BLONDIE
JOHNSON (1933) and BACK IN CIRCULATION (1937)
Though she never became a major star, few
actresses exemplify the 1930s as perfectly as the exuberant Joan Blondell. For Depression
era moviegoers, she was ubiquitous, appearing in 55 pictures that decade,
typically in support of James Cagney and Dick Powell but also as a headliner in
crime and romance programmers.
Whether she was top of the bill or a
supporting player, Blondell brought the same kind of off-handed sarcasm and
unstoppable energy as the Warner Bros. male stars.
Not only is the film an entertaining story of rags to riches but it offers sharp commentary on the suffering during the Great Depression and can be viewed as an early tale of female empowerment. It’s probably Blondell’s most charismatic performance.
A few dozen films later, Blondell is an ethically
challenged newspaper reporter “Timmy” Blake (short for Timothea) in “Back in
Circulation,” one of many “Front Page” clones Hollywood cranked out in the 1930s
and early ‘40s.
A tip that a wealthy businessman might
not have died of natural causes, sends “Timmy” to the funeral, demanding—as
only reporters in movies could do—that the ceremonies be stopped and an autopsy
performed. The feisty girl reporter is soon demanding interviews with the young
widow (Margaret Lindsay, the wife in “Jezebel”) and the attending physician
(John Litel), while her demanding editor (Pat O’Brien, this time taking the
Walter Burns role)
In an era where reporters were encouraged
to do what it takes to get the scoop, “Timmy” and others at the Morning Express
impersonate doctors to get past police barricade, hold a witness at gunpoint,
break into the dead man’s home and knock out a witness (“Timmy” delivers the
punch).
The
snappy dialogue (Adela Rogers St. Johns, one of the most famous journalists of
the 1930s, was among the screenwriters) and the non-stop bickering between
editor and reporter make the film seem like a bridge between the original
“Front Page” and Howard Hawks’ version “His Girl Friday.”
Ray Enright, who had been directing
second-features for Warner Bros. since the late 1920s, was behind the camera
for both of these. The sure-handed pro keeps the action moving while giving
time for supporting players to shine; Allen Jenkins, Claire Dodd, Toshia Mori
and Holloway in “Blondie Johnson” and Regis Toomey, George E. Stone and Spencer
Charters in “Back in Circulation.”
Blondell’s torrid pace during the
1930s—including six with Cagney and 10 with Powell—slowed in the 1940s, but she
gave three high-profile performances during the decade: as a hospital volunteer
in the war film “Cry ‘Havoc’” (1943), repeating her stage role as Aunt Sissy in
“A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” (1945) and as the spurned clairvoyant in “Nightmare
Alley” (1947). She scored an Oscar nomination near the end of her film career
for her role in the Jane Wyman weeper, “The Blue Veil” (1951)
From the 1950s through the ‘70s, she made
appearances on dozens of TV series, occasionally working in features, memorably
in “The Cincinnati Kid” (1963), “Support Your Local Gunfighter” (1971) and
“Grease” (1978).
The actress, whose career began in
vaudeville at age three in support of her parents, died in 1979, working right
to the end.
DUMB
MONEY (2023)
The Reddit-Robinhood-GameStop stock market
phenomenon of 2021, more than any recent event, played out like a script from
one of Frank Capra’s “common man vs. the powers that be” pictures. Yet this
film, despite its efforts to paint the retail investors as working-class heroes
and the Wall Street hedge fund bosses as arrogant blowhards, is an unpleasant
experience featuring characters that never inspire cheering.
Paul Dano captures the nerdy, headband wearing Keith Gill,
whose postings on the social media website Reddit inspired nonprofessional stock
market dabblers to put money in GameStop stock even though the video game store
was thought to be on the brink of bankruptcy. As the number of Gill’s followers
investing in GameStop multiplies, the stock price skyrockets, making them rich
overnight and creating financial disaster for the hedge fund firms that bet the
stock would sink.
While the movie, directed by Craig
Gillespie (“I, Tonya” and “Lars and the Real Girl,” both first-rate films),
makes its case about how easily the market can be manipulated, it’s hard to
root for those portrayed as investing money they couldn’t afford to lose. It
also doesn’t help that the Reddit community is portrayed as filled with profane
and sexist commentary, accepted matter-of-factly. In addition, everyone in the
film swears like they’re a character in a popular streaming series. (I’m
convinced that the proliferation of profanity in settings once considered
family friendly stems from the constant swearing in TV scripts.)
Seth Rogen, Vincent D’Onofrio and Nick
Offerman are unrelentingly Machiavellian as Wall Street CEOs, while Shailene
Woodley is underused as Gill’s supportive wife. The most interesting character
in the film, who ironically doesn’t do any investing, is Gill’s slacker
brother, well played by Pete Davidson.
The film doesn’t emphasize the recent downside
of GameStop investing: while at the height of the craze the stock hit $500 a
share, in the past year it’s hovered around $17.
