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Post by Ish Kabbible on Mar 18, 2016 22:26:08 GMT -5
Could not sit thru 4 straight Mickey and Judy films , so I'll intersperse them with a boxset from Universal Studios titled Pre-Code Hollywood
Hot Saturday (1932) Cary Grant, Nancy Caroll, Randolph Scott, Grady Sutton
Maryville USA.A small town where everyone knows everyone's business. Ruth (Caroll) is a fun-loving but virtuous girl working as a bank clerk. All the single males try to date her from the bank but she's not interested on them. Romer (Grant) is a well to do playboy who scandalizes the town by having women stay the night at his place. He too has his eyes on Ruth and invites all the bank employees to his place for an alcoholic fueled party, planning to make time with Ruth. But Ruth hops onto a motorboat with one of the bankers for a joy rife. Miles away he turns into Mr. Octopus. She refuses his advances so he strands her far away from the party. By the time she walks back the party is quite over. Romer gives her a ride home in the middle of the night. The town busybodies gossip about what time Ruth got back home. She loses her job for being immoral. Her mother thinks she's a slut. Ah..the good old days
Grant's 6th feature film and he's 100% into the Cary Grant persona unlike some earlier movies. it's Grant's first leading role.Good production values. Grady Sutton I find as a wonderful hapless character actor. Sleight film up until the scandal starts and then it's quite good. Naughtiest bit: Ruth finds her little sister rummaging through Ruth's lingerie drawer and notices some panties missing. The sister feigns innocence. Ruth reaches underneath her sister's dress and pulls them off. That scene couldn't be repeated for decades
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Mar 18, 2016 23:32:54 GMT -5
A fantastic sequence from my next viewed movie
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Post by berkley on Mar 19, 2016 0:15:20 GMT -5
Another Cary Grant movie to go on my list.
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Mar 19, 2016 13:38:08 GMT -5
Strike Up The Band (1940) Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, June Preisser
Mickey and Judy organize their high school band into an orchestra to compete for a radio show contest
After the blockbuster earnings of Babes In Arms, within months MGM rushed out the two again in a similar format along with director Busby Berkeley and June Preisser. Preisser is adorable with her kupie doll looks and cute voice. Always plays Judy Garland's rival for Mickey's affections. Plus she's a great athletic dancer and contortionist . Has this signature move wher she flops on the floor , on her chest, and does a tumblesalt. Ouch!!
Mickey Rooney is given loads of opportunity to play his real-life favorite instrument, the drums. He's pretty good at it to.
Yes, stuffed with corn and can be enjoyed by me in controlled doses. Berkeley's extravagant dance numbers sure do help.
Oh, and that video clip I posted yesterday? That was the very first piece of special effects done by George Pal for Hollywood
Here's June Preisser from Babes In Arms so you know what I'm talking about. Looks-wise she reminds me of Christine Aguilera
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Mar 19, 2016 18:32:40 GMT -5
Be Here to Love Me: A Film About Townes Van Zandt (2005)
A documentary about the life of singer/songwriter Townes Van Zandt. Excellent look at one of the great sonwriters of the last half of the 20th Century and a truly troubled soul. Townes died at 52 from complications of a life of substance abuse, leaving a legacy of some of the most beautiful songs written in the time period and having inspired a generation of musicians.
Very good documentary looking at the life of an incredible talent.
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Post by Hoosier X on Mar 19, 2016 20:43:04 GMT -5
I'm about halfway through Which Way to the Front?, one of Jerry Lewis's later movies. It's not hugely entertaining but it's not hard to watch either. I'm enjoying it.
It gets more points for being weird than it does for ever actually being funny.
It also gets a lot of points for all the weird cameos, like Kathleen Freeman, Mike Mazurki and Joe Besser (one of the replacement Three Stooges). There's a bunch more.
George Takei is in this movie! Martin Kosleck is in this movie!
