THE INDISPENSABLE CARY GRANT

According to Bill Libby's 1978-1979 poll, Cary Grant had more films cited as favorites by film fans than any other actor, yet critical acclaim has largely escaped Grant. He is one of the many acting greats who have failed to achieve that pinnacle of industry acclaim, the award of an Oscar. I wrote these opening lines in 1986 when I did a second evaluation of Grant's work. It seems appropriate to update once more the list of best films for one of America's most distinguished actors, the English born Archie Leach, Grant's real name.

Grant's failure to win an Oscar can probably be attributed to his particular skill at playing light sophisticated comedy. Because of this he was largely cast in such roles, which are much last likely to be attributed as best performances as compared to more serious roles. During his long career Grant received only two nominations. The first of these, was a tear-jerker called "Penny Serenade" with co-star Irene Dunne who often played opposite Grant and had very similar comedic skills. The Penny Serenade is entertaining, but would probably be seen as a bit on the corny side by today's audiences.

The second Oscar nomination was for a genuinely serious picture, the dark "None But the Lonely Heart" where Grant played a cockney loser without much in the way of a warm nature. This picture has all the qualities of a typical Film Noir

Early in the life of Mensa Classic Films we developed a concept of five films of a particular type or featuring a particular performer or director that we could take with us to an imagingary Desert Island. This provided a convenient way of listing our favorites. However when it came to doing Cary Grant a real problem developed in coming up with only five Grant films, so we compromised and named a top five followed by three more of almost the same prime classification.

Without further ado, here are the Big Five, and as usual, in alphabetical order:

o Gunga Din

o None But the Lonely Heart

o Only Angels Have Wings

o Philadelphia Story

o Topper

The near three, that we would probably be just as happy with in exchange for any of the above are:

o Arsenic and Old Lace

o Bringing Up Baby

o North by Northwest

Those eight films cover a span of 23 years and indicate Grant's enduring skill

Gunga Din - Adventure par excellence and surely one of the all-time favorite films in this genre. The north Indian frontier, the British Raj and that line of aristocratic officers, dedicated soldiers and native warriors opposing the hordes that come out of the mountains and through the passes in an attempt to overrun India. Victor McLaglen and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. are Grant's cohorts, and Sam Jaffe is memorable in the title role. (See Classic Films issue no. 40, June 1985 for the writer's critique).

None but the Lonely Heart - Grant in probably his most serious role received a nomination for best actor but was panned by some critics and but grudgingly liked by others. He plays a cockney son of Ethel Barrymore and is loved by two women, the sensitive Jane Wyatt and June Duprez of the sensual almond-shaped eyes. Grant is the neer-do-well Ernie Mott in a film set in a dark London area of crime and deprivation.

Only Angels Have Wings - One of our favorite films on the early days of aviation, with grant playing the charismatic leader of a floundering airline in equatorial south America with the amazed and anguished Jean Arthur, the cool and reserved Rita Hayworth, and a crew of enthusiastic pilots played by a number of Hollywood's finest supporting players. (see our issue No. 3, Jan. 1982 for a review of the film).

Philadelphia Story - Grant as the super-sophisticated C.K. Dexter Haven, unconquerable Katherine Hepburn as the soon-to-be conquered Tracy Lord, and a host of other outstanding character players in this period piece on Mainline Philadelphians in the years before World War II. (The writer reviewed this film in Classic Films issue Number 17, March 1983).

Topper - The earliest film in our list with Grant in another sophisticated role accompanied by excellent support from Constance Bennett, our favorite role for the latter. They're the madcap Kirbys of wealth and ectoplasm. Roland Young is the mousy banker they reeducate, and Billie Burke is the banker's stiff and bossy wife plagued with dyspepsia.

Of the films in this list, the movie fans via the L.A. Times survey of 1978 rated "Philadelphia Story" as the 48th best top film of all time. "Gunga Din" finished 95th. "Bringing Up Baby" and "Northwest by Northwest" were in the top 100. The most recent survey of the Internet Movie Data Base ratings listed North by Northwest as the most favored Grant film followed by Notorious. Both of these films used the spy environment as a basic setting.

In the five year period following my development of the Cary Grant list of favored film, I had the opportunity of seeing various Grant pictures a number of times. One film which I would include in my all time favorite list would be "Sylvia Scarlett" another Grant co-starrer with Katherine Hepburn. This film was made in 1935 and featured Grant in his only other performance playing with a cockney accent. Grant is a hustler in this film and has become acquainted with Edmund Gwenn and Katherine Hepburn in a cross channel journey from France to England. The latter pair have had to flee France because of the father's shenanigans. The three form a team and skuldugger as best they can with mixed success. Grant does not know that Hepburn is a girl since she is always dressed in boys clothing. In the attempt to escape France she has had her hair cut and is dressed in mens clothes posing as her father's son. It is a very different and off beat film for all three performers and one certainly worth watching. Grant performs an English music hall song or two in his cockney accent.

Grant has another vocal which he delivers in a nice baritone voice in the World War I aviation film called "Suzy," Grant plays a French flying office and co-stars with Franchot Tone. The female lead is Jean Harlow who Grant meets in a French cafe where Harlow is an entertainer. After she does her vocal piece, "Did I Remember," a really lovely and very plaintive song, he gets up and proves to her he can do it from memory. Much like Rex Harrison in "My Fair Lady" Grant does the song half singing and half reciting.

Both "Sylvia Scarlett" and "Suzy" rank pretty far down the list of favorite Grant films. Grant also sang a couple of numbers in the peculiar farce "Kiss and Makeup." Grant is a cosmetic beauty expert in France, which I find hard to believe. Perhaps the most interesting part of this film is Toby Wing who did the "Young and Healthy" number with Dick Powell in "42nd Street" without speaking a line, and who has a couple of lines in this film while disrobing down to her undergarments.

