SHINING VICTORY (1941)

Taken from JUPITER LAUGHS, a B’way flop* Warners produced on B’way, presumably retitled SHINING VICTORY to echo DARK VICTORY, a big 1939 hit, this medico-drama about brilliant, caustic research doc Henry Stephenson and his humanizing doctor assistant (Geraldine Fitzgerald) seems made entirely from borrowed pieces. Mostly REBECCA/’40, from its fiery end to a chilly man-of-the-world with a secret, even a ripoff of the Miss Danvers character. The story is largely driven by experiments to find a chemical cure for dementia at a Scottish sanatorium (which happens to look much like REBECCA’s Manderley), but the real purpose of the film was to raise the profile of stolid Henry Stephenson from prestige supporting player to leading man in the Walter Pidgeon mold.* It didn’t come off for a number of reasons: First, Irving Rapper, in his directing debut, has trouble animating a film that doesn’t step outdoors for a full hour; Second, the doctor’s intimidating character, meant to be an obsessive, is mostly a pain, and doesn’t add up when he suddenly melts into Mr. Nice Guy; and Third, because Stephenson died of a heart attack a month after this opened. Only 52.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *On B’way, it starred Alexander Knox who also didn’t break thru after splashy leads in Hollywood; and Jessica Tandy, in supporting roles until finally hitting stardom on film as a senior citizen.

DOUBLE-BILL: *Pidgeon had an outstanding 1941 with MAN HUNT for Fritz Lang; BLOSSOMS IN THE DUST with regular co-star Greer Garson; and John Ford’s HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY.

THE SHOW (1927)

Released a few months before his better-known THE UNKNOWN (a supreme piece of absurd, ironic dismemberment horror), this fine Tod Browning silent has been overlooked. Big mistake! The high batting average for Late Silents holds on this grisly little tale, with John Gilbert, freed from his Great Lover roles, transformed into a despicable/irresistible barker for a carny show of fake freaks (Torso Woman; Underwater Woman; Spider Woman). He also gets in the act himself as John the Baptist, with a trick beheading to follow Salome’s dance. That’d be Renée Adorée, Gilbert’s BIG PARADE co-star, dancing on-stage as Salome, and pining away for Gilbert off-stage. He hardly notices, too busy wooing any young thing with cash to boost. But show owner Lionel Barrymore notices, and is jealous enough to try substituting a real sword in the beheading spectacle. And that’s after he’s robbed and murdered a sheep herder, the father of Gilbert’s latest inamorata! Gilbert, who looks good for the crime, hides in Adorée’s attic where he learns . . . well, too much to give away. This plotty nonsense is stunningly well executed, with masterly painted backdrops of cityscapes giving a touch of Grimm Fairy Tale atmosphere, and director Browning exceptionally lively, adventurous in pacing & clever angles. But the real revelation is Gilbert, reveling in his reformed bad guy role, swaggering away like some louche Liliom (Billy Bigelow in the musical CAROUSEL). Here, a modern audience can clearly see what all the fuss was about in his meteoric career. Beautiful print, too, and a fine new score for chamber orchestra by Darrell Raby. Great for Silent Cinema newbies who’ve yet to move beyond the great comedians.

DOUBLE-BILL: As mentioned above, THE UNKNOWN/’27. OR: His career going downhill fast, Gilbert pleaded for a chance to play another cad, this one unreformed, in DOWNSTAIRS/’32.

SO EVIL MY LOVE (1948)

