clore
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Posts posted by clore
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> {quote:title=TopBilled wrote:}{quote}Try as it might, AIP never really moved beyond B-film fare. They attempted some big-budget respectability with METEOR and THE AMITYVILLE HORROR at the end, to mixed results.
In 1970, the AIP version of WUTHERING HEIGHTS played Radio City Music Hall as did HENNESSY in 1975. Who would have thought while sitting and watching the double bill of THE AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN and CAT GIRL in 1957 that AIP would possibly manage billings in NYC's most prestigious theater?
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At least if they played LOAN SHARK, LUCKY NICK CAIN, I'LL GET YOU and THE MAN FROM CAIRO, they would be titles that aren't normally on the schedule. They may have Raft already past his prime, but they're starring vehicles anyway.
JOHNNY ALLEGRO is another one that hardly airs.
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I'm lucky, I've seen every single one of Ladd's starring films. Here in NYC, Ladd actually got one of the first theme weeks ever on Channel 5, then WNEW-TV. They had the Paramounts handled by MCA and from the other stations I got to see the rest of them.
I even saw his DUEL OF CHAMPIONS in a theater, but it's not really worth citing. Terrible movie.
I do like HELL ON FRISCO BAY, probably my favorite of the Jaguar productions for Warners, the second would be THE IRON MISTRESS.
I have several DVD copies of THE PROUD REBEL but none of them look as good as what I saw on Channel 9 about 40 years ago. A shame that the great cinematography by Ted McCord is so compromised by the mediocre prints out there.
I'd really love for TCM to play the Raft and Ladd versions of THE GLASS KEY back-to-back.
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It would be just like TCM to build a Raft day around
*Around the World in 80 Days*
*Ocean's 11*
*Casino Royale*
*The Ladies Man*
*Deadhead Miles*
*Skidoo*
*Five Golden Dragons*
*Sextette*
Look at what they did for Alan Ladd day a few years back. They aired *Citizen Kane, Joan of Paris* and *Captain Caution*. Collectively, Ladd might have had 15 minutes between the three of them.
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I understand that on the set of his last film, George Peppard was especially nasty to Ladd, referring to him as a drunken has-been to his face. It upset Carroll Baker so much that she lashed back at Peppard.
Ironically enough, Peppard would end up an alcoholic himself.
Ladd actually looks better in his last film than he did in 13 WEST STREET in which he's obviously slurring and so puffy-faced that this Ladd fan can't sit through the film again.
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No sign of him according to a list that I saved and have updated regularly from someone's post a while back.
May 1994: Greta Garbo
June 1994: Glenn Ford
July 1994: Greer Garson
Aug.1994: Edward G. Robinson
Sept.1994: Barbara Stanwyck
Oct.1994: Angela Lansbury
Nov.1994 John Garfield
Dec.1994: Best of ‘94
Jan.1995: Esther Williams
Feb.1995: Ronald Reagan
Mar.1995: TCM Salutes the Oscars
Apr.1995: Doris Day
May 1995: Myrna Loy
June 1995: Errol Flynn
July 1995: Gene Kelly
Aug.1995: Paul Muni
Sept.1995: Jane Powell
Oct.1995: Clark Gable
Nov.1995: The Barrymores
Dec.1995: Best of ‘95
Jan.1996: Deborah Kerr
Feb.1996: Robert Young
Mar.1996: 31 Days of Oscar
