[Haywire over Hayward.]

Hayward & her VOTD performance (and pantsuit)

 

http://moviemorlocks.com/2015/09/24/the-power-of-the-pantsuit/

 

An interesting article and some good pics to accompany it.

 

I find it noteworthy that the piece starts with this quote: “What we have here is a dirty soap opera. It is dirty because it intends to be, but it is a soap opera only by default. It tries to raise itself to the level of sophisticated pornography, but fails.” – Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times

 

The Russ Meyer-directed sequel to VALLEY OF THE DOLLS came out ca. 1970. Unlike its predecessor, it did in fact garner an "X-Rating" and is regarded by many as even worse than the original.

 

The screenplay was written by one Roger Ebert (his one and only that was ever produced.)

 

Roger Ebert - 178 lbs. =  Rex Reed

[Haywire over Hayward.]

Wow,  I found it rather funny and entertaining.   OK,  much of that is driven by Julie Newmar.   But I was surprised by the performances of Mason and Hayward (I expected worst based on what I had heard about the film).    To me only the ending dragged but hey, in this type of marriage go round type film,  getting to the ending we all know is going to happen,  often does drag.

 

Hmmm.

 

I just found the whole thing static and stagey and I can't recall a single laugh or line of funny dialogue. The film presents us with this strange, comedic scenario, but then doesn't do or say or build anything on it that is funny in any way.

 

Newmar was terrific though, it's a shame her film career never took off. She was so convincingly Swedish and didn't even look like herself, if not for her height, I wouldn't have even guessed it was her.

[Haywire over Hayward.]

Wow.

THE MARRIAGE-GO-ROUND is terrible.

[I Just Watched...]

While the 40s Pride and Prejudice is a fine, well made movie,   Garson was 36 years old attempting to play the 20 year old Elizabeth.  Yes,  Garson was a beauty and looked great for her age but I can see why MGM would try to hide her actual age.  

 

and yet, i spite of the fact that she is too old, I think PRIDE AND PREJUDICE is her finest performance, and her Elizabeth Bennett is the best representation of the character that has been done. ironically 1940 was the only time between 1939 and 1945 that she wasn't nominated.

[Haywire over Hayward.]

 

"yes, yes, it's just me, International Hair Spokesmodel Barbara Perkins, here to inconspicuously visit my hometown in a $45,000 floor-length mink and eighteen inches of hair. Nothing to see. Move on, move on. No paparazzi, no photos..."

[Haywire over Hayward.]

LOL. I agree her parts of the story are the most boring. But it isnt entirely her fault. Terrible writing and dialog. And that sappy ending! A total rewrite from the book which ends up unhappy for her (no storybook ending).........

 

The budget for wigs and falls in this film  must've been in the 5 figure range at least!!! I hate that pulled back and fall on the top look so popular at the time........

 

what happens to her in the book?

 

You could never get in a good girlfight with someone wearing a fall. It was like a lizard's tail, just grab it and it pulls off and they run away.

[Haywire over Hayward.]

Wow. Joey Heatherton is really out of her acting element here. That's like a singing trio of Pavarotti, Placido Domingo, and Justin Bieber.

 

Yes, but Pavarotti was never a centerfold.

 

 I love Neely!

 

 

 

This GIF illustrates my biggest issue with VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, which is that Barbara Perkins and her character are so damned BORING! It is unforgiveable that the story devotes so much time to her in the end when, seriously, a department store mannequin may as well be playing the part (and probably has in any number of gay community theater reenactments.)

 

And seriously, at the wave of a hand, you just go from being a career secretary to a famous international hair spokesmodel overnight?

 

Seriously?

 

And please don't think I'm belittling secretaries, I'm not...I just think a famous international hair spokesmodel should rise up through the ranks and not just be plucked from obscurity! Girl didn't even ride the float or anything before BAM! International Hair Spokesmodel, at your service....straight from answering the phone and typing letters, no Star Search or anything....

 

ps- I seem to recall a sequence in VALLEY OF THE DOLLS that follows her abrupt transition from office girl to international hair spokesmodel, and it includes some pretty damned funny and VERY sixties hair on some ladies. A highlight of the film. I can only imagine the inches it took off the ozone layer to get everyone ready.

[I Just Watched...]

Greer Garson married the actor who played her son in MRS. MINVER.

The marriage was an unhappy one.

The son did not appear in the sequel THE MINIVER STORY. I don't think he was even mentioned.

Garson's marriage to the actor had ended by that time.