Another of Grant's really funny roles was that of newspaper editor Walter Burns in "His Girl Friday." Grant played opposite Rosalind Russell, Ralph Bellamy and a slew of great supporting character actors in the remake of Hecht and MacArthur's "Front Page." This film is one of the principal "Fast Paced Films" that I reviewed in Classic Films issue number 28 in February of 1984.

Grant had two very successful comedies made in early in his career playing opposite co-star Irene Dunne. Irene Dunne's comedic talents are readily notable in the two films. In the first, "The Awful Truth" Grant and Dunne have grown tired of each other and gotten a divorce. The main problem with the divorce is who gets the dog, played by the venerable Asta of the Thin Man series of films made with William Powell and Myrna Loy. After the divorce Dunne has taken up with Ralph Bellamy, playing one of his dopey guys, this time a cowboy from Texas who lives with his mother.

In "My Favorite Wife" Grant remarries after his wife is declared legally dead. She had been on an archaeological expedition in the south Pacific and was presumed to have drowned. She arrives back when Grant gets married accompanied by her companion for seven years, Randolph Scott who had survived with her on a desert island, which of course causes Grant much internal. It's a delightfully silly film which ends with Grant dressed up in a Santa Claus outfit wishing Dunne a Merry Christmas in the attic of a mountain cabin. You will have to see the film to understand the whole significance of the scene.

When I wrote much of this in 1986 I noted that I had seen several of my favorite Grant films on the tube. In addition I have been exposed to a number of other Grant films that I was largely unaware of, including DVD's of some earlier and later films. I might note that one film I really enjoyed was "Thirty Day Princess" which starred Silvia Sydney in the key role of an out of work American actress being hired to portray a princess form a ruritarian like country from the Balkans. Her performance is terrific in both roles. Grant plays a newspaper publisher who is much against the Princess's visit, she's here to help float a loan for her impoverished country. After meeting her, played by the out of work actress, Grant falls in love. Edward Arnold plays the wealthy Bank President who is behind the loan.

Back in 1986 there was a lot of controversy over the process of colorizing films which was largely a brain child of Ted Turner of Turner Classic Movies. Fortunately the enthusiasm for this process has largely disappeared. I worried of their attempting to apply it in particular to a dark stark black and white film noir type picture like 'None But the Lonely Heart."

Grant remains a class by himself. Of modern day actors only George Clooney has some of the same charisma. Clooney has worked in a far greater range of productions. He has shown real comedic abilities including spoofing his persona. Cary Grant was once asked about the Cary Grant mystique and he commented, "Everybody wants to be Cary Grant, even I would like to be Cary Grant.

The Passing of Desiree Kennelley, Editor of CLASSIC FILMS

Des Kennelley passed away on December 4th. It was a great loss for those of us who were associated with her in the production of Classic Films through the early and middle 1980's. As a Mensa society Special Interest Group (SIG), it attracted a number of readers both from members of the society and from other readers who came into contact with it.

Des had special skills when it came to both writing and editing the newsletter. She had an instinctive knowledge of communicating through the written word. And, her background both educationally and in career positions culminated with several years experience as a technical editor in the aerospace business.

I first met Des in 1980, after I had accepted a position as a Proposal Development Specialist with GenCorp's Aerojet ElectroSystems Division. That job entailed both writing and putting together the management portions of the Division's new business acquisition organization primarily in Space System activities involving sensing technologies. The work I did called for me to interface with the Editing Department. Des was somewhat unique at the time, the only woman in a group with several men. It took a lot of convincing on her part to convince the Manager of that department to accept a woman in that responsibility.

After a few contacts with Des, I discovered two things: one, that we were both members of Mensa; and two, that we had a lifetime interest in films. Putting two and two together, we convinced Mensa, not a difficult task, to let us provide a Newsletter for a new SIG of our invention. Thus the birth of the Classic Films SIG and our newsletter.

My contacts with Des in the process of producing the monthly newsletter led to discussions of her family history. Though having a basic family background of many generations in England, she was actually born in Scotland in the early 1920s. This was a product of her father's position as Manager of a regional Igranic facility. Igranic was the largest of what we would call today an Electronics firm in Britain. Its headquarters were in Bedford, England. Des's early years were spent in Scotland but eventually she moved to Bedford when her father became the firm's overall General Manager. She told me at one time that her father spent a considerable amount of money with a language coach to correct her Gladwegian Scotch burr when speaking. You might get an idea of this accent by seeing a video. There is a review of the very entertaining Gregory's Girl in Classic Films issue No. 42, April 1985. In a trip to Britain in 1988, I was exposed to English accents at the Falconberg Arms, the little hotel we stayed at in Coxwold, England. This little village is in Yorkshire about 25 miles north of the city of York. I talked to the maitre d' at the hotel's pub about one peculiar accent. I noted one of his employees was a man I could never understand at all and inquired where he was from, figuring it must be somewhere far away. No, I was told, this particular chap lived about 20 miles away.

At some point in time in her early years, Des caught Scarlet Fever. This disease was far more serious in those days than it is today. The severity was learned by Des when her parents came to visit her in the hospital, while she was recovering, and she asked why everyone was whispering. Her mother burst into tears when she realized Des had suffered damage to the eardrums which is one of the bad possibilities from Scarlet Fever. While going to school in those earlier days she had to carry a small box which served as an listening device. Later, as technology advanced, she acquired the first of many hearing aids.

She told me a lot about the war years in Britain. Bedford is about 40 miles north of London, so that the Blitz affected it as well. Children were evacuated out of London into nearby communities; Des's mother took in four from London's east side, not the most promising part of London. It was quite a learning experience to have these young girls living with them. One of the older girls sent them Christmas cards for a couple years after their stay.

