Showing posts with label drama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label drama. Show all posts
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| Jeanne Eagels is obsessed with Herbert Marshall |
"Your whole life is wrapped up in rubber!"
In this early sound film, the famous Jeanne Eagels plays the role later essayed by Bette Davis, the bored wife on the rubber plantation who shoots her lover again and again when he tries to leave her. Although not as good as William Wyler's remake, this is a creditable and interesting picture, with good performances. Eagels perhaps underplays too much in her courtroom scene, but she gets better, and certainly works herself up into an impressive lather when she finally tells her husband (Reginald Owen) what she really thinks of him. Herbert Marshall played the husband in the remake, but in this he's the lover, who has a good scene at the opening [which is not recreated in the Wyler version]. Lady Tsen Mei plays Li Ti, the role essayed by Gale Sondergaard in the remake, and O. P. Heggie is the lawyer. The production code not being in place in 1929, this picture has a less, shall we say, conclusive ending. The whole story is a twisted anti-romance. Kim Novak played the actress in the biopic Jeanne Eagels.
Verdict: A great opportunity to see the famous Eagels on film. ***.
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| Alice Faye and Dana Andrews |
" ... and love alone can make the fallen angel rise, for only two together can enter paradise."
In a small coastal town not far from San Francisco, ex-publicity man Eric Stanton (Dana Andrews) has set his sights on the wealthy June Mills (Alice Faye), whose sister, Clara (Anne Revere), may be a tougher nut to crack. Then there's sexy waitress, Stella (Linda Darnell), who may throw a monkey wrench into Eric's schemes if he's not careful. A murder investigation ensues, which brings in tough detective Mark Judd (Charles Bickford), and a suspect named Dave Atkins (Bruce Cabot). Fallen Angel can be looked upon as a mystery, film noir, or whatever you want to call it, but it's full of such good performances and nice moments that it emerges as a strong (if flawed) and compelling drama. In a different role for her, Faye [On The Avenue] is excellent as a woman who loves someone unconditionally -- she has a particularly good moment telling Eric how she feels about him -- Darnell [Day-Time Wife] is vivid and vital as the saucy waitress, and Andrews [Boomerang] gives another sharp and solid performance, playing a man who is more complex than he first appears. Revere, Cabot, Bickford, as well as John Carradine as a professor and Percy Kilbride as a cafe owner with feelings for Stella, are all on the mark. The story is, perhaps, wrapped up a bit too neatly, but this is an engrossing and interesting movie.
Verdict: One of Preminger's better efforts. ***.
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| Barbara Stanwyck and Regis Toomey |
Kitty Lane (Barbara Stanwyck), a girl from the wrong side of the tracks, winds up as a waitress in a literally greasy spoon where she meets David Livingstone (Regis Toomey). David wants to marry Kitty, but his termagant, selfish mother (Clara Blandick) refuses to countenance the idea of her son, who's studying to be a doctor, marrying a common waitress, and trumps up charges against her with the aid of an odious judge friend [it's quite satisfying watching Toomey give this creep a knock-out punch]. Years later Kitty has become a famous Broadway star, of course, and David comes calling ... can this love be rekindled and will mama allow it to happen? Stanwyck is fine in a Joan Crawford rags-to-riches role, and Toomey is very adept and appealing. The developments are unlikely, the script mediocre, but the stars manage to put it over if nothing else. Zazu Pitts plays yet another dithery friend of the heroine's. Blandick is fine as the mother from Hell. Toomey later did such TV shows as Shannon and Grinde directed a great many movies, including a few Boris Karloff thrillers such as The Man They Could Not Hang.
Verdict: Stanwyck is almost always watchable in anything and she's made worse. **.
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| Dan Duryea on the phone while Gordon Gebert listens |
CHICAGO CALLING (1951). Director: John Reinhardt.
