Tag: Angela Lansbury

The Hoodlum Saint (1946, Norman Taurog)

The Hoodlum Saint is a surprisingly long ninety-four minutes, though since it takes place over eleven years (at least), I suppose some plodding is to be expected. There’s plenty not to be expected about Hoodlum Saint, starting with the time period. It begins in 1919, with a fifty-four-year-old William Powell returning from the Great War to discover, well, son, if it was up to me….

He was a newspaperman, which for a bit seems like Saint is going to be a newspaper picture. It’s not.

Once he doesn’t get his job back—an uncredited Will Wright plays the editor, establishing Saint’s going to reunite Powell with a half dozen (at least) MGM or Thin Man costars—but once he doesn’t get his job back, we find out Powell’s friends with the local hoods. The film starts in Baltimore. James Gleason, Rags Ragland, Frank McHugh, and Slim Summerville play the hoods. Gleason’s the boss and has something of a story arc (directly related to the title, no less), while the rest are just comic relief. McHugh disappears for a large portion of the second act… then Ragland disappears for a large part of the third act. They’re all fine. Nothing wrong with Saint is any of the actors’ faults.

So then it seems like it’s going to be some kind of crime picture; Powell heads with the hoods down to the local Catholic Church, where he tells off the priest; he’s in it for number one now. Only then it’s this strange business comedy where Powell enlists the hoods’ help in… getting him into a wedding party so he can hobnob with the wealthy and beg a job off one.

Except before he can meet a rich guy, he meets Esther Williams. He’s crashing the party and kisses her to throw off suspicion. Williams is twenty-five. Not in the movie; they never discuss the pronounced age difference, but Powell’s at least supposed to be in his thirties, possibly forties, given how they old age make-up him by the end. It’s so obvious you think they’re going to comment on it.

They never comment on it. It’s also not going to be a romantic comedy about coworkers—Williams works at the paper where Powell gets a job after meeting her. He’s really just interested in it so he can go off and become a millionaire in New York City. That ambition works out for Powell, except the hoods all come along because Baltimore’s no fun without him (bailing them out of jail); Williams stays. Their relationship is so chaste at this point, it’s not even for sure she’s the romantic interest.

In New York City, Powell catches the eye of the even more inappropriately aged Angela Lansbury; she’s a club singer. Lansbury’s twenty-one. I guess she also ages a decade throughout, though she disappears for long stretches because Powell’s love interests aren’t crucial to the main plot. The main plot—at what must be halfway through the movie because Powell’s already a wealthy businessman—involves St. Dismas, the Good Thief from the crucifixion, who is, you guessed it, the hoodlum’s Saint. Powell wants to prank Gleason instead of just bailing him out, so he has the other hoods pretend they’ve been converted, then Lansbury’s going to bail him out with the name Dismas.

Gleason will become a changed man over the next few years, dedicating himself to charity work.

And then the stock market. Because by 1929, double millionaire Powell convinces all the working stiffs to play the stock market. Also, he’s given up on Williams, who couldn’t wait forever for him.

So, the stock market crash will cause Powell severe emotional distress, and it’s going to get him into the third act, where Hoodlum Saint becomes an “atheist sees the light” movie. With Hays Code constraints.

It’s a very, very weird movie. And never anywhere near as good as it ought to be with the cast. While Powell and Williams can banter, both comedically and dramatically, director Taurog’s shockingly bad at directing their scenes. Hoodlum Saint ought to be easy studio fodder; instead, it’s clunky and meandering. The parts are too thin, but the acting’s universally solid. Powell, Williams, Gleason, Lansbury. The script—from James Hill and Frank Wead—does them no favors.

Terrible, silly music from Nathaniel Shilkret (like slide whistle sounds) does a lot of damage, but Ray June’s photography is good. Unfortunately, Ferris Webster’s editing is not, but it appears to be more lack of good footage from Taurog.

Hoodlum Saint is a tedious movie with an excellent cast reduced to middling performances thanks to the script and direction.

This post is part of the Third Esther Williams Blogathon hosted by Michaela of Love Letters to Old Hollywood.

A Life at Stake (1955, Paul Guilfoyle)

A Life at Stake is a peculiar noir. It’s low budget, it’s got an actor-turned-director in Guilfoyle, it’s got Angela Lansbury as the femme fatale, it’s got a great, lushly romantic score from Les Baxter, and it’s got a jam-packed script from Russ Bender. The film only runs eighty minutes, and there are a couple longer suspense sequences, but Stake is usually full of distinct dialogue. Bender’s always giving someone something weird to say, and then it curiously derails the scene as the film tries to resolve the newly introduced tangent. It’s got a lot of personality.

