For those of you who
are unfamiliar with Cinemallennials, it is a bi-weekly podcast in which I, and
another millennial, watch a classic film that we’ve never seen before, and
discuss its significance and relevance in today’s world.
Brandon deWilde, Jean Arthur, Van Heflin, and Alan Ladd
Shane follows the story of a mysterious wanderer named Shane (Alan Ladd) who rides into the lives of homesteaders Joe (Van Heflin), Marion (Jean Arthur), and their son Joey Starrett (Brandon deWilde) on the wide-ranging plains of Wyoming. Joey is immediately enamored with Shane and his ornamented gun belt, dreaming that Shane must be a great hero. Shane believes he has found his little patch of paradise until he is thrust into an ongoing war between the homesteaders and the local cattle baron, Rufus Ryker (Emile Meyer), and his gang. Shane feels he must act in order to protect the Starretts – and to redeem himself from his shrouded past.
During this episode, Andreas and I will be discussing hero worship and its dangers, how our personal decisions can affect not only ourselves but also those around us, how classic films approached wealth inequality, and the film’s direct influence on the 2017 superhero drama, Logan.
Hugh Jackman in Logan, and Alan Ladd in Shane
Throughout the film, Joey is enamored by Shane’s attire and weaponry. He
follows Shane around as if he were a god amongst mere mortals. Joey, like many
other boys, worships at the feet of the legend of gunslingers and their form of
vigilante justice, not fully realizing the extent of the
consequences that violence brings upon all involved. Hollywood’s golden age
inspired many young boys to romanticize violence
and weaponry. I, myself, was one of those boys, and have now since learned better, but Shane,
subverts that message in a time when the western
was still top billing.
Alan Ladd
At the conclusion of Shane, our hero makes sure to tell his acolyte the truth about who he is, what he does, and how it negatively affects both himself and those around him. “Joey, there’s no living with… with a killing. There’s no going back from one. Right or wrong it’s a brand and a brand sticks. There’s no going back.” Shane knows that Joey could potentially turn into someone like himself and wants Joey to break that violent cycle. In Alan Ladd’s performance, you feel the deep pain of the weight of his past gunslinging and how he desperately wishes he could break from who he was, and is, because of the violence he has committed. He wants Joey to know the reality and consequences of his “hero’s” actions, but Joey doesn’t understand and doesn’t want Shane to leave. All Shane can do is to remove himself from the situation and hope, just like maybe Stevens hoped with the film, that the realities of violence would be revealed to Joey (and the audience) in an impactful way.
I hope you enjoy this episode of Cinemallennials, which you can find here on apple podcasts or on spotify. Please reach out to me as I would love to hear your thoughts on Paths of Glory, especially if you’re a first-time viewer too!
Dave Lewis is the producer, writer, and host of Cinemallennials, a podcast where he and another millennial watch a classic film that they haven’t seen before ranging from the early 1900s to the late 1960s and discuss its significance and relevance in our world today. Before writing for Classic Movie Hub, Dave wrote about Irish and Irish-American history, the Gaelic Athletic Association in the United States, and Irish innovators for Irish America magazine. You can find more episodes of Cinemallennials, film reviews and historical analyses, on Dave’s website dlewmoviereview.com or his YouTube channel.
That said, here are some of our May classic movie picks available for FREE STREAMING all month long on the CMH Channel. All you need to do is click on the movie/show of your choice, then click ‘play’ — you do not have to opt for a 7-day trial.
In celebration of May Birthdays, we’re featuring western icon John Wayne (born May 26, 1907) with Angel and the Badman co-starring Gail Russell – and dance icon Fred Astaire (born May 10, 1899) with Royal Wedding opposite Jane Powell. We’re also celebrating Gary Cooper’s and Frank Capra’s birthdays (May 7, 1901, and May 18, 1897, respectively) with Meet John Doe, and director Howard Hawk’s birthday (May 30, 1896) with screwball comedy His Girl Friday starring Cary Grant, Rosalind Russell and Ralph Bellamy. We’ll also be showing Road to Bali in honor of both Bing Crosby’s and Bob Hope’s birthdays this month (May 3, 1903, and May 29, 1903). And more…
From 1947, Angel and the Badman was written and directed by James Edward Grant, and starred John Wayne, Gail Russell, Harry Carey, and Bruce Cabot. It is the first film that Wayne produced as well as starred in.
Screwball comedy, His Girl Friday, from 1940, was directed by Howard Hawks, and starred Cary Grant, Rosalind Russell, and Ralph Bellamy.
A classic among classics, Meet John Doe, from 1941, was directed and produced by Frank Capra, written by Robert Riskin, and starred Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwyck.
…..
We’re also celebrating Mysterious Mayhem with some mysteries and noirs.
And Then There Were None, from 1945, is a film adaptation of Agatha Christie’s 1939 mystery novel of the same name, directed by René Clair.
Cheating Blondes, a 1933 precode mystery, was directed by Joseph Levering, and starred Thelma Todd, Ralf Harolde, and Inez Courtney.
…..
