LsDoorMat

"First Monday in October" (1981), released about the same time that Reagan appointed the first woman to the Supreme Court - Sandra Day O'Connor - with the female justice, Justice Ruth Loomis played by Jill Clayburgh, and Walter Matthau as her fellow justice and ideological nemesis, Justice Dan Snow. The chief justice is played by Barnard Hughes who seems to just want to keep the peace and keep a low profile, not really what you would expect from a chief justice. Weirdly nobody calls him by name, they just call him C.J. This thing is really a time capsule, and that can be surprising since I was 23 when it was released and thought of 1981 as modern times. At Loomis' confirmation hearings she is asked if being a woman will influence her decisions and why she doesn't have any children! Even the justices make sexist remarks like saying "the perfume will make the place smell better" and wondering if she will put up curtains! The really interesting thing for me was that I had a hard time telling whether Loomis and Matthau were just disagreeing on cases or if one was right and the other left or if one or the other was supposed to be a moderate! Not until the end does the film clearly tell you which is which with a funny line about cab fare and liberals never having money. There are two cases the justices spar over - one is a pornographic film that the maker says is actually an educational documentary, and the other is a large corporation's possible attempt to squash the development of an idea that would have competed with their established products. Loomis naively talks about the virtues of big corporations and how they only want to build up America and their stockholders. Matthau does a monologue about defending everybody's right to free speech no matter how offensive. Today nobody believes big corporations are inherently good, and both libs and conservatives would like to squish the other side's free speech rights if they could. The dialogue could have been better for the material, but there is a mini-mystery towards the end that gives the film an interesting twist. Matthau is basically just playing a more erudite version of Oscar the slob from The Odd Couple, Matthau's character's wife leaves him in the middle of the movie because - I'm not sure - the reason she gave was that her husband did not know what kind of wallpaper they had, but she made sure to take that fur coat with her! I loved it if for no other reason than to take a look back at how politics used to be. I'd give it an 8/10 but YMMV. Especially when you see the credits and find that Robert E. Lee cowrote the play and the screenplay! It probably could not get screened today because of that! Oh how times have changed!

Not to rain on Jerry Lewis' parade, but the following video is interesting. For one, it was obviously done several years ago when Robert Osborne was healthy, and it was not posted until three days after his death. I wonder if this is some request Robert made, because in it is the only time I have ever heard Robert say he did not like somebody and go into details. That person was Jerry Lewis. Sure he talked about the Mitchum interview as being his least favorite, but he did not say he disliked Mitchum, even mentioning how ill he was at the time as a possible mitigating factor. At any rate, watch and see what you think. Very unusual for Bob to say he disliked ANYBODY. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9MECarU7zM&t=4220s

Thanks for bringing attention to this drednm! I believe LoC just issued blu/dvd releases of "When Knighthood was In Flower" and "Bride's Play" is available on DVD-R, but I think "Enchantment" is not yet available and maybe a TCM premiere???? So I'm hoping to get a pristine copy of Enchantment when it airs, since it is not commercially available. To anybody not familiar with Ms. Davies' work, I suggest you not miss "Show People" or "The Patsy". They both show just how talented she was. I'm not suggesting you miss her other films either though. I will admit I am a fan. "When Knighthood was in Flower" is also a great chance to see a very young William Powell in what I think was his second film role in his first year in film - 1922. He played villains and shady characters until sound came in and his voice just did not match that persona.

Likewise: Oh yes it is. Duck Season Rabbit Season Duck Season....

Double Harness was one of six movies along with "Rafter Romance", "Living on Love", "One Man's Journey", "A Man To Remember", and "Stingaree" whose rights were given to Merian C. Cooper from the RKO library in 1946 as a form of payment. They probably did have to be restored, but the main problem was the negotiating with the estate of Cooper to retrieve the rights from the heirs. That was done by March 2007 when all six became the property of Warner Brothers and were shown on TCM for the first time.

The 1930 version of Holiday belongs to Warner Brothers since it was a RKO/Pathe film. The print that exists is rather shaggy, and WB probably hasn't gotten around to restoring it yet.

