What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

[Harp]

I still say Acela's quiet car was one of the greatest advancement in train travel in the past fifty years.

More specifically in Masterpiece Bakeshop; wherein a bakery declined a wedding cake contract with a *** couple based First Amendment religious grounds and the right to silence as opposed approbation or indifference.

I recall sitting in a Rock Island quiet car with a friend, a federal judge, and I was about to deliver a constitutional stemwinder for him and another lawyer pal when I was ''susshed,'' and ''This is the QUIET CAR sir.''

======
December flies by and my annual Sim or Scott Scrooge screenings have yet to happen. I am leaning more towards Sim this year as the memorable post-brokerage collapse restitution talk always takes me back to law school days, when I worked an overnight international trading desk for a Chicago commodity brokerage.

 

[Zombie_61]

A few nights ago we started watching Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the American 1941 version starring Spencer Tracy and Lana Turner. My wife had never seen it, and she grew bored with it before the plot began to take off. I personally prefer the 1931 version starring Frederic March and Miriam Hopkins so that didn't bother me much, but I do wish she'd given it more of a chance. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[Fading Fast]

More specifically in Masterpiece Bakeshop; wherein a bakery declined a wedding cake contract with a *** couple based First Amendment religious grounds and the right to silence as opposed approbation or indifference.

I recall sitting in a Rock Island quiet car with a friend, a federal judge, and I was about to deliver a constitutional stemwinder for him and another lawyer pal when I was ''susshed,'' and ''This is the QUIET CAR sir.''

======
December flies by and my annual Sim or Scott Scrooge screenings have yet to happen. I am leaning more towards Sim this year as the memorable post-brokerage collapse restitution talk always takes me back to law school days, when I worked an overnight international trading desk for a Chicago commodity brokerage.

I watched the Sim one this weekend. It's close call, but it is my favorite of the many versions that I've seen.

 

[Harp]

I watched the Sim one this weekend. It's close call, but it is my favorite of the many versions that I've seen.

Can't argue this; although George C puts his indelible stamp down on Dickens; whom had a low opinion of Americans, and gave an English accent a good go at the start but it fizzled out quite soon afterwards.
That office scene with Bob Cratchett's coal usage and clothing against the cold. Definitely a first class all American effort but then he decided to punt. He relapsed to Missouri baritone gruffness. The drop occurred out on the street when he encountered tubercular Tiny Tim; though later vestige sounded at the counting house where he sold his corn holding for his quote. Then, ****** its gone with the wind.

 

[Fading Fast]

Yes Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus (1991) with Charles Bronson, Richard Thomas, and Edward Asner


"Virginia,

Your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except what they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds.

All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to our life its highest beauty and joy."


There's more to Frank Church's famous editorial, including this wonderful section:


"You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, or even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernatural beauty and glory beyond.

Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else as real and abiding.

No Santa Claus? Thank God he lives and he lives forever."


This classic Noel editorial – regularly reprinted at Christmas – was originally published in 1897 in the New York newspaper The Sun. It was written by Francis Pharcellus Church in response to a letter querying the veracity of Santa Claus by eight-year-old Virginia O'Hanlon.

All that is true, and it's a wonderful story, but it doesn't fit the needs of a compact made-for-TV feel-good Christmas movie in which each piece must advance the plot while building the perfect Christmas-time narrative. So the makers of the movie got – ahem – creative with the story.

They also told one of the few tales Hollywood – deep down in its soul – loves to tell: the underdog being kicked by those more well off, but faith and hard work ultimately reward the underdog. Heck, it's one of the ideas that Hallmark built its Christmas movie empire around.

In Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus, Virginia is the daughter of a loving Irish immigrant family struggling in poverty as prejudice and greed keep the Irish out of jobs. In real life, though, Virginia was the daughter of a surgeon – she went on to college and eventually earned a PhD.

The Frank Church side of the story is closer to the truth, as he was a noted editorial writer and his publisher did assign him the editorial in response to Virginia's letter, but the part in the movie about him being a widower and near suicidal was all made up to "enhance" the story.

So what are we left with? A somewhat silly and obvious movie, built around an incredibly wonderful and real story, with an impressive cast including Charles Bronson playing Church, Ed Asner as his editor, and Richard Thomas as Virginia's kind Irish immigrant dad.

