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| Cabaret -- old chum |
Cabaret (1972) Fosse. I’ve been enjoying this picture for about fifty-three years, that is since it first appeared in theaters. I saw it three times during its initial theatrical run. I’ve no idea how many times I’ve seen it since but suffice to say my DVD is well worn. It sits at number twenty-two on my all-time top 100 films list which come to think of it seems a tad low. Cabaret features Oscar winning performances from Liza Minelli and Joel Grey and Grey’s turn as the master of ceremonies is one of the greatest supporting player performances of all time in any film of any genre. But one thing I noted during my latest viewing was how good Michael York was. He was evidently one of many candidates for the role of Brian Roberts. It is difficult to imagine anyway being better in the role. He had to play opposite the vivacious, the eccentric, the emotional, the erratic, the delightful Sally Bowles (Minelli) and let her do her thing. This he did with aplomb. Cabaret delights on so many levels. The music, the characters, the setting, the stories. I’ll never tire of it.
Lacombe, Lucien (1974) Malle. Talk about the banality of evil….A young Frenchman in war torn France seeks to join the resistance but stumbles into a group of French collaborators who work for the German police. What the heck, he joins them instead. The title character is not a lad with great intellectual gifts and he wants to be part of something, he wants to belong, he wants action and excitement, never mind with whom and for what. Lucien kills easily as we see early in the film when he needlessly kills a small bird with a slingshot. He falls in love with a young woman named France (the stunning Aurore Clément) and tears her life asunder. This is a story of how easily and thoughtlessly we can slip into various roles even ones that require us to kill.The horrors committed in the film are not presented so as to shock us, rather they are matter of fact, carried out by regular people who fancy themselves doing regular work. The great Louis Malle directed.
More Than a Secretary (1936) Green. What an awful movie and particularly a terrible waste of the great Jean Arthur. I’ve remarked before how Ms. Arthur had chemistry with every leading man she played opposite of. That was before I saw this clunker where her love interest is George Brent. Maybe they would have worked well together with a decent script or under a better director but this is one of those movies that doesn’t work on any level. Screwball romcoms are supposed to make us root for the couple to get together. In this picture I soon gave up any interest in the two and and whether they lived happily ever after or not. I just wanted it over.
A Matter of Life and Death (1946) Powell and Pressburger. David Niven is a World War II British pilot who was supposed to die but the conductor from heaven missed him in the fog. Every effort will be made to bring him back. It’s a bizarre premise but it’s still a very good film. Kim Hunter is the radio operator who the flyer falls in love with in the minutes before he was supposed to die. Roger Livesey plays a doctor friend of Hunter’s who is naturally skeptical that this downed flyer is being told he must ascend to the afterlife. But when he’s forced by personal circumstance to believe him, the doctor defends him in afterlife court. None of it is as silly as it seems and it all makes for an intriguing tale and moving love story. It’s got elements of Here Comes Mr. Jordan and The Devil and Daniel Webster. This is one of four excellent films in a row that Powell and Pressburger made between 1944 and 1947 (the others being A Canterbury Tale, I Know Where I’m Going and Black Narcissus).
Love Affair (1939) McCarey. Sappy, cloying ultimately dull. Not a total waste of time; after all, you get the charms of Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne as your leads but it's bit too melodramatic for my taste. I didn’t care for the remake, An Affair to Remember, either despite it starring Deborah Kerr and Cary Grant and the newest version, also called Love Affair with Warren Beatty and Annette Bening was a stinker. The passion in this version (the best of the three for whatever that's worth) is more told than shown. I never believed it. The side story with the grandmother seemed particularly contrived and lacking emotional heft. If you told me you liked or even loved this film I’d think not a whit less of you. Simply not my thing. Leo McCarey was a fine director but his films were often more technically astute than emotional impactful.
Ever Since Eve (1937). Silly movies can be good movies and of course great fun. Such is the case with this delight which was Marion Davies’ last film role. She was in her late thirties and still easy on the eyes though she looked puffy, doubtless from the heavy drinking that she was indulging in. Nonetheless she and co-star Robert Montgomery worked well together in the story of a woman (Davies) who makes herself look plain so that she can land a job as secretary to a novelist (Montgomery). Patsy Kelly and Allen Jenkins, two of the better supporting players of their era, are in top form here and add to the zaniness. Davies and Montgomery were two of the better comic actors of the their time and together they took a very silly premise and made a perfectly charming movie out of it.
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