I Just Watched...

[limey]

Don't forget the "Furious Spasms" poster.

 

And Broderick Crawford not remembering the oldmovies he made. (Although the script does have him being asked about people he didn't make movies with in real life.)

 

Ah, the Spasmes Frenetiques poster - given that the other movie references were to real movies, I actually googled both that & the Japanese cast names shown - if it was real, it's also real obscure, as the only thing that came up was something to do with World of Warcraft...

 

I liked the sequences they did with Crawford, especially his line about turning up because the booze was free & he might get laid!

[speedracer5]

I am almost finished reading Fred Astaire's autobiography Steps in Time (about two chapters left) and it made me want to watch the Astaire/Rogers films.  I'll admit that I've only seen a few of them (Top Hat, Roberta and The Barkleys of Broadway).  I've found that I've preferred Astaire in the later part of his career when he performed with different ladies.  Maybe it's because I've always been so-so on Ginger Rogers.  I don't dislike her, but I don't love her like I do Lucille Ball, Judy Garland and Bette Davis.  I'm still trying to give her a chance though, and I've liked her in the films of hers I've seen (I'll Be Seeing You, Stage Door and Bachelor Mother).  

 

Anyway, I own both of the TCM Astaire and Rogers Collections, so I have 8/10 films they made together.  I'll need to see if I can procure a copy of Carefree and The Barkleys of Broadway from the library.  I'm trying to watch the films chronologically.  

 

Flying Down to Rio.  This is Astaire and Rogers' first film together, even though they're only supporting players.  They do have a couple dance numbers together.  This film was interesting.  There was a scene of chorus girls wearing sheer tops with some slightly strategically placed ruffles.  I'm sure that if one were to look closely, some poor chorus girl had a wardrobe malfunction somewhere.  Dolores Del Rio was fine.  Her co-star Gene Raymond was dull.  Astaire and Rogers were the true highlights of this film.  The bizarre airplane dance at the end was hilarious and strange--but easily the best part of the film.

 

The Gay Divorcee.  This was Astaire and Rogers first film in which they co-starred together.  I really liked the film.  I loved Ginger Rogers' dresses and she and Astaire had some great musical numbers.  I especially liked the last dance number where they jumped up and down off of tables and twirled out of the room.  I also really liked seeing a young Betty Grable in the scene at the beach club.  Her silk jumpsuit looked really comfortable.  There were too many instances of men wearing socks and sandals for my tastes.  I also do not care to see Edward Everett Horton in shorts again.  

 

My problem it seems with the Astaire/Rogers films, is like The Marx Brothers films, they all seem to run together to me.  It's hard for me to remember specific instances or details from one film or the other.  

 

Reading the Astaire book has made me want to rewatch all of Astaire's films.  I have many of them, so it shouldn't be too hard.  Hopefully between Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, TCM, and the library, I can fill in the blanks with the films of his that I haven't seen.  There's a film of his that he mentions in his book, Let's Dance, co-starring Betty Hutton, that I'd never even heard of.  I find Hutton somewhat obnoxious, but I'll watch it for Astaire.

[LornaHansonForbes]

It has been a very, very long time since I read it, but I distinctly recall really, really liking the Charles Williams novel that is the basis for THE HOT SPOT.

[Swithin]

Flying Down to Rio.  This is Astaire and Rogers' first film together, even though they're only supporting players.  They do have a couple dance numbers together.  This film was interesting.  There was a scene of chorus girls wearing sheer tops with some slightly strategically placed ruffles.  I'm sure that if one were to look closely, some poor chorus girl had a wardrobe malfunction somewhere.  Dolores Del Rio was fine.  Her co-star Gene Raymond was dull.  Astaire and Rogers were the true highlights of this film.  The bizarre airplane dance at the end was hilarious and strange--but easily the best part of the film.

