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Forbidden Hollywood Collection - Volumes One & Two


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7 hours ago, pherank said:

I just watched Ava Gardner, Robert Taylor and Charles Laughton in The Bribe (1949) on TCM, and I noticed that she seemed to be getting away with very little makeup, which I liked.

I'm trying to envision holding Andy Hardy near and dear to my heart, but it's just not working.

An MGM noir, as it happens. :)  Not the kind of project that the director, Robert Z. Leonard, was generally associated with. Great supporting cast.

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13 hours ago, dirac said:

An MGM noir, as it happens. :)  Not the kind of project that the director, Robert Z. Leonard, was generally associated with. Great supporting cast.

Should have been good, but wasn't. Vincent Price and Laughton make things more interesting but the script isn't all that impressive. So probably could have been anyone in those particular roles. And there's definitely no heat between Gardner and Taylor - I can't really think of when Taylor ever demonstrated much heat. He's on my dud list. It happens that TCM had recently shown His Kind of Woman from 1951, with Vincent Price in a very oddball role that was quite fun. I was hoping for more of the same kind of thing, but The Bribe wasn't even a slow burner to me, just slow and fairly predictable. Oh well.

Edited by pherank
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And there's definitely no heat between Gardner and Taylor - I can't really think of when Taylor ever demonstrated much heat. He's on my dud list.

How true. No matter how sparky the lady, Taylor had a hard time getting those colored lights going.  Gardner and Taylor were supposedly having an affair, but any heat generated didn't make it into camera range. The exception in my recollection is Lana Turner in Johnny Eager, which also features one of Taylor's few good performances.

I've never seen His Kind of Woman because I find Jane Russell unwatchable in anything other than Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Not even Mitchum and Price could tempt me. Did you like it overall?

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On 7/13/2021 at 10:41 AM, dirac said:

How true. No matter how sparky the lady, Taylor had a hard time getting those colored lights going.  Gardner and Taylor were supposedly having an affair, but any heat generated didn't make it into camera range. The exception in my recollection is Lana Turner in Johnny Eager, which also features one of Taylor's few good performances.

I've never seen His Kind of Woman because I find Jane Russell unwatchable in anything other than Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Not even Mitchum and Price could tempt me. Did you like it overall?

Yes, but with reservations - it ends up being so goofy and weird that I kind of have to like it. I'm a supporter of goofy-weird. Is it a gem of Noir filmmaking? No, not really.

Basic plot: a gambler (Robert Mitchum) accepts a mysterious job that will take him out of the country (to Mexico) for a year - for a reward of $50,000.
Price plays a famous movie actor (a ham) spending time at the same Mexican resort, who seems to be a hunting enthusiast primarily. And Price keeps trying to interest Robert Mitchum's character into going hunting, which of course makes us think that something nefarious is going to happen around that, but there's a twist to all that. Price gets to be a good guy in the end (which in itself is interesting). Mostly it's a lot of talking and scheming, and Mitchum and Russell being...charismatic(?) It is notable that Mitchum and Russell did NOT have an affair during production of this film.  😉

 

Edited by pherank
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Mitchum and Russell were also in Macao, clips of which seem unwatchable today, though I may have thought differently when I saw it years ago in a good print von Sternberg showed in a class he once (or twice) gave. I guess Sternberg got the Macao job because of Shanghai Express and Shanghai Gesture. (Interestingly parts of Shanghai Express were filmed in a little alleyway that the Santa Fe RR tracks go, or then went, through, not far from original Trader Joe's in Pasadena). William Wellman also gave – or rather spoke at – a class, Albert Johnson's, and told a story (which I may have posted before) about seeing Robert Mitchum for the first time. Mitchum was hitchhiking, walking forward along the side of the road with his thumb out, maybe somewhere between Palm Springs and LA, I'm not sure. Wellman said he knew immediately that Mitchum would become a big star from the way he moved his ass. In effect his swagger was his screen test.  I remember thinking how amazing it was that someone of Wellman's generation would comment, and rather glowingly at that, on the sensuality of another male. It was struggled with but just not talked about.

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6 hours ago, miliosr said:

But what a part! Ain't there anyone here for love?

" Nobody chaperones the chaperone. That's why I'm so right for this job."

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Mostly it's a lot of talking and scheming, and Mitchum and Russell being...charismatic(?) It is notable that Mitchum and Russell did NOT have an affair during production of this film.

 

Physically the two of them are well matched and they look great together. I just find Russell's "acting" unacceptable; I don't think there was another major female star as capable of blighting a movie through her amateurishness until the advent of Ali MacGraw.

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19 hours ago, dirac said:

Physically the two of them are well matched and they look great together. I just find Russell's "acting" unacceptable; I don't think there was another major female star as capable of blighting a movie through her amateurishness until the advent of Ali MacGraw.