Capitolfest 2017 core dump part 9/9 Stowaway (1932) A forgettable B programmer with an oddly stellar cast (5/10) At 54 minutes in length, this little film was obviously a B film made to precede the feature picture of the evening, back when the movies were an evening's entertainment. It for sure has plenty of atmosphere and plenty of promise when you look at the synopsis, but it plods along so slowly it really is work to pay attention throughout. Fay Wray is Mary, a taxi dancer at a port dive, where the proprietor, Tony (Paul Porcasi), is not particular as to how his girls are treated. They often get mauled by the customers, and one night in comes first mate Groder, who actually tears Mary's dress. She slaps him and goes back into the dressing room. Tony blames her for the altercation, charges her for the damaged dress, and fires her, refusing to give her any of the back wages he owes her. Out on the foggy streets and penniless, another man accosts her thinking she is a prostitute, but is scared away by a cop. The cop thinks Mary is a prostitute too and is going to arrest her but she runs away. He makes chase on foot, and she hides on board one of the cargo ships nearby and gets away. The good news is this ship is going to San Francisco, where she has a good job waiting if she can get there. More good news is that when Mary screams in the cargo hold as bales of hay are lunged at her by a conveyor belt, it is second mate Tommy (Leon Ames) who finds her, frees her from the hay, and is sympathetic to her story, agreeing to help her hide. He gives her shelter in his room. The bad news is that Groder the groper's ship is the one Mary is hiding on. More bad news is that Tommy's door - for some unknown maritime architectural reason - has a round glass portal in it where anybody could look inside and see what is going on. But Groder has his problems too. A sailor on the ship (Lee Moran) keeps accosting him and demanding "his share of the loot" for the sale of some unknown contraband. Meanwhile there is a new steward on board (Roscoe Karns) who keeps creeping around the ship and showing up whenever Groder and the sailor are arguing. Where is all of this leading? In spite of its potential, no place really all of that interesting. The film might just be a cure for insomnia if not for the stellar cast - Faye Wray, Leon Ames, and Roscoe Karns as they are getting started in talking film. Then there is Montague Love (that was his real name folks), a holdover from the silents but still a respectable actor in the talkies although he tends to chew the scenery here. Finally there is Lee Moran who was doing well over at RKO in supporting parts that remind me a great deal of Ned Sparks. Unfortunately for Lee Moran, Ned Sparks arrived on the scene. I'd give the plot a 3/10 for being so slow in spots and not taking advantage of several opportunities for some mystery and action. I'd give the cast a 7/10 for making the best of a mediocre situation. That gives me my final rating of 5/10. Probably only for completists of the actors involved and students of film history.

Capitolfest 2017 core dump part 8 The Wild Horse Stampede (1926) Who IS that billed above Fay Wray??? (7/10) ...That would be Jack Hoxie, a true Western star if there ever was one, and star of dozens of silent westerns, ending his silent career at Universal which was known for its Western films in the silent era. This is a pretty short film. Hoxie plays Jack Tanner, who enters a competition to capture ten thousand wild horses for a cash prize. He then plans to ask Jessie Hayden (Fay Wray) for her hand in marriage. However, hissable villain Charlie Champion beats him to the proposal. Meanwhile a woman looking for the husband that abandoned her finds refuge in Tanner's house. When Jessie goes to Tanner's house and sees the woman in a bathrobe tending to Jack's laundry she draws all of the wrong conclusions and decides to marry Champion on the rebound. An aside here- Honestly Jessie, that woman looks like she is at least 40. You are less than half her age and half her size. She might be his aunt there for a visit! Lighten up! Meanwhile, Champion's men decide to let the wild horses go from Tanner's make shift corral just as Champion and Jesse are making their way into town. The key is that these are "wild" horses. They are not just going to amble out of the corral at a normal gait, they are going to stampede! And right into the path of Jesse and Champion's buggy! Tanner rides like the wind to explain about the woman at his house to Jessie if she will let him, to save her from the "wild horse stampede", and deliver one other piece of vital information that up until now all of the parties involved were not privy to. This was a great little western with lots of action, the film moves along nicely, and special honors have to go to Bunk the Dog, who really knew how to act. Hoxie's story is rather sad. He had great talent in roping, riding, and stunts, but westerns could not be made because of the camera's need to be static for about the first three years after and during the transition to sound. Hoxie made only one film between the end of 1927 and 1932 as a result. Plus, Hoxie's looks were those of a silent star not those of the Gables and Gary Coopers that rose up in the 1930s. If you have never seen him, Hoxie greatly resembled John Travolta in pancake makeup. Besides his style, Hoxie was illiterate, which made the transition to sound and scripted roles impossible. He died in obscurity in the 1960s, sadly forgotten with many of his films destroyed by neglect and decomposition