For those of you who aren’t familiar with the service, Best Classics Ever is a new mega streaming channel built especially for classic movie and TV lovers. The idea of the channel is to make lots of classic titles accessible and affordable for all. That said, Classic Movie Hub is curating titles each month that our fans can stream for free on the Classic Movie Hub Channelat Best Classics Ever. If you’d like access to the entire selection of Best Classics Ever titles, you can subscribe to everything for a low monthly fee of $4.99/month (Best Stars Ever, Best Westerns Ever, Best Mysteries Ever, Best TV Ever) or for an individual channel for only $1.99/month.
You can read more about Best Classics Ever and our partnership here.
Silents are Golden: A Closer Look – The General (1926)
Often called one of the finest silent films of all time – some people even consider it the finest – Buster Keaton’s masterwork The General(1926) still feels wonderfully fresh nearly 100 years later. Handsomely photographed and proudly recreating its historical time period with careful detail, it’s an impressive showcase for Keaton’s filmmaking skills – and some of his finest stunts, too.
Buster Keaton in The General (1926)
By the mid-1920s, most major comedians had proudly transitioned from making short comedies to features. Audience expectations for good comedies were high and they liked frameworks of dramatic stories rather than just slapstick. Keaton had already made several popular feature-length comedies including the period picture Our Hospitality(1923) and the big hit The Navigator(1924), and was keenly aware of the trends of the day.
Gagwriter Clyde Bruckman likely knew this when he brought him the Civil War memoir The Great Locomotive Chase by William Pittenger, recounting the Andrews Raid where Union soldiers stole a train and attempted to cut off the Confederates’ supply lines. Keaton was instantly fascinated by the gripping story (the original title was Daring and Suffering: a History of the Great Railway Adventure), and decided to turn it into his next comedy. At the time the old South was considered the “noble loser” (many Civil War veterans and their families were still alive as well), so he made his main character the Southern engineer who loses The General, dubbing him Johnnie Gray.
Today, the real “The General” locomotive, built in 1855 in Paterson, New Jersey, is at the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History in Kennesaw, Georgia.
Excited about recreating the Civil War period on-screen – he wanted it to look “so authentic it hurts” – Keaton hoped to film around the border between Georgia and Tennessee where much of the original train chase took place. He even wanted to use the actual The General locomotive, then being displayed at the Union Depot in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Unfortunately, the border area was too developed to pass for the rural 1860s, and the Tennessee government balked at loaning out The General. But he did find an ideal location around the sleepy town of Cottage Grove, Oregon, which was full of forested hills and plenty of train tracks. In May 1926 Keaton moved his company and 18 boxcars of costumes, filmmaking equipment, recreations of Civil War weapons, remodeled train engines, etc. to Cottage Grove, and work on his ambitious film began.
“Keaton moved his company and 18 boxcars of costumes, filmmaking equipment, recreations of Civil War weapons, remodeled train engines, etc. to Cottage Grove, Oregon”
For everyone involved, it was an exciting, memorable summer – full of hard work but plenty of fun too. The citizens of Cottage Grove were ecstatic over being the “Hollywood of Oregon” and the local newspaper breathlessly covered every detail of the filming. Folks from nearby towns flocked in to watch the famous comedian at work. At the end of a day’s filming Keaton and his crew would sometimes host a dance or put on a show for the locals. He also squeezed in fishing and baseball whenever he could, even fixing up Cottage Grove’s local ballpark free of charge. The town could hardly have asked for a more agreeable crew of “movie people.”
Scene of the crowd gathered to watch Keaton’s train stunt
To play the Civil War soldiers, Keaton recruited 500 of Oregon’s National Guardsmen, clad in period-accurate uniforms. His father, Joe Keaton, was also recruited for a small role as a Union general, and brunette Marion Mack was chosen to play his slightly bird-brained leading lady. Locals often saw Marion biking around town while not on set, and Keaton got a kick out of playing pranks on her. He concocted the scene with the water spout, for instance, without telling her that the spout was going to gush water all over her. Her surprised reaction is in the film today.
Buster Keaton and Marion Mack
Filming wasn’t always easy, especially when the summer heat sometimes broke 100 degrees. Keaton’s stunts were frequently dangerous, especially since many involved running and climbing around on moving trains. The charming gag where Johnny sits on a train’s piston and it slowly moves him up and down could have killed him if too much steam had caused the engine to spin its wheels. During the battle scenes, two soldiers almost drowned in the rapids, and Keaton was knocked unconscious by a cannon blast. A forest fire even started at one point, allegedly by sparks from the wheels of the 1860s-styled trains, and Keaton and his crew personally helped beat back the flames with their shirts and pants.
The crown jewel of the shoot was the single most expensive stunt in silent film history, a train crashing from a dynamited bridge into a river. That July day thousands of people flocked to watch the stunt, some shuttled in by morning trains. A special trestle had been built, loaded with strategically-placed explosives. At three in the afternoon, the signal was given and six cameras cranked side-by-side as the train began crossing the trestle. When it reached the middle the dynamite went off and the train plunged smoothly into the water. The paper reported that Keaton was “as happy as a kid” over how well the stunt turned out.