April 1996: Irene Dunne
May 1996: James Stewart
June 1996: Rosalind Russell
July 1996: Fred Astaire
Aug.1996: Ann Sheridan
Sept.1996: Van Johnson
Oct.1996: Kathryn Grayson
Nov.1996: Robert Mitchum
Dec.1996: Best of ‘96
Jan.97: Humphrey Bogart
Feb.97: Eleanor Parker
Mar.97: 31 Days of Oscar
Apr.97: Ava Gardner
May 97: George Brent
June 97: June Allyson
July 97: John and Walter Huston (also Director of the Month)
Aug.97: Cary Grant
Sept.97: Ida Lupino
Oct.97: Walter Pidgeon
Nov.97: Katharine Hepburn
Dec.97: Best of ‘97
Jan.1998: Lana Turner
Feb.1998: Charlton Heston
Mar.1998:31 Days of Oscar
April 1998: Red Skelton
May 1998: Olivia de Havilland
June 1998: James Cagney
July 1998: Lucille Ball
August 1998: Joan Crawford
Sept.1998: John Wayne
Oct.1998: Cyd Charisse
Nov.1998: Claude Rains
Dec.1998: Best of ‘98
Jan.1999: Elizabeth Taylor
Feb.1999: William Powell
March 1999: 31 Days of Oscar
April 1999: Dennis Morgan
May 1999: Bette Davis
June 1999: Mickey Rooney
July1999: Natalie Wood
August 1999: Peter Sellers
Sept.1999: Norma Shearer
Oct. 1999: Gregory Peck
Nov. 1999: Ginger Rogers
Dec. 1999: Burt Lancaster
Jan. 2000: Debbie Reynolds
Feb. 2000: Robert Ryan
March 2000: 31 Days of Oscars
April 2000: Spencer Tracy
May 2000: Alexis Smith
June 2000:Wallace Beery
July 2000: Judy Garland
August 2000: film debuts
Sept 2000: Jane Wyman
October 2000: Dick Powell
Nov 2000: Frank Sinatra
Dec. 2000: Lauren Bacall
Jan. 2001: Elvis Presley
Feb.2001: Jean Hagen
March 2001: 31 Days of Oscar
Apr.2001: Knighted Actors
May 2001: Jean Harlow
June 2001: W.C. Fields
July 2001: Ann Sothern
Aug.2001: James Garner
Sept. 2001: Robert Taylor
Oct. 2001: Lana Turner
Nov.2001: Glenn Ford
Dec.2001: The Marx Brothers
Jan. 2002: Marlene Dietrich
Feb. 2002: Kirk Douglas
March 2002: 31 Days of Oscar
April 2002: Barbara Stanwyck
May 2002: Edward G. Robinson
June 2002: Greta Garbo
July 2002: Sidney Poitier
Aug. 2002: Joan Crawford
Sept. 2002: Van Heflin
Oct. 2002: Final films
Nov. 2002: Shelly Winters
Dec. 2002: Montgomery Clift
Jan. 2003: Doris Day
Feb. 2003: John Garfield
Mar. 2003: 31 Days of Oscar
Apr. 2003: Harold Lloyd
May 2003: Olivia de Havilland
June 2003: TV Actors in Films
July 2003: Lee Marvin
Aug. 2003: 1st Summer Under the Stars
Sept. 2003: James Mason
Oct. 2003: Boris Karloff
Nov. 2003: Shirley MacLaine
Dec. 2003: David Niven
Jan. 2004: Katherine Hepburn
Feb.2004: 31 Days of Oscar
Mar.2004: Charles Chaplin
Apr. 2004: Judy Garland
May 2004: Greer Garson
June 2004: Cary Grant
July 2004: Stars That Died Before Their Time
Aug.2004: 2nd Summer Under the Stars
Sept.2004: Myrna Loy
Oct. 2004: Peter Lorre
Nov.2004: Clark Gable
Dec. 2004: James Stewart
Jan.2005: Canadian Actors
Feb. 2005: 31 Days of Oscar
Mar. 2005: Claudette Colbert
Apr. 2005: Errol Flynn
May 2005: Orson Welles
June 2005: Ingrid Bergman
July 2005: Audrey Hepburn
Aug. 2005: 3rd Summer Under the Stars
Sept.2005: Greta Garbo
Oct.2005: Robert Mitchum
Nov.2005: Joan Fontaine
Dec. 2005: Bing Crosby
Jan. 2006: Robert Montgomery
Feb.2006: 31 Days of Oscar
Mar.2006: Nelson Eddy & Jeanette MacDonald
Apr.2006: Deborah Kerr
May 2006: Bette Davis
June 2006: Anthony Quinn
July 2006: Elizabeth Taylor
Aug.2006: 4th Summer Under the Stars
Sept.2006: William Holden
Oct.2006: Child Stars
Nov.2006: Lucille Ball
Dec. 2006: Gary Cooper
Jan.2007: Jean Arthur
Feb.2007: 31 Days of Oscar
Mar.2007: Gene Kelly
Apr.2007: Rita Hayworth
May 2007: John Wayne and Katherine Hepburn
June 2007: Ida Lupino
July 2007: Randolph Scott
Aug.2007: 5th Summer Under the Stars
