TCM: The Greatest Movie Channel

[mariah23]

I just read on Entertainment Weekly’s website that Olivia de Havilland died peacefully in her sleep Saturday.  It’s the end of an era.

[Spartan Girl]

Dying in her sleep at 104...you can't ask for a better end to a more deserving legend. RIP.

[voiceover]

My first thought was her being greeted by Robert, and embraced by Errol Flynn.

[Inquisitionist]

5 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

Dying in her sleep at 104...you can't ask for a better end to a more deserving legend. RIP.

She and I shared a birth date, 40 years apart.  I hope I go the same way!

I have seen surprisingly few of her movies.  Will be keeping an eye out for TCM's tribute.

[Rinaldo]

21 hours ago, Milburn Stone said:

To add one bit of data to @Rinaldo's point: In 1961, 9 out of 10 middle class homes in America had the Camelot original cast album. (I'm making that up, but not by much.)

It was one of the first cast albums I bought, I can tell you that -- the first week it was available, which was very soon after opening. (Our family only owned two others at that time, I think -- My Fair Lady and The Music Man.) In addition to its aural appeal, its original issue was one of the most lavish and colorful such LP albums ever: masses of color photos of those gorgeous sets and costumes.

This page lists all the cast albums that have been certified gold or better. Camelot is in the Gold section, having reached its 500,000 units sold just a year after opening. (It hit #1 on the Billboard pop charts.) 

[benteen]

RIP, Olivia de Havilland.  A true legend who lived a long, great life.

[vb68]

RIP Olivia de Havilland.   What an actress. She was one of my mom's favorites, which means she was also one of my favorites as I grew up watching her so much.

I'm also waiting for the TCM Tribute. I have to say the national news (at least the one I saw)  tonight didn't really do her justice. It was very brief and matter of fact.

On a totally different note, I can now say I've watched Foxy Brown. It was on in the pre-dawn this morning today and about what I expected. I wouldn't say it was great or even that good, but I enjoyed it for the most part. Pam Grier was the best thing about it for sure.  It was probably most  interesting as a time capsule of that period and you could definitely see the inspiration someone like Tarantino drew from it. 

Edited July 27, 2020 by vb68

[aradia22]

Quote

I just read on Entertainment Weekly’s website that Olivia de Havilland died peacefully in her sleep Saturday.  It’s the end of an era.

I just heard. She held out for a long time. 104 years is quite a life, considering how much she accomplished.

I have also seen surprisingly few of her movies. GWTW obvi. The Heiress (which I love). The Light in the Piazza.

But I always missed Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte when it was on TCM. And they didn't program her Errol Flynn movies often enough for me to catch them. At least during the years I had TCM.

[Suzn]

I hope they show To Each His Own.  Olivia's performance raised it well above the typical unwed mother story.

[VCRTracking]

6 hours ago, Rinaldo said:

It was one of the first cast albums I bought, I can tell you that -- the first week it was available, which was very soon after opening. (Our family only owned two others at that time, I think -- My Fair Lady and The Music Man.) In addition to its aural appeal, its original issue was one of the most lavish and colorful such LP albums ever: masses of color photos of those gorgeous sets and costumes.

This page lists all the cast albums that have been certified gold or better. Camelot is in the Gold section, having reached its 500,000 units sold just a year after opening. (It hit #1 on the Billboard pop charts.) 

And it made Robert Goulet a star. It is weird seeing him in clips of him in Camelot without the mustache though!

I hope TCM shows De Havilland's The Snake Pit. Harrowing movie.

[Miss Anne Thrope]

I'm hoping for The Strawberry Blonde to appear in the de Havilland tribute (though I think they may have shown it recently, which I missed).  She pairs really well with James Cagney and it's a fun (? well, sort of) movie.