In this undeservedly forgotten and unusual drama, Dan Duryea [Too Late for Tears] plays Bill Cannon, an unemployed husband and father in L.A. who at times drinks a little too much. His wife takes their little girl and leaves for Chicago, after which he gets a telegram saying that the child was injured in a car accident, and that his wife, Mary (Mary Anderson) will call with news the next day. There are two problems, however: a man (Ross Elliott) has come from the phone company to remove the phone due to an overdue bill; and Cannon has no idea which hospital his daughter is in or how to reach his wife. What follows are his attempts to get money to pay the phone company, eventually putting him in contact with a fatherless boy, Bobby (Gordon Gebert), who hits Cannon's dog with his bicycle and wants to give him his savings to pay the phone company. [Cannon's interactions with the boy would raise eyebrows today, but in this film it's all very innocent, although some might argue that even in 1951 Cannon's hanging around with Bobby, entering his bedroom at night, and so on would be questionable behavior.] Things spiral down inexorably to a very moving conclusion. Director Reinhardt isn't able to sustain the tension all the way through, however, and while Duryea's performance is quite good, at times he seems a little too calm considering the feelings his character is going through; he is wonderful in the final quarter, though, when he has to pull out all the stops. Gebert is one of the most talented child actors I've ever seen, and Anderson [Lifeboat], Elliott [Tarantula], and the rest of the supporting cast are all notable. Gritty location filming adds to the film's impact as well.
Verdict: It this had been made in Italy it would probably be considered a classic. ***.
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| Jon Voight and Jane Fonda |
Sally Hyde (Jane Fonda of Joy House) is married to Captain Bob Hyde (Bruce Dern of Family Plot), who is fighting in Vietnam. During his absence she decides to volunteer at a military hospital where injured soldiers are being treated and recuperating. One of those soldiers, Luke (Jon Voight of National Treasure) is an angry fellow with paralyzed legs, and someone Sally used to go to school with. The two are drawn into a friendship, and then a physical and emotional love affair, and then Bob comes home ... Although Coming Home couldn't have been made during Hollywood's Golden Age for obvious reasons [and very differing attitudes], one still suspects that this could have been a truly great film had it been crafted by, say, William Wyler. Hal Ashby [Shampoo] isn't quite up to the task, and some important scenes have less dramatic heft because of it. Still Coming Home does examine the varying attitudes of the country during the Vietnam conflict, the experiences of some soldiers when they come home bent and broken, the changing role of women and housewives, and adds a poignant romantic dilemma to all of it as well. The script sort of lets you down just when it most needs to be working, unfortunately. Jane Fonda and Jon Voight are okay -- Voight has a particularly good scene when he's talking to college students -- but Dern, in the least sympathetic role [until the end] pretty much walks off with the picture. Penelope Milford makes an impression as Sally's new friend, Vi, and Robert Carradine does the best he can with the under-written role of her mentally disturbed veteran brother, Billy. The soundtrack consists of some evocative seventies rock music, often used quite adroitly. A sub-plot in which Sally tries to get the women who run the hospital newspaper to run articles that may actually be helpful to the recovering vets and is rebuffed is important but dropped too quickly. Dern was also the murder victim in Hush ... Hush, Sweet Charlotte. Ashby also directed Being There with Peter Sellers.
Verdict: Just misses being a great movie. ***.
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| Mediocre duo: Nigel Davenport and Jean Wallace |
Extreme pollution and a grain-destroying virus have combined to cause hunger and even cannibalism in parts of the world, and citizens of the UK are afraid it isn't long before the same thing happens to them. John Custance (Nigel Davenport), his wife, Ann (Jean Wallace), their children, and friend Roger (John Hamill) take off for a farm in the countryside but have a hell of a time getting there. Along the way they hook up with Pirrie (Anthony May), a casual murderer, but they descend into savagery just as much as everyone else. Eventually Custance is pitted against his own brother ... No Blade of Grass is well-directed by Cornel Wilde [The Naked Prey] -- who does not appear in the film but offers some narration -- but can't overcome its weak script and the miscasting of its two mediocre leads, Davenport [A Man for All Seasons] and Wallace [Jigsaw], although there are good performances from members of the supporting cast. There are some arresting sequences, such as the harrowing business when the family tries to get out of a mob-ruled city by car, and a tense stand-off between Custance and Pirrie over the daughter, Mary (Lynne Frederick). George Coulouris [Citizen Kane] has a small role as a gun shop owner. Despite all of the very grim goings-on, No Blade of Grass manages to become quite tedious after awhile. There is hardly a sympathetic character in sight.