The notorious train-on-the-bridge scene
Today, it’s often mentioned that The General was negatively reviewed, and thanks to its expensive shoot it’s considered a flop as well. There’s likely room for more research here, especially since many of the negative reviews seem to have come from the New York newspapers (or so this writer has heard), and the box office numbers cited didn’t always include foreign markets. But Buster himself said: “…It held an audience. They were interested in it – from start to finish – and there was enough laughter to satisfy.” Marion Mack would also insist, “It was the audiences that made it such a hit, the studio never realized what a gem they had on their hands until the money started rolling in.” At any rate, as far as they were concerned The General had been a success.
Trivia: Keaton shot 200,000 feet (almost 38 miles) of film for this picture.
If it was indeed overlooked
in the 1920s, The General has since stood the test of time. It’s also
survived in extraordinarily beautiful condition, as clear and crisp as it was a
century ago. When we take in its timeless humor and breathtaking stunts today,
it’s not hard to see why Keaton once said: “I was more proud of that picture, I
suppose, than any other picture I ever made, because I took an actual happening
out of the Civil War, out of the history book. And I told it in detail, too.”
Lea Stans is a born-and-raised Minnesotan with a degree in English and an obsessive interest in the silent film era (which she largely blames on Buster Keaton). In addition to blogging about her passion at her site Silent-ology, she is a columnist for the Silent Film Quarterly and has also written for The Keaton Chronicle.
Femme Fatales? Voiceover narration? Flashbacks? Cynical anti-hero? Deep shadows and single-source lighting? Urban setting? Unique camera angles? Hard-boiled detective?
Yes. And no.
You won’t find every one of these qualities in every film
noir. And not having any or all of these qualities doesn’t mean a film isn’t
noir.
In this month’s Noir Nook, I’m taking a look at a film that doesn’t have many of these typical characteristics, but which I maintain is nonetheless indisputably noir: Ladies in Retirement, a 1941 Columbia feature starring Ida Lupino, Louis Hayward, Elsa Lanchester, and Evelyn Keyes.
What’s it about?
Lupino plays Ellen Creed, who works in the English countryside as a live-in housekeeper and companion to former actress Leonora Fiske (Isobel Elsom). Ellen also is the caretaker – from a distance – for her two sisters, who are eccentric at best, and borderline criminal at worst. When her sisters are threatened with eviction from their London lodgings because of their bad behavior, Ellen relocates them to her employer’s home, but the solution turns out to be less than ideal. And Ellen’s woes are exacerbated by the unexpected appearance of a distant relative (Hayward) who’s clearly up to no good.
Evelyn Keyes
What’s not noir?
Far from a modern setting in a city like San
Francisco, Chicago, or New York, Ladies
in Retirement takes place in rural England during the Victorian era.
The story is presented in a straightforward
fashion, with no flashbacks and no narrator.
There’s no detective or similar authority figure
driving a criminal investigation, nor does the film contain a character who
serves as an anti-hero.
Louis Hayward & Ida Lupino
What’s noir?
Although her motivations leaned more toward
necessity and desperation than avarice and desire, Ellen is clearly a fatal
femme. Unlike many femmes of this type, she didn’t use her feminine wiles to
bamboozle a hapless male; instead, she took matters into her own hands.
Literally.
With the exception of a few scenes, the primary
action in the film takes place within the confines of Mrs. Fiske’s home, where
atmospheric shadows serve to underscore the film’s tension. Outside, an
ever-present mist adds to the constant sensation of apprehension.
The cinematography deftly utilizes close-ups on
the faces of the characters, particularly Ellen’s. In each instance, this
device allows the viewer to experience the character’s growing anguish and dread.
What’s the bottom
line?
Ladies in Retirement certainly isn’t your garden variety noir, but it contains several strong noirish elements. Most importantly, in addition to these characteristics, the film operates from the opening scene under a feeling of impending doom – the sensation that things are not going to turn out well. And that’s the unmistakable mark of film noir.
…
– Karen Burroughs Hannsberry for Classic Movie Hub
How Many Films did James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart Star in Together?
Cagney and Bogart, two very well-dressed but ruthless, gangsters 🙂
Learn your lines, plant your feet, look the other actor in the eye, say the words, mean them.— James Cagney
Cagney and Bogart — two of the toughest ‘tough guys’ to ever grace the Silver Screen — both who helped define the gangster genre, and both who were able to break free from that typecasting — each, incidentally, winning an Academy Award for playing a good guy.
James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart starred in THREE films together:
Angels With Dirty Faces (1938), directed by Michael Curtiz
My Favorite? Don’t kill me, but for me, it’s The Roaring Twenties, hands down. Bogie is just soooo ‘bad’ in this film — he’s so much ‘badder’ than ‘bad guy’ Cagney, that I always find myself rooting for Cagney and hoping that everything will turn out swell for him. Spoiler alert, it doesn’t.
Patricia Neal: An Unquiet Life and Joan Crawford: The Essential Biography Two Biographies for Two Lucky Winners!
CMH is happy to announce our next Classic Movie Book Giveaway as part of our partnership with University Press of Kentucky! This time, we’ll be celebrating two iconic actresses, Joan Crawford and Patricia Neal!