Bronson is good even playing against type as the sensitive, grieving widower. Still, the man projects the same "I'm tough so you don't have to be" protect-the-weak vibe on which he built his career – which perfectly fits the role here as a tough reporter protecting a child's dream.

Virginia herself is played by Katharine Isabelle who looks like a 1990s idealized version of an 1897 nice, cute, and innocent Irish immigrant kid. Her adult career would tilt heavily toward horror movies, but in 1991, ten-year-old Isabelle got to play one of the sweetest kids ever.

Filmed in British Columbia, on a made-for-TV-movie budget, and pre-CGI, the period details are good, but would have benefited greatly from the cinematographer turning down the light and giving the movie calmer, richer, and more varied hues; but again, maybe it was the budget.

Like the bright color, there's little subtlety here. The bad guys are cardboard villains who start fights and build themselves up on racist thoughts, while the good guys are all but perfectly kind and charitable. It's a bit much, yet still, it's hard to break a truly magical core story.

The letter from an innocent child; a cigar-smoking, hard-boiled editor assigning it to his world-weary top reporter, the reporter banging out a classic for all time in one sitting – maybe it's not perfect TV, but it's a pretty perfect and true Christmas tale.

Yes Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus is not a classic movie, but it has one of the truly great Christmas stories at its core. It's childhood innocence defended by a world-weary man who prods the cynic in all adults to remember there are better angels out there.

 

[Harp]

I saw this once, years ago, but recall Bronson's sensitive portrayal. The pocket watch scene when he leaves it inside his desk for the news clerk; during his suicidal closure, which itself added immeasurably to script heft.
Surprising that this little jewel seemingly slipped away.

 

[belfastboy]

Just finished watching "Jay Kelly"......Clooney's latest. A fun bit of fluff on a quiet Christmas day. It is funny that a Hollywood movie posing as the serious inner reflection of an aging movie star turns out to be a silly bit of light comedy with not a serious moment to be found. Which in way makes it the perfect Hollywood movie. I can never get this right......"does this make the movie ironic?"

 

[Fiedi]

Just watched Capras It's a wonderful life with Jimmy Stewart - gives you back the faith in humanship...

 

[Fading Fast]

The Grasshopper (1970) with Jacqueline Bisset, Joseph Cotten, Jim Brown


Freedom and choices are wonderful things – who doesn't want to be free and have choices about what they want to do with their lives? However, both wonderful concepts – in abstract and in practice – come with a price tag: responsibility, and its handmaiden, consequences.

When you are free to choose, you are also responsible for yourself. Make the wrong choices and you own the outcome – the consequences. Sure, you can point the finger for your failures every which way you want, but still, you own it – you're free after all, and you made the choices.

By 1970, western culture had blown the doors off the old restraints and young people, in particular, were looking at a cornucopia of options they didn't have before. Despite all the legitimate complaining, women, too, had freedom and choices they never had before.

If there is any other lesson in The Grasshopper – a muddled paean to freedom – beauty, like any gift, has to be used wisely or it can be squandered or even turned into a destructive force. Jacqueline Bisset runs that gamut in a few tumultuous years of freedom in the late 1960s.

At nineteen, Bisset runs away from her middle class home in a quiet Quebec town to join her boyfriend in Los Angeles. He's happy to see her and wants to get married, which is great until Bisset thinks about married life and bolts. It's the second of several boltings Bisset will perform.

Now in Vegas, she gets a job as a "showgirl," a t*pless dancer (with pasties) in a gaudy Vegas revue. Hanging out with a group of young singles, it's all drugs, s*x, and wasted money until she marries a black former football star, played by Jim Brown.

Two wonderful things stand out about her marriage to Brown: one, the interracial issue is not a big deal to either of them, and, two, he tries to be a good husband. She, though, one more time, is too worried about becoming a normal person to stick it out. So she bolts once again.

There's also a whole lot about the seedy side of Vegas as, to some, it looks extravagant and luxurious, like twenty-four-seven fun, but the business side of it – which is basically legalized gambling and winked at prostitution – is cutthroat and dirty.

