Honor Among Lovers.

Review #2522: Honor Among Lovers.

Cast:

Claudette Colbert (Julia Traynor), Fredric March (Jerry Stafford), Monroe Owsley (Philip Craig), Charles Ruggles (Monty Dunn), Ginger Rogers (Doris Brown), Avonne Taylor (Maybelle Worthington), Pat J. O'Brien (Conroy), Janet McLeary (Margaret Newton), and Ralph Morgan (Riggs) Directed by Dorothy Arzner (#1648 - Sarah and Son, #1810 - Working Girls, #1992 - The Wild Party, #2187 - Christopher Strong, #2362 - Anybody's Woman)

I suppose the best way to start talking about the film is to let Arzner's words (conducted in the 1970s) about the movie: "I collaborated in the writing of Honor Among Lovers, which I made for Paramount in New York. As audiences were ready for more sophistication, it was considered the smartest high comedy at the time. No, there was no pressure regarding the script, I had very little interference with my pictures. Sometimes there were differences in casting, sets, or costumes, but usually I had my way. You see I was not dependent on the movies for my living, so I was always ready to give the picture over to some other director if I couldn’t make it the way I saw it. Right or wrong, I believe this was why I sustained so long––twenty years." This was the 8th credited feature film for Arzner as a director, right between Anybody's Woman (1930) and Working Girls (1931). There were apparently a few working titles with "Sex in Business", "Strictly Business", and "Another Man's Wife". This was the second pairing of Colbert and March, who first appeared together in Manslaughter (1930) (they appeared again with The Sign of the Cross [1932] and Tonight is Ours [1933]).

Okay, sure, an office triangle movie with a couple of future Academy Award winning actors involved*. It sounds like a pretty casual affair, particularly with a runtime of 75 minutes that basically coasts on just how much you yearn to see how one woman's choices create so many ripples for all involved. It's the type of movie that has its own little quirks for modern audiences, of course, mainly because the boss in the film is, well, a boss trying to strike up a romance with his secretary that decides that the best course of action after she gets married is to fire her. But at least he seems normal when compared to the other man in the triangle in Owsley, who was a stock theater troupe man before he got onto film (in the last days of silent film) that acted all the way until his death...at 36 in 1937 (from a heart attack, of all things). One can enjoy a little bit of ham-handedness (especially when representing the underrated aspect of a love triangle story: a guy who isn't actually that good at wooing). One thing comes to another and boom, suddenly you have folks trying to throw their significant other down the river for their foolishness. At least the movie isn't completely judgmental over the decisions made by its one key feminine presence (because if it was, the movie probably would hit the rails into melodrama to chuckle at). Colbert and March prove fairly dependable and have a bit of chemistry together to where it at least isn't too hard to see where they would actually grow up and want the other. As a whole, it's a decent movie that comes and goes with the relative craftsmanship that Arzner had honed down in less than five years as a director that just rolls with useful sophistication and perspective for human nature.

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.

*March won his first Academy Award with his performance in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931) while Colbert won her award with It Happened One Night (1934), and if you pay attention to the supporting roles, you'll see the future winner for Kitty Foyle (1940) in Ginger Rogers

Apologies, I forgot to include a song of the day for the previous review. So enjoy two: 

belated) Song of the day

and this song of the day!

Bringing Up Baby.

Review #2060: Bringing Up Baby.

Cast: 

Katharine Hepburn (Susan Vance), Cary Grant (Dr. David Huxley), May Robson (Elizabeth Carlton Random), Charles Ruggles (Major Horace Applegate), Walter Catlett (Constable Slocum), Barry Fitzgerald (Aloysius Gogarty), Fritz Feld (Dr. Fritz Lehman), Virginia Walker (Alice Swallow), George Irving (Alexander Peabody), Leona Roberts (Hannah Gogarty), Tala Birell (Mrs. Lehman), and John Kelly (Elmer) Directed by Howard Hawks (#951 - The Big Sleep, #1352 - His Girl Friday, #1399 - Rio Bravo, #1687 - O. Henry's Full House and #1773 - Red River)

Review: 

"I think the picture had a great fault and I learned an awful lot from that. There were no normal people in it. Everyone you met was a screwball and since that time I have learned my lesson and I don’t intend ever again to make everybody crazy."