An Unquiet Life was recently adapted to film, entitled To Olivia, starring Hugh Bonneville, Keeley Hawes, and Sam Heughan (yes, from Outlander). The film premiered a few months ago in the UK, but there’s no word yet on when it will be available here in the States. Our friends at UPK will keep us posted!
In order to qualify to win this Joan and Patricia Prize Package via this contest giveaway, you must complete the below entry task by Saturday, May 1 at 6PM EST.
We will announce our two lucky winners on Twitter @ClassicMovieHub on Sunday, May 2, around 9PM EST on Twitter. And, please note that you don’t have to have a Twitter account to enter; just see below for the details.
So, to recap, there will be TWO WINNERS, and each winner will win BOTH of these books:
ENTRY TASK (2-parts) to be completed by Saturday, May 1, 2021 at 6PM EST
1) Answer the below question via the comment section at the bottom of this blog post
2)ThenTWEET (not DM) the following message*: Just entered to win the Patricia Neal: An Unquiet Life & Joan Crawford: The Essential Biography #BookGiveaway courtesy of @KentuckyPress & @ClassicMovieHub – #AnUnquietLife – Two lucky winners will win both bios 🙂 #EnterToWin here: http://ow.ly/jnMx50EuG4N
THE QUESTION: What are your favorite films or performances by both Joan Crawford and Patricia Neal?
*If you do not have a Twitter account, you can still enter the contest by simply answering the above question via the comment section at the bottom of this blog — BUT PLEASE ENSURE THAT YOU ADD THIS VERBIAGE TO YOUR ANSWER: I do not have a Twitter account, so I am posting here to enter but cannot tweet the message.
NOTE: if for any reason you encounter a problem commenting here on this blog, please feel free to tweet or DM us, or send an email to clas…@gmail.com and we will be happy to create the entry for you.
ALSO: Please allow us 48 hours to approve your comments. Sorry about that, but we are being overwhelmed with spam, and must sort through 100s of comments…
Joan Crawford in Mildred Pierce (1945)
…..
If you missed the premiere of our Screen Classics Discussion video event, you can catch it here on YouTube:
…..
About the Books:
Joan Crawford: The Essential Biography: This new biography of Crawford sets the record straight, going beyond the gossip to find the truth about the legendary actress. The authors knew Crawford well and conducted scores of interviews with her and many of her friends and co-stars, including Frank Capra, George Cukor, Nicholas Ray, and Sidney Greenstreet. Far from a whitewash―Crawford was indeed a colorful and difficult character― Joan Crawford corrects many lies and tells the story of one of Hollywood’s most influential stars, complete with on-set anecdotes and other movie lore. Through extensive interviews, in-depth analysis, and evaluation of her films and performances―both successes and failures―Lawrence J. Quirk and William Schoell present Crawford’s story as both an appreciation and a reevaluation of her extraordinary life and career. This fascinating book tells the behind-the-scenes story of one of Hollywood’s great dames.
Patricia Neal: An Unquiet Life: The internationally acclaimed actress Patricia Neal (1926–2010) was a star on stage, film, and television for more than sixty years. On Broadway she appeared in such lauded productions as Lillian Hellman’s Another Part of the Forest, winning the first Tony award. In Hollywood she starred opposite the likes of John Wayne, Paul Newman, John Garfield, and Gary Cooper in some thirty films. She is perhaps best known for her portrayal of Alma Brown in Hud, which earned her the 1963 Academy Award for Best Actress. But there was much more to Neal’s life. She was born in Packard, Kentucky, though she spent most of her childhood in Knoxville, Tennessee. For a time, Neal became romantically involved with Gary Cooper, her married costar in The Fountainhead. In 1953, Neal wed famed children’s author Roald Dahl, a match that would bring her five children and thirty years of dramatic ups and downs. At the pinnacle of her screen career, Neal suffered a series of strokes which left her in a coma for twenty-one days, and Variety even ran a headline erroneously stating that she had died. After a difficult recovery, Neal returned to film acting, earning a second Academy Award nomination for The Subject Was Roses (1968). She appeared in several television movie roles in the 1970s and 1980s and won a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Dramatic TV Movie in 1971 for The Homecoming. Adapted as a major motion picture (filmed as An Unquiet Life) starring Hugh Bonneville, Keeley Hawes, and Sam Heughan, Patricia Neal: An Unquiet Life is the first critical biography detailing the actress’s impressive film career and remarkable personal life. Author Stephen Michael Shearer conducted numerous interviews with Neal, her professional colleagues, and her intimate friends and was given access to the actress’s personal papers. The result is an honest and comprehensive portrait of an accomplished woman who lived her life with determination and bravado.
Silents are Golden: Silent Superstars – The Marvelous Mabel Normand
If Charlie Chaplin is considered the king of slapstick, then Mabel Normand certainly is its queen. Much-loved by audiences in her day, everyone who knew and worked with Mabel also remembered her fondly, describing her as “wonderful, generous,” “lovable,” and “full of life.” Indeed, she seems to have been all of those things and more. Sadly, her life would be brief, but she managed to live it to the fullest.
