Category: Nominees – 1940s

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Twelve O’clock High – 1949

Here we have another war movie, this one starring Gregory Peck as a WWII bomber pilot.  The film was good, but it had the potential to be great.  Sadly, it fell a bit short of the mark.  Don’t get me wrong – I enjoyed it, but I could have enjoyed it more.

The film was focused around a central issue.  It was a real issue that existed in the war and the film really went out of its way to explore it from a number of different perspectives.  It was battle fatigue, both psychological and physical.  How far could men be pushed to continue putting their lives on the line, day after day?  How long could they endure the constant mental anguish of seeing their friends being killed?  How much death could they take and give before their minds began to shut down?  How much could a man endure?

In the film, they called it “maximum effort,” and they spent a good amount of time trying to define it.  The men of the 918^th Air Division is known as a “Hard-luck” group.  They have low morale because of their frequent losses. Their commander, Colonel Keith Davenport, played by Gary Merrill, is like a father to his men.  He knows them all personally, grieves when any one of them is killed, and goes to bat for them when they are ordered into dangerous missions, saying that they need a rest from the constant flying.

But the Air Force is trying to perfect precision daytime bombing.  Unfortunately, Colonel Davenport is the wrong man for the job of leadership because of his over-familiarity with the men serving under him.  In comes Brigadier General Frank Savage, played by Peck.  He is as tough as nails, and through strict and rigorous discipline and training, he molds them into the best bomber squadron in the Air Force.

The drama of the film comes in when his hard and emotionless style of command meets resistance at every turn.  Nearly every pilot asks to be transferred out from under his command.  They resent him, but eventually come to respect him because their mission success rate increases dramatically, just as their mortality rate decreases.  Like him or not, he was just what their low morale needed.

But it was the end of the film that surprised me.  Here they have Hollywood superstar, Gregory Peck, playing the hero, the man who has all the answers, the man who always gets the job done.  And then, from out of nowhere, he learns, first-hand, exactly what “maximum effort” really means.  He is getting ready to go on the most important bombing run, and his psyche finally cracks.  His limbs stop responding and his conscious mind shuts down.  He becomes catatonic, unable to move.

Apparently, extreme stress can actually do that to a man, if he is pushed (or pushes himself) far enough.  I was surprised that his character showed human frailty.  In Hollywood films, the lead actor is usually portrayed as a perfect male specimen.  He is brave, honest, and true.  He is fearless and tough.  He always knows the right thing to say, and never fails in his mission.  But here, Peck broke.  He shows weakness in an almost sad way.  I both respected and admired him for taking the role.

Another actor who I thought did a good job was Dean Jagger, playing the part of Lieutenant Colonel Harvey Stovall.  The film actually starts out with Stovall returning to the abandoned air field after the war’s end, and so the main body of the movie is really his flashback.  Then the end of the movie returns to Stovall as he finishes his recollections and leaves the empty field.  Stovall was General Savage’s right hand man, too old to fly any bombing missions, but willing to do whatever he could out of his belief in the rightness of opposing the Germans.  Jagger won the award for Best Supporting Actor for the role.

He also had one of the best lines in the film, which seemed to sum-up one of the horrors of the war, saying, “That is not why I am drunk tonight. I got drunk because I am confused. I was thinking, which is a thing a man should not do, and all at once I couldn’t remember what any of them looked like. I, I couldn’t see their faces, Bishop, Cobb, Wilson, Zimmy, all of them. All of you. They all looked alike, just one face. And it was very young. It confused me. I think I shall stay drunk until I’m not confused anymore.”

But overall, I would have like to see a little more aerial combat, showing the horrors that the men faced every day.  And the scenes that did, needed to who more than just Peck in his pilot’s seat.  They needed to show the harsh, bloody dangers that the crew faced to get me to more fully understand “maximum effort.”  I think things like that may have pushed the film from good to great.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Letter to Three Wives – 1949

This movie was a good, and well written drama, but there seemed to be a subtle element to the plot may have touched the supernatural, just a little bit.  I know, that is a strange thing to say about an Academy Award nominated film from the 1949, but to me, it is undeniable.  I’ll explain.

The film was about three women, their husbands, and one mysterious woman who’s face is never shown on the screen.  The film starts out with a woman doing a voice-over as we watch the plot being set up.  She speaks in narration, introducing the three wives as they prepare to go on a trip together to volunteer at a picnic for underprivileged children.  She talks in a first-person, omniscient dialogue, implying that she know them each personally and intimately.

Right there, my suspicion was aroused.  The only time you ever hear that particular kind of narration is when it is a dead character talking about the events that led to their death.

The three wives were Deborah, Rita, and Lora Mae, played by Jeanne Crane, Ann Sothern, and Linda Darnell, respectively.  Their husbands, Brad, George, and Porter were played by Jeffrey Lynn, Kirk Douglas, and Paul Douglas, again, respectively.  As the women are going to the picnic, they each discuss, with bitterness, a woman named Addie Ross.  She seems to be more beautiful, smarter, more thoughtful, and more familiar with the three husbands than the wives are comfortable with.

