AddisonDeWitless

> {quote:title=Arturo wrote:}{quote} > > Yes these are all Fox films, but all the studios seemed to assign their pretty new contractees to similar front of the camera chores. It wasn't a question of how well they were able to play the part, but how well they photographed and elicited comments via fan mail from viewers. Which is one reason why I have a growing respect and inn-terest for "your girl" (so to speak) Linda Darnell. It is astounding the Olympian gamut of roles she was forced into in all her years at Fox. Not only was she REALLY YOUNG when she started (and thus all the more challenged) , but she's pretty darn good in all of them and it's quite the variety: young latinas, a silent Virgin Mary, the concubine to the King Of Siam, Frontier Woman, and of course, the endless parade of whores. A lot of people would've cracked under the pressure (and maybe she did) but *their on camera work would show it.* That doesn't seem to be the case with her at all, she steps up the plate and delivers every time (that I've seen.) Oh shoot, I'm derailing me own thread.

*YES I KNOW!!!!* *AND BELIEVE IT OR NOT, I AM ONE OF THE MORE SANE POSTERS ON THIS SITE!!!!!!!!!* (not really)

Oh believe it or not, I am chill- no worries. I like to *embolden* things sometimes to make a point, which is- in this case- that the film was *sorely lacking a musical score.* *SOMETIMES I EVEN USE ALL CAPS AND MULTIPLE EXCLAMATION POINTS TOO!!!!!- PROBABLY A HABIT I SHOULD BREAK!!!!!!!!!!!!!* Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 20, 2013 7:39 PM

> {quote:title=infinite1 wrote:}{quote} > > *If you really want to talk about boring films how about a film like HIGH NOON* ? (It) has put me to sleep on numerous occassions. > > > > > > > *Oh believe me, I could.* You and I are in a distinct (but correct- if you ask me) minority of classic film lovers who dislike High Noon. > > > > > > ps- I hate it when the quotes eat the text. > > Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 20, 2013 7:24 PM

> {quote:title=GoodGuysWearBlack wrote:}{quote}The title sequence was meh. The theme music was kinda lame. What theme music? As I watched the whole thing, I kept thinking "WHERE IS THE MUSIC???!!!" There were brief moments of *music cues,* but they lasted maybe 5-6 seconds. Aside from that, the film as I recall it *had next to NO music, especially in the action scenes were it needed it the most!* Do I remember it wrong?

> {quote:title=GoodGuysWearBlack wrote:}{quote} > > {quote:title=finance wrote:}{quote}Any "B", shoot'em up Western over GIGI or THE BANDWAGON? > Yes. Seconded, (and heartily.) And even though I didn't think Jesse James was particularly good, I'd *definitely* watch it again, whereas you'd have to strap me down and tape open me eyes Clockwork Orange style to get me to sit through Gigi.

duplicate post. Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 20, 2013 6:48 PM

> {quote:title=finance wrote:}{quote}The title was kinda meh. Well, what else were they supposed to call it? I mean, it's about Jesse James and all...

> {quote:title=jamesjazzguitar wrote:}{quote}I think you meant to say the movie lines are like the book, since the movie lines were based on the book. > > Well, chicken/egg, potayto potahto...it's not necessarily inn-correct to say it my way, but six of one, a half dozen of the other...

> {quote:title=misswonderly wrote:}{quote}I remembered after I posted that comment on the hot house scene in *The Big Sleep*, that the General actually says something about "the smell of decay". > Can anyone recall the exact words of that speech? It's really effective, especially as we're only about five minutes into the film. I don't recall the exact quote in the film, but from my copy of the novel: " I seem to exist largely on heat, like a newborn spider. And the orchids are an excuse for the heat. Do you like orchids?....they are nasty things. Their flesh is too like the flesh of men, and their perfume has the rotten sweetness of a prostitute." The book is like the movie line for line in many parts, but this (obviously) is not one of those parts. Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 20, 2013 2:18 PM

*...and the technicolor does suit him so well.* (although it makes me wonder *all the more* why they *didn't* shoot The Mask of Zorro from *the very next year* in color- that is a film that BEGS TO BE SHOT IN COLOR. (Oddly enough, I feel like Jesse James would've been just fine in B&W- of course, with a different script and better director.) Thanks to all the replies, I was thinking I was going to be inundated with people saying " Jesse James is awesome: you twit!"