Mabel Normand
Mabel was born in Staten Island, New York, in
1892, the daughter of carpenter Claude Normand and his wife Mary J. Drury. She
was a mischievous, impulsive child, and also showed a talent for athletics,
spending much time swimming at the Staten Island beaches and eventually earning
medals. Other passions included music (her parents were ardent music lovers)
and art. She was also a devoted Catholic, saying later in life: “I am a
Catholic, but don’t hold that against the church.”
In 1906 the teenaged Mabel found a job in the
mailroom for the sewing pattern company Butterick, hoping the extra income
would help her parents. Being naturally pretty with dark curling hair and
enormous eyes, she ended up working as a model instead, posing for long hours
in fancy gowns and hats. One of the artists who captured her likeness was James
Montgomery Flagg, famous today for his “I Want You!” Uncle Sam poster.
One of the images she posed for.
It was while posing for lantern slides that Mabel became interested in “moving pictures.” Her friend Alice Joyce, a fellow model, started getting small parts in films and invited Mabel to go with her to visit the Biograph studio. Mabel was introduced to director D.W. Griffith (who likely recognized the popular model) and he hired her as an extra for five dollars a day.
She would work at Biograph briefly, leave to act alongside comedian John Bunny at Vitagraph just as briefly, return to Biograph, and finally find her niche in Biograph’s comedy unit headed by the legendary Mack Sennett. This was the perfect fit for the sunny, high-energy Mabel, who had a definite flair for comedy. Her first starring short would be the split-reeler The Diving Girl (1911), capitalizing on her attractiveness and swimming skills.
Still from The Diving Girl (1911)
Sennett’s Biograph comedies were so successful that he decided to take over the old Bison studio in Los Angeles and start his own studio, Keystone. Mabel was one of his biggest talents and would be featured in one of Keystone’s very first films: The Water Nymph(1912).
Over the next few years Keystone became wildly popular, and so did Mabel. She starred in dozens of slapstick-infused shorts alongside fellow comedians Ford Sterling, Fred Mace, and Roscoe Arbuckle, to name a few. She and Arbuckle had a wonderful onscreen rapport and would star in a number of “Fatty and Mabel” shorts.
Roscoe & Mabel
She and Sennett also began seeing each other – one of the more well-known Hollywoodland romances – and in 1915 the two dynamic personalities became engaged.
Mack & Mabel
But everything wasn’t sunshine and roses.
Mabel contracted tuberculosis around 1914, a widespread disease at the time.
The illness would plague her on and off throughout the years. Rumors have long
circulated that Mabel used drugs, or was even a cocaine addict. If she was addicted to cocaine, it’s been
speculated that it was originally prescribed by a doctor treating her
tuberculosis, since it was thought to ease bad coughs. (At the time, even
heroin was prescribed for some ailments.)
Mabel’s romance with Sennett came to an abrupt end when –as the story goes – she caught him in a hotel with actress Mae Busch. Friends claimed Mae threw a vase at her, causing a bad head injury that took weeks to recover from. In any case, Mabel did indeed suffer some sort of significant injury (the studio claimed she fell) and did break off her engagement with Sennett. Eventually, they would continue working together (Sennett even allowed her to have her own separate studio), but Mabel wouldn’t allow the romance to be rekindled.
Normand was known for her big eyes and big smile
By the end of the 1910s, comedy features were in vogue, and Mabel would star in Mickey (1918), which became a smash hit (in spite of the Spanish flu pandemic). Now working for Samuel Goldwyn, she would star in Peck’s Bad Girl (1918), Sis Hopkins(1919), and a number of other features before returning to Sennett for classics like The Extra Girl(1923). By now the public was using a new word: “Mabelescent,” meaning “sparkling and vivacious.” Mabel was making thousands of dollars a week and spent it lavishly, but gave it away lavishly, too. Decidedly unpredictable, she was once known to tip a chef a hundred dollars for a pie.
Normand was writing her own films by 1912 and directing them by 1914, making her one of the first women to do so.
Adding to her ongoing troubles with tuberculosis were two major 1920s scandals. Director William Desmond Taylor, a friend of Mabel’s, was shot and killed under mysterious circumstances that to this day haven’t been explained, and Mabel, unfortunately, was the last person known to see him alive. Later, another scandal erupted when her chauffeur shot Courtland Dines, actress Edna Purviance’s fiancé, in a bizarre misunderstanding. In both cases, Mabel was innocent of any wrongdoing, but the court trials and gossip took a toll on her career. Not until 1926 would she appear on screen again, this time in a series of Hal Roach shorts.
Mabel
Also in 1926, Mabel surprised everyone by marrying actor Lew Cody. She and Lew (a witty man and in-demand public speaker) had been good friends and apparently staged a joke wedding at a party. Warming to the idea of marrying for real, they decided to make it official.
Mabel Normand & Lew Cody
While Mabel and Lew’s marriage was shaky at first, they became closer over the next few years – and especially once Mabel’s health began to fail. Tuberculosis finally began to claim her life, and in those final months of suffering Lew would go above and beyond to devote himself to her care. In 1930 she passed away, at age 37.
The girl who “made millions laugh” was buried
at Calvary Cemetery in Los Angeles. And while she was gone far too soon, nearly
a century later Mabel Normand is still legendary as one of the great names of
silent comedy.