LOL. Now you're getting into the era of 60s and 70s "fresh faces".

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On 7/18/2021 at 7:01 PM, pherank said:

LOL. Now you're getting into the era of 60s and 70s "fresh faces".

Cybill Shepherd, anyone? 

Not a great time for female stars. Nobody really breaks through beyond Streisand and Fonda. On the other hand, Jill Clayburgh probably doesn't become a star at any other time.

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4 hours ago, dirac said:

Cybill Shepherd, anyone? 

Not a great time for female stars. Nobody really breaks through beyond Streisand and Fonda.

I think that Julie Christie and Goldie Hawn broke through.

If you focus on the word "star" rather than "actress" you could include Raquel Welch and Ann Margaret.

 

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4 hours ago, lmspear said:

I think that Julie Christie and Goldie Hawn broke through.

If you focus on the word "star" rather than "actress" you could include Raquel Welch and Ann Margaret.

 

Good points. Women did become stars but not in the numbers they did in the big league days of the Golden Age and the "woman's picture," and I think only Streisand and Fonda were up there with the men in box office and staying power. If I remember right by the late seventies Christie was playing the old Evelyn Keyes role from "Here Comes Mr. Jordan." Shirley MacLaine became big in the Sixties but she was mostly playing prosties, not exactly peacock parts.

Ann-Margret can be quite good and in a different era for women she might have done more and better good work, although she made some bad decisions.

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Jane Withers has died at the age of 95. She was too young to have been a part of the Pre-Code era and yet she lived long enough to be one of the last surviving stars of Hollywood's Golden Age.

The Norma Shearer page I follow on Instagram had a cute photo of Jane and Norma together at a USO event in 1941.

And speaking of Norma, Wikipedia lists August 10th as her birthday. (Her actual birthday may have been the 11th but she celebrated it on the 10th.) Regardless -- happy birthday to Norma Shearer!!!

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Thank you for posting, miliosr. An obit for Withers in the  NYT.

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Jane Withers, a top child star in the 1930s who played tough, tomboyish brats in more than two dozen B films and achieved a second burst of fame as an adult as Josephine the Plumber in commercials for Comet cleanser, died on Saturday in Burbank, Calif. She was 95.

 

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On 7/25/2021 at 5:00 PM, lmspear said:

Your thoughts on Vanessa Redgrave, Faye Dunaway, and Gena Rowlands, please, Dirac.  There was the late career success of Ruth Gordon in "Rosemary's Baby" and "Harold and Maude".

My apologies for not replying sooner, lmspear, and thank you.  Dunaway is an interesting case - she hit it big in her twenties with Bonnie and Clyde and then lost her way for some time until coming back big in the middle-late Seventies. Unfortunately she didn't have the great post-Network career she should have had, for reasons both personal and professional. She was great in Mommie Dearest but the performance stuck to her and also she was hitting her forties. I always liked her a lot. She's a real star with a great face for the camera, and she can act.

On those occasions when I've seen Rowlands she struck me as an admirable actor with a tendency to go overboard, so I'm not really well versed enough in her career to comment. (I'm not a big fan of the movies directed by the late John Cassavetes.) 

Redgrave hasn't had a conventional star career but then I doubt if she wanted one. She got off to a good start from the beginning, with Laurence Olivier announcing her arrival into the world onstage at the Old Vic with Dad at his side.  It's interesting that, like Meryl Streep, she was never a movie ingenue - both of them were almost thirty when they became movie stars.

 

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Several Old Hollywood feeds I follow on Instagram mentioned that today is Jean Harlow's birthday. (She was born on March 3rd, 1911.)

In that period 1932-37, she was arguably M-G-M's biggest female box office star - bigger than Garbo, bigger than Shearer, bigger even than Crawford.

One of the Instagram posts talked about how Harlow was the bridge between Clara Bow and Marilyn Monroe. I had never made that connection before but I can see the truth in it.

A little pre-Code Harlow from Dinner at Eight:

 

 

Edited by miliosr
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Interesting. 

Harlow has little in common with Monroe apart from hair color and sex appeal.  Marilyn onscreen was soft, with a sweetness of presence even at her most brassy. Harlow was diamond hard.

Monroe was part of the apostolic succession of 20th Century Fox blondes, from Alice Faye to Betty Grable to Monroe, who filled the mold and then broke it. They were all basically nice girls. With Harlow you could never be sure, although she also specialized in Good Bad Girls, as in “Red Dust.”

Harlow was a huge star. "Libeled Lady" from 1936 or 37 featured Harlow, William Powell, Spencer Tracy, and Myrna Loy, and she got top billing.