Back in LA, Bisset becomes a mistress to a wealthy man, played by Golden Era Hollywood star Joseph Cotten, who then offers to marry her, so she naturally bolts one more time. Drugs, prostitution, Vegas again, and a stoned stunt follow. As the credits roll, she's all of twenty-two.

Bisset is more engaging than believable as the angsty "free spirit." Most of us have known someone like her: an arrestingly beautiful, but unsettled young woman who can't appreciate or leverage her looks into a full, healthy life. It's heartbreaking.

A few times, Bisset notes in frustration that she wants to be "special," not "ordinary." That is why she bolts so often when faced with an ordinary life. That's fine, but what does that mean to someone, like her, without a special talent? Maybe it just means an unhappy life.

Despite receiving prominent billing and giving a fine performance, Cotten is only in a few scenes and maybe gets fifteen minutes of screen time. It's almost jarring to see this icon of Classic Hollywood in a 1970 s*x-and-drugs movie, but he brings acting gravitas to it.

Brown, looking like he could still play football, was never going to be an Academy Award winner, but he acquits himself well. Somewhat like Cotten, though, it's almost jarring to see this stalwart of the gridiron play a version of himself a bit lost in the cultural chaos of the era.

This of-its-moment 1970 movie is a wonderful time capsule for us today: loud colors, long hair, early rock music, a shocked older generation, and the underlying ennui of the young generation because freedom isn't magically translating into happiness are already present.

We understand some of it now. We know that freedom without individual restraint smashes up like Janis Joplin, but what we don't know, and probably never will, is how society strikes the right balance.

The Grasshopper is a sad early tale about one woman trying to find that balance, but proving unable to do so.

 

[CanuckPeter]

Saw Goodbye June on Netflix last night, great movie, star studded cast, good story line

 

[Harp]

^ Great Grasshopper review. Bisset possessed beauty and credibility. And Joseph Cotton was always good.
I recall from David Niven's book, either The Moon's A Balloon or Bring On The Empty Horses that Cotton had told Louella Parsons or Hedda Hopper that he would kick her in the gluteus maximus for a false gossip column.
Which he did in public. An act of criminal and tortious battery. He should have snagged Oscar for Citizen Kane.
Being a confirmed Irish bachelor, I can relate to Bisset's peripatetic nature and aversion to married life with its inherent responsibilities; although not her character's innate irresponsibility. Life can be strange and I like a flick that gives straightforward examine of capricious fate and deliberate choice.
---
For whatever reason, I still haven't seen A Christmas Carol. So, I've extended this year's Sim/Scott until
New Year's.

 

[Zombie_61]

Just finished watching "Jay Kelly"......Clooney's latest. A fun bit of fluff on a quiet Christmas day. It is funny that a Hollywood movie posing as the serious inner reflection of an aging movie star turns out to be a silly bit of light comedy with not a serious moment to be found. Which in way makes it the perfect Hollywood movie. I can never get this right......"does this make the movie ironic?"

My wife and I tried to watch that a few nights ago, and we found it to be mostly tedious and uninteresting. After 45 minutes we gave up and found something else on TV to occupy our time.

Last night we settled in and watched Miracle on 34th Street (1947) starring Edmund Gwenn, Maureen O'Hara, John Payne, and a young Natalie Wood. I'd never seen the movie because I'm not big on "holiday" movies, but I rather enjoyed it.

 

[Fading Fast]

Forbidden Cargo (1954) with Nigel Patrick, Elizabeth Sellars, Terence Morgan, Jack Warner, and Joyce Grenfell


Somehow, despite its Empire evanescing and its economy wallowing in socialist shortages, England still made modestly budgeted high-quality movies after the war, mainly by filming in beautiful black and white and focusing on storytelling and characters, not special effects.

Forbidden Cargo is a perfect example of how postwar British filmmakers told a very good story with a talented cast of characters who touch you. Yes, there are some high-speed chases and even a few underwater scenes, but none are cutting edge or close to what Hollywood could do.

What you care about most are the people, starting with Nigel Patrick playing a customs officer who connects a few dots from Navy duck boats illegally landing at a bird sanctuary (of course England had those back then) to a potentially large drug smuggling syndicate.

With the support of his very British – as is almost everyone in this one – no-nonsense supervisor, played by Jack Warner, Patrick goes undercover to expose the scheme and identify its senior perpetrators.