Before boarding the boat, they are handed a letter that is addressed to all three of them.  It is from Addie, saying that she has run away with one of their husbands.  The three women do their best to ignore the letter and dismiss it as a joke in poor taste.  The film that follows is made up of the flashbacks of the three women as they reflect on their marriages, each afraid that she is the unlucky woman.

It actually is a very cleverly written script for which Vera Caspary and Joseph Menkiewicz won the Academy Award for Best Writing, Screenplay.  In each of the three flash-back sequences, we learn that each husband obviously knew and, on some level, loved Addie, letting the audience know that it could be any one of them.  It also established that each marriage had its problems, just to keep the audience guessing even more.

The one-day picnic trip ends and the three women nervously return to their homes in the early afternoon.  Rita is first and finds George waiting for her.  She seems to fall in love with him all over again.  Lora Mae, who seems to have the rockiest marriage, finds Porter at home, but in a sour mood.  Their relationship does not seem to change.  Finally, Deborah arrives at home and is given a telegram from Brad, saying that he will not be home that night.  Her heart breaks.

But in the end, they pulled the old switcheroo.  Later that evening, the three women and the two remaining husbands go to a party, and wouldn’t you know it?  It turns out that it was Lora Mae’s husband, Porter, who had run away with Addie Ross.  But he loved his wife too much to go through with it, despite their marital problems.  If we were paying close enough attention in the beginning of the film, we would remember that Brad had told his wife that he might not be home that evening, even going so far as to explain why.  Apparently he was telling the truth.

I also learned that there were some significant differences from the original novel, Letter to Five Wives, aside from two women being cut.  Wikipedia summed it up pretty well, so paraphrase their article.  “All the major characters differ substantially between the novel and film. In the novel, Lora Mae is less a gold digger, and more a woman who has always been dominated by her wealthy husband; Rita is trying to succeed in a second marriage with a man she has never felt passionate about; and Deborah is a plain and quiet ex-spinster whose “catch” of a husband has been disappointed in her lack of success in society. As for the other two wives, Martha and her husband locked horns over child-rearing issues, while Geraldine was devoting excessive time and money to her singing career with few results.”  Interesting…

And finally, I have to return to the film’s parting kicker, which cemented, in my mind, that for whatever reason, Addie Ross was dead.  As the friends, whose marriages have all been strengthened by the events of the day, leave the table, a champagne glass mysteriously tips over and breaks.  Addie’s first-person voice-over returns, and she cryptically says, “Hi-ho.  Goodnight Everybody.”  So, was the tipping champagne glass proof that she was a ghost, or was it just a red herring?  Watch the film, and decide for yourself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Heiress – 1949

This was a movie with a simple plot, but good character development.  I know it was effective with me.  Olivia de Havilland played the lead, Catherine Sloper, the only daughter of wealthy doctor, Austin, wonderfully played by Ralph Richardson.

Catherine is painfully plain and shy and her father makes no secret of his extreme disappointment in her.  Enter Morris Townsend, played by Montgomery Clift.  He is a young man who lavishes attention on her, but is apparently only interested in her inheritance.  They plan to marry, but when he learns that her father will disinherit her if she marries him, Morris disappears, proving to her that he never loved her.  Catherine turns bitter and is mean to everybody.  She ends up happy at her father’s death, and though she still loves Morris, she spurns him and resigns herself to being an old maid.

Of course, it is much more subtle and complex than that, but those are the bare bones.  There are a few little sub-plots that crop up along the way, but nothing terribly interesting.  Now, all that being said, I actually liked the film.  There were some excellent performances and the costumes and sets were wonderful.  And I must also say that William Wyler’s directing was spot-on.

One scene, in particular, caught my attention as being well done.  It was the scene in which Catherine is waiting for Morris to arrive and take her away.  In the middle of the night, she comes to the parlor with her bags packed and her cloak on.  Her Aunt, Lavinia, played by Miriam Hopkins, wakes and is dismayed when she learns that Catherine told Morris that she would not accept her inheritance.  Aunt Lavinia knows that he will not return for her, and so she waits up with Catherine.

The scene was well done because de Havilland portrayed the nervous excitement of the character so well.  And the let-down, when the hour of his arrival comes and goes without a sign of him, her break-down into tears was heart-breaking to watch.  She finally realizes that her father had been right.  He only wanted her money.  And then, after that, her sad, sad walk of shame back to her room really pulled at my heart-strings.

After that, her character did a quick about-face.  I mean, in the beginning, she was young and innocent and looked at the world through rose-tinted lenses.  But after the betrayal, she became mean to her father for never loving her for who she was, and mean to Morris for breaking her heart.  But she was also mean to her Aunt for seeing was happening and not doing anything to stop it, and mean to her housemaid because… well, because by that time she was just a mean and bitter woman.

