TomJH

Right you are finance.

One of those subtle Bogart moments that I love:

Buster liked them big

What a great photo That's Marlene Dietrich being hoisted to kiss a returning G.I. (New York City, 1945)

On a legendary movie's set. If I have to tell you which film it's from, shame on you as an old movie buff.

Edward G. Robinson is terrific in Five Star Final. He very convincingly plays a hard boiled yellow journalism editor who gradually becomes sickened by his own trade. Robinson's performance compensates for some of the weaker acting to be found with some of the supporting cast members (ie Marian Marsh and, gad, Anthony Bushell as her boyfriend). It's still a hard hitting film. It's been too many years since I saw the Bogart remake (clearly made on a "B" budget, though a lot of Warners Bs can be quite entertaining). Memory tells me that it has little of the impact of the original. I love these kinds of behind the scenes shots. That's Robinson and Marian Marsh in Five Star Final.

Yes, mrroberts, The Oklahoma Kid is a western that no one has ever taken seriously. Aside from its banal script, both Cagney and Bogie do seem terribly miscast in western attire. Cagney would later complain about the fancy outfit he wore, Bogart once commenting, in looking at Jimmy in his wide brimmed cowboy hat, that he looked like a mushroom. However, keep in mind that Cagney was a man who loved country living (he had already purchased some property by this time at Martha's Vineyard) and he had a passionate love for all horses, particularly Morgans. And, to be fair, as much as people laugh at the idea of city boy Cagney as a cowboy, if you watch this film, I think you may agree that his horsemanship in the film is pretty impressive. Cagney called The Oklahoma Kid a programmer, and had this to say about his co-star in it: "Bogie played a heavy in it, doing his usual expert job. By this time in his career he'd become entirely disillusioned with the picture business. Endlessly the studio required him to show up without his even knowing what the script was, what his dialogue was, what the picture was about. On top of this he would be doing two or three pictures at a time. That's how much they appreciated him. He came into the makeup department one morning and I said 'What is it today, Bogie?' 'Oh, I don't know,' he said, 'I was to go over to Stage 12.' There he was fulfilling his contract, doing as required, however much against his will. We shared the same attitude: when there's a job to be done, you do it. New acting talent would come along, and the studio's idea of building them up was simply to throw them into one picture after another as quickly as possible. In this sink-or-swim situation the ones who survived were the ones with natural durability. Bogie had that kind of durability. Albeit he was a tremendous personality, the studio didn't do anything about him until fortuitous circumstances put him opposite Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca, and away went Bogie. Sheer accident. The studio had no thought of using him to the fullest, indeed of using anyone to the fullest bent of their talent. The policy toward talent was simplistic: just throw them in, then throw them out. Talent was not nurtured, it was simply consumed." And Cagney himself may have also have had the same long hard road to stardom that Bogart had if it was not for his own fortuitous circumstances when he and co-star Edward Woods reversed their scheduled roles in The Public Enemy (director Bill Wellman claiming credit for this). Cagney suddenly got the lead in the film and the rest, as they say, is history. Cagney taking a break between Oklahoma Kid takes

Bette Davis and Errol Flynn with their pets on the set of The Sisters, filmed in 1938. Flynn was a devoted dog admirer. The schnauzer pictured here, Arno, was a particular favourite of his, often accompanying the actor on his film sets. Arno was also taken by his owner on board his schooner, the Sirocco, where the dog would entertain Flynn and his guests by leaping in excitement at the sight of flying fish. Arno disappeared off the schooner in 1941, his body being found on shore a few days later. The actor could not bear to see the dog's body, asking, though, for his collar, which he buried in a private ceremony. Flynn would have a variety of pets throughout his life, but when he wrote his autobiography in the late '50s, Arno was the only one to which he devoted a couple of paragraphs.

