Dinner at Eight

What a cast - MGM's finest in a series of vignettes leading up to Mrs Jordan's dinner party (which we never actually see). Jean Harlow is at her wisecracking best and her most stunning; Marie Dressler and John Barrymore are terrific as washed-up actors; everyone is just excellent. Everything that can possibly go wrong does - you can't help but sympathise as Billie Burke's Mrs Jordan gradually gets more and more ruffled by the day's events. Some great one liners and yet another excellent entry on Cukor's CV.

"Darling, I've got Lord and Lady Ferncliffe [...] You remember the Ferncliffes from London, do you darling?"

"Yes, yes.. and how dull they were, eating mutton."

I just love it! This lavish all-star MGM-production still is great entertainment. Some of it's notions are somewhat dated perhaps, but with this team behind - and in the film - nothing can go wrong.

A portrait of various strata of New York society, the clash between the newly riches and the old elite, the Old and New World, the battle of the sexes (between Wallace Beery and Harlow), Gotham in a nutshell. Nothing is "really" happening, the same as its "twin brother" GRAND HOTEL and essentially it's a filmed play (based on the play by George S. Kaufman and Edna Ferber), but with this cast there are no complaints. You don't hear anyone complaining about David Mamet's GLENGARY GLENN ROSS's filmed play, do you? Jean Harlow, "the Blonde Bombshell", as the deliciously vulgar wife of Wallace Beery, the new man in town, trying to connect with the New York elite and Washington politicians. John Barrymore is fantastic as a once famous actor from the silent era, who cannot accept the fact that his career is over.

To me the film is just a perfect time capsule of so many typical topics of the era: the depression, the transition from silents to talkies, the continuous transformation of the upper crust of New York society, the traveling by ocean steamer to Europe... It's actually a very rich film, no matter how fluffy it might look (in the case of Jean Harlow's wardrobe quite literally). And when given a treatment like this, the top-notch cast, good writing, gorgeous sets under the supervision of David O. Selznick and George Cukor, it's a feast for the eye.

Camera Obscura --- 9/10

If like me, you're more familiar with the early 30s Warner Brothers movies when Daryl Zanuck was at the helm which focussed on how the poor struggled with - and usually overcame the deprivations of the Great Depression, Dinner at Eight will take you a while to get used to. You might think it's not for you but you should stick with it - it's worth it.

Rather than finding Joan Blondell doing anything she can to avoid starvation or James Cagney turning to crime to feed his family, this film is about how the rich ultra-privileged cope with the economic disaster. Whilst their situations are not life or death choices, they're just as devastating for them - or they think they are.

When compared with what was happening to millions of working and ex-working people, the awful tragedy of Billie Burke not having an aspic lion ready for the dinner's centre piece may sound absolutely trivial - which of course it is - but this film shows how such pointless trivia is ruining her life. It's very clever.

It is a clever film (based on a clever play) but perhaps not that easy for us in the 21st century to engage with. Despite some descriptions it's not a comedy, it's not easy viewing and after the first half hour it would be easy to switch off thinking that it's over-hyped and boring but don't - keep with it. It's one of those films that sticks around in your head days afterwards because it's actually very good. Considering the talent and expense that went into making this that's not surprising. MGM pulled out all the stops with this and it really shows. Surprisingly even Jean Harlow shows that she can actually act!

Essentially it's theme is 'rich people are suffering too.' It focusses on a small group of 'privileged people' preparing for a big society dinner party but nobody is whom they seem. Some are living in a fantasy world they've invented and can't survive outside of it. Some have clawed their way up from the gutter to the top of the ladder only to find out that they're now teetering on the edge of a fragile precipice but to keep their social position, to maintain the facade which they need they must keep going even though they know their only option is to plummet down the ground. It's about a false world of vulnerable unhappy people figuring out (or indeed giving up on) how to cope with their futures. That sounds a miserable premise for a film and indeed it's not the most cheerful of movies but the witty script and professional direction make all these characters very real, multi-dimensional and personable. Of particular praise is John Barrymore playing a former superstar actor now virtually a destitute and penniless has-been, slowly killing himself with cheap whiskey. Because this role is essentially his own life by 1933, his performance is poignantly tragic and very moving.

"Dinner at Eight" is a 1933 film that still holds up when viewed by today's audiences. How odd that it wasn't even nominated for an Academy Award. This could be because it is quite similar in form to "Grand Hotel", which won the Best Picture Oscar the year before. It really is more of a comedy/melodrama than pure comedy, since there is much tragedy unfolding during the movie. Aging star Carlotta Vance (Marie Dressler) is broke, silent film star Larry Renault (John Barrymore) is "washed up" and a hopeless alcoholic, and Oliver Jordan (Lionel Barrymore) is in danger of losing his shipping business. While these people are all struggling, the only characters that are doing well are the reptilian Dan and Kitty Packard (Wallace Beery and Jean Harlow). Dan Packard is a self-made millionaire with no ethics, and his wife is a gold digger with eyes for another man - her personal physician. The lives of the players all intertwine in ways that are unknown to them, with the depression-era message being that the rules of life have changed in ways that had never occurred in the U.S. before. The vice of the opportunistic social-climbing Packards is rewarded, while the well-heeled of yesteryear, playing by the rules of the past, have nothing but their memories and faded finery left to comfort them.

Of course, there are plenty of comic moments. Billie Burke's performance as Mrs. Jordon is hilarious as her prime concern is that her carefully planned dinner party is coming apart before her very eyes. She comes across as a kinder, gentler Marie Antoinette when she acts like the accidental destruction of her centerpiece dish, a lion-shaped aspic, is the end of the world. Although many have said that Jean Harlow steals this picture, and her talents do shine through, I think Marie Dressler's comic touches really help make the film. For example, when a forty-something secretary mentions that she saw Dressler's character perform "when she was a little girl." Dressler replies that the two must get together some evening and discuss the Civil War. Dressler also makes the very last scene of the movie. As everyone is going into dinner, she finds herself in conversation with Harlow's character. First off, she does a hilarious double-take when Harlow mentions she's been reading a book. Next,Harlow tells Marie Dressler how this book she has been reading says that machinery will soon take over every profession. Marie Dressler looks Jean Harlow up and down as only she could do and says "My dear I don't think you need to worry about that."

Dinner at Eight is one of the consummate movie buff's movies...

It has romance, glamour, wit, charm, intrigue, interesting characters and a great story.

The agonies that Mrs. Oliver Jordan (the incomparable Billie Burke [Are you a good witch or a bad witch?]) must go through to stage what is supposed to be a simple dinner party will leave you laughing, sympathizing and grateful you are not her.

Jean Harlow is at her most beautiful. She radiates an overt yet somehow innocent sexuality that shows why she became a major star so quickly.

Marie Dressler proves why she was so heralded. Her acting cannot be called subtle -- but it is always effective.

After watching this film you will wonder if people ever really did live this way. Strangely enough, I believe they probably did.