Film_Fatale

> {quote:title=clore wrote:}{quote} > There should be a book on the production of THE BIG TRAIL. Not only did they produce the two versions simultaneously, but Fox also made versions for the French, Spanish and German speaking markets too. These are titled: > > Piste des g?ants, La > Gran jornada, La > Die Gro?e Fahrt I don't think I'd heard of those, clore. I wonder if Fox Video still has that material somewhere. Maybe it's too much wishful thinking, but can you imagine if they issued a *Big Trail: Ultimate Collector's Edition* with the 3 foreign-language versions, as well? It would be so very lovely. > Not western related, but I'm sitting here anxiously awaiting the showing of THE MAGIC BOX in a couple of hours. I haven't seen it since I was a kid, but it has just about every notable person of 1950s British cinema in it making a cameo. It's not on DVD, so if you have any interest at all, you might want to record it. > I've heard wonderful things about *The Magic Box*, and I most definitely did record it, although I haven't had time to watch it yet. I think I'll enjoy it a great deal. From the few glimpses I caught, it seems they had a very good print - and it even has closed-captioning (which comes in handy sometimes with screencaps). By the way I should probably mention I'm running the TCM Fans Social Network (http://tcmfans.ning.com) and you're always welcome to join, if you wish. Once you set up a personal profile, you can upload as many photos and videos as you wish, and you can also get to know the other members there. We've only had it running for a week or so, but it's coming along nicely. B-)