Thanks, Thelma. So, then, you say that an exorcism can actually affect a residual energy series of events, even though they don't actually involve ghosts. Interesting. You also indicate that while the use of a model of a home or boat is rare for an exorcism, it can be done. It certainly came as new to me when they did that in the case of the Zaca. But, then, most of everything you've written about so expertly in the past few days on this thread has been news to me, as well, to put it mildly. Welcome back to the thread, Eugenia. You're not derailing anything.

Thanks very much, Thelma, for your interpretation of the boat hauntings If, as you say, the spectral partying on Flynn's boat was, in fact, not ghosts but, instead, some kind of energy recording replaying itself from the past, how does that work in with the fact that that recording stopped occurring after the exorcism? The truth is, I'm not quite certain how often the sounds of a party were claimed to have been heard by locals. Certainly, though, the claimed sightings of "Flynn's ghost" on the deck did continue for years. They ended with the exorcism. I was also surprised that they performed the exorcism on a model of the Zaca (about 30 inches in size, I believe) rather than upon the boat itself.

The third and final time that James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart worked together was in one of the most elaborate gangster sagas of the period, *The Roaring Twenties*, in 1939. Raoul Walsh directed this sentimental portrait of the prohibition era, the first of four profitable and artistically rewarding occasions in which he would work with Cagney (including Strawberry Blonde and White Heat) and the first of two with Bogart (the other being High Sierra). While Cagney was unquestionably the film's star, Bogart scored with the best of his three roles in support of him. He played a nasty, back stabbing hood, with an effectively sardonic sense of humour. Early WWI battle scenes, set in a foxhole and the remnants of a shelled building, have Bogart and Cagney first meeting one another, as well as a third character, played by Jeffrey Lynn. Lynn is established early as a decent, sensitive person, in marked contrast to that of hard hearted Bogart. At one point Bogart aims his rifle and fires at an enemy. He beams afterward, "That sucker jumped three feet in the air and came down as straight as a board." A moment later Lynn gets the sight of his rifle on a German but holds off from firing, commenting that his target looks like a 15-year-old kid. Bogart then takes aim and fires. "He won't be 16," Bogie says with immense satisfaction. Later in the film there's a marvelous scene set in a speakeasy owned by Cagney. All of the principal characters are gathered at a table, Cagney, Bogart, Lynn, Cagney pal Frank McHugh and Gladys George as speakeasy hostess Panama Smith. By this point in the story they are established as gangsters, profiting from the bootleg business. Many the best lines of dialogue in this scene go to Bogart. After Cagney refers to buying a line of cabs as something to fall back on in his old age, Bogie responds, "In this business you shouldn't worry about your old age." A moment later McHugh rises from the table, announcing that he's going to try to get a dance. "Yeah, that'll be a break for some dame," Bogart calls out. The scene draws to a close with Cagney leaving the table, making reference to the fact that he trusts his friends. Bogart turns to Gladys George, saying, "You know, he's a sucker. I don't trust mine." "The feeling's mutual, chum," George replies, "They don't trust you either." Yes, George gets the final topper. Aside from its strong cast and handsome production values, one of the pleasures of The Roaring Twenties with its somewhat predictable story line is the occasional sharp dialogue exchange. SPOILER ALERT ABOUT THE ENDING: And it's Gladys George that also gets the final and most memorable line of dialogue in the film. Cagney's character is established as washed up but he gets gunned down by rival gangsters, dying on some church steps. George runs to him, cradling his head in her hands. A cop arrives, inquiring as to Cagney's identification. George seems to put a lifetime of grief into the film's final line of dialogue: "He used to be a big shot," she says as the music swells, the camera pulls back from them and the words The End appear on screen. Director Walsh was once asked in reference to the ending why, after Cagney gets shot several times, still stumbling on for half a block before finally collapsing on the steps of a church, it took him so long to die. "He's an actor," Walsh replied.

