TCM: The Greatest Movie Channel

[prican58]

Easter Parade. I love this last number as Judy sings it in the way only she could do. Beautiful tune.

Yes bmoore4026, I was thinking exactly that while watching. The most emotional stuff occurs after Masala tells Judah that they are alive. I love Heston's portrayal of the agony upon finding his mom and sister in the leper colony. 

Looking forward to The Robe now. I love the ending. 

Edited April 17, 2017 by prican58

[MisterBluxom]

14 hours ago, Rinaldo said:

There are two parts to the answer: 1, those were the days of studio contracts, when the studio that "owned" you (MGM in his case, though with loan-outs and trades possible) told you where to report, the day after your current movie wrapped; and 2, Gable was not yet A-list when the year started. You can see him transitioning from bit player to second man to leading man in the course of the year, by clicking through to each individual film and looking at the billing order. Indeed, in the credits before this year, he was usually "uncredited," and in the lists for early 1931 there are generally one or two men billed above him, but by the end he's at the top -- an impressive rise in such a short time. And starting the very next year, his number of movies per year becomes a saner 4 or 5, as befits a star.

Ahh. Thank you. I assumed that after he made Gone With The Wind, he would automatically be an A-list actor. I didn't realize the true timing.

[Milburn Stone]

17 hours ago, Silver Raven said:

It always blows my mind how Gable made the movie San Francisco, about the 1906 earthquake, in 1936, just 30 years after the quake.  That would be as close to us as a movie set in 1987.

I know. I think about that kind of stuff a lot. We who were born in the second half of the twentieth century tend to put dates like 1906 in the same category as 1066, but they weren't that long ago. My theory is that it's the immense amount of change that happened in the twentieth century that makes 1906 seem like ancient history to us. 

Here's another mind-bender, at least for those of us (like me) born around 1950. Gable's San Francisco came out only fourteen years before I was born. Yet 1936 has always seemed like ancient history to me, no less than 1906. Maybe I was 15 when I first became aware of the movie. So that was twenty-nine years after its making. To a 15-year old today, that would be 1988. Which to me feels like yesterday.

Does 1988 feel to today's teenager like 1936 felt to me? That's what I don't know. Arithmetic says it should, but arithmetic could be wrong.

Edited April 17, 2017 by Milburn Stone

[Crisopera]

I was so looking forward to seeing the silent Ben-Hur, which I have never seen, but my dvr recording was almost entirely pixelated.  So frustrating!

[prican58]

I saw it very fleetingly today but is there a promo for a new Essentials on TCM? It looked like Alec Baldwin will be hosting.

Just wondering.

[psychoticstate]

On 4/12/2017 at 11:34 PM, aradia22 said:

I started watching Picnic and it was fine (I kept comparing it the production of the play I saw recently) but after maybe 15 minutes I realized I wasn't in the mood for it so I put on Forsaking All Others (1934). I forgot how much I love these old romantic comedies. I can see why this is a lesser one but it's not terrible. I feel certain that I've watched it before, or at least the part where Dylan and Mary go to the house and then the others catch up to them. Maybe it's one of those movies where I only watched the middle. Anyway, solid Mankiewicz script as far as quips go. Lots of zingers. A few nice Adrian costumes. Not too crazy with the ruffles in this one. I feel like Robert Montgomery was great here. He's such a Dylan. I never buy him as a real romantic lead. He's much better as this schmuck. Clark Gable looked gorgeous and there were moments when I thought he found a real sensitivity in his acting that wasn't required for a silly movie like this. Also, I thought it was funny how many times they managed to get him in partial states of undress. Oh, 1934. On that note, it made me realize how warped my brain is getting from the new superhero body standards. Gable looked lean and almost lanky to me at times until he stood next to Montgomery or something. Actors now are getting so unnaturally big and muscular. I also thought that this was the sweetest and gentlest character I've seen him play. Sure, there was the hairbrush thing but aside from that, he was a tabby cat. I'm not sure I was into it but maybe if he'd have been more aggressive then Mary would have leapt into his arms halfway through the movie. Joan was great but she was a lot more standard and I feel like part of the issue with her character is how the plot played out. Things were great at first. But somewhere after the Todd's party, even though there were some great moments, the plot gets kind of inert and it makes less sense for things to drag on the way they do until they get resolved in a big rush at the very end. I wish the revelation had come earlier instead of the revelation --> HEA ending we got. It would have improved the writing for Mary's character and given me more time with Gable and Crawford as a couple and I can never get enough of that. Frances Drake was beautiful as Connie but not a particularly great actress. I don't think I've seen her in anything else. It was weird to see Rosalind Russell in such a small part. I kept expecting her character to come back in some way.