[Rinaldo]

Those are all good choices for Olivia de Havilland; she made a lot of good ones. I came around to her rather late (3 or 4 years ago), having previously considered her as someone became a star because of her beauty (and then people are automatically impressed when such a star dowdies up as in The Heiress or goes through anguish as in The Snake Pit), and finally discovering how wrong I'd been. She delivered two very fine performances under Mitchell Leisen's direction: Hold Back the Dawn and To Each His Own, and the latter is the better movie (I would maintain that it isn't just her performance that raises it above its "Madame X" sort of premise -- it's made with a great deal of skill and tact). And she's just splendid in The Heiress -- everyone in it is.

[Milburn Stone]

9 hours ago, VCRTracking said:

And it made Robert Goulet a star. It is weird seeing him in clips of him in Camelot without the mustache though!

If I can go down this rabbit hole...I always thought it was a shame the way Goulet's career played out. Such a great theatrical baritone! Somehow he allowed himself to become a punchline.

[Inquisitionist]

1 hour ago, Milburn Stone said:

If I can go down this rabbit hole...I always thought it was a shame the way Goulet's career played out. Such a great theatrical baritone! Somehow he allowed himself to become a punchline.

Isn't that the truth?  😒  And that egregious mustache did not help!

[VCRTracking]

Although his appearance on The Simpsons shows what a good sport he was:

 

 

[Milburn Stone]

 

57 minutes ago, VCRTracking said:

Although his appearance on The Simpsons shows what a good sport he was:

 

 

I do think he was smart to be a good sport. (He also was a good sport in a Naked Gun movie.) But somewhere along the line, his art became perceived widely as kitsch.

But I am rethinking my use of "allowed" in "allowed himself to become a punchline." The culture did it, and he didn't have a choice. The culture didn't do that to everybody. (Sinatra never became a joke, despite that there was a lot of joking at his expense.) But Goulet didn't choose to become a punching bag, there was just something about him, beyond his control, that the culture loved to punch. A sad waste of a great talent.

Edited July 27, 2020 by Milburn Stone

[Wiendish Fitch]

I often wonder how Robert Goulet felt about being the reason Elvis Presley shot the TV in his hotel room...

[VCRTracking]

I wonder about that bit where Ophelia is speaking in a Swedish accent even though she's wearing lederhosen that Coleman has to make a comment on it. Was it because Jamie Lee Curtis couldn't do a German accent?

 

Edited July 27, 2020 by VCRTracking

[Rinaldo]

2 hours ago, Milburn Stone said:

But I am rethinking my use of "allowed" in "allowed himself to become a punchline." The culture did it, and he didn't have a choice. The culture didn't do that to everybody.

I was thinking about that myself. As we got into the 1970s, his kind of Broadway baritone became perceived as old-fashioned and out of touch. (The same thing happened to Harve Presnell, who got 3 or 4 big movie roles and then faded from the screen for decades till he returned as a bald character actor, while other Broadway singing men of the period like John Cullum and Richard Kiley and Jerry Orbach were really actors first.) He could keep doing summer stock etc. for a while, but if he wanted to remain visible to a national audience, he kind of had to acquiesce in making his obsolescence a joke. He made a career out of being a good sport about it, in fact.

It can go in the other direction, too. After American Idol and subsequent publicity (and a dreadful tie-in movie), Justin Guarini was a punchline at 25. But he kept taking his work seriously, going on auditions alongside everyone else, and has now established himself as a top-level musical theater singer-actor. Three of the best stage performances I recall in the last decade or thereabouts are his: in Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (in which, in an all-star cast, he and Laura Benanti were about the only ones to rise above their material), in the short Encores! run of Paint Your Wagon (a recording was made, so you can verify it), and as Bobby in Company. I have a lot of respect for him.

[Babalu]

A couple of tangential comments:

Robert Goulet was my second crush when I was a small girl, so I’ve always had a soft spot for him. My first crush, when I was even smaller (age 3/4?) was.....Liberace.

I agree, @Rinaldo, that Laura Benanti was the star of Women on the Verge (though she wasn’t billed as such and didn’t have the biggest role). But my second favorite, by far, was Danny Burstein. I went to the very first preview (they hadn’t even had a dry run of the whole production, and Bartlett Sher came out to apologize before it started), and there were technical problems galore, which the cast handled with grace and humor. I agree that some of the big names were not transcendent, but I still loved it, which is a pretty unpopular opinion.