Capitolfest 2017 core dump part 7 White Lies (1935) Takes some interesting twists and turns but reaches a conclusion I disagree with completely (8/10) SPOILER WARNING!!! John Mitchell (Walter Connolly) runs a newspaper that doubles as a scandal sheet. He prints everything that is true even if it ruins lives. William Demarest, although he makes the big entrance, actually has a minor role as a reporter who has just talked to a bank officer who embezzled a great deal of money, Dan Oliver (Leslie Fenton). Demarest says maybe they should not print the story, that Oliver shows remorse and has actually returned most of the money and plans to return the rest. Mitchell says no go, Oliver is responsible for his actions, and the bank depositors deserve to know the truth. Later, in a totally separate incident, Mitchell gets pulled over for speeding by motorcycle cop Terry Condon (Victor Jory). Condon will not let Mitchell off the hook for this. Furious, Mitchell returns to his office determined to use his influence to bust Condon off of the force. Mitchell's daughter Joan (Fay Wray) convinces her dad that he should get Condon promoted instead, and write an article about the honesty of the cops that are protecting the city. Dad relents. Later, Dan Oliver shows up at Mitchell's office ready to shoot Mitchell if he prints the story about his embezzlement. Coming to thank Mitchell, the now promoted Condon shows up and manages to disarm Oliver. Again, Condon is promoted. As a side plot, Joan and Condon are starting to fall for one another, but things are interrupted when, at Oliver's trial, he is found guilty and escapes, but not before pulling a gun (again) and shooting Condon, who is not seriously wounded. Oliver's best girl comes to visit Joan and tell her how if it wasn't for her father printing that story, Dan would still be a law abiding citizen, that everything is all of their fault. Joan has pity on the girl, who has lost her job and her apartment, and agrees to help her get a job and a new apartment so she can get on her feet. But Oliver is still hanging around, watching. He thinks Joan helping his girl is a trick, kills the total stranger that is with her in the apartment they found for his fiancée, after knocking Joan unconscious. Then, like the whining coward he is, he puts the gun in Joan's hand who is then arrested for the murder of a man with whom she had no quarrel. He grabs his fiancée and goes into hiding. Now the movie gets a bit ridiculous at this point. Joan is put on trial for murdering a suitor who understood he was not first choice, and happy just to be a friend. But for some reason, because they were in an apartment alone together and might be "playing house", there is a shot at conviction, not because Joan looks guilty but because she might be of low morals and therefore a killer??? Hey, who voir dired this jury anyways? Oh well, if I'm going to watch the films of 1935 I'd better be prepared to deal with the values of 1935. Meanwhile, the officer who arrested Joan but believes her innocent, Condon, resigns from the force and is trying to find Oliver and his girl even though both seemed to disappear off of the face of the earth. Oh, and in case you are wondering, Oliver is just hunky dory with Joan going to the chair in his place. How will this all work out? Watch and find out. The conclusion this film reaches that I disagree with, based on an impassioned speech on the witness stand by Joan's dad during her trial, is that he should have left Oliver alone after he found out he was returning the money, that if he did none of this would have happened. Maybe so, but Oliver was a sociopath waiting to hurt someone. Ordinary people that impulsively steal once don't grab a gun and threaten to shoot people, then graduate to actually shooting them, and then graduate to murdering total strangers and framing people for revenge. Too bad, because that was great acting on the witness stand by Walter Connolly, who seldom got a chance at such a big role at Columbia, but was one of their stalwart supporting actors throughout the 1930s. Another plus - it was great to see Victor Jory play a protagonist for once and do a good job of it, playing the role of Condon with great likability.

