Category Archives: Film

12 Days of Christmas Movies: WE’RE NO ANGELS

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We're_No_Angels_-_1955_-_posterHumphrey Bogart and Michael Curtiz reunited 13 years after Casablanca for a Christmas-time comedy.  Based on the stage play My Three Angels, the film We’re No Angels tells the tale of three escaped convicts who help a merchant and his family in a French coastal town at the Christmas season (or more aptly saison de noël).

Joining Bogart in wearing the stripes are Aldo Ray and Peter Ustinov.  Leo G. Carroll and Joan Bennett play the merchant and his wife, while Basil Rathbone is his oiliest as an unscrupulous relative.  This movie has it all: romance, intrigue, and humor.

Wisely, neither Curtiz nor screenwriter Ranald MacDougall tried to “open up” the play too much.  The movie hews closely to the source material and is set largely in the merchant’s store.  In this holiday-themed morality tale, the convicts are more moral than the “upstanding” citizens.  The family and the convicts come to realize this.  In its own way, it has a “happily ever after” ending, or at least an ending of just desserts.

Bogart was not known for his comedies. But he is wonderfully wry in this movie.  Paired with Sabrina, this makes one wonder what his career might have been had he lived longer. He certainly could have slipped easily into character parts in both dramas and comedies.

12 Days of Christmas Movies: STALAG 17 and THE APARTMENT

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Wilder filmsToday’s Christmas movies take a darkly comic turn with Billy Wilder’s Stalag 17 and The Apartment.

William Holden won an Oscar for his heroic-anti-hero Sefton in 1953’s Stalag 17. Set in a German POW camp during World War II, it tells the story of a group of Americans who share a barracks.  Holden’s character is a black market profiteer who is disliked by most of his fellow prisoners.  Otto Preminger plays the iron-fisted commandant of the stalag.  Robert Strauss, Harvey Lembeck, Don Taylor, Richard Erdman, Neville Brand, Gil Stratton and Robert Shawley play other residents of the barracks.

Wilder’s movie was based on a play written by Donald Bevan and Edmund Trzcinski. The two playwrights had actually spent time in a Stalag during WWII.  The latter also had a bit part in the movie.  Once “Hogan’s Heroes” started airing on TV, the makers of Stalag 17 sued for plagiarism since they had pitched it as a TV series in the 1960s. The case was settled out of court.

Stalag 17 is a layered story with much humor in such a depressing setting. It is also a mystery as the barracks residents seek to determine who is sharing their secrets.

Wilder would return to Christmas Eve and a different type of hero in 1960’s The Apartment.  Jack Lemmon plays a rising corporate executive who tries to succeed by letting his superiors use his apartment for their assignations.  Complications arise when he falls in love with Shirley MacLaine, who is involved with his boss played by Fred MacMurray.  Others in the cast include Hope Holiday as a barfly who meets Lemmon in a bar on Christmas Eve, Ray Walston, Edie Adams, Jack Kruschen and David Lewis.  David White, better known as Larry Tate on “Bewitched,” plays a less honorable businessman in this movie.

This is definitely an adult comedy. It subtly shifts between comedy and drama.  Like Stalag 17, Wilder chose to shoot this movie in black and white to add to its mood.  These films serve as reminders that in the 1950s and early 1960s, the choice of filmstock really lent a tone to the movie.

The chemistry between Lemmon and MacLaine is palpable.  They both play lovable losers that the audience wants to root for.  MacMurray, who had starred in Wilder’s Double Indemnity, is unafraid to play an unlikable character. Interestingly he was just starting his run in “My Three Sons” when this film came out.

The Apartment won five Oscars: Best Picture, Best Director (Wilder), Best Original Screenplay (Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond), Black & White Art Direction and Film Editing.  It was also nominated for five other Oscars including Lemmon (Actor), MacLaine (Actress) and Kruschen (Supporting Actor).

Billy Wilder was a genius of a filmmaker.  These two films are testaments to that fact.

12 Days of Christmas Movies: POCKETFUL OF MIRACLES

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pocketfulYesterday’s movie featured Bette Davis cast against type as a frump.  Today’s movie marks her transition into character parts.  It is 1961’s Pocketful of Miracles which was Frank Capra’s final movie.  Davis plays Apple Annie, a homeless woman who shakes down the other panhandlers in NYC.

In the complicated plot (based on a Damon Runyan story) Ann-Margret plays Davis’ daughter who has never met her because she has been away at boarding school in Switzerland (paid for with proceeds from Davis and her cohorts).  Glenn Ford and Hope Lange play a friendly gangster and his moll. Thomas Mitchell, Peter Falk, Edward Everett Horton, Arthur O’Connell and Sheldon Leonard.

Ford, Lange and Mitchell help Davis pass herself off as a society matron during her daughter’s visit. But of course, mayhem ensues.  It is a witty story filled with its share of Capraesque moments as people do the right thing for the right reasons.

Peter Falk nabbed an Oscar nomination for his wise-cracking portrayal of Joy Boy, one of Ford’s henchmen.  The film was the last for Mitchell, who once again played a lovable Irish drunk as he had in Gone with the Wind, It’s a Wonderful Life, Stagecoach (winning and Oscar) and so many other films.  Ann-Margret is, well, Ann-Margret.  While Ford and Lange may simply walk through their parts, they are affable, relaxed performers who seem to be enjoying the company.