 

No, he was not mentioned. That marriage lasted from 1943 to 1947. Some time later it was revealed to the public that she was in actuality ten years older than MGM's publicity had led people to believe. Since 1942 was just "The Year of Greer" I get that she just had to win the Oscar, but I wish it had been for RANDOM HARVEST instead- not that I like the film that much, she is just more genuine in it than she is as MRS MINIVER.

 

PS- The 1940 PRIDE AND PREJUDICE is one of my ten favorite films of the decade.

[Will Joan Bennett be SOTM in May?]

copy and pasted from wikipedia (Otto Censor may take out some of the details)

 

FOR THE RECORD, THIS IS A SCANDAL, CHILDREN OF TODAY:

 

Scandal

For twelve years, Bennett was represented by agent Jennings Lang. She and the onetime vice-president of the Sam Jaffe Agency, who now headed MCA's West Coast television operations, met on the afternoon of December 13, 1951, to talk over an upcoming TV show.^[2]

Bennett parked her Cadillac convertible in the lot at the back of the MCA offices, at Santa Monica Boulevard and Rexford Drive, across the street from the Beverly Hills Police Department, and she and Lang drove off in his car. Meanwhile, her husband Walter Wanger drove by at about 2:30 p.m. and noticed his wife's car parked there. Half an hour later, he again saw her car there and stopped to wait. Bennett and Lang drove into the parking lot a few hours later and he walked her to her convertible. As she started the engine, turned on the headlights and prepared to drive away, Lang leaned on the car, with both hands raised to his shoulders, and talked to her.

In a fit of jealousy, Wanger walked up and twice shot and wounded the unsuspecting agent. One bullet hit Jennings in the right thigh, near the hip, and the other penetrated his groin. Bennett said she did not see Wanger at first. She said she suddenly saw two livid flashes, then Lang slumped to the ground. As soon as she recognized who had fired the shots, she told Wanger, "Get away and leave us alone." He tossed the pistol into his wife's car.

She and the parking lot's service station manager took Lang to the agent's doctor. He was then taken to a hospital, where he recovered. The police, who had heard the shots, came to the scene and found the gun in Bennett's car when they took Wanger into custody. Wanger was booked and fingerprinted, and underwent lengthy questioning.

"I shot him because I thought he was breaking up my home," Wanger told the chief of police of Beverly Hills. He was booked on suspicion of assault with intent to commit murder. Bennett denied a romance, however. "But if Walter thinks the relationships between Mr. Lang and myself are romantic or anything but strictly business, he is wrong," she declared. She blamed the trouble on financial setbacks involving film productions Wanger was involved with, and said he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.^[2] The following day Wanger, out on bond, returned to their Holmby Hills home, collected his belongings and moved. Bennett, however, said there would not be a divorce.^[13]

The following is extracted from the book On Sunset Boulevard (1998, p. 431) by Ed Sikov.

In 1951, producer Walter Wanger discovered that his wife, Joan Bennett, was having an affair with the agent Jennings Lang. Their encounters were brief and frequent. When Lang and Bennett weren't meeting clandestinely at vacation spots like New Orleans and the West Indies, they were back in L.A. enjoying weekday quickies at a Beverly Hills apartment otherwise occupied by one of Lang's underlings at the agency. When Wanger found proof of the affair, he did what any crazed cuckold would do: he shot Lang in the balls.

On December 14, Bennett issued a statement in which she said she hoped her husband "will not be blamed too much" for wounding her agent. She read the prepared statement in the bedroom of her home to a group of newspapermen while TV cameras recorded the scene.^[14]

Wanger's attorney, Jerry Giesler, mounted a "temporary insanity" defense. He then decided to waive his rights to a jury and threw himself on the mercy of the court.^[15] Wanger served a four-month sentence in the County Honor Farm at Castaic, 39 miles north of Downtown Los Angeles,^[16] quickly returning to his career to make a series of successful films.

Meanwhile, Bennett went to Chicago to appear on the stage in the role as the young witch Gillian Holroyd in Bell, Book, and Candle,^[17] then went on national tour with the production.

Bennett made only five movies in the decade that followed, as the shooting incident was a stain on her career and she became virtually blacklisted. Blaming the scandal that occurred for destroying her career in the motion picture industry, she once said, "I might as well have pulled the trigger myself." Although Humphrey Bogart, a longtime friend of Bennett, pleaded with the studio on her behalf to keep her role as Amelie Ducotel in We're No Angels (1955), that movie proved to be one of her last.

As the movie offers dwindled after the scandal, Bennett continued touring in stage successes, such as Susan and God, Once More, with Feeling, The Pleasure of His Company and Never Too Late. Her next TV appearance was in the role as Bettina Blane for an episode of General Electric Theater in 1954. Other roles include Honora in Climax! (1955) and Vickie Maxwell in Playhouse 90 (1957). In 1958, she appeared as the mother in the short-lived television comedy/drama Too Young to Go Steady to teenagers played by Brigid Bazlen and Martin Huston.