“Just because I’m a little – well, you know, different – people believe anything weird about me.” – Mabel Normand
Both Timothy Dean Lefler’s biography Mabel Normand: The Life and Career of a Hollywood Madcap and Brent Walker’s mighty book Mack Sennett’s Fun Factory were useful sources for this post. I recommend giving them a read!
Lea Stans is a born-and-raised Minnesotan with a degree in English and an obsessive interest in the silent film era (which she largely blames on Buster Keaton). In addition to blogging about her passion at her site Silent-ology, she is a columnist for the Silent Film Quarterly and has also written for The Keaton Chronicle.
Is there anything
scarier in horror movies than the truth factor?
It doesn’t matter how far-fetched the plot or how loosely it may be based in reality, just a touch of “this did happen” or “this could happen” sets me on edge. (I haven’t watched The Blob the same way since my young niece shared that a teen blogger said it was based on a true story.)
Some films are set up to put the truth factor in your mind from the start. Take Day of the Animals (1974) a film with a somber opening crawl that detailed the real work of doctors F. Sherwood Rowland and Mario Molina of the University of California who startled the scientific community in 1974 with their findings on how chlorofluorocarbons – found in everyday objects like hairspray and spray deodorants – were contributing to the depletion of the ozone layer. (They later co-shared the 1995 Nobel Prize in chemistry.)
One way to unnerve a movie viewer is to tell them the film could really happen, as does the opening crawl of Day of the Animals.
The crawl continued:
“dangerous amounts of ultraviolet rays are reaching the surface of our planet and
adversely affecting all living things. This motion picture dramatizes what
could happen in the near future if we continue to do nothing.”
That’s one way to get the viewer’s attention – I was unsettled before the first character was on screen.
Day of the Animals was one of the eco-horror films of the 1970s that came from growing ecological and environmental concerns. The first Earth Day on April 22, 1970 was held to acknowledge these worries about pollution, pesticides and other contaminants and how it’s up to humans to protect the world’s natural resources.
If we didn’t? Well, these films were cautionary tales on what could happen.
Day of the Animals (1974) depicted the disastrous effects of holes in the ozone layer. Food of the Gods (1976) serves a version of what happens when chemicals we’re putting into the ground rise again. In Prophecy (1979), environmental waste from a paper mill causes a bear to mutate into a giant killer.
* * * *
In the eco-horror film Frogs, the amphibious title creatures gather to watch humans.
The first of these eco-horror films was Frogs (1972), which addressed the effects of pollution.
But don’t be fooled by the title. There are more than frogs in this cult classic. Snakes, spiders, alligators, leeches, insects, amphibians and whatever else might be found around a Florida island take revenge against humans for destroying the planet. The frogs mostly sit – or hop – around, eerily watching the humans and seemingly instructing the other creatures to attack. As in Day of the Animals, this animal voyeurism is effectively creepy.
The wealthy Crockett family is spending their annual two-week birthday celebration on their private Florida island. Patriarch Jason Crockett (Ray Milland) is a cranky, wheelchair-bound man who doesn’t show much regard for anything or anyone other than himself. The already unhappy group is even more miserable because of the incessant croaking of the frogs that continues around the clock.
They should have listened closer. The frogs aren’t happy about the family’s use of poisons at their plantation and paper mill, plus their general indifference to nature. Uncle Stuart suggests pouring oil in the water to choke off the frogs, no matter what else it kills. Mr. Crockett’s solution is to dispatch the gardener to spray pesticide around the island to quiet both the frogs and his family.
Joan Van Ark and Sam Elliott try to survive an attack by nature in Frogs.
Enter freelance photographer Pickett Smith (played by Sam Elliott in a rare clean-shaven role) who is on assignment for an ecology magazine’s pollution spread. He’s seen the water pollution around the island before his canoe is upended by two family members in a motorboat. Mr. Crockett isn’t happy about the unwelcome visitor until he realizes that Pickett’s knowledge of ecology could come in handy with the family’s “frog problem.”
Again, pay attention
people. You’ve got more than a frog problem as that giant snake wrapped around
the dining room chandelier proves.
An uninvited guest shows up for dinner in Frogs.
“Frogs attacking
windows, snakes on chandeliers. Those aren’t exactly normal things Mr.
Crockett,” Pickett says in the understatement of the film.
But Crockett counters with his belief that “man is master of the world.”
As bodies pile up, the stubborn Crockett refuses to see the deaths as anything other than accidents. The soft-spoken Pickett knows better. “You’ve overdone it with the pesticides and poisons here. I’m afraid to think of what’s happened,” Pickett says in a sentence that sums up the film.
A grisly death in Frogs.
Most of the attacking animals in Frogs are small, but what they lack in size they make up for in quantity. The image of a person covered in spiders and entombed in their webs makes its point.
Frogs wants us to remember that all the contaminates we put into the Earth and air will find their way back to us.
* * * *
A group of hikers are stalked by animals that have turned aggressive because of holes in the ozone layer in Day of the Animals.
