MAKSQUIBS CINEMATHEQUE: ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT (1941)

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It's a bit like seeing Rembrandts & Titians in a book reproduction, or from posters with iffy color values, no texture or weight to the surface and the wrong dimensions . . . all while snacking on chips & soda. (Oops! You get that at your local cinema,too.)
The ease of instant movie gratification risks turning an art form (well, sometimes) into little more than low-grade eye-candy & mindfodder. So, maybe it's worthwhile to write a bit down on what we're all viewing, just to keep fully engaged.

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Monday, May 12, 2008

ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT (1941)

A lumpy mix of Damon Runyonesque comedy and flat-out melodrama (it’s GUYS AND DOLLS meets CONFESSIONS OF A NAZI SPY) adds rather than subtracts interest on this early WWII Warners pic. Humphrey Bogart is "Gloves" Donahue (think Dave the Dude or Sky Masterton), a B’way Big Shot who follows a classy dame (the unmemorable Kaaren Verne) into a den of Fifth Columnists posing as antiques dealers. A remarkable supporting cast all get nice bits to chew on (Conrad Veidt, Judith Anderson, Jackie Gleason, Frank McHugh, Jane Darwell, Wm. Demerest, with extra marks going to Peter Lorre & Phil Silvers), but the comic invention sags badly (the recurring double-talk routines are pathetic) and megger Vincent Sherman is unable to coordinate the action scenes to their full potential.

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A last thought before we go.

Well, enough from me. But before we sign off, here's a great quote from Emile Zola's L'OEUVRE (THE MASTERPIECE), which is about painting rather than the yet to be invented medium of film, but which points a fine critical eye toward the whole idea of art criticism. It's a good, if chilly, thought to keep in mind, especially when you surf the net.

"Has it ever struck you that posterity may not be the fair, impartial judge we like to think it is?

"Suppose the artist's paradise turned out to be as nonexistent as the Catholics, and future generations prove just as misguided as the present one and persisted in liking pretty pretty dabbling better than honest to goodness painting. There are some accepted masterpieces for which I myself wouldn't give a twopenny damn.

"Classical training has given us a wrong view of everything and forces us to acclaim as geniuses a lot of fellows who are no more than well-balanced, facile painters, while what we might really prefer is the work of more emancipated but less even artists known only to an initiated few. Immortality at present depends entirely on the average, middle-class mind and is reserved only for the names that have been most forcibly impressed upon us while we were still unable to defend ourselves...

"Perhaps that's the sort of thing that's best left unsaid. It's certainly the sort of thing that gives me the shudders!"- Emile Zola

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Monday, May 12, 2008

ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT (1941)

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A last thought before we go.

DROP ME A LINE