Another peculiarity of the bombing incidents was people's attitude relative to the excitement during the noise of bomb explosions, firing of anti-aircraft guns, fires and fighting fires. This often resulted in passionate occurrences that would probably not have happened except for the excitement induced by air raids. Two British films of the Battle of Britain, where these kinds of exciting happenings occur are Danger UXB, the Masterpiece Theatre series starring Anthony Andrews, and Hope and Glory, the semi-autobiographical film by John Boorman. In the first of these, Andrews lives in a boarding house where his military job is defusing German-dropped, unexploded bombs, UXB's. The owner of the boarding house has a very nubile daughter played by Carol Watling, who entices Andrews on occasion when bombs are falling and she is dressed in either a filmy nightgown or just her panties and bra. In Hope and Glory, teenager Sammi Davis is overcome by the excitement of an air raid and finds herself in a ruined building making love to a Canadian soldier she has met in a pub. Des said these kinds of events were not unusual during the war years, but she assured me that she was never affected that way.

Later during the war she worked for a government office in Bedford that was responsible for assuring agricultural pests, particularly from American Lend Lease, did not end up feasting on British crops. This was fun work, according to her.

There were many airbases surrounding Bedford. Many of these were American bases. She and some of her friends became acquainted with American officers from these bases at Canteens that offered food, relaxation and dancing. Des met an Officer at one of the bases who became a steady date. After the war he returned home and she eventually came to America with her mother and older sister. She stopped in Kansas on the way west and discovered that the old fire had disappeared and the relationship was over.

She told me of one other wartime event, a trip she and her sister and a number of others made to Paris after that city had been liberated. Those were exciting times with the French reacquiring freedom, and the air was filled with festivity. She met a man who had been a member of the Norwegian underground who had been fighting in Norway. It was interesting to her to meet someone who had actually been involved with that kind of war.

Des, her mother, and sister located in Santa Monica. While there her sister had a heart attack, the same disease that had struck her father just before the start of the war. Margaret, the sister was only 40 at the time.

While in Santa Monica Des got a job at the big Rexall main drugstore at La Cienega and Beverly in Los Angeles. At the time it was the largest drugstore in the United States. There she met Joe Kennelley, who worked there as well and who she eventually married. They were blessed with two sons, Chris and Cam. Both these boys are married, to Holly and Rose respectively, and between them there are two daughters each, Brook and Lauren for Chris and Holly, and Erica and Megan for Cam and Rose.

Des passed on this family history to me over time including many other events of interest, including discussions of her four granddaughters and her daughter-in-laws. Since this is supposed to be about her experience with Classic Films, we should pursue that area. Des was an outstanding writer and a great editor. She once told me that it would be nice if I had learned to spell in school and had also received some sort of instruction in the proper use of punctuation. All I could say was that the teachers tried, but they didn't have that much to work with.

Her first review in our very first issue was the wonderful World War II film called Brief Encounter that starred the doe-eyed Cecilia Johnson and the craggy faced Trevor Howard. It was a very romantic story and was beautifully reviewed by Des. To a certain extent, Des concentrated on British films, though she has a number of reviews of American-made favorites. In our initial discussions of movies I first connected to her when I noted I was familiar with an English-made fantasy film she mentioned called "Dead of Night." She was surprised I had ever heard of it, let alone seen it. It's an interesting film with five separate fantasy stories recounted by visitors to a house for a party. The ending is very surprising and makes you want to think about what you saw before.

As this is the Christmas Season, I would like to call particular attention to Des's Christmas commentaries, which dealt with Christmas practices and events while she was growing up in Britain. These are fun to read and allow for comparison with times past and celebration in Britain as compared with today here. These are in Issue 26, Dec. 1983 and Number 50 in Dec. 1985. They are quite entertaining and discuss recipes, party activities and the like. It is Des's writings on England and how things differed there that I find most interesting in her work.

We will really miss Des. Her son Cam told me she was a very underassuming person who was last in line for blowing her own horn. I would have to agree with him. You really needed to talk to her and bring out her interesting history. She was a pleasure to work with and fun as well. Her insults of my writing performance were always very carefully laid out to assure that I was well aware that she was just teasing.

Desiree Kennelley, 1922 - 2008, a person really worth knowing.

Dick Gardner, Classic Films

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ELENA ET LES HOMMES (1956)

I wrote a review of this film back in 1986. It starred Ingrid Bergman in what was a truly a delightful comedy in lovely color but which proved to be a box office failure. I hadn't seen it since 1986 when I followed up on a review in the LA Times which highly recommended the film. To re-address this review I ordered a DVD copy from Netflix and viewed it again.

The film was originally filmed in both English and French. The DVD I received was in French. I always enjoy hearing French spoken, though I understand little of it. Fortunately the DVD included excellent subtitles in English.

Another feature of the DVD is an interview with the films director, Jean Renoir. Renoir made several memorable films in France before World War II devastated that country. The most famous of these are Rules of the Game and The Grand Illusion. The latter dealt with a German prisoner of war camp in the Bavarian Alps during World War I. In Rules of the Game Renoir dealt with French attitudes just before the start of World War II. It's tangled activities are somewhat similar to Renoir's work on Elena Et Les Hommes. Renoir made several films in the United States, after he fled France before the German occupation in 1940. These were largely not as successful as his earlier French output. However, one of these is a poetically beautiful film set in 1946/7 India during the British administration. This film, called The River, featured the coming of age of three young women, two of which were British. The third was a girl with an English father and Indian mother.

In the interview with Renoir he discussed why he made Elena Et Les Hommes. He had decided he wanted to make a film starring Ingrid Bergman and that he wanted it to be a comedy. After analyzing what he wanted to do, he presented his ideas to her, and she agreed to do the film.

As I mentioned before, the film didn't attract audiences in either the US or France though this was for entirely different reasons. At that time, 1956, naturalism was the name of the game. Films depicted life, the sordid, the untamed, the degeneration of society. Stemming from the neo-realism of the postwar Italian film makers, spreading into France where the new wave of directors emulated the realism of Renoir of the thirties, and into America where the film noir was at it peak. The French were strong adherents to film naturalism, and the frothy Elena Et Les Hommes was completely out of step with filmgoer interests and attitudes. In that sense it was typical of American escapist films of the thirties and war years, which dealt quite often with wealth and the wealthy.

