A Slight Case of Murder.

Review #2370: A Slight Case of Murder.

Cast: 

Edward G. Robinson (Remy Marco), Jane Bryan (Mary Marco), Allen Jenkins (Mike), Ruth Donnelly (Nora Marco), Willard Parker (Dick Whitewood), John Litel (Mr. Post, banker), Edward Brophy (Lefty), Harold Huber (Giuseppe 'Gip'), Eric Stanley (Mr. Ritter, banker), Paul Harvey (Mr. Whitewood), and Margaret Hamilton (Mrs. Cagle) Directed by Lloyd Bacon (#562 - It Happens Every Spring, #898 - Larceny, Inc, #1340 - 42nd Street)

Review: 

Edward G. Robinson doing comedy isn't too out of left field, really. Actually, Roy Del Ruth had directed him in 1933's The Little Giant (which dealt with a bootlegger trying to go into the legit business) and John Ford had directed him in a crime comedy with 1935's The Whole Town's Talking, which dealt with a lookalike killer. A Slight Case of Murder is based on the 1935 play of the same name, which had been created by Damon Runyon (the famed writer and his one attempt at making a play) and Howard Lindsay (who actually became noted for his work in Broadway plays and musicals with Russel Crouse beginning in 1935). Earl Baldwin and Joseph Schrank were credited for the script behind this movie. Incidentally, Bacon (a very busy director in the 1930s, he apparently made over three dozen movies in that decade)* and Robinson would team up again with a gangster-related comedies with Brother Orchid (1940, which had Baldwin as a writer) and Larceny, Inc (1942), which is probably the more famous Robinson movie about a convict trying to go straight. Incidentally, Roy Del Ruth would direct a remake of A Slight Case of Murder with Stop, You're Killing Me (1952), which starred Broderick Crawford.

With a plot involving a bunch of corpses turning up in the middle of foreclosure and a cop for a possible son-in-law, you've got plenty here for a neat little comedy, even with the apparent age on display in terms of its subject matter. Every so often, I have to remember that there was some pretty crappy beer people had to deal in the old days (as opposed to now, I suppose). To be honest, even with the amount of movies that I've seen with Robinson in the cast (ten, now), I sometimes think I haven't given him his proper due as an actor, and this is saying something for a guy who honed his talents for several years on Broadway and thrived when it came to dramas, particularly since he had the temperament to sell damn near anything, from the tough guy role to the biopic (sure, that doesn't include dancing, but who's asking?). He clearly seems to be having fun here, having the talent to make the hijinks bounce off him with useful timing without turning it into straight farce or just being the straight man to strange stuff, he just happens to be involved in a silly little dark comedy that won't have too much violence but will have enough silly shifty people for 85 minutes. Donnelly pops into the action with attempts at playing natural class that results in a few chuckles, although the cast of goons-turned-assistants such as Jenkins and Brophy are worth a few laughs as well. The buildup to resolve the dead body problem is pretty amusing if not a bit abrupt (seriously it goes from calling the cops to fainting like that). These are the kind of movies that could be stamped out a dime a dozen in the old days that will work exactly for those who like something that will deliver most of the time with colorful enough people and execution in a specific age and place (dated or not) that you could call the epitome of "quick yarn". Hit or miss, you won't have your time wasted here, suffice to say. As a whole, if you are in the mood for Edward G. Robinson and a bit of silly fun with a quick pace and resourceful company around him, you will find a neat little movie here to enjoy from the old years.

Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.

*Welcome to the four-timer club, Lloyd Bacon.

The Life of Emile Zola.

Review #1347: The Life of Emile Zola.

Cast: 
Paul Muni (Émile Zola), Gloria Holden (Alexandrine Zola), Gale Sondergaard (Lucie Dreyfus), Joseph Schildkraut (Captain Alfred Dreyfus), Donald Crisp (Maitre Labori), Erin O'Brien-Moore (Nana), John Litel (Charpentier), Henry O'Neill (Colonel Picquart), Morris Carnovsky (Anatole France), Louis Calhern (Major Dort), Ralph Morgan (Commander of Paris), Robert Barrat (Major Walsin-Esterhazy), and Vladimir Sokoloff (Paul Cézanne) Directed by William Dieterle.

Review: 
"I've never tried to learn the art of acting. I have been in the business for years but I still can't tell what acting is or how it's done"

As redundant as it may sound, one needs a bit of history now and then. Who better to headline a biographical film than Paul Muni? The son of actors, he had started a career in Yiddish theatre in Chicago after emigrating there from Lemberg (a city that was in the Austro-Hungarian Empire but is now referred to as Lviv, Ukraine). He was noted for his makeup skills, appearing as an 80-year-old man to debut on stage while being just 12. He spent three years on Broadway before being signed by Fox Film in 1929, making two films (The Valiant and Seven Faces), but he went back to Broadway before being enticed to return in 1932, with Scarface and I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang leading to him being signed by Warner Bros. Muni was noted for his preparation for roles, particularly for biographies, which served him for films such as The Story of Louis Pasteur (1936), which won him an Academy Award for Best Actor. Muni made 13 of his 23 films in the 1930s, having script approval over what he wanted to do, a rare thing at the time. He ended his career the same way he started it: with an Academy Award nomination (he had five in total).

