Low Budget

Zasu Pitts, another prolific character actor from Hollywood’s golden age, had a career that lasted from the silent era to television of the early 1960s.  She estimated that she appeared in 500 films, and I’m sure she forgot quite a few of the titles.  But when one appeared in my mailbox, courtesy of Netflix, I appreciated the chance to see her do a star turn.  In “So’s Your Aunt Emma” from 1942, she plays a the title character, who gets involved with a young boxer (as a mentor) and some gangsters in Chicago.

This low-budget entry from Monogram Pictures, a B-Movie studio, reminded me of the original Superman TV series, with lots of stilted dialogue and thug violence.  It’s hard to imagine now how much Zasu Pitts had audiences rolling in the aisles, but she’s playing a clever country bumpkin type and that really played well in the 1940s.  Back then, I’m told, there really was a big difference between urban and rural areas.

I wonder what Quentin Tarantino would think of this film.  He likes formula or genre pictures.  This film fits nicely into the low budget, boxing, country bumpkin, fish out of water genre — and it has violence and gunfire.  Tarantino said he decided to get into filmmaking when he saw “Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein” from Universal International Pictures in 1948.  Although Abbot and Costello played it for laughs, the monster really does commit horrific acts of violence.  But So’s Your Aunt Emma is not campy horror, it’s a film about double-crossing gangsters and a fearless old lady.  Thankfully, it lasts only about an hour.

Posted in Movie Reviews, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Film Noir Beginnings?

I watched a film tonight from 1935 and Columbia Pictures called “Crime and Punishment,” directed by Josef von Sternberg and starring Peter Lorre, Edward Arnold and Marian Marsh.  It veers from the story by Fyoder Dostoevsky in that it does not retain much of the suspense of the novel; Raskolnikov, as played by Lorre, flips back and forth between being a total mess to a cunning murderer.  But we can’t see the wheels turning as we could in the novel  Moreover, the novel’s sense of total degradation and sense of creeping inevitability seems lost in this translation.

Of course, successful movies pick a central theme rather than a collection of them.  The film chose to not delve into the hallucinogenic nature of Raskolnikov’s villainy,  choosing instead to concentrate on the war of wills between Raskolnikov and Edward Arnold as Inspector Porfiry.  We witness Raskolnikov’s undoing as he incriminates himself, and it’s always fun to watch Lorre when he’s up against a clever opponent.

A rougher treatment of this story could make it film noir material, but it maintains little of the darkness prevalent in later films with similar stories such as “Shadow of a Doubt,” directed by Alfred Hitchcock in 1942, or “Double Indemnity,” directed by Billy Wilder in 1944.  von Sternberg really didn’t want to make the film, and he disliked the script and the actors.  Hitchcock would have made a much more suspenseful movie.

Posted in Movie Reviews, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Favorite Movies

I wanted to close out the year by talking about some of my favorite films. Favorite, of course, is a relative term. Ask anyone about their favorite movie and you might hear anything from “Star Wars” to “Pulp Fiction” to “Gremlins” to “Titanic.” I define favorite movie as one you can watch anytime, again and again, and still enjoy it and get something new from it. My favorite movie, “The Wizard of Oz,” fits those criteria. It has a great score, wonderful actors, a terrific story, fine performances and cutting edge special effects for its time.

For years as a kid, I watched The Wizard of Oz on a black and white television set, and I didn’t know about the Technicolor part. The television in my house growing up took about 15 minutes to fully turn on (and about the same amount of time for the white dot to vanish when you turned it off). The following exchange from the movie didn’t make sense to me: Dorothy: “What kind of a horse is that? I’ve never seen a horse like that before!” Guardian of the Emerald City Gates: “And never will again, I fancy. There’s only one of him and he’s it. He’s the Horse of a Different Color, you’ve heard tell about.” Imagine my surprise to finally see this movie in color years later and see that the horse sported a purple coat with yellow polka dots. I believe it continuously changes color as well.

Other favorite films of mine include “Back to the Future,” “The Lady Eve,” “Nights of Cabiria,” “School of Rock,” “The Apartment,” “Apocalypse Now,” “Dark City,” Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist,” “The Last Picture Show,” “Pather Panchali,” “Singing in the Rain,” Sam Fuller’s “Pickup on South Street,” and Michael Powell’s “I Know Where I’m Going!”