[Crs97]

I stumbled across High Society.  Wow could it use a modernization. As much as I love Grace, Frank, and Louis, listening to her dad wax eloquently about how having her for a daughter caused him to have an affair . . .  someone please drag this into the 21st century.

I know I am late, but RIP, Olivia.

[VCRTracking]

3 hours ago, Crs97 said:

I stumbled across High Society.  Wow could it use a modernization. As much as I love Grace, Frank, and Louis, listening to her dad wax eloquently about how having her for a daughter caused him to have an affair . . .  someone please drag this into the 21st century.

I know I am late, but RIP, Olivia.

It's a musical remake of The Philadelphia Story, and a worthwhile discussion can be had on that movie.

One last thing regarding CAMELOT, first you can tell Vanessa Redgrave and Franco Nero aren't acting. Also is this the first time we see "sex hair" in a mainstream Hollywood movie? 

 

 

[tennisgurl]

Arsenic and Old Lace tomorrow, and Cat People the next day?! Am I somehow subconsciously choosing the movie schedule this week?!

I love Cat People, even if I always wish that Irina got her happy ending and had stayed the focus, she is a way more interesting character than the wonder bread pair known as Oliver and Alice. For a movie that was clearly marketed and created to be a B movie camp horror fest, its got great atmosphere, the tension is almost all in what is implied than what is shown (which is my preferred brand of horror when I actually want to be creeped out) and its got a lot of heart and tragedy to it in the fate of Irina. Despite the premise which sounds pretty campy and ridiculous, it actually takes its premise seriously and plays it for heartbreak and horror. 

The 80s remake...well it has a sweet David Bowie song. 

Arsenic and Old Lace will never get old no matter how many times I watch it, so many quotable lines. Its one of the movies I show people when they say they dont like old movies to get them on board the black and white movie train. "Johnny, don't brag! You got twelve, they got twelve; the old ladies is just as good as you!" 

[Crs97]

39 minutes ago, VCRTracking said:

It's a musical remake of The Philadelphia Story, and a worthwhile discussion can be had on that movie.

Yes, but I like High Society better because I cannot stand Katherine Hepburn.  Same storyline so discussion works for both.

[VCRTracking]

6 minutes ago, Crs97 said:

Yes, but I like High Society better because I cannot stand Katherine Hepburn.  Same storyline so discussion works for both.

Ironically the reason The Philadelphia Story was a hit for Hepburn after being "Box Office Poison" for a couple of years was because audiences didn't like her arrogant public persona and enjoyed seeing her being put in her place.

Edited July 28, 2020 by VCRTracking

[Rinaldo]

12 hours ago, Babalu said:

I still loved [Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown the musical], which is a pretty unpopular opinion.

It is, but I'm right with you: I loved it too. As I said to a friend (a member of the pit orchestra) at dinner afterward, it was about the best time I've ever had at a show that was basically a mess. I saw it later in previews, but still before the official opening, and I would have mentioned Danny Burstein too, but his role turned out to be disappointingly small. 

1 hour ago, VCRTracking said:

... the reason The Philadelphia Story was a hit for Hepburn after being "Box Office Poison" for a couple of years was because audiences didn't like her arrogant public persona and enjoyed seeing her being put in her place.

Exactly. And this is commented on in much recent writing about Hepburn (a daughter being at fault for her father's philandering is especially unconscionable). For that reason, many who enjoy her prefer Holiday as a Grant-Hepburn pairing, because there she doesn't get blamed for other people's wrongdoing.

[BradyBunchFan]

TCM remembers Olivia de Havilland:

http://www.tcm.com/remembers/

 

[VCRTracking]

I've seen all the films being shown tonight. I like all of them but the two I have the most personal affection for is The Thin Man and Guys and Dolls. 

