finial12 Reviews

Route 66: The Clover Throne (1961) Season 1, Episode 15

Keep on Driving, Tod and Buzz

[3/10 · 9 January 2012]

Think about the more daring caricatures of female sexuality that appeared on television in the early '60s and Tuesday Weld, Julie Newmar and Joey Heatherton probably come to mind.

Perhaps the memory of these actresses is enough for many viewers, but in a poorly developed story by Herb Meadows on an otherwise good series like Route 66 one more contestant in this dubious carnal derby, Ann Helm, was featured in the episode entitled "The Clover Throne." Helm, who comes across as a very likable, down-to-earth person in Tom Weaver's book of interviews, "I Was a Monster Movie Maker" (McFarland), was asked here to play a cartoonish character in this episode without enough backstory to make her role credible.

When some good actors are done in by one of the weakest episodes of this rolling anthology series, with enough "huh?" moments to catch one's attention, even though the premise is borrowed from "God's Little Acre," as re-imagined on a date farm in Indio, CA as lust, willfulness, stubbornness, and the march of progress all coalesce around this arid spot where characters stew in their own sweat.

Even one of the normal pleasures of Route 66 is largely ignored. One of the enjoyable aspects of seeing this fifty year old program again is the chance to see America before malls and MacDonald's homogenized almost every town, but in this episode, very little of the surrounding country is on display, though we do briefly see a date-producing palm for all of one minute.

Jack Warden plays an obsessive man crippled in a farm accident who insists that the teenage Lolita who is his ward (called, nauseatingly by one and all,"Sweet Thing") should become his bride. Despite the inherent creepiness of their relationship, no one seems to think that this is unwise, at best. The girl in question is played with a certain rancid coyness by Ann Helm, a young actress who had previously been plucked at 16 from the chorus line of the Copacabana nightclub to appear on The Shirley Temple Theater as Sleeping Beauty. Perhaps that whirlwind shift had an effect on her ability to perform as a recognizable human being. Using a grating Southern Belle manner for her role, Helm's characterization was not helped by the script or the director.

After about five minutes' exposure to her character's simpering if obvious ways, it is puzzling why anyone would want this junior strumpet for more than a moment's pleasure. During the first 55 minutes of the story the manipulative girl only displays a certain trashy erotic style, along with greed, vanity, delusions of grandeur, and a dangerous tendency toward being a tease. The normally sane Jack Warden is given far too little to do until a contrived ending "resolves" the characters' issues in an absurd and dramatically illogical way.

Of course Tod (Martin Milner) and particularly Buzz (George Maharis) are sucked into the orbit of these desert rats, assisting the girl when one of Sweet Thing's easy marks (a convict on work release) responds as might be expected. If you can, please seek out any of the other Route 66 episodes--especially those written by series co-creator Stirling Silliphant. Even though Silliphant sometimes launched into faux philosophical flourishes in his dialogue and story, they are infinitely better than this particular episode.

Goodyear Theatre: The Golden Shanty (1959) Season 3, Episode 5

"The Saddest Memory" of Arthur Hiller: Working with Errol Flynn

[12 December 2011]

In an interview, director Arthur Hiller recalls the time when he directed Errol Flynn in what he described as "a little western story." First encountering Flynn in rehearsal after checking his costume (and noting the scent of vodka), Hiller was enormously impressed when the actor gave a beautiful reading of his character in the read-through with the cast, but, when it came time to block the action out and begin filming, Flynn's self-confidence began to ebb away, prompting Hiller to try to boost his confidence. Despite the warmth between the actor and director, the next day Flynn called in sick.

According to Hiller, the production company brought Errol to work by limo after their doctor checked him out, and Hiller understood that Flynn was merely afraid. The once swashbuckling figure, who was clearly in pain, at one point faltered over a bit of business, laid his head on the bar in the saloon where the scene was set, breaking down in tears during filming, saying "I don't know what I'm doing." Hiller, who felt that the actor was well liked by most people was deeply moved by the whole experience, much of it too heartbreaking to witness.