I find it interesting that after all those years of Bogart toiling in the supporting mug doldrums at Warners, finally achieving stardom in 1941, that stardom confirmed even moreso with the release of Casablanca soon afterward, that the actor in Bogie was eager to experiment with his screen persona as soon as he did - in 1945, a mere three years after playing Rick Blaine. That's when he played a pair of wife murderers in Conflict and The Two Mrs. Carrolls (the latter film being held up for release by Warners for two years). I have always found Bogie to be embarassingly bad, almost laughably so, in Carrolls. Conflict, fortunately, is not the same kind of over-the-top melodramatic brew. It's a fairly intriguing mystery, in whch we're never quite certain if Sydney Greenstreet is playing cat-and-mouse games with perfect crime murderer Bogart, or not. Or is Bogie starting to lose his mind? Bogart's quite good in his role, I think, and Greenstreet's fun to watch, even if he isn't up to dastardly deeds. Conflict, because the actor's role in the film is so "un-Bogartian," will never be the fan favourite that a Casablanca or To Have and Have Not will always be. The film is definitely worth a viewing, though, for one of Bogart's earliest experimentations with his newly created screen image. If The Two Mrs. Carrolls was one of the actor's few mis-steps during his prime years, Conflict was, at the least, a middling success, in my opinion. His wife murdering days were over with these two films, though 1950's In a Lonely Place, with one of Bogart's greatest performances, I think, still made you feel that having a relationship with this guy might not be the healthiest thing for a woman to do.

Thelma, it occurred to me that I've had another acquaintance with an individual who described a strange series of incidents that happened in a former work place of mine. He was a contractor that I had working on the company's telephone system for about a week. He worked off hours (about 11pm or midnight through to 4am or 5am before company personnel arrived to start up for the day). It's a large four storey building, constructed in the late 60s, and the telephone control room, where the contractor worked exclusively, is a small room, tucked away in a corner of the basement. The contractor would be there by himself, though he had a co-worker who subbed for him, also working by himself. The rest of the building would be empty in those early morning hours. The contractor told me that on numerous occasions as he worked on a wall adjacent to the open door to the room his peripheral vision would frequently catch sight of something seeming to peak into the room at the doorway. He would turn his head to the doorway but nothing was there and he'd turn back to continue his work on the wall. He ignored it the first few times but when it happened again he would rush to the door. What he saw he described as a kind of semi-transparent blurr in mid air quickly rushing away from him, around a corner to a hallway that ran through the rest of the basement. When the contractor then rushed to that long hallway there was never anything or anybody there. When I suggested to him that it was the late hours and he was just tired, having a bleary-eyed hallucination of some kind, he told me that he always worked those early morning hours, he was not particularly tired, and he had never experienced anything like that in any of the many buildings in which he had worked before. What added considerably to the interest of this story, however, was when he told me that his partner told him he had had the same experience while working alone in that room. He, too, saw a kind of blurr in the air that would rush away when he quickly tried to investigate. Of course, afterward, I told other employees about this, and we were soon joking about the company ghost lurking in the basement. Still, I wondered about it, and still do. I never heard of anyone else mentioning anything of this kind. The truth is, though, very few of people would have been in the basement in the wee morning hours.

I'm not certain of the magazine nor, unfortunately, the date of the article. By his image, though, it's clearly a photo taken at least some time during the '60s. It's an interesting picture, though, considering the attitude expressed by Sanders in it, particularly when you consider his 1972 suicide note; "Dear World, I am leaving because I am bored. I feel I have lived long enough. I am leaving you with your worries in this sweet cesspool. Good luck."

Well, hermanding, I think Bogart is pretty dynamic in the film, too. I love the interplay between Bogart and Rains in Casablanca. Many of the best scenes in the film are when these two actors share the screen. They have an extraordinary chemistry, the obvious affection their characters feel for one another seeming so real, so that at the film's end, when Rick and Louie both come over to the Allied side together, I suspect that a first time audience will feel like cheering. And, yes, it would also be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

mrroberts, we are in total agreement. If anyone ever personified debonair charm and sardonic humour it would be Claude Rains as Louis Renault. For me, if there was only one Rains performance to be placed in a time capsule, this one is it. As a matter of fact, since Rains' portrayal is in Casablanca, it is in a celluloid time capsule. What great luck for Claude Rains that what is arguably his greatest performance is contained in his most popular movie.