For some reason, more than other movies around this time, I started thinking about how this movie would have played coming out around the Depression. I think maybe it was Crawford. She wasn't her kind of scrappy working girl character. But it also wasn't such a glamorous movie that you'd think audiences would see it as escapism. It seemed like it was about society types in a way that was out of touch with everyday people. Also, I noticed way more... not racist... but racially weird comments in this script. I mean, normally if the movie isn't about race, they don't bring it up at all but I kept noticing them tossing off little comments that seemed weird. 

If you like witty scripts, I recommend it. It's harmless enough and mostly a vehicle for zingers delivered by pretty people. 

I love Forsaking All Others!  It's not genius or anything but just good old fun.

On 4/15/2017 at 10:52 PM, MissBluxom said:

I just watched "Strange Cargo" with Clark Gable and Joan Crawford. Some interesting points:

Joan got top billing there. This movie was made in 1940 (after Gone with the Wind) - hard to understand why she ever got top billing.

The story was kind of dis-jointed and I think the director put the actors into some very difficult situations. But they both gave wonderful performances. Even if you disagree with me that the story was kind of crummy and some of the other actors really didn't fit (like Peter Lorre), the performances given by Gable and Crawford were so great that they overcame any of the flaws in this film.  I don't know if TCM will be showing this movie or not. But if they don't, I sure would like to recommend it to anyone who likes either or both of these actors.

I had never before seen  Strange Cargo but found it on a web page from some critic who claimed it was one of JC's top five films. Hard to disagree with that. She was terrific. They both were.

Crawford got top billing because it was in her MGM contract at that time that she got top billing on her pictures.  Gable was definitely MGM's biggest male star but I don't think he cared as much about top billing.  

Strange Cargo is a good film.  The last film pairing of Gable and Crawford and both looked, and acted, wonderfully.  

[Silver Raven]

4 hours ago, Crisopera said:

I was so looking forward to seeing the silent Ben-Hur, which I have never seen, but my dvr recording was almost entirely pixelated.  So frustrating!

It's on YouTube.

[voiceover]

4 hours ago, Crisopera said:

I was so looking forward to seeing the silent Ben-Hur, which I have never seen, but my dvr recording was almost entirely pixelated.  So frustrating!

Don't worry, crisopera.  As principal dancer of the RNFC*, I've already arranged to have it added to the "Watch TCM" site.

Notice (as I was reminded this time around) that it's *Esther's* idea to track down Judah's mother & sister in the leper colony (which is filmed to look like a valley of walking dead.  Truly creepy).  All by herself, she braves the terrifying, contagious atmosphere, and doesn't stop searching until she finds them.  Then she coaxes them into leaving with her.  The audacity of The Flapper! I'm tellin' ya.

Enjoying William Daniels as Guest Programmer.  He was so handsome & compelling in 1776.  Another re-discovery:  it's the little moments in this, what get me.  The last "'Til Then" Abigail sings, while running across the fields, only stopping to belt out "Saltpeter, John!"  And the Georgia Rep, Dr Hall, quoting Edmund Burke before flipping the voting tab to "Yes".

37 minutes ago, Silver Raven said:

It's on YouTube.

 

Or YouTube.

[bmoore4026]

14 hours ago, Milburn Stone said:

I know. I think about that kind of stuff a lot. We who were born in the second half of the twentieth century tend to put dates like 1906 in the same category as 1066, but they weren't that long ago. My theory is that it's the immense amount of change that happened in the twentieth century that makes 1906 seem like ancient history to us. 

Here's another mind-bender, at least for those of us (like me) born around 1950. Gable's San Francisco came out only fourteen years before I was born. Yet 1936 has always seemed like ancient history to me, no less than 1906. Maybe I was 15 when I first became aware of the movie. So that was twenty-nine years after its making. To a 15-year old today, that would be 1988. Which to me feels like yesterday.

Does 1988 feel to today's teenager like 1936 felt to me? That's what I don't know. Arithmetic says it should, but arithmetic could be wrong.

Well, they came out with a movie about 9/11 in 2006 and one about the Indonesian Tsunami in 2012.  So, really, I'm surprised a movie about the 1906 earthquake didn't come out sooner.