Sept.2007: A Star is Born (starmaking/breakthrough performances)
Oct.2007: Henry Fonda
Nov.2007: Guest Programmer Month
Dec.2007: Irene Dunne
Jan.2008: James Cagney
Feb.2008: 31 Days of Oscar
Mar.2008: Acting Dynasties
Apr.2008: Hedy Lamarr
May 2008: Frank Sinatra
June 2008: Sophia Loren
July 2008: Rosalind Russell
Aug.2008: 6th annual Summer Under the Stars
Sept.2008: Kay Francis
Oct.2008: Carole Lombard
Nov.2008: Charles Laughton
Dec. 2008: Joseph Cotten
Jan. 2009: Jack Lemmon
Feb. 2009: 31 Days of Oscar
Mar. 2009: Ronald Reagan
April 2009: Funny Ladies and 15th Anniversary
May 2009: Sean Connery
June 2009: Great Directors
July 2009: Stewart Granger
August 2009: Summer Under the Stars
Sept. 2009: Claude Rains
Oct. 2009: Leslie Caron
Nov. 2009: Grace Kelly
Dec. 2009: Humphrey Bogart
Jan. 2010: “The Method”
Feb. 2010: 31 Days of Oscar
March 2010: Ginger Rogers
April 2010: Robert Taylor
May 2010: Donna Reed
June 2010: Natalie Wood
July 2010: Gregory Peck
August 2010: SUTS
Sept. 2010: Vivien Leigh
Oct. 2010: Fredric March
Nov. 2010: Ava Gardner
Dec. 2010: Mickey Rooney
Jan. 2011: Peter Sellers
Feb. 2011: 31 Days of Oscar
March 2011: Jean Harlow
April 2011: Ray Milland
May 2011: Esther Williams
June 2011: Jean Simmons
July 2011: Singing cowboys
August 2011 SUTS
Sept. 2011 Kirk Douglas
Oct. 2011 Nicholas Ray
Nov 2011 Battle of the Blondes/Shipboard Sagas
Dec. 2011 William Powell/Christmas movies
Jan, 2012 Angela Lansbury/Jack Cardiff
Feb. 2012: 31 Days of Oscar
March 2012: Karl Malden/British New Wave
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In UNDERWORLD USA, Richard Rust runs down a little girl on a bike. I don't recall any scene involving a store though.
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For what it's worth, I doubt that the author is being deliberately misleading. A little more exposition would have been preferable, but I think the point is that Garfield did have the stage to return to even if Hollywood turned its back to him. It may not have been as lucrative, but it would have given him employment.
Someone like Larry Parks who had no previous Broadway experience and nowhere near the recognizability couldn't fall back on that although he did land on Broadway toward the end of the 50s.
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Mine is one that was directed by a man who passed away earlier this week, Robert Fuest.
The film is THE ABOMINABLE DR. PHIBES, one which not only had a sense of the period in which it was set, but also of the time in which it was released. Just the right amount of pop-art stylishness, a goofy sense of humor about itself and an ad campaign that spoofed a recent boxoffice blockbuster.
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> {quote:title=misswonderly wrote:}{quote}
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> ( By the way, Alan Ladd, as anyone who knows even a little about this actor is aware, had personal problems and a huge drinking problem, but I didn't want to bring that into the discussion. I think he might have had that "melancholy" persona anyway.)
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Poor Ladd, one never knows what demons drive the other guy, but he had an incident in his life that probably figures strongly.
Before he hit stardom, he was one more struggling actor, only he had a family which included his mother and some siblings as I recall, all dependent on him. This was in the era when you could feed a family a meal for fifty cents.