When missionary widow Ann Todd fell for handsome con man Ray Milland on the ship home from Jamaica, she never expected to find herself involved in art theft, blackmail, murder and miscarriage of justice. And that’s only the half of it, dearie. Suggested (really?) by some turn-of-the-last century events in London, the film has something of the spirit of GASLIGHT to it as Milland romances Todd into moral quicksand even as he's two-timing her with a tart, all while pushing her to renew an old friendship with neurotic Geraldine Fitzgerald, now rich & fleece-able, unhappily married to a control freak husband. Smart & sadistic, the husband may be on to them, but he also may not last the night due to a heart condition. Maybe his death could be helped along. That still leaves private investigator Leo G. Carroll stalking about. But what can he prove? After a straightforward first act, multi-tangents all start playing out at once in narrative counterpoint, and the script is soon in over its head. Easy to imagine how this U.K.-based production, made thru the Hal Wallis Unit @ Paramount, could have benefitted with closer Hollywood supervision. Legendary producer Wallis, normally a stickler in script construction, here letting the ball drop just a bit. Or perhaps there’s just too much plot for the running time. Lewis Allen’s stock megging is fine as far as it goes, but so much more could have been done in atmosphere & suspense. But very strongly cast in its Hollywood leads (all with U.K. backgrounds) and in London supporting players, even if Ann Todd always comes across as Joan Fontaine’s understudy.

DOUBLE-BILL: You can see what’s missing here by comparing the British version of GASLIGHT (retitled ANGEL STREET/’40) with the superior Hollywood remake of 1944. (M-G-M suppressed the earlier film which has led many critics to let its underdog status cloud their judgement of the two films.)

CANDIDE (1991)

Celebrating the Leonard Bernstein Centennial. For the latest re-release of this composer conducted version of Bernstein’s brilliant, if flawed masterpiece, Deutsche-Grammophon have brought together the 1989 studio recording and the live concert event that preceded it (2 CDs/1 DVD). Even with an outbreak of the flu, the concert version is the better bet in all but sound balance, with the grandiosity Bernstein brought to just about everything in his final years, partially tamed by the excitement of working in front of an audience. Some things still move at near practice tempo, but there’s far more momentum. And while it has the operatic inflation of Lenny’s infamous (and bizarrely miscast) studio recording of WEST SIDE STORY, this cast is pretty wonderful (with subtitles to clear up diction from the chorus and high flying sopranos). Also, the operetta style of the piece has less trouble handling the Bernstein bloat. Normally sparing with tunes, Bernstein’s a positive spendthrift here, inspired by Voltaire’s wild ride thru a series of picaresque disasters, as characters die & pop back to life in exciting adventures & fresh lands as naive Candide learns life’s painful lessons and finally matures. His musical response miraculous. (Even better than his WONDERFUL TOWN, which takes some doing.) And what a thrilling climax at the end when the orchestra drops out for a choral peroration in ‘Make Our Garden Grow.’ Jerry Hadley is a nonpareil Candide (looks just right, too), while vet singers Christa Ludwig & Nicolai Gedda (a man with perfect diction in six languages) grab every laugh. Book troubles have been the bane of this remarkable show since Lillian Hellman wrote the original problematic script (Richard Wilbur, with the lion’s share of lyrics, had no such problems). But this concert version, from a rewrite by Hugh Wheeler, works pretty well. But the score’s the thing. Best served in the Original Cast Recording of 1956, abridged, of course, but still sounding well. And definitely not at practice tempo!

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Lenny’s rep as composer is far stronger now than it was during his lifetime. Perhaps the lack of critical respect partially explains some of his more ponderous tempos. Serious tempos for a composer who wanted his work to be taken seriously.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: If only Steven Spielberg & (especially radical/intellectual/over-thinking playwright) Tony Kusher had dared to take on Lenny’s CANDIDE (dying for a proper film treatment) rather than going for the easy win with their announced WEST SIDE STORY remake.

STAGE MOTHER (1933)

