Who's In It: Rod Taylor (Long John Silver, The Time Machine, 101 Dalmatians), Jessica Tandy (Cocoon, Driving Miss Daisy, Fried Green Tomatoes), Suzanne Pleshette (Blackbeard's Ghost, Support Your Local Gunfighter, The Bob Newhart Show), and Tippi Hedren (Marnie).
What It's About: A woman (Hedren) plays the world's dumbest practical joke and finds herself in a small town during the onset of the Bird War.
Who's In It: Laurence Olivier (Wuthering Heights, The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, Clash of the Titans),
Joan Fontaine (Suspicion, Jane Eyre, Ivanhoe),
George Sanders (The Picture of Dorian Gray, All About Eve, The Jungle Book),
Judith Anderson (Laura, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock),
Nigel Bruce (Watson to Basil Rathbone's Sherlock Holmes),
Reginald Denny (Madam Satan, the Bulldog Drummond movies from the '30s, Batman: The Movie), C Aubrey Smith (Tarzan the Ape Man, Bulldog Drummond Strikes Back) and Gladys Cooper (The Black Cat, My Fair Lady)
What It's About: A young bride (Fontaine) moves to her husband's (Olivier) estate and contends with the figurative ghost of her predecessor.
It's a smart - really smart - gothic romance with some great twists and turns. But even when I know what's coming after having seen it so many times, I always find something new about a character or just the way that Hitchcock's telling the story. And it's so beautifully shot and wonderfully acted by everyone involved.
I go into detail about my favorite cast members in the MMN episode, but I'll say again here that Fontaine and Olivier are awesome together and make me want them to figure things out even while it's clear that they aren't a natural fit for each other and have a lot of work to do. Oliver's charming, but also heartbreaking as he's not dealing well with the trauma of his previous marriage. Fontaine is naive and childlike to a fault. They both have characteristics that the other needs, but neither knows how best to support the other. It's great to see them (and it's mostly Fontaine) work through that.
The best part for me is watching Fontaine's character grow and seeing how that affects her relationship with Maxim (Olivier). The movie doesn't hit me over the head with it, but suggests her maturing in subtle ways and I love to find new clues every time I watch.
Who's In It: Maureen O'Hara (1939's The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Black Swan, Rio Grande), Charles Laughton (The Old Dark House, Island of Lost Souls, 1939's The Hunchback of Notre Dame), and Robert Newton (Disney's Treasure Island, Blackbeard the Pirate).
What It's About: A young woman (O'Hara) moves in with her aunt (Marie Ney) and uncle (Leslie Banks) in their remote, coastal inn and discovers that the place is the headquarters to a ruthless gang of land pirates.
How It Is: I talked about this one at length on Mystery Movie Nightrecently, but the short version is that I'm very fond of this gothic romance/spy thriller. I'm still looking for a print where I can understand all the dialogue, but I like the story enough that I'm willing to struggle through that even with the lousy print I've got.
I'm a big fan of gothic romance anyway, but the sea elements make this one extra cool for me. And I love the sense of place in the inn itself. It's full of nooks and crannies, but I understand where they all are in relation to each other and it's fun to explore. Charles Laughton is delightfully over-the-top as Sir Humphrey and it's great to see a very young Robert Newton in a heroic role as a British spy who's infiltrated the gang. Newton's not especially memorable if you don't already know him as the future Long John Silver, but I got a kick out of him anyway.
Rating: Three-and-a-half out of five intrepid, gothic heroines.
Great spy story with a super cool agent. I like that it's set in the Cold War and I love the heavy use of '80s New Wave music. I even like how the song choices fit with what's going on onscreen ('Til Tuesday's "Voices Carry," for instance, when two characters are trying not to be overheard), but I understand how that might be annoying for some.
The plot is complicated, with a lot of double- and triple-crossing to keep track of, but while I was often kept guessing, I was never confused. And it all tracked for me in the end. Looking back after all the reveals have been made, I have some questions about why certain characters did what they did, but I'm not calling that a flaw until I've been able to see it again with the knowledge of what everyone's up to.
The selling point is the action sequences. There are a few big fights and they're all staged differently and even have different tones from each other. One is a brutal, very prolonged fight in a stairwell, for example, while another in a posh hotel is slow motion and operatic.