Generally, I want to like the characters in a movie, so movies with lots of rotten characters don’t appeal to me. I like interesting dialogue, but not too much of it. The visuals should dominate, as in I Know Where I’m Going! Paramount liked I Know Where I’m Going! – produced in Scotland by The Archers company – so much that it made the script required reading in Paramount’s screenwriting department. Michael Powell said Paramount used it as an example of how a perfect screenplay should be constructed.

Posted in Announcements, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Remembering My First Movie

I remember the first movie I ever went to by myself — Billy Budd.  I was only about 8 years old and the movie played at the Squirrel Hill Theater in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  I wandered in on a rainy Saturday to watch a matinee.  The theater, now a fourplex, was big and spacious and I remember a curved screen that displayed the full visual effect of the projection.  The film starred Peter Ustinov, Robert Ryan, Terrence Stamp and Melvyn Douglas, who all turned in fine performances.

The film’s story, about a young sailer who’s accused of killing the ship’s master at arms (Ryan), is a powerful shipboard fable with a talky script directed with finesse by Ustinov.  He had a long, distinguished and enchanting career as an actor and raconteur, but he also directed 9 quirky movies.  He could ham it up sometimes as an actor, but he turns in a fine performance here as the captain.  He played classical types well (he’s great in “Sparticus”).

Posted in Announcements, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

On Preston Sturges

Having watched Preston Sturges’ great film, “The Lady Eve,” the other day, I went looking on the web for an site celebrating his career.  I found a site called prestonsturges.net, which calls itself the official Preston Sturges website.  The site contains a lot of interesting items, including an article about Sturges from the May 2010 “Vanity Fair” magazine.  In addition, there’s a series of pages devoted to excerpts from his movies.

In this era of ultra unsophisticated comedy, I find it remarkable that Sturges’ movies hold up so well.  They combine intelligent characters with clear motivation and great stories.  He also worked with terrific actors, such as Joel McCrea, Barbara Stanwyck and Eric Blore.  He made 6 or 7 great films, but his filmography also shows his prolific career as a Hollywood screenwriter.  A book containing five of his screenplays, “Five Screenplays Preston Sturges,” contains very good commentary and history by Brian Henderson.  Sturges also wrote an autobiography, which doesn’t necessarily focus on his Hollywood successes.  He called it “Preston Sturges by Preston Sturges:  His Life in His Words,” and he died at a hotel while dictating it, leaving it unfinished.

According to imdb.com, Preston Sturges had this to say about making successful comedy movies:

A pretty girl is better than a plain one / A leg is better than an arm / A bedroom is better than a living room / An arrival is better that a departure / A birth is better than a death / A chase is better than a chat / A dog is better than a landscape / A kitten is better than a dog / A baby is better than a kitten / A kiss is better than a baby / A pratfall is better than anything.

Posted in Announcements, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Character Actors

Some actors make me smile every time I see them on the screen.  They made the Golden Age of Hollywood great.  I’m thinking of actors such as the stodgy Franklin Pangborn, the highly suspicious William Demarest, the conniving Eric Blore, the blunt Marjorie Main, and the stentorian Eugene Pallette.  They appeared as fathers, mothers, store clerks, crooked politicians, con men and hotel managers and always added a dose of wit and charm to a Hollywood movie.

I wouldn’t necessary seek out every Edward Everette Horton or Edward Arnold film, but I find delight in getting to see Horton act with Ronald Colman in “Lost Horizon” from Columbia Pictures in 1937, and watching Arnold ham it up as the crooked industrialist in “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” from Frank Capra and Columbia in 1939.  Thelma Ritter, another great character actor (she appeared in “Miracle on 34th Street) won a Tony for best actress in 1958 on Broadway and was nominated for 6 Academy Awards.  She never won but continued to turn in memorable performances.

Posted in Announcements, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Blake Edwards

I learned today that Blake Edwards died, one of my favorite filmmakers.  When you look of the some of today’s comedy filmmakers such as the Coen Brothers, the Farrelly’s, Paul and Chris Wietz and others — you can see the influence of Edwards in their gleeful journey along the boundaries of taste in the name of comedy.  Critics debated Edward’s restraint in such films as “10,” “Darling Lili,” and “S.O.B,” but I never thought he went too far and it’s always worth it.

He made the unrelentingly sad “Days of Wine and Roses” a pleasure to watch.  It goes through the paces of a redemption story but it’s really about human struggle, giving us something to take home.  When the fabulous “The Great Race” opened at the Squirrel Hill Theater in Pittsburgh in 1965, I went to see it 4 times!  Of course, those were the days when a little kid could wander around the neighborhood and even see a movie if he wanted to.  I loved Jack Lemmon’s tour de force performance in The Great Race, and what a great story about those daring adventurers of the early 20th century.  It shocked me to learn in today’s New York Times obituary of Edwards that the film did not make much money.