The script, anyway. The film itself does not. Leading man Keith Andes apparently got the job for his impressive chest—which gets a showcase in the first scene—rather than his acting prowess. Lansbury’s okay as the femme fatale, but once her viciously cruel and rather icky husband Douglass Dumbrille gets into the action, she’s barely around anymore. See, Lansbury’s a wealthy lady who wants to go into business with down-on-his-luck builder Andes. She’s bored and wants to go back to real estate, with Andes building the houses for her to sell. Or is it all a scheme to take out a life insurance policy on Andes then kill him to collect?

The life insurance policy melodrama takes over from the illicit behavior stuff, though it never gets particularly illicit; while Andes is determined not to take no for an answer, Lansbury’s able to keep him under control because he wants her for her money too.

Meanwhile, Lansbury’s earnest kid sister, Claudia Barrett, becomes fascinated with Andes, and he’s not going to cast her attentions aside just because she’s a naive twenty-one. The naivety makes her just great for exposition dumps it turns out, but with a bunch of added dialogue because Bender’s an enthusiast writer. Lansbury probably gives Stake’s best performance—there’s not much competition—but Barrett certainly provides the most likable one. Well, except Kathleen Mulqueen as Andes’s assistant, who has to put up with her boss not just being a post-war builder bro, but an obsessive one. He’s worried he’s too worried about Lansbury and Dumbrille plotting to kill him… because he’s got too much evidence they’re trying to kill him not to be concerned. Mulqueen’s got to weather his ranting. It’d probably be great ranting if it weren’t for Andes’s performance and Guilfoyle’s direction.

Plus, Barrett’s performance falls apart in the third act when she gets downgraded from love interest to sidekick. It’s not her fault as Bender’s writing doesn’t really keep together for the finale either.

Most of the film is wanting interiors, but there are a couple nice exterior street scenes shot on location. The first is just a shot, finally opening the film up—almost the entire first act takes place at Andes’s boarding house (run by Jane Darwell in an extended but not unwelcome cameo)—and the second is a suspense sequence. Guilfoyle’s no better at directing off a soundstage than on, but Ted Allan’s photography is a lot more interesting out of doors.

Frank Sullivan’s editing is bad, but it usually seems to be a lack of coverage from Guilfoyle.

Stake’s engaging throughout thanks to the script’s strangeness—and Baxter’s music leads to some good sequences—with the wanting finale short enough not to matter much.

Mister Buddwing (1966, Delbert Mann)

Mister Buddwing is kind of amazing. And exceptional. But only if both those descriptors are used as pejoratives. Like. Wow. What a mess it is.

What’s funny is how director Mann maybe sees what he’s trying to do with the film but doesn’t see how he’s not achieving it. The film wants to be edgy mainstream and is instead occasionally rather painfully square. Most of the problem is leading man James Garner. He hasn’t got a handle on the performance—getting no help from Dale Wasserman’s screenplay and then somehow even less from Mann. Worse, Mann uses a lot of close-ups on Garner during the movie, usually for reaction shots, and he’s never good enough. He’s rarely ever giving a passing performance. Like, he just doesn’t get the part. No one does, apparently.

Garner wakes up in the first scene in Central Park, with Mann shooting in first person point of the view. The titles roll as Garner (we’ll soon find out) goes into the Plaza Hotel and looks at himself in a mirror. Pretty soon we figure out he’s an amnesiac who remembers absolutely no details of his life. Not even his name. He gets his first name from Angela Lansbury, who he calls when he finds her number in his pocket. Lansbury’s not great, but she’s a lot of fun. And the film will go awhile without any fun. So she should be in it more.

The last name he makes up coincidentally, narrating about it. Though it makes no sense why he so desperately needs a last name other than the script is trying to make the title’s relevance painfully clear. Garner’s narration is terrible. Poorly written, poorly delivered. And then it’s gone, which is weird because regardless of it being good or not, it makes sense. Garner spends a lot of the movie wandering around Manhattan by himself. It might help to know what’s going on since his expression has three varieties of blank. Blank ought to work for the character. Wooden even. But it doesn’t, because Buddwing is so amazing in how it never works.

