LornaHansonForbes
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Posts posted by LornaHansonForbes
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Don't forget about Gwen Stefani as Jean Harlow-- who looks nothing like Harlow whatsoever.
Stefani apparently had some dialogue and more scenes than just the one in which she appeared (silently), but was so awful that they were left on the cutting room floor (see also: Faith Hill in THE STEPFORD WIVES.)
I have to also say that- while I have not seen the entire movie because I thought it was really, really boring- I'm 50/50 on DiCaprio's performance (see also DJANGO UNCHAINED) and thought Cate Blanchet- while a good actress in numerous other films- was dreadful as Hepburn.
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Damn math.
Math should be declared part of the Axis Of Evil.
(but thanks for the correction)
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"TOR be, or not TOR be--that question:Whether 'tis nobler in mind to sufTOR Slings and arrows of outrageous TORtuneOr TOR take arms against sea of troubles And by opposing end them.TOR die, TOR sleep-- No more--and by sleep say TOR end heartache, and thousand naTORal shocksThat flesh heir to.'Tis consummationDevoutly TOR be wished.TOR die,TOR sleep--TOR sleep--perchance TOR dream: ay: there rub,For in sleep of death what dreams may TOR When TOR have shuffle off mortal coil,Must give TOR pause.NOW TIME FOR GO TO BED!"(IN THIS SPOT, IMAGINE A HUMOROUS IMAGE OF TOR JOHNSON THAT I WOULD'VE POSTED WERE I "ALLOWED TO USE THAT IMAGE EXTENSION" IN THIS COMMUNITY.")
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Lorna,
i noticed that Amazon UK has a Spanish dvd copy of Beyond the Forest for sale. I don't know if you can access that through Amazon USA, or not. But you could probably get it through Amazon UK and have it shipped.
But contact the seller and make sure the Catalanian subtitles are removable.
I'm not sure what the licensing deal is here, but there are a lot of 'unavailable' old films showing up in Spanish dvds. South Korean too.
Dude, you are down with the streets!
Thanks for the tip...although I thought there was some sort of issue with European DVDs (region 4?) not playing on American DVD players (region 2?) Nonetheless, the next time I have some money to blow, I'll check it out.
....and I don't mind subtitles in the least. In fact, I would love to know how to say "what a dump!" in as many different languages as possible.
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The film needed Charles Walters or Robert Wise, or anyone else (other than Josh Logan), who understood MOTION pictures.
Love it.
PS- I've never forgiven him for CAMELOT either.
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Ava Gardner said that she was surprised as well to get the nomination for Mogambo but said she was relieved when Audrey Hepburn won it because she didn't want to go onstage in front of everyone to accept it.
I've tried to watch Mogambo a couple times and for whatever reason, lose interest. Perhaps with an interest in Gardner (and Clark Gable and Grace Kelly have been slowly growing on me over the past couple of years), I'll be able to get through it. I've seen the beginning quite a few times, but I don't think I can tell you how the film ended.
Believe it or not, but MOGAMBO was a HUUUGE hit- $5.2 million in 1953 which in today's money is on a par with a film making over $100 million. It was the 8th highest grosser in a year that saw a lot of box office bonanzas.
Today though, it is really hard to believe people lined up to see it because it is a snooze and any greatness Ava's performance could've had is tamped down by her having to appear opposite Grampa Gable and Grace "the human popsicle" Kelly (the latter was also, rather inexplicably, nominated for an Oscar for her work in the film as well.)
You're a lot better off watching RED DUST (1933)- the original of which MOREGUMBO is a remake.
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Agreed. It seems that many of the actors of the time with extraordinary good looks seemed to have trouble being taken seriously. These actors (more so with women than men) are hired just to look pretty in the scene. Ava was the seventh and last child of her parents. Her next closest sibling in age to her was still like 5-6 years older--so even though Ava had six siblings, they were so much older than her that she was pretty much an only child. Her sister, "Bappie" as Ava called her, sounds like she was the closest to Ava (and followed her all over the world) and she was like 15-16 years older. Nobody else in the family looks anything remotely like Ava. She sure lucked out when the genes were passed out.
Reading this, I wouldn't be entirely surprised if Ava was maybe a "drop off" baby...one her father fathered outside the marriage who her mother consented to raise....or possibly it was one of her older sisters who was really her mother.
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in a year so weak for leading actresses that Debbie Reynolds got nominated for her thoroughly irritating work in THE UNSINKABLE MOLLY BROWN
ouch
and Julie Andrews won for a pretty pedestrian supporting part in MARY POPPINS.