I also saw “Wild Rovers” when it came out in 1971 and really enjoyed it.  It’s not on DVD, but it’s a forgotten gem of a western with William Holden and Ryan O’Neal.  Edwards could do all genres well, not just comedy.  Like Howard Hawks, he explored many genres, and I appreciated his understanding of human nature and knack for comedy timing.  Hats off in respect for Blake Edwards, a great artist.

Posted in Announcements, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Film Festival

The San Francisco Silent Film Festival’s 6th Annual Winter Event takes place on Saturday, February 12, 2011 in San Francisco, California.  At it, you’ll see luminaries such as Leonard Maltin and probably Robert Osborne — plus a tremendous program of classic silent films.  Their schedule is up at www.silentfilm.org.

I wrote about the TCM network’s “Moguls and Movie Stars:  A History of Hollywood” yesterday.  They mentioned the great New York Times critic Bosley Crowther.  Just because he trashed “Bonnie and Clyde” in a review, they pushed him out and called him “over the hill.”  Pauline Kael at the New Yorker hailed Bonnie and Clyde as a masterpiece and her opinion reigned.  I like to type in old movies on Rotten Tomatoes and then read the Crowther review.  He reviewed tirelessly for 27 years, and master’s theses have been written about his influence and legacy.  He invented movie criticism as we know it today — and he was a true critic who changed the literature.

Posted in Announcements, Silent Film | Leave a comment

Movie Moguls

Tonight, I saw the last episode of “Moguls and Movie Stars:  A History of Hollywood.”  I liked the series, which really did focus on history.  In 7 parts, we got everything from the first exhibited motion pictures in 1989 all the way to “Easy Rider” in 1969.  Of course, each one of the moguls — Meyer, Zanuck, Cohn, Goldwyn, Zukor, etc. could have had an hour of their own, but the series remained chronological.  It’s easy to follow with very few themes — 7 parts, 7 themes.  It’s entertaining and it doesn’t take a lot of intellectual focus.

I recently saw “The Thief of Bagdad,” the fabulous 1940 fantasy with Sabu and Conrad Viedt.  The commentary track has Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola talking about their experiences watching the film on TV in the late 1940s.  I grew up in the 1960s and 1970s, but I don’t remember ever seeing this on our old black and white Zenith that took 15 minutes to warm up.  As a child, I’m sure I’d want to be that boy (Sabu) in the film.  At the end, he flies off in his flying carpet to new adventures — like I want to do now.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Sound of Silents

I went to see the 1928 “Passion of Joan of Arc” silent film at the beautiful Paramount Theater in Oakland, California recently — complete with an orchestra, a chorus and an original and beautiful score written by Richard Einhorn (Voices of Light).  Seeing and writing about these cinema masterpieces will be my aim in writing this blog.  I’m a screenwriter and cinema lover with a keen interest in the preservation and projection of great silent films.

Of course, I also enjoy sound films.  In fact, my favorite movie of all time is “The Wizard of Oz,” which I find wonderful in every way — great story, great acting, great songs, great special effects and the kind of charm that makes it seem fresh viewing after viewing.  But I think classic silent films have a special and very different place in my appreciation.  One must watch them very attentively and catch the subtlety in their visual storytelling.  You can’t do the ironing while watching a silent film.

The Passion of Joan of Arc involves the trial and execution of Joan, played by Maria Falconetti, in one of the greatest performances in cinema history.  She portrays the subtle emotions of a woman who conveys messages from her God to the disbelieving judges.  One can really believe from her acting and facial expressions that the spiritual channel is wide open.  In other “trial” films, such as “Judgement at Nuremberg,” “12 Angry Men,” and “Inherit the Wind.” we see many more actors presenting a lot more business for the camera.  But The Passion of Joan of Arc relies on Falconetti’s emotion to carry the movie.  Carl Theodore Dreyer, the director, uses lots of static close-ups of Joan and her accusers to convey the terror of the Hundred Years War and the English invaders in France.

Silent Film — The San Francisco Silent Film Festival winter event program arrives!  View the schedule at www.silentfilm.org. I bought my tickets today.

Posted in Movie Reviews, Silent Film | Leave a comment