In 1937, Howard Hawks read a short story in the magazine Collier's that had been written by Hagar Wilde. He laughed so much that he wanted to make a film of the story, which I'm sure you know was called Bringing Up Baby. He had time to spare, considering that he was being stalled out in making "Gunga Din" (which was worked out eventually by George Stevens). Wilde wrote the story and co-wrote the screenplay with Dudley Nichols (known for his structure work with films such as The Informer three years earlier) that retained a chase for a docile cat (panther in the story, leopard in the movie) in the wilderness of Connecticut. Look, sometimes you have to say audiences don't always know what the hell they want. This is especially true here for a film that only would make a small profit upon subsequent re-release. Perhaps most famously, Hepburn would be referred to as "box office poison" by the Independent Theatre Owners of America a couple of months after the release of this film in 1938, who referred her as having an excellent performance but also referring to it and another film in Stage Door as flops when closing out by saying "Sound judgment and good business sense are valuable assets in an industry that is far from being an art." Believe it or not, Hawks actually had Harold Lloyd in mind first for the lead role played by Grant. The studio rejected that suggestion and offered the role to a handful of others that rejected it. Lloyd apparently told Hawks that the film was the "best constructed comedy" he ever saw, which I'm sure has something to do with Grant and his portrayal that surely was modeled after Lloyd (right down to the glasses). Walter Catlett (a veteran of vaudeville and a number of films since the early 20th century) was brought in to help out Hepburn and her early jitters with doing comedy and ended up having a key role in the film as well. This was the second of four films with Grant and Hepburn after Sylvia Scarlett (1935), Holiday (1938) and The Philadelphia Story (1940), and it was her work in the latter of the four that resulted in Hepburn's first of four Academy Award wins, proving the old lesson that sometimes words on print really are worth less than toilet paper.

It is a profoundly silly movie, the screwiest kind of screwball movies that could only be done by a craftsman of energetic filmmaking. Hawks may have thought that the film had a few too many zany characters, but the main thing that is told here is that at the end of the day, it is better to enjoy life with free-spirited energy rather than try to stick with dignity. Hawks later stated that the way he achieved such vast pace is by pacing the actors "quickly within the frame rather than cross cutting fast". This results in a zany film filled with consistent energy from beginning to end that delivers everything you would think comes in these types of films without failing in the goal of worthwhile comedy. The 102-minute runtime is the ideal time to try and wrap these odd little characters for one wholly watchable feature that never plods in how it presents these two main people and the winding road they are tied to in amusing predicaments, complete with a select handful of ad-libs. Grant was already a comedic name on the rise with The Awful Truth (1937), because he really was quite the charmer who could hold his own with any kind of material and any kind of requirement, which in this case involves flustered panic. You can see pretty easily from the first sequence involving old bones and where his energies have to lie with such vaunted people. Hepburn is a free spirit of the highest order in impulse, one who has such a great chemistry with Grant that never leaves our mind from the very get-go. They make for such a great pair together, one zigging where the other is zagging without a false note detected among their interactions or ones where Grant is left trying to spin out of a spinning top of absurd situations, one of which involves a torn dress and a hat and another involving waiting to be heard in the middle of a convoluted explanation. They make a quality pair in both timing and, eventually, romance. Robson (a veteran of the stage who became a noted film presence at the ripe age of her seventies) amuses as the dignified straight one among the proceedings to be accompanied by Ruggles and his befuddled attitude among would-be hunters. They are swept up into probably the most interesting of all confounding situations when it comes to Catlett and the belief of just who is really who and the case of one (or two? or none?) leopard. It is the kind of film with quality animal performances (Nissa, the leopard who is used to play both the docile and circus leopard and Skippy, already familiar from The Thin Man) to go with quality timing that practically is as timeless as one would hope to expect in a comedy of screwy manners. The only real debate is just how damn good it is within the career of Howard Hawks and his immeasurable qualities in filmmaking.

Overall, I give it 10 out of 10 stars.

It Happened on 5th Avenue.

Review #1613: It Happened on 5th Avenue.

Cast: 

Don DeFore (Jim Bullock), Gale Storm (Trudy O'Connor), Victor Moore (Aloyisius T. McKeever), Charles Ruggles (Michael J. "Mike" O'Connor), Ann Harding (Mary O'Connor), Grant Mitchell (Farrow), Edward Brophy (Patrolman Cecil Felton), Arthur Hohl (Patrolman Brady), Alan Hale, Jr. (Whitey Temple), and Dorothea Kent (Margie Temple) Directed by Roy Del Ruth (#395 - The Maltese Falcon (1931), #432 - The Babe Ruth Story, #807 - The Alligator People, #949 - The First Auto) 

Review: 