The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Continuing to rewatch some of my favorite movies from 2016. This was my third or fourth time watching The Magnificent Seven and I like it more each time. I already thought it was a fun movie the first time, but some things that bugged me then don't bother me anymore. It's not that there aren't flaws, it's just that the things that I like - certain characters, set pieces, and the way the villain gets his comeuppance, as examples - smother out the nitpicks that I originally had. It's still not as good as the original, but it doesn't have to be.
Doctor Strange (2016)
One of these days I'm going to need to comprehensively rank the Marvel movies, but I suspect that this will be in the upper part of the middle tier. I enjoy it a lot, appreciate its inventiveness about what spells look like, and like that it opens up a corner of the MCU that hasn't been explored before. I also like how Strange defeats the villain and what that says about him as a character. It's all cool stuff done in a new way.
But even though it's done in a new way, the story that it's telling doesn't feel new enough for me to totally fall in love with the movie. It's essentially Tony Stark's character arc again. And as much as I love Cumberbatch and love him in this role, that sameness keeps me from putting Doctor Strange with very favorite Marvel films.
Moana (2016)
Not just my favorite movie of last year; it's headed towards being one of my favorite movies of all time. There's more to unpack than I want to put in this post, but the short version is that it doesn't just push the nautical/island adventure and awesome female character buttons for me. There's serious, spiritual depth to this movie and a great discussion to be had about mission and identity and how those things are connected. Need to come back to this at some point.
The Ice Pirates (1984)
I've wanted to see The Ice Pirates since 1984. I missed it in the theater and somehow never got around to watching it later, but I've always been a big fan of Robert Urich and of course space opera and pirates, so how could I not enjoy it?
Little did I know.
Maybe I just wasn't in the mood, but as much fun as the cast is (had no idea Angelica Huston and Ron Perlman were in it), it's much sillier than I expected and I didn't actually like any of the characters. Urich is playing the scum bucket that everyone thinks Han Solo is, but without the heart of gold. At least, no heart of gold had been hinted at by the time I gave up and turned this off.
Lady Jane (1986)
So next week, Diane and David and I are taking off for a couple of weeks to go see Britain. It's been a lifelong wish of mine to go see the home of so many of my childhood heroes: Robin Hood, Sherlock Holmes, Ebenezer Scrooge, Tarzan, James Bond, the Loch Ness Monster... it's a long list.
That means that I won't be updating this blog during that time and there might not be any podcasts with me on them either. If you're with me on Facebook though, I'll be posting there as much as possible, but otherwise, I'll pick up here when we get back.
It also means that we're watching some movies to prep for the trip. Lady Jane has been a favorite of mine since I fell in love with Helena Bonham Carter in the mid-'80s, but it's a downer and I knew David wouldn't love it, so I haven't shared it with him before. We're going to go see the Tower of London, though, and Lady Jane is largely set there and covers an important event that took place there. I figured it would be a good touchstone to have for our visit.
True enough, David wasn't thrilled, though I think he appreciated what he was supposed to about the story. I don't agree with every decision that Jane Grey and her husband make, but I'm not supposed to. They're kids and they make a lot of immature decisions. But I love their passion and I love the questions that the movie raises about how far we're willing to go for things that we believe are important. It kind of goes back to the themes of mission and identity from Moana and I love thinking about that stuff.
When Strangers Marry (1944)
I love me some Robert Mitchum and this has a bunch of other cool people, too. I see Dean Jagger get weepy every year in White Christmas, Kim Hunter went on to play Zira in the Planet of the Apes movies, and Neil Hamilton of course is Commissioner Gordon in the Adam West Batman series. And it's directed by William Castle (House on Haunted Hill, 13 Ghosts).
When Strangers Marry is a good thriller in which Hunter marries a guy (Jagger) she's only known a short time. The cops (led by Hamilton) want to bring Jagger in for questioning about a murder in the last town Jagger was in, but he's doing his best to stay off the grid. Hunter starts to wonder what she's gotten herself into and whether she shouldn't have married her childhood sweetheart (Mitchum) who's recently re-entered her life, instead.
Like I said, it's a good thriller, but it's not great. I was able to predict the outcome, but the bigger problem is that I never for a second believed that anyone would choose to marry Jagger over Mitchum.
