EIGHT MEN OUT (1988)

Think the 1919 World Series ‘Black’ Sox scandal is ‘can’t-miss’ film material? Think again. (And it’s not that John Sayles’ well-intentioned work has aged badly, it flopped on release.) Though made with the admirable intention of avoiding standard baseball tropes & clichés as much as possible, Sayles doesn’t come up with good substitutions, so plot & characters are left dangling in the wind. And a touristy quality in period detail has the mostly fresh-faced cast struggling to make you believe they might be wearing circa 1919 itchy wool undergarments. These hardened ball players, horribly mistreated by their ogre-like owner, could pass more easily for Mercury 7 astronauts. And the tricky split focus between players, reporters, gangsters & corporate big-shots, positioned inside a complicated story structure (a three act World Series/then newspaper montage investigation/an abbreviated three act trial/then epilogue) defeats Sayles as stylist. While Sayles-the-didact is unable to find a spot for a lecture on, say, the struggle between labor and capital in early Major League Baseball. The film begs for an epic vision, for the long view, but Sayles settles for relief story-pitching and a line-up of lousy accents that miss the mark on Boston, Chicago & New York.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Sayles is okay as sportswriter Ring Lardner, but iconic Chicago newsman Studs Terkel is a delight & real-deal eccentric as fellow sports-writer Hugh Fullerton.

LINK: Added 10/10/19 – Turns out, almost everything we thought we knew about this scandal is wrong all the way down the line-up! https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/09/opinion/black-sox-scandal-1919.html

I WALK ALONE (1947)

Out of prison after a 14 year prohibition-era rap, Burt Lancaster meets up with ex-partner Kirk Douglas to collect on the 50/50 split they’d promised each other back in the day should just one get caught. But too much has changed in the post-WWII corporate America Lancaster now finds himself lost in for that bargain to hold, the bigtime nightclub Douglas built up no longer run out of a petty cash drawer. Lancaster tries strong-arming his way in, rounding up a depleted gang of thugs to pressure Kirk; Douglas staying one step ahead using nightclub chanteuse Lizabeth Scott to kiss and tell on Burt. Only Lizabeth falls for the lug while a third partner (Wendell Corey) has an ace up his sleeve in a secret set of tell-all accounting books on Kirk’s business interests. Plenty of narrative angles for the usual film noir tropes, but for some reason, producer Hal Wallis gave second-unit/special effects man Byron Haskin the directing reins and Haskin, in his feature debut, seems to be learning on the job. Such lumpy, bumpy work; every edit a visual jolt, and not offering a lot of help on the acting front, either! Wallis seems to know it, too, slathering a loud, overactive musical track to cover all gaffes like meat gravy on a blue-plate special. Only pulling back on the score in the third act when Haskin (or someone . . . vet cinematographer Leo Tover?) suddenly ups his game. Okay, but could have been a lot better.

DOUBLE-BILL: See this done right (and with Kirk Douglas in a very similar role) in Jacques Tourneur’s OUT OF THE PAST/’47, released about a month earlier.

STATE FAIR (1933)

First-rate Americana from director Henry King (Americana his specialty), the best adaptation of Philip Stong’s novel*, showing real connection & deep feeling for terrain & the human comedy/zero condescension to rural folk. Hard to find good DVD or streaming options, but even compromised visuals can’t fail to capture the warmth of Janet Gaynor, Will Rogers, Louise Dresser & Norman Foster’s farming family, off to the annual State ‘do,’ where the young adults will court romance (fleeting or permanent) while the parents enter pickles, ‘spiked’ mincemeat & a world class hog for prizes. (For modern audiences, it's the best introduction to Rogers, who can be a pokey, if richer character in his John Ford films.) And everyone glowing from within under Hal Mohr’s honeyed lensing. Mohr, Mary Pickford’s cinematographer after her split with Charles Rosher, does wonders for Gaynor, making her chance-meeting & romance with that nice young Lew Ayres an enchantment. So’s the whole film.

DOUBLE-BILL: *Stong’s other film adaptation in ‘33, another rural romance from another filmmaking ‘King,’ director King Vidor, his masterful, criminally unheralded THE STRANGER’S RETURN/’33.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Remake #1: Rodgers & Hammerstein's 1943 film musical with pleasing songs and one real classic (‘It Might as Well Be Spring’) gives off an antiseptic Iowa-via-B’way vibe, shiny & TechniColor bright; while a Texas-set 1962 remake of that version misses on every level.