Ladd's mother was pestering him for a quarter and he at first kept refusing her as things were that tight. She became such an annoyance that he yielded. she went out and bought rat poison with that money and committed suicide. Contrast that to the question of his own death 25 years later - was it intentional? Is searching for a mother figure part of the reason that he fell for the slightly older former actress Sue Carol who served as his agent and basically made most of his decisions for him?
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Nice job Slaytonf.
Thank you.
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There's a story of how when Warren Beatty was at some screening of BONNIE AND CLYDE, he thought that the sound was off, and that his gunshots should have had more "ooomph" and that he modeled the sounds as Stevens did in SHANE.
He ran to the projection booth and said something about the sound being amiss and the man said "I fixed it. I haven't heard a film so poorly mixed since SHANE."
Maybe that man is still working.
I'm half-kidding here, but it seems that so much of the time these days, I'm sitting with my fingers on the remote to turn up the dialogue or turn down the music.I'm certain that I heard the "Goodbye Shane" or "Bye Shane" the last time that I watched the film on TCM. I have that in my log as being April 2009.
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Now, you claim that my quote above from IMDB is untrue by virtue of the fact that he was offered HIGH SIERRA, THE MALTESE FALCON, and ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT and turned them down, that he was his own worst enemy. Well, maybe he was and maybe they were mistakes. From his perspective they were not.
I reject the IMDb info because it's indefinite. It refers to how Raft was affected by his associations "later in his career. We're talking a 50 year career here and in the first 20 years of it he was getting starring roles for the most part at various studios. On a relative scale, it is early in his overall career.
As far as which side (studio or Raft) was right as to the movies offered, it doesn't matter from either side's perspective - you're the one claiming that they didn't offer him "Raft and Raft only" vehicles and that he was broadsided by studio execs.
So, who offered HIGH SIERRA, THE MALTESE FALCON and ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT? Was it the person in charge of the studio commisary? History does not bear out your conjecture.
That they have become cult classics adds to the attraction of labeling them as GEORGE RAFT mistakes even though they were tailor made for BOGART and would not have worked well with RAFT in the lead.
Hold on, they were offered to Raft first, you admit that, but now you're saying they were tailor made for Bogart? That seems rather inconsistent. Seems to me that Bogie was getting the leftovers. We'll get to that part about not working well with Raft in the lead later.
You then bring up DOUBLE INDEMNITY claiming it to be another GEORGE RAFT "mistake" even though the fact is that RAFT and ROBINSON hated each others guts. Do you really think that ROBINSON, more in favor with WARNERS, would have accepted RAFT as the male lead over him? I don't believe it.
First, and I pointed it out already, DOUBLE INDEMNITY was a Paramount film, not Warners. Secondly, you're presuming that Robinson was already cast - not so, Wilder hadn't signed up anyone at the point in which he approached Raft. If Raft had signed, maybe Robinson wouldn't have done the film - but that would have been his mistake. Besides, the point is what Raft did to sabotage his own career, not what others would have accepted or not. He refused a male lead because it didn't fit in with his own sterling image of himself.
Now, as the story goes, JACK WARNER wanted RAFT for the lead in CASABLANCA, RAFT wanted CASABLANCA, but HAL WALLIS nixed him. Then, WARNERS threw RAFT BACKGROUND TO DANGER, A lesser vehicle, to placate him before ending his contract. Yea, they didn't sabatoge his career. Sure they didn't.
So, you're saying that Raft deserved a reward for having turned down everything offered to him over a two year period. You're presuming that his status to the public remained high despite not being seen and while being eclipsed by Bogart in the very same films he could have appeared in. Films offered to him by the same execs you claim deliberately tried to sabotage his career.
Just what did Raft do to deserve such a plum property as CASABLANCA - and yet another one that is now part of the Bogart mystique and so we don't really know if it would have been of equivalent stature had Raft been the lead anyway. You yourself cited the other Bogart pick-ups "would not have worked as well with Raft in the lead," yet you're not presuming so here obviously. Again, you're being inconsistent.