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I've started a deep dive into Norma Shearer's Pre-Code period, which ran from 1929 to 1934 when full enforcement of the Code began.

First up . . . 

The Last of Mrs. Cheyney

Cast: Norma Shearer, Basil Rathbone, Hedda Hopper

Production Credits: Sidney Franklin (director), Cedric Gibbons (art direction), William Daniels (cinematographer), Adrian (costumes)

Premiere: July 26, 1929

Synopsis: Fay Cheyney (Shearer) is the front woman for a gang of jewel thieves. While planning to steal a pearl necklace, she meets Lord Arthur Dilling (Rathbone) and becomes romantically involved with him.

M-G-M released The Last of Mrs. Cheyney early in the sound era and it reflects all of the problems that beset early sound films. Derived from a play of the same name, The Last of Mrs. Cheyney is filmed like one. The camera is incredibly static and, as such, the film lacks visual interest.

The source material is in the English "repartee" vein, and I don't know that the material and Norma Shearer were meant for one another. She and Rathbone bat the dialogue back-and-forth but the sense I got was that Rathbone was playing down to her. Shearer is much better at the film's end when she is exposed as a thief and is not particularly repentant about it. Her 'Pre-Code' persona was born here but would come to the fore much more forcefully the following year in The Divorcee.

Shearer's voice is perfect for sound films but more than a tad affected. She looks wonderful in Adrian's gowns, though, and it's easy to forget that, at the time of the film's release, the Shearer/Adrian duo would be setting fashion trends.

Rathbone is charming as Shearer's love interest but it's strange to see him in something other than a villainous part or as Sherlock Holmes. Hopper provides light comedy relief but, obviously, better things were in store for her. Shearer's gang of jewel thieves are best of all, and their singing "Carefree and Happy" adds some liveliness to a somewhat stale production.

Grade: B- (Interesting as an early species of sound film and Pre-Code but creaky overall)

 

Edited by miliosr
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In those early talkies Shearer sometimes sounds like Minnie Mouse. She got better, and she did okay with the Coward dialogue in “Private Lives.” (I also seem to remember Crawford in those days saying things like “cahhn’t” as if she had Lina Lamont’s voice coach.)

The Last of Mrs. Cheyney actually became a Crawford vehicle some years later. I haven’t seen it.

I really enjoy Norma in her naughty lady phase and she looks great in those slinky bias cut Adrian gowns. Legend has it she didn't wear underwear.

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On 3/30/2022 at 3:36 PM, dirac said:

(I also seem to remember Crawford in those days saying things like “cahhn’t” as if she had Lina Lamont’s voice coach.)

Barbara Stanwyck was still speaking that way on The Colbys in the 1980s!

Here's a newsreel clip from the Grand Hotel premiere in Hollywood in 1932. You can hear what Joan Crawford (7:00) and Norma Shearer ("You know being a fan is hard, darling") (8:14) sounded like. Lilyan Tashman's voice (4:38) is the best. though, considering she was "from Brooklyn".

 

Edited by miliosr
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Their Own Desire

Cast: Norma Shearer, Robert Montgomery, Lewis Stone

Production Credits: E. Mason Hopper (director), Cedric Gibbons (art direction), William Daniels (cinematographer), Adrian (gowns)

Premiere: December 27, 1929

Synopsis: Lally (Shearer) finds 'Mr. Right' in the form of Princeton hunk Jack (Montgomery). But complications ensue when Lally discovers that Jack's mother is the "other woman" for whom Lally's father (Stone) threw her mother overboard.

This is more like it. Shearer was more in her element in a Roaring Twenties romance than she was in an English drawing room. She also had a very congenial partner in Montgomery, who was in his first year at M-G-M. (He had already starred with Joan Crawford earlier in the year in Untamed.) Shearer's "light" playing is her best playing; "heavy" dramatic scenes not so much. 

The passage of six months between the release of The Last of Mrs. Cheyney and the release of this picture meant that "talking pictures" were becoming "moving pictures" again. Their Own Desire has some well-staged action sequences including Shearer and Montgomery swimming in a pool and getting caught on a "lake" in the middle of a storm.

Best of all is the glimpse this picture provides into late-period Roaring Twenties clothes, automobiles and design (Art Deco). Shearer wears Adrian's designs superbly and it's no wonder that Adrian delighted in designing for her.

The downside to Their Own Desire is that it is very short - 64 minutes. I suspect that the original cut of this film was longer but tested poorly with audiences. Also, while Shearer and Montgomery get their happy ending, their problem -- her mother and his father are still together and her mother is still depressed and suicidal -- remains at the fadeout;

Grade: B (The drama is merely OK but the Roaring Twenties vibe is great.)