This second-tier feature from M-G-M is a real find. A sort of proto-GYPSY*, it moves in dramatic shorthand following hard-luck vaudeville artiste Alice Brady (in a blistering perf) as she goes thru a couple of husbands and dozens of cons & cutthroat measures to push talented daughter Maureen O’Sullivan into the big stage success she missed out on. Some of the shared elements with GYPSY/’62 are quite striking, but this film, strongly paced by fading director Charles Brabin, has backstage verisimilitude you can almost smell, and a thrilling, vicious dog-eat-dog theatricality that went missing in Mervyn LeRoy’s embalmed version of the great musical. Highlights include a wild Kiddie Cattle Call audition with scores of would-be child vaudevillians (look for ‘Little Rascal’ Carl ‘Alfalfa’ Switzer and surely that’s an uncredited ‘Baby’ Rose Marie right before O'Sullivan's dance), and some stage-worthy production numbers for O’Sullivan (and her dance double). The last act is fearsomely overstuffed: three sabotaged romances (NYC politician; Boston Brahmin Franchot Tone; Phillips Holmes with a bad British accent); and a final Mother/Daughter showdown that really is right out GYPSY’s last act (did GYPSY librettist Arthur Laurents know this film?) before a hurried wrap-up. Dramatically, it’s plenty rough & tumble, and Brady’s magnificent perf (more Marie Dressler than ‘Method’) will shock modern realists, but this film is the rough-edged real deal in too many ways to miss, bumps and all.

DOUBLE-BILL/ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *GYPSY, the great Jules Styne/Stephen Sondheim/Arthur Laurents/Jerome Robbins/Ethel Merman musical about Mama Rose & daughter Gypsy Rose Lee triumphed five times on B’way and made one mediocre film. Long touted for remake, Barbra Streisand is planning on going into production when she turns 80. And with Lady Gaga, a dazzling age-appropriate choice for Mama Rose, as Gypsy.

THE SECRET PARTNER (1961)

Innocent-man-on-the-run pic . . with a twist you’ll see coming a mile away. But not bad, with a neat turn from Bernard Lee (007's original ‘M’) as a wily, chain-smoking detective closing in on the case. It also provides the rare chance to catch glamorous Haya Harareet in something other than BEN-HUR/’59. She’s the estranged wife of Stewart Granger, a cargo shipping exec who’s already being blackmailed by his dentist, now forced to prove that a robbery at his firm is an elaborate frame-up. With production values and tension wanting, the film needs a lot more plot & personality than it gets. But scripters David Pursall & Jack Seddon think their one big twist is enough. (And a painfully intrusive jazz-inflected score by Philip Green also doesn’t help. Green does far better for Dearden in ALL NIGHT LONG/'62, a modernized OTHELLO set amid the London jazz scene.) Dearden makes an efficient job of it, but try SAPPHIRE/’59 to see him really work a police procedural.

DOUBLE-BILL: Though best known for KHARTOUM/’66 (a very uneven pic), Dearden’s SAPPHIRE, with its intriguing race angle and excellent location work, may be his best film.

PLEASE BELIEVE ME (1950)

After an influential run of poetic/ atmospheric low-budget horror pics (CAT PEOPLE/’42 to BEDLAM/’46), producer Val Lewton never quite returned to form after ankling R.K.O. (Though his last, Hugo Fregonese’s APACHE DRUMS/51, is visually alive, an impressive, downbeat Western.) Not that he could have done much with this modest programmer, a 3 GUYS/1 GAL rom-com, pleasant enough, even cute, and not nearly as stupid as you expect. It stars Deborah Kerr, four years & four pics into her M-G-M contract, still unsure what to do with her. She was just too good at anything they tossed her way. (At least it’s not QUO VADIS?/’51!) Here, she's a penniless Brit who’s just inherited a Texas cattle ranch. Why she must be worth millions! Or so she imagines. So too, three handsome, eligible bachelors on the same ocean liner: wealthy Peter Lawford; suspicious lawyer Mark Stevens; con man Robert Walker; a trio of preening roosters against one choosy hen. In sketch-like scenes played in airless interiors & breezeless ship decks, Lewton seemingly gives in to the studio’s complete lack of atmosphere. Surely the budget could have stretched for a fan or two. And there’s no more style after we reach New York, though at least the romantic roundelay gets neatly worked out without much comic flop sweat. Director Norman Taurog hardly scintillates (for ocean liner romance it’s no LADY EVE; for a sharply defined male trio try TOM DICK AND HARRY, both 1941), but at least he doesn’t push.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: A pool-side moment on board has a neat example of changing tastes in body image. Watch Peter Lawford pop up from the water and give a body-builder pose. Frankly, he looks great, lean, toned & manly. But he’s greeted with derisive laughs, too skinny to pull it off. Today, he’d be trending on the internet and Kerr shamed for not being a Size 2.

