"Hot Saturday": Early Cary Grant is Heaven

         

Cary Grant and Nancy Carroll in the film's poster

        In  1932's "Hot Saturday," a rumor rips through a small town and damages an innocent girl's reputation. The film sports a cast of familiar names from pre-code films including Nancy Carroll, Randolph Scott, Jane Darfield and a young Cary Grant looking better than you've probably ever seen him at 28. The movie moves quickly and perhaps a little unevenly through its plot, excelling in some scenes with an easy evocative grace (usually those featuring Grant and Carroll together) and bobbing clumsily through others. 'Saturday' makes up for less refined moments with an ending that stands as a delicious example of the kind of subversion of mores that make Pre-Code films so satisfying to watch.

              The film stars Nancy Carroll as Ruth Brock, a pretty young bank clerk living in a small middle-class town. Romer Sheffield (Cary Grant), a millionaire playboy living on the outskirts of town, plays the field with glamazon socialites, but has his heart set on simple Ruth. There's chemistry between the two, but Romer's reputation makes him a untenable choice for virtuous Ruth.

           In a completely innocent scenario, Ruth hides out at Romer's home one night after a disastrous date with beau Conny (Edward Woods). Conny and one of Ruth's frenemies witness Ruth leaving and waste no time spreading the news. From there, her life begins unraveling very quickly.  The bank fires her and she is relieved from her post at the local woman's club.

            With no one to turn to and the entire town whispering about her, Ruth runs to the arms of Bill Fadden, a hunky geologist and childhood friend who breezes into town one day completely oblivious to the rumors swirling around about his former crush. Made desperate by her current situation, Ruth quickly accepts Bill's proposal of marriage and from then on lives in a perpetual state of anxiety for fear that Bill will find out about the Romer rumor (fun bit of alliteration there). Meanwhile Romer makes his intentions clear to a distressed Ruth: "Would it interest you to know that I've wanted you ever since I saw you in the bank?" The tension of the film rises as Ruth tries to keep Bill uninformed while dodging vindictive friends with cruel intentions and sorting out her feelings for Romer.

       Like the 50s drama "Peyton Place," our movie tells the story of the destructiveness of lies and rumors. However, "Hot Saturday" is not a hard hitting drama bent on social reform. It is a work of camp and melodrama more apt to delight than to edify.  Even scenes featuring the town's injustice towards Ruth carry only a lightweight sort of  wrong compared to the maltreatment of Lana Turner in PP. This is not a disparagement. The movie's blatant 'B movie-ness' is part of its charm.

        The script is mostly mediocre, but moments between Nancy Carroll and Cary Grant are at times worthy of a better movie. Their scenes together follow the usual romantic arc from banter-y pals to wistful lovers towards the end. Carroll gives Ruth an impressive depth and her charm is palpable in this film. Grant secures his place as a future leading male powerhouse with a sincerity in look and speech that provides weight to light words. He even outshines established male lead Randolph Scott whose aw-shucks boy-next-door performance feels underdeveloped.

Grant, Carroll and Edward Woods who played Conny

Spoiler Alert!!

          Besides witnessing Grant's sterling potential as a leading man, the film's denouement is another reason to watch this film. After Bill proves inflexible, our heroine "sullies her good name" by shacking up with Romer and then running off with him to New York in the final act. The idea of marriage is brought up between the two but is not seriously regarded. Instead the real union is between Ruth and the possibilities of a new life without limitations. Though she technically becomes a "fallen woman," instead of regarding this as tragic, the film emphasizes the joy in Ruth discovering that after everything, the real punishment was denying her real feelings for Romer for the sake of morality. Once she lets go of self-judgement, she is able to truly live her life. The solution is not marriage and social inclusion, but venturing into the unknown and believing in one's self. This is a daring message for its time and a testament to film's ability to guide the direction of the social compass. If only Tess of the Durbervilles ended this way....sigh.