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Mar 20, 2016 0:22:56 GMT -5
Pre-Code Hollywood Collection Boxset
Torch Singer (1933) Claudette Colbert. Baby LeRoy
Claudette can't afford to care for her illegitimate (a post-code no-no) baby and is forced to put her up for adoption. 4 years later Claudette is finally a successful singer, although she specializes in sultry torch songs. Claudette is visiting a radio station when the woman who is to be the lead voice for a kiddie program gets microphone-fright and can't speak. Claudette jumps in and does the kiddie show under a different name. She becomes an instant radio star. Can she keep her tortch song background a secret from the public? Or that she is an out-of-wedlock mom? And can she use the radio show to track down the whereabouts of her child? And what happens when the father appears from nowhere after all these years?
Ya gotta love this stuff.Plus Baby LeRoy without W.C.Fields. A much neglected little gem of a film. Claudia Colbert does a great job as well
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Post by The Captain on Mar 20, 2016 10:51:44 GMT -5
Well, I finally got around to watching Citizen Kane last night with my wife, and I can certainly see why it is considered a masterpiece.
Although the ending had long been spoiled for me, my wife somehow still had no idea what "Rosebud" was. We were about 3/4 of the way through the movie, and she turned to me and said "it's probably something stupid, like his dog or his sled." I just had to bite my lip and laugh inside until we got to the end.
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Post by Hoosier X on Mar 20, 2016 11:38:24 GMT -5
Well, I finally got around to watching Citizen Kane last night with my wife, and I can certainly see why it is considered a masterpiece. Although the ending had long been spoiled for me, my wife somehow still had no idea what "Rosebud" was. We were about 3/4 of the way through the movie, and she turned to me and said "it's probably something stupid, like his dog or his sled." I just had to bite my lip and laugh inside until we got to the end. The first time I saw Citizen Kane, I was about 14 and I saw that it was scheduled for about 2 a.m. on one of the broadcast stations. I was trying to broaden my classic films horizons past monster movies and Tarzan and Abbot and Costello, so I stayed up to watch it. And I dozed off at the end. I saw the scene where they are throwing everything into the fire, and the camera moves closer and closer, and it was so late at that point that I dozed off in the final seconds and didn't know what "Rosebud" was. I asked my mom and dad and some of my relatives, but nobody knew what Rosebud was. And this was before you could look it up on the Internet just like that. But a few months later, maybe a year or more later, I was reading an Iron Man comic (I forget which issue it was, but I remember the Bob Layton art), there's a sequence where Tony Stark is trying to solve a mystery and he just keeps hitting a dead end. He's feeling very frustrated. He's sitting at the bar mulling things over. (I think it's a bar at a hotel or maybe on a luxury ocean liner.) He turns to the drunk sitting next to him and says something like: "Do you know anything?" And the drunk says: "Hic. Rosebud's the sled." So a drunk at a bar in a comic book told me what Rosebud was. |
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Post by Hoosier X on Mar 20, 2016 12:02:01 GMT -5
I watched Reflection in a Golden Eye (1967) last night. Based on its reputation as a famously bad movie, I expected it might be hard to watch. I started it very late, almost 10 p.m. I have the flu that's been going around, which is leaving me very fatigued so I slept until almost noon yesterday. So even though I was very tired at 10 p.m., I wasn't at all sleepy because I'd only been awake for ten hours.
So I sat up in bed and played with the cat while I watched Reflections in a Golden Eye.
I don't want to say too much about it. Part of what I enjoyed was the mystery of the film. I found it very entertaining and watchable, and I was actually kind of fascinated by the proceedings.
On the other hand, it's very weird and I admit that I understand its bad reputation. I really have no idea who I would ever recommend this to. I think it's certainly worth a try for anybody who's a fan of John Huston, Elizabeth Taylor and Marlon Brando because they all do some amazing work here. (Julie Harris, Brian Keith and Robert Forster are all really good too.)
It starts off with a quote that implies that one of the characters is gong to be murdered.
And you're not very far into the movie before you realize every character has a good reason to kill one or two (or more!) of the others.
It's set on a military base in the South. Marlon Brando is a colonel, a military instructor with a speech impediment. Elizabeth Taylor is his army-brat wife. They don't get along. Brian Keith is also an officer at the base. He lives next door with Julie Harris (his crazy wife) and Anacleto (the Filipino caretaker). Robert Forster is an enlisted man who is good with horses but doesn't do too well with people.