Verdict: Unremittingly depressing, and not good enough to compensate for it. **.
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| Deborah Kerr and Richard Burton |
"Don't make me take steps, Dr. Shannon ..." -- Judith Fellowes.
The former minister T. Lawrence Shannon (Richard Burton), who was locked out of his church, is now guiding ladies on a tour bus through Mexico. Young Charlotte Goodall (Sue Lyon) can't keep her hands off Shannon, inspiring the ire of her formidable guardian Judith Fellowes (Grayson Hall). Shannon takes the gals to a small hotel run by an old friend, Maxine Faulk (Ava Gardner), whose husband died a short while ago. While some of the tourist ladies put up a fuss, Maxine reluctantly admits the impoverished artist Hannah Jelkes (Deborah Kerr) and her aged poet father, Nonno (Cyril Delevanti) to her hostel. As these characters interact and Shannon faces dismissal from the tour business, will the man finally find himself "at the end of his rope," like one of the iguanas tied to the stairs? Like many Williams' adaptations The Night of the Iguana is a mix of the poetic and the pretentious, but it does have some very tender moments. Burton, Lyon and Delevanti walk off with the acting honors. Grayson hall [House of Dark Shadows] is a bit overwrought, almost ridiculous at times, as Judith, but the whole idea of the fire-breathing repressed lesbian is terribly dated. Deborah Kerr [Edward, My Son] is good, but she doesn't quite get across the weary defeatedness of someone who is a caregiver to a man in his nineties [walking him around Mexico in the heat with little money could almost be considered elder abuse], and is apparently homeless besides -- where is the sheer desperation she would be feeling? Gardner [Seven Days in May] is not bad at all and suitably earthy; Bette Davis played the role on the stage. The poem that Nonno completes, written by Williams, of course, is beautiful. Despite its flaws, the movie casts a certain exotic and haunting spell.
Verdict: Imperfect but entertaining and well-acted, with some interesting characters. ***.
Iris Hartford (Lola Albright) has been disappointed by the men in her life, so she decides to slap the make on a boy this time, the super's 17-year-old son, Vito (Scott Marlowe). The two fall in love, but Vito can't deal with Iris' profession. Right away the movie has a problem because Scott Marlowe was actually 29 at the time of filming, and looks considerably older, so the whole idea of a supposed twenty year age difference is completely lost; Albright was 36. Marlowe gives a good performance, but can't quite compensate for his miscasting. Albright is much more interesting in this than she was in her white bread role on Peter Gunn, but the greatest actress in the world would have trouble making the confused and confusing, underwritten Iris come alive. Joe De Santis scores as Vito's father, Mr. Pellegrino, and Herschel Bernardi, also from Peter Gunn, is excellent as a "friend" of Iris who is clearly in love with her. Perhaps the most notable performance is given by Clarke Gordon as Iris' desperate ex-husband, Harry. This script should probably never have been filmed, at least not with these leads. Singer also directed Love Has Many Faces with Lana Turner.
Verdict: Under-baked, with titillation that goes nowhere slowly. **.
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| Everett Sloane talks to Jack Palance |
THE BIG KNIFE (1955). Producer/director: Robert Aldrich. Screenplay by James Poe from the play by Clifford Odets.