In the United States, a different reality short-circuited Elena Et Les Hommes. The film's star, the beautiful Ingrid Bergman was then falling into her exile and disgrace for having succumbed to raw romance with Italian film director Roberto Rosselini, while making his production Stromboli. The general population who had pedestaled Bergman in the '40s now turned against her in vengeance for her perceived flawed behavior, resulting in a general resistance to seeing her films. So alas, Elena et les Hommes died a quick and complete death.

Back in the fall of 1986 the film was revived and given a one-week showing at West LA's Nuart Theatre, one of the revival houses then operated in the LA area by the Landmark Theatre's group. Michael Wilminton's review in the LA Times indicated that it would be worth the writer's time to drive the nearly 40 miles for a viewing. It was a decision that I was glad I made for the film was indeed a delight and a pleasure to watch. it was beautifully mounted, with gorgeous costumes in keeping with its time frame of the 1880s and was loosely based on French history. In addition to the beautiful Ingrid Bergman it starred from the distaff side Juliete Greco and two male leads in the presence of France's handsome Jean Marais and Puerto Rico's Mel Ferrar. Renoir had captured much of the light fluffiness that one found in Gigi a few years later.

I will only touch briefly on the story. Elena, Ingrid Bergman, is an impoverished Polish princess, who needs to marry well to assure financial well being for herself and her servants. She has been betrothed to a silly young pianist, but finds more opportunity in a wealthy up and coming merchant in shoes and boots. She attends a great street/sidewalk fete celebrating Bastille Day, with the merchant, and in the crush of the celebrating crowd she becomes separated from him. This is a beautifully done scene, loaded with people, excitement, brilliant costuming, confetti, streamers and the joy of life. In the crush Elena is aided by a handsome young man, mel Ferrar, who is a friend of the French military hero of the time General Rollan (Marais). All France is in love with the general, including Bergman as Elena, and this is where the slight touch of history fits, since Rollan is loosely based on France's Boulanger, whose followers pushed a crisis in the 1880s.

Elena and Rollan first meet through the offices of Ferrar; he is Henri in the film, a wealthy but basically not very active man.

Following this long opening episode the film switches to the second of its three settings, a beautiful estate/chateau. The army is involved in military maneuvers nearby and Rollan is, of course, a participant. Bertin, the wealthy bootmaker, owns the estate, and has invited Elena to spend a weekend there. A typical Gaelic farce of misidentification, liaison, and revelry then ensues including a duel and a sumptuous banquet. Bertin's son falls in love with Bergman's maid, though he is betrothed to another. Bertin is planning on a big wedding. All kinds of confusion results between the various principals, including Rollan, who also visits the estate.

The final scene is set in a brothel in another part of France. This is a very idealized brothel. The scene involves some very humorous dialogue. Intrigue is in the air, since the supporters of Rollan are trying to talk him into taking over the government and setting up a dictatorship. Gypsies are also a part of the activities. Elena arrives for a liaison with Rollan. There are escapes and mistaken identities, and the film quickly moves towards its conclusion with nothing really decided except that an important incident in history has occurred. These are exciting times in the lives of several people when the film reaches its lighthearted close, with Elena's selection of the dispassionate Ferrar as the man she really loves.

The film doesn't sound like much in the telling, but it really is a charming piece. Bergman is never more beautiful, full figured, her erotic mouth ever set in a delightful smile with her brilliant teeth adding to her delicious appearance. She is also beautifully gowned. The film, in fact, resounds in gorgeous costuming, for both female and male performers. All in all it's a delightful film, one that any viewer who loves the presentation of nostalgic pieces in a fantasy world will surely love.

Dick Gardner, Classic Films

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L.A. Confidential

A few weeks ago the LA Times did a special on films devoted to those situated in Los Angeles. This list had one caveat in that the films had to be released in the previous 25 years, which meant only pictures released from 1984 on would be considered.

Being a resident of Southern California I was immediately interested in examining the list. I was surprised to learn that I had seen only seven of the 25 films selected by the newspapers film critics. It was also easy for me to come up with a complementary list of twelve additional films, most of which I felt could have easily been substituted for some of the films on the Times' list. However, most impressive to me was their selection of L.A. Confidential as the most important film made during this period with a Los Angeles setting.

I would totally agree with that judgment and would note that L.A. Confidential would probably rank very high in any list of the best pictures over all during the time period specified. Surprising as it may seem, L.A. Confidential didn't win the best picture Academy Award for that year. That was the year of Titanic, a film that won several awards. Today, as an after thought, I checked the comparative merits of the two films and found that L.A. Confidential ranks much higher on rating lists.

Kim Basinger was the only Academy Award winner for a performance in L.A. Confidential, when she won for best actress in a supporting role. Basinger received nominations from several other groups and was named as either best actress or best supporting actress in two such groups. The BAFTA, the British equivalent to the Academy Awards named her best actress. All three of the male leads, Guy Pearce, Kevin Spacey and Russell Crowe received nominations from other award organizations with Spacey receiving two such nominations including a best actor win, while Pearce and Crowe received one nomination each.

The film was derived from a novel by James Ellroy which dealt with Los Angeles crime and law enforcement in the period shortly after World War II during the late 40's and early 50's. Ellroy's book, as with Academy Award winner Chinatown a few years earlier, borrows from some real LA history. The movie opens with a Christmas Eve jailhouse assault on Mexican-American youths that had occurred a few years earlier in LA. He used this thread to develop a story that delves deeply into police corruption, which was not a new, isolated event LA.

To develop this theme the film focused on four members of the police department, Ed Exley played by Guy Pearce, Jack Vincennes played by Kevin Spacey and Bud White played by Russell Crowe, plus in addition the Captain of the detective bureau, Dudley Smith played by James Cromwell.