Each Dawn I Die

Whatever happened to the prison film? Have I missed them? Are they underground now? And I mean a good one, not that Adam Sandler bullshit "The Longest Yard" or the overdone action thrillers where the prisoners are solid blocks of muscle with manic eyes. I mean a prison movie where we go behind the bars and learn about the individuals that make up this fascinating society. A good prison film, like "The Shawshank Redemption", can teach us about ourselves and give us a deeper gratitude for life. In the 1930s audiences could not get enough of quality prison films that sympathized with the plight of the common man.

"Each Dawn I Die," a film released by Warner Brothers (who else?) in 1939, is a fast-paced, fast-talking film that includes familiar elements of the prison genre and important pieces that defined future film styles. The movie boasts two of the most engaging faces of the era, James Cagney and George Raft, in leading roles as well as a really fine group of lesser known actors from the period. The film entertains from beginning to end with action and engaging word play. Cagney brings his regular Cagney schick (stiff walk, fast talk, deadly accurate punches), but he also shows some raw emotion that raises the movie from a B-picture to a film that earns its place as one of the best genre films released in Hollywood's best year, 1939.

Cagney stars as Frank Ross, a hard-hitting newspaper man who is framed for a drunk driving rap by a corrupt politician. District attorney Hanley and his "equally disgraceful assistant Grayce" view Cagney's investigative journalism as a major threat to their dirty dealings. Pulling strings that you hope are only so effective in movies, the men have Ross tried, sentenced and incarcerated within the first 10 minutes of the film. On the prison bus, Ross meets and quickly engages in rat-a-tat 30s dialogue with George Raft's character, 'Hood' Stacey, a died-in-the-wool gangster sporting the kind of flippant attitude towards crime that really grinds Ross's gears. The two alpha males naturally start out as adversaries, but soon become allies as they face deadlier enemies than each other inside and out of the prison's walls. For Stacey, he becomes the target of a former lackey from his crew, Limpy Julien (Joe Downing) who vows to make Stacey pay for giving him the limp of his namesake. With his case hopelessly tangled in red tape by the evil lawmakers, Ross's enemies are those keeping him in prison to prevent him from spreading the truth. On the outside his newspaper team, his mother and his girl Joyce, (played little know actress Jane Bryan), are pounding the pavement daily to get Ross help.

After a prisoner is murdered, Stacey reasons that if Ross fingers him as the murderer, it would get Ross a pardon and put Stacey in the right position to escape. For George Raft the plan goes off without a hitch, but Cagney isn't so lucky. The warden and nasty guard believe that he helped Stacey to escape, a suspicion that leads Ross to 6 months in the hole. His time there produces a real change in the character who up until that point still believed that justice would be done. "I'll get out if I hafta kill every screw in the joint!" This exclamation marks the beginning of his  literal and figurative descent into darkness. While in the hole, he becomes the most difficult prisoner in the place, and seriously jeopardizes any possibility for parole. Meanwhile, Stacey and Joyce  on the outside devise a plan to help Ross get out. But whether Ross will maintain his sanity by then, remains to be seen. The final moments of the film are of an explosive prison riot that brings the film's angsty Marxist undertones their most startling visual representation.  

The acting here is really superb. As I mentioned before, Cagney's deeper emotional moments are highly gratifying to watch. When he begs the parole board to release him, head hung low in humble dejection, voice cracked with desperation, your hearts breaks at his sincerity. Together, he and Raft are the perfect duo. Cagney's intense and sharp, Raft is aloof but penetrating. 

As great as the chemistry is between Raft and Stacey, scenes that include one or more of the colorful inmates that make up the film's cast are a pleasure to watch. Although some of the characters can be described with just one adjective such as dumb guy or angry guard, the actors are so good that they make the best of the little screen time they share with Cagney or Raft. 

The best of them is played by Stanley Ridges. His character is Mueller, the guy that has gone stir crazy and can't take much more time behind bars. Prison films always have this person, the one who goes off on rants and tangents, but Ridges makes the character his own by delivering some of the best lines in the film. The way he describes prison life is deeply moving: "I'd sooner be dead than livin' in this madhouse. Break your back workin' all day, sit in your cell til next morning with nothing to do but stare at the wall, Screws goin' by snoopin,' rats like Limpy. Next thing you know you're stir nuts. Just bidin' your time until you can kill the next creep that comes your way." He speaks these words in a strained, desperate voice that rises in intensity with each phrase. His words slowly grip you and somehow make you a little more grateful that you can turn the knob of your door and exit your room as you please.