P&P fans, don't forget that the Michael Powell double feature comes out on DVD tomorrow (Tuesday, Jan. 6th). Here's a rave review from the New York Times' Dave Kehr: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/06/movies/homevideo/06dvds.html January 6, 2009 Critic?s Choice *New DVDs: Michael Powell* By DAVE KEHR _THE FILMS OF MICHAEL POWELL_ A new double-disc set from Sony, ?The Films of Michael Powell,? brings a pair of impeccably restored movies by this pre-eminent British director. One is a completely assured work from the height of his big-budget British period, the 1946 film ?A Matter of Life and Death? (retitled ?Stairway to Heaven? when Universal first released it in the United States). The other is the 1969 ?Age of Consent,? a ragged independent production from Powell?s years of wandering the desert of international co-production, after the scandal of ?Peeping Tom? (1960) effectively ended his career in England. Stylistically, the two films could hardly be more different: the first is a product of a controlled studio environment, in which compositional elements seem to have been chosen with fanatical care, while the second was largely shot on location near and under the influence of the Great Barrier Reef off Australia, where nature seems to have dictated most of the camera positions. And yet the two movies share a distinctive sensibility that balances British restraint and respect for imperial tradition with a fearless iconoclasm and a rampant erotic delirium. Like much of Powell?s wartime work, from ?The Spy in Black? (1939) to ?A Canterbury Tale? (1944), ?A Matter of Life and Death? seems to have been made in response to a particular propaganda need ? in this case to smooth over the strained relations between Britons and Yanks that had arisen during the war?s four years of forced cohabitation. British interests are represented by a handsome young R.A.F. officer played by an actor famous on both sides of the Atlantic, David Niven. The American presence is incarnated by a relative newcomer, the Broadway actress Kim Hunter, who would go on to star as Stella in the Brando-Kazan ?Streetcar Named Desire? (as well as to play the simian scientist Zira in three ?Planet of the Apes? pictures). A virtuoso opening shot displays Powell?s ambitions: nothing less than a tracking movement across the universe, beginning with a distant galaxy and coming to fix on the cockpit of a British bomber, returning toward Dover from an air raid deep within Germany. The plane has been hit, and all hands have died or bailed out, with the exception of Niven?s Capt. Peter Carter. Preparing to abandon the bomber, though with a parachute he knows will not open, Carter is filing his final report with June (Hunter), an American radio operator stationed near the coast. A few lines of poetry and personal reflection exchanged across crackling airwaves are enough to create a couple in love, an effect underwritten by Powell?s bold visual style: gigantic close-ups of the two principals that cut them off from their immediate physical surroundings and place them in an emotional space of their own, where the glare of the fire enveloping Carter?s cockpit seems to be reflected in the red highlights of June?s hair. And yet the screenplay, by Powell?s longtime associate, Emeric Pressburger, has barely gotten under way. Carter bails out, and awakens to find himself on a beautiful seashore, which he takes to be the border of Paradise. In fact, it is that next best thing in Powell?s book, the shore of the Sceptered Isle, not far from where June is stationed. It appears that thanks to one of those clerical errors that angels are prone to in postwar fiction, the heavenly conductor who was to scoop Carter up and lead him to the higher place ? an aristocratic victim of the French Revolution, played in full foppery by Marius Goring ? missed him in the British fog and allowed him to live. When Carter is asked to return to the ranks of the dead, he claims clemency because he and June have fallen in love. A celestial court is convened, in which the prosecution is manned by an angry American (Raymond Massey), the first fighter killed by a British bullet in the Revolutionary War. No stodgy Briton will possess this fine flower of American independence, at least if he can help it. Like so many of the films that Powell and Pressburger made together ? they incorporated their partnership as the Archers ? ?A Matter of Life and Death? seems to overflow with ideas. In between international politics and metaphysical speculation (in this movie heaven is in black and white, while Jack Cardiff?s bursting Technicolor is reserved for earthly delights), the film even finds room for some cinematic self-referentiality. The cast of characters includes a brain surgeon (the Powell regular Roger Livesey), whose godlike attributes include a camera obscura he uses to ?survey his domain,? following the projected images of the villagers in his care. He who controls the image controls the world ? a sentiment that takes a filmmaker to appreciate it. Or, perhaps, a painter. Where ?A Matter of Life and Death? delights in piling up digressions and asides, ?Age of Consent,? based on a 1935 novel by the Australian artist and sybarite Norman Lindsay, is simplicity itself. Powell seems personally invested in the character played by James Mason, a celebrated Australian artist who abandons the cacophony of New York City for a shack on an isolated beach, where he finds inspiration in the form of sand, sea and Cora, a remarkable teenage girl who lives down the way. Played by a 23-year-old Helen Mirren, in her first major movie role, Cora is the answer to an exhausted artist?s prayers: a pure and innocent force of nature, who is proud to pose as nature made her (and nature made her well). Produced by Mason and Powell, ?Age of Consent? hardly seems innocent in casting the star of Stanley Kubrick?s ?Lolita? (1962) in another tale of middle-aged yearning for underage flesh, though this time the fantasy element is emphasized by making Cora the aggressor. For ideological reasons, ?Age of Consent? seems about as likely to be remade today as ?The Birth of a Nation,? yet the picture doesn?t feel unhealthy ? at least not to this male gazer, or to Ms. Mirren, who has contributed an affectionate reminiscence to this edition. Metaphorically, ?Age of Consent? is about an artist falling back in love with his art ? something Powell needed to do after the scathing experience of ?Peeping Tom.? From the looks of this blissful, openhearted film, he succeeded. (Sony, $24.96, unrated.)

Everyone, don't miss A SCANDAL IN PARIS tonight, a rare and wonderful feature starring George Sanders (he's the leading man this time, not just support). It's Douglas Sirk's first Hollywood picture, I believe, and is filled with a delightful wit that give George's considerably facile talents plenty of scope. I hope you enjoy it. It airs at 1:15 a.m., EST. Definitely planning on watching and recording it! B-)

Awwww... don't they make a lovely couple? :x Angie- I would love to have some Coop photos added to the photo section at the TCM fans Social Network. Let me know if you don't mind my "borrowing" them or if you'd rather register and post them yourself. The site address is: http://tcmfans.ning.com

> {quote:title=metsfan wrote:}{quote} > You are correct Film Fatale. The photo is from "The Indian Tomb" (1921) and it depicts the ailing soul of the Maharajah. This is what he looked like before the self destruction. > Wow, so that must be Conrad Veidt, right? The movie appears to be listed in imdb under its original German title, *Das Indische Grabmal: Der Tiger von Eschnapur*: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0012313/ I'd definitely like to watch it! Veidt as a Maharajah sounds very exotic. B-)