She starred on Broadway in the comedy Love Me Little (1958), which ran for only eight performances.

Of the scandal, in a 1981 interview, Bennett contrasted the judgmental 1950's with the sensation-crazed 70's and 80's. "It would never happen that way today," she said, laughing. "If it happened today, I'd be a sensation. I'd be wanted by all studios for all pictures."

[Will Joan Bennett be SOTM in May?]

edit- I just looked it up and PRIVATE WORLDS was directed by Gregory LaCava, who did some interesting films. Colbert played a Psychiatrist in it, and it has got to be one of the earliest depictions of a female doctor in American movies.

[Will Joan Bennett be SOTM in May?]

One film of Joan's I'd like to see is Private Worlds with Claudette Colbert and Charles Boyer. TCM has never shown it (Paramount again) from the mid 30s....

 

Yeah, I'd really like to see that one too. Colbert earned her follow-up Oscar nomination after It Happened One Night for this.

I didn't know Charles Boyer did an English-language film before Algiers.

[Will Joan Bennett be SOTM in May?]

Just because it's easy to fill up four days with a star's pictures doesn't mean the star is of SOTM stature. I'm not demeaning her--I just feels that she falls a bit short. So do a lot of others that have been SOTM.

 

 

Not meaning to gang up on you, but...hang on lemme just get the pitchfork from by the back door...

 

K, back. Joan Bennett totally merits a SOTM. She has 98 credits to her name, and an easy half of those are features wherein she is outright or second lead. Her performance in SCARLET STREET (which is in the public domain) is the best given by an actress in 1945 and one of the best given by an actress in the 1940's period. She worked with all kinds of directors- Fritz Lang, Jean Renoir, Curtiz and even Dario Argento AND she was one of the most DARING of Hollywood actresses- taking on older (and sometimes unpleasant) roles without reserve (she became a grandmother in real life before she was forty) and not shying away from intense subject matter- the Lang films, THE RECKLESS MOMENT, THE MACOMBER AFFAIR, HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS, SUSPIRIA

 

...And maybe they would also show WE'RE NO ANGELS (1955), which is a film I'd like to see.

 

Plus, a year or so after she became a grandmother at 38, Joan's husband caught her meeting another man in a parking lot and shot him in the crotch... I may have messed up on the details somewhat, but that is a great Hollywood story, man.

[Will Joan Bennett be SOTM in May?]

I wouldnt say so. She was a star for well over 2 decades. And starred in quite a few films considered classics today. Constance has already been SOTM.  Last fall, I believe.

 

Yeah, and that was a head-scratcher for me, because of the two, Joan not only had the better and longer career, she really was the better actress (not that Connie wasn't good, she was, but Joan had real versatility.)

[Haywire over Hayward.]

to me, Agnes Moorehead's finest hour is is THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS, a film I'm not really crazy about (although I realize it is good) but her work in that film is SUPERB, especially the staircase fight and her last scenes in the movie when her character has been reduced to nothing.

 

She lost that year to TERESA WRIGHT, who was double-nominated for Best Actress for PRIDE OF THE YANKEES and supporting for MRS MINIVER (winning for MINIVER.) I'm glad Teresa got an Oscar, but in the long run, as great an actress as she was, her overall contribution to film was not as significant as Mooreheads- who is constantly showing up in films for the next two decades and is always fun to watch whether's she's acting as a realistic "grounding" for a film like CAGED or doing some subtle work as in ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS or blowing the lid off things and taking it to a "ten" to wonderful results (more films than I can mention here.)

[I Just Watched...]

I watched some of MRS. MINIVER last night. I don't know why, I don't really like it, in spite of the fact that all the actors are fine and it's lovely to look at.

 

The REAL REVELATION for me came this morning when I caught the last twenty minutes of THE MINIVER STORY- a 1950 MGM sequel to MRS MINIVER that didn't do well at the box office.

 

SPOILER ALERT IN RE THE MINIVER STORY, ALTHOUGH REALLY, ARE YOU GONNA WATCH IT...AND KNOWING THIS BEFOREHAND MIGHT ACTUALLY ENHANCE YOUR VIEWING OF IT:

 

The film had a dreamy air about it, it was a really good-looking last twenty minutes I saw...very lyrical, slow, serious...it came off as moving and effective and compelling, everything that MRS MINIVER is not (to me.) The real shocking thing though was the fact that Mrs. Miniver dies at the end of it from a heart condition, apparently brought on by the war.