There’s this amazing scene where Garner has been followed by an old man—the first half of the movie is lousy with over-interested supporting players talking to Garner so there can be exposition. Garner will eventually yell about how he can’t remember his identity; almost every scene has him yelling about not remembering. So the old man (George Voskovec) wants to blackmail Garner into being his manservant. It’s a weird, dumb scene and does absolutely nothing. Doing nothing would be fine if the film wanted to do nothing and, until that point, it seems like it might not want to do much. Garner has just had the first flashback scene, with Katharine Ross appearing as Garner’s years ago love interest. He thinks he knows her—in the present—then we get this long flashback sequence of obnoxiously cut together scenes—Fredric Steinkamp’s editing is really bad, both conceptually and practically (though a lot of both have got to be Mann’s fault)—where Ross plays the woman she’s not. Just in Garner’s imagination. Only it’s unclear how much of the flashback he remembers and how much of it is just for the audience’s edification. Narration might help clear it up. Even bad narration.

Only there isn’t any. There’s Voskovec harassing Garner instead.

It’s such a bad, deliberate move. Especially since the return to the present sequence opens up the film’s periphery as far as people go; Buddwing’s New York is really empty. Except cars. Mann’s inconsistent if there are people around Garner—who never interact because the film’s just the story of one ant among millions—sometimes there are montages with people in the background, sometimes the city’s empty. But there are always cars in the distance. It’s like they couldn’t get the shot they needed so they took the one they got and it didn’t work, which is pretty much the movie overall.

Eventually Suzanne Pleshette comes into the movie and then there’s a flashback where she plays the girl Ross had previously played. Later it’s Jean Simmons. Now, the flashback sequences are written even worse than the present, because they’re hurried along stylistically, but basically they’re all about Garner becoming more and more of an abusive shitheel. Now, the film would never characterize it as abuse, but it’s scary intense. Mann and Wasserman need to keep Garner sympathetic in the present so they have to demonize the “girls” in the past. They even do it in the present when Lansbury makes a too minor but very welcome near third act return.

Only then in comes Simmons and her present tense mystery woman—infinitely wealthy and drunk and with a past sounding just like the flashbacks and Garner’s memories. At least it seems like he remembers the flashbacks by the time the movie gets to Simmons. He never really shows it, not in performance or dialogue, but Wasserman’s script definitely implies it by the third act. We just missing it, even though the movie is supposed to be about Garner finding out his identity, not the audience finding it. Instead, the film informs the audience first, Garner offscreen. Dumb. And weird.

The third act actually has potential. It’s the strangest thing. If they’d pulled off the third act, Buddwing would probably work, even with Garner’s flat performance and Mann’s jarred direction. Because Simmons is fantastic. In the present. In the past she gets into the problem Ross and Pleshette had; Wasserman writes the part something awful. But in the present, just having fun, Simmons is fantastic. Makes up for Garner even.

Pleshette is affected in the present, but still sort of sympathetic. She’s nothing but sympathetic in the past because she gets the brunt of Garner’s abuse. It’s not really interesting—her affected present day performance—but at least it’s distinctive. Ross is background in her section, which seems weird since Lansbury at least gets her scenes. Ross just gets to be stalked. But in that genial sixties way because Wasserman’s shallow.

Strange small part for Jack Gilford—who wants to convince Garner he’s Jewish because Wasserman’s script is weird in addition to shallow. Joe Mantell’s terrible as a cabbie who seemingly tells Garner an important story. Raymond St. Jacques comes off best, even if he’s poorly written. He’s in the Simmons section and gets to enjoy in its heightened quality. Nichelle Nichols has a tiny part and is phenomenal. More than anything else in the film—even Simmons, who’s stuck with Garner—Nichols seems like she’s visiting from the alternate reality’s Mister Buddwing where it’s great. She definitely gets cinematographer Ellsworth Fredericks’s best work in the film.

Fredericks shoots a really flat New York city, seemingly unintentionally. Or is it supposed to be so dull even when it’s obviously not.

Kenyon Hopkins’s score is similarly disjointed. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad, sometimes it’s wrong. The one thing the music needs to be right about, it’s never right about, even when it’s good. But it gets bad and wrong at some point near the third act and never gets any better. Even when Simmons shows up. She succeeds in the harshest of conditions.

Mister Buddwing would need to be seen to be believed. But it doesn’t need to be believed.

THIS POST IS PART OF THE ADORING ANGELA LANSBURY BLOGATHON HOSTED BY GILL OF REALWEEGIEMIDGET REVIEWS.

Gaslight (1944, George Cukor)

At the end of Gaslight, when all has seemingly been revealed, there’s only one question left. If Scotland Yard inspector Joseph Cotten isn’t an American in London, why doesn’t anyone notice his lack of accent. It’s a wise choice not to give Cotten an accent–presumably he couldn’t do one–but it also means there’s always something a little off about him, which just furthers his likability. And his likability is important, because (intentionally) there’s not much likable in Gaslight.