Now, I would be remiss if I did not spend some time on Ralph Richardson’s fantastic performance.  Apparently, he originated the role in the London production of the stage play.  It was clear that he understood the character.  He loved his daughter, but he loved her dead mother even more.  He idealized his wife so much that Catherine could never hope to measure up.  And when it came down to it, he seemed to care about what would happen to his fortune than his daughter’s happiness.  The character could have so easily been very two-dimensional, but Richardson brought a passion to the role that gave it subtlety and direction.

Another honorable mention has to go to Miriam Hopkins.  As the widowed Aunt, and a woman living in the early 1800’s, her desire to have Catherine marry was understandable, but she seemed to think that having a husband, any husband at all would be preferable to being alone, even if it was a loveless marriage.  And it also came out that she didn’t really think Catherine capable of catching any man without her inheritance.  So, she was just as bad as the rest, even though she was fighting to keep her niece’s romance with Morris alive.  Hopkins did a fine job.

And lastly, I have to say something about Montgomery Clift.  He was handsome enough, but I didn’t feel his acting skills was on par with the rest of his co-stars.  I can’t put my finger on exactly why, but he seemed a little lack-luster next to the rest of the cast.  Whether it makes a difference or not, it is interesting to note that the character of Morris was lightened for the film.  In the original stage play he was apparently a much darker character, but at the time, Clift was popular with Paramount as a leading man.  They didn’t want to tarnish his image too much by having him play such a bad-guy.

I would say that the film was average.  It was good but not great.  In the Best Picture category, it was up against All the King’s men, Battleground, A Letter to Three Wives and Twelve O’clock High, so I think it was appropriate that it didn’t win.  However, de Havilland did win the Oscar for Best Actress that year.  And though Aaron Copeland, a classical composer with a very distinct style, won for Best Original Score, the music didn’t really stand out for me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Battleground – 1949

Here we have the first real example of a war film after the end of WWII.  It also had the significance of a film that portrayed American soldiers as flawed and human.  I’ll say that it was a good movie, despite the fact that I am generally not a fan of war movies.

Still, about the only thing I didn’t like was the fact that for half the film, I didn’t know who any of the characters were.  I recognized faces and what personalities went along with them, but that was about it.  They didn’t do much to introduce any of them.  But after a while, the names didn’t seem to matter much.

The film follows a group of men in the war, in France, who are members of the 101^st Airborne Division, who are defending the town of Bastogne.  They are out-manned, out-gunned, and running low on food and provisions, but they refuse to give up.  Many friends and fellows are killed, but the brave heroes struggle on through a winter of bitter cold and snow to defend the strategically located town.

The film covers the Siege of Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge.  There were many men in their company, but there were six main characters which the story follows.  The Squad Leader is Holly, played by Van Johnson.  His partner is the new kid, Jim Layton, played by Marshall Thompson.  Other members of the squad are Jarvess, played by John Hodiak.  He is smart and speaks both French and German.  The man waiting for his orders to be sent home is “Pop” Stazak, played by George Murphy.  Kinny, who is constantly spitting chewing tobacco, is wonderfully played by James Whitmore.  And finally, Douglas Fowley plays “Kipp” Kippton, the guy with the false teeth.

These six characters were all very well written, each with their own personalities, their own good points and bad.  The plot was extremely character driven, so a lot of time and care was given to developing them.  The incredible hardships that the men were forced to endure on the big screen, made me feel for them.  Add to that the fact that the actors all did a fantastic job, and I became emotionally invested in the story.

For example, the character of Layton started out as a green recruit, while the other men were all seasoned soldiers.  But over the course of the film, he dug trenches, took part in life threatening battles, and watched friends die.  His skin grew thicker, as his attitude became calmer.  Thompson, did a wonderful job of showing the transformation, so that I actually gained a measure of respect for both the character and the actor.

But for me, and apparently for the Academy as well, the stand-out was James Whitmore, playing the role of Kinnie.  He really looked like he embodied the soul of the American soldier.  His character suffered along with everyone else, and yet his spirit never seemed to break.  In the end of the film, it was he who rallied the squad one last time to leave the field of battle with their heads held high.  Whitmore was nominated for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal, though he did not win.  However, he did win a Golden Globe for the role.

The story was certainly inspirational.  There were acts of heroism to lift the spirit performed by American soldiers set against impossible odds.  Sounds a little too Hollywood, custom made for a patriotic public who had recently seen the end of the war, right?  Well, think again.  Apparently the events that took place in the film were quite accurate with only a few deviations from true history.  The biggest example was that of German soldiers posing as American soldiers.  To be sure, that did happen during the war, but in another location.

The screenplay was written by Robert Pirosh, who based it on his own experiences during the Battle of the Bulge.  The realism of the writing became very evident when nearly every character had his own moment of doubt, of wanting to go home, or even run away from the battle.  None of the characters were perfect, and that is what made them so believable.  Pirosh won the Academy Award for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay.