Postscript: Montgomery is supposed to be a Princeton undergraduate in this and Shearer is supposed to be younger than him. In reality, Shearer was 27 when this was released (but looks older) and Montgomery was 25 (but looks younger). So, a certain suspension of disbelief is required.

 

Edited by miliosr
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Norma Shearer's next film after Their Own Desire was The Divorcee (released in April 1930) for which Shearer won the Oscar for Best Actress. I've reviewed it on page one of this thread so I'll move on to Shearer's next release:

Let Us Be Gay

Cast: Norma Shearer, Marie Dressler, Rod La Rocque, Hedda Hopper

Production Credits: Robert Z. Leonard (director), Cedric Gibbons (art direction), Adrian (gowns)

Premiere: August 9, 1930

Synopsis: When frumpy housewife Kitty (Shearer) finds out that her no-good husband Bob (La Rocque) is stepping out on her, she divorces him. Three years later, she has transformed herself into an international bon vivant. Mrs. Bouccicault (Dressler), who befriended Kitty in Paris, brings Kitty to her estate in Long Island to distract her granddaughter Diane from Bob, who is another guest on the estate. (Diane is set to marry Bruce but is infatuated with Bob.) Of course, no one at the house party knows that Kitty and Bob used to be husband and wife.

Based on a 1929 play starring Tallulah Bankhead, Shearer is in her full 'Pre-Code' mode here. Not only is she dealing with her ex-husband but she's also juggling two other potential suitors at the same time. As always, Shearer is at her most believable when she's engaged in comic antics. Her attempts at portraying an international sophisticate are less successful.

Shearer has a very uncongenial foil in La Rocque. With his seedy looks and smarmy manner, you can't understand why she married him the first time let alone why she would consider remarrying him.

The real standout in the cast is Marie Dressler, who effortlessly steals every scene. Dressler was on the rise at M-G-M in 1930. She had already appeared successfully opposite Greta Garbo earlier in 1930 in Anna Christie and Let Us Be Gay was another star turn for her. (There would be many bright moments ahead for Dressler at M-G-M. In 1931, she would rank 5th [behind Shearer] in the annual Top Ten Money Making Stars Poll and she would actually rank first in the same poll in 1932 and 1933 - ahead of Shearer, Garbo and Joan Crawford.)

The ending to Let Us Be Gay is infuriating as Kitty, having laid out intelligently her reasons for not reconciling with Bob, then inexplicably reunites with him in the last 15 seconds. It's a Post-Code ending to a Pre-Code film.

Adrian's clothes and Cedric Gibbons' really capture that late-20s/early-30s vibe. In particular, Kitty's bedroom at the estate is extraordinary with its huge balcony and sweeping steps that lead down to the estate grounds.

Grade: A- marked down to a B because of the ridiculous ending.

Edited by miliosr
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I finally caught up with Joan Crawford in Our Blushing Brides (OBB) (premiere: July 19, 1930).

OBB was the final film in the Crawford 'Our' series at M-G-M, which also included Our Dancing Daughters (1928) and Our Modern Maidens (1929). The characters were different in the series but the actresses were largely the same. Crawford and Anita Page appeared in all three while Dorothy Sebastian appeared in the first and third movies.

In any event, OBB was an early species of the 'three girls in the big city' genre in Hollywood and, in its structure, bears a strong resemblance to the later The Best of Everything (1959). In this, Crawford's part parallels that of Hope Lange in The Best of Everything while Page and Sebastian's parts are reminiscent of those of Diane Baker and Suzy Parker in the latter film.

The basic premise of OBB has Crawford, Page and Sebastian toiling away in dead-end jobs at a department store. Page and Sebastian are out to find rich husbands while Crawford is looking for love and romance. Matters end badly for Page, OK for Sebastian and happily for Crawford. (Not only does Crawford's character, Jerry, find happiness with looker Robert Montgomery - he's also the department store owner's son! The Joan Crawford 'shopgirl makes good archetype' was born here.)

As for Crawford herself, she's a work in progress in OBB. Her speaking voice alternates between an early talkie affected one and a working-class accent (which is more believable for someone who is earning her living modelling clothes at a department store.) Her acting is also an uneven mixture of naturalistic talking pictures acting and silent film conventions. But the face is already starting to achieve its full potential.

There's a funny bit of business toward the end of the movie. Crawford finds herself in a movie theater showing Let Us Be Gay - the M-G-M movie which premiered three weeks after OBB in 1930. It's funny because actor Raymond Hackett, who played Montgomery's younger brother in OBB and whose character was in the theatre with Crawford, also played a supporting role in Let Us Be Gay. So, Hackett the character was watching Hackett the actor on screen.

Viewers can decide for themselves which ending - to OBB or Let Us Be Gay - is more implausible.

 

Edited by miliosr
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