But an appreciation of freedom is not what the film is about. Though Ross becomes a free man by the end of the picture, many of the film's lovable characters meet their end in the deadly prison raid. The way the camera stays trained on the faces of the fallen inmates, and all but dehumanizes the throng of intruding guards makes it clear where our sympathies are directed. The movie makes the point that the system simply isn't fair. The scales of justice are weighted.  "Each Dawn I Die" is really a precursor to Film Noir, that great genre that made pessimism and the inevitability of perpetual disappointment look damn good. Noir did not really become an identifiable style until the mid 1940s, but our film showcases its most classic features. It's scrutinizing look at society and its failings is one of them. As a character from one of my favorite noir films Detour once said "no matter where you turn fate always sticks a foot out to trip ya." Characters like stacey, Ridges and even Limpy Julian come from the wrong side of the tracks and thus can never climb the ladder to success without rigging it first. Movies like this, where the villains are those in power, turn an accusing spotlight on culture and ask "what are you doing to cause this?"   

 

The Children's Hour: A Poignant Film, A Pivotal Moment in Women's History

               "Like, I don't want to be a traitor to my generation and all" (Cher Horowitz anyone?), but the 60s were just better. I'm sorry 2000s, but you're just not daring enough for me. Sure, you'll go there when it comes to portraying sex or violence on screen, but you're not prepared to plumb the emotional depths of stuff that is real. It's not only that the world cared more, said more and did more in the sixties, it's that they were unafraid to investigate with real openness topics that were taboo. One need only look at the innovation and heartrending reality displayed in films like 'Easy Rider' and 'Bonnie and Clyde." These late 60s films were as concerned with sharing a message about the state of affairs in America and openly criticizing the hypocrisy of the status quo as they were with ticket sales and box office.

          Even in the early 60s, a time when America still struggled to free itself from the lingering grasp of 1950s hyper-conservativism, films introduced groundbreaking material in movies that forced a long overdue psychological growth in American audiences. One of those films was the much heralded "The Children's Hour" from 1962. Still a product of the previous generation, this film is all smooth lines, clean language and promotion of conventional mores (in certain respects), but it puts the topic of lesbianism front and center, an extremely controversial subject for its time (and now). This film is beautifully done yes, but the cleanness of its setting, a small girls school in conservative upper-class town, and the beauty of its stars, the incomparable Audrey Hepburn and the always engaging Shirley McClaine, are all there to showcase the ugly destructiveness of bigotry in our lives. That is the overarching message; lesbianism is simply the vehicle with which to bring this intention about.

Before you get all excited that there's a lesbian film with Audrey Hepburn and Shirley McClaine, you should hold your horses. This isn't "Blue is the Warmest Color." They're not lesbians. Their characters are just as glib on the topic as the community in which they live. They are friends, best friends. They've known each other since college and live together as
the co-owners of the Wright-Dobie school, a prominent institution in their small, upper-class community. Neither is married, but Karen, Audrey's character, does have a doctor fiance that is excited to finally walk down the aisle with her at long last. He's played by James Garner who, to be honest, I've never had much to do with, but he looks nice and gives an aghast expression at the right moments so I guess he does well here.

Martha, McClaine's character, is alone, but doesn't seem to be sweating that fact as much as her over-the-hill aunt does. Miriam Hopkins plays Aunt Mortar, the school's drama coach and resident ding-bat. She's adequate as a Norma Desmond drama queen with shades of Annie's Miss Hannigan. One expects a moth to fly out of her flea-bitten fox stole any minute. Everyone is happy with their situation until an ugly (I'm sorry, but this little actress is very ugly) little girl spreads a rumor about Ms. Dobie and Ms. Wright that threatens not only the women's livelihood, but also the sanctity of their very lives. The rumor spreads quickly (some might say unrealistically so) through the town and causes undue destruction to their reputations. The women fight against this happening in court and in their personal lives, the resulting impact brings the women and the entire town to an unexpected place.