Crossfire (1947)
Another early Robert Mitchum movie. I liked this one better though. It's a psychological thriller disguised as a murder mystery. From the start, there are really only a couple of options for who the killer might be, so the real mystery is about the potential motives of the primary suspects. Both are recently discharged soldiers, but one's a hateful bigot and the other is a sweet, but stressed out kid who may not be responsible for all of his actions. Robert Young is the main cop on the case, with Mitchum playing an officer who knows both suspects and wants to prove the kid's innocence.
There's no surprise as to who the killer really is, but that's okay. As the poster's tagline suggests, the movie's more concerned about hate and bigotry. It's heavy handed about delivering that message, but it's also great at humanizing the murder victim and driving home the tragedy of the crime. And sometimes - especially recently - heavy handedness in preaching against hate is exactly what we need.
The Paradine Case (1947)
I'm a big fan of Gregory Peck and Alfred Hitchcock, but I couldn't finish The Paradine Case. Peck plays a married lawyer who falls in love with the woman (Alida Valli) he's defending for murder. The movie hinges on selling the Peck-Valli romance, but that's exactly where it falls apart. Valli is supposed to glamorously mysterious, but she's dull as a mop and there's no reason for Peck to be tempted by her. Especially when his wife (Ann Todd) is utterly charming and far more interesting as a person. The script and performances do no work to transition Peck from happily married to grumpily considering adultery, so when he suddenly and inexplicably started exhibiting feelings for Valli, I was out.
Rio Grande (1950)
The third in John Ford's "Cavalry Trilogy." I accidentally skipped the second, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, because I forgot that Rio Grande was part of it. There are way too many Westerns named after rivers, ya'll.
This is a bona fide sequel to Fort Apache. It doesn't reference any of those events - and I'm not even 100% sure that the timeline works out - but John Wayne is playing the same character in both movies. I like how different the two films are, though.
Fort Apache is about authority and the military structure and what happens when good people are given bad orders. Rio Grande is a more personal movie. Some of Fort Apache's themes show up here, too, because Wayne's character once had to carry out a difficult order that directly affected his relationship with his wife (Maureen O'Hara). But Rio Grande is mostly about that relationship, with both characters trying to decide if they want to repair it. Complicating the situation is that their son has enlisted in the army and been assigned to Wayne's command. O'Hara of course wants the boy out, but Wayne's feelings on it aren't so simple.
It's a lovely story of guilt and repentance and the possibility of forgiveness, which doesn't just play out in the family of main characters. There's also a soldier who's wanted for manslaughter, so when the US Marshal shows up to bring him in, the film adds justice to the mix of themes. What role, if any, should the government play in forgiving crimes? Pretty great stuff.
Winchester '73 (1950)
I'm not typically into movies that follow props around. Most of the time they're thinly disguised anthologies and I'm just not crazy about anthologies. But that's not Winchester '73. The characters who come into contact with the rifle are already connected in other ways and none of them leave the story completely unless they die. It's really about Jimmy Stewart's trying to get the rifle, but more importantly - and for reasons unrelated to the rifle itself - get his hands on the guy who stole it. The other characters are clever diversions who weave in and out of that main plot, but all of them are worth the time the movie spends on them.
Song of the Week: "Electric Love" by BØRNS
No one reads this far down, do they?
Wanted to rewatch this and Dawn before seeing War. I'm still amazed by how much this works. Which is to say that it works completely and wonderfully, fully connecting me to its characters regardless of species. And what a great, cathartic finale as everyone gets their comeuppance. In the best Planet of the Apes movies, I should always feel conflicted about where my loyalties are and this is probably the best at accomplishing that in the history of these movies.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)
I still care about the humans in Dawn - especially Keri Russell, Jason Clarke, and Kodi Smit-McPhee - but they're ultimately MacGuffins in the movie's real conflict between Caesar and Koba. It's a brilliant clash of ideologies and what I love most about this trilogy is the battle between compassion and hate. Which leads directly to the third film...
War for the Planet of the Apes (2017)
In Dawn, the compassion-hate conflict is between Caesar and Koba, but in War it's within Caesar himself. His conflict with the human Colonel (Woody Harrelson) has led Caesar down a dark path and threatens the beliefs that he holds most dear. War handles this in a beautiful, emotional way and it's a great conclusion to what's easily my favorite science fiction trilogy of all time (at least until the current Star Wars trilogy is done... fingers crossed).
Grease (1978)
Rewatching Back to the Future for an upcoming Mystery Movie Night got me in the mood for something else from the '50s. And this has been on the list for a while since a couple of shots from it are in that great 100 Movies Dance Scenes Mashup video that my family and I can't stop watching.