 

I love Flying Down to Rio. It has great songs -- "The Carioca;""Orchids in the Moonlight," and of course the title song. An older friend of mine, long since gone, told me that she saw the film when it first came out, at the Loew's Paradise -- a grand old movie palace in the Bronx. My friend said that when "Orchids in the Moonlight" was sung, the screen turned purple!  The movie is mentioned in The Subject Was Roses -- Timmy Cleary (the Martin Sheen character) talks about seeing the film at the Loew's Paradise as well, and does an impression of the one of the planes, as he sings a few bars.

[darkblue]

It has been a very, very long time since I read it, but I distinctly recall really, really liking the Charles Williams novel that is the basis for THE HOT SPOT.

 

Wish TCM would show that steamy movie.

[speedracer5]

Viva Las Vegas.  Okay. Normally I think the Elvis movies are kind of lame, but I saw this one for the first time... and I loved it.  I mostly watched it because I'm a fan of Ann-Margret and I like Elvis' "Viva Las Vegas" song.  This movie was awesome.  Elvis was his normal Elvis self, but he sang a lot of great songs.  Ann-Margret was sensational and I loved all her costumes.  This movie also made me feel guilty for drinking wine and eating fatty cream based soup while I was watching it, because she has such an enviable figure in that film.  I need to go on a diet so I can walk around in crop tops like Ann-Margret.  There was a scene in the rehearsal hall where I debated a long time if Ann-Margret had panties on underneath her black nylons.  Despite all the close-ups of her derriere, I'm still undecided.  Regardless, she looked fantastic.  Ann-Margret and Elvis had such fantastic chemistry.  Too bad they didn't make another film together.

 

I love movies with car racing scenes and Elvis' race was fun to watch and it was exciting at the end.  I liked seeing Uncle Charlie from My Three Sons as Ann-Margret's father.  I also loved all the dancing in this movie.  I feel like I would have fit in perfectly in the teen/twenty-something party scene in the 1960s.  The silly 60s style dancing is my kind of dancing and something I can do.  I love 60s dancing movies, especially 60s teen dancing movies.  Perhaps that's why I like the "Beach Blanket Bingo" movies and the Gidget movie with Sandra Dee and the Gidget TV show with Sally Field so much.  I need to go back in a time machine and go to one of those 60s parties where they're doing "The Twist" and "The Swim."  That's my speed.

[LornaHansonForbes]

FANTASTIC LIES, an ESPN doc about the Duke Lacrosse team gettin railroaded by the justice system.

 

It was EXCELLENT, and VERY highly recommended.

[GregoryPeckfan]

I love Flying Down to Rio. It has great songs -- "The Carioca;""Orchids in the Moonlight," and of course the title song. An older friend of mine, long since gone, told me that she saw the film when it first came out, at the Loew's Paradise -- a grand old movie palace in the Bronx. My friend said that when "Orchids in the Moonlight" was sung, the screen turned purple!  The movie is mentioned in The Subject Was Roses -- Timmy Cleary (the Martin Sheen character) talks about seeing the film at the Loew's Paradise as well, and does an impression of the one of the planes, as he sings a few bars.

 

 

I remember that scene.  I'm a big fan of Martin Sheen, and the films that normally I would not watch in the first place for their violence would make up a 24 hour marathon of Martin Sheen.

[speedracer5]

FANTASTIC LIES, an ESPN doc about the Duke Lacrosse team gettin railroaded by the justice system.

 

It was EXCELLENT, and VERY highly recommended.

 

I heard the documentary filmmaker being interviewed on NPR.  The documentary sounded really interesting.  I guess I didn't follow the story closely when it was current news, even though I remember hearing about the Duke Lacrosse team.  I didn't realize that the story was a farce.  

 

I'm also disappointed that I missed this documentary, I didn't realize it was going to be on so soon after the NPR interview.  It'll probably repeat.

[GregoryPeckfan]

Re: Astaire/Rogers:

 

I have seen all of them.

 

Let me tell you how I remember them to distinguish them;

 

Flying Down To Rio: The only film where they aren't the stars.