Capitolfest 2017 core dump part 6 Cheer Up and Smile (1930) The main road of the plot is thin, but it is full of interesting sidetracks... (7/10) ...For example, if you've always wanted to see a young John Wayne in a modern dress role being handed some flowers from Franklin Pangborn and the Duke not then punch him in the nose, this is your film! "Cheer Up and Smile" has the always whiney Arthur Lake whine some more as underclassman Eddie Fripp being hazed by a fraternity to which he is trying to gain admittance. Two of the stunts he must perform get him in bad trouble. Kicking a professor in the pants gets him kicked out of college, and kissing a random girl on the street gets him in trouble with his girl Margie, played by Dixie Lee. So a despondent Eddie leaves college even though the fraternity wants to explain things to the dean and his girl, and he gets a job as a musician in a nightclub. In this part of the film you get to see Whispering Jack Smith sing in a contraption that appears to be a china closet, Olga Baclanova as the wife of the hot tempered jealous owner of the night club plays a Russian who only speaks a little French and thus does not have to talk at all (Her English was awful, and when she was originally recruited as a silent star by Paramount, that didn't matter). However, for some reason she just can't keep her hands off Eddie, with the night club owner always walking in on what looks like a mutually compromising situation. Then some gangsters decide to rob the nightclub, knock out Whispering Jack Smith who is supposed to sing on the radio from the nightclub, and Eddie has to sing in his place, with the robbers' guns at his head. Why they just didn't scram with the loot is anybody's guess. Well Eddie's nervous stammering singing style is a huge hit, although he gave a fake name when he went on the air - Eric Dare - because he couldn't remember his own name. Does this sudden fame and fortune lead to Eddie squaring things with his girl? If so how? Watch and find out.

Capitolfest 2017 core dump part 5 Innocents of Paris (1929) Early Talkie Chevalier is delightful (8/10) Innocents of Paris was a delight with Maurice Chevalier in his first talking film and his first in English. He comes on stage at first and explains that he is doing this film in English because of the trouble that he has caused before when he has spoken French to an American girl. He asked her if a guy she waved at was her father and in reply she kissed him. Phonetically what he said sounded in English to be "Come on and kiss your papa"!". What follows is a rather predictable melodrama with Chevalier as a junk man who rescues a boy from the Seine, but cannot manage to rescue his mother. A suicide note she left behind tells her father that he was right about the man she married, that he deserted them, and suicide was the only way out. When Chevalier delivers the note and the boy to the grandfather's home he discovers the boy and his interest in his other daughter Louise are unwanted because he is "just a junkman". Maurice takes the boy home with him and decides to pursue a career as a singer to win the approval of Louise's father. Of course he is a success, and of course he attracts the interest of the wife of the owner of the bistro in which he works. Louise misunderstands that the attraction is not reciprocated. Louise's father misunderstands Maurice's intentions and plans to shoot him. Paramount can't let a Maurice Chevalier film end in tragedy! So how does this all work out? Watch and find out. And while you are watching and finding out, see just how charming and likable Maurice Chevalier's screen presence was. He sings quite a few songs in the film, but his humor, smile, and charm serve him well beyond the musical acts. I'd really recommend this one.