And it really is all about the music in this one. The story is mostly bunk and I don't like Danny, Sandy, or really any of their friends except Frenchie. The ending is stupid. But dang those are some great songs and I always forget how awesome Olivia Newton-John's voice is.
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Trying to clear out some room on my TiVo. I recorded this on a lark, because there's a John Denver song with the same title and I'm nostalgic for John Denver. That's a dumb reason to watch a movie, but I also like Gary Cooper and Merle Oberon, so what the heck.
I love this movie so much. Oberon plays a wealthy, young woman named Mary Smith whose widowed father is trying to get a Presidential nomination. Mary's not especially troublesome, but she's under especially tight scrutiny, so her dad sends her to the family's house in West Palm Beach to get her away from the New York paparazzi. There she cute-meets a rodeo cowboy named Stretch (Cooper), but she's pretending to be a lady's maid at the time and... well, you've seen a romantic comedy before, so you know how that goes.
There are some modern romcom tropes, but I found that refreshing in a '30s film. And I love that the story is told from Mary's point of view with Stretch being the love interest. The movie also has some nice things to say about the value of people, with both Mary and Stretch needing to adjust their ideas about what kind of people they're interested in.
Five Came Back (1939)
This one popped on my radar because a bunch of people crash in a jungle. And it's very early Lucille Ball and I'm always interested in her serious roles.
I love this one, too. It's sort of a proto-Lost with a varied group of passengers on a downed plane trying to survive until they can rescue themselves. There are three airline personnel, a young couple in love, an elderly couple in grumpiness, a bounty hunter (John Carradine) and his prisoner, a man escorting a young boy for mysterious reasons, and Lucille Ball's character: a beautiful, but ostracized woman.
What's great is that every one of these characters finds themselves challenged and changed by the ordeal in the jungle. Some for the better, and some not so much. As the title spoils, not all of them make it out, but that's a fascinating and touching story, too.
It was remade in 1956 as Back from Eternity with Anita Ekberg and Rod Steiger, so that also just went on my list.
Murder, My Sweet (1944)
I'm a huge fan of The Big Sleep, both the Raymond Chandler novel and the 1946 movie based on it. But I'm enough of a fan of the movie that I haven't been that interested in seeing other actors in the role of Philip Marlowe.
And here's another thing: my love of the novel is all about the mood and the dialogue. Chandler's an awesome writer, but - at least in The Big Sleep - he's not an awesome mystery writer. There are huge dangling plot threads and red herrings that don't make sense. Maybe he fixed that in subsequent books, but I haven't read them yet to find out. If Murder, My Sweet (based on Chandler's Farewell, My Lovely) is faithful to its novel, though - and I understand that it is - I still have concerns. For most of its run time, the story spins around without going anywhere. It relies on all the things I like about Chandler (mood, dialogue, and Marlowe himself) to keep me going, but the central mystery is kind of dull.
Phantom Lady (1944)
After enjoying The Web, I started looking for other Ella Raines movies to watch and this is a big one. She plays another secretary, but this time her boss is the one who's in trouble for murder, not the one trying to cover it up. And she's great in it, but neither her boss nor the story itself deserve her. The villain is easy to deduce as soon as the character is mentioned, but then the movie still confirms it way too early. The villain's motivation is super flimsy, too, and the scheme to cover their tracks is even shakier. This is a classic only because of Raines herself and an unforgettable scene with a ridiculously lewd drum solo.
Frontier Gal (1945)
Before she was Lily Munster, Yvonne De Carlo had a prolific film career. She made a lot of Westerns, so I wanted to check some of them out. I shouldn't have started with Frontier Gal, though, because hoo boy. Her character's unlikability in this movie is only surpassed by her co-star's.
Rod Cameron plays an outlaw who visits a saloon run by De Carlo. He takes a liking to her, but she insults him, so he kisses her against her will. She slaps him, so he kisses her again. She slaps him again, so he kisses her again. Repeat several times until she falls in love. And that sets the tone for the entire movie, which might as well have been called No Means Yes.
I'll watch more De Carlo Westerns, but yikes... this one.
Spellbound (1945)
One of my favorite Hitchcock films, partly because I love its two leads, but it's also a great story that keeps turning into something new. Showed it to David this viewing and he wasn't that interested to begin with. I asked him to give it 15 minutes and then decide if he wanted to keep going. We kept going.