> {quote:title=lzcutter wrote:}{quote} > It originally aired on TNT over three nights. I would actually prefer to see it over three nights rather than back to back because it gives us time to talk about each episode before the next episode airs. I didn't get to watch it when it aired originally, but it's probably a good idea to do it like that. Some folks, like me, will be getting the DVD set anyway, and we can always choose to watch them all in one sitting. B-)

> {quote:title=lzcutter wrote:}{quote} > Let's try to heal some of the breaches that have occurred in all the political talk instead of creating more. It's a wonderful idea, if we could get everybody to agree on it.

Sorry, I thought we were skipping the "Q". Swanson, Gloria

*Umbrellas of Cherbourg, The*

> {quote:title=clore wrote:}{quote} > THE MAN FROM LARAMIE is my favorite of the Mann westerns, and it was the first one that I ever saw. All these years later, it still holds up fine. If I were to make up a top 25 list of westerns, it would be on it. > I think it's going to grow on me, too. There is definitely something almost Shakespearean about the tragedy of the old man, Alec, and Will Lockhart's quest to find out what caused the massacre in which his younger brother was killed. And I'm still getting over the great use of the locations, they are some of my favourite after Monument Valley. > The Leone films are all among my "favorites" and I have each one on DVD. I'm old enough to remember reading about the first one prior to its release here in the U.S. For about a year I was anxiously awaiting its release as I already knew Eastwood from RAWHIDE. There was a little piece in "Variety" about how this little homegrown film was playing in Italy and attracting more customers than THE SOUND OF MUSIC which at the time was the biggest film worldwide. It was such a smash that when Sophia Loren came to the U,S. to promote OPERATION CROSSBOW in 1965, she said that she was dying to meet Clint Eastwood. > > I can remember quite clearly, it was about this time of year that FISTFUL OF DOLLARS opened in NYC, and I dragged a friend to see it in what was one of the biggest snowstorms ever to hit the northeast and we had gotten a day off from school. We got to the theater and found it was closed, but the manager gave us tickets to over the weekend. My friend was not really a big fan of westerns, but when we finally did see the film, he was ecstatic about it and we sat through it twice - you could do that in those days. We saw the first sequel several times in the theater and as for THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY, that was was around the NYC theater circuit for so long that we saw it the first time on New Years Day of 1968, and in the following summer, we saw it for the third or fourth time. We were hooked on spaghetti westerns by that point and we went to every one that managed to get a theatrical release. > That's an awesome story, clore. I really wish I could have been there to watch those movies when they were brand new, what an experience that must have been. I have seen the newer "director's cut" or whatever they called it of *The Good The Bad and the Ugly* with the recovered footage, when they played it in theaters here in the U.S., and it is definitely one of those experiences as a filmgoer that could almost be described as "out of the body" (I think Ebert was the one who used that term) because it's such an exhilarating experience, especially in a theater full of folks who really admire the movie. > THE BIG TRAIL continues to amaze me every time I see it and it's one that I would love to see on the big screen. There are some shots in it that have so much going on in the background - the wagon train goes on for miles - that the small screen does not do it justice. Yes, I am glad that at least Fox finally got around to reissuing the movie in its widescreen version on DVD, because for years all you could get on DVD was the "non-widescreen" version (weren't they both filmed simultanously?). Hoping for a blu-ray release might seem like too much at this point, but who knows? In a few years, it might just happen. B-) > Well, enough rambling, better save something for the next post. Yes, we should save some for later! Take care, clore!

> {quote:title=Audreygirl2007 wrote:}{quote} > I love Groundhog Day and it's one of my all-time favorite movies. However, I'm very surprised it made the list. Just becuase it's one of my favorites doesn't mean that it's the best of all time. > > Thanks for posting the list. It was interesting! You're welcome. It is, obviously, just one person's opinion, but I thought it was interesting that all of his movies were from the 40s and 50s, except of course *Raging Bull* (1980) and *Groundhog Day* (1993).