Once upon a time, there was a studio called Monogram Pictures. They were created to make cheap movies under the guise of two folks: Trem Carr and W. Ray Johnston in 1931. Several series came out of the scraps of former stars and fresh unknowns, whether it involved Westerns or the Bowery Boys. Fifteen years passed before an argument was made by producer Walter Mirisch to do work in costlier productions to evolve. The result was a new unit in Allied Artists Productions that would make more expensive films - in other words, they went from making films at a fraction of the usual Hollywood production to trying to make Hollywood budget-level films. Monogram Pictures continued on until 1953, while Allied Artists would make a variety of films for 31 years (which ranged from films like Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) to Love in the Afternoon (1957) to Cabaret (1972), which they co-produced). This was the 63rd of 75 films that were directed by Roy Del Ruth, who one will recognize from his plentiful output of dramas, crime films, and various others (some obviously better than others). The film fell into the hands of Ruth after the rights of the story were brought to Allied Artists after Frank Capra let the rights to the script go. The film was written by Frederick Stephani and Herbert Clyde Lewis, who later received the only Academy Award nomination regarding this film for Best Story (for 17 years, the Academy Awards honored films with Original Screenplay, Screenplay, and Best Story...confusing, but this was the case), which it lost to another classic involving Christmas in Miracle on 34th Street (1947), which like this film also received subsequent remakes in television and radio.

What we have here is the quirky story of folks that move into a mansion while the owner happens to be away for the holidays...which just happen to lead into a love story, a redemption story, and so on and so forth (how the rich man disguised as a hobo is never recognized by anybody besides his ex-wife and daughter as the actual owner of the house is up to you to interpret, because I suppose house portraits aren't present). Basically, it is the kind of film that goes for the heart string of being a better person than just the size of a wallet, where the tramp can be a king, and heartwarming goo is plentiful. Actually, it is an okay film, although its place on the totem pole of Christmas movies depends on one's preferences. I certainly was surprised at first to hear about the connection with Capra and this film (or more specifically, the "almost" connection), but then I realize that Capra had done It's a Wonderful Life (1946), which was released four months before this film - the funny thing is that this was actually delayed for some unknown reason, as research suggests that this film was delayed six months in its release to line up with Easter of all things (as much as I would like to mock this for not being released on Christmas like it should be, Miracle on 34th Street was released a month after this film) - Capra, alongside other famous folks of the time, also gave a recommendation to the film. It sure is a shame too, because one is a film that became a (public domain) classic after it wasn't an initial success with audiences (which is played every year as a tradition), while the other was a light success (making $1.8 million on a budget of $1.2 million budget) that had a shelf life with other Monogram and Allied Artists films for a few decades that has a fair amount of air-time. Besides, both have those moments of trying to sweet-talk their audience with sentiment, but it just so happens one is more efficient at handling what is needed with a film like this at 115 minutes. In other words, it can be funny for those who like what it offers in sentiment, while others will want it the same as getting a hole drilled in their head. The acting is certainly alright from what is needed in earnest from a few solid actors that while not quite well known were at least ones known to give effort. For example, Moore had been an actor on Broadway (in 1896) before being brought in to appear in films beginning in 1915, and this was his fifth-to-last role; here, he is the patron of interlopers with warm kindness, which obviously makes for worthy appeal. DeFore had a steady work in theater and film that would find footing with the advent of television in the following decade, and while he may not make a great romance angle, he at least makes for a spirited effort in the can-do attitude that the film wants. Storm was an actress that spent twelve years acting with a variety of low-budget studios, mostly with Monogram (she ended her film career for television, which worked out for two lengthy sitcoms) - however, the strangest thing to note is that fact that while she sings in the film, it is actually just her lip-synching to someone else (decided by Ruth, much to her disappointment); she does fine here, although the idea of her playing a teenager (while being six years older) is probably a bit much to swallow. Ruggles (who did work in the theater, film, radio, and television in six decades of work) plays the stuffy comic elements well, although the redemption aspects seem a bit more silly in being drawn out. Honestly, it might have worked better with one real story to it, either keeping with the interlopers or the redemption of the rich man into a rich happy man, since instead we have a muddle heap of sap that can only go so far, one that makes a few gags go fine but otherwise feels like an odd egg in the cornucopia of Christmas material to look around for. If one is curious for something that isn't just the usual classic Christmas fare done every time, this might work out just fine. As a curiosity in the eyes of seeing a low budget studio trying to re-invent themselves, it most definitely has a place for cinema, average or not.

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.