THE
EQUALIZER 3 (2023)
Few actors have ever been able to move so
comfortably between films based on classic theater (“Fences,” “The Tragedy of
Macbeth”) and violent action pictures as Denzel Washington does. In this third
installment of this adaptation of the 1990s TV series, Washington’s Robert
McCall ventures to Sicily to deliver his unapologetic vigilante justice on a
mob family.
Badly injured, he ends up recuperating in
a quaint, coastal Italian town in the Amalfi Coast region. About the same time,
another mob family thinks they can bully the town folks into handing over the
city for development of casinos and hotels. But they didn’t count on the
one-man wrecking crew in the form of this limping American stranger, who has
quickly become part of the community.
McCall gets the CIA involved, anonymously
contacting agent Collins (Dakota Fanning, who co-starred with Washington in
“Man on Fire” when she was 10), but she and her team mostly arrive in time for
the cleanup.
Director Antoine Fuqua, who’s directed all
films of the franchise and also “Training Day,” which earned Washington his
best actor Oscar, keeps the killing to a minimum, instead focusing on the way
McCall and these small-town Italians bond in ways that aren’t possible most
places in America.
It’d be easy to dismiss this as just another
star-vehicle actioner, which it is, but “Equalizer 3” also features a
thoughtful, naturalistic performance from the best in the business.
Celebrating its 100th
anniversary, this Buster Keaton comedy is often ranked as one of the
actor-director’s greatest works, alongside “The General” (1927) and “Sherlock
Jr.” (1924). To me, it stands up better than much of Keaton’s pictures as it
mostly focuses on an actual plot and character development rather than jumping from
one acrobatic stunt to the next.
While Keaton’s critical stature has grown
as his silent rival Charlie Chaplin’s has declined, I still find Chaplin, even
when he’s milking the sentimentality of the Little Tramp, the greater artist.
I’ve never warmed up to Keaton’s stone-faced, rather infantile character who
never tired of getting pushed around.
“Our Hospitality” satirizes the infamous
Hatfield and McCoy post-Civil War feud (renamed Canfield-McKay), as the
silent’s prologue shows Willie McKay’s father dying in a shootout in the Blue
Ridge Mountains with one of the Canfields. The young widow quickly leaves for
New York City with young Willie and raises him there.
Fast forward 20 years and Willie is a
young, clueless dandy who receives notice that he is now the owner of the
family’s “estate” back in the hills. Imaging a palatial estate, he boards one
of the strangest transportation contraptions ever imagined.
It’s obvious from the start, though not to
Willie, that this woman must be a Canfield. Once they arrive in the rural
community, her father and brothers immediate start plotting to shoot the young
McKay. Their plans are complicated by the tradition of “hospitality” they must
show to this courting young man while he’s in their home. It becomes a game of
cat-and-mouse that ends, as Keaton adventure inevitably do, with a harrowing
escape, this time on the side of a rocky cliff and over a waterfall.
Keaton, to his credit, uses intertitles
sparingly, allowing the visuals carry the humor and drama, even in the casting,
as all the other men in the film are at least a foot taller than the star. If you’ve never seen a Buster Keaton film,
this might be the perfect starting point (and is available on YouTube for free).
Among the other acclaimed movies marking
a century of existence include Harold Lloyd’s most famous work “Safety Last!” Chapin’s
“A Woman of Paris,” “The Hunchback of Notre Dame,” featuring Lon Chaney’s
heartbreaking performance, and Cecil B. DeMille’s first version of “The Ten
Commandments.”
SHE’S
FUNNY THAT WAY (2015)
This final feature of Peter Bogdanovich,
who died in 2022, might have come off as an amusing screwball comedy—with a few
alterations—if it was made in 1937 and starred Cary Grant and Carole Lombard.
This modernized, less subtle version of a mistaken-identity comedy quickly
grows irritating and tiresome.
Owen Wilson, at 54 still sporting his
floppy mop of blonde hair more suited to a frat boy, plays a famous film
director who regularly cheats on his wife with call girls when in New York.
When Arnold’s most recent paramour (Imogen Poots) auditions for his upcoming
play, which stars his wife (Kathryn Hahn), the stuttering, frenetic confusion
begins.
Also connected to the young actress-call
girl Izzy is a doddering judge (played with stupendous idiocy by Austin
Pendleton), a distracted, angry therapist (Jennifer Aniston), and the play’s
leading man (Rhys Ifans). The sex-mad characters fly in and out of the film as
if it’s a Jerry Lewis telethon and are more grating than comical. But I did
want to see more of Izzy’s parents, played by Bogdanovich’s long ago muse,
Cybill Shepherd, and the great comedian Richard Lewis.
The story is told in flashback, which adds
nothing to the film, during an interview (Illeana Douglas plays the reporter)
with Izzy, now a success in Hollywood. The script was written by the director
and his ex-wife, Louise Stratten, whose older sister Dorothy was Bogdanovich’s
lover when she was murdered in 1980.
The film has gained some recent traction,
under the title “Squirrels to the Nuts” (a line from an Ernst Lubitsch film), a
somewhat altered version re-cut by the director shortly before his death. But I
doubt it could be refined enough to be anything more than an unsatisfactory
meshing of Woody Allen and ‘30s screwballs.