Richardson, Ralph

*Scandal in Paris, A* (Bob's Picks tonight)

Great news for fans of MGM musicals with blu-ray players! Warner Home Video have announced the US Blu-ray Disc release of *Gigi* and *An American in Paris* on 31st March 2009. Priced at $28.99 SRP each, the Blu-ray Disc versions of these Best Picture Oscar-winning 1950s classics follow the 2-Disc Special Edition DVDs that were released back in September 2008. Lovingly restored and remastered for the DVD releases, the Blu-ray editions benefit from the same restorations and will feature the same bonus content. *An American in Paris* - Originally photographed in Technicolor, is the latest recipient of Warner Bros.? proprietary Ultra-Resolution process, which takes the original Technicolor negatives and meticulously combines them to yield a stunning picture with sharpness and depth of field never seen before. *Gigi* was produced after the demise of the original Technicolor system, photographed in the industry-standardized Eastmancolor process. For this new DVD release, Gigi has been photo-chemically restored from its original camera negative and safety separations to produce a much sharper and colorful image than has been seen in decades. It also contains a 5.1 audio mix created from the original multi-track source elements. http://www.dvdtimes.co.uk/content/id/69736/gigi-and-an-american-in-paris-us-bd-in-march.html

rita (or brenda?) You can request movies on tcm.com - or you can try buying the DVD set from your favourite retailer. Hope that helps.

> {quote:title=clore wrote:}{quote} > What about yourself, what's on top? Well, it's a hard question to answer. If someone had asked me when I was a teen, obviously I would have said *Silverado* If you'd asked me in college, I probably would have replied "The Good the Bad and the Ugly*, because that's when I started really getting to know spaghetti westerns. Or, for that matter, any westerns made before I was born. More recently, it's kind of a toss up, I suppose, between some of the top westerns like *Stagecoach*, *The Searchers*, *High Noon*, *Winchester 73*, *3:10 to Yuma* and *Once Upon a Time in the West*. But they all have such unique qualities that it's very hard to pick just one. And speaking of great westerns, I finally got a chance to watch *The Man From Larabie* this weekend. It was a great experience - especially because this is the first widescreen western that I actually get to watch in a widescreen TV. For some reason I was under the impression I had seen it before, but I was probably just getting it mixed up with some other of the Stewart-Mann westerns. SPOILER ALERT! Arthur Kennedy's character does so many horrible things, especially towards the end of the movie, that you really felt so glad to see him finally get what he deserves - and at the hands of the Apaches, too (which is cathartic because it was his dealings with them that led to the death of the brother of James Stewart's character). You kinda feel happy for the old man, Alec (Donald Crisp) at the end because even though he lost the two younger men whom he had considered his sons, he reconnected with the great love of his life, and by all appearances learned to live a happy life in spite of having lost his sight. It's a pretty darn good western, and the locations were beautiful B-)

> {quote:title=JackFavell wrote:}{quote} > I will always watch TTM. It's a must! > > I gotta go, I'm going to watch Tales of Hoffman! See ya later, Mica! Hope you enjoyed *Tales of Hoffman*, Jackie. And *The Red Shoes*, too, if you stayed up for that one. Feel free to tell us all about it in the Powell & Pressburger thread. > P. S.: Many have pointed out that the cuckoo clock was invented in Germany, not Switzerland. But why let the facts get in the way of a good quote? So true... so very true B-)

CineMaven, I don't remember if it was you or somebody else who mentioned *The Best of Everything* but at any rate we finally got to watching it today and enjoyed it very much. It almost seems like a 50's version of *Sex and the City* (but without the nudity, of course). B-) Felt almost kinda sorry for the April character, to get mixed up with that louse who just wanted to, well, you know. Suzy Parker's character was obviously the one who got dealt the worst hand, it almost made me wish she could have gotten some Prozac or something to help her forget that other louse (Louis Jordan). Were all the guys in the movie louses? Well not quite, but at times it almost seemed that way. Brian Ahern's character in the end is not such a bad guy, but he sure would be getting himself into a lot of sexual harassment cases in this day and age!! In the end, I almost wish Joan Crawford could have had a few more scenes, but it's obvious that the movie was meant to be carried by the younger ladies, the ones who were just trying to get started in the big city.