I think it's safe to say that Casablanca is the most famous black-and-white film ever made. Even people who hate black and white features will probably be inclined to view this one, if only to see what all the fuss is about. This Warner Brothers production, produced by Hal Wallis with the mercurial but brilliant Michael Curtiz at the directorial helm, received three Academy Awards, 1. Best Picture of 1943, 2. Best Director - Curtiz, 3. Writing (Best Written Screenplay) - Julius J. Epstein & Philip G. Epstein. Wallis had played a crucial role throughout the making of the film. However, when the announcement for best picture was made at the Academy Awards ceremony, the producer was shocked to see studio boss Jack Warner (who had been involved very little during the film's production) rush onto the stage to accept the Oscar. That would eventually lead to Wallis' decision to leave WB and take his great talents over to Paramount. Of the many pleasures that I derive from viewing the film, one of the chief joys is the dialogue from the Epstein brothers. No matter how many times I see Casablanca, I never tire of the often clever, witty one liners produced or those other lines that are just so much a part of the legend of this film. Here's a sample of just some of them: *Rick*: Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine. *Rick*: Here's looking at you, kid. *Yvonne*: Where were you last night? *Rick*: That's so long ago, I don't remember.. *Yvonne*: Will I see you tonight? *Rick*: I never make plans that far ahead. *Renault*: How extravagant you are, throwing away women like that. Some day they may be scarce. You know, I think maybe I shall pay a call on Yvonne. Maybe get her on the rebound. *Rick*: Well, when it comes to women, you are a true democrat. *Renault*: I've often speculated on why you don't return to America. Did you abscond with the church funds? Did you run off with a senator's wife? I like to think that you killed a man. It's the romantic in me. *Rick*: It's a combination of all three. *Renault*: And what in heaven's name brought you to Casablanca? **Rick*: My health. I came to Casablanca for the waters.* *Reanult*: The waters? What waters? We're in the desert. *Rick*: I was misinformed. *Ilsa*: Play it once, Sam, for old times sake. *Sam*: I don't know what you mean, Miss Ilsa. *Ilsa*: Play it, Sam. Play "As Time Goes By." *Rick*: What's that you're playing? *Sam* (playing piano): Oh, just a little something of my own. *Rick*: Well stop it. You know what I want to hear. *Sam*: No, I don't. *Rick*: You played it for her. You can play it for me. *Sam*: Well, I don't think I can remember . . . *Rick*: If she can stand it, I can. Play it! *Ilsa*: Is that canon fire, or is that my heart pounding? *Renault*: Karl, see that Major Strasser gets a good table, one close to the ladies. *Karl*: I have already given him the best, knowing he is German and would take it anyway. *Strasser*: Are you one of those people who cannot imagine the Germans in their beloved Paris? *Rick*: It's not particularly my beloved Paris. *Another German Officer*: Can you imagine us in London? *Rick*: When you get there ask me. *Strasser*: What is your nationality? *Rick*: I'm a drunkard. *Renault*: That makes Rick a citizen of the world. *Rick*: Go ahead and shoot. You'll be doing me a favour. *Renault*: Round up the usual suspects. *Rick*: I stick my head out for nobody. *Renault* (in closing's Rick's Cafe): I'm shocked, SHOCKED to find that gambling is going on in here. *Croupier* (handing Renault money): Your winnings, sir. *Renault*: Oh, thank you very much. *Ferrari*: Hello, Rick. *Rick*: Hello, Ferrari. How's business at the Blue Parrot? *Ferrari*: Fine. But I'd like to buy your cafe. *Rick*: It's not for sale. *Ferrari*: You haven't heard of my offer. *Rick*: It's not for sale at any price. *Ferrari*: What do you want for Sam? *Rick*: I don't buy or sell human beings. *Ferrari*: Too bad. That's Casablanca's leading commodity. *Ilsa*: What about us? *Rick*: Well always have Paris. *Rick*: Ilsa, I'm no good at being noble, but it doesn't take much to see that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy mixed up world. 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! *Rick*: Louie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. And, finally, my favourite dialogue exchange in the film - *Ugarte*: You despise me, don't you? *Rick*: Well, if I gave you any thought, I probably would. Finally, there is, I feel, a noteworthy continuity error at the beginning of Casablanca that I find amusing. It's at the end of a breathlessly paced short sequence, brilliantly edited, so most viewers have undoubtedly missed it. For those with the DVD of Casablanca it occurs 3 min. 39 sec. into the film. It's at the end of the sequence in which there are a succession of fast edits as police are rounding up "suspicious" persons on the streets. There is a dialogue exchange at one moment between police and one suspect who suddenly bursts into a run trying to escape them. There is a long range camera view of the man running as he is then shot in the back by police just as he reaches a wall, a wall which has a mural of a French army officer on it. The next edited image is a closer shot of that mural of the French officer as police leap upon the wounded man. Only now, leaning against that wall with the mural, is a young woman in Arab costume (a prostitute?) with an impassive expression upon her face. The only problem is that in the previous shot when you see the long range image of the same wall with the mural, that woman is nowhere to be seen.