That awesome dream sequence designed by Salvador Dali is a highlight, but it's the central mystery and the plot twists (and Bergman and Peck) that make Spellbound so rewatchable.
Shock (1946)
Phantom Lady wasn't the only movie I watched this week inspired by The Web. I wanted to see some more Vincent Price noir, too, so that's where Shock comes in. Price plays an adulterous psychologist who accidentally kills his wife. Unfortunately, he's seen by a woman (Anabel Shaw) who's already under a lot of mental stress. Watching the murder sends her into a catatonic state. When Price is called in to minister to her, he discovers that she's a witness to his crime. Under pressure from his girlfriend, he realizes that if Shaw never recovers, he's off the hook.
It's not my favorite kind of Price role. He's still great, but he's too much a victim of circumstance and his girlfriend to thoroughly relish his performance. Give me wicked and conniving - or at least charmingly caddish - any day.
Song of the Week: "Seagulls! (Stop It Now)" by Bad Lip Reading
This doesn't just crack me up; it gets stuck in my head for a week and I don't even complain.
Started a John Hughes marathon this week. Should've included Vacation as well, but we'll have to go back and pick that one up later. My memory - probably tainted by the sequels (including Christmas Vacation, which I don't like as much as most of my friends) - is that it's overrated, but still funny. I should see it again and make up my mind.
But this is about Mr. Mom, which is also very funny. Michael Keaton is really charming and I always love Terri Garr, too. And the way it deals with gender issues holds up surprisingly well. Sure, the premise is supposed to be funny because stay-at-home dads... that's a disaster waiting to happen, right? But the movie never shames either spouse or suggests that they're better off in their traditional roles. It upholds both business career and homemaking as important, vital work, regardless of the gender of the person doing it. Not all of Hughes' writing stays this fresh, so I was really pleased.
Sixteen Candles (1984)
Here's one that doesn't hold up as well. Anthony Michael Hall is really funny as Farmer Ted and Molly Ringwald is very effective as the awkward Samantha, but I don't ever root for her to end up with Michael Schoeffling's Jake. That's partly Schoeffling's fault, but it's also the script's for the way it introduces him. It suggests that he's noticed Sam before, but doesn't do anything about it until he steals a private note revealing that she wants to have sex with him. Creepy.
I'm not as creeped out by Ted's ending up with Jake's girlfriend, Caroline. I've heard people describe that as date rape, but the movie makes it pretty clear that both characters were drunk and that Ted remembers even less of it than Caroline does. It's not a part of the movie that I cheer about, but I don't find it as problematic as a lot of folks claim.
But then there's Gedde Watanabe's character, who is super troublesome. And the whole theme of the movie seems to be about how graceless teenage life is. And it is, which is why Sixteen Candles resonated with a lot of kids in its day, but as an adult it's kind of hard to watch.
The Breakfast Club (1985)
I don't have the words for how much I love this movie. It is to my teenage years what Star Wars was to my childhood. I don't know how many times I've seen it, but it feels like hundreds. For years, I could quote the whole thing.
The themes in it are profound and I've failed for 30 years to make up my mind about what happened on Monday. A tiny part of me has wanted a sequel to give me the official answer, but I know that's not what I really want. I appreciate being able to waffle back and forth about who stayed friends and who ignored whom. I love thinking about it and changing my mind and I don't want that locked in.
Far and Away (1992)
The Mummy has put us on a bit of a Tom Cruise kick. Not because it was great, but because I want to relive (and share with David) some of the Cruise movies that were great.
Far and Away is one of those. It's a giant, sweeping epic held together by the charisma of its two leads and a beautiful score by John Williams.
Things to Come (1936)
I'd always heard about the wonderful visuals - both in design and effects - of Things to Come, so I wanted to see it for myself. And it sure is cool to look at. But it's barely a story and I certainly don't care about any of the characters it shoots past me at light speed. I'm glad to have checked it off my list, but can't imagine revisiting it.
Stage Fright (1950)
Stage Fright, on the other hand, is amazing. Last year I finally sought out some Marlene Dietrich movies, because I'd never seen any. I feel pretty confident about my handle on her oeuvre now, so I'm not being a completist about it, but Stage Fright was a straggler still on the pile because it's directed by Alfred Hitchcock. I love Alfred Hitchcock, but not every movie, so I'm never 100% confident that one I haven't seen will be a winner. This one is though.