*http://forums.tcm.com/jive/tcm/thread.jspa?messageID=7960011* That's actually a pretty interesting thread, and not one I remember having read before. I'm still learning about Fritz Lang's work, but that thread is one I'd definitely like to come back as I watch more FL movies. There is no question that Hitchcock was extraordinarily lucky in terms of his experience with the great German directors, aside from the fact that he started working in the British film industry pretty much as it was being born, writing inter-title cards and what not, which gave him enough opportunity to learn almost every facet of filmmaking as he worked his way up to becoming a director. I want to revisit that Hitchcock biography I read a while back because there are also some interesting parallels between him and John Ford (reportedly they were both secretly scared of women and generally uncomfortable with openly discussing anything that had to do with sexuality). Certainly their Catholic upbringing (albeit in different countries) seems to have been a major influence to both.

> {quote:title=hamradio wrote:}{quote} > Groundhog Day? Someone has got to be kidding That would make Scrooge LAUGH (before his dream). "Gone with the Wind'", NOT on the list? Someone has a strange sense of humor or is drunk! > > Well at least "5000 Fingers" is not included (whew). Ah, but when someone who obviously has such deep appreciation for so many movies from the 40's and 50's selects that one as the _only_ American movie from the 90's that deserves to be considered one of the Top 10 American movies of all time, it sorta makes you think, no? I'll be honest and admit that my eyes almost popped out when I saw that he'd included it. But that's the beauty of "top ten" lists - sometimes you come across a choice that is bizarre and fascinating and just makes you think for a while. At least that's how I saw it. To idolspencer: feel free to join us at tcmfans.ning.com, we can chat there.