Capitolfest core dump part 4 Naughty Baby (1928) A delightful comedy, saved from the flames (8/10) I was surprised to see the 1928 silent "Naughty Baby", a Mervyn LeRoy directed film starring Alice White from First National, at Capitolfest. The 2017 Capitolfest team managed to assemble enough of the Vitaphone score to give the organist something to go on in composing the accompaniment. For years this film has been listed as lost, and "Broadway Babies" was long considered the earliest existing Mervyn LeRoy directed film. This was better than White's talking films and there are quite a few funny moments. Alice plays hat check girl Rosalind at a fancy hotel when she spots wealthy young Terry Vandeveer (Jack Mulhall). She sets her cap for him, but that means he can't know she's a hat check girl, and her attempts to not let him know get her fired. She makes him think she is a society girl by getting her three actual suitors humorously played by Benny Rubin, George E. Stone and Andy Devine to supply her with gowns, fancy bathing suits, furs, jewels, and elegant transportation, purloined from their own places of business. However, it could be that Terry has some problems of his own, as his checks begin to bounce. Thelma Todd plays a gold digger, but it's not like Alice's motives are pure as the driven snow either. I guess the difference is Thelma intends to use blackmail to get Terry and Alice's character is actually trying to get him to fall in love with her. Best moment: Alice's character and Terry "accidentally" run into each other at the beach and decide to take a swim. What Alice doesn't know is that the suit that Benny Rubin got for her is not really meant to swim in, and it comes off completely in the middle of their swim. It's really a cute way to pass an hour and go back to those roaring 20s. I'd give it a whirl if it ever comes your way.

Capitolfest 2017 core dump part three Hail The Woman (1921) The spirit of Christ is a loving one not a judgmental one... (7/10) ...seems to be the lesson of this film from almost a century ago. However, there were several themes woven into the script besides this including the virtues of the emancipation of women. The film involves a family (the Berefords) descended from the Puritans whose joyless father rules the roost with an iron fist so absolutely that his wife has become a frightened shadow of her original self, the son, David, is bullied into becoming a minister just to keep dad happy, and the daughter, Judith, is forced to drop out of high school because dad figures she is going to get married anyways and that more education will just make her a bad wife. And besides, dad has picked out a husband for her anyways, self-righteous buffoon Joe Herd (Vernon Dent), who looks like he has it in him to be every bit the bully Judith's dad is and then some. If you don't remember Vernon Dent, he is probably best known as the exasperated straight man for the Three Stooges in the Columbia shorts that they made. But all is not as it seems. David has secretly married the town handyman's daughter, Nan. Judith visits the home of an author who shows Judith that woman is on the verge of emancipation in the U.S. and that many doors are open to her. When Joe catches her at the author's house he believes the worst, quickly runs to her dad, and dad has her ejected from their home for being alone with a man and smoking! Oh the horror!. She willingly goes. Meanwhile, though Nan and David had wanted to keep their marriage secret, Nan becomes pregnant, her stepdad finds out, and David's dad pays off the stepdad to send Nan away. David's dad assumes the worst, figures the girl is "a wanton", and David does not dare tell dad about the marriage. Don't get the wrong idea about David. He badly wants to do the right thing, but he is a coward. In the meantime, years pass, Judith becomes a successful fashion designer, but even when she was just a poor shop girl she'd skip lunches to buy presents for the orphans at "Settlement House". She also runs into Nan in the city, by chance, as she is dying of malnutrition and neglect, and Nan entrusts her baby by David to her, the child's aunt. Judith and a wealthy fellow who doubles for Santa at the orphanage fall in love, and it looks like Judith's happy path will never cross the path of the dysfunctional family she left behind. Well life is what happens when you're making plans. I'll let you see if and how this all works out. It has some tried and true melodramatic moments in it, but it is an original too. Like I said, I don't think I've ever seen female emancipation and a message on the true spirit of Christ worked into the same film in quite this way before. Best line: Before Judith leaves home she runs into the author and asks him "What has God got against women?". The author's response: "Maybe it is because they filled the earth with men!". Priceless.