 

Wow.

[I Just Watched...]

I like Rope.  I know that some find it boring, but I find the film interesting, albeit a little weird (these men kill their friend, whom they deem "inferior" and try to justify the murder stating that it was a philosophical exercise, or whatever).  

 

 

 

 

Have you seen COMPULSION (1959)? Good companion film to ROPE. 

 

I was never really "in" to John Dall until I saw GUN CRAZY and now I appreciate all his performances; Farley Granger I'm still a little "meh" on. The revelation of ROPE, to me, was JIMMY STEWART, who is rarely mentioned when people mention the film, but who is the heart and soul of the picture... I understand that Jimmy Stewart was a great actor, but he's never appealed to me: I think he is sensational in ROPE. 

[Haywire over Hayward.]

LOL. It had to be hot wearing that thing. So Aggie was the favorite? I didnt know that. She must've been crushed to lose to Kedrova who was a dark horse if there ever was one. I think that was Aggie's last shot at an Oscar........

 

it was.

 

nomination #4 (she had been up for MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS, MRS PARKINGTON and JOHNNY BELINDA before, all of which were superior to HUSH HUSH.) In fact, she won the National Board of Review award for Best Actress for AMBERSONS (not even supporting!) and she is one of the only things I like about JOHNNY BELINDA- her character undergoes a really interesting and believable change in the story and Aggie conveys it wonderfully.

 

And according to INSIDE OSCAR, Agnes was very much considered the favorite for SWEET CHARLOTTE, although more for the "give it to her, it's time" sense than the "it's a great performance and a worthy movie" sense. As for the competition, Gladys Cooper really doesn't have a very substantial role in MY FAIR LADY, Grayson Hall is a delight in IGUANA, but it's not a major enough part to be considered, and I don't know who Edith Evans was: so it makes sense that Aggie would be considered the one "due" out of the lot.

[Haywire over Hayward.]

...I wonder if after she lost, Agnes just ripped off the piece a flung it a few rows back. Like, "oh well, I lost, but at least I can take this damn thing off."

[Haywire over Hayward.]

LOL. The hairpiece!  (you know what I meant!)

 

I know I know...

(it's been a slow week on the boards.)

[Haywire over Hayward.]

LOL. Whatever. That thing looked like it weighed 10 lbs!

 

EW!!!!

[Haywire over Hayward.]

LOL. Maybe she came from the Bewitched set and there was no time to work up a new doo!

 

Ew. I think you men " 'do " as in short for hairdo.

The second "o" makes it gross.

[Dr. Zhivago Haters Gather Here!]

I also own the book but have not read it.

 

HANG ON TO IT!

 

Your bed may loose a leg or you may need fuel during a week-long ice storm, or you might have to change a tire and you don't fully trust the jack....

[I Just Watched...]

I haven't seen Mr. and Mrs. Smith yet.  I've heard that it wasn't among his best films, but I've wanted to see it out of curiosity.  I actually saw that movie today at the movie store, used, for $4.99, but I didn't pick it up because I hadn't seen it and wasn't sure I really wanted to own the film.

 

The souffle never really rises with MR AND MRS SMITH, and it came during a very successful time for him.

 

As for the "less-mentioned" Hitchcocks, FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT is the best (better really than REBECCA) followed by ROPE and I CONFESS! Most of the rest of his "second tier" works are disappointing...although FAMILY PLOT is a charming film, it just has no real style to it. ...and THE PARADINE CASE has its fans.

[Haywire over Hayward.]

Well, first Lorna, the hairstyle Aggie is sportin' there and with it all piled on top her noggin was a very popular hairstyle during that time for both young and older ladies,

Honey, ain't a hair in that thing on top her head that belongs to Aggie. THAT is a "piece" if ever I saw one. (she probably used it to keep cigs and loose change in.)

 

(...HOWEVER, if you stop that clip at the 1:05 minute mark and look at the usher that that Greek broad who won walks past on her way to the podium, isn't it at least nice to know that Huntz Hall found some kind'a work in Tinseltown after that whole Bowery Boys series ended its run?!!!) 

Granted he's only onscreen for a millisecond BUT OMIGAH, I THINK THERE IS A GENUINE CHANCE YOU ARE RIGHT!

Gold Star for you, good sir.

 

(hope they didn't have Leo Gorcey parking cars!)

 

[Dr. Zhivago Haters Gather Here!]

my internet went down last night after posting this (COINCIDENCE?....probably.)

sorry i couldn't liveblog the experience.

love the responses though.

 

ps- for the record, i had it on for about an hour while i did some household chores...you know, all the stuff you wait to do until the internet goes down. then i turned it off.