Movie star Charles Castle (Jack Palance) was involved in a hit and run that killed a child, but his p.r. man, Buddy (Paul Langton), took the rap for him. Charles' wife, Marion (Ida Lupino), who is separated from him, swears she'll divorce him if he re-signs with Stanley Hoff (Rod Steiger), who probably helped engineer the deception. Now there's a new complication: Castle had a woman with him in the car that night, Dixie Evans (Shelly Winters), and she's drunkenly shooting her mouth off everywhere she goes. Now Hoff and his associate Smiley (Wendell Corey), want to take care of Dixie -- permanently ... The Big Knife might have worked on the stage, and the Odets original was undoubtedly better than this half-baked adaptation, but the film sinks almost from the get-go. The chief problem is the epic miscasting of Jack Palance. Charlie might have evoked some sympathy in the viewer if he was played by a man who could get across his essential weakness and confusion, but Palance seems incapable of ever displaying the slightest trace of vulnerability. It gives the actor his presence and strength, but he's just all wrong for this picture. His scenes with Ida Lupino are stagey and over-rehearsed and just don't work at all -- both of them are busy "acting" instead of being. We're constantly being told of how wonderful Castle is and of his supposed integrity, but all we see is a corrupt, self-absorbed individual who allowed another man to take responsibility for his actions, slept with the man's wife, and acts like a dickhead throughout. When he protests at the idea of "silencing" Dixie, it's hard to believe that he would object -- he's the last one to take a high moral stance. It's up to the supporting cast to give the film whatever limited stature it has. Rod Steiger has some ferociously effective scenes as Stanley [some might think he's merely showing off]; Wendell Corey underplays beautifully as the slimy Smily; Everett Sloane is as solid as ever as Charles' agent; and Paul Langton has a beautifully and powerfully delivered speech to Castle at the end of the film that is one of the most memorable bits in the movie. As for the women, Ilka Chase offers a dead-on portrait of an oily, if stereotypical, gossip columnist, Shelley Winters is so-so as Dixie, and Jean Hagen fails to impress as Buddy's sluttish wife, Connie. Wesley Addy has a nice turn as the writer Hank Teagle. Oddly, a confrontation between Dixie and Hoff that might have been quite cinematic and dynamic is mentioned but not shown, but the film isn't "opened" up very much. It's hard to like or enjoy a movie in which virtually every character is either unpleasant or annoying. Robert Aldrich was the wrong director for this, as well. For a worthwhile Odets adaptation, see Clash By Night.
Verdict: A fairly embarrassing mess of Hollywood pseudo-profundity with horribly miscast leads. **.
THE TOWERING INFERNO (1974). Director: John Guillermin. Action scenes directed by producer Irwin Allen.
Warner Brothers and 20th Century Fox each had rights to two separate novels with the same theme: "The Tower" and "The Glass Inferno" both had to do with massive fires in high-rise buildings. The two studios cooperated on one film combining aspects of both stories, thus The Towering Inferno. During an inaugural party in the penthouse of the world's tallest building in San Francisco, a fire breaks out and gets worse and worse as firemen try to cope with the disaster. People are trapped in the Promenade room as other horrible incidents occur on the floors below. As some individuals try to make their way down to the ground far below, the others at the party enact a desperate scheme to save themselves and put out the fire at the same time. Everything is hampered and things made worse by the fact that against the architect's orders a man named Simmons (Richard Chamberlain), the builder's son-in-law, saved money by ignoring the fire codes and safety procedures.
Watching Inferno today with memories of 9/11 in your head makes for a distinctly uncomfortable experience. That being said, Allen has put together a suspenseful and often terrifying movie that grips you for its full length and never lets go. Among the more gut-wrenching scenes are the one where a group tries to get past a shattered, swinging metal staircase, and the horrifying business in the scenic elevator, during which Jennifer Jones' character plunges to a grotesque death. There are a very few moments of pathos in the movie, but most of it is tension and terror. Paul Newman is fine as the architect, an ordinary man, who watches his dream project collapsing and tries to save lives, although Steve McQueen is unemotional throughout as the fire chief. William Holden is the builder, Faye Dunaway is Newman's lover, Fred Astaire is an aging con man, Robert Vaughn is a senator, and Susan Blakely is Holden's daughter, and all are fine. John Williams' score helps sustain the tension. O. J. Simpson is also in the movie,, but that's a disaster of a different kind. Guillermin also directed The Whole Truth and the first terrible remake of King Kong.
Verdict: Not exactly a pleasant experience but certainly well done. ***1/2.
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| An Emma Bovary with Something Extra |
In this loose adaptation of Gustave Flaubert's "Madame Bovary," Emma (Edwige Fenech) is married to a country doctor (Gerhard Riedmann) but has affairs with Rudolf Boulanger (Peter Carsten) and young Leon Dupuis (Gianni Dei) while dodging the admiring creditor Adolphe Lheureus (Franco Ressel). Major changes to the story include Boulanger being willing to pay off Emma's debts [which he never does in any other version, pleading poverty], and Emma having sex with Lheureus in exchange for a batch of IOUs. Fenech seems to have been cast for her body, which is undraped as often as possible, while the male cast members seem not to have been cast for their looks; Fenech's acting seems adequate as does the others'. This is an adaptation of a French novel made by a combined German-Italian production company with a French-born star and dubbed into Italian. Fenech's eye make up is way overdone but her fans won't be looking at her eyes.