There aren’t any frogs in Day of the Animals, but there’s a deadly array of birds, bears, snakes, buzzards, mountain lions, rats and dogs for starters. They’re among the animals that have turned dangerously aggressive at high altitudes around a Northern California mountainside town (and the world), a phenomenon blamed on problems with the ozone layer.
There’s more, too. Sweaty locals are complaining about the heat while news reports advise against going outside because of ozone depletion.
That won’t stop tour guide Steve Buckner (Christopher George) who ignores a ranger discouraging him from taking city folk up the mountains for a two-week hike. The area is so remote they’re dropped off by helicopter (never a good thing in a horror movie). The group includes a boy and his mean mother (classic film actress Ruth Roman), a dying pro football player, an anthropology professor (Richard Jaeckel), a squabbling husband and wife, a desperately-in-love young couple, a TV reporter (Lynda Day George, real-life wife of Christophe George), a Native American guide named Santee (Michael Ansara) and an ad exec (Leslie Nielsen).
Real-life husband and wife Christopher George and Lynda Day George star in Day of the Animals.
In the mountains, the beauty of nature can’t hide that something isn’t right. Santee feels it. “There’s something strange in the woods and I don’t know what it is.” Things go bad fast. Birds get aggressive, a wolf attacks the sleeping group the first night. Just like in Frogs, there’s resistance to the idea that those are anything other than isolated incidents. That changes the next day at the food drop where it’s been destroyed by animals who have eaten everything. Night 2 brings an even larger attack.
It’s not much better in the town below which is being evacuated by the Army with more blame put on ozone depletion. (This film has a very focused view of the problem.)
By now, we’re well into that familiar movie guessing game of “who will survive” (and, let’s admit it, “who we want to survive”). Tempers flare, people fight people.
Problems with the ozone layer start to affect people as Leslie Nielsen takes off his shirt and attacks his fellow hikers – and a grizzly – in Day of the Animals.
Most shocking is the usually funny Leslie Nielsen’s performance as a racist and violent man who becomes as much a danger to the group as the animals. It’s difficult to listen to him rant and threaten others in the last third of the film. It culminates in a notably strange scene of a shirtless Nielsen provoking a hand-to-hand battle with a grizzly.
In perhaps the film’s boldest statement, Nielsen’s growing rage mirrors that of the animals and presents the idea that the “ozone thing,” as it’s called, has the same dangerous effect on humans as it does on animals.
Repeated images of a mountain lion and other animals stalking hikers elevate the tension in Day of the Animals.
Day of the Animals is a surprisingly tense film. I never relaxed and jumped several times even on my second viewing (and I’m not a film jumper). The horror builds on the repeated images and sounds of animals in their natural habitat. As in Frogs, the animals are voyeurs who stalk their victims. Birds circle overhead; a mountain lion crouches on a rock like he’s ready to pounce; a bear is always walking nearby just out of sight. It’s unnerving.
Yet all those disturbing images, the multiple animal attacks and Leslie Nielsen thinking he’s more powerful than a grizzly aren’t as scary as the one feature that sets eco-horror apart from other films: it could happen.
Ground pollution eaten by chickens has some big results in Food of the Gods.
* * * *
More eco-horror
Here are three other films that could fall under the eco-horror banner.
Food of the Gods (1976), a very loose adaptation of H.G. Wells novel. Contaminants that rise from the ground are mistaken for food and given to animals who grow large and deadly. This comes from American International Pictures and is directed by Bert I. Gordon.
Long Weekend (1978) is a well-regarded Australian film in which a miserable couple goes away for a few days and their reckless disregard for nature – tossing cigarette ashes into the brush, killing animals – causes nature to fight back.
Toni Ruberto, born and raised in Buffalo, N.Y., is an editor and writer at
The Buffalo News. She shares her love for classic movies in her blog, Watching Forever. Toni was
the president of the former Buffalo chapter of TCM Backlot and now leads the
offshoot group, Buffalo Classic Movie Buffs. She is proud to have put Buffalo
and its glorious old movie palaces in the spotlight as the inaugural winner of
the TCM in Your Hometown contest. You can find Toni on Twitter at @toniruberto.
For those of you who are unfamiliar
with Cinemallennials, it is a bi-weekly podcast in which I, and another
millennial, watch a classic film that we’ve never seen before, and discuss its
significance and relevance in today’s world.
In today’s episode, I talked with Mary Jo Hernandez about the 1959 comedy, Some Like it Hot, directed by Hollywood legend Billy Wilder. Some Like It Hot is a hilarious romp that is both meaningful and surprisingly appropriate for our own time.
Billy Wilder is considered one of the most inventive and adaptable filmmakers during Hollywood’s Golden Age. From his first success in turning Greta Garbo from a tragic heroine into a comedy star in Ninotchka, to casting William Holden against type and bringing silent star Gloria Swanson back into the limelight for Sunset Boulevard, Wilder was truly one of a kind. While he was able to adapt actors to roles or film genres that audiences weren’t used to, Wilder’s ‘daring’ is his most significant contribution to Hollywood, and some believe that Some Like It Hot was the death knell of the strict production code that censored films during Hollywood’s Golden Age.