[Nidratime]

Quote

Well, they came out with a movie about 9/11 in 2006 and one about the Indonesian Tsunami in 2012.  So, really, I'm surprised a movie about the 1906 earthquake didn't come out sooner.

Movies were kind of new at the time.

[bmoore4026]

Well...today's theme, apparently, is "Everybody be cray-cray": http://www.tcm.com/schedule/

[mariah23]

18 hours ago, prican58 said:

I saw it very fleetingly today but is there a promo for a new Essentials on TCM? It looked like Alec Baldwin will be hosting.

Just wondering.

It was just announced on TCM's Facebook page.  Alec Baldwin will be hosting with special guests William Friedkin, Tina Fey, and David Letterman.  Also a special appearance by Letterman's beard.

[voiceover]

Reruns of M*A*S*H are popping up everywhere, and this morning's "Rainbow Bridge" is a reminder that the series (early years esp) is scattered through with references to delight the TCM crowd:

"...I think Ralph Bellamy said it best when he said, 'If I can't get the girl, at least give me more money.'"

and

(re: to Fr Mulcahy's nice benediction) " I feel bad.  We tried to get Pat O'Brien."

Edited April 18, 2017 by voiceover

[Rinaldo]

And one entire episode of M*A*S*H has no plot other than the whole company sitting down together to watch My Darling Clementine.

[voiceover]

Because it features "The three things that make a movie great: horses, cowboys, and horses!"

I also recall Hawkeye's reax to seeing a Gene Tierney pic: "I love her overbite!"

Edited April 19, 2017 by voiceover
Because I can't remember the 2nd thing, and me unable to recall a MASH line is devastating

[prican58]

The MASH movie refs are fun and I always remember the Gene Tierney comment. I think that when I was watching that show back in the day (middleschool/high school) I was into the old films but was only just beginning to get a grasp of all the actors besides the Bogarts, Cagneys and Davis'. Eventually I saw Laura and figured it out. 

Given that the show takes place during the 50s I think movie commentaries would have been something many people came by naturally. TV hadn't overtaken the movies yet as a common cultural reference.

[prican58]

5 hours ago, mariah23 said:

It was just announced on TCM's Facebook page.  Alec Baldwin will be hosting with special guests William Friedkin, Tina Fey, and David Letterman.  Also a special appearance by Letterman's beard.

I wonder if The Essentials will just be the same films over and over. I gather it will be based on the The 52 Essentials book so that's almost a movie per week minus some holiday breaks. Once they go around will they start over with reruns? What about the following year?

 How about some "new Essentials"? Jaws, Rocky, Annie Hall and Spinal Tap are the only ones from outside the 50s/60s (1975-1984) so do they try and promote other films? Just wondering because while all 52 are arguably "essential", that doesn't mean nothing else can ever be considered such. 

[mariah23]

58 minutes ago, prican58 said:

I wonder if The Essentials will just be the same films over and over. I gather it will be based on the The 52 Essentials book so that's almost a movie per week minus some holiday breaks. Once they go around will they start over with reruns? What about the following year?

 How about some "new Essentials"? Jaws, Rocky, Annie Hall and Spinal Tap are the only ones from outside the 50s/60s (1975-1984) so do they try and promote other films? Just wondering because while all 52 are arguably "essential", that doesn't mean nothing else can ever be considered such. 

 

Well, No Time for Sergeants airs May 27.

[ratgirlagogo]

3 hours ago, prican58 said:

Given that the show takes place during the 50s I think movie commentaries would have been something many people came by naturally. TV hadn't overtaken the movies yet as a common cultural reference.

And all the movies referenced were recent for people in the early fifties.

[voiceover]

Robert Donat's British spy romances Marlene Dietrich's Russian countess during the Revolution in Thursday morning's Knight Without Armour.  They're just sizzling together (one of my Top 10 Movie Kisses...so, Nyah).

Just occurred to me as I was rambling in to post this reminder, that Donat would've made an intriguing Zhivago.  You might have to see him dressed like a Cossack in this movie to visualize it, though. 

There are worse things I've put you through.

[Pyralis]

I'm sorry I missed it - pesky thing called work. My morning would have been a lot more pleasant.   I usually try and watch anything Donat's in if I can, even if I have seen them all more than once.