The film is a remake of an earlier film adaption of a famed stage play by the indomitable Lillian Hellman. The play, written and performed in the twenties, dealt even more openly with the subject of lesbianism than does this film which isn't surprising. Though the restlessness of the 60s demanded new ideas be presented to the public in media, the anxiousness of the 50s prevented this film from addressing it in a straightforward way. 

William Wyler, the director of this and the 1930s film version
, chooses to soften the controversy of its subject  by casting flawless actresses and shooting the film as a classic high-level drama. Emotions run high, but hairs do not come out of place. Her mind may be disturbed, but there is never a wrinkle on Audrey's gown. And of course the word 'lesbian' is never uttered. Whenever its left to the actors to describe the alleged activity between Ms. Dobie and Ms. Wright, euphemisms so innocuous are used that at times it feels like parents explaining sex to an 11-year-old. The only time that what they are accused of is spelled out is when, tired of the diverting language, Garner's character forces Karen to tell him what everyone is so upset over. She looks up at him, doe eyes wide with almost child-like amazement, and says "They think that Martha and I are lovers." This line provides the characters as well as the audience with a much needed release. Wyler designed it so that all of the tension gathers from the moment the little girl speaks to her grandmother, until now. The tension builds again from this moment until the most lauded scene of the movie when Martha confesses.

In the climax, Martha confesses to Karen in a long, breathless stammering soliloquy that is at once heart breaking and cathartic. "I have loved you the way they said!" These words leave her with a rush of energy like that of water bursting from a fireman's hose. Deep, heartfelt and violently honest, In this scene she embodies the tortuous responsibility we all have to admit to ourselves the terrible truth of who we are.

Besides Barbara Stanwyck, there is no actress that I adore more than Audrey Hepburn. Her many graces, talents and virtues have been discussed at length for decades so I won't extol them here. She impresses me in this film not only with the stoic gravity of her performance, but with her ability to consciously take a step back and give McClaine the center of attention. Recognizing that the demands as an actress for Shirley are far greater than what is asked of her, she gives McClaine the room that she needs to climb to the emotional heights required of her role.

The venerable Fay Bainter plays the little girl's grandmother, the one who initially believes the rumor and spreads it through town. Old, stodgy and feigning virtues that she doesn't really have, The grandmother represents American society of the time. Sheltered by a lack of curiosity and a culturally cultivated fear of difference, she describes the two as "unnatural" and dramatically treats them as outcasts under the guise of protecting the young. Once events come to pass, she shows her humility by admitting that she was wrong. This is how America would like to think it would be; Understanding and apologetic.

But Wyler does not let her get away with her ignorance. The final scene, with Karen walking away from the town and even her fiance is a telling moment in cinema history. In the past there would be only one of two ways for this story to end for Audrey's character: death or assimilation. Karen would have to either trip and fall dead or marry James Garner and get over it. Walking away from the town, alone and strong,visually legitimized a whole new choice for women in film and in society. It's not as though this is the first time this has happened in film (The Third Man shows a similar ending), but arguably it is the first time in American cinema that such an iconic actress is used to make such a subversive point. I don't have to accept the way things are, she seems to say, I can go it alone and create a new reality. And that's what women did during the 60s and the 70s. Created new paths by refusing to accept the old ones.

In January of 2011 a theater revival of The Children's Hour staring Keira Knightley and Elizabeth Moss came on the Comedy Theater of London to excellent reviews. It's a testament to the far reaching impact of this story that artists are still choosing to tell it. This film no doubt holds back much more than this modern interpretation does, but  in either respect the message is clear: love is a dynamite, but hatred is the flame that lights it
.

The Bad Seed: Rhoda is the Blonde BADShell!!

Why do killers kill? If that's the topic of any day time talk show, you better believe that we are all tuning in! Well if you want a crash course from a cinematic source, check out 1956's "The Bad Seed."This black and white horror/suspense film makes heavy use of Freudian psychosis theory to explain the exploits of a murderous little 8-year-old girl. Not quite Hitchcockian, but still highly watchable and unique, the film delivers a fun, engaging study into the beginnings of a serial killer!