One of the small touches I liked was something obvious, when thought about, but it might have been easily missed.  The men were on the battlefield, surrounded by German soldiers, surviving out in the open during a harsh winter.  The actors all grew beards and just kept getting grungier and dirtier.  It made sense, showing the passage of time during the seven day siege.

Again, I’ll say, I am not a huge fan of war films, but I guess if they are done right, I can enjoy them as much as any other genre.  And Battleground got it right.  Sure, it didn’t take home the Best Picture Oscar, losing to All the King’s Men, but I think maybe it should have won.  It was a much more engaging film.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre – 1948

This was, I’m sorry to say it, a weak film.  It wasn’t a bad film, just a weak one.  It had some interesting performances, fairly believable realism in the sets and costumes, and an un-stereotypical ending for a Hollywood movie.  But the main point of the story seemed a bit farcical.  I know… Hollywood puts out films that stretch credibility all the time, but I hold a Best Picture nominee to a higher standard.

Let me explain.  In a nutshell, the main point of the plot was that the prospect of money is enough to turn good men to murderers and thieves.  That’s it.  The film begins as Fred Dobbs, played by Humphry Bogart, is stranded in Tampico, Mexico.  He has no money, no work, and is forced to beg strangers for a few pesos so he can buy food.  He meets another man in the same situation, Bob Curtain, played by Tim Holt.  Together, they find work doing hard manual labor, employed by a charlatan who tries to cheat them out of the promised wages.

They meet an old prospector, Howard, played by Walter Huston, who agrees to guide them into the wilderness to dig for gold.  But he warns them that gold changes a man.  A good man might do anything for the rare treasure, even murder his best friend for it.  The three men set out into bandit-infested wilderness and set up their mining operation.  They find about $75,000.00 in gold dust and divide it between the three of them.

But this is where the plot really made me roll my eyes.  Dobbs begins talking to himself and becomes wildly paranoid, thinking that his partners are after his gold.  The three partners take their treasure and head for home.  Along the way, Howard leaves Dobbs and Curtain to help a sick boy in a small Mexican village, entrusting his share of the gold to the two men.

Dobbs then starts behaving as if he has completely lost all his marbles.  He changes from a somewhat sane man, to a murderer and a thief.  He shoots Curtain and takes off into the desert alone with all the gold.  I don’t know.  I was reminded of how cartoon characters behave when a pretty girl walks by.  As soon as they lay eyes on her they start panting, drooling, and hooting.  Their jaws hit the floor and in a microsecond, they become senseless morons.  Dobbs’ reaction to the gold was very similar, almost cartoonish in its absurdity.  Does gold really make men act like that? Only in the movies, I think.

Along the way they have to fight off Mexican bandits who are smart enough to rob trains and out-maneuver the Mexican Federales, but dumb enough to not know what gold dust is.  The leader of these stupid criminals, known only as Gold Hat, played by Alfonso Bedoya, has the only line in the movie that actually became a famous quote.  He and his banditos try to convince the three prospectors that they, themselves are the Mexican police, Dobbs asks them where their badges are.  He responds, “Badges? We ain’t got no badges. We don’t need no badges! I don’t have to show you any stinkin’ badges!”

Bogart’s performance really wasn’t anything special because he just seemed to play himself.  There seemed to be nothing new about his portrayal, and unfortunately, I am starting to see this as a trend with him.  I liked Tim Holt’s performance as the honest Curtain well enough, but it was Walter Huston that really caught my attention.  As the seasoned prospector, he not only looked the part, but the character was well written.  He was the wise old man who had been through it all before and taught the two stupid young men what real gold prospecting was all about.  He was a likable character and Huston did a great job.

Apparently, according to my research on Wikipedia, the film followed the original book very closely, so I have to give them credit for that.  Also, I learned that this was one of the first Hollywood films to be shot on location outside the U.S.

But I also found something else that lends a little credence to my earlier statement, saying that this was a bit of a weak film.  A Wikipedia quote says that “The film is often described as a story about the corrupting influence of greed.  Film critic Roger Ebert enlarged upon this idea, saying that ‘The movie has never really been about gold but about character.’  However, the ability of the film to comment on human nature generally has been questioned, in view of the fact that Dobbs’ character is so evidently flawed from the beginning.”  That is exactly what I thought!

And then there was the ending.  Humphry Bogart was a pretty big name at the time, and he had top billing.  But his was the only character in the film to die.  I was surprised that Hollywood would kill off their big star, but as the man who tried to murder his friend and steal all the gold, he had to get his just punishment before the end of the movie.  It was the badgeless banditos that did it.  Then, just to prove how dumb they were, they dumped all the gold dust into the wind of a dust storm, believing it to be nothing more than bags of sand.  Oh well.  Easy come, easy go.  Such are the whims of fortune.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Snake Pit – 1948

I have to start this review off by saying, right up front, how incredibly impressed I was by Olivia de Havilland’s outstanding performance.  The movie is about a woman’s struggle to find her sanity while being treated at a mental hospital.