[Crisopera]

Is anyone else having the pixilation problem with TCM?  It is now constant, which makes the channel unwatchable.  It seems to be the only channel doing this.  Does anyone know if it's the DVR or the cable that's the problem.  Happens both live and recorded.  It starts, the picture freezes, then pixilates, over and over again, while the soundtrack is uninterrupted.  Any thoughts?  And annoyingly, Spectrum (Time/Warner) doesn't support Watch TCM, the bastards!

[Milburn Stone]

4 hours ago, Crisopera said:

Is anyone else having the pixilation problem with TCM?  It is now constant, which makes the channel unwatchable.  It seems to be the only channel doing this.  Does anyone know if it's the DVR or the cable that's the problem.  Happens both live and recorded.  It starts, the picture freezes, then pixilates, over and over again, while the soundtrack is uninterrupted.  Any thoughts?  And annoyingly, Spectrum (Time/Warner) doesn't support Watch TCM, the bastards!

Not having that problem, and blessedly, the problem that was endemic to TCM when watched on DirecTV-- the "skip-framing" artifact that affected both video and audio--has abated. At the time I thought people here might think I was crazy or super-picky, since apparently no one else here was seeing it, but then I discovered other DirecTV viewers with the issue on the TCM message boards. (No response came from TCM, but maybe the message got through, because as I say, the problem went away after many months.) Anyway, a recurring theme does seem to be that TCM from time to time fails to provide this or that carrier with the amount of "buffering" in the signal that is considered acceptable practice. The problem clearly is with TCM, since every other network does provide sufficient buffering to prevent artifacts! I guess doing so costs money, and TCM's beancounters are cheap? Doesn't seem consistent with the high standards of TCM's creative programming, but perhaps excellence in one department doesn't bleed over into another.

In case it's helpful, here is one of the 2 threads on the TCM boards where the skip-framing was discussed. You can probably "bump" the discussion with your input about Spectrum, or else start a new topic there:

http://forums.tcm.com/index.php?/topic/54925-picture-jumps-on-ch-256-direct-tv/

Edited April 22, 2017 by Milburn Stone

[Crisopera]

Thanks, Milburn Stone!

[ratgirlagogo]

8 hours ago, Crisopera said:

annoyingly, Spectrum (Time/Warner) doesn't support Watch TCM, the bastards!

Hmm, it does for us.  The more common problem (which we're having right now by the way) is that the  Watch TCM site keeps telling us we have to update Flash even though we have the most current update, so nothing will load.

[Rinaldo]

I may be all wrong (I often am about technical stuff), but I have had sites (not TCM as it happens) tell me I need the current version of Flash when I already have it, and I found that all I needed was to use a different browser. Chrome has been the one that lets me watch Amazon Prime videos, for instance, where Safari wouldn't.

[Charlie Baker]

Time Warner NYC didn't support Watch TCM, then it was taken over by Spectrum.  Other areas with Spectrum can access Watch TCM, but we in NYC (and other places?) still can't.  This serves to intensify a long time irritation. 

[Crisopera]

Yeah, I don't know what Time Warner/Spectrum has against TCM - it took Time Warner years just to add TCM to the channel lineup, and now it doesn't support Watch TCM.  As I said before, bastards!

[Rinaldo]

Currently playing, from 1957: Sweet Smell of Success. A gem, though not a happy time at the movies -- it leaves one feeling less than optimistic about the human soul. I see that the TCM online commenters call it "noir": OK, in the sense that it all seems to happen at night, in flashy drunken old-time Times Square, but it's not what people usually mean by the term. The main story concerns a driven press agent (Tony Curtis) and a spiteful columnist (Burt Lancaster). The two actors are not only both marvelous, their performances aren't like anything they ever did before or after. They have a great time with the Clifford Odets (adapted by Ernest Lehman) dialogue; lines that might seem too artificial on paper become memorable as they savor them (just the way Curtis says "avidly"). Add in James Wong Howe cinematography and music by Elmer Bernstein (with the Chico Hamilton Quintet central to the plot), and it's one of the most vivid experiences 50s Hollywood has to offer.

[prican58]

"You're a cookie full of arsenic." Love Burt's delivery of that line.

[Wiendish Fitch]

"You sound happy, Sidney. Why should you be happy when I am not?"

JJ Hunsecker, one of cinema's most quotable villains. :)

[Rinaldo]

17 hours ago, prican58 said:

"You're a cookie full of arsenic." Love Burt's delivery of that line.