Capitolfest 2017 core dump part two One Hysterical Night (1929) A great concept that could have had better pacing (6/10) This was Reginald Denny's first talking picture and one that he co-wrote as well. It has a great idea - A domineering woman is angry that her two sons will not inherit a relative's three million dollar estate, and that it instead will go to a nephew (Reginald Denny as William Judd). But there is an insanity clause in the will - if Judd is deemed of unsound mind the money goes to her family. So she cooks up a scheme to make Judd think there are no hard feelings and has her sons ask him to a "fancy dress ball" that is happening that night at one of their friend's homes. They tell Judd that first prize goes to the person who stays in character the best and have Judd dress up as Napoleon. Meanwhile, the scheming aunt goes to "The Home for the Historical" - a sanitarium - lamenting that her nephew believes he is Napoleon, she wants to have him committed, and she will bring him there that night to prove he is insane. The reason the insane asylum is called "The Home for the Historical" is that all of the inmates believe they are historical characters - Salome, William Tell, Robin Hood, etc. Judd, knowing none of this, shows up at the sanitarium thinking it is a private home and that the inmates are the other party goers. The head doctor is convinced that Judd is insane and Judd's relatives leave believing they are in the money. How will Judd ever get out of this? Watch and find out. Denny gives a good performance, but the part at the sanitarium with the interaction of the inmates goes on for about 15 minutes more than necessary. This was a film that has a story that would have been too much to stuff into a two reel short and is really to thin to stretch into a feature. Still I think it is worth a look for its original idea and very natural acting considering it is a very early talkie.

Capiltolfest 2017 core dump part one Disorderly Conduct (1932) Sally Eilers really is a very "Bad Girl" in this film (7/10) Spencer Tracy plays motorcycle cop Dick Fay who believes that how you get ahead on the force is to always play it straight, never take bribes. This costs him, and he knew it would - to an extent. For example he decides that a parade of "lumber trucks" looks suspicious and decides to investigate. The gangster who is in charge of getting the "lumber" to its destination offers him a big bribe. Dick says no go and pursues the caravan. However, the ruffian accompanying the gangster decides to run Tracy down with his car. The ruffian pays for this deed via he gangster in charge, and Fay recovers, still on the straight and narrow. But then he pulls over Phyllis Crawford who is zooming down the highway and then leads him on a high speed pursuit. He drags her to jail with her claiming she'll get even. She does. Daddy has the pull to have her charges dropped and Dick demoted to patrolman and transferred to another precinct. The man in charge there is straight arrow Captain Tom Manning (Ralph Bellamy), who never looked better. Meanwhile bitter Dick Fay has decided that the gangsters are right - that being on the take is the best way to get ahead. He takes big bribes from a guy running a local speakeasy to keep Manning and his men away, claiming there is nothing illegal going on and tipping the gangster off if they are on their way. But then Manning figures out that Fay is crooked, locks him up for a few hours, and makes HIM lead the charge to raid the speakeasy. Complicating factors are that Phyllis is Manning's girl, the night of the raid she is at the speakeasy and makes one of her big tease come ons to a hard boiled guy that just won't take her no for an answer, and soon she finds herself implicated in a crime that not even daddy and all of his money can get her out of. Meanwhile the raided gangster feels betrayed by Fay and decides to get even Al Capone style. How does this end? Pretty unbelievably if you ask me. This was the precode era and unjust endings were allowed, but everybody's response to things were just a little too "Sunnyside Up" if you pardon the expression. There is one exception - a very sad event that precipitates a change in Fay. This is a good early performance by Tracy in a (largely) believable script. El Brendel shows up to bring a little levity to what is largely a very suspenseful tale, and Ralph Morgan is quite believable as Katherine's daddy, who has literally killed the girl's character with kindness. Oh, and he is also up to his neck in the illegal rackets that the police are fighting.

Yes, I saw it. You so very rarely get to see films with Colleen in them. I had never heard of the film before so I didn't know what the plot would be. I thought it was interesting that Annie ended every fable with "The Goblins will get you if you don't watch out", because my grandmother, born in 1899 -same year as Ms. Moore - always said that to us as kids when we were growing up as some kind of cautionary tale. I wonder if it was a generational thing? I'm going to do a Capitolfest core dump on everything I saw in the "I Just Watched" thread, probably tomorrow night.