Bogart evolved into what he became by working, Raft evolved into what he became by not working.
By the way, BACKGROUND TO DANGER might have been a better movie. But Raft insisted on changing the character of the Ambler story from a regular guy, to a secret agent. They even called in John Huston to help on a rewrite. Raft had more ideas, such as having FDR congratulate him at the end for successfully completing the mission. Huston was pitching in for free, but decided that there was nothing to do to improve such a watered-down script if Raft was going to have his way.
Still, to try to salvage what looked to be a bad situation, Wallis ordered Raoul Walsh to take the directorial reins from Jo Graham who had done two films for the studio. Raft had worked well with Walsh three times previously and was one of the top men on the Warner lot.
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the scene where Bogie and Demarest pose as Nazi engineers for the underground meeting. OMG, I never laugh so hard as I do at those!
That wasn't in the script. Demarest suggested it to liven up the scene but Vincent Sherman supposedly had doubts about whether Bogart was up to a double-talk routine that Demarest had done in vaudeville decades earlier.
To the surprise of the director, Bogie picked up on it immediately in the first rehearsal and was enthusiastic about adding such a scene to the film.
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It strikes me as a movie that not only was cast poorly, but then when they were done with it, they didn't know how to promote it. Did you see the awful trailer that TCM was running, most of which was devoted to LeRoy sitting in his office? When it came to showing actual footage, more time was spent on the less ethnic Ray Danton and Madlyn Rhue when it came to speaking, there were no dialogue tracks for the two leads. Even Rhue only gets to say "Oh Jerry," it's the dulcet tones of Danton that are dominantly heard.
Other than LeRoy that is.
http://www.tcm.com/mediaroom/video/204105/Majority-of-One-A-Original-Trailer-.html
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I thought it was Maynard Holmes when I first saw it, but he also reminds me of Grady Sutton.
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Don't forget Judith Anderson, Wallace Ford, Ludwig Stossel and Martin Kosleck.
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If Warners had a problem with his image or associations, why then did they keep offering scripts to him? We're not talking about "B" pics, these were "A" films.
Look at his record at WB:
THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT: August 1940
MANPOWER: August 1941
BACKGROUND TO DANGER: July 1943
A two-year gap between the last two, you can't blame them for wanting to get out of a deal made with someone who obviously didn't want to work there.
*"His career was marked by numerous tough-guy roles, often a gangster or convict. The believability with which he played these, together with his lifelong associations with such real-life gangsters as Owney Madden and Bugsey Siegel, added to persistent rumors that he was also a gangster. The slightly shady reputation may have helped his popularity early on, but it made him somewhat undesirable to movie executives later in his career." from IMDB*
The IMDb is like Wikipedia, anything can get placed there. The history proves otherwise as Warner execs offered him HIGH SIERRA, THE MALTESE FALCON and ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT.
Here's an example of what can happen at the IMDb, these two items are right in sequence on his bio page:
His parents Conrad and Eva Ranft had ten children, nine of them boys, with George the eldest.
According to both the 1900 and 1910 Censuses for New York City, Raft only had one sibling named Eva "Katie" Ranft, born on April 18, 1896 in Manhattan.
*Maybe there were those at the studio that resented RAFT'S higher berth and felt that BOGART deserved the push by virtue of his being at the studio since 1936. In any event it's no coincidence that his "supporting" player soon left him in the dust. In any event, it would have been nice to have seen a film built around RAFT AND ONLY RAFT, without any assistance from BOGART.*
Had he starred in the same three films that I cited above, he would have had films "built around Raft and only Raft."
*Are you saying that people in Hollywood weren't blacklisted because of their suspected outside activities? I am not familiar with RAFT's level of formal education, but as you point out above, he was in good company with CAGNEY, ROBINSON, and MUNI who all refused films at some point in their careers, yet their careers were not damaged to the extent that RAFT'S was.*
They were all at the studio longer, so they also had built up a measure of good will. Also, all were gone from Warners at about the same time as Raft. Cagney had a series of flops and it took a return to Warners in 1949 to restore his career - temporarily. Robinson went on to character parts at a variety of studios as did Muni, albeit less frequently.