TOKI O KAKERU SHÔJO / THE GIRL WHO LEAPT THROUGH TIME (2006)

Very popular Japanese story with multiple adaptations (Live-Action; Anime; TV) gets what is generally considered its most satisfying treatment in this 2006 anime feature from Mamoru Hosoda . The gimmick (and, alas, it is just a gimmick) has our coming-of-age adolescent high school girl stumbling upon a gurgle in the time continuum allowing her to take a step back on the clock for a redo after some typical teenage accident or social faux pas. Revving up to speed for an out-of-control running leap, she crash lands and finds herself transported back minutes, hours or days, whatever is needed. (These set pieces pure eye candy, with a long run to the rescue late in the pic a real visual tour-de-force.) But the time leaps also feel like a narrative cheat since they make it too easy to fix any problems with an instant redo. (Less GROUNDHOG DAY than golfer's Mulligan.) Most of the story deals with her budding romantic relationships with two ultra-cool guys she meets regularly for baseball practice, a nerdy hunk and a hipster hunk, each a foot & half taller than she, BTW. One of these guys holds the secret to the time-travel, but the story wisely shies away from too much explanation. Maybe if the physical look were less of a disappointment (sharp & bright in the time-shift scenes, but unpleasantly hazy in regular action in school & at home) or if the girl weren’t such a teenage angst-ridden pain-in-the-neck. All told, probably best for YA novel fanciers.

DOUBLE-BILL: Many of the visual, narrative & character ideas touched on here get a far better, far more clever/carefully worked out treatment in YOUR NAME/’06 (see below), a well-deserved blockbuster up for Stateside remake. But try and see the Japanese original.

LEFT HAND OF GOD (1955)

There’s a new man in town. And he’s charming the locals in spite of idiosyncratic ways & a serious lack of expertise in his claimed profession. Truth is, he’s a fake, making it up as he goes along and just getting away with it. But he’s also caught the eye of that pretty single gal while raising suspicions from the town’s leading couple. No secret to us, he’s confessed his plan to a fellow professional even while spreading tidbits of joy to people he meets in town. He’s even got the kids learning a catchy foreign tune by ear. (Cue sentimental reprise of said tune at the finale when the authorities finally catch up to him and send him packing.) Sure sounds like THE MUSIC MAN, no? But we’re not in Iowa anymore. (Heck, we’re not even in Kansas.) Nope, Mainland China, 1949, Catholic Missionary in place of a Marching Band and Humphrey Bogart as a phony priest on the run from Lee J. Cobb’s powerful warlord. (Cobb the only Caucasian masquerading as Asian in here, and thankfully with minimal YellowFace makeup.*) Bogart & Gene Tierney do nicely playing the suppressed passion routine, but Bogie’s less convincing putting off mass week after week, stumbling thru a prayer & a sermon while speaking more Chinese (Mandarin?) than Latin. You’d think someone would notice. Director Edward Dmytryk wisely doesn’t linger long enough for anyone to think this thru (a two-hour story arc compressed to 87 minutes), and he’s much helped by Franz Planer’s handsome lensing. Ultimately, it’s all a bit silly, but pleasant, even fun.

DOUBLE-BILL: Big budget post-WWII Chinese Missionary stories oddly popular at the time. At 20th/Fox alone, splashy CinemaScope productions of LEFT HAND, INN OF THE SIXTH HAPPINESS/’58 and SATAN NEVER SLEEPS/’62.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *See Cobb do full YellowFace duty in ANNA AND THE KING OF SIAM/’46.

A BILL OF DIVORCEMENT (1932)

Clemence Dane’s arthritic play, trimmed & kept on its feet by director George Cukor, is still worth a look for Katharine Hepburn in her all but fully-formed debut & for John Barrymore’s star turn, remarkable right from his glamorously delayed third-reel entrance. At 50, he’s a handsome, shell-shocked WWI vet, just fled from the mental asylum he’s been at the last 15 years. Recovered . . . or about to relapse? Unexpectedly showing at the family manse, he unwittingly upsets all carts, unaware that ex-wife Billie Burke has finalized a divorce and plans to re-marry; meeting newly engaged daughter Hepburn for the first time. Worse, his fragile mental health may have been induced by shell-shock, but it stems from a family history of bad blood & inherited insanity . . . guess who’s likely to get it next. Yikes! Somehow, under Cukor’s smooth handling, they pull off this drawing-room claptrap for an act and a half, but come the third, all devolves into one long slog of selfless martyrdom punctuated by arias of renunciation for each major player. A bit much even when the play was new in the ‘20s. Yet what an entrance for Kate, sweeping down a staircase, looking & sounding like nothing ere seen on film. She hasn’t the range for her big renunciation scene with mild-mannered fiancé David Manners (and wouldn’t till her Mary Tyrone in LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT/’62), but her presence is immediately apparent. And Barrymore is continuously fascinating. Slipping easily between calm naturalism and plunges into quick-spent flurries of barnstorming matinee idol madness. Barrymore finally taking film acting with the seriousness of his stage work. As if working with Greta Garbo in GRAND HOTEL and Hepburn here had him at last seizing on possibilities in the medium. (Or just shamed him into improving his game.) And for the next two years, until his alcoholic breakdown at the end of 1934, putting up a brief, precious master-class in film acting.*

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Four classics in eight films: TOPAZE; DINNER AT EIGHT; COUNSELLOR AT LAW; TWENTIETH CENTURY. (And three of the remaining four not far behind.)

DOUBLE-BILL: A John Farrow remake from 1940, w/ Maureen O’Hara & Adolphe Menjou (not seen here), rarely shows.