The search leads him to a Polish smuggler wonderfully played with greedy moral agnosticism by Eric Pohlmann and then to a brother-sister team, played by Terence Morgan and Elizabeth Sellars. Yes, despite the conflict, there are sparks between undercover Patrick and Sellars.

The rest of the plot is best seen fresh, but it's reasonably smart with a few good twists and surprises. What really works though are the characters and atmosphere. Shot in an almost documentary style, you feel like you are following an actual customs department investigation.

That gives it a "behind the scenes peek" feel, but it also draws you into the characters. Patrick is everything you'd want in an investigator: he's smart, patient, persistent, courageous, and quietly handsome. He's integrity personified, yet a pretty crook like Sellars still gets his libido thinking.

Sellars is the second best thing in the movie. She's stunning looking, but in a standoffish manner and clearly immoral. Yet with a devotion to her brother and an honesty to herself about herself, you almost like her.

She manages to be arrogant, yet a bit vulnerable, which is hard for an actress to pull off. Watch how in several scenes with Patrick she draws a line first and then lets him cross it slightly. She's in control, but still exposed. Also, when she's in a scene, she's the one you are watching.

Morgan, too, is excellent as the more immoral sibling who has left honesty so far behind that his only calculation is how to get away with the most money possible. He's a handsome, engaging antihero whom you know will fail, but whom you – once or twice – almost wish wouldn't.

A note has to be made about Joyce Grenfell playing a half-cocked British aristocrat and passionate bird enthusiast who sets everything in motion. Her exchanges with Patrick are so understatedly funny, that you'll almost cheer when she shows back up in the epilogue blithely unchanged.

Director Harold French moves his B&W film swiftly through its sequences, blending crime investigation, romance, and even some James Bond-like action in the South of France. Toward the end, French even tucks in a little bit of noir in the nighttime search for the smuggled drugs.

Directors like Hitchcock say, "look at what I've done;" French in Forbidden Cargo, conversely, doesn't want you to notice his work. You will, however, implicitly notice it in the best way possible: you'll enjoy the picture.

Today, movie stories are insanely complex, layered, usually dour – and they move through images at advanced gamer rates – but that doesn't make them better, just louder, more complex, and more exhausting.

What British filmmakers in the 1950s did is quite impressive. On much smaller budgets than Hollywood A pictures, they told stories well. That's it and that's all that really matters. Tell a story well, and you've made a successful picture; tell it loudly, and all you've made is a loud picture.

Forbidden Cargo is a story well told.

 

[Harp]

The Crusades (1935) featuring Loretta Young, snagged while searching for Sim's A Christmas Carol,
brought back Catholic high school theology class showing reminiscence. Its opening scene of Saracens raiding what seemed a southern Italian village and forcibly stealing local women, however, had been cut. Instead, the opening was moved forward on the film to 12th Century Jerusalem and a toned-downed,
comely female captive slave auction. Suitably disappointed, I resumed searching for Sim's Scrooge.

A definite must see Xmaser, Sim's Carol set standards seldom equaled today, with tight extraordinarily
focused character projection inside a cogent linear production true to written page down to the last comma.
The best literature always offer exceptional cinematography when wed correct disciplined direction.
Toss in a most capable thespian like Alastair Sim as the stick that stirs the drink, and a classic results.

 

[Fading Fast]

Airport (1970)


Airport was a big deal in its day. Based on a massively successful novel by Arthur Hailey and with a cast that almost reads like a roll call of the era's top stars, it launched what became the 1970s disaster genre – a genre that spun off in several directions.

It also sparked a pretty famous spoof, which damaged Airport's reputation for years; fair or not, it made the original movie seem like the **** of a big joke. If they spoof you that successfully, you couldn't really be a good movie - right?

Wrong. Airport is a good movie – a big, giant, sloppy melodramatic mess of a movie – but a good one. It is also a heck of a time capsule not only of the culture, but of the airport and airline industries of that era, when people still made some important seat-of-their-pants calls.

Today, there are policies and procedures, compliance and risk officers, protocols, and lawyers "embedded" in every step. While that had already started creeping in by 1970, an engineer, pilot, or executive back then could still sometimes make an important decision on the fly by intuition.