Just found this op-ed and thought it might lead to some interesting discussion. Probably not everyone will agree with Stanley's list.... http://fish.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/04/the-10-best-american-movies/ January 4, 2009, 10:00 pm The 10 Best American Movies It?s Top Ten time again, and like everyone else I have a list, in my case a list of the 10 best American movies ever. Here it is, with brief descriptions and no justifications. Only the first two films are in order. The others are all tied for third. *The Best Years of Our Lives* (1946), directed by William Wyler. Regarded as producer Sam Goldwyn?s masterpiece, this deeply felt study of soldiers coming home after World War II boasts career-best performances by Fredric March (who won an Oscar), Myrna Loy, Teresa Wright, Dana Andrews, Virginia Mayo, Cathy O?Donnell, Hoagy Carmichael and the amazing Harold Russell (two Oscars), a double amputee and first- and last-time (non)actor who played a double amputee. The movie is filled with thrilling and affecting scenes ? the moment when Milly Stephenson (Loy) realizes that the person at the door is her husband, Al (March), who has come back a day before he was supposed to; the moment when Homer Parrish (Russell) waves goodbye to his two new friends and his parents see the hooks that are now his hands for the first time; the moment when Fred Derry (Andrews) hoists himself into a military plane like the one he flew in so many times and hears in his mind the engines of the other dead planes surrounding him in rows. The three intertwined stories are resolved with a measure of optimism, but with more than a residue of disappointment and bitterness. Al Stephenson is still a drunk. Fred Derry is still poor and without skills. Homer Parrish still has no hands. *Sunset Blvd.* (1950), directed by Billy Wilder. Notable for Gloria Swanson?s triumphant comeback performance in a movie that denies her character a comeback, the film also has William Holden doing his ?morally-flawed-person-in-an-attractive-package? act to perfection, not to mention the ancillary pleasures of a young, boyish and humorous (world you believe it?) Jack Webb, a self-parodying turn as a director/husband-turned-factotum by Erich von Stroheim, a silent appearance by silent star Buster Keaton and a cameo performance by Cecil B. DeMille playing himself. The voice-over narration of the story by a dead man floating in a swimming pool seems not bizarre but exactly right; Joe Gillis (Holden) was morally dead before he hit the water. When the movie begins, Gillis comes across as a nice guy, somewhat down on his luck, and Norma Desmond (Swanson) comes across as an egomaniacal monster who pressures him into becoming her boy-toy. But even before the final incredible scene of Desmond descending a staircase while the camera, empty of film, rolls, she has earned the sympathy we extend to the terribly needy, and he has revealed himself to be the true monster, a betrayer of Desmond, of the young girl (Nancy Olson) who sees more in him than there is, and of himself. *Double Indemnity* (1944), also directed by Billy Wilder. This time Wilder?s anti-hero ? played by Fred MacMurray, who could do tall but weak with the best of them (see ?The Apartment,? ?The Caine Mutiny? and ?Pushover?) ? is not dead but dying as he narrates the story into a tape-recorder destined for the ears of his boss, Barton Keyes (the incomparably great Edward G. Robinson). You know what?s going to happen the moment Barbara Stanwyck ? you see just her legs ? slinks down the staircase of her house, and Walter Neff (MacMurray) probably knows it, too; but he, like us, is compelled to see the plot through the inevitable downward spiral to its ending. Phyllis (Stanwyck) predicts it all when she says, ?It?s straight down the line for both of us.? Keyes, the indefatigable unlocker of puzzles, is even more precise: ?They?re stuck with each other. They?ve got to ride all the way to the end of the line. And it?s a one-way trip; and the last stop is the cemetery.? Just before that stop, the true love story of the film announces itself when, in response to Keyes?s acknowledgment of the depth of his feelings for his protege, Neff says ?I love you, too,? and dies. *Shane* (1953), directed by George Stevens. In this beautifully photographed western, a laconic, stoic stranger rides in out of nowhere and rides out again ( perhaps mortally wounded) in the same direction, as Joey Starrett ( Brandon De Wilde) implores him to ?come back, Shane.? In between, Shane (Alan Ladd, in the performance of his life), a man at once steely and sentimental, hard-edged and effeminate, becomes the love object of almost everyone in the movie. Joey loves Shane; his father (a tree-like Van Heflin) loves Shane; his mother (Jean Arthur, luminous in a role she disliked) loves Shane; the cowhand played by Ben Johnson learns to love Shane; and even Wilson, the gunman portrayed so memorably by Jack Palance in a breakthrough role, loves Shane in the way one can love one?s mirror image. The movie is at once clich?d ? the settlers vs. the cowmen; the lone, rugged individualist vs. the community ? and elegiac. Like the pastoral, the western caresses a landscape it knows to be already lost and alive only in the imagination; and in ?Shane? the caress is lingering, loving and sad. *Red River* (1948), directed by Howard Hawks, is not elegiac but looks forward to the days when western beef will supply eastern