MAKSQUIBS CINEMATHEQUE: FOUR JILLS AND A JEEP (1944)

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Wednesday, July 1, 2009

FOUR JILLS AND A JEEP (1944)

Wan WWII number about four Hollywood babes (den mother Kay Francis, glamorous Carole Landis, jiving Mitzi Mayfair & comical Martha Raye) who go on an extended USO tour. These four gals really did go overseas on just such a trip, but you’d never guess from the formulaic script that there was the slightest bit of truth to the story. Too bad no one thought of trying to make a movie out of their real adventures. Jimmy Dorsey & the band are along for some nice back-up; Phil Silvers is always welcome (although his big comedy bit is a stinker); Alice Faye, Carmen Miranda & Betty Grable are wedged into the pic via radio broadcast (honest to Pete, we actually spend a couple of reels sitting around listening to Command Performance); but the only performer who got anything out of the pic was debuting crooner Dick Haymes who is some kind of smoothie. He plays Mayfair’s fella and when you see her eccentric leg kicks, you’ll know what the attraction is. Yikes!

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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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Wednesday, July 1, 2009

FOUR JILLS AND A JEEP (1944)

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A last thought before we go.

DROP ME A LINE