The film opens in a flashback–teenage girl Ingrid Bergman is being hurried out of London for the continent, presumably something to do with a strangler on the loose (a newspaper headline informs the viewer). Ten years later, she’s training to be an opera singer. Only it’s not going so well and she’d much rather run off with her pianist, Charles Boyer. So she does, meeting a British woman (Dame May Whitty) along the way; turns out Whitty lives just across the street from Bergman’s childhood home, where she fled in the opening scene, following the murder of her aunt.

Bergman’s ready to go back to London, however, so long as Boyer’s with her. He’s always wanted to live in London. How coincidental she just happens to own some property there. Even if she has nightmares about her time in the house.

Until this point–them arriving in London–Boyer’s been the perfect suitor, now husband. But on their initial tour of the house, Bergman comes across a letter from an admirer to her aunt and it drives Boyer into a fit. He snatches it away from her, explaining he’s upset at how upset the house is making her. He’s such a considerate fellow.

The action cuts ahead–using Whitty snooping on her new neighbors, without much success–and it’s a very different household. Boyer’s just hired rude young maid Angela Lansbury, who he sort of flirts with, sort of doesn’t, but definitely implies interest. He’s constantly chastising Bergman for losing things, even though she has no memory of it. Seemingly to prove his point, she loses something that very day, a family heirloom he’s given her.

On one of the few occasions Boyer lets her out of the house, they happen to pass Cotten, who thinks he recognizes Bergman–for her aunt–and begins inquiring into the still unsolved murder. And finds out it was also a robbery; the thief grabbed precious jewels. Boyer and Bergman had just been to visit the crown jewels, where Boyer salivated at the sight of them. Rather suspicious.

For about the next half hour, Boyer is just tormenting Bergman. He’s absurdly cruel and controlling, even though the film doesn’t actually reveal him doing anything criminal. He’s just some guy who married a wealthier woman, took over her property, and treats her like garbage. Nothing too uncommon for 1885 London, though it’s hard to say as he doesn’t let Bergman meet anyone. Especially not Cotten, who’s still trying to figure out what’s going on with the pair.

Then, at about the hour mark (the film runs just under two hours), we finally see Boyer do something rather suspicious and almost obviously devious. The second hour, which has Bergman start further breaking down, Cotten finally figuring out what’s going on, then multiple showdowns, is phenomenal. The first half is setup, the second half is payoff. And Bergman gets some payoff too, which is a welcome change since most of the first hour and some of the second is just watching Boyer mentally abuse her. Boyer’s cruel in his abuse, not charming. Gaslight accounts for Bergman’s isolation as a factor, but has a hard time showing it. If Bergman’s not with someone else or being terrified while alone, she doesn’t have any scenes.

It’s not until she and Cotten get their first scene alone together where there’s just this phenomenal acting and reveal on the character she’s been creating all along. It takes Gaslight a while to get to its payoff, but its worth it right away when it starts.

Gorgeous photography from Joseph Ruttenberg–especially once the walls, proverbially, start closing in on Bergman. That phase of the film is when director Cukor starts getting rather creative as well. There’s not much in the way of visual foreshadowing on Boyer; in fact, Gaslight usually avoids it, not giving him any suspicious behaviors when he’s just gotten down manipulating Bergman. The way it plays him off Lansbury is phenomenal.

Ralph E. Winters’s editing is also crucial. He’s got to keep up the pace, which drags a little first hour, then never slows down for a breath in the second, even during Cotten’s exposition dumps.

The actors are the stars–earnest Cotten, haunted Bergman, quizzical Boyer. There’s obviously some bad going on with Boyer (from his first scene in London), but it’s never clear what. He’s never sympathetic or redeemable, he’s just cruel. Increasingly cruel. In a special way or just in a bad Victorian husband way is the question.

Bergman spends the film pent up. When she finally gets loose–starting with a wordless exclamation–there’s no stopping her.

Cotten gets to be the steady throughout. He’s always cute, always sympathetic. I mean, his first scene has him taking his niece and nephew to a museum, how can he not be likable. Even if he’s got that obvious, inexplicable lack of English accent.

The supporting cast is all good, especially Lansbury and Barbara Everest (as the hearing impaired cook who can’t ever confirm Bergman’s audial suspicions). And Whitty’s fun. She’s in it for the punchlines mostly and she gets them.

The production design and set decoration are excellent. And Ruttenberg’s lighting of them. Cukor’s got some fantastic composition in Gaslight too, particularly for how he moves the actors around the frame. The screenplay is quick and nimble, though maybe more for Cotten than anyone else. Boyer’s big suspicious action scenes are always a little too big. It’s not clear enough, at the start, why Bergman wouldn’t be more concerned with his behavior.