16 hours ago, Wiendish Fitch said:

"You sound happy, Sidney. Why should you be happy when I am not?"

JJ Hunsecker, one of cinema's most quotable villains. :)

May I just say what a great pleasure it is to see my love for this edgy gem shared by others. Years ago when the movie Diner (another gem) was new, I was a bit puzzled by one of the peripheral characters who (as his friends explained) went around saying nothing but quotes from Sweet Smell of Success. I wondered what was so special about that film that it would influence someone (even a fictional character) that way. As of the last decade or so, now I know.

[Inquisitionist]

10 minutes ago, Rinaldo said:

May I just say what a great pleasure it is to see my love for this edgy gem shared by others. Years ago when the movie Diner (another gem) was new, I was a bit puzzled by one of the peripheral characters who (as his friends explained) went around saying nothing but quotes from Sweet Smell of Success. I wondered what was so special about that film that it would influence someone (even a fictional character) that way. As of the last decade or so, now I know.

Oh my gosh, which Diner character was that?  I haven't seen the movie in ages.

[Rinaldo]

44 minutes ago, Inquisitionist said:

Oh my gosh, which Diner character was that?  I haven't seen the movie in ages.

I don't even remember his name. It was a quick bit, and as I didn't know Sweet Smell at the time (except the title), I just barely caught on to what was happening.

OK, researching: the Wikipedia Diner article doesn't mention it (though the SSoS one does, as a cultural effect). But whadayaknow -- the TCM site posts just the right clip: Steve Guttenberg and Tim Daly are catching up at the pool hall, and Methan (played by Tait Ruppert) stops by, spouting his quotes.

http://www.tcm.com/mediaroom/video/241484/Diner-Movie-Clip-Cleopatra-On-A-Plate.html

[Inquisitionist]

Wow, great research, Rinaldo!  I remember seeing it and having the SSoS reference go right over my head.

[SeanC]

Witness for the Prosecution is impressive for Billy Wilder's ability to pull off a twist that should be really hard to translate from the page to the screen.

[AuntiePam]

The Opposite Sex, a 1956 remake of The Women, but with men and musical numbers.  June Allyson, Leslie Nielsen, Joan Collins, Agnes Moorehead, Ann Miller -- maybe it's my knee-jerk reaction to casual adultery ("It didn't mean anything!") but this was well-nigh unwatchable for me.  It wasn't campy enough to be fun, or serious enough to make me care about the Hilliard's marriage.

June Allyson's ridiculous hairstyle didn't help either.  One clue that a hairstyle is unattractive is that nobody has ever copied it.  June has had lovely hair at different times, but that too-short page-boy in her later movies makes me wonder what she was thinking, and why nobody suggested something different.

[Charlie Baker]

During the day yesterday there was a roster of Ricardo Cortez movies.  One I'd wanted to catch for sometime was the first filming of The Maltese Falcon.  Cortez's Sam Spade doesn't have the gravity or angst of Bogart's and he frankly enjoys being a wolf.  He and Bebe Daniels made an attractive coupling. The rest of the cast was pretty good.  There are some broad comedic moments which worked, and not a lot of early talkie staginess.  It holds up well for an eighty-five-year-old movie (!) and entertains.  I don't think anyone around then would be thinking that ten years later John Huston and his cast would make something transcendent out of this perfectly fine detective story.  (There was a version in between these two, also, with Bette Davis and Warren William, called Satan Met a Lady, which I haven't seen.)

[Rinaldo]

The DVD set of The Maltese Falcon includes both of those earlier versions of the material as extras. (As well as shorts and featurettes including the filming of the ballet Gaité Parisienne.) One of the best-filled-out such boxes.

[Crisopera]

The middle version of The Maltese Falcon is terrible - and I love both Bette Davis and Warren William.  I think Warren William would have been an excellent Sam Spade in a good version, since Hammett describes him as "looking rather pleasantly like a blond Satan".  The earlier version has the pre-Code advantage of being able to be honest about the storylines and a better Fat Man in Dudley Digges than Alison Skipworth (Satan Met a Lady doesn't even have an actual Falcon - it's a jeweled horn).  I'm quite fond of Ricardo Cortez, especially in the pre-Code days.  Mind you, he was better as a villain than a leading man.  I picked up some of that TCM group and am looking forward to watching them this weekend (no more pixelation!).  Something I learned today - the great cinematographer Stanley Cortez (The Night of the Hunter, The Magnificent Ambersons)  was Ricardo's brother.