Right from the opening scene, it is clearly evident that her character, Virginia, is bonkers.  She doesn’t know who or where she is.  She hears voices in her head.  She doesn’t recognize the people she is with.  She is perpetually confused and disoriented, and de Havilland really showed off her skills as an actress to perfection.  She was magnificent.

However, the Academy decided to give the Best Actress Oscar for 1948 to Jane Wyman in Johnny Belinda, which I have not yet seen.  But I’ll be honest – Wyman had better turn in a phenomenal performance, or I’ll know that de Havilland got robbed.  The character of Virginia was incredibly complex.  Not only does she have all the problems I have already mentioned, but she had no short-term memory, and a sketchy long-term memory.  She’d had problems in her past that were rooted in her childhood, and traumas in her adult life that would test anyone’s sanity.

At the start of the film, she is already in the mental hospital, though she thinks she is a novelist, doing research in a prison for her next book.  She is frightened and confused when she and the other patients are rounded up from the yard and herded into the hospital which is depicted as little more than a bedlam-esque mad-house.

Screeching and moaning women are kept in overcrowded wards, attended by a staff that is far too small.  The hospital administration cannot afford to hold all the patients, and are doing their best to release as many of them as they can, whether they are well or not.  Some women seem saner than others, like Virginia’s friend, Grace, played by Celeste Holm, whom she does not remember.

There is a doctor who cares about his patients on a fundamental level and truly wants them to heal and grow strong enough to survive in the real world.  His name is Dr. Mark Kik, played by Leo Genn.  Genn’s performance was appropriately calm and gentle, making him a likable character.  As a last resort, and in an effort to make contact with Virginia and bring her back to reality, he prescribes shock therapy.

This is the third Best Picture nominated film I’ve seen that made use of shock therapy on a patient in a mental hospital, and it is never comfortable to watch.  The other two were both Best Picture winners: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest in 1975 and A Beautiful Mind in 2001.  It is always shown as a horribly painful experience that left the victim in a near catatonic state.  This film was no different, however, there was a slight difference.  Here, the treatment actually seemed to do the patient some good.

Virginia eventually begins to remember where she is and why she is there.  She goes through a long period of coming to terms with being crazy, all the while being helped by her husband Robert, played by Mark Stevens.  From there, the movie follows her struggles, her ups and downs, as she strives to discover and deal with the traumatic events in her past which caused her to lose touch with reality.

The film’s title seems self-evident, but there is actually a deeper and more specific meaning.  After the character of Virginia acts out and is punished with a straight jacket and solitary confinement, she is sent to the worst ward of the hospital, Ward 12, despite the progress made with Dr. Kik.  The women in Ward 12 are the violent and mentally deranged.  Virginia called it the snake pit because she remembered a story which said that in the past, mental patients were thrown into snake pits to shock them back into reality.

And that is exactly what happened to her.  Realizing that she had reached rock-bottom, she understood that she wasn’t nearly as crazy as the women of Ward 12.  And even though she was still confused about some of the psychological causes of her mental illness, she was able put herself on the road to recovery.

So the film had a happy ending, which was like a final form of relief for me.  I had spent the entire film in a state of nervous tension.  De Havilland had a face that looked innocent and vulnerable.  She invited viewers to empathize with her and feel sympathetic to her plight.  She effectively portrayed the entire gambit of emotions that the character of Virginia required, and she did it all with a sense of purpose and an intense dedication to the role.

As a result, the film wasn’t always easy to watch, but it was well worth the Best Picture nomination.  In fact, I think it should have won over Sir Lawrence Olivier’s Hamlet.  But that’s just my opinion.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Red Shoes – 1948

The first thing that comes to mind when I think of The Red Shoes is the term Art Film.  This was a piece of art.  The lead actress, Moira Shearer, not only had to look gorgeous, but she had to be able to act a very dramatic role, and dance her feet off.

Sure, we have seen other dance films strutting their stuff at the Academy Awards – mostly Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly.  But their style of dance was a very Hollywood style.  Their dancing was jazz dance and tap.  They both used elements of ballet, but neither was true ballet.  Shearer was a real ballerina.  Her dancing was pure ballet.

Now, I have never been a huge follower of the art form, but I must say that the dancing in The Red Shoes was phenomenal.  To my uneducated eyes, the dancing was graceful and fluid, complex and incredibly physically demanding.  And nobody in the cast had a more difficult job than Shearer.  She was wonderful to watch, even for a guy like me, who knows nothing about the world of professional ballet.

The story is loosely based on the gruesome fairy tale by Hans Christian Anderson, The Red Shoes, in which a vain young girl loves her red shoes so much that she wears them everywhere.  Even when her step-mother is ill, she wears them to a party.  Then the shoes start to relentlessly dance on their own, forcing the girl to dance herself to death.  So let that be a lesson to all you young girls out there.  Beware of vanity!