I attended Capitolfest. Next year's star is Ronald Colman. My favorites? "Cheer Up and Smile" has the always whiney Arthur Lake whine some more as an underclassman in love with a girl who would love him if not for the usual misunderstandings. What makes this special? Whispering Jack Smith singing in what appears to be a china cabinet. Olga Baclanova continues to try and save her acting career in the age of talkies by being a Russian who fakes speaking French and thus does not have to talk at all. The highlight of the film is seeing John Wayne in a modern dress role being handed some flowers from Franklin Pangborn and not punching him in the nose. Innocents of Paris was a delight with Maurice Chevalier in his first talking film - at least in English. He comes on stage at first and explains that he is doing this film in English because of the trouble that he has caused before when he has spoken French to an American girl. He asked her if a guy she waved at was her father and in reply she kissed him. Phonetically what he said sounded in English to be "Come on and kiss your papa"!". A predictable melodrama, but Chevalier's numbers and just his presence make it something special. Wild Horse Stampede surprised me - I generally don't like the western genre yet this one held my interest. We came in a few minutes late so I was confused by a couple of things. There are telephone lines everywhere and Faye Wray is wearing a dress from the 20's but everybody is using a horse and buggy. I was surprised to see "Naughty Baby", a Mervyn Le Roy directed film starring Alice White from First National. The Capitolfest team managed to assemble enough of the Vitaphone score to give the organist something to go on in composing the accompaniment. What surprised me is for years this film has been listed as lost, and "Broadway Babies" was long considered the earliest existing Mervyn Le Roy directed film. This was better than White's talking films and there are quite a few funny moments. Thelma Todd plays a gold digger, but it's not like Alice's motives are pure as the driven snow either in going after a seemingly wealthy young man. Benny Rubin, George E. Stone and Andy Devine show up as Alice's suitors who really don't have a chance. There were quite a few WB vitaphone shorts that showed up. I don't remember that much from WB in the festival before, but this time they contributed their shorts plus the "Naughty Baby" feature film. "Hail the Woman" was an odd film whose point was difficult to figure out. It was about a woman from a puritanical home in which her father rules the roost so absolutely in which his wife has become a mere shadow of her original self, the son is bullied into becoming a preacher just to make dad happy, and the daughter rebels and goes to the city to make a living for herself. The story is good enough but the surprise was having Vernon Dent show up as the dad approved suitor for the daughter before she made her way to emancipation. If you don't remember Vernon, he is probably best known as the exasperated straight man for the Three Stooges in the Columbia shorts that they made. Sadly, Vernon went blind from diabetes before the end of his life. This is a very incomplete list, but it is my list of the highlights. If you want to know more ask. If anybody else was there I was the woman with hair way too dark for my age (59) in the grumpy cat tee shirt and jeans with my husband who looks like the world's oldest living hell's angel. Hope to see you next year at Capitolfest!

Chaney was for sure one of the greats of silent film, especially in his favorite genres, horror and tragedy. He did only one sound film, and that was a remake of one of his silents, so who knows how he would have done in the sound era once real competition came along. Buster Keaton came to MGM in 1928 as the greatest comedian in the world, and left in 1933 a hopeless alcoholic, pretty much considered washed up. He never starred in an American feature film again. If Keaton had died in 1930, we'd probably be sitting around talking about what great things he would have done if he had not died so young. Now Chaney was a homebody, not given to the heavy partying and womanizing that helped bring Buster down, but you just never know. Chaney was so good at silent film partially because his parents were deaf and pantomime was how he communicated with them. If he had to use the spoken word rather than gestures could he have been another Karloff? He was only six years older than Karloff. Chaney's favorite director, Tod Browning, only directed four films in the next seven years after "Freaks" and then retired. I believe he came from a wealthy family so money was probably not an issue. Who knows if Chaney would have struggled along in the 30s and then given up acting himself. And, yes, I think If Academy Awards had been given out earlier in the 1920's Chaney would have won at least one award.