Verdict: Watch Jennifer Jones in Madame Bovary instead -- or even Beyond the Forest. **.
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| Greta Garbo and Marie Dressler share a cocktail |
"If my old man don't help me, it's men again. Men all the time."
In this loose adaptation of Eugene O'Neill's play, the first film in which "Garbo Talks," coal barge captain Chris Christopherson (George F. Marion) is nervous because the daughter he hasn't seen in may years is coming to town. Chris' companion, Marthy (Marie Dressler), agrees to move off the barge to make way for Anna (Greta Garbo), who far from being innocent was employed as a prostitute after her cousins on the farm had their way with her. As father and daughter awkwardly try to mend fences, into their lives comes a sailor named Matt (Charles Bickford), who falls in love with Anna. But what will he think when he learns of the woman's past? Garbo's performance in her first talkie is a bit uneven, still influenced by the style of silents, but she does have some fine moments, such as when she delivers the poignant "I am my own boss" speech in which she tells of being misused by men throughout her life, and there's a beautifully played scene when Anna and Chris have their first meeting in the bar. Marie Dressler [The Patsy] almost walks off with the movie as Marthy, and has some especially splendid moments when she has a drink with Anna when the younger woman first arrives at the saloon. "You're me," Anna tells her, "forty years from now!" Charles Bickford [The Big Country] is a little broad but effective as Matt. The story is resolved much too neatly [except for poor Marthy] but the movie is well-done and well-acted for the most part. A German language version was made immediately afterward using the same sets but Garbo [Mata Hari] was the only cast carry-over. O'Neill's play was also the basis for the musical "New Girl in Town" decades later.
Verdict: Garbo Talks and More! ***.
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| William Desmond Taylor, Margaret Gibson, Myrtle Gonzalez |
In this silent short, Alice (Margaret Gibson) is a shop girl with a plain boyfriend, a floorwalker named Fred (George Holt). Into the store come dapper society man George Dale (William Desmond Taylor) and his fiancee, Helen (Myrtle Gonzalez); Dale catches Alice's eye. There's also a new shop girl named Mazie (Jane Novak) whose fashionable clothing makes Alice envious. Determined to get George to notice her, Alice buys a new outfit, including one of the most hideous hats imaginable, but George asks her out anyway. When George introduces her to Helen and other friends, Helen gives Alice an affectionate kiss on the cheek. Later when he is having a drink alone with Alice, her tries to kiss her and she says "That's where she kissed me because she loves you!" Exit Alice. Okay. Alice learns it is better to stick with her simple life and floorwalker Fred [and hopefully she'll get rid of that hat!]. Because of the presence of Taylor and Gibson [aka Patricia Palmer] The Kiss is of historical interest, but it is hardly a lost classic. It only lasts about ten minutes and the acting is broad.
Verdict: Not one of the more memorable silent films. *1/2.
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| Olivia De Havilland as the troubled Virginia |
Virginia (Olivia de Havilland) is a troubled woman who has been committed to a psychiatric institution. Dr. Kik (Leo Genn) interviews her confused but loving husband, Robert (Mark Stevens), and tries to figure out what is responsible for Virginia's fragile mental state. Flashbacks show her life with Robert, as well as the earlier years before she met him. It's all rather psychologically dubious, but the film is generally well-acted and entertaining. Fellow patients in the institution, some of whom are crazier than others, include Beulah Bondi as a haughty old lady with delusions, Betsy Blair as the delicate Hester, as well as Lee Patrick, Celia Lovsky, Barbara Pepper, Minerva Urecal, Marie Blake (Blossom Rock), and others, most of whom just have bits. Mary Treen, Glenn Langan, and Ann Doran are on the staff; Helen Craig gives a terribly unsubtle performance as the evil Nurse Davis. Natalie Schafer is cast as Virginia's mother and Lora Lee Michel plays her as a child; both are quite good. While The Snake Pit is an uncertain mixture of sentiment and silly moments, and is a bit on the exploitative side, it does have some undeniably effective scenes, such as the poignant climax when Laura (Jan Clayton, who was Julie Jordan in the original Broadway production of Carousel) sings "Going Home" at the dance. Alfred Newman's score and Leo Tover's cinematography are also assets. Arthur Laurents, among others, worked on the screenplay and disavowed this in his memoirs. Seven years later, The Shrike was a somewhat grittier look at life inside a mental ward. Litvak also directed This Above All and many others.