The director describes the filming of "The Golden Shanty" in some detail during an interview found at the Archive of American Television, found below in Part 6 of his account of his career. The comments about Flynn begin at 6:06 below: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=-JQ_juHn0Vg

Have Gun - Will Travel: In an Evil Time (1958) Season 2, Episode 2

An Example of Fine Writing and Acting

[2 January 2010]

I saw the episode "In An Evil Time" this evening during the "Have Gun, Will Travel" marathon on the Encore Western channel on 1/2/10 (I believe this episode is available on DVD and may be repeated in the daily broadcast of this program that begins on Encore on Monday, Jan. 4th, 2010 in the late afternoon).

This episode concerns Richard Boone's encounter with Hank Patterson, a crusty old bank robber with a badly broken leg. Patterson has absconded with $50k following a robbery, leaving his fellow robbers and the posse behind. Paladin has been hired by the bank owner to recover the loot.

Richard Boone discovers Patterson, a grizzled reprobate named Pappy French, who's been on the wrong side of the law for forty years, lying in the desert after the old thief has fallen from his horse, (which really aggravates the geezer, since he regards the horse as one of the dumbest creatures in creation). He and Paladin become friends, despite the old man's initial hostility to him. Gradually, even though he knows that Paladin will turn him in after they go back and get the money that Pappy has hidden before his accident, the pair grow on each other. The robber in Pappy can't quite believe that Richard Boone won't help him escape, even if he is offered half of the loot.

Written by Shimon Wincelberg aka Simon Bar-David, an excellent screenwriter who is perhaps best remembered for the Star Trek episode, "Dagger of the Mind", this story was a model of economy and eloquence. Wincelberg wrote 14 of the programs for Have Gun, Will Travel and after seeing this one, I can't wait to see some others.

The characterization of Boone and particularly of Hank Patterson, who had a very long career portraying old coots, (remember him on Green Acres?), both actors were splendid, funny, natural and surprisingly moving.

When the old boy, fatally shot by his former greedy young companions, asks Boone: "Paladin, would you laugh if I asked you to say a few words over me? Not that I'm asking Him for any favors, I'd just like to hear how you might say them." Richard Boone eloquently quoted from Ecclesiastes 9:11 in a believably conversational way: "I returned and saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong. Neither yet bread to the wise nor yet riches to men of understanding. Nor yet favor to men of skill. But time and chance happeneth to them all. For a man also knoweth not his time. As fishes that are taken in an evil net. as birds that are caught in a snare, so are the sons of men snared in an evil time when it falleth suddenly upon them."

This was beautifully done by all--with direction by Andrew MacLaglen, Victor's son, who appears to have been behind the camera on many of these episodes.

The Guy Who Came Back (1951)

The Guy Who Came Back (1951): Looking for a DVD-r

[7/10 · 21 August 2009]

"The Guy Who Came Back" (1951-Joseph Newman), along with Jacques Tourneur's "Easy Living" made at RKO, depicted professional football in the 1940s with a touch of realism. Though the Tourneur film is broadcast on TCM occasionally, "The Guy Who Came Back" appears to have fallen off the map, though I can vividly recall seeing this broadcast on TV in the 1970s.

I was touched and amused by the story of an aging football player living in the past until WWII allows him to relive his "glory days". Paul Douglas as the immature but very human guy is at his best, making you smile and feeling a tug of compassion for the man as he sees life as he imagined it, slipping away. Linda Darnell is very winning and gives a nuanced performance as an understanding beauty attracted to the big lug, and Joan Bennett, as she was in that year's big hit, "Father of the Bride", exceptionally funny, using her dry comedic skills to create a thumbnail portrait of a a woman who is vexed by her husband's lack of perspective on life. Each of the actors who appeared in this film are probably much more appreciated now than when they were working.

Why would 20th Century Fox, which is renowned for the quality of the DVDs that it produces, allow this movie to moulder somewhere in a vault or at least broadcast it on FMC, as they have with other rarities, such as Paul Douglas' equally obscure "Everybody Does It" (1949-Edmund Goulding) and "Love That Brute" (1950-Alexander Hall)?

Is there a copyright issue with this film?