Relationships, too, were in flux. In the 1950s, you got married, stayed married, or talked in hushed tones (shh!) about your divorce, but now affairs, divorce, and "blended" families were all becoming familiar. And it wasn't just the men stepping out.

All of that and more is on display in a movie that takes place in one snowy night at a busy, fictional Chicago airport. Burt Lancaster plays the man who runs that airport, which is a job no normal person would want as every difficult problem eventually makes its way up to him.

With a blizzard sweeping in and one plane already stuck and blocking the airport's key runway, Lancaster also has to deal with a stowaway, played by Helen Hayes; his wife demanding a divorce; and his mistress, the airline's senior passenger agent, played by Jean Seberg.

He also has the airport's board breathing down his neck as they want to close the airport to prevent any problems during the storm and to appease a political situation related to a noise issue. Oh, and one more thing: there's a bomb on a plane that just took off.

As to the bomb, a dispirited husband and demolitions expert, played by Van Heflin, takes out a large insurance policy with his wife, played by Maureen Stapleton, named the beneficiary before he boards the plane with a bomb in his briefcase. He's hoping the ocean hides all the evidence.

The pilot of the plane, played by Dean Martin, is Lancaster's brother-in-law. He's having an affair with a senior stewardess, played by Jacqueline Bisset. In a sign of the times, Martin's wife knows this but is playing a long-marriage game, hoping to wait out her husband's affairs.

Another very 1970s piece of the puzzle is George Kennedy playing a cigar-chomping maintenance chief, the man Lancaster calls in to get the stuck plane cleared from the runway. Kennedy is no corporate man: he is a gets-things-done-by-the-seat-of-his-pants guy.

In fairness, he's a man who has internalized decades of experience, which has coalesced in his brain into smarts and intuition that Kennedy uses to make decisions without consulting a manual or "the experts." That will matter in the climax.

You'll want to see that climax fresh as a lot happens rapidly and engagingly in Act III. It's easy to mock the movie's story or special effects today, but that's cheap. It's a darn fine action-adventure movie that, if you appreciate its place in motion-picture history, has held up very well.

By the time you get to the climax, you care about the people involved. Lancaster has stuck his neck out to keep the airport open; Martin is helping to pilot the wounded ship home; Bisset is badly injured; and Stapleton is bereft at the death and destruction her husband has caused.

Darn it, though, you also care about the relationships, only some of which are resolved: Martin's has a big curveball sent his way, Lancaster's looks more settled, and little Ms. Helen Hayes might just come out on top of them all.

When Martin has a heart-to-heart with Bisset about their affair, it's just two actors carrying a scene full of cultural meaning for the era. It would never be written that way today because Hollywood only allows one viewpoint on the issue, but that's part of the value of old movies.

Is this all a bit too much melodrama for one night? Of course it is, but that is what a good movie does: it distills a lot of life down into an encompassing but digestible story. Is the dialogue brilliant? No, but overall, it's fun and delivered well by talented actors across the board.

Airport is also a bit quirky stylewise, as it leans into some of its humor without undermining the tension from the crisis. Finally, it is the 1970s on full display, with bright colors, long hair, and big cars framing a true cultural and social pivot caught halfway through its turn.

Seen in the full sweep of cinematic history, Airport endures as a piece of entertainment and as a movie of its moment. For cinema fans, it also has a dream cast of old and (at the time) new Hollywood stars that makes you wonder how big its budget was.

With one Oscar win, five nominations, and a blowout at the box office, Airport made an impression upon release, bent the curve of movies throughout the 1970s, and is still well worth watching today: regardless of what the critics then or now might say.

 

[Harp]

^ Triggered a stewardess memory. While in service, I was on leave traveling to Chicago from Athens,
and the plane stops in Madrid to take on passengers and top off fuel tanks. I'm sitting in a section with
empty seats, look out my window and see a bunch of Lufthansa stewardesses outside waiting to board.
Lufthansa gals are all lookers, so I feel lucky. Two absolute angels sit next to me. With this brunette
babe, I immediately launch me Irish charm no holds barred offensive. A crash and burn. Midway over
the Arctic Circle, I surrendered and read a paperback. Plane lands JFK, I politely say farewell, head downstairs to baggage claim. Grab my bag, turn around, and there SHE is. ''Thomas, would you like to get a drink?''
A tightly scheduled Chicago connection atop her walled off silence. And, admittedly my youthful insouciance
kicked in. I begged off with a quick goodbye. On the plane to Chicago, a dreaded sense that I had made
an extraordinary terrible mistake.