[Rinaldo]

Thanks to Carl Reiner night on TCM, I revisited All of Me (I’d honestly forgotten he directed it) for the first time in forever. I loved it then, and I love it still.  Steve Martin and Lily Tomlin make an unexpectedly perfect pair (who would have guessed?), there's a supporting cast stuffed with great skilled comedy actors (Richard Libertini, Jason Bernard, Madolyn Smith, Selma Diamond, Eric Christmas — if only Victoria Tennant could’ve been ditched in favor of Emma Thompson or someone with actual comedy ability). And then the sublime final minute during the end credits where we look into the mirror and see Steve and Lily finally together, dancing. Glorious.

But why did they show it in a 4:3 pan-'n'-scan copy, and not the original widescreen format? Surely that can’t be the only way it survives? But maybe so; Wikipedia tells me that that's the only format in which it's ever been released for home video. How can the original elements of a popular and well-remembered comedy from 1984 be lost? Is there any point contacting TCM to ask about that? How does one even do it?

[StatisticalOutlier]

I watched Arthur when it was on the other night.  The opening credits with the limousine going through the streets of New York and Christopher Cross singing Arthur's Theme was just sublime.

For years, when Mr. Outlier has said he's going to take a shower, I always respond, "I'll alert the media"--stealing John Gielgud's droll response when Arthur tells him he's going to take a bath.  He never had a reaction.  Well, it turns out he'd never seen the movie, and yet never once in all these years asked why I said I was going to alert the media when he was going to take a shower.  Then again, I'm no John Gielgud.

[Bastet]

On 7/29/2020 at 12:29 PM, Rinaldo said:

Thanks to Carl Reiner night on TCM, I revisited All of Me (I’d honestly forgotten he directed it) for the first time in forever. I loved it then, and I love it still. 

I adore that film.  Even though I had watched it on DVD quite recently, when I came across the final 20 minutes on TV last night, I had to stop and watch.

On 7/29/2020 at 12:29 PM, Rinaldo said:

if only Victoria Tennant could’ve been ditched in favor of Emma Thompson or someone with actual comedy ability)

Yes, she is the weak link in a cast that is thankfully otherwise so perfectly suited to their roles I am not distracted by her.

[StatisticalOutlier]

I just watched Alice Adams off my DVR from about a year ago.  In his little thing at the end, Ben Mankiewicz was talking about the plot and how Alice and Walter lived happily ever after in the movie, but not in Booth Tarkington's novel.  Then he referred to Alice and Walter again.

The thing is, Walter is Alice's brother.  Her boyfriend's name was Arthur, played by Fred MacMurray. 

I would normally think this is kind of a howler, but I can't help but think "Walter" whenever I see Fred MacMurray, because of Double Indemnity.

[Calvada]

On 7/27/2020 at 7:02 AM, Miss Anne Thrope said:

I'm hoping for The Strawberry Blonde to appear in the de Havilland tribute (though I think they may have shown it recently, which I missed).  She pairs really well with James Cagney and it's a fun (? well, sort of) movie.

This is being shown on Monday as part of the Rita Hayworth day of "Summer Under the Stars."

[Miss Anne Thrope]

1 hour ago, Calvada said:

This is being shown on Monday as part of the Rita Hayworth day of "Summer Under the Stars."

That's excellent - thanks for the heads up!

[VCRTracking]

Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck and Gary Cooper. 

"Come on Krupe, knock yourself out!"

 

 

[xaxat]

16 hours ago, VCRTracking said:

Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck and Gary Cooper. 

Stanwyck is sooo hot in that movie. No man could have resisted her charms.

[Wiendish Fitch]

1 hour ago, xaxat said:

Stanwyck is sooo hot in that movie. No man could have resisted her charms.

Stanwyck is absolutely stunning in Ball of Fire, as well as The Lady Eve (and they were released the same year!).

Ball of Fire is too charming for words. I love the part where Sugarpuss not only realizes she truly loves Bertram, but is actually kind of turned on by his earnestness and has to adopt his practice of dabbing cold water on her neck!