Naturally, one is to expect a few wrinkles of inaccuracy, which the film anticipates with a title card stating that the while the production has basis in history, the historical basis was "fictionalized for the purposes of this picture". Relating to that, a cursory search of Zola leads me to a fact I didn't discover in the film: he wrote a cycle of twenty novels named Les Rougon-Macquart, for which Nana (mentioned in the film) was part of. The obvious sticking point with history is how the film deals with the Dreyfus affair when relating to anti-Semitism of the time that was key to the case since he was Jewish (the word isn't even mentioned in dialogue, only shown on screen once), which has been argued to be due to the timidity of studios when it came to dealing with Nazi Germany. There are numerous quibbles that can be freely noted, ranging from how he is brought into the Dreyfus case (not over the tears of the wife) to the fact that his death (carbon monoxide poisoning through a badly ventilated chimney) was not in fact the day before exoneration of said general. But as Zola once said, "The truth is on the march, and nothing shall stop it." The film relies on the sentiment of truth and justice eventually prevailing in the end, with German actor-turned-director Dieterle being the one to help do it, having directed Muni to three biographical films (the aforementioned Pasteur film and Juarez) in a directing run that spanned forty years. The film has a stagy quality to it, where one senses a speech with some sort of platitudes to pop up sooner than later, which can work out well when a moment of dignity is required. In that sense, Muni makes the best of it, where one sees the dedication in bringing an icon of writing to the screen come out without seeming too much like overacting (which Muni has been criticized for, with Dieterle even accusing him of doing occasionally). One can see his conviction on display without hesitation in the monologue scene for the court, a six-minute scene of dedication to making the measure of a man. The rest of the actors (including an Academy Award-winning performance from Schildkraut) do just fine, keeping up with Muni in displaying some dignity in keeping the momentum going without too many bumps in the road, whether as people who stand with Zola for truth or stand among keeping it buried to not have to deal with an army admitting fallibility. Granted, the resulting film that comes from said statements seems a bit long at 116 minutes, but at least one can say that this worked better with being a biography than the previous biographical Best Picture winner in The Great Ziegfeld (1936), even if it is at best a fairly okay experience to spend time with. One can be inspired to inquire further about the famed author than the mild snapshots that this provides. It may not be the most prime material for its decade, but it still finds a way to create curiosity through its attempts at entertainment along the lines of other films of its ilk in most of the right places.

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.

Jezebel (1938).

Review #1022: Jezebel.

Cast: 
Bette Davis (Julie Marsden), Henry Fonda (Preston Dillard), George Brent (Buck Cantrell), Donald Crisp (Dr. Livingstone), Fay Bainter (Aunt Belle Massey), Margaret Lindsay (Amy Bradford Dillard), Richard Cromwell (Ted Dillard), Henry O'Neill (General Theopholus Bogardus), Spring Byington (Mrs. Kendrick), John Litel (Jean La Cour), Gordon Oliver (Dick Allen), and Janet Shaw (Molly Allen) Directed by William Wyler (#509 - Roman Holiday)

Review: 
Admittedly, it is hard to talk about the film without comparing it to Gone with the Wind (#569), which was released one year after this movie, which was based off the 1933 play of the same name by Owen Davis. It has been stated that Davis got the role as a sort of a consolation prize for not being awarded the role of Scarlett O'Hara, which went to Vivien Leigh. However, it should also be mentioned that the original actress intended for the role for Jezebel was Tallulah Bankhead, but she fell ill during rehearsals.

In any case, Davis won an Academy Award for Best Actress (her second and final career win) and Banter would win one for Best Supporting Actress for this movie. For the time, Davis' character must have come off as shocking (manipulating people for love and wearing red to a party), but she just comes off as spiteful and not all too compelling, even with her story arc. It should be noted that Davis does pull of a fine performance, though. I will say that her character is mildly compelling to see progress through the movie, but the ending is a bit odd with her motivations, which seems a bit tacked on. The other performances are pretty consistent, and they (along with the production values) help in making for a film that is at the very least dazzling, with Fonda being a fine standout along with Brent and Bainter. The sequence with Davis and Fonda at the ball is a particular highlight in striking tone. The black-and-white photography is fine, but this is a film that probably should've been filmed in color in order to to make the red dress that she notably wears stand out (this is coming from someone who has nothing against black-and-white, of course). The run-time of 103 minutes is fine for the romantic drama that it wants to be, with a few interesting scenes that make it worth it just enough. It doesn't hold too much of a candle to the other more famous film that followed a year later, but if you look past that and try to see the movie for its own worth, you will find it something that is probably worth a look.

Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.