 

Top Hat: Feather dress/my favourite/Eric Blore refers to himself in the plural

 

Carefree: I never remember any of the songs or dances.  I think I've seen it once.

 

 

Swing Time: Excellent song that won Best Song, but it has blackface so it can't be my favourite

 

Barkleys of Broadway: color movie

 

The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (do I have the title right?):  Kilts

 

Roberta:  This is the one with Irene Dunne and Randolph Scott not on a ship

 

Shall We Dance: this is the one with the Ginger Rogers masks

 

Follow the Fleet:  Randolph Scott without Irene Dune on a ship.

 

Have I  not mentioned any others?

[GregoryPeckfan]

BEHAVE YOURSELF: 1951:

 

This is the first time viewing of this comedy which I recorded on TCM last week.

 

The crime comedy stars Farley Granger, Shelly Winters, Sheldon Leonard, Lon Chaney, Elisha Cook Jr. and other famous nameless faces.

 

 

Granger and Winters are a married couple on their anniversary living with her mother in her mother's house.

 

He has forgotten the anniversary - of course  - and tries to buy a  present when a dog intervenes and destroys property and then follows him home.

 

Winters and her mother think the dog is an anniversary present.

 

The dog is actually trained to locate illegal loot

 

Bodies pile up.

 

It is, as I have mentioned, made in 1951.  The code was in force.  Crime does not pay.

 

Very funny.

Edited March 14, 2016 by GregoryPeckfan

[LawrenceA]

Superman III (1983) - (4/10) - Really terrible sequel that nearly undoes the goodwill created by the first two films. Christopher Reeve returns as Superman, who, in his alter ego of Clark Kent, travels back to his hometown of Smallville to attend his high school reunion. While there, he crosses path with an evil buisness magnate (Robert Vaughn), his equally evil sister (Annie Ross), and Vaughn's ditzy assistant (Pamela Stephenson). They've hired a computer genius (Richard Pryor, cashing a check) to help develop a super computer to help in their plan for global domination. They also develop artifical kryptonite that turns Superman evil. You know he's evil because he quits shaving, has dingy clothes, and straightens the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

 

Margot Kidder was fighting with the producers at this point, so her role as Lois Lane is reduced to short cameos at the beginning and end of the film. Jackie Cooper returns as Daily Planet editor Perry White, and Marc McClure as junior reporter Jimmy Olsen. Annette O'Toole appears as Kent's high school crush Lana Lang, and Gavan (Son of Dan) O'Herlihy as a drunken high school bully.

 

Director Richard Lester tries to accentuate the comedy in this, but the script is so awful that nothing can save it. The effects are bargain basement as well, with some really shoddy miniature and matte work. At the time, this seemed like the worst film treatment Superman could get. If we only knew...

 

 

Rewatch.   Source: DVD.

[LonesomePolecat]

re: fred & ginger

 

I keep them straight by the songs-- TOP HAT is the Irving Berlin one, SHALL WE DANCE is the Gershwin one, etc. ANd like GregoryPeckFan I too can't remember a thing about CAREFREE.

 

Just watched LT ROBINSON CRUSOE, USN which I enjoyed and can't believe I never saw it before. Although sometimes I felt like Dick Van Dyke was being overly directed/edited and kept thinking they should have just handed him the props and rolled film, still thought it was funny and a worthwhile Disney fling.

[GregoryPeckfan]

LIGHTENING STRIKES TWICE (1935):

 

This is a screwball crime  comedy about mistaken identity, trap doors/floors where people disappear who are presumed murdered, and total confusion.

 

This stars Ben Lyon, Thelma Todd, and several famous nameless faces.

 

This movie is a lot of fun to watch.

 

However, there are so many twists and tunes that if I didn't see it again for 6 months I would not be able to tell you what happened. At all.

