kingrat
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Posts posted by kingrat
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V (1983) - (7/10) - 1983 was perhaps the peak year for the TV mini-series, with The Thorn Birds, The Winds of War and V all premiering to big ratings. V features a worldwide alien invasion, as huge, circular motherships arrive and take up stationary orbit all over the planet, directly over large cities. The media soon dubs them the "Visitors", and they appear human, although sensitive to the light and with strange voices. They seem to be benevolent at first, sharing medical and technological breakthroughs, while not asking for anything in return. But of course they are after something, and they will stop at nothing to get it, and soon they are disposing of enemies and setting up human collaboration units to weed out the "undesirables". A group of people soon set up an underground resistance, but can they hope to stop the seemingly superior alien invaders?
Marc Singer stars as a heroic war correspondent who is the first to learn of the aliens true nature, along with Faye Grant as a biologist, Jane Badler as an alien commander, Richard Herd, Andrew Prine, Leonardo Cimino as a Holocaust survivor who sees the writing on the wall, Evan Kim, Michael Wright, Bonnie Bartlett, Neva Patterson, Robert Englund as a friendly alien, and many more.
This was probably intended as a starting point for a series, but instead it led to another mini-series the following year, before finally a short-lived series (and a remake in 2009). It's derivative of a lot of things, namely the Arthur C. Clarke novel Childhood's End. It's also a very heavy-handed allegory of the Nazi occupations in Europe and the Holocaust; the alien symbol is even a variation on a swastika. The effects are decent, if dated at this point, and the script, by writer-director Kenneth Johnson, never really rises above average. But it's fun in a dopey, Saturday-morning serial way. At slightly over 3 hours, it's also a bit short as far as mini-series go.
Rewatch. Source: DVD.
Lawrence, I thought Marc Singer and Jane Badler were going to be big stars. The mini-series was a great form, perfect for books too long for a movie and yet with a definite conclusion.
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I know there are sometimes strange combinations when the daytime theme ends and the evening theme begins, but I particularly like Thursday's back to back showing of FINIAN'S RAINBOW and VIRIDIANA.
Although YOUNG CASSIDY isn't all that successful as a whole, you get to see Michael Redgrave as Yeats, Edith Evans as Lady Gregory, Flora Robson with a good death scene, Rod Taylor and Julie Christie looking young and gorgeous. The young Maggie Smith has a delicate beauty and a flawless ivory complexion; too bad she didn't play more romantic roles in her early career. And Sian Phillips, T.P. McKenna, Jack MacGowran--it's a great cast.
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Swithin, thanks for the link to the fascinating article about Nicolas de Gunzburg.
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The Outsiders:
Tom Cruise, Emilio Estevez, Patrick Swayze, Matt Dillon, Rob lowe etc.
Absolutely! Ralph Macchio and Diane Lane as well.
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The actors who dub the supposedly American characters (in English) in the first section of I AM CUBA are particularly atrocious. Better to turn down the sound and just watch the camera movement.
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Susan Sarandon in BULL DURHAM: "Men will do anything if they think it's foreplay."
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THE REMAINS OF THE DAY - The novel is told by the butler, an unreliable narrator. The tone is high comedy with undertones of tragedy. The film, with a more objective viewpoint, reverses the tones. The tone is tragic, thanks in no small part to the performances by Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson, with moments of comedy. The novel is fine, quite well-written, but scarcely at all moving, unlike the film.
I believe I prefer the movie versions of HOWARDS END and A ROOM WITH A VIEW to the Forster originals, though the difference is not so great.
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I'm a fan of Lindsay as well. I've read that she was a lesbian that rebuffed a lot of amorous advances from the wrong people, and thus it hurt her career. She also had trouble with poor romantic chemistry with a lot of her male co-stars. I read about the latter in Jimmy Cagney's biography, I think.
Yes, Margaret Lindsay refused to play the game of publicly dating various actors and eventually marrying someone, perhaps in a "lavender marriage" like Janet Gaynor and Adrian (where a lesbian marries a gay man). Not playing the game hurt her career.
She was friends with Edgar Ulmer and his wife, and lived in their house for a time, according to Ulmer's daughter, who introduced HER SISTER'S SECRET.
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It's a remake of 1933's Goodbye Again, starring Warren William and Joan Blondell. I never cared for the character Warren William plays in this one, and haven't seen Honeymoon for Three as a result.
I'll have to look for the original. in HONEYMOON FOR THREE George Brent plays a best-selling author pursued by his female fans. Ann Sheridan, his secretary, is of course the right woman for him.