(HORROR OF) DRACULA (1958)

Seen in the 2007 British Film Institute restoration (on Warner Archive), Hammer Horror’s take on Bram Stoker, the follow-up to their game-changing CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN/’57, surely reps the company’s high-water mark in the genre. There’s real dread, real suspense in director Terence Fisher’s cinematic vision, utilizing vivid TechniColor now looking sharper & more refined. Just as much effect stems from Jimmy Sangster’s tightened narrative and geography*, along with an emphasis on sex that’s built into the script and buttressed by Christopher Lee’s vampire swagger & blood-sucking hormonal appeal. Dracula’s bites, love-hickeys that penetrate. Mostly busty woman, but he’s equally drawn to Jonathan Harker’s tasty neck at first. And, unlike later Hammer Horror, forward momentum never giving way to spinning wheels as Michael Gough’s skeptical husband & Peter Cushing’s doctor/avenger bring battle-worthy team play against this supernatural beast.

DOUBLE-BILL: Ridiculous & slow as molasses in winter, Universal’s Tod Browning/Bela Lugosi DRACULA/’31 remains memorably odd & essential.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Pity to lose dear, bug-besotted Renfield, but without Dwight Frye to play him . . . ?

HOLY MATRIMONY (1943)

British author Arnold Bennett is probably best-known Stateside for this clever bit of Shavian social/class whimsy about a famous/publicity-shy artist who serendipitously assumes his valet’s identity after the man’s unexpected death . . . then marries the valet’s intended! (The bride mistakenly identifying him from a picture of the two.) All is bliss until an art dealer recognizes the ‘dead’ artist’s style in some brand new ‘posthumous’ pictures and, even worse, when the valet’s abandoned wife & family show up 25 years after last contact. Yikes! Hard to imagine a starless B-pic taking on this sort of sophisticated, delicate comedy and not trouncing it to pieces. Yet the film is something of a minor triumph, with Monty Woolley & Eric Blore getting things off on the right foot as artist & valet, plus an outstanding supporting cast for such a little pic (Franklin Pangborn, Laird Cregar, George Zucco, Una O’Connor, Melville Copper, Alan Mowbray) joining in. As the perfect middle-aged wife, Gracie Fields (a great favorite in Britain) is something of an acquired taste, her down-to-earth act a bit unyielding, but she grows on you. Kudos to scripter Nunnally Johnson for a smart adaptation, director John M. Stahl for finding (and sticking to) just the right tone, and lenser Lucien Ballard for . . . well, for being the great Lucien Ballard! It’s a small, unexpected gem.

DOUBLE-BILL: Two silent versions (one with Lionel Barrymore) are lost/unavailable, and a 1933 version with Roland Young & Lillian Gish is awkwardly handled by legendary theater producer/director Arthur Hopkins in his only try at the movies. Instead, something completely different in a similar whimsical tone: Samuel Fuller’s THE BARON OF ARIZONA/’50 with Vincent Price.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: And speaking of Vincent Price, he starred in a quick flop 1968 B’way musicalization of this (Jules Styne/'Yip' Harburg) called DARLING OF THE DAY against the great Patricia Routledge who won a Tony in spite of its brief one-month run. Watching the film, you’ll spot the problem, Price’s obvious role isn’t the withdrawn artist, but Laird Cregar’s egotistical art dealer.

INTERRUPTED MELODY (1956)

Standard-issue (read mediocre/highly fictionalized) bio-pic of Australian dramatic soprano Marjorie Lawrence whose career was ‘interrupted’ by polio. With Eleanor Parker unable to do the one thing she must: convince us that Eileen Farrell’s thunderous voice is emanating from her throat. Oh, the mouth moves more-or-less in synch with the arias & pop tunes (Farrell unusually comfortable in all genres), but there’s no sense of a body participating in vocal production as she flings her arms out. And there's even less going on physically between Parker and Glenn Ford as the doctor/husband who didn’t want to become Mr. Marjorie Lawrence, then gave it all up to help her recover enough strength to resume her singing career to some extent. (The film has her return to the MET for the five hour TRISTAN AND ISOLDE!) Alas, all the dramatics in this M-G-M production, before and after her health crisis, have aged as poorly as the hazy print out on Warner Archive’s VOD. And director Curtis Bernhardt’s early CinemaScope megging feels nearly as wheelchair-bound as our protagonist. Somehow this tripe won a Best Writing Oscar® for William Ludwig & Sonya Levien. Ho-Yo-To-Ho, indeed!

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: The first half of the film (farm girl/ Paris studies/stage/romance) is so conventional, it’s a relief when polio comes into play and gooses up the drama. How sick is that?

WATCH THIS, NOT THAT: The year’s best musical bio-pic was more ‘Pop’ oriented: LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME with smash perfs from Doris Day & James Cagney (and even stiffer CinemaScope compositions from a becalmed/befuddled Charles Vidor).

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Listen up during a brief excerpt from CARMEN where William Olvis makes a standout partner for Parker on film (and Farrell on the vocal track).  His next gig put him on B’way (and the Original Cast Recording) for all the character tenor roles of Leonard Bernstein’s masterpiece CANDIDE.