 

[Fading Fast]

The Saint Takes Over (1940) with George Sanders, Wendy Barrie, Jonathan Hale, and Paul Guilfoyle


To appreciate The Saint Takes Over, you have to know that it is a B serial movie: a series of films with the same character(s), often played by the same actors (but not always), with a short runtime, and a small budget. They were modest efforts shown before the A picture came on.

They were also the precursors to the early TV shows where the fun is seeing the same characters and premise in each entry (or episode, when TV began). You don't come for the usually complicated yet repetitive plots; you come because you care about the characters.

In RKO Pictures' Saint series, George Sanders, here and in several entries, portrays the title character. Having originated in the novels by Leslie Charteris – tall, handsome, suave, and a touch haughty – one imagines Sanders was pretty close to Charteris' ideal of the Saint.

One also has to understand what being a hero meant in pre-WWII America. What it didn't mean was being a self-effacing advocate for social justice, which is pretty much our modern definition of a hero. Back then, it was more about individual honor, loyalty to one's friends, and a sense of justice.

The last one hits at the crux of the difference between the eras. Today, a hero fights for the downtrodden; in that earlier era, he could be fighting for a falsely accused millionaire, a framed police chief, or a tough-but-honest businessman being cheated. Justice for all, literally, meant justice for all.

Today, a hero isn't allowed to enjoy being rich for the lifestyle, only for the good it can do for others. But back in that less "enlightened" time, the hero's style – wardrobe, automobile, home, tastes – often reflected an educated man of good breeding who enjoyed the finer things in life.

George Sanders, playing the title character in The Saint Takes Over, is all of those things – plus he likes women. While our modern perfectionists would never see it because he can be condescending, one thread running through these episodes is Sanders likes smart women.

Wendy Barrie plays a smart woman in this one – a woman out for revenge and with no time for Sanders' flirting. Yes, it's 1940 and the man comes off as frivolous and the woman as the one devoted to her task. The past only perfectly fits our modern story if you ignore the actual past.

The, as always, not very important plot has Sanders returning to New York City just in time to help his friend and sometime professional antagonist Jonathan Hale, once again playing a police inspector – but this time dismissed from the force under suspicion of bribery.

Sanders and Hale might oppose each other on a case, but Sanders respects Hale's integrity and never for a minute doubts his innocence. That said, as the two work to clear Hale's name, Sanders has a whale of a time needling Hale every time a clue (all planted) points back to him.

It's that dynamic – friends working together while bickering – that, when done well, is movie or TV gold. It's every cop-buddy movie – think Nick Nolte and Eddie Murphy in 48 Hrs. – and maybe half of every movie or TV show ever made (it's the main dynamic of TV's Friends).

The story covers a lot of ground – Sanders in New York, a $90,000 bribe, a safe robbery, several murders just before Sanders gets there to stop them, a threatened torture scene, cops, car chases, and bull*ts and fists flying – but it's the characters that matter.

Barrie is good as the dedicated avenging angel, but it also takes her somewhat out of the romantic interest box that is always more fun. Hale as the inspector is pitch perfect as, even thrown off the force, he is still a smart cop to his core – and he genuinely likes Sanders.

Tossed into this one is Paul Guilfoyle playing a mob flunky who starts working for Sanders after Sanders gets something on him. Their chemistry is so good you just enjoy watching Guilfoyle trying to keep up with Sanders as Sanders quietly lends him a hand when he falls behind.

Which brings us back to Sanders as the Saint. He plays the man as unflappable: often focused and even rushed, but he's never perturbed. Sharply dressed, he's a man who enjoys life's luxuries, but he is usually the first to connect the obscure clues together to solve the mystery.

He is a wonderful incarnation of the character. When he whistles the Saint's signature tune or passes out one of the Saint's cards with a stick-figure Saint on it, you feel Sanders and the Saint are one.