If anyone knows if this is available, please let me know.

Thank you for any help you may be able to offer.

A Bill of Divorcement (1940)

It Has Moments

[8/10 · 16 August 2007]

Maureen O'Hara, aka the tempestuous queen of technicolor, helpmate and sparring partner for John Wayne, (or is it John Ford?), was still finding her way tentatively after being plucked from obscurity by an astute Charles Laughton. Her introduction to worldwide audiences as the benighted gypsy girl in the masterpiece of Hollywood storytelling, "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" brought her fame for her sensitivity and astounding beauty.

Here, hampered by the unimaginative direction of John Farrow and hammy acting of Adolphe Menjou, she attempted to make audiences forget Katharine Hepburn's still moving portrayal of the same character. But then, aside from an intense talent, Hepburn also had George Cukor behind the camera to guide her and a chastened John Barrymore giving one of his better late career moments.

You can glimpse the makings of a thoughtful actress in O'Hara here, who might've shone brighter if she could've had more opportunities to display some of the inner turmoil that made her remarkably beautiful face so haunting long after the technicolor prints of more bombastic films fade. It is worth a look for that alone.

The Weaker Sex (1948)

Wartime Slice of Life Poignancy

[21 May 2007]

This small scale English movie was beautifully crafted by talented hands behind & before the camera. Notably, cinematographer Erwin Hillier, (whose b & w night scenes were beautifully composed and lit here), and a familiar and likable cast headed by Ursula Jeans and Cecil Parker added to this ironically titled film. Set around the central event of D-Day preparations and the aftermath of all the concentrated activity on the war, it demonstrated the emotional ripples on such events throughout the lives of the characters, centering on the household of Jeans, her children, and the military service personnel who come in and out of their lives as boarders during the war.

While some might dismiss this as a trite movie about inconsequential people in a great turning point in history, the strength of this film is that detailed, largely domestic focus on the wartime anxieties, hard work and, of course, usually stoic British attitudes toward the war. This was heightened by the skilled filmmakers' ability to show the emotional ebbs and tides surging beneath the seemingly placid surface of the characters' lives. One illustration of this was the work of character lead Cecil Parker as a middle aged naval officer and widow Ursula Jeans as they quietly realized that their platonic friendship was deeper than either had fully realized.

So Ends Our Night (1941)

Refugee Drama, Well Acted, Good Historical Account

[7/10 · 8 January 2007]

I just saw this over the weekend for the first time on DVD, though I'd seen it in college and never quite forgot it. The impact of Erich Maria Remarque's story of German refugees in Europe must've been enormous to those few who saw this sparsely distributed movie in 1940/1941.

The Historical Context: This film, made prior to the American entry to the war but after the fall of France, may have helped to prepare the American public for the coming war, as in "The Mortal Storm" and "The Man I Married" and like the later movie, "Watch on the Rhine", gave the issues involved a human face, but is much more profoundly fatalistic than any of those other movies. Even at the somewhat hopeful conclusion, and especially since we view this movie today after the Holocaust was revealed, the doomed atmosphere that pervades a lot of the action is still sobering over a distance of 65 years.

I couldn't help thinking that the theme of the movie is still sadly relevant throughout the world. Another interesting aspect of the film is something that I cannot answer but hope that some well informed individual might be able to help with eventually. I don't see how this movie could've gotten a production code approval. Some of the outré aspects of the story include a woman offering herself quite frankly to a March and removing her outer garments, the fact that two characters live together--in sin, as they used to say, and the fact that a sympathetic character commits suicide, an event that the film treats as an act of heroism. The print that I saw says that the movie was made by David L. Loew-Albert Lewin, Inc., and distributed theatrically by United Artists--but could movies really be distributed much of anywhere without the explicit okay of the production code at that time? I realize that Loew and Lewin had deep connections to MGM and big-time money in Hollywood and NY, but I really doubt if the filmmakers would've been willing or able to pay any of the fines that the Production Code office may have imposed for a violation of their principles.