Verdict: Hardly the final word on the subject but not without its merits. ***.
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| Yves Montand |
THE WAGES OF FEAR aka La salaire de la peur/1953). Director: Henri-Georges Clouzot.
"If I'm going to be a corpse, I want to be presentable."
"Just takes a few months to get to be a hundred."
In a grubby, hopeless town in South America, four desperate men agree to drive two trucks loaded with nitroglycerin over rough terrain to deliver to a fiery oil well for a great deal of money. The two main characters are Mario (Yves Montand) and his fellow Frenchman, Jo (Charles Vanel), with whom he strikes up an affectionate father/son friendship which is sorely tested and pretty much defeated by their ordeal. In the second truck are Mario's former friend, Luigi (Folco Lulli) and Bimba (Peter van Eyck). What sets this movie apart from its Hollywood remake, William Friedkin's Sorcerer, is the intense, more dimensional characterization that has you caring what happens to these not always likable individuals. The Hollywood version is also afflicted with "Indiana Jones" fever in which the situations the drivers and trucks find themselves in are sometimes like something out of a cliffhanger, while Clouzot manages to generate suspense over more reasonable travails. The acting is excellent, with Vanel in particular etching a memorably superb portrait of a tough guy who has to deal with thoughts of age and fear as the taut and terrifying journey continues, but the others are also marvelous. Luis De Lima, Vera Clouzot, and William Tubbs also register as another wannabe driver, Mario's sometime girlfriend, and the supervisor in the oil company who's much more concerned with the nitro getting through than he is about human lives. The Wages of Fear is imperfect and overlong and builds slowly [although there are tense scenes even in the first half hour, such as a confrontation between Jo and Luigi in a tavern] but it is arresting and moving. At one point Mario allows his desperation and exasperatioin with Jo to go too far, but in a very satisfactory conclusion it all comes full circle. Clouzot also directed Le Corbeau.
Verdict: A classic French film well worth the viewing. ***1/2.
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| Emma gets some action |
MADAME BOVARY (2 part BBC mini-series/2000). Director: Tim Fywell.
"Truly well-bred people don't give a fig about how their domestics behave. If I hadn't been told otherwise, I would swear you were middle-class!" -- Emma Bovary to her mother-in-law
Emma (Frances O'Connor) marries country doctor Charles Bovary (Hugh Bonneville) but discovers that life with him and his termagant mother (Eileen Atkins) is devoid of the romance, excitement and poetry that she finds in the many books she reads, and her dissatisfaction grows in leaps and bounds. She meets a soul mate named Leon (Hugh Dancy), then has a full-fledged affair with wealthy Rodolphe (Greg Wise). Meanwhile her debts mount as she is taken advantage of by slimy salesman Lheureux (Keith Barron). Although longer than the superior Hollywood film, this is a truncated version of the story with graphic softcore sex scenes. The main problem is that Emma is so distinctly unlikable in this that you can hardly summon up any sympathy for her: as played by O'Connor she comes off like a trampy, utterly thoughtless social climber and nothing more. This British television production is also on the cheap side like a studio-bound soap opera; the all-important ball sequence is almost laughably brief and comparative colorless. The actors in this are all good, but none of them give what could be called a great performance.
Verdict: Stick to the novel and the Hollywood version. **.