The story is complicated and quite realistic until a shoot-out in the end involving various members of the police department. Though the later event is overdone, it doesn't take away from the central premise involving crime and law enforcement.

Kim Basinger, Danny DeVito and David Strathaim have important supporting roles as a call girl, a supermarket tabloid-type reporter and the operator of a high class call girl operation, respectively.

Basinger as Lynn Brackett is one of the call girl prostitutes who works for Strathaim. Strathaim as Pierce Padgett lives in a Richard Neutra designed house in the Los Feliz district which is locally famous as the Lovell Health House. DeVito as Syd Hudgens is a writer who knows all there is to know about crime and notoriety in the City. He has a working arrangement with Jack Vincennes where he gets a tip when an arrest is about to be made and in particular if the arrest involves illegal activity such as adultery, or a celebrity.

The film covers the interplay of all these people plus a series of other criminal types including the real life Mickey Cohen and Johnny Stompanato. The latter was particularly interesting because of his involvement with film star Lana Turner and his eventual real life shooting by Turner's daughter.

There are numerous critiques available on the internet discussing the details of the film. What I want to do here, however, is to discuss the roles and performances by those playing the three detectives.

Guy Pearce does an excellent job at showing he's a straight shooter but also is very clever at trying to get ahead and gain stature in the department. Both of these characteristics come out early and are easy to follow as the film progresses. By the end of the film he has had several opportunities to exhibit his smarts.

Russell Crowe, on the other hand, plays an entirely different character. He's a tough guy by nature and likes to lay his weight on antagonists. Not a nice man to run into if you are a criminal or if he perceives you to be an enemy. There is some background to his behavior, which helps to explain him but not justify it. He really does the brawler role well. He also has a fixation on helping women.

Kevin Spacey has a much more difficult characterization to establish. He likes the celebrity side. He's the technical advisor for a TV show much like the old Dragnet series with Jack Webb. Yet he can be tough if motivated, and is smart but not obviously so. He also has real moral character which you gradually become aware of. Essentially, he has to project a far more complex person.

My personal opinion is that he had the hardest role to successfully
interpret.

One last thought. The concept used in the films to have prostitutes look like film actresses is actually true. There was a call girl ring operated out of the Hollywood Hills that had prostitutes dress and make up to represent particular actresses. One very popular one at the time was Jean Harlow, the peroxided blonde bombshell who was perhaps the most recognized screen actress in the middle 30's. The actress portraying Harlow had her hair peroxided and was made up to look like the actress plus some other useful tricks.

L.A. Confidential is a really thought provoking film, and like many unusually good ones, takes several viewings to really understand its complexities.

Dick Gardner, Classic Films

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ROXIE HART

I wrote a review of this film back in 1986. The film was based on a play that hit the stage in 1926 and which was followed by a silent film version the next year. In 1975 Bob Fosse developed a new musical stage version of the story, which was quite successful. In 2002 this musical was made into the film. Chicago, starring Catherine Zeta Jones and Rene Zelweiger. The latter played the Roxie Hart role. It was a very successful film and winner of several Academy Awards.

Roxie Hart, though based on largely the same characters is a different film. In 1942 the production code was in full force and placed restrictions on what you could and couldn't do. For example, screen couples, married or not always slept in twin beds. Any hanky panky scenes set in the bedroom required that one or both of the performers have one foot on the floor. The important rule effecting Roxie Hart was if someone committed a crime, they had to suffer the consequences. In the 1942 film they got around this requirement by having the murderer the story was structured around being not Roxie, but someone else.

I noted in the beginning of my review that Roxie Hart had been on the AMC channel a couple of times recently. I remember being overwhelmed with laughter at the film's spoof of Chicago during the roaring twenties when I saw it the year it was released. My memory was good, for it is still one hulluva funny film. Ginger Rogers plays the brassy Roxie, a hoofer hoping to become a star and who is charged with the murder of one Mr. Casey. The attorney who is going to get her off, "They've never hanged a woman in this county yet," is Billy Flynn, played adroitly by a flamboyant Adolph Menjou. The romantic lead, if there really is one, was George Montgomery playing a young very romantic cub reporter, Homer Howard. The film is also blessed with a wealth of fine supporting players, including the dry Lynne Overman (Jake Callahan) a cynical older reporter, Phil Silvers a very brassy newspaper photographer named Babe, William Frawley (O'Malley) an easily swayed juror, George Chandler (Amos Hart) who is low in the credits but deserving much credit for his funny portrayal of a dumb, injured husband, and Iris Adrian (Two Gun Gertie) one of Hollywood's premier hard-boiled dames of that period, and not to forget, Milton Parson who plays a deadly serious cadaverish radio announcer. During the trial, which is covered live on radio, the sponsor is an advertising doctor. In one commercial, Parsons intones, "Write us about your gallstones," This and all his lines are delivered with an ultra-serious deadpan tone. These are all mixed together with such other old pros as Sara Allgood and Spring Byington in parodies of a ladies jail matron and a genteel lady reporter, Miss Sunshine, respectively. You can think of Roxie Hart as another look at the world that MacArthur and Hecht parodied so well in Front Page. Nunnally Johnson wrote the very clever script in this film and easily equaled the former's comedic approach to Chicago, booze and crime.

The film opens with Montgomery; he talks like Clark Gable throughout the film which was apparently a trade mark of sort that he used, telling a tale in a saloon on a rainy night in Chicago in what is in the time frame of the early '40s. He is a seasoned reporter who, while downing a couple of shots, and thereby getting in the mood proceeds to tell the story of "Roxie Hart," the greatest of them all. This takes us to a flashback to 1927 with our being greeted by a couple of gunshots behind a door and being followed by two more. Later we see the police grilling Amos, who readily admits having fire the gun. Callahan is covering the shooting for his paper, when he notices a woman climbing stealthily down the fire escape. He hangs up the phone he uses, and hurriedly goes into another room, shuts the door, where we see Roxie for the first time in the form of a gum-chewing floozy with curly brown hair (it's supposed to be red for this black and white film): Ginger Rogers. Callahan charges back into the room and manages to subdue Roxie after a spirited tussle.