Edited April 29, 2017 by Crisopera

[enoughcats]

On 4/17/2017 at 8:41 AM, Milburn Stone said:

I know. I think about that kind of stuff a lot. We who were born in the second half of the twentieth century tend to put dates like 1906 in the same category as 1066, but they weren't that long ago. My theory is that it's the immense amount of change that happened in the twentieth century that makes 1906 seem like ancient history to us. 

Here's another mind-bender, at least for those of us (like me) born around 1950. Gable's San Francisco came out only fourteen years before I was born.

Of a similar age, I am.

My home town newspaper always had a 75 years ago and 100 years ago filler.

Perhaps the one that hit me hardest was a quote that so and so had just celebrated her (late 90s) birthday and hoped to make 100.  They interviewed her and asked her what was memorable about her life.  She answered that as a very small child she had been responsible for fanning the President at dinner.  They asked which President?  She responded "Mr. Washington, of course."

Later when I worked in Houston, someone hired the marquee at Memorial City right next to I-10 and congratulated a good friend, giving his name and reminding him that he "was one quarter the age of the U.S.A."

[voiceover]

Just to throw down with the rest of you: "The cat's in the bag and the bag's in the river."

Was thinking during the Streisand bday marathon, what crap luck her characters always had with men!  At least, in the dramas.  

And why don't they show my favorite (What's Up, Doc?) anytime they do one of these? (Answers own question:) I'd guess because, though she's the female lead, and gives one of her best performances ("'Propriety': Noun...See, 'Etiquette'!"), it's not "about" her in any significant way.

[prican58]

I'm posting this vid from the old Judy Garland tv show. This dancer Bobby Banas stands out here. Now, lately I am reminded of the film Guess Who's Coming to Dinner and a scene where a delivery boy comes to Spencer and Kate's house and just busts out dancing. I thought it was the same dancer but I see that it isn't. Still, I dig both of these. Love the 60s dancing!

Edited May 1, 2017 by prican58

[Milburn Stone]

16 hours ago, prican58 said:

I'm posting this vid from the old Judy Garland tv show.

That clip made me contemplate the entire history of dance, from the first time mankind thought of pre-planned movement to music. Which is a compliment.

Now I want to see Martha Raye do the Nitty-Gritty. I bet she could.

[Milburn Stone]

On 4/16/2017 at 4:15 PM, Rinaldo said:

A subject that interests me (I'm surprised that nobody seems to have written a book about it yet, given the abundance of Hollywood-history writing) is how long the practice of actors working under contract to studios may have persisted. It began diminishing in the 1950s, concurrently with the studios losing control of the physical theaters, but how long did it last?

The little bits one reads here and there fascinate me. Like this bit from an online interview with Shirley Knight (a Warners contract player in the early 1960s...

Thanks for sharing that bit from Shirley Knight, Rinaldo. Fascinating. Somebody should write a book.

I was saying just the other day (I think it was a real conversation with a friend; apologies if it's something I wrote here and I'm repeating myself) that Hitchcock, for all his singular greatness as a film artist, never shied away from using contract players in his secondary parts. You might think he would have said, "Get me the best actor for the role, I don't care who it is," but no. Time after time in his movies of the fifties through seventies--whether it be the woman clerk in the house of rented rooms in Vertigo, or the used-car dealer in Psycho, or, for God's sake, Leo G. Carroll in North by Northwest--you see contract players. It's like he didn't care that the audience would be going, "Hey, it's that guy." And I'm sure he didn't. He recognized that we don't believe actors are real, that all we need is that an actor adequately perform his dramatic function in the story, because the story is all that matters. It almost helps that the actor is someone we've seen a million times, because then story (as opposed to irrelevant notions of believability) is king.

When we're children and daddy is reading us a story, we don't go, "Hey, that's not a dragon talking, that's Dad doing a voice." We know that's Dad sitting right there, and we don't care. We still get completely into the story. Just tell us the story.

Edited May 1, 2017 by Milburn Stone

[SeanC]

Tonight's centenary tribute to French actress Danielle Darrieux includes Jacques Demy's oft-looked final musical, Une chambre en ville, which is for my money up there with his best films.

[Rinaldo]

Thanks for the alert, @SeanC. I had noticed that title on the upcoming grid and bypassed it (never having heard of it), but I've now set a recording. (I had already set a recording for The Earrings of Madame de..., one of those classics everyone talks about that I've not yet seen.)