But the filmmakers wrote a modern story about Vicky Page, played by Shearer, a ballerina who has the potential to be a great star, thanks to the patronage of and guidance of the impresario of the ballet, Boris Lermontov, played by Anton Walbrook.  He takes her under his wing and molds her into the best dancer the world has ever seen.  The only trick is that she can never marry, for such a thing would ruin her as a ballet super-star.

The plot has also been following the character of a brilliant young composer named Julian Craster, played by Marius Goring, who Lermontov employs with similar promises of greatness.  He commissions Julian to write the ballet, The Red Shoes, as a vehicle for Vicky to attain her stardom.  So what happens?  Of course, Lermontov’s two young protégés fall hopelessly in love with each other.  They marry and Vicky leaves the ballet.

The ballet sequence was really the film’s highlight.  It was a 15 minute long sequence that had surprisingly good special effects, wonderful music that was written specifically for the film by composer Brian Easdale.  Within the ballet, Vicky’s beautiful dancing took her from the stage to various surrealistic landscapes, dancing with figures made of cellophane, making several costume changes, and watching fellow dancers blink in and out of existence, as only the medium of film can do.  It was beautiful to watch.

The trouble was that this was only about half way through the movie.  The ballet was the starting point for the romance between Vicky and Julian.  But it was also the last of the movie’s dancing.  It nearly made the rest of the film anti-climactic.

The rest of the film covered the romance and the tragic consequences of the romance, culminating with Vicky’s suicidal death.  It was a cleverly written, though vague, mirror of the original fairy tale, in which Vicky’s dancing became more important to her than the love of her life.  At that point, knowing that her husband, Julian, is leaving her for good, and knowing that she cannot stop dancing, even for him, she kills herself.

Her death scene was a little more gory than I was expecting, which I totally respect.  In Hollywood, during those decades of filmmaking, when a character is run over by a horse carriage or falls from a high building, there is generally no blood.  No need to disturb the audience with believable blood and gore.

But The Red Shoes took a more realistic angle.  After Vicky threw herself from a balcony to get hit by a passing train, she should be pretty messed up, physically, and she was!  Sure, they didn’t show severed limbs or protruding bones, but she did have blood all over her, bloody scrapes and cuts, and her clothes were shredded.  That’s more than most movies would have shown, so kudos to this one.

Just as an interesting little note:  In the film’s ballet of The Red Shoes, the exhausted dancer is at death’s door and asks a priest to remove the shoes.  When he does, she dies.  In Hans Anderson’s original fairy tale, the girl asks an executioner to cut off her feet, which he does.  But even then, the severed feet continue to dance in the shoes, blocking her from going to church to ask God’s forgiveness for her vanity.  Wow, Mr. Anderson… Wow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Johnny Belinda – 1948

This was a good film that starred Jane Wyman as a young deaf-mute in Nova Scotia.  What made the film so good was the engaging plot, which was easy to follow and well written.  But before getting into why it was such a good movie, I have to have my say about the fact that Jane Wyman took home the Oscar for Best Actress for her portrayal, beating out Olivia de Havilland in The Snake Pit.  Olivia – you were robbed!

But this review isn’t about that.  It is about the virtues of Johnny Belinda, and its exceptional cast of actors.  Wyman, of course, played the female lead, Belinda McDonald.  As a deaf-mute, everyone on the Island of Cape Breton, including her father, Black, played by Charles Bickford, and her Aunt Aggie, played by Agnes Moorhead, thought she was stupid and retarded.

But the new doctor in the town, Dr. Richardson, played by Lew Ayres, doesn’t believe it.  He learns sign language well enough to teach it to her, and establishes communication.  He discovers that she is really intelligent and, goes out of his way to educate her.

But the real drama of the plot begins when the town’s resident bully and womanizer, Locky, played by Stephen McNally, sees Belinda as she is blossoming from an ignorant young girl into an attractive young woman.  He gets drunk and rapes her.  The rape scene was significant on a number of levels, the most prominent of which was that pesky Hayes Code.  Rape was considered an unsuitable subject for the movie-going audiences of the time.  Johnny Belinda, however, is considered the first Hollywood film to get around the Code on the subject.

It also really set up the drama for the rest of the film.  Imagine being a deaf mute whose ability to communicate is not very strong.  If you are violently raped, how do you tell anyone what happened?  You’re still working on signs for “father” and “thank you.”  It made me horrified for her character who had to endure the crime in silence.

But then we learn that the rape produced a child.  This is where the supporting cast of actors, Bickford and Moorhead, really got to shine.  The shock and anger that came out was real and believable.  Moorhead, in particular did a fantastic job in the heart-wrenching scene where she learns of the girl’s pregnancy.  She curses herself for being so hard on Belinda and promises to take care of her.

Bickford also had his moments, like when he learns of the baby, when the baby is being born, and, when he finally figures out who had raped his daughter.  He fights Lockey but unfortunately is killed.