[LawrenceA]

Blonde Cobra (1963) - (2/10) - Okay. I need some help with this one. I watched this short film because it's one of the 1001 Movies to See Before You Die. Now, I don't expect to like all of them, or to agree that they should be on a list such as this. But even if I don't like a title in that book, I can almost always see some reason or another that someone would list it. It was ground-breaking technically. It was important to a certain nation or culture's cinematic evolution. It features previously-taboo subject matter or imagery. But not this time.

 

The film consists of bits and pieces of film, some in color but most in black & white, without sound. The audio track is made up of old song bits, avant-garde music pieces, random noises, or most often the puerile ramblings of the film's subject, Jack Smith. Smith was apparently quite a character among the underground NYC art scene of the 50's and 60's. So this film is meant as a piecemeal portrait/homage to Smith. Most of his "stories" are heard on the soundtrack during long stretches of black screen. The bits of old film seem to be outtakes of a silly home-movie of some sort, mostly of Smith in mock drag and fondling a chicken carcass. Seriously.

 

After watching the film, I read the entry in the 1001 book to try and glean why this would be included, but it doesn't really explain why. Reading on imdb, I first find that this film has the lowest aggregate score of any film listed in the 1001 book, a 3.2/10. Some people feel it's a cruel joke played by the book's authors on a gullible readership. Others that defend the film (there were a few) seem to say that audiences shouldn't expect anything, and just take this as an abstract work of art, with as much or as little meaning as you can read into it. To me, it's the very worst kind of arthouse junk, the kind that gives art films a bad name and scares away the general public from trying anything new. I'm hoping one or more of you fellow posters who have seen it, or will go and see it, will give me any feedback as to your impressions of the film. It's available on YouTube, and it's only 32 minutes long. It's a looong 32 minutes, though. And be warned: he uses some foul language in his "stories" and and there's a tiny bit of nudity near the end (pun intended).

 

 

First time endured.  Source: YT.

[cigarjoe]

Wish TCM would show that steamy movie.

It would definitely have to be a late nighter.

[LornaHansonForbes]

Superman III (1983) - (4/10) - Really terrible sequel that nearly undoes the goodwill created by the first two films. Christopher Reeve returns as Superman, who... crosses path with an evil buisness magnate (Robert Vaughn), his equally evil sister (Annie Ross), and Vaughn's ditzy assistant (Pamela Stephenson). They've hired a computer genius (Richard Pryor, cashing a check) to help develop a super computer to help in their plan for global domination. They also develop artifical kryptonite that turns Superman evil. You know he's evil because he quits shaving, has dingy clothes, and straightens the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Director Richard Lester tries to accentuate the comedy in this, but the script is so awful that nothing can save it. The effects are bargain basement as well, with some really shoddy miniature and matte work. At the time, this seemed like the worst film treatment Superman could get. If we only knew...

 

SUPERMAN 3 has one of the WTFiest moments in any 80's film, Hell, any film ever- near the end when the SuperComputer the villains build starts malfunctioning and they try to flee. The Villain's sister- who heretofore really has served zero purpose in the story- is sucked into a claustrophobic compartment of the computer and- in one of the most disturbing moments that i can recall from a childhood filled with disturbing moments, she screams in agony as the computer strangles her with wires and staples metal all over her face. she then emerges as the most ridiculous looking robot ever, ever, EVER. I mean, even Robbie the Robot would laugh at this thing.

 

The director of this film had to've had some SERIOUS issues with his mother or something....i just cannot fathom how or why they felt like this needed to happen in a movie that children were going to want to see.

 

Anyway, the sister is played by ANNIE ROSS- as you noted- and she is actually an accomplished jazz and standard vocalist who, i can only assume, was being blackmailed into appearing in this or really needed to pay off a loan or something.

 

and for the record, RICHARD LESTER directed JUGGERNAUT (1974)- which I mentioned in the David Hemmings thread and which I'll give another shout-out too here as an EXCELELNT, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED FILM.