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Sunday 3/13 had a schedule very much to my taste, with LOVE LETTERS, THE UNINVITED, THE QUIET AMERICAN (1958), TOOTSIE, and SAWDUST AND TINSEL. THE SMILING LIEUTENANT and VICTOR/VICTORIA aren't chopped liver, either. I should have taken the opportunity to see Errol Flynn in THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER.
Monday 3/14 - Anyone who hasn't seen THE ASPHALT JUNGLE has a chance to remedy that.
Tuesday 3/15 - HONEYMOON FOR THREE is a very funny screwball comedy. Ann Sheridan should have been cast in more comedies. And George Brent can actually play comedy, which surprised the heck out of me.
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Love the photos, Lawrence.
Just a reminder to everyone that THE TEN COMMANDMENTS will be shown in theaters in many cities across the country on March 20 and March 23.
THE KING AND I will be shown at this year's TCM Film Festival.
For those who don't know THE JOURNEY, I highly recommend it. TCM shows it from time to time. A varied group of people tries to leave Hungary in 1956 during the Soviet takeover. Deborah Kerr wants to help her lover (Jason Robards) escape, for he has participated in the struggle against the Soviet. Yul Brynner plays the Russian officer who controls their fate, and he's very smitten with Deborah. One of Anatole Litvak's best films.
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LA KERMESSE HEROIQUE (aka CARNIVAL IN FLANDERS) was shown on TCM a couple of years ago. It was famous in its day, then became less well known. A town in Belgium is about to be conquered by the Spanish during the religious wars of the seventeenth century. The men run and hide, but the women find a way to conquer the conquerors.
OIL FOR THE LAMPS OF CHINA was shown on TCM three or four years ago. It's based on a best-selling novel by Alice Tisdale Hobart and was directed by Mervyn LeRoy. Pat O'Brien plays an oil company employee in China, and Josephine Hutchinson is his wife. The theme of the film is the sacrifice that the woman is expected to make for her husband and the sacrifice that the husband is expected to make for his employer. The climax of the film is the choice O'Brien must make between helping his wife through a difficult pregnancy and helping to put out an oil fire in a remote location. Although some of the scenes are stagy, this is one of the most intelligent films of the period. The company bosses aren't mustache-twirling villains, but they think nothing of appropriating the invention Pat O'Brien makes, and he doesn't feel that he has been wronged. Hollywood has rarely made good films about big business, but this one is an exception.
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Here are the current choices for 1935:
Best Actor:
Charles Laughton, MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY*
Ronald Colman, A TALE OF TWO CITIES
Paul Muni, BORDERTOWN
Robert Donat, THE 39 STEPS
Fredric March, THE DARK ANGEL
Best Actress:
Francoise Rosay, LA KERMESSE HEROIQUE*
Katharine Hepburn, ALICE ADAMS
Bette Davis, DANGEROUS
Marlene Dietrich, THE DEVIL IS A WOMAN
Josephine Hutchinson, OIL FOR THE LAMPS OF CHINA
Honorable mention: Madeleine Carroll, THE 39 STEPS; Bette Davis, BORDERTOWN; Miriam Hopkins, BARBARY COAST; Carole Lombard, HANDS ACROSS THE TABLE; Merle Oberon, THE DARK ANGEL
Best Supporting Actor:
Eric Blore, TOP HAT*
Herbert Marshall, THE DARK ANGEL
Franchot Tone, MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY
Walter Brennan, BARBARY COAST
W.C. Fields, DAVID COPPERFIELD
Honorable mention: Ralph Bellamy, HANDS ACROSS THE TABLE; Cary Grant, SYLVIA SCARLETT; Cesar Romero, THE DEVIL IS A WOMAN
Best Supporting Actress:
Blanche Yurka, A TALE OF TWO CITIES*
Edna May Oliver, A TALE OF TWO CITIES
Margaret Lindsay, BORDERTOWN
Peggy Ashcroft, THE 39 STEPS
Janet Beecher, THE DARK ANGEL
Honorable mention: Jean Muir, OIL FOR THE LAMPS OF CHINA
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Top 10 for 1935, no particular order. Very much subject to change on seeing or re-seeing more films:
The 39 Steps
La Kermesse Heroique (Carnival in Flanders)
A Night at the Opera
The Devil Is a Woman
A Tale of Two Cities
Mutiny on the Bounty
Top Hat
Oil for the Lamps of China
David Copperfield
The Dark Angel
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TOYS IN THE ATTIC has some of the least probable siblings: Geraldine Page, Dean Martin, and Wendy Hiller.