Best Aspects: I found the restrained and touching performance of Fredric March as an Aryan German who was opposed to the Nazi government to be the centerpiece of this movie, even though he's only in about half the scenes. The expression on his face in one scene in which he's trying to catch a glimpse of his wife's face in a crowd just before leaving her to go into exile is very moving. Frances Dee as the wife is very expressive in her brief, nearly silent but haunting scenes. March's resilient spirit, and his deeply effective final scene, the antics of Leonid Kinskey, and a lovely, relaxed performance from Anna Sten, add to the interest of this film for me.

Good Aspects: Margaret Sullavan, whom I usually find to be a magnetic actress, seems at somewhat of a low ebb in this film. Yet, there is one vibrantly delivered speech that she gives about why she loves the puppy-like Glenn Ford that shows a flash of her ability to breath life into material. She is suddenly, for that one sequence an actress who makes the viewer understand that politics aside, its the connections of Sullavan, March, Ford and Dee to one another that keeps each of these characters tethered to their humanity despite everything that they are going through. Ford, playing a very believable teenager who is the child of an Aryan & Jewish marriage, is earnest and most affecting in his reminiscences of home and longing for a peaceful existence.

Technical Aspects: The script is heavily reliant on flashbacks and narration, and at times it was a bit hard to keep track of which nation the refugees found themselves in, though overall, the strong leads and great supporting players, who also include Erich Von Stroheim, Sig Rumann, and Roman Bohnen, manage to rise above the sometimes disjointed script . The issuance of the film on DVD is welcome, but unfortunately, the picture quality of the transfer is sometimes overly bright and occasionally fuzzy, and the sound is a bit muddy at times, but it is adequate, and the good acting, compelling story and excellent direction by the underestimated John Cromwell still make it quite watchable.

In general, I'd hope that others might comment on this movie, and suggest it for viewing by those interested in that period's "premature" anti-fascist films.

Pride of the Marines (1945)

Still Powerful

[5 March 2004]

Having seen this film about 20 years ago, but I was impressed to find it even more moving when viewed today. John Garfield and Dane Clark gave two of their finest performances in this movie about a Marine blinded on Guadacanal. This story of survival is told in a realistic mixture of the brutal, the bitter and the enduring spark of hope that make living, rather than dead heroes. Some would surely disagree, but I can't help but think that some of the guys who find themselves in Walter Reed and other veteran hospitals recovering from their today's war wounds might get a great deal out of this beautifully acted--and seldom shown--"period piece". It's a pity it's not on dvd/vhs. WHY??

The Russia House (1990)

Acting 3, Storytelling -1, Film Score 10

[6 May 2003]

All the ingredients for a souffle of a spy-love story were there. Take three good actors, Sean Connery, Klaus Maria Brandauer, and Michelle Pfeiffer, allow them to create memorable, unique characters who interact in a melancholy, sadly beautiful, disintegrating Leningrad and have Jerry Goldsmith compose a ravishing score with Wynton Marsalis playing the theme. Allow a director and editor to tell this story in an incoherent fashion and voila! The souffle will never rise to what it might have been.

What could have been perfection must be viewed with a discerning eye: I'd watch it for the grown up love story, the cynical idealism of Brandauer and Connery's characters and the urban Russian settings--grand and squalid, all at the same time, like this movie. Oh, but that musical score--magnificent!

Any Number Can Play (1949)

A Postwar Gable

[11 December 2002]

This postwar movie was one of Clark Gable's last for the studio that made him a star--MGM. Gable is older, perhaps wiser, but here fully capable of playing this role with all of the insight into life that his 49 years have earned him. One has the feeling that after the great '30s roles such as Rhett Butler, after the death of Carole Lombard, and after the war, Gable was perfect for the world-weary professional gambler that he plays here--the part fits him like a glove. And he's surrounded by great character actors such as Frank Morgan, Lewis Stone, and Mary Astor, to name a few.

I don't agree with the other review that said this was a totally unrealistic, if watchable film: I grew up in a small city that had a gambling house similar to the one depicted here. It was well run, had many regulars, and was quite well known to the authorities. In any case, this movie is well worth a view, if you're not a Gable fan, you might be after viewing this one.