CAUSEWAY (2022)
In recent years, it has been rare that Academy
Award voters take notice of good performances in minor, little-seen movies. But
in honoring last year’s film work, they looked beyond “Everything Everywhere
All at Once” and “The Banshees of Inisherin” to nominate Brian Tyree Henry for
his role as James, a small-town auto mechanic who befriends a depressed Afghan
war vet (Jennifer Lawrence).
While Lawence gives her usual fine
performance—her Lynsey is back home recovering from a brain injury suffered
while serving—Henry steals the picture. While the film is weighed down with too
many tragic characters, the script comes to life in the conversations between
Lynsey and James, mostly while she works cleaning pools.
I’m sure Lawrence was in the running for
best actress, delivering a low-ley, but intense performance, a change of pace
from her wide-eyed, frantic scientist in the end of the world comedy, “Don’t
Look Up” (2021).
Making her feature film debut, director
Lila Neugebauer keeps the temperature low through the story even as characters dig
deep into their emotional scars. She clearly knows how to get the most out of
her actors.
The film is far from Henry’s first success:
the 41-year-old was in the original cast of “The Book of Mormon” on Broadway,
scored a Tony nomination for his performance in the play “Lobby Hero” and, on
television, is among the stars of the hit series “Atlanta.” Unfortunately, if your name isn’t Denzel
Washington, mainstream cinema doesn’t offer many good roles for
African-American actors, certainly not compared to the theater or streaming
world. Here’s hoping some filmmakers are paying attention.
SEVEN DAYS TO NOON (1951) and THE QUEEN OF SPADES (1949)
After four decades of watching way too
many movies, it has become a rare treat to discover a first-rate, vintage film.
I streamed both of these mid-century gems in the same week on Kanopy (through
the LA County Library) after they languished on my need-to-see list for years.
“Seven Days” won an Oscar in 1951 for best motion
picture story (a category eliminated a few years later), honoring the original
idea by Paul Dehn and James Bernard, which Roy Boulting and Frank Harvey turned
into a terse, no-nonsense script about the development of the atomic bomb.
Nothing could be timelier at the
beginning of the Cold War than a cautionary tale about weapon research; the
Boulting-led team (Roy and brother John direct) avoid the histrionics and
preaching that the subject can lend itself to.
Central London is under threat after a
scientist demands that Britain announce the end of A-bomb development or he
will detonate a powerful bomb in a week’s time. The picture follows the manhunt
by Scotland Yard detectives with the help of the scientist’s daughter and his
research assistant.
Even with the urgency always in the
forefront—large titles announce the beginning of each day as the deadline gets
closer—the officials remain calm and levelheaded, as is the British way.
With a few stars in lead roles, this film
might be better remembered, but instead British character actors Barry Jones
(“Prince Valiant,” “Alexander the Great”), as the disgruntled scientist and
Andre Morell (“The Bridge on the River Kwai,” “Ben-Hur”), as the stoic police
investigator, head the cast. Both are
fine, but I can just imagine Ralph Richardson and Trevor Howard in the roles.
The Boultings were among the leaders of post-war British cinema as both producers and directors. John was the more successful director, receiving solo credit for “Brighton Rock” (1947), “The Magic Box” (1951) and the comedy classic “I’m All Right, Jack” (1959).
Even more impressive is “The Queen of Spades,”
a dark, gothic rendering of an Alexander Pushkin short story about a military
officers obsessed with gaining his fortune through gambling.
Set in early 19th Century
Russia, the story opens with a gathering of young officers wagering large sums
on the card game faro. Though the scene plays like an atmospheric way of
introducing Herman, a Russian officer played with sweaty urgency by Austrian
actor Anton Walbrook (“Gaslight,” “The Red Shoes”), it turns out to be the
crucial moment of the story.
Soon after the game, Herman reads about a
countess who regained her fortune a half century earlier by learning a magical
way to win this game. He immediately becomes obsessed with discovering the
secret.
He heartlessly
courts the countess’ naïve ward, Lizaveta (Yvonne Mitchell), to gain access to the
elderly woman (Edith Evans in a haunting performance). Dame Edith—in her first
film in over 30 years after decades of Shakespearean roles on the British
stage—creates an almost spectral figure, hovering between life and death and holding
on to her faro secret.
After her return to movies, Evans became a
regular supporting player in Britain and Hollywood in such films as “The Nun’s
Story,” “Look Back in Anger,” “Tom Jones” and “The Chalk Garden,” earning
supporting acting Oscar nominations for the last two. She scored a best actress
nod for her role in “The Whisperers” (1967), playing a lonely, fragile woman
struggling to survive in her senior years in the slums of Manchester.
Director Thorold Dickinson (the original
“Gaslight”) and cinematographer Otto Heller (“The Ladykillers,” “Alfie”)
utilize the look of film noir and Warner Bros. horror pictures to frame “Queen
of Spades” as both a powerful study of unbridled greed and a creepy ghost
story.
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