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Natalie Wood having a meltdown in the sound booth while she's supposed to be lip-synching her musical number (INSIDE DAISY CLOVER).
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A classic open ending from one of Ben M's very favorite films: THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR.
PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK leaves us, well, hanging.
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If I've seen fifteen of the films Bogie hasn't, there are many more of the ones he's seen that I haven't! THE AFFAIRS OF CELLINI is hard to come by, if I remember correctly.
THE HOUSE OF ROTHSCHILD is interesting if only because this is one of the few Hollywood films of the classic era which is about Jews. It's also interesting to see George Arliss' acting style, which is based on earlier theatrical traditions.
A fun fact about THE AGE OF INNOCENCE: Julie Haydon, who plays May Welland (the role played by Winona Ryder in the Scorsese film), was the original Laura in THE GLASS MENAGERIE. She was the mistress of the prominent Broadway theater critic George Jean Nathan, usually taken to be the model for Addison DeWitt in ALL ABOUT EVE.
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The John Brahm film LET US LIVE, with Henry Fonda and Maureen O'Sullivan, definitely belongs on your list. The French poetic realism style, as in PORT OF SHADOWS, also belongs there.
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1934's Suspension of Disbelief Award: Mickey Rooney grows up to be Clark Gable (MANHATTAN MELODRAMA).
Best Supporting Actor for 1934:
Ned Sparks, IMITATION OF LIFE*
Peter Lorre, THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH
Melville Cooper, THE PRIVATE LIFE OF DON JUAN
Charles Vanel, LES MISERABLES
We do seem to have a consensus that Colbert, Davis, Lombard, and Loy all belong on the short list for Best Actress this year.
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DAMES has some of Busby Berkeley's giddiest, most surreal musical numbers. Not to be missed.
HEAT LIGHTNING is another early Mervyn LeRoy film that has much more energy than the stodgier, longer films he made in the 1950s. It has some resemblances to THE PETRIFIED FOREST, which hadn't been filmed yet. Aline MacMahon, having fallen for a guy (Preston Foster) who turned out to be a criminal, now runs a filling station in the desert. She tries to look after her younger sister (Ann Dvorak), who's in love with a fellow Aline thinks is no good. Meanwhile, two dizzy, man-crazy dames (Ruth Donnelly and Glenda Farrell) who've just gotten Reno divorces stop for the night with their chauffeur. And--you guessed it--Preston Foster turns up again. Aline in overalls looks extremely butch early in the film and then transforms into all woman when her ex-beau returns. It's interesting to see her in a leading role, and one that calls for serious drama. All this, and Jane Darwell as a tourist who stops for gas.
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All times E.S.T.:
6:15 p.m. "Torch Song" (1953)--Unforgettable staging of song "Two-Faced Woman" and its' aftermath. Film is funnier than Carol Burnetts' parody "Torchy Song"; CB's version can be seen on YT for those who want an advance peek at the scheduled film. Recommended for fans of the silly.
Come on, guys, you KNOW you want to see Joan Crawford in blackface!
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There are many portrayals of monarchs on screen, so maybe it's more important to think of others. But we do remember Bette Davis as Elizabeth I (twice), Cate Blanchett as Elizabeth I (twice), Helen Mirren as Elizabeth II, Marlene Dietrich as Catherine the Great (THE SCARLET EMPRESS), etc. Katharine Hepburn is less than ideally cast as MARY OF SCOTLAND.
There are also portrayals of female criminals, such as Ann Todd as Madeleine Smith in MADELEINE, Faye Dunaway as Bonnie Parker in BONNIE AND CLYDE, etc.
Greer Garson, who did several of these biopics, also played Eleanor Roosevelt in SUNRISE AT CAMPOBELLO.
Nicole Kidman played Virginia Woolf in THE HOURS.
Rosalind Russell played Sister Kenny, who developed a new treatment in the fight against polio.
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I'm a big fan of HIGH BARBAREE, which no one has mentioned yet. It's one of the best 1940s romances.
Joe Btfsplk Day Festivities
in General Discussions
Posted
There's Louis Malle's fine film THE FIRE WITHIN (LE FEU FOLLET) about a young man who visits his friends trying to find a reason to go on living, but their lives make him even more depressed. Not recommended for those suffering from depression.