DOWNTON ABBEY Season One. 2010. Seven episodes. Created and [co-] written by Julian Fellowes.The male heir to the British estate, Downton Abbey, is lost on the Titanic in 1912. Since Robert Crawley, the Earl of Grantham (Hugh Bonneville), and his wife, Cora (Elizabeth McGovern) have no male offspring, and the heir must be male, Cora and her oldest daughter, Mary (Michelle Dockery) are faced with the prospect of losing a fortune. Haughty Mary has two sisters, the comparatively plain Edith (Laura Carmichael), who is basically treated like crap by the rest of her condescending family, and budding feminist Sybil (Jessica Brown Findlay), who tries to help one of the ambitious maids get a job as a secretary. The new heir is a cousin named Matthew Crawley (Dan Stevens), and everyone hopes that he and Mary will make a love match and solve all of their problems, but things get a little complicated. Matthew has a mother, Isobel (Penelope Wilton), who proves an irritant to Crawley family matriarch, the Dowager Countess Violet (Maggie Smith), although on occasion they have the same goals. Violet forms an alliance with Cora.
In the meantime, there's drama amongst the servants as well. The new valet, Bates (Brendan Coyle) is not only lame, but has an unsavory history. He has raised the everlasting ire of Thomas (Rob-James Collier), who had hoped to get his job, and who teams with the sour Sarah O'Brien (Siobhan Finneran) to scheme to get rid of him. [More on Thomas in a bit.] Sarah mistakenly believes Cora plans to replace her as personal maid and wreaks a terrible vengeance. The butler Mr. Carson (Jim Carter) and head maid Mrs. Hughes (Phyllis Logan), run the household with the help of cook, Mrs. Patmore (Lesley Nicol), who is losing her sight; young William (Thomas Howes), who is losing his mother; and Daisy (Sophie McShera), who has a hopeless crush on Thomas. Then there's the "radical" chauffeur Branson (Allen Leech), who talks politics with Sybil.
Downton Abbey is handsomely produced and well-acted for the most part. Smith sometimes overdoes the cutesyness of her character, and McGovern, while not a bad actress, simply seems miscast and uncertain of how to proceed. The show begins quite reasonably, but in the second episode turns into a slightly absurd soap opera when it introduces a handsome young Turkish character who dies in unexpected circumstances not much later, suddenly turning Downton into Dynasty. Much more problematic is the character of Thomas, who is gay, and while the actor wisely doesn't play him too stereotypically [aside from arched eyebrows and the occasional pursed lips], it's hard not to notice that Thomas is like an old-fashioned nasty "faggot" being fairly horrible to everyone. Gay characters are welcome in programming, but surely Fellowes could have come up with a less odious creature than this, whose inclusion even seems homophobic. [Not that all gay characters have to be perfect, of course, but this man's evil doesn't quite seem divorced from his homosexuality.] Another odd thing is that some of the characters talk "wisely" about Thomas as if it were the 21st century and not 1912! Why the hell would the unsophisticated cook know of his sexual orientation -- in 1912 no less!
Aside from that, let's get real about Downton Abbey. Its main strength is simply that it's entertaining. It's not really great drama, and it will push the envelope of credulity if it will get people watching. Taken with a grain of salt, Downton Abbey is fun if nothing else. And it does have some marvelous and memorable sequences to be fair [such as Violet being selfless regarding her prize roses].
Verdict: Proof that the British can dumb things down just as well as the Americans when they want to, but it does hold the attention. ***.
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| Emma (Jones) wants a more exciting life and husband (Heflin) |
"A man can change his life if he wants to ..."
Published in France in 1857, Gustave Flaubert's brilliant novel "Madame Bovary" was accused of being an "outrage against public morals" and the author put on trial (and acquitted). This film version of the book begins with James Mason as Flaubert in the courtroom, explaining his creation, and then proceeding to [unnecessarily] narrate the early sequences of the movie. Farm girl Emma (Jennifer Jones) meets and falls in love -- or so she thinks -- with a simple, unambitious country doctor named Bovary (Van Heflin). But her day to day life is tedious and lacks color, and she realizes she is living with the wrong man, kind but dull. Her need for passion and excitement is even more energized when the couple are invited to a ball at the home of the Marquis D'Andervilliers (Paul Cavanagh) and she sees how wealthy people live and realizes how many men find her attractive. Guilt-wracked and initially resistant, she is drawn into affairs with Rodolphe Boulanger (Louis Jourdan), who shatters her, and later a young lawyer named Leon (Christopher Kent, who later became the director, Alf Kjellin). Meanwhile her taste for the finer things in life means that her debts are adding up alarmingly, but it may be her husband who has to pay the piper. Emma isn't evil, but her dissatisfaction with her life with Bovary makes her susceptible to, shall we say, outside stimuli. Madame Bovary is pretty faithful to the novel, despite a couple of changes. In the book Dr. Bovary is pressured to operate on the clubfooted Hippolyte (Harry Morgan, herein known as Henry) with almost tragic results, while in the film he wisely realizes that he hasn't the skill of a surgeon, making him somewhat more sympathetic. The more licentious scenes of the novel, such as Emma and Leon driving all around town in a carriage obviously having sex in the back behind lowered blinds, have been jettisoned. Although Madame Bovary could have been better cast -- Heflin never comes off as that dull or unattractive and Jones isn't the perfect Emma, although Jourdan is fine -- the actors are still quite good, including those of the large supporting cast, which includes George Zucco as Leon's boss; Gladys Cooper as his mother; Ellen Corby as the maid, Felicite; Mason as Flaubert; and especially Frank Allenby as the slimy salesman, Lhereux. The film is well directed by Minelli and has a nice score by Miklos Rozsa. Kjellin/Kent later appeared in Ice Station Zebra and directed the telefilm Deadly Dream.