 

[VCRTracking]

2 hours ago, Wiendish Fitch said:

Stanwyck is absolutely stunning in Ball of Fire, as well as The Lady Eve (and they were released the same year!).

 

Another movie she made that year also with Cooper was the first movie I saw of hers and which made me fall in love with her when I happened to catch it on the local station when I was a kid was Frank Capra's MEET JOHN DOE. That ending, my god.

[EtheltoTillie]

I am looking forward to rewatching Ball of Fire later this week.  I recorded it and haven't seen it in years.  I started watching last night and was so enchanted by the Seven Dwarfs entourage, played by all the famous character actors of Hollywood. 

Last week I watched Guys and Dolls again.  There's always something new to focus on.  This time I was astounded about how inventive and funny the Havana bar scene choreography was.  I loved how Jean Simmons went wild.  I also was floored by Stubby Kaye's voice for "Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat."  Oh, and I also loved Miss Adelaide's wedding dress. 

I'm in a bit of a Jean Simmons rabbit hole.  I watched The Happy Ending on Amazon Prime this week.  This movie stars Jean Simmons, Shirley Jones, and many more (don't  forget Bobby Darin, credited as Robert Darin--I won't spoil his part), and was directed by Simmons's love interest (later husband) Richard Brooks.  How had I missed this movie before?  Another example of a late sixties film that I should have been aware of.  It's very dated and weird yet also a fascinating psychological study.  Another example of a famous theme song that was a hit song at the time ("What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?").  Catch this movie if you can.  Then I decided I wanted to watch Elmer Gantry, also starring Jean Simmons and Shirley Jones!  I have already set my DVR for next week when they show it on TCM. 

Edited August 3, 2020 by GussieK

[EtheltoTillie]

PS Richard Brooks is also the director of Elmer Gantry.

[VCRTracking]

19 hours ago, GussieK said:

Last week I watched Guys and Dolls again.  There's always something new to focus on.  This time I was astounded about how inventive and funny the Havana bar scene choreography was.  I loved how Jean Simmons went wild.  I also was floored by Stubby Kaye's voice for "Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat."  Oh, and I also loved Miss Adelaide's wedding dress. 

Jean Simmons is so adorable in the Havana scene. I love her appearance on Star Trek The Next Generation. When they showed the promo on TV they have that great moment where she yells "I've brought down bigger men than you Picard!"

Edited August 3, 2020 by VCRTracking

[EtheltoTillie]

Sorry not sorry:  I have to post one more thing about The Happy Ending, and I hope that is okay, as it is not appearing currently on TCM.  But I just remembered I have to recommend the wonderful performance of Tina Louise, as the un-Ginger.  A hard-bitten housewife who serves as the Greek chorus commenting on the marriages of all the other characters.  I remembered Tina just now because by coincidence I just started watching her as a detective in an episode of Cannon, from the seventies. 

[Rinaldo]

I caught Down To Earth on Rita Hayworth Day, having heard of it often before, but never seen it. What an odd item it is: a sort-of-sequel to Here Comes Mr. Jordan, with the same agent (James Gleason, now moved from sports to theater) the same heavenly messenger (Edward Everett Horton), but a new Mr. Jordan (Roland Culver in for Claude Rains) and the same director. But now in color. And a musical. 

So Rita is the muse Terpsichore, because somehow the muses are all up there in the afterlife, and she's offended by the new swing musical about her and her sisters, so she asks to get sent Down To Earth to fix it. But of course she falls in love instead, complications ensue, etc.

It's always a pleasure to see Hayworth, of course -- I won't say "hear" because her singing was always dubbed (in this case, nicely by Anita Ellis) -- but this is a miserable vehicle for her dance talents because the songs are so poor. One (a trio with two men), I thought was a plot point in which she was trying to ruin the song by rendering it in a dreary monotone, but no -- the music is just written that way. With studios fussing over every detail in their movies then, and often replacing or deleting songs, I wonder how this score got through. Anyway, in the end this just isn't very good.