After he has had a chance to talk to her, he learns that she is interested in becoming a stage star. He persuades her to admit to the crime in order to assist her in achieving this career goal. He also says he will be able to line up the undisputed top attorney of that era, Billy Flynn, to handle her case. Roxie goes for the deal, and her husband, willing to be let off from the crime he committed, cooperates.

Roxie goes to jail where she quickly becomes its most famous inmate. Callahan's paper is trumpeting the case, and Amos Hart has come with almost all the $5,000.00 Flynn wants to take Roxie's case. Flynn tells him to call Roxie's parents when he hasn't got all the money. He does, and her father tells him no. After he hangs up he tells her mother, "They're going to hang Roxie." "Didn't I tell you?" the mother replies and they both go back to reading and rocking while sitting on the front porch of their little farmhouse.

Roxie is interviewed in the jail after she has had a run-in with Velma (Helen Reynolds), another lady prisoner, resulting in a kicking, scratching and hair pulling fight which is broken up by Mrs. Morton, the matron (Sara Allgood in a completely out-of-character role for her). She knocks their two heads together and exclaims, "Children, Children" to the unruly pair. Despite this outburst the interview goes on smoothly with all the reporters and Flynn in attendance, and ends up with Roxie doing the Black Bottom with everyone there joining in. This is initiated by Callahan inquiring if her Black Bottom rendition has been well received. Roxie replies, "I ain't had any complaints yet." This is one of Roger's two dance numbers. Later on she does a nice little soft shoe routine on the metal stairway in the jail.

Flynn concocts a story for Roxie, which she memorizes. It implies that the shooting of Mr. Casey was an attack of self-defense; she and the gentleman were fighting for his gun. She came up with it, shot him and says, "Everything went purple." Callahan asks, "Was it lavender or violet."

The court scenes are a riot and include a fight between the district attorney and Flynn. "No one can call me that and live," shouts Flynn after being denounced as a lying, etc., etc. by the district attorney. As Flynn tears off his coat and prepares to give battle, he whispers in the bailiff's ear, "Grab me, Billy." Fortunately several other officers have grabbed the district attorney, so the latter is not able to assault the angry Flynn being held back by the bailiff.

Flynn has singled out the jury foreman, O'Malley, as ready to eat out of his hand. This becomes quickly obvious from the performance of old pro, Bill Frawley, who does his jury scenes using his complete repertoire of facial expressions.

The trial comes to its conclusion with Roxie on the stand describing the whole incident. She had claimed to be pregnant in jail after having been reduced to second fiddle following the incarceration of the notorious "Two Gun Gertie." "Got a match, Bud," Iris Adrian in the role queries Callahan in her best hard-as-nails voice. Earlier when he was in the witness chair, Amos had declared he has divorced Roxie (when she was in jail) because, "the little stranger was too much of a stranger." Now Roxie testifying to the end finally brings up her unborn child and collapses in tears on the floor in front of the jury box. Flynn picks her up, and as Babe orders the latest in his many interruptions of the trial to get pictures. You see the cameramen flashing their old-style explosive flashes, with Roxie smiling upside down as she is held in Flynn's arms.

Well, the conclusion is obvious. Roxie goes free, O'Malley would have hung the jury even if it had taken a lifetime. The films ends with Homer (Montgomery, who as you remember has been narrating the story) going out in the rain where his wife is waiting for him. Here we see Roxie behind the wheel with about five kids. The film closes with her telling him, "Honey, I think we are going to have to get a bigger car next year."

The pleasure of Roxie Hart is essentially in the dialogue and delicious overacting. The lines are witty and well delivered. Rogers and Menjou are particularly adept, but the supporting players do a lot with small, juicy roles. If you want to see a sparkling version of Chicago's classic twenties, this will be your cup of tea.

Dick Gardner, Classic Films

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THE THREE FACES OF EVE and SYBIL

These two films deal with 'DID' Dissociate Identity Disorder sometimes known as Multiple Personality Syndrome. This is a psychological condition whose victims live in a world of inhabited imaginery and very different and diverse personalities. In each of these films detailed examples are provided on just how the individual copes with and is aware of the different personalities that make up their character.

In the 1940's there was increasing interest among film-goers of psychological problems. This was especially true in 1945 when two separate films dealt with aspects of psychology. The American film Spellbound, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, examined a man suffering from Amnesia. Gregory Peck played the patient and Ingrid Bergman had the role of the psychiatrist who eventually identified what had brought on his condition which was related to a murder Peck had witnessed. Peck played an amnesiac again several years later in the intrigue film Mirage.

The second film of note in 1945 that had psychology as a primary focus was the English film The Seventh Veil. The problem in this film dealt with a concert pianist, Ann Todd who tried to commit suicide by throwing herself into the Thames. Herbert Lom was the psychiatrist who worked with her gradually pealing away the veils that she had placed around herself mentally to cope with her psychological problems. The seventh veil was the last one he pealed away to bring her freedom from her fears. James Mason, playing one of his dark roles was her music mentor in the film. Though like Spellbound this film was a major award winner it is not currently available in a video format. About the best a viewer can get is a spoof done on the Syd Caesar Show Of Shows with Caesar in the James Mason role, Howard Morris playing the psychiatrist Lom and the very funny Imogene Coca playing the unfortunate pianist. It had the very funny revised title of The Seventh Wail.