Verdict: Certainly not the masterpiece that the novel is, but on it's own terms vivid and entertaining, with Jones in very good form. ***.
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| Allyson and Chandler at the sideshow |
A STRANGER IN MY ARMS (1959). Director: Helmut Kautner.
Korean war widow Christina Beasley (June Allyson) and her mother-in-law Virgilnie (Mary Astor) are both mourning the death of son and husband, Donald (Peter Graves). The women, especially Virgilnie, are hoping that Major Pike Yarnell (Jeff Chander) will use his influence to get Donald a posthumous Medal of Honor, even though it's given in only the most extreme of circumstances. At first Pike doesn't even want to come to a ceremony for the man who was his navigator, but his attraction to widow Christina gets the better of him. As Pike and Chris find themselves increasingly drawn to one another, Chris must face the reality of her marriage, and Virgilnie must confront the even more difficult reality of her relationship with her son, as well as what happened on the life raft that Pike and Donald shared in the days before Donald's death (shown in flashback). A Stranger in My Arms certainly sets up an intriguing situation, but it's still rather dull, and as a romance it misfires because the leads have no chemistry. Not only is the sexless Allyson a mismatch for the virile Chandler, but she's so short next to him that there are times you get the strange sensation that Pike is pitching woo to a circus midget [not that there's anything wrong with that]! Allyson and Chandler offer competent performances, but nothing more than that, leaving the acting honors to Mary Astor, who has an especially good scene reacting to a note left for her by her son. As Donald's bimbo sister, Sandra Dee seems like a moron. Charles Coburn plays Donald's wealthy grandfather, who thinks he can buy anything, even a medal; he's fine but appears too briefly. Conrad Nagel is suitably low-key as Astor's put-upon husband and Graves is adequate but unimpressive in the flashbacks on the life raft. Kautner did a few American films and then went back to Germany.
Verdict: Intriguing situations of which the most is not made. **1/2.
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| Virginia Maskell and Ian McShane |
YOUNG AND WILLING aka The Wild and the Willing/1962). Director: Ralph Thomas.
"Damn it woman! Lloyds doesn't underwrite everything in life!"
Harry Brown (Ian McShane in his film debut) is a charismatic ladies man at an English college who has a steady girl, Josie (Samantha Eggar of Curtains), but has an affair with the wife, Virginia (Virginia Maskell), of one of his professors, the rather stern Chown (Paul Rogers). Harry is kind to his somewhat geeky roommate, Phil (John Hurt of Alien), and friendly with what appears to be the sole black student on campus, Reggie (Johnny Sekka). Other characters include Sarah (Katherine Woodwille), for whom Phil is carrying a torch, and somewhat snooty Andrew (Jeremy Brett), who was also involved with Virginia. It all leads up to a protracted finale in which Harry gets Phil to help him climb a tower and plant a flag as a prank, an act that leads to tragedy. Young and Willing has its moments, but a lot of it is very predictable. However, the actors are quite good, especially McShane and Maskell, here playing a role very different from hers in Doctor in Love, which was also directed by Ralph Thomas.
Verdict: Some compelling moments and performances. **1/2.