OUCH!!
To be fair though: I love Debbie and think she was absolutely one of the best and think she should've been nominated for both SINGIN' IN THE RAIN (along with Jean Hagen in the supporting category) and MOTHER (1996) (best lead.) MOLLY BROWN is just too, too, too, too much.
And of course, how can you not love Juuuuuuulie Andrews (it's the magic word.)? I would've definitely given her the award for THE SOUND OF MUSIC, which was a much more substantial part.
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Oh yeah, I mean, given the choice of watching HOT SPELL or BEYOND THE FOREST, or LETTY LINTON or a rediscovered print of LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT, I would choose any of the latter, but still if I happen to see HOT SPELL on the schedule, I guarantee you whatever plans I had for that evening or afternoon will be postponed.
Wait, I'm sorry, I forgot what thread I was in.
I meant: LETTY LINTOR or BEYOND THE TOREST or LONDON AFTOR MIDNIGHT.
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Yes, LHF, you can count me among the curious.
Thank you.
hashtag #FreeHotSpell
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LornaHansonForbes--How did Hepburn do??? I'm honestly curious, because "Show Me" has some notes near the coloratura range of soprano & will set dogs howling--how Did Hepburn do???
Judge for yourself:
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You are quite right about Grahame being supporting in THE BIG HEAT and Page being the lead in HONDO.
Both were definitely among the best performances of the year.
PS- I've never come across anyone on the boards who likes either THE MOON IS BLUE or Maggie McNamara in it (myself included.)
PSS- Bless her heart.
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About Ava--she also had a good singing voice (which MGM dubbed anyway)
See "Show Boat" (1951)--she's heartbreaking in that film. Also, I don't know if the CD is still available--but check the original soundtracks & look for the two songs done with Avas' real voice--they're on my CD as a bonus, at the very end. She is So much better than Annette Warren (who dubbed her in SB).
damn straight. it's a rare case of someone being dubbed when they should have let them use their own voice:
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3rd--Warner was right to dub Hepburn--at least MFL endures mostly because of Marni Nixon's voice, whatever its'other problems.
I know.
The DVD is loaded with extras, one of which is Hepburn singing a couple of numbers in her own voice. The one I remember is SHOW ME.
Bless her heart: she tries, oh how she tries.
ps- it's worth noting that the very handsome actor whose name eludes me now (Jeremy Brett?) who plays Freddie and was in another picture with Audrey (maybe WAR AND PEACE?) was an accomplished singer- yet he was dubbed for ON THE STREET WHERE YOU LIVE. I sometimes wonder if this was done to make Audrey feel better.
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For the life of me, I do not understand Ava's Oscar nomination for MOGAMBO. It is, in all the annals of the award, one of the most head-scratching selections ever (although 1953 was an off-beat year for leading performances by an actress, and some of the more deserving non-nominated performances that year were given by actresses in films that didn't seem like Oscar material- ie Russell and Monroe in GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES, Gloria Grahame in THE BIG HEAT and Doris Day in CALAMITY JANE.)
She's not bad, mind you, but it is a thoroughly unremarkable turn in a thoroughly unremarkable film that is a very weak remake of a very interesting film and very good performance (Jean Harlow in RED DUST, of course.)\
However, she is SPLENDID in NIGHT OF THE IGUANA and it is a real shame she did not get nominated for that (in a year so weak for leading actresses that Debbie Reynolds got nominated for her thoroughly irritating work in THE UNSINKABLE MOLLY BROWN and Julie Andrews won for a pretty pedestrian supporting part in MARY POPPINS.) In fact I am hard-pressed to think of a better performance by an actress that year.
Maybe the fact that it totters on the brink of being a supporting role factored in, I don't know...but she is hilarious, bawdy, refreshing,. earthy- and the fact that her beauty has faded somewhat is embraced by her instead of masked.
It's a total win.
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Yeah...I pretty much agree with the last four posts in a row...yet, I fess up that I love MY FAIR LADY, I even own it on DVD and often will watch some or all of it when it airs (rather frequently) on TCM.
In fact, when I first got cable again (about eight years ago) after a long drought without, TCM was the first channel I turned to and MY FAIR LADY was what was on...
So strong is the book and so strong is the music, and so strong is the original dialogue by Shaw- that even the fact that we are watching two people who can't really sing "sing" directed by someone who doesn't seem to understand anything about musical direction is (for me at least) pushed to the background to some degree.