Flynn was an adventurer throughout his life. That natural adventurous spirit of his embued his screen performances with an authenticity in larger-than-life heroic roles, no matter which action genre in which he worked, including westerns. Because of his uniqueness, he was the only non American-born actor who was a hit at the U.S. box office as a western hero. That was not the case with Grant, though, to be fair, he was excellent in Gunga Din. Take a look at him, though, in The Howards of Virginia as an illustration of a costume film in which he looks completely out of place. That was never the case with Flynn.

Arturo, speaking of The Mark of Zorro, I thought you might enjoy the following (sorry, no images of Linda Darnell):

Casablanca set stills. These photographs were taken prior to shooting in anticipation of lighting and design approval.

Thelma, when you were entertaining that invisible crowd of chorus girls in that Chicago movie palace, it's a shame that my friend who I told you said she could see spirits wasn't there is confirm your feelings. If there's ever been a Hollywood star who could be cursed with a restless earthbound spirit not many would be more likely candidates than your namesake. Her death remains one of the great unsolved Hollywood mysteries. It would be exciting for you, no doubt, to participate into an investigation of reporting sightings of her ghost, possibly gliding down that long flight of stairs she is reputed to have scaled that final evening before ending up in that garage. I had never heard that there were ghostly reports on Mae West before.

A subject that has not been broached on your thread, Thelma, is that of haunted boats or ships. As a boy I grew up watching Errol Flynn films on television, and his celluloid image became, for me, the spirit of adventure and romance. In fact, it still is today. I've also become a bit familiar with the actor's life. There are few figures in Hollywood's history who became quite so controversial as Flynn. But during his day the actor always claimed that any publicity, good or bad, was good, and he rarely disputed or defended himself publicly against some of the more outragious claims made about him. Flynn lead a life of genuine adventure before he finally arrived in the film capital. Of particular note, was a leisurely six month trip that he and three other young daredevils took on a schooner, sailing along the Great Barrier Reef to New Guinea. And Flynn would always have a greater love affair with the sea and sailing than he ever would with any woman. After becoming a film star he would purchase two schooners from which he would often flee Hollywood, sometimes at the exasperation of studio boss Jack Warner. In his heart of hearts, I think Flynn was a sailor. Okay, he was a sailor who wanted to be a writer. Okay he was a sailor who wanted to be a writer who also wanted to have a hell of a good party time. Eventually the latter aspect of his character overwhelmed him, unfortunately. That, combined with a increasing emotional downward spiral that started in the 1940s, would eventually lead to an early death at age 50. But his spirit, however, that may well be another story. After his contract with Warner Brothers terminated in 1952 and he made a failed attempt at film production in Italy the following year, Flynn, accompanied by his wife, Patrice Wymore, lived much of his life on board his 118 foot schooner, the Zaca, sailing between his Jamaican estate and Palma de Mallorca, Spain. Following the actor's death from a heart attack in 1959, the Zaca remained moored for a few years at the Club Nautico in Palma de Mallorca, where few repairs or attempts at upkeep were done for the vessel, as Flynn's lawyers squbbled endlessly over his estate. Those