Amarcord- Fellini, 1973

Perhaps because we watch so many nature documentaries, the structure of this narrative is a quite familiar season to season on planet earth - in this case, in 1930’s Rimini. However, it’s also the final year a schoolboy will spend in the quaint tourist town of his childhood before he presumably moves on to the much larger, and much colder big bad world - which truly did get bad as Europe entered the Second World War. Suspected traitors were not just made to drink castor oil like his dad- a punishment meant for children. 

 The film is drenched in nostalgia - though it’s equally clear that every social institution from family to state is dysfunctional. On the family level, the problem is that the boy’s father married up, so father and son are in different classes in a very class conscious society. They can’t understand each other, and dad, though bright and capable, does not have the education to articulate thoughts. All he can do is yell and slap.

 Is that why the boy chose to leave? Very little is shown of his inner life, other than the rowdiness and sexual frustration he shares with all the other boys. Is all that stuff supposed to entertain us? The promotional poster shown above seems to offer that.

 I’d like to think he’s fleeing this very patriarchal and misogynistic society - as firmly demonstrated at the beginning by the annual custom of burning the effigy of an old woman in the town square to mark the end of Winter. Then, near the end, all the boys pelt a single, attractive, adult woman, presumably because she’s available, but not to them. 

 But maybe he’s just leaving to advance a career. Or maybe to escape an abusive father. Like the fog that drifts in from the Adriatic, the narrative is  a misty cloud, here and there punctuated by strings of festive lights, or an annoying motorcyclist who races through the streets. As with many European films of that era, the primary message seems to be “Yes we’re dysfunctional, but at least we’re cute” - and I’m not buying it. Forget your fond memories of adolescent fantasies and man up! But the cloying theme music was so sweet - and so many of the scenes were charming - especially Gradisca’s wedding reception at the very end. She’s married a fascist policeman. Oh, well …. we will always love her anyway

All About Eve - Joseph Mankiewicz, 1950

 

All About Eve - a fable about Broadway.

 This is basically a film about collaborative artists. They’re working on a play, “Aged in Wood”. Margo Channing (Bette Davis) plays the lead, Lloyd Richards ( Hugh Marlowe) wrote it, Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter) becomes the understudy, Addison Dewitt (George Sanders) is the theater critic, Bill Sampson (Gary Merrill) is a director and Margo’s boyfriend, and Karen Richard’s (Celeste Holm) is Lloyd’s wife. Eve progresses to become Margo’s successful understudy with the help of Karen and the youthful replacement is applauded by Addison, the astute critic who has "lived in the theater as a Trappist monk lives in his cell".  Forced to confront her age, Margo steps away from playing lead in Lloyd’s next project, and immediately accepts Bill’s proposal of marriage, to pursue a more private life.

Eve has proven herself to be ruthless and duplicitous in pursuit of a career and the men attached to the women who helped her.  But on Addison’s authority, we may accept that theater has been well served - while both of the men reject her advances.

 So all’s well that ends well for these artists , on stage and off - and a good supporting cast has given Bette Davis ample opportunity to express a range of emotions with her famous, half lidded eyes.  As a bonus treat, an amazing new actor, Marilyn Monroe, shows how much her face can express in the few seconds allotted to her.  Above all, we are introduced to a special world by artists who have lived in it - as opposed to movies about Roman gladiators or cowboys.

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On the other hand , however, we are welcomed into that special world by Addison Dewitt, the theater critic, who tells us that the only function of writers and producers is to “build a platform on which the actor may shine”. This defines a certain kind of theater that might better be called entertainment than art. He goes on to introduce the producer as the kind “who is out to make a buck”, and he does seem to instigate controversies that are not about the plays themselves. He need not have involved Eve in attacking

Margo.

Evidently, this British gentleman is slumming in the sordid alleys of American entertainment. “Unable to love or be loved”, as he puts it, he asserts “ownership” of Eve by threatening to reveal her sordid past. More than a little creepy - though there is no hint of a sexual relationship - and he only announced his ownership in order to prevent  her from trying to marry Karen’s husband. At the end, Eve is packing her bags for Hollywood, with the good possibility she will never return.  

So Broadway does not have a new star after all.  It’s just seen the impending retirement of an old one.  BTW - Eve’s natural talent truly was amazing - but possible.  Like Mozart being able to hear a concert of new music and then sit down to write the score, Eve taught herself how to act by watching a good actress over and over.  No acting classes were needed.  Everyone she knew at the  award ceremony hated her - but they all appreciated her talent.

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The humor here is as dry as Addison’s monotone - but the title of the play that won Miss Eve the coveted  Sarah Siddons award was “Footsteps on the Ceiling”

Now that’s a hoot!

Some Like It Hot - Billy Wilder, 1959

 

It’s my guess that back in 1959 America, cross-dressing was so personally threatening, the need to laugh it off could get an audience to sit through 120 minutes of giddy horse play. Nowadays, not so much. It was nearly impossible to watch, despite the very watchable faces of Jack Lemmon and Marilyn Monroe. 

 For males,  the threat is that if they didn’t dress like men, they would no longer qualify as such - and as the story advances, it becomes ever more clear that not only does the Jack Lemmon character look better as a woman, but eventually he’d rather be one so he could marry a millionaire and be taken care of. As his boyfriend makes clear in the final scene: “ nobody’s perfect” - i.e. his cisgender is no problem.   And given his growing submissiveness to his roommate, it should be no problem for him either. His only reason for dating the old money bags was to accommodate his roommate’s attempt to tryst with Sugar (Marilyn Monroe) on the rich man’s yacht.  

 By contrast, the masculinity of that roommate is never doubted. If it wears a skirt, he’ll take it for what it’s worth - and what is worth more than a passionate (if pathetic), Marilyn Monroe: desperate for love and money and anything that helps her escape her cheap, disreputable life. Can’t see how any of this is humorous. And it only hints at what a comedy like ”Transparent” will make explicit 60 years later.

It might have worked much better as a 20 minute short,

like Laurel and Hardy made thirty years earlier.

His Girl Friday - Howard Hawks

 

.” The Front Page” (1931, Lewis Milestine),

 “His Girl Friday” ( 1940, Howard Hawks) 

 As we now suffer under the alternate reality of a totally politicized news industry, it’s hard to find any humor in the mendacity of its forebears a century ago. It’s not funny, it’s despicable - and “The Front Page” just serves to normalize it. Even more despicable is centering the drama on the careers of phony journalists while some poor witless soul may or may not be executed for murdering a black policeman. (was that really a serious crime back then?) The cynicism of “The Front Page” is unbearable - and not especially lightened by the stylized facial antics of the liar-in-chief, Adolph Menjou. 

 But it is lightened with the breezy dialog, camera movements, and gender change given the story a decade later in “His Girl Friday”.  The grim premise of the story recedes beneath a light and frothy surface that can be played over and over like a classic song. Cary Grant and Rosalind Russel are wonderful together - and so are their costumes. It’s curious how there is no sexual tension in their romantic relationship - just a light hearted zest for goofiness. Wonderful moments with the press corps as well - so you can ignore how depraved they all are. Well, it was 1940 after all - so I guess you can appreciate it as a way of coping with the impending doom of total war on a scale never seen before. ( Hitler even gets mentioned in the dialog). 

 Also liked the hopeless sincerity of Ralph Bellamy, playing the poor sod who thinks he’s found a wife. 

Isn’t he just begging to be deceived? His dreams are smashed, but he sells life insurance, so we know he had it coming. Ah, cruelty.

The craft of  American movie making traveled a long way between 1930 and 1940.