But yes, it is perhaps the most lethargic musical ever- who can exactly "thrill" when Audrey/Marni "sings" I COULD HAVE DANCED ALL NIGHT as she, um, wanders around the Higgens house and goes to bed.
HOWEVER, someone brought up Vincente Minelli and I have to say that GIGI is every bit as static as MY FAIR LADY, and without the benefits of a great script- AND (its biggest fault) actors who are treated more as props and set dressing than actual living creations with feelings, thought, and motivations.
I love MY FAIR LADY, but I totally get anyone who doesn't; but, for the life of me, it's really hard to comprehend how anyone could love GIGI, (or as I like to think of it: PROSTITUTION: THE MUSICAL.)
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"EsTORte"
Heeeheee.
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See, I feel guilty because I always remember things incorrectly...I am the worst when it comes to misquoting, even films that I have seen more times than any sane person should have.I'm always adding a word or dropping a word or forgetting a sentence or sometimes misconstruing the meaning altogether.
You never want to be in the car with me when WE DIDN'T START THE FIRE is on the radio, 'cause I'm always all: "da da Dada da da da, da da Dada da da da, da da da Dada da da...Mari-lyn Mon-roe."
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Mehhh, some mysteries are best left undiscovered...
I guess, but come on: some of you guys have to be as curious as I am
#FreeHotSpell
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Didn't the actress who played Aunt Clara also play Robert Walker's doting mother in STRANGERS ON A TRAIN ? And that same year, 1951, she played Paul Douglas' mother on THE GUY WHO CAME BACK.
I had never realized that that is the same actress. She is FANTASTIC in STRANGERS ON A TRAIN: not just for her wonderfully eccentric line readings but for all she says with just her eyes and facial expressions (there's a scene where Ruth Roman confronts her about what kind of man her son really is and she denies it, but we can see in her face and body language that she totally already knows.)
I would definitely rate her work in that movie as one of the absolute best examples of someone milking the hell out of a small role and coming up aces.
I think she & the original Gladys Kravitz were the only two cast members of. BEWITCHED who won Emmys.
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I had to look - Hot Spell is #2! Still, how do we know that ranking isn't from the work of only one person?
at this point, I have to admit that if they scheduled HOT SPELL to be on at 3:00 in the morning and the power went out, I would MacGuyver a generator out of spare household appliances just to be able to watch it: if only to see what all the damn fuss is about.
(& I can't stand Shirley Booth!)
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Oh yay. Double feaTOR tonite: SHE TOR A YELLOW RIBBON followed by TOR BY TORWEST. All in glorious TORCNICOLOR.
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I think one notable difference between Lucille Ball in MAME, and Audrey Hepburn in MY FAIR LADY is that, at least Hepburn excels in her non singing scenes. I know it was easy for her to play the lady elegant, and she's terrific in those scenes, but where Audrey sparkles is in playing Eliza at her grubbiest and cockniest: she is terrific and does as good a job as any great actress could in a role that is a 180 from pretty much everything she had done before. Even in the non singing parts of MAME (at least the ones I saw) Ball just seems listless stilted and uncomfortable.
Audrey is good enough in her own right that you can at least kinda sorta overlook the Julie Andrews thing. (if not entirely forgiving it)
...Vanessa Redgrave in CAMELOT is another story.
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I think you make an excellent point, Palmerin...although i think a lot of the movies that followed "Star Wars" improve on the formula and were more intelligent (or at least had some better dialogue) even for example "The Empire Strikes Back."
Omar Sharif has died
in General Discussions
Posted
Well...I think part of the ZHIVAGO hate stems largely from the fact that, for a time at least, it was THE go-to film for TCM when they had three hours to kill on a weekend...why it also showed up in prime time (seemingly) a dozen times a year is anyone's guess. I actually think it's not bad at all- flawed, but (for me) pretty compelling in spite of the glacial pacing and lack of storyline) but little nits and picks sometimes turn into ripped holes when something gets trotted out during prime viewing hours 147 times in 10 years.
But I am reminded of the interstitial wherein Omar discusses working with David Lean on ZHIVAGO and how he instructed him to play the role (more or less) as a blank slate...which is actually a pretty big challenge for a good actor (and Sharif was a very, very good actor)...and that's what he does in ZHIVAGO, so I think therein lies some sort of testemant to the fact that there was tremendous talent there (the same issue was discussed with regard to Hurd Hatfield in THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY)
ps- I hope they show JUGGERNAUT (1974) where Sharif plays the captain of a cruise ship being terrorized by a mad bomber. That is a TERRIFIC movie.