[film lover 293]

LawrenceA--"Blonde Cobra" (1963) contains (I THINK) some quotations from Baudelaire; doesn't make it any less painful to watch.  The throwaway lines about Maria Montez at the 23-24 minute mark are a Blessing; so is the duet between Harriet Hilliard (?) and Edward Everett Horton (?) to "Let's Call The Whole Thing Off" that follows.  Pretentiousness doesn't  excuse a film as bad as this, IMHO.  Your rating is right, IMHO.

[LawrenceA]

 

 

mmmmm, that's some tasty cheese product.

[LornaHansonForbes]

 

"Ha. Ha. Ha. Your outfit looks ridic-u-lous."

[LornaHansonForbes]

ps- I could forgive the SuperComputer for nearly killing the woman as it cruelly assimilates and mechanizes her, erases her mind and scars her for life...but did it have to do that to her hair?

 

That just seems one step too far.

[rosebette]

I caught Victor/Victoria last night.  I was surprised how well that film has held up and in many ways is still current and timely.  What a group of pros.  Ben's comment about Julie being associated with Mary Poppins and Sound of Music shows how we have underestimated her gifts as an actress and comedienne.  James Garner's character was called "King," and indeed he was, king of the reaction shots -- some of the best I've seen since Cary Grant in spotting Irene Dunne in the elevator in My Favorite Wife.  It's so hard for me to believe that Garner is no longer with us.  Robert Preston was a great scene-stealer.   It's also one of the last "original musicals," since the score was written completely for that film, rather than a musical adapted for Broadway (instead the reverse happened).

[LawrenceA]

Flaming Creatures (1963) - (2/10) - Another short film recommended by the 1001 Movies to See Before You Die book, this one was directed by the star of Blonde Cobra. His name is Jack Smith, and he was something  of a character in the NYC underground art and film scene of the 50's and 60's. He was also an out and proud gay man, in both his life and art. Shot in black and white on over-exposed stock and using a lot of roving, soft focus close-ups, there's no plot at all here. It's just a lot of Smith's friends, mostly men with at least one or two women, in cheap, dime-store drag, posing and gyrating and laying in piles of each other on the floor. Oh, and there's a ton of graphic male and female nudity, and a lengthy sexual assault scene. This is rough, X-rated stuff, and I was kind of stunned that it was on YouTube. This caused a lot of furor in the 60's, with multiple arrests as a result of its exhibition. That notoriety may be a reason it's in the book, although some critics state that it has a "transcendent beauty". Um, no. It's self-indulgent garbage. It has also been posited that it's a precursor to the John Waters school of outrageous shock/camp. That may be, but Waters does it better. This runs 42 minutes, and only its brevity saved it from a 1/10 rating.

 

 

First time watched. Source: YT.

[wouldbestar]

LawrenceA--"Blonde Cobra" (1963) contains (I THINK) some quotations from Baudelaire; doesn't make it any less painful to watch.  The throwaway lines about Maria Montez at the 23-24 minute mark are a Blessing; so is the duet between Harriet Hilliard (?) and Edward Everett Horton (?) to "Let's Call The Whole Thing Off" that follows.  Pretentiousness doesn't  excuse a film as bad as this, IMHO.  Your rating is right, IMHO.

 

You probably know Harriet Hilliard better by her married name-Mrs. Ozzie Nelson.  Edward Everett Horton voiced many of the Bullwinkle characters and was the usual narrator. 

[LawrenceA]

Heaven and Earth Magic (1962) - (7/10) - Underground animation from filmmaker Harry Smith. This plotless movie is a series of random tableau, animated a bit in the style of the later Terry Gilliam stuff on Monty Python, but black and white and a lot cruder. It will be appreciated by fans of obscure animation and druggies alike. I wasn't high, but I enjoyed it all right, for what it was. It contains a unique beauty, and ironically, despite its underground status, I see its influence most clearly in modern advertisements. Even at just 66 minutes, it runs a bit long, but came as a refresher after the last two shorts I watched. One of the 1001 Movies to See Before You Die.

 

First time watched.  Source: YT.