Rhoda, the bad seed of the title, appears as a sweet, pretty and exceedingly feminine young lady who has practically everyone in the small duplex she lives in with her mother at her feet. The mother, Christine, is the perfect 1950s housewife, full with beauty, civility and a moneyed background. The trouble starts when Rhoda loses a penmanship award at school.  A few days later, after a school picnic, a boy in Rhoda's class is found dead in the water next to the lake that the students played beside. It was considered an accident, but an accident doesn't explain the bruises around the boy's face, neck and fingers.

Rhoda, looking crazy evil

It also doesn't explain the absence of the penmanship pen that was seen on the boy's person before the picnic. Once Christine is questioned about Rhoda's connection to the boy's death she begins looking at her darling daughter in an entirely different light.  Christine's father  introduces another piece of information that calls Christine's own origins into question and sends her spiraling into full-blown paranoia and panic. The methods that Christine resorts to to suppress  the homicidal urges of her offspring leads the film down a far darker path than expected and leads to a surprising outcome.

Movies about killer kids are always fun, but this was the original film that set the niche genre off right. Watching Rhoda carry out her devious plans with school girl glee is a guilty pleasure that just won't quit. The film is hardly feminist, but women do occupy the most interesting roles. Eileen Heckart was nominated for an Oscar for her performance as Hortense Daigle, the dead boy's drunken hysterical mother.

Eileen Heckart. TOASTED

 Her every slurring, boozing appearance in the film rightfully demands our utmost attention as she delivers a performance drenched in convincing sentiment and stinking only a little in melancholic melodrama. While Heckart's acting reaches the broad dimensions re
quired of her role, other actors color far outside the lines, creating caricatures where portraits should be.

 The greatest offender would have to be Harry Jones in the role of Leroy, the house's handy man. Lusty, deceitful and lazy, Leroy is a disturbing combination of Lenny from 'Of Mice and Men' and the racist crows from "Dumbo." Jones chooses to play him with an overabundance of slack-jawed charm that pulls his portrayal to cartoonish proportions. The bizarre choice to have Leroy speak to himself as though he's speaking to the audience, no doubt an unfortunate left-over from the play on which the film is based, makes him seem all the more ludicrous and out of plan in this streamlined, high caliber film.


Nancy Kelly as Christine

Patty McCormick as little Rhoda, was also nominated that year and rightfully so. Her understanding of the nuances required of her character was scary for an actress that young (she was nine at the time of filming). Her performance is the earliest example of the actress's natural talent and gift for role immersion. I'd say that actress Nancy Kelly also delivers a spot on performance if it were not for the screechy quality her voice takes on as the film climbs towards its climax. Seeming to equate showing terror with raising your voice to an even higher pitch, Christine seems to be communicating with owls by the end of the picture.

 Director Mervyn Leroy clearly wanted a sophisticated tone for his thriller and he succeeded in creating this with a slow dramatic pace. You'll see none of that drive-in movie gore here. Indeed of the 3 murders that occur within the film, only one of them happen in real time. The other two are described and talked about. The one that does appear on screen is not fully seen by the audience. We only have screams, some high intensity music and a few shots of running to build an image. The lack of graphic is the one choice of Mervyn Leroy's that I don't like. The movie was adapted from a play where I'm sure much of the action happened off stage. When transferring to a visual medium, it makes sense to use, well, visuals. I understand how withholding sight can sometimes be more terrifying, but the film is interested in being too refined and holds back too much to make it a legitimate horror entry. Psychological thriller maybe.

The film itself, excepting a few acting flaws, is a solid Academy quality film, but the 'horror' element seems to have eluded Leroy a little bit. Still, the direction provides a solid base on which to pile the film's many captivating moments and at time comedic miscalculations.

"Red-Headed Woman": The Best Pre-Code Hollywood Film

I don't own this picture

It is no wonder that there are so many drag queens who pay homage to Jean Harlow. Her innocent face and baby doll looks were a complete contradiction to her assertive personality, acerbic wit and unapologetically sexual image on screen. With all her physical assets its a testament to her style, confidence and perfect delivery that its what comes out of her mouth that delights us most in her films. 