It begins JJ Abrams-style in the middle of the action with Jane Wyman and Richard Todd on the run from the cops. We quickly learn that Todd's the one the cops are after and that he's just enlisted Wyman's help, so after a brief flashback to catch her and us up on what happened, the plot is off and running. Basically, Todd is wanted for the murder of his lover's (Dietrich) husband. He believes that the blame has been shifted onto him because of bad luck and some bad decision-making on his part, but Wyman suspects that it may have been an intentional framing by Dietrich.
After Wyman puts Todd into hiding with her dad (wonderfully played by Alastair Sim, who's becoming one of my favorite actors), Wyman sets out to get a confession from Dietrich and prove Todd's innocence. But what's so cool is that things never unfold the way I expected them to. The story's just similar enough to others I've seen that I think I know how it's going to go, but then someone makes a weird (but always plausible) decision or reveals some new information that takes the story in a new direction. It kept me guessing - and hooked in - every step of the way.
Fire Down Below (1957)
This is another movie that defied my expectations for it. It starts off with Robert Mitchum and Jack Lemmon as co-owners of a boat that they charter to rich people in the Caribbean. When they're paid to help passportless Rita Hayworth escape the authorities by taking her to another island, both are immediately attracted to her and the movie sets itself up as a romantic triangle. But it's not actually about who Hayworth is going to end up with.
I don't even want to reveal what it's really about, because finding that out was such a cool journey, but it's safe to describe Fire Down Below as a fascinating character study of all three leads and that the lead it's most concerned with isn't the one I thought it would be.
Zorro (1957-61)
I quickly jammed through the rest of Season 2 and I'm glad I did it that way. Parceling it out was turning it into kind of a slog, but binge-watching it meant that mediocre episodes were immediately followed by more exciting ones. And there were a few storylines that I enjoyed quite a bit.
The series never did return to the 13-episode arcs of the first season, but there were several multi-part storylines. One of the best starred Annette Funicello, who was given the role as a 16th Birthday present by Walt Disney. She plays a young woman who's come to Los Angeles to meet her estranged father. She's convinced that he lives there and she's even received letters from him postmarked Los Angeles, but no one has heard of the man. It's a cool mystery and Funicello brings a lot of conviction and spunk to her role.
There's still sort of a Season 3 left, so I'm not done with the show, but "Season 3" is only four episodes, so I'm almost there.
Jam of the Week: "Green & Gold" by Lianne La Havas
A great, funky, sultry groove that reminds me of Sade.
Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca is even more straight gothic romance than Jamaica Inn. It's about a lovely young woman who marries a dark, brooding man and goes to live at his ancient estate. There are secret parts of the house where she's discouraged to go and the whole place is haunted by the ghost (figurative, at least) of the mansion's former mistress.
Even though we talked about du Maurier already with Jamaica Inn, I have to give Rebecca a separate entry because I love Hitchcock's adaptation so much. I discovered it years ago when I was exploring George Sanders' filmography and uncovered a treasure trove of Hitchcock that I'd never explored before. Prior to that, I was mostly familiar with his '50s and '60s stuff, but Rebecca led me to the '40s and what would become some of my favorite Hitchcock films. Movies like Notorious and Spellbound and Foreign Correspondent.
Rebecca was also my proper introduction to gothic romance. I'd been attracted to elements of it before, like with Beauty and the Beast, but Rebecca is the full, complete package: a highlight of the genre that sent me searching for more.
It's been difficult for gothic romance to remain its own, distinct genre. I've already talked about how many see it as a sub-genre under horror, emphasizing the gothic half of its influences. But it's gone the other way, too. A lot of people read the word "romance" and immediately file it under other books in that category. Which is what happened with Daphne du Maurier's stuff, though it's as clear an example of classic gothic romance as ever existed.
The "romance" in gothic romance doesn't refer to people falling in love, though that often happens in those stories. In its classic sense, "romance" refers to fantastic, heroic deeds, often with some kind of supernatural element. It's was Horace Walpole's marrying that to crumbling, medieval (gothic) settings that gave the genre its name. But "romance" has become so identified with kissing that it's tough to remember that it doesn't always have to mean that.