tables. But before that can happen, there has to be the first cattle drive, and its adventures and obstacles provide the plot for this film. The real center, however, is once again the love and hate relationships among the key characters. There are two triangles and one dyad. The first triangle is made up of cattleman Tom Dunson (John Wayne in the role he should have won an Oscar for), Dunson?s adopted son Matthew Garth (Montgomery Clift, matching Wayne?s screen power despite the disparity in their physical presences) and family retainer Groot Nadine (Walter Brennan playing the irascible, principled old coot to perfection). Garth and Groot love Dunson; Dunson loves Garth and Groot; Groot loves Dunson and Garth. None gives his love unconditionally. Groot tells Dunson at a crucial moment, ?You was wrong, Mr. Dunson.? Garth leads a mutiny against his father. Dunson vows vengeance against his son and promises to kill him. He is prevented from doing so (although it is unlikely that he would have ever really gone that far) by Tess Millay (Joanne Dru), who makes up a third of another triangle with Dunson and Garth. Garth, in turn, forms a dyad with Cherry Valance (John Ireland, in his best role except for his bravura turn in ?All the King?s Men?), a fast gun who competes with him but is devoted to him, and risks his life to protect him. Brooding over all these characters is the cattle drive itself, a force both of nature and history. And a generator of excitement and purpose all on its own. *Raging Bull* (1980), directed by Martin Scorsese. Tom Dunson, in ?Red River,? almost brings everything he has fought for and loved down on his head, but is redeemed at the last moment. Nothing redeems Jake La Motta (Robert De Niro, in an Oscar-winning performance ), who can find the worm in any apparently happy situation and who systematically drives away everyone who cares for him with the same relentless brutality he displays in the ring. Anything can set him off, even a steak that may or may not be overdone; and if there is nothing in view, he can make it the provocation up, as he does when he accuses his brother (Joe Pesci) of betraying him with his wife (Cathy Moriarty). For La Motta, rage is the default condition, the ordinary, everyday emotion; anything else is an anomaly he cannot abide and he soon removes it. Most boxing movies trace the classic pattern of rise, fall and redemption (?Somebody Up There Likes Me,? ?The Cinderella Man?), or tell a moral tale about the corruption of the sport (?The Harder They Fall,? ?The Set-Up?), or detail the corruption of the protagonist (?Champion,? ?Body and Soul?). ?Raging Bull? offers no triumph, and no moral. It just exhibits the self-destructiveness of its central figure again and again; even the depiction of La Motta?s later career as a nightclub entertainer extends rather than ends the pain. The wonder is that Scorsese was able to make something lyrical out of a polluting self-destructiveness, but that is what he did. *Vertigo* (1958), directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Here again is a love that destroys, not in the form of rage, but in the form of obsession and control. Hitchcock was one of two directors (the other was Anthony Mann in, for example, ?The Man from Laramie?) who saw that Jimmy Stewart?s nice guy persona could have a dark side. This is a movie about manipulation and the fabrication of reality. Scottie (Stewart) is manipulated by his friend Gavin, who also manipulates the woman (Kim Novak, brilliant in a dual role) who in turn manipulates Scottie. When the deception is complete and Scottie believes that the woman he loves has died, he is lost until he sees a girl who resembles her. (She is her, but not her, at the same time.) He then does to her what had been done to him ? he manipulates her, denies her her own identity and makes her over until she is the simulacrum of a woman who never was. When he discovers how he had been fooled by a theatrical illusion, he hisses, ?Did he train you? Did he rehearse you? Did he tell you what to do and what to say?? ? apparently not realizing that he is furious and indignant about the very behavior he has been exhibiting. There is an abstract geometrical quality to the relationships in this film and they work themselves out in the space of a strangely abstract San Francisco, empty, dreamy and in brilliantly enameled Technicolor. There?s no getting to the bottom of this movie; it?s vertiginous. *Groundhog Day* (1993), directed by Harold Ramis. Another Pygmalion story, but this time the material the sculptor works on is himself. Phil Connors (Bill Murray) is a jaded, dyspeptic, arrogant, cynical and obnoxious TV newsreader who on Feb. 2 finds himself covering the emergence of the groundhog in Puxatawney, Pa. When he wakes up the next morning, he finds that it is not the next morning, but Groundhog Day all over again and all over again and all over again. (His own spring will be late.) His responses to being trapped eternally in the same day include disbelief, despair, excess and hedonism before he settles down to make the best of the situation, which, it turns out, means making the best of himself ? a self-help project that takes forever, but forever is what he has. (It is as if he were at once the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future and the object of their tutelary attention.). By bits and pieces, fits and starts, he makes himself into the most popular fellow in