Charteris would agree that the Saint isn't literature; it's entertainment. With Sanders in the role, The Saint Takes Over is another entertaining entry in the enjoyable B series that saw Sanders play the Saint five times before all legal hell broke loose between RKO and Charteris.

 

[Fading Fast]

Min and Bill (1930) with Marie Dressler, Wallace Beery, Dorothy Jordan, and Marjorie Rambeau


A woman in her sixties, with a well-worn face and the appearance of an unmade bed, shouldn't become an Oscar-winning leading lady in Hollywood, but Marie Dressler did because her portrayal of real-world grit, compassion, and humor resonated with Depression-era audiences.

Hollywood sells youth and beauty because Hollywood sells s*x, but every once in a while it sells something else, as it did with Dressler. With her it sold an everyday hero to a public that needed one amidst great economic struggle.

It also sold an incredibly talented actress, a former vaudevillian, who intuited the nuances of movie acting – there's no overgesturing or other stagey tics from this pro. Dressler understood comic timing and the value of strong expressions. She could still be studied by actors today.

In Min and Bill, Dressler plays the owner of a waterfront hotel and speakeasy in a tough neighborhood needing a tough dame like Dressler to run it. She also raises her not-legally-adopted (after she was abandoned by her birth mother) daughter, played by Dorothy Jordan.

Helping her with everything, including raising Jordan – when he's not drunk or out earning a living on his fishing boat – is her boyfriend, played by one of Dressler's regular acting partners, Wallace Beery. They fight like they are an old married couple who still love each other.

The rub comes when social services want to take a now teenage Jordan away from Dressler because the waterfront environment is no place for a young girl. Social Services is right, but still, no one wants to see Dressler lose Jordan, most of all Jordan.

Dressler, who'll never admit to caring about Jordan despite the love she has for the child being obvious to all – credit again to Dressler, who rightfully won an Oscar for her performance here – places Jordan with a respectable couple and also pays for Jordan's "finishing school."

Dressler wanted to avoid having social services take Jordan, but she also wanted to get Jordan away from her birth mother – a woman Jordan never knew – who is a selfish aging prostitute, played by Marjorie Rambeau, sniffing around for anything she can sc*m from Dressler.

That's the setup that, by Act Three, has Jordan, now a proper young lady, engaged to a wealthy, young society gentleman. Rambeau, though, is the one risk to Jordan's future happiness, which means there's one final showdown coming between Rambeau and Dressler.

This average story is quite engaging because the acting is outstanding. Yes, Dressler is an outsized talent whom you fully believe could run a waterfront "establishment" and sacrifice everything for her surrogate daughter, but she's not alone on the screen.

Beery and Rambeau both deserve credit too. Beery understood that, despite the title (he's Bill to Dressler's Min), his is a supporting role, so he lets Dressler shine, which only makes himself look better. He's a man who loves his bossy girlfriend even if they fight half the time.

Rambeau, as well, makes the most of her time on screen. In her final scene, she shows her true character. Until then, she had been selfish but in a harmless way, yet now she shows us she's a viciously greedy woman willing to smash anyone in her way. It's frighteningly good acting.

Despite all these old pros delivering strong performances, young Dorothy Jordan, as the waterfront rat who convincingly turns society deb, holds her own in every scene with them. It's her handling of her society transition that makes the movie believable.

Jordan never lets her character become a cliché. Her heart and innate character show even when she's a guttersnipe – traits she maintains later when the social and financial wheels turn dramatically in her favor. It's a beautifully nuanced performance from the twenty-four-year-old.

MGM opened up the purse strings on this one, mixing location shooting for genuine waterfront color with elaborate and convincing sets. Min and Bill is a professional effort at every turn.

At the start of the Depression, MGM turned an unlikely battleship of a woman, Marie Dressler, into a box-office draw by leveraging the star's incredible talents to address the country's need for a regular-person hero. That it worked says something good about the country back then.

 

[Trenchfriend]

This evening will be "Les choses de la vie" (1970) on Arte. I curiously never saw it before!

 

[Harp]

This evening will be "Les choses de la vie" (1970) on Arte. I curiously never saw

Ever see Belle de Jour with Catherine Deneuve by director Luis Bunel?
Talk about things of life....