In 1957 two psychiatric doctors wrote and had published the story of one of their patients who suffered from multiple personalities. It was called The Three Faces of Eve. The film adaptation of this book was released that same year. It starred Joanne Woodward as Eve White, a mousy girl who was suffering from memory lapses. Her husband, played by David Wayne brought her to the two doctors to see what they could find out relative to her spells. Over time the doctors discovered that Eve White was inhabited by two alter ego's. The first of these was called Eve Black. Eve Black could be readily described as a wild girl completely different in character from Eve White. She went dancing, dressed in expensive clothes and drank. Further she made fun of Eve White and couldn't stand Eve's husband. In Eve Black you saw a personality very similar to the role played by Kate Blanchet in Shipping News. One Film Critic referred to Blanchet in this performance as a real old fashioned heller.

Eve White and Eve Black were not the end of the personalities. One day while in the doctor's office, and in response to a query, another person showed up. She didn't seem to know who she was but called herself Jane. Eventually, after further treatment, the Eve White and Eve Black persons disappeared and Jane was left as the only person in the triumvirate.

Joanne Woodward's performance is extraordinary. She makes the transitions effortlessly. Eventually, the doctors only have to ask for Eve White, Eve Black or Jane and she will instantly be the other personality. Woodward's performance was rewarded by her receiving the best actress award for 1957. The principal psychiatrist was played well by Lee J. Cobb. It turned out some events of her childhood had a traumatic effect on Eve's life. Most memorable was an insistence by her mother that she kiss her dead grandmother who was lying in a coffin in her home. Eve had strongly and nearly hysterically resisted this requirement but eventually gave in and performed what was an extremely odious task for the child.

In Sybil, Joanne Woodward returned to the multiple personality role this time playing the psychiatrist, Dr. Wilbur, dealing with Sybil who was inhabited by a much greater group of personalities. Sally Field played this role and was nearly as good as Joanne Woodward was in the previous movie. She was awarded the best television actress award in the Emmy's for that year.

The film was based again on a book written by a psychiatrist who had initially treated the patient. This treatment that lasted for a period of over ten years. Early in the film we see Sybil acting as a teacher's aide in a school outing in a park. As we follow the sequence of events we note that she is very disturbed over a middle-aged woman pushing a child on a swing in the park. Gradually, we note her continuing agitation. Eventually we finding her standing ankle deep in a lake in the park with no understanding of why she is there and what brought on this bizarre behavior. That night at home she is recalling the event and humiliation when something she sees outside her apartment attracts her attention. She starts pounding on the window, breaking the glass, and cutting her hand.

She is taken to an emergency hospital where the hand is treated. Later we see Joanne Woodward talking to her there. Apparently, she had been acting strangely and the medical assistants working on her injury decide to call in psychiatric assistance. Woodward knows there is something deeply troubling the young woman, Sybil, and suggests if she ever would like to see her to call her at the phone number she provides.

Eventually Sybil is worried enough that she calls and makes an appointment. Much to Woodward's surprise the girl who keeps the appointment is the same girl, but very different. She is exquisitely dressed, and very outwardly conversational. She identifies herself with a different name and says she knows all about Sybil, but that Sybil doesn't know anything about her. Thus begins the series of consultations that will last over the next decade.

It seems that Sybil is occupied by more than a dozen personalities, some of which know each other and some of which don't. Two of these are boys, one of which is very belligerent. As Woodward peals away the veils surrounding Sybil she learns what awful things had happened to her as a child. Her mother was actually not rational and for some reason took a dislike to Sybil. She tortured her, some of the things are really awful, and made her life miserable. Her father ignored all these happenings. He was a deeply religious man and could not face up to the reality of his wife's insanity.

After long term treatment there is only one horror that Sybil has never revealed to Woodward. This was something that happened in what is referred to in the film as the green kitchen. After this is solved Sybil is required to face up to the fact that she has had all these personalities living within her who helped her survive in a world whose background was sheer horror. Woodward and Field go to the town where Sybil was raised and there in a park like setting she is brought face to face with the demons who have lived within her. These have been changed through the guidance of Woodward to become friends. They are all teenagers and they come out from behind trees where Sybil meets and hugs them. It is a rather dramatic ending.

In real life both Sybil and Eve managed lead more or less normal lives. Eve's real name was Chris Sizemore. Actually the solution to her problem didn't end with the three faces of Eve, later she acquired a number of other separate personalities. Usually these seem to come three at a time. She gave a lecture a couple of years ago at a university where she discussed her case. Accompanying her was her son Bob, who noted that he could tell by looking in her eyes when she had changed personalities, and there was one such personality that he didn't like.

Sybil was based on Shirley Ardell Mason; She eventually became an art teacher and is now deceased. Interesting enough, several of her personalities were artists. Examination of their individual works revealed that each personality used a different brush stroke when working on their artwork.

Sybil was originally a nearly 200 minutes long TV film. There are two different versions available on DVD one of which is 121 minutes and the second 132 minutes. To cut the film down to an approximately two hour production called for the complete elimination of some scenes. Though it isn't obvious when viewing the DVD that I saw, the complete film among other things fleshed out the relationship between Sybil's mother and father and provided more insight into their relationship.

Flora Rieba Schrieber who was Sybil's psychiatrist wrote the book the film is based on. One final thought. At one time in the film Sybil denies that all the horrendous details of her life were false, and that she had just made them up to impress psychiatrist Wilbur. Woodward proved to Sybil that they were not false and we learned that this denial was another one of Sybil's protection mechanisms in that she never trusted anyone after her terrible childhood.

There is controversy involving both Sybil's and Eve's stories, but there is no question over the remarkable performances of Joanne Woodward and Sally Field as the two young women with multiple personalities.

Dick Gardner, Classic Films

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HOLLYWOODLAND and THE BLACK DAHLIA

These two films reached the theatres in 2006. They share some of the distinct impressions that make up films devoted to life in Los Angeles and in particular those centered on that part of the city encompassed in Hollywood. Both dealt with some of the peculiarities of life in L.A. Though only one of these, The Black Dahlia, was a genuine crime, some of the events depicted in Hollywoodland also include criminal activities including a possible murder. I'll deal with both of these films relative to the events they depicted and the aspects that were literally fiction as opposed to the real world and in particular in its more sordid moments.