Gaslight’s an outstanding thriller. Just too bad Bergman didn’t get more to do in the first hour.

This post is part of the Joseph Cotten Blogathon hosted by Crystal of In the Good Old Days of Classic Hollywood and Maddy of Maddy Loves Her Classic Films.

Dear Heart (1964, Delbert Mann)

Dear Heart starts awkwardly and ends awkwardly. At the beginning, director Mann and writer Tad Mosel are very deliberately setting up their protagonists and the setting. The awkwardness makes sense. That very solid foundation allows for everything following. The ending, which plays–at least for Geraldine Page’s character–like a reverse of the opening for a while, doesn’t get to use that excuse. After almost two hours of extremely careful plotting and deliberate planning, Mosel doesn’t use what he’s been setting up. It’s very disappointing.

Mosel gets away with a lot so it might just be one thing too many. He plots this film over two and a half days–Page is in New York for a convention, Glenn Ford has just accepted a promotion at a firm there–and Mosel is able to throw all sorts of wonky ideas into the mix. Newly engaged Ford gets to contend with his future step-son crashing (Michael Anderson Jr. is fantastic in the role).

So Ford’s conflicts are both internal and external. He does great work in both areas, but Page’s are all internal. And her character is an extreme extrovert–the way Mosel works in how she talks about herself when just meeting someone is amazing–but all of that conflict, Page doesn’t get to say it. She shows it in this extraordinary expressions.

Mann’s direction is good, script’s great, Page and Ford are great. Dear Heart’s great. It’s just not perfect; I guess it doesn’t have to be.

State of the Union (1948, Frank Capra)

Capra tries for another entry in his humanist series (Mr. Deeds, Mr. Smith and John Doe) and fails miserably. Two of the principal ingredients–Robert Riskin and Gary Cooper–are missing, but since State of the Union is from a play, it’s questionable if Riskin could have helped (Union‘s problems are fundamental). As for Cooper… Spencer Tracy’s excellent and the film’s failings aren’t his fault. The film’s also something of a technical failure, plagued by some terrible editing from William Hornbeck, during the first half.

The movie moves well enough–the first half hour until Katharine Hepburn shows up goes at a lightning fast pace–usually thanks to Van Johnson. Johnson’s cynical but affable reporter is Union‘s best part. Margaret Hamilton’s put-upon maid is also a lot of fun, but Capra tends to misuse actors here more than not. Adolphe Menjou gets saddled with one of the big bad guy roles and he’s way too passive for it. Charles Dingle, in a smaller part, would have had the volume. As the primary villain–corrosive both as a newspaper publisher and Tracy’s mistress–Angela Lansbury is out of her depth. She doesn’t have the skills to pull it off as believable, not just in terms of her villainous scenes, but to convince anyone Tracy would want anything to do with her… much less leave Hepburn for her. (Hepburn in the Lansbury role would have been interesting). There’s the major problem with State of the Union… Tracy’s a bad guy too.

The big changeover happens late in the film, so the viewing experience isn’t totally ruined. Hepburn’s got a great drunk scene during the last act, which is painfully slight, and Maidel Turner, as her drinking buddy, helps a lot. But the whole thing, as it wraps, is bad. Tracy’s not even a main character after Hepburn shows up, so no long walks to think or hurt expressions from the witness stand.

Capra’s free of any earnestness here, just treading water. Worse, he’s lost almost all filmmaking imagination, only retaining competence–with the exception of one plane chase scene, which was probably all second unit. Sure, it’s adapted from a play and there’s lots of stagy scenes, but Capra doesn’t even explore that idea.

It’s a sad afterword to the trilogy and a waste of time for Tracy and Hepburn. They both have good scenes, Hepburn having a lot more, but as a narrative, it’s an embarrassment.

1.5/4★½

CREDITS

Produced and directed by Frank Capra; screenplay by Anthony Veiller and Myles Connolly, based on the play by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse; director of photography, George J. Fosley; edited by William Hornbeck; music by Victor Young; released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Starring Spencer Tracy (Grant Matthews), Katharine Hepburn (Mary Matthews), Van Johnson (Spike McManus), Angela Lansbury (Kay Thorndyke), Adolphe Menjou (Jim Conover), Lewis Stone (Sam Thorndyke), Howard Smith (Sam I. Parrish), Charles Dingle (Bill Nolard Hardy), Maidel Turner (Lulubelle Alexander), Raymond Walburn (Judge Alexander) and Margaret Hamilton (Norah).

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