It turns out that Belinda is an excellent mother and loves her son, Johnny (hence the film’s title), enough to kill for him.  When Locky, knowing that the boy is his, tries to take him from Belinda, she shoots him dead.  Then there’s a trial, in which Belinda is accused of murder, and the truth finally comes out.  Locky’s wife, Stella, played by Jan Sterling, who had learned what really happened, breaks down and tells the court everything.  Belinda is released and gets to keep her baby.  But just to give the film an even more uplifting ending, Dr. Richardson, who has fallen in love with Belinda, takes her and Johnny away to live happily ever after.  Yay Hollywood!

The film had a great story to work with, but my problem is that they just didn’t take it far enough.  First of all, there was the rape scene.  Granted, it was new territory for movies and they handled it well enough.  But they could have done a much better job with Belinda’s reaction.  It wasn’t anywhere near intense enough.  Belinda was a young and innocent girl who had just been raped, with no way to tell anyone what had happened.  But all that happens is just that she becomes sullen and unresponsive for a while, until Dr. Richardson shows up and gets her to visit another physician with him.  Then, she is apparently fine.  Even seeing Locky at church doesn’t get that much of a reaction out of her.  She shies away a little and turns her head, but that’s it.  There was so much opportunity for a more intense performance, but it was all missed.

And that brings me to my second problem with the film.  Wyman’s performance was good, but it could have been great.  The whole thing was too calm and demure.  If she didn’t seem to feel strongly about what was happening to her, then why, as a viewer, should I?

Just as a fun little last thought, there was a wonderful line in the film that might have been easy to miss, but it had me laughing out loud.  When the town’s old ladies are gossiping, one says of Stella, “She’s her own worst enemy,” to which another replies, “Not as long as I’m alive, she isn’t.”  What a great line!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Miracle on 34^th Street – 1947

Now, this was a perfect example of a Christmas movie.  It was a story about whether or not Santa Clause is real.  It starred Natalie Wood, Maureen O’Hara, John Payne, and Edmund Gwenn.  It was a fun movie with a feel-good ending.  It was also schmaltzy, and overwhelmingly sweet.  Those two things are not mutually exclusive.

I’ll also say right away that the version I received from Netflix was a colorized version of the film, which is really too bad.  I would rather have seen it in the original black and white.  The colorization was alright, but not terribly bright.  It all looked like it had a slightly gray gel over the picture, giving the whole thing a very faded look.  I find that I don’t really care for colorized movies.  It takes me out of the story when I can’t help noticing how much the images LOOK colorized.

The story starts with a jolly-looking old man in a suit walking down the street in New York.  He stops at a store window as a man is setting up a display featuring Santa and his reindeer.  The old man tells the shop owner that the flying animals are in the wrong order, implying that he believes himself to be the very man he resembles, Kris Kringle.

He is indignant when he finds a drunk man dressed as Santa, getting ready to ride on the float in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.  He talks to the parade’s director, Doris Walker, played by O’Hara, and takes the man’s place.  He is a hit, and is so popular that he is given a job as Santa for Macy’s department store.

He is wonderful with the children, and has some strange ideas when it comes to promising them the toys that their parents might not be able to get.  He even goes so far as to send parents to other stores if Macy’s does not have what they want.

 

Back at home with Doris, Natalie Wood played the part of her daughter, Susan.    Doris has a policy of raising her daughter to not believe in fairy tales, fictional stories, or anything of the kind.  That includes Santa Clause.  Doris’s handsome young neighbor, Fred Gailey, played by Payne, is a lawyer who is trying to gain Doris’s affections by befriending Susan.

The leads were all perfectly cast.  First of all, Wood was wonderful.  Even as a child she was attractive, and a good actress to boot.  And I’m happy to say that she did not break the cardinal sin of movie-making.  She was cute, but not because she was trying to be.  She just was.  Her part was well written and well played.  Child actors could learn a thing or two from her wonderful performance.

O’Hara was also good.  She was no-nonsense, but not mean.  She had a sense of humor, and a sense of frustration throughout the film that surfaced when she started getting reports that the Santa she’d hired actually believed that he was the real Santa Clause.  The character was a single mother, though the film never really explained what happened to Susan’s father.

Next was Payne.  The film didn’t really focus on the romance between Fred and Doris, though it certainly didn’t shy away from it either.  Payne played Fred with such a likeable ease that it was easy to imagine love blooming between the two.  He easily bowed to her wishes when it came to raising her daughter, but not when it came to his own principles.

But though all their performances were superb, the real stand out of the cast was Edmund Gwenn.  He was instantly likeable and pleasant.  He had a gentle smile that made you feel at ease.  It was a smile full of generosity and light-hearted good will, just like the man in the red suit should have.  And you could tell that the actor was comfortable in the role.  There wasn’t a bit of angst or malice in him.  Gwenn played the role to perfection.