Hollywoodland

Hollywoodland deals with the death of television star George Reeves who portrayed Superman in the TV series of that name. Reeves reached the height of his film career earlier with an important film role in Gone With the Wind portraying the Tarleton Twin who married Scarlett O'Hara and who was killed early in the Civil War. After that supposed breakthrough role Reeves' career stagnated. Eventually, he got the Superman part, one he didn't really like and one he held until his untimely death from a gunshot wound, supposedly self-inflicted, but with enough controversy to invite a skeptical conclusion, i.e., the old conspiracy theory.

Hollywoodland covers this story with interest, but adds some special embellishments and details some of the unusual aspects to the story. These settle on the role of Toni Mannix in life. Ms. Mannix was the wife of one of the real strongmen in the MGM organization. In some respect he was considered an enforcer of studio policy. Ms. Mannix had met Eddie Mannix in Hawaii back in the middle thirties. She was a woman with a stage background most notably as a Ziegfeld chorine, under her maiden name of Toni Laneir. She was also known as the girl with the million dollar legs and had an uncredited role in The Great Ziegfeld film.

The three important roles portraying real people were performed by Ben Affleck as Reeves, Diane Lane as Toni Mannix and Bob Hoskins as Eddie Mannix. Each of them does a credible job at making the person they are portraying come to life. In particular, Land and Hoskins are really believable, and Affleck, though not as dynamic as the other two, did perform in one of his best if not his top performance.

The relationship between the three is quite remarkable. Toni and George met at a party where George in a continuing attempt to secure another top role manages to insert himself in a publicity picture take of Rita Hayworth at a nightclub party. Toni notes this and comments to him later about it without identifying herself. This chance encounter results in a long term affair with Toni providing Reeves with a house to live in and many other expensive gifts. She obviously was very much in love with the TV personality. Television back in the 50's was not nearly as big a career move as it would be today. At that time someone doing TV was obviously not strong enough to do films. Reeves resented this and was increasingly discouraged with his comic strip hero role. Eddie Mannix for reasons not explained in the film doesn't seem to mind Toni's interest in Reeves and in fact is involved with someone else as well. It's not an easy relationship to understand.

There is one other lead player in Hollywoodland, a man named Louis Simo played by Adrian Brody. For some reason Simo just doesn't come across. Perhaps it's became Brody is playing a fictional person in a film where most of the others are real. Simo is convinced that Reeves' death was a murder and spends most of the movie trying to prove it. This results in some beatings handed out by people under the order of Eddie Mannix. At the end he's still not convinced that it was a suicide, but is frustrated in his attempt to prove it.

The film, though not great, does tell an interesting story in an entertaining way. The photography is well done and the staging for the times, it represents, the late 1950s, is well done. There are enough good performances to make it an entertaining viewing.


The Black Dahlia

The story of Elizabeth Short, the real life Black Dahlia, has been addressed previously in film. What has been depicted is the ugliness of the crime, the finding of a young woman's body following her horrific murder. This was most notable in the film True Confessions (1982), where the depiction of the corpse and where she was found were covered. Actually this film, that starred Robert Duval as a Los Angeles Police Department detective and Robert DeNiro as his brother, who was a high official in the Los Angeles Catholic Diocese, is an entirely different story. The real story is about corruption in the Diocese and its discovery and the resulting punishment dealt to DeNiro. The film covers the relationship of the two brothers and DeNiro's role in the Diocese corruption case and Duval's involvement in that event with the Dahlia type murder being incidental.

Oddly enough in The Black Dahlia a similar bit of fiction is offered to supplement the murder. Here Aaron Eckhart and Josh Hartnett play a couple of detectives (Lee Blanchard and Bucky Buckhost) in the LAPD who though working on other cases are eventually put on the Black Dahlia case. Eckhart has a girl friend in Scarlett Johannsen (Kay in the film) who he seemingly shares with Hartnett. It's not really one of Johannsen's better performances. Hilary Swank also plays a heavy in the film a young woman named Madeleine Lincott. Like Toni Mannix, she's very wealthy. Though her performance is okay, the role itself seems rather unreal. She apparently is a switch hitter with sexual interest in the Black Dahlia but also gets involved with Hartnett. That is about the sum of who is in the film except for Mia Kirshner who plays the 'Dahlia' to a certain extent in the way the girl lived her life as a drifter. It's a sad performance.

This film has the Black Dahlia performing in a stag film, i.e. porno production, something the real Elizabeth Short never accomplished. Though she was interested in breaking into the film business she didn't have the intestinal fortitude to work at gaining any recognition.

Some of the story is really completely unrelated to reality. James Elroy wrote the book the film is based on. It is far less successful than LA Confidential the really big film that just failed to win the Academy Award for best picture. Both the latter film and Mr. Elroy's Get Shorty really caught the mood of L.A. The Black Dahlia only marginally catches those nuances since the story itself is not as clever as Elroy's other two efforts. Elroy was particularly interested in the story, since his own mother was murdered in a somewhat similar fashion. It was a crime, somewhat like that of the Dahlia, and similarly, has never been solved.

Still, the film is not a waste of time. It is well shot and does a good job of depicting Southern California at the time, 1946. It certainly can be enjoyed, but it is not really a very close to the rendition of the Black Dahlia reality.

There is one other film that resonates with the Black Dahlia. That's the Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, William Bendix film called the Blue Dahlia. It s a film noir from 1942 and is generally considered the source for the Black Dahlia name. Actually, the Blue Dahlia was a nightclub supposedly located on Sunset Strip. The film also involved murder.

I have a separate article that discusses the Black Dahlia murder in some detail, but also relates some aspects of the crime that were of particular interest to me. This article can be found in "Reflections on the Black Dahlia" on the Fairview Collaborative Website in their "Observations" section under the secondary listing called "Reflections."

Dick Gardner, Classic Films

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