DOUBLE-BILL: As mentioned above, everyone knows EVE, but give TOM DICK AND HARRY a look for peak Ginger Rogers.

CONTEST: One of the Unwritten Rules of Billing Etiquette is broken on this film. Hint: it involves the ending. Name the broken rule (Bonus Bragging Rights if you know the reason behind it) to win a MAKQUIBS DVD Write-Up of your choosing.

TÔKYÔ BOSHOKU / TOKYO TWILIGHT (1957)

Though it opens in classic Yasujirô Ozu style: Slightly detached middle-aged single father; Younger daughter in need of a husband; Older daughter in need of a better husband; this film rapidly descends into ever darker corners of family melodrama. Baldly stated, Ozu’s plot elements might well have shown up in a late ‘50s/TechniColored Hollywood tear-jerker: unwed pregnancy; the reappearance of a mother after twenty years; excessive drinking & gambling (sake in place of Scotch/Mah Jongg instead of poker); hunting up cash for an abortion; disrespectful youth; suicide; deathbed contrition. (Douglas Sirk or Mark Robson could have done it up Hollywood style.) But in spite of all the heightened action, this is still very much a Yasujirô Ozu film, with his subtle restraint in all departments, played out in his signature style of unforced inevitability. Fascinating, heartbreaking, utterly his own. Ozu films change like the proverbial river once you put a foot in. But here, it’s Big Foot, and with a proportionate change in the current’s flow.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Criterion has apparently leased their LATE OZU Series from Shôchiku Japan Home Video unit. The color films have all come up well, but some of the b&w titles, though in very clean prints, seem to have been processed with a compressed grey scale, slightly dulling Ozu’s impeccable compositions.

THE GREAT MEADOW (1931)

Poorly received at the time, M-G-M’s attempt to add Talkie technology to the frontier spirit that made James Cruze’s THE COVERED WAGON/’23 one of the great hits of its day, now looks like a considerable achievement in historic Americana. But an extended production schedule meant that by the time the film came out, it was already looking somewhat dated in technique & acting style. Dialogue is on the declamatory side and sometimes wide master shots play out in a stage-bound proscenium manner. But director Charles Brabin also gets loads of period color and detail following a party of settlers, in the late 1770s, who brave an eight-month journey from comfortable Virginia to wild Kentucky thru brutal terrain & hellish weather to reach a promised valley, an Eden of a Great Meadow. (Stunning location cinematography, presumably Clyde De Vinna's, with William Daniels back at the studio.) They’re led by newlyweds Johnny Mack Brown & Eleanor Boardman who meet all trials head-on. And such trials! Indians; disease; food shortages; birth pains; blizzards; desertion; loved ones gone missing on missions . . . the works. At only 75 minutes, it sounds overstuffed. But the stiff acting actually works in the film’s favor, undercutting the melodrama, and Brabin scores by really putting everyone thru their paces on what looks like a very rough journey. He has a penchant for low traveling shots, from the waist down. (Boardman, married to director King Vidor, must have been full of wild tales when she got back from the grueling location shoots. No wonder she retired from acting later that year.) Plenty creaky in places, but often filled with a sense of fresh beauty and wonder as well as having a rare feel for the sheer labor hidden behind personal heartaches.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Johnny Mack Brown was then in free-fall @ M-G-M. King Vidor’s big 70mm BILLY THE KID/’30 had just underperformed; a Joan Crawford musical (GREAT DAY) had the plug pulled; then this disappointment followed by another Crawford mishap as he found himself replaced by Clark Gable when COMPLETE SURRENDER was reshot/retitled as LAUGHING SINNERS/’31. Finally, his third-billed role in the very successful THE SECRET 6 (also ‘31) got shoved to the side with a seventh-billed Clark Gable effectively taking over the hero’s spot while the cameras turned! After that, minor studios and B-Westerns for JMB.