Du Maurier is primarily thought of as a romance writer, but her books - especially Jamaica Inn and Rebecca - are not kissing books. On the contrary, they're atmospheric and thoughtful and rarely end with a heroic couple in each other's arms. Jamaica Inn is one of the ones that does, more or less, but it gets to its love story through a dark tale of murder. It's about a young woman who goes to live with some relatives and learns that their inn is a headquarters for a gang of brutal thieves. Her uncle and his men intentionally run ships aground on the nearby rocky coast in order to kill the sailors and steal their cargo. Against her better judgment, the young woman begins to fall for her uncle's younger brother, in whom she sees a spark of decency.
The gothic setting is the old inn that's no longer used for its original purpose, though there are spoilery references to something even older and potentially supernatural. The uncle is no nobleman, but he's no less sinister and threatening. And the uncle's younger brother isn't especially heroic at first - in fact, the young woman more or less has to rescue him from the path that he's on - but he comes through in the end. All the gothic romance trappings are there. Jamaica Inn was du Maurier's fourth novel, but the first of her most famous ones. It was published in 1936 and adapted to film by Alfred Hitchcock only three years later, the first of three Hitchcock movies based on her stuff. We'll talk about Rebecca later, but The Birds was also inspired by a short story of hers. Jamaica Inn was also adapted into a couple of mini-series: one in 1983 starring Jane Seymour and more recently in 2014 starring Downton Abbey's Jessica Brown Findlay.
As we get into the '30s, there are going to be enough movies to talk about from each year that I'm going to split them into genre groups. This week I'll talk about comedies, dramas, and adventure movies from 1931, then next week I'll cover mysteries and horror.
In Monkey Business, the Marx Brothers play a group of stowaways on an ocean liner. The twist is that there are also warring gangsters on board, so one of them hires half of the Brothers to assassinate the other, who's in turn hired the other Brothers as bodyguards. And all this is going on while all four Brothers are being hunted and chased by the ship's crew.
The Marx Brothers' movies are having diminishing returns for me as the same recurring gags continue from film to film, but they're still clever and a lot of fun.
Windy Riley Goes Hollywood(1931)
This is a goofy, not-that-funny comedy about a wise guy from New York who gets mixed up in the movie biz and almost ruins the career of a young actress. Louise Brooks plays the actress and this short talkie is mostly memorable for giving her a chance to be heard. Sadly, her delivery isn't great, but then neither is anyone else's. Like many early sound films, Windy Riley was made by people who are clearly struggling to figure out the best way to use the new technology. I get the feeling that this was meant to launch a series of Windy Riley shorts, but it apparently didn't catch on. I can see why.
The Front Page(1931)
It was tough for me to figure out how to take this one. It's got some dark elements, but is clearly meant to be funny. The problem is that the humor isn't derived from the dark subject matter; it's in spite of it. That makes for a tonally inconsistent movie that also fits with Adolphe Menjou's character, who's absolutely despicable for most of the movie until suddenly he's supposed to be rather charming. I hated him in The Front Page, but for truly charming Menjou, check out Morocco.
I'm curious to see the Jack Lemmon/Walter Matthau remake of The Front Page to see if it fixes anything. I love both those guys, so at the very least I expect I'll be more forgiving. Mata Hari (1931)
I thought that the fictionalized story of Mata Hari was at least going to be a spy movie, but it's just a horrible, unbelievable, melodramatic romance. Greta Garbo plays the title character who inexplicably decides to give up spycraft out of her unconvincing love of a Russian pilot. There are plenty of opportunities for Garbo to ham it up with overboard drama, but I'm not in.
The Skin Game(1931)
I have a hard time with Hitchcock's early, non-thriller movies, but that's all on me for wanting them to be more like North by Northwest instead of accepting them on their own terms. The Skin Game is a pretty great movie on its own, showing the tragedy when two families go to war against each other.
It's a lot like Romeo and Juliet in that way (and is even based on a play). In fact, the first characters we meet from the two families are a son and daughter who like each other, even if they don't like each others' relatives. Unlike Romeo and Juliet though, the story doesn't focus on the kids. It's all about the parents and the depths of nastiness that they'll sink to in order to gain power over their enemies.
I actually kind of hate Romeo and Juliet and The Skin Game fixes my biggest problems with it. To begin with, it very clearly defines the source of animosity between the two families. The Hillcrists are old money and the Hornblowers are new, but the real clash is over their visions for the rural community in which they both live. The conservative Hillcrists want to preserve the country while the self-described "progressive" Hornblowers want to develop it with factories.