Things keep occuring to me after the fact: Destry Rides Again is another Western from the same(ish) year 1939/1940 that blows Jesse James out of the water.

I just imdb'd the film and director Henry King. Two notable things: Apparently two horses were deliberately killed in the cliff-jumping scene that led to the ASPCA monitoring all film productions from then on. *So- the film was NOT completely "actionless",* but I would say *the first hour is definitely action-lite* (and so many early scenes could have been much livelier.) Henry King was a big director for Fox, he did Song of Bernadette, Looooooooooooove is a Many Spleeeeeeeeeeeeendored Thing and 12 O'Clock High- three films which went over gangbusters with audiences and The Academy, but in retrospect ( I think it's safe to say) are nowhere near as highly regarded TODAY as they were on release. He also directed Wilson (1944)- but be careful bringing *that* up as threads that mention that film seem to get locked and scrubbed from the board, and I would so like to hear what the rest of you have to say on the matter. ps- I see The Return of Frank James was directed by Fritz Lang. Maybe I watched the wrong film first. Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 20, 2013 11:31 AM

First off: *thanks for the new blood, TCM.* (even if they're not the greatest films, I'll take anything new over Gigi again.) I was hoping someone else would start a thread on the double-feature last night of Jesse James (1939) and its 1940 follow-up The Return of Frank James, as I don't feel really passionately on the matter, and yet I *do* want to know; *was anyone else seriously underwhelmed by the first film?* (FYI: I had no interest in sticking around for the second one.) It was intriguing to me that Jesse James is- according to various sources- AMONG THE TOP FIVE GROSSERS OF 1939, a year that did not lack for films of sterling quality. And yet- what a bore! *seriously lacking in action in the first part,* CRYING OUT DESPERATELY IN NEED OF A SCORE (in most parts), and worst of all: *terminally slow pacing*. With most westerns, I can forgive the lack of character development, the silly dialogue, the lazy plotting, even the anachronistic costumes and hairstyles of the actresses- but *bad pacing* I *cannot forgive.* Tyrone Power was terrific and gorgeous in technicolor, Henry Fonda looked good and was good in the *pathetically underdeveloped* and *undershown* character of Frank James, Carradine was good in a borderline walk-on role that was (AGAIN!), underdeveloped, I love Jane Darwell, although she is nearly always underused in everything (and she was, somewhat, in this as well.) Randolph Scott was a likeable presence and Donald Meek is always good, *and the technicolor was stunning*- but- MY GOD!- it was a lifeless affair, what few action scenes there were could barely be termed "action" in the loosest sense (campare it to the cheaper, less gorgeously filmed Stagecoach when it comes to "action"; or even The Hunchback of Notre Dame or Gunga Din.) Has there ever been a more listlessly filmed train robbery in a film? How inn-teresting that this film, directed (barely) by Henry King with its overall blandness outgrossed so many *much better* films in that year. Jesse James: *two stars out of four.* Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 20, 2013 11:30 AM Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 20, 2013 11:34 AM

> {quote:title=misswonderly wrote:}{quote}GoodGuysWearBlack, I'm afraid I have not seen *Parrish*. Could you elaborate a little as to its "garden" allusions? > > > And that hot house at the beginning of *The Big Sleep* ! You can feel Marlowe getting hotter and sweatier and more uncomfortable as the scene progresses. And the General who's hiring him- all that talk about orchids and spiders. > Yes, sometimes gardens are not the lovely, restful places we want them to be. > wow, there were a lot of good things in this post, but I'll address these two: Parrish is kind of a silly film, *but* it is like a (rather valuable) lesson in Tobacco Growing 101, the far more interesting elements of the plot (at least to me) deal with the sensitive nature of growing tobacco, especially when it is in its early stages and highly susceptible to fungus and rot. I was kind of sorry when they got away from the lesson on sharecropping and got in to the silly soap aspect of the family drama. Raymond Chandler is one of my favorite writers *of all time,* and it fascinates me how in every one of his six Phillip Marlowe novels, he makes a lot of references to the flora and fauna of Los Angeles- and in the first-person guise of the hard-boiled detective Phillip Marlow. Frequent mentions are made of the jacaranda trees and flowering myrtle that grows on the hills of the city...which helps to build on the sinister aspect of all the depraved things going on behind the ivy-choked walls and thick hedges of hibiscus. PS- Suddenly Last Summer earned a richly deserved Oscar nomination for the art/direction set design.