town and wins the love of his producer, the beautiful Rita (a perfectly cast Andie MacDowell). The miracle is that as the movie becomes more serious, it becomes funnier. The comedy and the philosophy (how shall one live?) do not sit side by side, but inhabit each other in a unity that is incredibly satisfying. This is a ?feel-good? movie in at least two senses of the word ?good.? *Meet Me in St. Louis* (1944), directed by Vincente Minnelli. When the calendar finally turns a page in ?Groundhog Day? and Phil and Rita walk out of the bed and breakfast to start their new life together, Phil says, ?Let?s live here,? which means let?s live in small-town America, where everyone knows everyone else and everyone takes care everyone else. In ?Meet Me in St. Louis,? the characters already live there (yes, St. Louis is a city, but in this movie it?s a neighborhood), and the plot centers on the question (not exactly burning) of whether or not they will be able to stay. The real center of the film is the loving depiction of a loving family, four sisters, a son, a mother and a father, a grandfather and a cook (the redoubtable Marjorie Main). To be sure, there are tensions, but they are the innocent tensions found in every family ? between teenage sisters, between husband and wife ? and as viewers we know that they will be dispelled. A film in which the inability of a young man to find a tuxedo for an important party counts as a crisis isn?t ever going to disturb your equanimity. It is only when Esther (a glorious Judy Garland) sings the achingly sad ?Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas? to her sister Tootie (a scene-stealing Margaret O?Brien) that a sense of the pains life often brings intrudes; but not long after, their father (Leon Ames) renounces his plan to move to New York (the only real villain of the story), and everything is once again well. This is a woman?s movie. Only the grandfather (Harry Davenport) is a fully drawn male character. The strength belongs to the sisters, to the cook and to the mother, excellently played by Mary Astor. And of course there is the music, with Garland at the top of her form, especially in the ?Trolley Song? sequence, perhaps the three most exhilarating musical minutes in film history. Despite the lavishly beautiful production, this is not a big movie ? no grand ideas, no moral dilemmas, no transformations of character, no deep insights. All it is is perfect. *A Tree Grows in Brooklyn* (1945), directed by Elia Kazan. Another happy family, but this one maintains its closeness despite the obstacles of poverty and a father given to drink who has trouble keeping his job as a singing waiter. In his first directorial effort, Kazan draws incredible performances from Dorothy McGuire as the wife and mother who is so beaten down by life?s hardships that she cannot afford the luxury of emotions; from James Dunn (who won an Oscar) as the dreamer who has nothing to give but love; from Peggy Ann Garner (special Oscar) as the daughter for whom his love is enough; from Joan Blondell as the slightly disreputable but warm hearted Aunt Sissie. What is said of many movies is true of this one: it will break your heart, not once but many times ? when you witness Francie?s beautiful faith in her father despite the evidence of his failures (?faith is the evidence of things not seen?); when her mother is unable to sustain her feelings for a husband who cannot be a provider; when mother and daughter reach an understanding as they wait for the birth of a child who will never know its father. But the heart it breaks ? in the film and in the audience ? is made whole again by the strength of the family that refuses to bend in the face of a world that offers it little. A tearjerker, to be sure, but so what? So there they are, 10 movies marked by sentiment and cynicism in equal doses, but with sentiment winning out more often than not. There were of course others I would like to have included, and I list a Second Ten here, without comment and in no particular order: ?Quiz Show,? ?The Wild Bunch,? ?Nashville,? ?My Darling Clementine,? ?How Green Was My Valley,? ?The Night of the Hunter,? ?Lonely Are the Brave,? ?Detective Story,? ?All About Eve? and ?Ace in the Hole.? Of course, expanding the list to 20 rather than warding off criticism affords it even more scope. Let the disagreements begin.

> {quote:title=metsfan wrote:}{quote} > Mr. Grimes, I hope you're not found in this state. The pain and anger will eventually go away with time. > Great photo, metsie! I'm not even sure what movie it's from. Looks like a silent movie to me. B-)

> {quote:title=molo14 wrote:}{quote} > > {quote:title=Film_Fatale wrote:}{quote} > > > {quote:title=molo14 wrote:}{quote} > > > Actually I feel I'm falling further and further behind myself. Frank will come through though. We must cling to that hope. > > > > Unless CM succeeds at getting him elected Governor of Illinois. > > Well if we put him on trial that will give him a "leg up" there. Would it really? Mmm. There's an idea.

> {quote:title=clore wrote:}{quote} > Oh, you mean the green guy downstairs. He looks like something something out of one of those old K.Gordon Murray children's matinee movies of 40 years ago. He eats too much chili and the fire comes out the wrong end. Sorry to hear that. So what's your favourite western of all time? Or did you mention that already? B-)

Edgar Barrier was in *The Giant Claw* (scsu's favourite) with Jeff Morrow