In fact, he was so good that he won the academy award for Best Supporting Actor that year, though maybe he should have been nominated for Best Actor instead.  Santa Claus was the lead in this film, not the lawyer who defended him.  But John Payne was a bigger name, so they gave him top billing, even though his character was not the central character.  But if that had happened, Gwenn would have been up against other leading actors like Ronald Coleman, Gregory Peck, John Garfield, and William Powell.  Up against those names, he wouldn’t have won his Oscar.

This was a fun movie.  There was much more to the plot, of course, mostly having to do with Kringle being put on trial for claiming to be real Santa Caluse, but it had humor and heart, and it also had a bit of brains as well.  It certainly had an element of fantasy and wonder that was refreshing.  There was nothing heavy, nothing really dramatic except for a few brief scenes.  And the ending was one that made me smile, despite myself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Great Expectations – 1947

Goodness gracious!  Charles Dickens is a one-trick pony!  If I see one more film based on a Dickens novel in which a young boy, usually a poor orphan, is raised by cruel and harsh people, is sent somewhere where he finds great fortune and a pretty girl around his own age, grows up, becomes a gentleman, has a life of big drama, and eventually finds happiness with the girl, who he has never stopped loving, I’m going to scream!

And there you have it, ladies and gentlemen.  That is the plot of Great Expectations, in a nutshell.  It is also the plot of Oliver Twist, David Copperfield, and Nicholas Nickleby.  Only the names have been changed to pretend that the stories are different.  True, Dickens has also turned out some unique novels like A Tale of Two Cities and A Christmas Carol.  But I’ll even go a step further than that, and admit that those are about all of his many works that I am familiar with.  Maybe there are more unique Dickens novels of which I am not aware.

But I am here to review the film, not the book.  The movie was made well enough; the actors did a good job, the music was fine, and from what my research has told me, the script was true to the source material, which I appreciate.  In the opening scene, as young Pip, played by Anthony Wager, is visiting his mother’s grave on a foggy evening, he is accosted by the dangerous escaped convict, Abel Magwitch, played by Finlay Currie, who forces him to promise to retrieve food and a file to remove his shackles.  The promise is made, and Pip is too honest to break his word, even if it was given under duress.

Later, he is roughly forced to go to the local crazy lady’s house to play for her – not with her but for her.  Her name is Miss Havisham, played by Martita Hunt.  Many years previous, she was unlucky enough to be jilted on her wedding day, causing her to lose her sanity.  She spent the rest of her life in the banquet hall as it decayed in to a filthy ruin.  Creepy!

While there, Pip meets Estella, played by Jean Simmons, an adopted girl who Miss Havisham has taught to be cruel to all men.  She treats Pip like a bug, but occasionally shows him a wisp of kindness.  Of course, Pip falls hopelessly in love with her anyway.  Then, after a few years, from out of nowhere, a mysterious benefactor sends lawyer, Mr. Jaggers, played very well by Frances L Sullivan, to take the teenage boy to London.  There, he gives Pip a healthy allowance and charges him the task of becoming a proper gentleman.

A few more years go by and he is reacquainted with a grown-up Estella, played by Valerie Hobson.  The only character I have not mentioned is Pip’s best friend, Herbert Pocket, played by Alec Guiness.  He doesn’t really have much to do with the plot, except that he helps Pip with his difficulties in the latter half of the film.

Unfortunately, there was very little about the plot that was unexpected, and I’ve already spent too much time on it, in any case.  Instead, I’ll go over the things about the film that stood out to me as good.

First, I’ll mention the costumes.  It was a period piece, so costumes from the 1850s were called for.  They seemed to get everything right, though there was one thing that looked out of place.  When Pip first arrives in London, he is dress in a gentleman’s clothing with a huge, stiff, white bow at his neck that was as big as his head.  Sure the director wanted him to visually stand out on the screen, but it looked ridiculous.

Second, I’ll examine the performance of Martita Hunt.  She played the spooky Miss Havisham well.  The slow and ethereal speech patterns, the languid movements, and the barely disguised misandry (the hatred of the male gender) all added up to make an interesting, if not likable, character.  Hunt did a good job, making the insanity almost believable.  The crazy hair and the tattered wedding gown, helped to complete the look of one who has lost touch with reality.  Also, her tragic demise took me by surprise.  As Pip angrily leaves her room, a stray coal from the fireplace sets her on fire.  She begins screaming and ignites like a Roman candle.  Pretty horrific, actually.

And lastly, I’ll mention the exceptional performance of Francis Sullivan.  The role of the lawyer is actually one that I wouldn’t expect to be memorable, but Sullivan brought both pomposity and kind, discerning morals to the character at the appropriate times.  He did a good job, using expressive, but not over-exaggerated, facial expressions to convey his dialogue, making him interesting to watch.

I suppose the film was made well enough, but I just wasn’t impressed with the source material.  I don’t get why the literary world is so impressed with Dicken’s rehashing of the same story over and over again.  Well, at least it was only a nominee and not a winner.