I think Kiss of Death is a terrific film, but it would be truly great one with the original ending and the scenes you mentioned involving Mature's ill-fated wife left intact (at least I presume.) It makes an intriguing and slightly ironic companion piece with Fourteen Hours (1952) also directed by Henry Hathaway and also featuring a grim, shocking, brutally pessimistic *original* ending that was *changed by the same studio-* although there's a long and twisted backstory on that one I don't feel like gettting into now.

...and I think the fact that she walked away from DER SPOTLIGHT -and QUITE WILLFULLY stayed away- is a *genuinely fascinating* story as well, so I'm all for a tribute. ps- so long as it contains Christmas Holiday- a film I want to see for all sorts of reasons.

Oh, BTW: Guy Who Started This Thread, If you don't already, you should get a job in network news. TONIGHT AT TEN: OMG: THIS THING IS ACTUALLY TOTALLY GOING TO HAPPEN!!! ~ps- well, not really.~

> {quote:title=ginnyfan wrote:}{quote}. There was time taken even though, IMO, *they still picked the wrong films* for the Rutherford tribute. Yeah, they can be kind of bad about that. The 2 1/2 minute(ish) TCM Remembers tribs they do when the person dies are great, and the end-of-the-year list they do is always done really well- I just wish that when it came to a 4 film or 24-hour period of said person's films being chosen to air that they'd really stop and think "okay what are four films that show so-and-so at *their best* even if we have to wait a little to show them?" or "what would *they* want to be shown as a fitting retrospective?" as opposed to "oh s***- what've we got that's laying around and paid-for?" or "what've they done that's in the PD?" ps- I do note though, that one example of a bad tribute has been rectified by TCM. I feel like they picked some crummy movies to showcase Jennifer Jones when she died, but they've since acquired some new titles of hers and I believe Cluny Brown was part of Ye Festivale. Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 16, 2013 10:27 AM

Production values are an A. Script/direction are a B.

> {quote:title=sfpcc1 wrote:}{quote} > > *Keenan Thompson* has been there *ten years,* I wonder if he's is leaving too? (is Good Burger 2 in the works? > *Synonyms:* nadir, bottom, floor, depths, dregs. Ten. Years. Wow.

> {quote:title=scsu1975 wrote:}{quote}It's called "Street Scene," composed by Alfred Newman, and was used in several Fox films. Thank you. It kindasorta has hints of Gershwin to me.

whatever song it is that's played at the end of Kiss of Death, it's briefly whistled by someone in the opening credits of Where the Sidewalk Ends. Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 14, 2013 10:05 PM

I like Kiss of Death but I don't like the way the ending is handled. And no: I do not mean that I expected there to be a *literal * kiss of death somewhere in the movie. I just think the voiceover is weak and unnecessary and kind of cornball, and Colleen Gray is too flat in the rendering of it. and The use of (am I right on this?) I'm Getting Sentimental Over You (or is is cribbed from Rhapsody in Blue ? and is it the same song used throughout Baby Face ?) Anyway, it's distracting. and It would be more effective if Mature's character died...plus, I mean, he does get shot like seven times or something, no? (But it's still a terrific film otherwise.) Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 14, 2013 9:56 PM Edited by: AddisonDeWitless on May 14, 2013 10:00 PM

> {quote:title=finance wrote:}{quote} > Possible double feature: > > THE TAKING OF THE PELHAM ONE TWO THREE > > > ONE TWO THREE > That would be awesomeness.