attorneys, desiring to be rid of the Zaca, consigned her to an English millionaire playboy, Freddie Tinsley, who swore he could sell her in France. What he did, instead, was to strip the Zaca of everything that appeared to be of value, abandoning her in 1965 in Bernard Voisin's boatyard in Villefranche. Voisin would later claim her for non-payment of rent. David Niven, in concluding his chapter devoted to old friend Flynn in his best selling reminiscence, Bring On the Empty Horses, wrote sadly of a chance encounter that he had with the deteriorating remains of the Zaca while he was in Villefranche. It was while the Zaca lay in this sad state of disrepair that either a fisherman or nearby skipper of a yacht (depending upon which source you choose) claimed to have heard the sounds of music and women laughing, further seeing the silhouettes of party goers dancing past the windows of the boat, as the lights flashed off and on. The problem was that there was no one aboard the Zaca at the time and the electricity to the vessel had been disconnected. Over the course of the following 20 years there would be other locals who said they heard similar sounds coming from the Zaca, as well as those who claimed to see the ghost of Flynn pacing his deck, the sightings of the actor usually coming around twilight. One man was so frightened by what he saw that he leaped overboard from his own boat, being rescued from the water, shivering and shocked. Having heard the ghostly tales about the schooner, Voisin decided to have an exorcism performed in 1979. Rather than doing it aboard the boat, a model of the Zaca was taken to a Monte Carlo church, attended by several people claiming to have seen Flynn's ghost. According to reports, the exorcism was presided over by both a Catholic priest and an Anglican arch deacon. The exorcism was considered to be a success and, since then, there have been no further reports of ghostly parties taking place on the vessel or the spirit of its famous former owner. The Zaca's sad history of decline would change through a couple of subsequent owners, with the schooner finally being overhauled, rebuilt and refitted in a two year operation by Italian businessman Robert Memmo, the schooner making a grand entrance at the 1993 Monaco classic regatta. It is my understanding that the vessel that Flynn sailed is still sailing today, entertaining celebrities and politicians, visiting various ports in the Mediterranean. Its winter berth is in Monte Carlo. Errol Flynn, a renowned conversationalist among other things, was a man who never let something as trifling as the truth get in the way of a good story. It was for no small reason that he was sometimes compared to Baron Munchausen. And these tales of ghostly midnight parties and his own spirit seen walking the decks of his schooner, whether true or not, these are tales the old boy would have loved.

Thelma, it's been really an education to read your great writeups on the paranormal. This isn't the kind of conversation that you expect to find on the TCM message board, of course, but that takes nothing away from its fascination. And perhaps there are a few readers here for whom this conversation has really served a valuable purpose, as well. One never knows where a thread initially about a lost Mary Pickford film will lead.

Mind blowing is putting it mildly, Thelma, especially if these scientists are eventually able to start to further understand or, perhaps, even prove the existence of other dimensions in co-existence with our own. I'm afraid it's all a bit much for my poor little brain to try to wrap itself around. But it is fascinating. And in the meanwhile, we all have the further excitement of ghost tales, a few even involving some of our film industry favourites.