[ratgirlagogo]

1 hour ago, Rinaldo said:

(I had already set a recording for The Earrings of Madame de..., one of those classics everyone talks about that I've not yet seen.)

One of my very favorite movies.  I envy you getting to see it for the first time.  "We're only superficially superficial."  And aren't we all.

Edited May 1, 2017 by ratgirlagogo

[Charlie Baker]

So yesterday included some perhaps less familiar stuff from the career of Star of the Month Clark Gable--like No Man of Her Own, the only movie he made with his love Carole Lombard, Sporting Blood, tart story of a racing horse, and Polly of the Circus with Marion Davies.  I'm always interested in plays adapted to film, and I'd never seen the movie of O'Neill's Strange Interlude with Gable and Norma Shearer.  The movie is under two hours and the play runs about five.  The device, or what some less charitable might term the gimmick, was O'Neill's experimenting with having the actors voice the character's inner thoughts in the midst of a scene, essentially baldly stating the subtext directly to the audience.  In the movie, it quite naturally was done in voiceover, while characters held their positions in the shots, not freeze frames.  The actors mostly come off well, but before you adjust to the technique, you might find yourself chuckling, judging it silly or even campy.  (See Groucho Marx's very funny riffing on the play  in Animal Crackers--"I'm having a strange interlude.") The play offers an immersion in its characters' anguish over the course of a lifetime (what do you expect from O'Neill?) while the movie, maybe because of its condensed nature, often slips into soapy melodrama. I still thought it was pretty fascinating.  I saw a production of the play in the 80s with Glenda Jackson (which was adapted for video) which really worked well; even there the interior monologues required an audience's adjustment. 

Edited May 4, 2017 by Charlie Baker

[Rinaldo]

I've never seen the film of Strange Interlude (I wonder how I missed or ignored it in the upcoming titles). I've read the play (and recall seeing at least part of the PBS telecast of the Glenda Jackson production) -- for some reason it was one of the few published plays my parents owned, so I read it at perhaps too young an age for all this feverish sexual frustration. Looking at it now, it seems an overwrought, dated piece of work, and I'm not referring to the "inner monologue" aspect, but the story itself: Nina deals with the grief of losing her fiancé in WWI by indulging in Shameful Promiscuity, and then marries dopey Sam and immediately gets pregnant. But no! Mother Of Sam, who couldn't reach them before the impulsive wedding, tells Nina the Shameful Family Secret: insanity runs in the family. So clever Nina will abort the kid and instead conceive one with loyal Dr. Ned, never anticipating that their effort at Cold Scientific Sex will instead turn into True Love. When the boy is grown, Sam helpfully dies of a stroke, but instead of making use of her freedom to finally marry Dr. Ned, Nina chooses Poor Suffering Charlie, who has had a crush on her from the sidelines since the certain went up on Act 1 (of 9). I'm sure a lot of that went by the wayside for reasons of "decency" as well as time.

Upcoming: 6 a.m. Sunday, Best Foot Forward. Yet another college musical, but one with a good Hugh Martin score and a fun cast largely taken from the stage cast (though some play different roles). Of them, June Allyson and Nancy Walker were making their film debuts, and Walker especially is great fun to see at such an early stage in her career. Lucille Ball does an odd drop-in "as herself," a visiting movie star (and presented as a bigger star than I think she was at the time -- it was to have been Lana Turner till motherhood intervened), with a scene I remember as non sequitur: her college-boy fan tells her how fervently he remembers a song she once sang, and she responds "OK, then I'll do a different one."

Tomorrow at 10 p.m., Sweet Revenge. I point it out only because it's such a strange choice for TCM to show at all: a virtually unreleased bomb from 1976, Stockard Channing's follow-up to her unexpected leap to star billing in The Fortune. I remember seeing previews for this one in theaters (where it went under various titles), and then... it never showed up. It eventually fizzled into a few theaters in some cities and then vanished, I don't think it's ever had a home video release, and I doubt anyone cares. She costars with Franklyn Ajaye (then best known for movies like Car Wash), and the twist seems to be that she's the unrepentant car thief and he's the staid public defender. Or something like that.

Edited May 4, 2017 by Rinaldo
I wrote "Ralph Martin," as properly noticed by @Milburn Stone below. Changed to avoid spreading misinformation.