressed, savagely recut, pronounced
forever lost, then finally restored in the 50s), the picture is bathed in
a frothy, silvery haze, which does wonders for its atmosphere.
dir: Jean Renoir
wr: Jean Renoir, Carl Koch
ph: Jean-Paul Alphen, Jean Bachelet, Jacques Lemare, Alain
Renoir
ed: Marthe Huguet, Marguerite Renoir
cast: Nora Gregor, Marcel Dalio, Julien Carette, Roland
Toutain, Jean Renoir, Paulette Dubost, Mila Parély, Gaston Modot,
Odette Talazac, Pierre Magnier, Eddy Debray, Claire Gérard, Anne
Mayen, Lise Elina, Pierre Nay, Richard Francoeur, Léon Larive
THE ROARING
TWENTIES
****
SON OF FRANKENSTEIN
***½
USA
The third Frankenstein picture - the last in the series to feature
Boris Karloff as the Monster (this time however, it's purely a matter of
keeping up appearances) - only manages to match its predecessors on a
technical level. The photography showcases the spectacularly stylised sets
at the optimal contrast and there's a lot of fun had with one
police inspector's artificial arm. But James Whale's absence behind the
camera is notably felt in that he managed to balance his kinks and quirks
with a strong sense of economy. This particular sequel runs for a full 100
minutes and that's simply uncalled for.
dir: Rowland V. Lee
ph: George Robinson
ad: Jack Otterson
cast: Basil Rathbone, Lionel Atwill, Bela Lugosi, Boris
Karloff, Josephine Hutchinson, Donnie Dunagan, Emma Dunn, Edgar Norton,
Lawrence Grant
STAGECOACH
*****
USA
When Orson Welles was asked about
his film training prior to making "Citizen Kane" (1941),
he said all he did was watch "Stagecoach" some forty
times. This was the first Western John Ford had made in ten years as well
as the first (of the nine) he shot in the now legendary Monument Valley.
Furthermore it was among the first to concentrate on characterisation as
much as it did on action and thus reclaimed the Western as a genre of
prestige. There is even the sense that the American landscape never before
looked quite as majestic as it does here. And beyond its great influence
and historical importance, it's also a grand piece of entertainment.
dir: John Ford
wr: Dudley Nichols
ph: Bert Glennon
ed: Dorothy Spencer, Walter Reynolds
m: Boris Morros
cast: John Wayne, Claire Trevor, Thomas Mitchell, John Carradine,
George Bancroft, Andy Devine, Donald Meek, Louise Platt, Tim Holt
THE STORY
OF THE LATE CHRYSANTHEMUMS
****
Japan
The earliest of the Kenji Mizoguchi films that regularly land on top ten
lists, this melodrama concerns the untalented son of a famous Kabuki actor
in 1880s Tokyo, who falls in love with his baby brother's wet nurse and
sacrifices his class standing and family connections to be together with
her. Stylistically, the film is a tour de force. Made up of primarily long
takes (the average shot duration is around a minute) taken through a
wide-angle lens at a distance from the actors, it defines the
protagonists' fates against the forbidding, unsympathetic social structure
of the period. The compositions are detailed, evocative and often
entrancingly beautiful. However, the film is marred by a vacuum at its
core in the shape of Shotaro Hanayagi. He spends the picture acting as if
in front of a mirror. It's difficult to buy him feeling any kind of
passion for another human being, much less a woman. He also happened to be
twenty years older than the character he was playing. Close-ups were
therefore not an option, which centrally shaped the film's aesthetic and
forever transformed Mizoguchi's cinematic language.
dir: Kenji Mizoguchi
ph: Yozo Fuji, Minoru Miki
cast: Shotaro Hanayagi, Kokichi Takada, Gonjuro Kawarazaki,
Kakuko Mori, Tokusaburo Arashi, Yoko Umemura
THE WIZARD OF OZ
*****
USA
Profoundly kitschy it may be, but it endures as the most entrancing piece
of fantasy that Hollywood has produced – and likely will ever produce.
No amount of orcs,
hobbits
or CGI monkeys
could match
the urgency and searing conviction of Dorothy’s voice or the deliriously
unhinged villainy of the Wicked Witch of West.
dir: Victor Fleming (and
Mervyn LeRoy,
King
Vidor)
ph: Harold Rosson
cast: Judy Garland, Ray Bolger, Bert Lahr, Jack Haley,
Margaret Hamilton, Frank Morgan, Billie Burke, Charley Grapewin, Pat
Walsh, Clara Blandick
THE WOMEN
****½
USA
The ultimate in catty fun. Anita Loos and Jane Murfin's script (based
on a play by Clare Boothe Luce) is an ode to diva worship and
sophisticated bitchery, providing quotable wisecracks for a teriffic
all-female all-MGM cast. Cukor's direction is unrepresentatively lumpy -
there is a neverending Technicolor fashion sequence stuck in the middle
with no discernible purpose beyond inflating an already inflated running
time. But his handling of his leading ladies is as commendable as ever.
Shearer and Crawford were never better. Russell maybe was, but rarely.
dir: George Cukor
wr: Anita Loos, Jane Murfin
cast: Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford, Rosalind Russell,
Mary Boland, Paulette Godard, Joan Fontaine, Lucille Watson, Phyllis Povah,
Florence Nash, Virginia Wiedler, Ruth Hussey, Margaret Dumont, Marjorie
Main, Hedda Hopper, Butterfly McQueen
WUTHERING HEIGHTS
****½
YOUNG MR. LINCOLN
***
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