Davis would later become a caricature of herself. But in this movie there are still flashes of brilliance.  She spends much of the movie looking unglamorous. But when she emerges as a regal society grand dame, it is clear that she still can command a room.

The climax of the movie takes place on Christmas Eve. Capra’s message of hope and redemption fits well within this setting.

12 Days of Christmas movies: THE MAN WHO CAME TO DINNER

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The_Man_Who_Came_to_DinnerWhat if you had a horrible house guest, and they would never leave?  That was the premise which launched Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman to write The Man Who Came to Dinner.  This rip-roaring stage play was made into a 1942 movie starring Monty Woolley, Bette Davis (cast against type as a frump) and Ann Sheridan.  In it Woolley plays a high-maintenance famous personality who is stuck as a guest in a house in small town Ohio due to an injury.

Others in the cast include Jimmy Durante, Billie Burke, Mary Wickes, Richard Travis, Grant Mitchell, and Reginald Gardner.  This is definitely a period piece rife with references to people and events in the 1930s and early 1940s.  But it is a lot of fun.  Woolley gleefully skewers everyone and everything in sight as he plots and plans ploys.

Most Kaufman and Hart plays and movies have underlying social themes or pertinent messages. This one does not.  Its only aim is to have fun.  Brothers Julius J. Epstein and Philip G. Epstein, do a good job of condensing the Kaufman & Hart play into a 90 minute movie without losing the bite or the wit.

Why is it a Christmas movie?  It takes place at Christmastime. A Christmas Eve radio broadcast is a plot point that provides a great deal of upheaval for the characters. In addition, a unique Christmas present serves as one half of a deus ex machina that helps wrap up the plotlines nicely.

Orson Welles, Don Knotts, Lee Remick, Joan Collins and Marty Feldman starred in a 1972 remake. A 2000 Broadway revival was filmed and aired on PBS with Nathan Lane, Jean Smart and Harriet Harris.

12 Days of Christmas: THE LION IN WINTER

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Lion_In_Winter1Ah, Christmas! A time for family reunions.  Things may, at times, get a bit tense as everyone is gathering together in confined quarters.  But few Christmas gatherings compare to Henry II of England and his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine as they gather with their sons at the castle where she has been imprisoned by her husband.

Joining in the festivities are Henry and Eleanor’s three sons: Richard the Lionheart, Geoffrey and John. Also present are Alais Capet, Henry’s mistress who is not as vacuous as she appears, and Philip Capet, the King of France who is Alais’ half-brother.

Alliances and allegiances shift as both rapiers and rapier wits are on display.

The cast is masterfully led by Peter O’Toole and Katharine Hepburn, who snagged her third Oscar for this film.  Anthony Hopkins appeared as Richard the Lionheart and future James Bond Timothy Dalton played King Philip.  Geoffrey and John were played by John Castle and Nigel Terry, respectively.

Based on James Goldman’s 1965 play, Goldman picked up an Oscar for Adapted Screenplay.  The movie’s third Oscar went to John Barry for his musical score.  O’Toole, director Anthony Harvey, and costume designer Margaret Furse all earned Oscar nominations, as did the film for Best Picture.

This is not a fast paced film, but it pays dividends with the joyfully biting interplay between Hepburn, O’Toole and the rest of the cast.

12 Days of Christmas Movies: HOME ALONE & HOME ALONE 2: LOST IN NEW YORK

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home aloneJohn Hughes’ Home Alone and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York combine the spirit of Christmas with Hughes’ own brand of safe anarchy.

While the original 1990 movie is by far superior, the 1992 sequel still has its charms.  I refuse to consider anything after that because they only weaken the franchise.

These movies nicely balance slapstick with messages of redemption. But they don’t veer too far in one direction or another.

Macauley Culkin (whose aunt Bonnie Bedelia stars in two of my other favorite Christmas movies – Die Hard) is certainly a key reason for the success. He is neither cloying or obnoxious (or obnoxiously cloying).

While the adults are meant to be more cartoonish, they still keep the film grounded.  Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern have wonderful chemistry as the Wet Bandits.  John Heard’s slightly befuddled father is an apt foil for Catherine O’Hara’s intense mother. The latter displays much warmth when needed, as well.

John Candy turns in a fun cameo in the first film. If you blink, you may miss future Tony nominee and The Newsroom actress Hope Davis as a French ticket agent.  The second film loads up on supporting players from Oscar winner Brenda Fricker, Tony nominees Tim Curry and Dana Ivey, SNL’s Rob Schneider and even a cameo from The Donald.  Former movie song and dance man Eddie Bracken plays the NYC toy store owner.

These are light-hearted films which still make me laugh out loud.  They are certainly enjoyable any time of the year, but especially at Christmas.

BLUE VELVET at the CALS Ron Robinson Theater tonight courtesy of Little Rock Film Festival and Arkansas Times

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Blue VelvetTonight BLUE VELVET will be shown in downtown Little Rock.  David Lynch’s powerful and deranged 1986 classic is part of the Arkansas Times Film Series co-sponsored by the Little Rock Film Festival.

Two other newspapers bearing the name “Times” have weighed in on this flick.  The Los Angeles Times has called it “the most brilliantly disturbing film ever to have its roots in small-town American life” and the New York Times deemed it “an instant cult classic … one of a kind.” This movie has it all: mystery and intrigue, severed ears, PBR, Roy Orbison.

The screening will be held at Ron Robinson Theater at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Dec. 18 (tickets are $5).