Billy Wilder with Marilyn Monroe on the set, and Tony Curtis in the background
Some Like It Hot, follows the story of two musicians, Joe (Tony Curtis) and Jerry (Jack Lemmon), who witness a St. Valentine’s Day Massacre-like crime and are on the run from gangster Spats Columbo. In order to escape the gangster’s clutches, they disguise themselves as women (Josephine and Daphne) and join an all-girl band that’s on its way to Florida. Both Joe and Jerry go crazy lusting over the band’s singer, Sugar Kane (Marilyn Monroe), who also changes her identity to get what she wants when she meets the heir to the Shell Oil empire, Junior (who is really Joe in disguise).
During this episode, Mary Jo and I will be discussing identity change and acceptance, how men can see and understand women’s reactions to inappropriate behavior, and how sometimes ‘faking it’ is the ultimate path to making it.
The ‘all girl’ band on the way to Florida
Some Like It Hot was not approved by the Motion Picture Production Code, otherwise known as the Hays Code, which prohibited the use of both visual and written representations of vulgarity, crime, and sexuality. The film’s depictions and references to homosexuality, cross-dressing, and promiscuity were deemed major offenses at the time, but Wilder was able to drive his themes home without directly addressing them. Here are a few examples:
As Joe and Jerry begin their cross-dressing survival journey, Jerry (now Daphne) slips and falls when boarding the train to Florida. Band manager Bienstock pats Daphne on the butt, encouraging her to get back up. As a result of this unwarranted touching, Daphne exclaims “Fresh!”
Daphne is constantly harassed by millionaire Osgood (Joe E. Brown) who continually follows her around their hotel despite being rejected. Although Osgood does have a redemption arc by the film’s closing, this example (as well as the example above), is an eye-opener to men, showing a woman’s point of view about being pressured or sexualized.
Sugar, Daphne and Josephine
The third example is where Osgood’s redemption comes in, and shows how Some Like It Hot bridges the gap between being relevant in its own time as well as today. This involves a spoiler alert, so if you haven’t seen the film, you can skip the next paragraph.
Osgood proposes to Daphne, who accepts, knowing that he’ll get millions in an anticipated divorce settlement once Osgood learns his true identity. As the film resolves to its end, Joe and Sugar unite in love, despite the ruse Joe tried to pull on Sugar, and Daphne tries to distance himself and confess to Osgood about who he really is and why he can’t marry him. Every excuse that Daphne gives, Osgood accepts, much to Daphne’s chagrin, and exhausted by everything, Daphne (now Jerry again) takes off his wig and exclaims, “I’m a man!” to which Osgood replies with a grin, “Well, nobody’s perfect.” This scene, showing Osgood’s acceptance of Jerry’s true identity, presents a forward-thinking perspective of homosexuality and gender identity, connecting our world today with the film world of the past.
Osgood and Jerry
Through the use of comedy and a stellar cast, Billy Wilder was able to address topics that he wouldn’t have been able to, if the film was written as a drama. His use of double entendre and coded references enabled him, and his actors, to push the boundaries of filmmaking. Some Like It Hot was able to toe the line of being appropriate for its time as well as being ahead of its time, setting a precedent for years to follow. And, despite not being approved by the Motion Picture Production Code, the film was an overwhelming success.
I hope you enjoy this episode of Cinemallennials, which you can find here on apple podcasts or on spotify. Please reach out to me as I would love to hear your thoughts on Some Like It Hot, especially if you’re a first-time viewer too!
Dave Lewis is the producer, writer, and host of Cinemallennials, a podcast where he and another millennial watch a classic film that they haven’t seen before ranging from the early 1900s to the late 1960s and discuss its significance and relevance in our world today. Before writing for Classic Movie Hub, Dave wrote about Irish and Irish-American history, the Gaelic Athletic Association in the United States, and Irish innovators for Irish America magazine. You can find more episodes of Cinemallennials, film reviews and historical analyses, on Dave’s website dlewmoviereview.com or his YouTube channel.
“Growing Up Hollywood” Screen Classics Discussion Debut Victoria Riskin & William Wellman Jr, moderated by Alan Rode
We’re so happy to share the Very First Event in our Exclusive Classic Movie Hub Screen Classics Discussion Video Series with University Press of Kentucky and co-host Aurora from Once Upon a Screen! It’s called Growing Up Hollywood, and it premiered on Facebook and YouTube earlier tonight.
Film scholar and author Alan Rode (Michael Curtiz: A Life In Film) moderated the event, which, IMHO, was an absolutely delightful chat with two children of Hollywood legends — Victoria Riskin and William Wellman Jr. A Big Thank You to Victoria and William for sharing such wonderful and very personal stories about what it was like growing up with such famous parents during the Golden Age of Hollywood!
Here is the entire discussion in all its glory for you to enjoy 🙂
…..
Stay tuned for more in this Discussion Series — which will include conversations about Jane Russell, Jayne Mansfield, Charles Boyer and more!
And please keep checking back here because CMH will be giving away lots of University Press of Kentucky classic movie books throughout the year. There are too many titles to list here, but just to give you a hint, we’ll be including books about Joan Crawford, Patricia Neal, Jayne Mansfield, Charles Boyer, Hitchcock, Vitagraph, the Studios and more!
,