I get the sense that the story isn't really choosing sides; enough characters comment on how nasty both families are being. But it's tough for me not to side with the Hillcrists. That's a surprising place to find myself in because they're so conservative and entitled, but their conservation extends to preserving the land and protecting the tenants who live on it; people whom Hornblower is perfectly happy to evict in order to have cottages for his workers.
In fact, the simmering feud is brought to a sloppy, overflowing boil exactly because Hornblower is tossing out an old couple that he'd promised could keep their home. Hillcrist had sold some land to Hornblower under those conditions, but Hornblower reneges with the explanation that he'd made that promise under the assumption that he'd be able to get some other land that he hasn't been able to acquire. Since those plans fell through, he doesn't feel bound by any assurances he made based on them.
As far as I'm concerned, Hornblower fires the first shot, so it's tough for me to feel badly for his clan, no matter how ruthless the Hilcrists get in fighting him. The script tries to increase the Hilcrists' culpability by having Mr. Hilcrest say at the end that he'd forgotten all about the old tenants. The implication is that he got caught up in hatred for its own sake. But even if he forgot his reasons for going to war, I never did.
It's not that I feel that the justness of the Hillcrests' cause also justifies all their actions. But it does put me on a particular side early in the movie and nothing happens to pull me off of it. The Hillcrests' ruthlessness takes the form of their learning a nasty secret about a member of the Hornblower family and being willing to use it to extort good behavior from the Hornblowers. There's some debate to be had here, but my feeling in the movie is that the Hornblowers are acting so dishonorably that if they're going to have nasty secrets, then those can be used against them to make them do what they should have been doing in the first place. The movie doesn't think so though, and I imagine that there are viewers who agree with it. It's a great topic for discussion.
I also love that the film ends as it begins, on the son and daughter who like each other. The story doesn't focus on them as it unfolds, but it does check in on them a couple of times and their friendship has been tested through these events. The final shot is of their reaction to the tragedy that's been done: they grab each other's hand.
In Romeo and Juliet the tragedy happens to the young people and makes the old folks put aside their differences in response. In The Skin Game the old people more directly suffer the consequences of their deeds while the young people promise that things are going to change in their generation. I much prefer the strength and hope of the latter message. Sea Devils(1931)
Super low budget movie about an escaped convict who stows aboard a ship with mutinous treasure-hunters in order to find the ones who framed him for murder. It's complicated a little by the presence of the captain's daughter, but mostly it's a straightforward plot and told simply. It's short though and I enjoyed it.
Corsair (1931)
Great concept about a disgruntled stock broker who takes to piracy to hurt his former boss' extra-curricular bootlegging operation. But it ends up in this weird place where our "hero" - having taken down his enemy - rejoins him in business and renews a romantic relationship with the boss' awful, manipulative daughter. Instead of giving them their comeuppance, he validates that they were just fine all along. Ugh.
Rich and Strange(1931)
I'm always nervous when adultery plays a major role in a movie, because I hate when it's glamorized. That's not the case here though in this early Hitchcock story about a couple who take a long, ocean voyage and are both tempted to be unfaithful. Both spouses make mistakes - one way more than the other - but the movie is honest and serious about exploring the consequences of those actions.
It reminds me some of the theme of Gone Girl, about the masks that we wear, even in marriage. But unlike Gone Girl, Rich and Strange deals with the unmasking in a real, human way and I love it for that. Joan Barry is especially powerful in her role and I'm sad that she retired from filmmaking a few years after this.
Not an easy movie to watch, but worth it in the end. I'll probably enjoy it even more next time. Law of the Sea(1931)
This made a cool double-feature with Rich and Strange since both are about infidelity and life at sea. Rich and Strange more closely connects the two by testing the commitment of a married couple on a long, ocean voyage. In Law of the Sea, a young sailor is tempted by the cousin of his fiancée.
This happens on shore, but sea life is very much part of the movie, especially since the young sailor still struggles with a tragic incident that occurred at sea 20 years earlier. Unfortunately, it's just as he's trying to come to terms with his feelings about the two women that he's also forced to confront the instigator of his childhood tragedy. That's a lot to deal with and the movie handles it well, up to a point. That point is the last scene, which wraps things up more quickly and neatly than I'd like, but Law of the Sea is still an interesting movie.