I'm sure Palmerin can speak for him/herself, but I think what is being said is something I've always wondered about. You see the well done musicals of the 40s and 50s like you saw on Gene Kelly's day, and then in the 1960s suddenly filmed musicals are, by and large, just awful. Some people like "How To Succeed in Business without Really Trying" but I just hate it. I think this has something to do with 60s films in general. They haved one foot in the production code era and another in the counter culture movement and nothing works, and that would probably apply to musicals too. The only ones that do work are those done in a traditional way like "Mary Poppins", "Sound of Music", etc.

i'd recommend, from later in the 40's - 1945 - "The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry". Here Sanders plays a more normal guy, a rather old bachelor who finds at mid-life he wants to marry. However, this will require his sisters, whom he has always cared for, living elsewhere. One sister has no problem, the other one passively aggressively sabotages his wedding plans until the romance is thwarted. Harry decides to take action, and suddenly we are in "Dial M for Murder" territory in more ways than one. Then the ending takes you somewhere else altogether. It's on DVD by Olive, and you might find it streaming on Amazon or Netflix. It really is a good performance by Sanders where he gets to show some range.

Although I've always found Eleanor Parker to be a rather bland actress, I'm looking forward to "The Naked Jungle" which is a 1954 Paramount that I don't think I've ever seen on TCM before. Is this a premiere? At any rate, the description talks about a cocoa plantation being overrun by a 2 mile by 20 mile group of red ants. Being a young adult in the age of "Airplane" and "The Naked Gun" I could see how this could turn out unintentionally campy. My husband tells me the 80s show McGyver ripped off this plot for one of its episodes. I'm also looking forward to seeing "Going Home" in the wee hours of tomorrow morning, the last Mitchum film in his group. There are mixed reviews on this one, which has Mitchum as a paroled convict returning home from serving a sentence for murdering his wife. Unfortunately his son saw him murder her, so there's bound to be some family drama there. I've never seen this one either, so I'm looking forward to seeing it and judging for myself.

"Anyway, can anyone think of any other illustrations of women in the movies whose wanton lifestyle would eventually catch up with them in the form of the Grim Reaper?" First SPOILER WARNING for "Dr. Monica" and "Christopher Strong". Well, sometimes they would reap themselves! In "Christopher Strong" an aviatrix played by Kate Hepburn has an affair with a married man played by Colin Clive. Hepburn's character gets pregnant. So she makes the obvious decision - fly off (until she runs out of gas???...can't remember WHAT she had intentionally go wrong) and die in a blaze of glory rather than face the (at that time) shame of being an unwed mother. In "Dr. Monica" Jean Muir plays a woman who has an affair with Dr. Monica's husband, played by William Warren. When she gets pregnant, it is ironically her lover's wife, Dr. Monica (Kay Francis), who attends to her. There is one scene - cut up by the production code - where the pregnant girl raises the possibility of abortion. Francis' character responds in code approved horror with "don't say that! don't even think that". But after the baby is born Muir - an aviatrix just like the heroine in Christopher Strong - pilots her plane into the sunset and crashes it intentionally because her baby would be so much better off with its production code approved parents - oh and dad doesn't even KNOW he is dad by the way - than with single mom. So abortion is wrong but suicide after the birth is honorable according to this film.

Yep, I can believe that "House of Dark Shadows" brought in enough money in 1970 to help out MGM. "Dark Shadows" was a huge hit of a supernatural soap opera, especially with young girls. All of my friends crushed on Barnabus Collins. Who would think that an acne scarred vampire would be a teen heart throb. I remember in 1968 at summer vacation Bible camp my friends and I would talk Dark Shadows for hours every day. Odd occupation at Bible camp I know. And, yeah, I know I'm replying to a very old post.

I'm jumping ahead a bit to August 2 because of my work schedule. Make sure you watch or record "Alias Nick Beal" at 12:AM night of Aug 2/Morning Aug 3. It is Ray Milland as a very debonair version of Satan. This is a late 40s Paramount and a rare treat. I don't know what it is doing on so late.

You said the other day you are a college professor. I bet your students love you, you must be a blast as a lecturer. You were reviewing Murder on the Campus the other day. If you like that film try finding a copy of College Scandal. It is very rare but very good and another murder mystery where I think you'll figure out who did it by the film's midpoint.