Raft was hardly finished after Warners, he went on to a series of releases at Universal, Fox, RKO and UA. How undesirable could he have been to be employed at so many companies? He made 13 films from 1944-49, tying Robinson. Cagney made only four films over the same period and Muni only made three films.
Raft had the chance to play the male lead in DOUBLE INDEMNITY at his old stomping grounds of Paramount after he left Warners. But when he couldn't get Billy Wilder to revise the ending to have him be an FBI agent on Stanwyck's trail, he refused the part. Time and again, Raft was his own worst enemy. Studio execs didn't have to sabotage his career, he was doing a good job of that on his own.
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He said he could never get over William Demarest doing his own pratfalls.
The one he takes on the porch in THE MIRACLE OF MORGAN'S CREEK always wows me.
I'm with you, I love ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT and think it's a fine example of the backlot standing in perfectly for the NYC locations. I've lived here for all of my sixty years and it still practically fools me.
The first time that I saw it in 1967, I had just come home from a revival house seeing THE MALTESE FALCON and CASABLANCA on the big screen. You would think that under those conditions, it wouldn't hold up, but it succeeds on its own level.
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Everything that I had checked some time ago, including the film's credits and the book, have it as Berry-Berry. The book however doesn't capitalize the second "berry." That's something I seem to have a mental block against doing.
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I've seen it on TV a couple of times here in NYC. Once in the 70s on WNEW, the next time a decade later on the PBS station when they had dozens of MCA-owned Paramount films running in blocks on Saturday nights.
It was up on YouTube as recently as a year ago, albeit with Portuguese subtitles.
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It may seem like nitpicking, but that constant referencing his "nickname" totally puts the film out of my grasp. The performances are fine, the direction, the cinematography - no complaints there.
I just can't believe that no one seeing the rushes or the first cut didn't realize just how annoying it was. Maybe there was something in Inge's psychological profile that had him give one character a name like "Berry-Berry" and his lover is "Echo."
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You're an obviously devoted fan of Eva Marie Saint. I find it hard enough to put up with all of the "Berry Berry" references in the daytime, but at 3am, my body would have gone into toxic shock.
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Don't get me wrong, I like Raft, but I'm not so fond of anyone that I can't see the ups and downs of anyone's given career.
I think that he's fine in THE BOWERY, BOLERO, THE GLASS KEY, SOULS AT SEA (my favorite Raft performance), SPAWN OF THE NORTH, EACH DAWN I DIE, INVISIBLE STRIPES, THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT, MANPOWER, BROADWAY.
It's after his WB period that suddenly he seemed to turn into the monotone, mono-expressioned performer that most associate with him. Even there, I do enjoy NOB HILL, JOHNNY ALLEGRO and I have a soft spot for LOAN SHARK which was the first film that I ever saw him in.
As with Randolph Scott, he made the mistake of too many late 40's films for Edwin L. Marin, a director who was pretty much a by-the-numbers guy regardless of genre and who didn't bring anything extra to the table. Scott and Raft are both in Marin's CHRISTMAS EVE and while the story is OK, it's just so flatly presented that everyone seems to be marking time.
I wouldn't mind seeing him get a SUTS day, but only if it's going to set free some of the not-so-usual-suspects. Yes, I agree, the Paramounts deserve to be uncovered as do a couple from Universal.
I'm half-kidding here, but it seems that so much of the time these days, I'm sitting with my fingers on the remote to turn up the dialogue or turn down the music.
LEAST & MOST FAVORITE of the week...
in General Discussions
Posted
FIVE FINGER EXERCISE was my least favorite of the week. It was too much like having my ex back for me to get past 45 minutes of Rosalind Russell's as an overbearing wife and mother. Normally I can watch just about anything all the way through, but this one was compromised by having already tolerated all of A MAJORITY OF ONE, an utterly painful film.
Faves for the week were back-to-back viewings of THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT and THIS GUN FOR HIRE.