There's drinking and yelling and horse-riding and brush-clearing. Also, some naked horse-riding. Eventually they get around to the murder.
I was mesmerized. Your mileage may vary.
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Post by Hoosier X on Mar 20, 2016 12:18:15 GMT -5
Regarding Which Way to the Front?:
Jerry Lewis assassinates Hitler.
Who would have thought Jerry Lewis would beat Quentin Tarantino to the punch by forty years?
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Post by Prince Hal on Mar 20, 2016 13:14:45 GMT -5
Well, I finally got around to watching Citizen Kane last night with my wife, and I can certainly see why it is considered a masterpiece. Although the ending had long been spoiled for me, my wife somehow still had no idea what "Rosebud" was. We were about 3/4 of the way through the movie, and she turned to me and said "it's probably something stupid, like his dog or his sled." I just had to bite my lip and laugh inside until we got to the end. And then, as Paul Harvey used to intone, "There's the (possible) rest of the story." www.theguardian.com/unsolvedmysteries/story/0,,1155656,00.html |
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Mar 21, 2016 1:03:55 GMT -5
Babes On Broadway (1941) Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland
Mickey and his two buddies are struggling to get on Broadway, singing instead in spaghetti joints. Mickey meets Judy and they organize their own production with the profits going to needy children
Been there done that. 3rd go-round with director Busby Berkeley (but no June Preisser-sigh). Pretty much the same ol' same ol' by now and with a two hour running time it feels quite a bit bloated. Judy and Mickey are fun to watch and highly energetic but a half hour easily should have been cut. You get a child prodigy on piano spotlight for no reason and a salute to England to keep up an upper chin against Fritz. And once again a big minstrel blackface finale
On the positive side there is a great impersonation by Rooney of Carmen Miranda as he sings one of her signature songs in drag and big platform shoes. This movie also introduces the classic song "How About You"
I'd probably appreciate it more if I space these films out once a year. Well, there is just one more left in the collection so lets push on
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Mar 21, 2016 1:26:07 GMT -5
Pre-Code Hollywood Collection Boxset
Murder at the Vanities (1934) Carl Brisson, Victor McLaglen, Jack Oakie, Kitty Carlisle
OMG, this boxset of films is getting better and better.
A series of near-fatal accidents and then actual murders are taking place during a big stage show that features dozens of gorgeous ladies. But the show must go on even as the police inspector investigates the crime
Released just a few months before the code clampdown, this movie probably pushed the limits just as far as it could go. The show girls throughout the movie usually are wearing the skimpiest outfits that can be shown, in fact sometimes its just well placed hands or little fig leaves hifding their bosoms. Lots and lots of legs too. Duke Ellington and his orchestra come out midway to do a number. And you'll hear the song 'Sweet Marijuana" in all its glory. It was legal at that point in time. Blood drips from the rafters, art deco scenery and a leering inspector McLaglen who finds it hard to concentrate on police work with all them dames around
Leading man Carl Brisson is a terrible, terrible, terrible actor. He is so bad that he's fun to watch. His singing sucks as well. Kitty Carlisle makes her debut here. I remember Kitty later in her life as a long time panelist on the What's My Line TV show.
Such a goofy, nutty and risque flick. Catch it if you can
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Post by Hoosier X on Mar 21, 2016 9:52:49 GMT -5
I watched Conan the Destroyer last night. OMG! It's HILARIOUS!
Arnold Schwarzenegger. Wilt Chamberlain. Mako. Sarah Douglas. Tracey Walter. Jeff Corey.
Olivia d'Abo takes it all SO SERIOUSLY! She was cracking me up.
But Grace Jones steals the show. I would have totally watched a ZULA TV show in the 1980s.
I shouldn't have been so surprised at how entertaining it was. Conan the Destroyer was directed by Richard Fleischer, who also directed The Narrow Margin, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Soylent Green, See No Evil, Fantastic Voyage and Red Sonja. And he was the son of Max Fleischer, who did all those awesome Betty Boop, Popeye and Superman cartoons.
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