As most of you probably know, by Pre

-Code I am referring to the Hays Production Code put into practice in the early 1920s that was meant to enforce censorship in the movies. 'Meant' is the operant word. Trust me, whoever edited many early Hollywood films was not concerned about censors. Sex, alcohol, sex, crime, sex, murder and sex were the main subjects of the best of these films, many of which showcased the incredible ballsy talent of film's first screen-goddesses. Harlow was a little more, shall I say, earthy, than your Shearers or your Crawfords, but that's exactly what audiences loved about her. At age 23 she was the biggest box office draw during the Depression; diverting attention away from long bread lines with her low cut tops and no-holds-barred humor. "Red-Headed Woman" displays the best of the distinctly Harlow approach and has been regarded as a definitively feminist film throughout the years. 

I don't own this pic.

As the pretty Lil Andrews, Harlow plays her best known character in RHW: a girl born on the wrong side of the tracks who dreams (well schemes) of a better life. She uses her body and persistent wiles to get men to do whatever she asks. Early in the film she decides the best way to get out of her shared apartment and into a penthouse is to seduce her married boss, the venerable Bill Legendre. Bill's conscious puts up a brave fight at first but eventually goes down in the second round with Red's beauty and brazen desire winning out. But Lil isn't the kind of girl to be content with only minor fortune. She finds another man with even more money, seduces and gets engaged to him too! This turns out to be her downfall as Bill finds out about the affair and uses it to get her out of his life once and for all. This is one dame who won't go down without a fight though. Watch and see. 

Harlow's an actress who's played good girls more often then bad in her career, but she knocked it out of the park when her characters were more devious. It's like that Mae West quote: "When I'm good, I'm very good, but when I'm bad, I'm better."You'd think we'd be unable to sympathize with her, but it's quite the opposite. Because it's Harlow we can watch her do things like show up drunk to her lover's apartment while he's home with his wife and end up rooting for her anyway. That's the tantalizing surprise of the film and really the beauty of Pre-code Hollywood in general: it's the dark side of people that we're interested in. Not the same-old chaste heroines, but the seedy ones who aren't afraid to show that they're seedy. Even today such women are not allowed to frolic around without meeting some terrible end or having some predictable change of heart. That's why its a shame that the Hays Code did come to be enforced later in the same decade.  Misfits, Criminals, and Societal Outcasts lost their voice once movies were cleaned up and made fit for "upholding the morality of american society." Thank God we have these movies to look back on so we can see what the movies were originally meant to do: show different lifestyles so that we know its okay to be different.

I don't own this pic
Una Merkel plays Harlows second banana best friend in the film

 Anita Loos, the screenwriter gives Lil a sharp tongue and a propensity for prime comebacks. Loos is also the writer of the 1939 version of "The Women" which is a great film that is very similar in plot and structure to "Red-Headed Woman." The major difference is that it's entirely sympathetic to the wife, Norma Shearer, and quite disparaging to the mistress, played in that film by Joan Crawford. I will say that though the emotional depth of "The Women" is much more compelling, Red-Headed Woman, and all its myriad shocking moments, is much more fun to watch. Harlow never needed a sparing partner; she knocked us all out all by herself. 

Movie Blog: I wouldn't do this if I didn't have to...

           

           If I could make my life about movies, I would. But I will be satisfied with the time being with this blog. I have made several before, but have had no luck with them. I tend to be verbose and that verbosity is tedious for readers and exhausting for myself. I will try to steer clear of this as much as I can (it is a challenge). I have a lot of unusually passionate emotions about this stuff and that energy has to go somewhere. I really love classic films so I will make entries based on my favorite. I will have a modern film every now and then, but you can get reviews for those anywhere (literally). 

I wouldn't do this if I didn't have to do it. Writing is hard and it takes up time. I have to because there are some movies that you have seen that I just have to talk to you about. And there are some movies that you haven't seen that I just have to get you to. That's it.