It sure sends out trivia links in all directions, though. Here Comes Mr. Jordan was based on a play called Heaven Can Wait (a title used for a completely unrelated 1943 movie); it was remade as a Warren Beatty vehicle using the original stage title, and again as a Chris Rock vehicle using the title of this sequel, Down To Earth. Meanwhile, Down To Earth itself was remade as Xanadu with Olivia Newton-John -- a flop movie that became a kind of camp classic, and was turned into a stage musical of the same name that put the campiness front and center.

[ruby24]

I watched the 1948 version of Anna Karenina. I thought it was pretty good- I guess it was a little long. I don't remember being blown away by the Greta Garbo one from the 30's, but I guess most people say that one's better. I thought Vivien Leigh was good though.

[chitowngirl]

Sigh-yesterday was Charlie Chaplin day and today is Goldie Hawn. Foul Play is such a good movie. I miss my TCM!!!

[GreekGeek]

This feels like sacrilege, but I watched The Great Dictator for the first time on Sunday and found it...not great. I acknowledge the courage it took to make fun of Hitler in 1940, and some sequences are justifiably classic: Adenoid Hynkel's first speech in gibberish German, the ballet with the globe, the barber's plea for kindness at the end. The rest was kind of all over the place. I never understood how the barber was so easily able to replace Hynkel. And all the scenes in the ghetto dragged; Chaplain understandably didn't want to make light of the suffering of the Jewish people, but there was no comedy there. I also got distracted by the dialogue: sometimes Chaplain used the mock-German and sometimes British-accented English (which I assume was his "real" voice); sometimes Jack Oakie used a fake Italian accent and sometimes he spoke in his own American voice.

[ruby24]

I watched The Pilgrim (1923) a Chaplin short I'd never seen (I guess it's not really a short- it was 43 min) and the 1936 version of The Last of the Mohicans. Youngest I've ever seen Randolph Scott. I liked The Pilgrim. LOTM was fine- I actually prefer the silent version I think (and the 90's one of course, which is the best- the only one to have actual Native American actors in their roles).

[EtheltoTillie]

I caught some partials on Norma Shearer day.  None seemed worth sitting through in their entirety.

1)  The Barretts of Wimpole Street  caught last half. Wow, that was weird.  That cousin with the Baba Wawa pronunciation?  Weird kissing?  However, Charles Laughton was genuinely terrifying.

2)  Private Lives:  Too talky and dated.  Somewhat amusing.  Caught beginning and end.  Just didn't feel like sitting through the whole thing.

3)  We Were Dancing:  Apparently Shearer's last movie.  Very strange.  She seemed to be channeling Greer Garson in both look and sound.  It was an unfunny comedy where she dumps her fiance to take up with Melvin Douglas as a professional moocher.  I lasted about 10 minutes.

I am a fan of The Women, but I don't see any special talent in Norma Shearer

[Suzn]

2 hours ago, GussieK said:

I caught some partials on Norma Shearer day.  None seemed worth sitting through in their entirety.

1)  The Barretts of Wimpole Street  caught last half. Wow, that was weird.  That cousin with the Baba Wawa pronunciation?  Weird kissing?  However, Charles Laughton was genuinely terrifying.

2)  Private Lives:  Too talky and dated.  Somewhat amusing.  Caught beginning and end.  Just didn't feel like sitting through the whole thing.

3)  We Were Dancing:  Apparently Shearer's last movie.  Very strange.  She seemed to be channeling Greer Garson in both look and sound.  It was an unfunny comedy where she dumps her fiance to take up with Melvin Douglas as a professional moocher.  I lasted about 10 minutes.

I am a fan of The Women, but I don't see any special talent in Norma Shearer

I would never claim that Norma Shearer was a great actress, but I love her anyway.  You need to see her earlier movies - A Free Soul and The Divorcee.  She may be an acquired taste, but to me she was utterly compelling.  The Women is one of my top ten favorite movies.

[VCRTracking]

Her pre-code work was definitely her best.