Acteurist oeuvre-view – Margaret Sullavan – Part 4: THREE COMRADES (1938) & SHOPWORN ANGEL (1938)

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In this week’s Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode, we follow Margaret Sullavan to MGM, watching two films from 1938, Three Comrades and The Shopworn Angel. Borzage’s film, based on Erich Maria Remarque’s Lost Generation novel about Germany between World Wars, could not be more different in tone from H. C. Potter’s love triangle melodrama, but both centre on a love that transcends the conventional, selfish two-lovers romance. Sullavan gives us two versions of a woman losing her disillusionment, and we reflect at some length on the meaning of Sullavan in Borzage’s movies. 

 

Time Codes:

0h 01m 00s:      THREE COMRADES (1938) [dir. Frank Borzage]

0h 50m 44s:      THE SHOPWORN ANGEL (1938) [dir. H.C. Potter]                             

+++

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise’s latest film piece on Preston Sturges, Unfaithfully Yours, and the Narrative role of comedic scapegoating.

* Check out Dave’s new Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist’s 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project! 

*And Read lots of Elise’s Writing at Bright Wall/Dark Room, Cléo, and Bright Lights.*

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

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Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Warner Brothers – 1937: CONFESSION & STOLEN HOLIDAY

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For this pass at Warner Bros. 1937, we have two more vehicles for Dave’s favourite actress, Kay Francis: Confession, Joe May’s scene-for-scene remake of the German melodrama Mazurka; and Michael’s Curtiz’s Stolen Holiday, a version of the Stavisky affair with Francis, Claude Rains, and Ian Hunter making up the Curtiz Triangle and Orry-Kelly, as usual, fearlessly emphasizing the outré bodies of Warner’s female stars. How do you prefer to see Kay Francis: as a sort of combination of Stella Dallas and the Michael Douglas character from Fatal Attraction, mowing down Basil Rathbone in the name of Sacred Motherhood? Or inspiring Claude Rains to discover unsuspected depths of decency with her talent for unconditional friendship? The beauty of this episode is: you don’t have to choose. 

 

Time Codes:

0h 01m 00s:                 Warner Bros. 1937 Studio Data 

0h 04m 02s:                 CONFESSION (dir. Joe May)   

0h 33m 49s:                 STOLEN HOLIDAY (dir. Michael Curtiz)

           

Studio Film Capsules provided by Clive Hirschhorn’s The Warner Brothers Story

Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler

                                   

+++

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise’s latest film piece on Preston Sturges, Unfaithfully Yours, and the Narrative role of comedic scapegoating.

* Check out Dave’s new Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist’s 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project! 

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

Check out this episode!

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Special Subject – Marcel Carné & Jacques Prévert, Part 1 – JENNY (1936), QUAI DES BRUMES (1938), HÔTEL DU NORD (1938), and LE JOUR SE LÈVE (1939)

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Our Summer in France series concludes with a look at the dynamic duo of poetic realism, director Marcel Carné and screenwriter Jacques Prévert. We discuss their first collaboration, Jenny (1936), and two noirish Oedipal fever dreams, Le quai des brumes (1938) and Le jour se lève (1939). We also look at a Carné film from the period in which Prévert was not involved, Hôtel du Nord (1938), and find both continuity with and difference from the surrounding films. Proletariats, perversion, the death drive, romantic love, and existential isolation: it’s everything you ever wanted from a Summer in France. 

 

0h 01m 00s:      Introduction to Carné     

0h 16m 46s:      LE JOUR SE LÈVE (1939) [dir. Marcel Carné]                

0h 50m 00s:      HÔTEL DU NORD (1938) [dir. Marcel Carné]     

1h 07m 52s:      QUAI DES BRUMES (1938)  [dir. Marcel Carné]

1h 29m 00s:      JENNY (1936) [dir. Marcel Carné]

                                   

+++

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise’s latest film piece on Preston Sturges, Unfaithfully Yours, and the Narrative role of comedic scapegoating.

* Check out Dave’s new Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist’s 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project! 

*And Read lots of Elise’s Writing at Bright Wall/Dark Room, Cléo, and Bright Lights.*

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

Check out this episode!

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Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – MGM – 1937: CONQUEST & PARNELL

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In this MGM 1937 episode, we look at two star-studded historical romances about charismatic political leaders and their mistresses: Conquest (directed by Clarence Brown), with Charles Boyer’s Napoleon Bonaparte and Greta Garbo’s Marie Walewska, and Parnell (directed by John Stahl), with Clark Gable’s Charles Stewart Parnell and Myrna Loy’s Katharine O’Shea. Despite the poor-to-terrible reputations of the films, we find a lot to recommend, from Conquest‘s surprisingly canny politics to Parnell‘s gender-inversion of Stahl’s fallen woman melodramas. Dave reveals his inner Napoleon fanboy, and Elise shudders at the Gnostic void into which love leads Stahl’s protagonists. 

 

Time Codes:

0h 06m 08s:                  Studio Data

0h 10m 01s:                  CONQUEST [dir. Clarence Brown]        

0h 45m 28s:                  PARNELL [dir. John M. Stahl]

1h 25m 00s:                 Listener mail with Adam

 

Studio Film Capsules provided by The MGM Story by John Douglas Eames

Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler

                                   

+++

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise’s latest film piece on Preston Sturges, Unfaithfully Yours, and the Narrative role of comedic scapegoating.

* Check out Dave’s new Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist’s 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project! 

*And Read lots of Elise’s Writing at Bright Wall/Dark Room, Cléo, and Bright Lights.*

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

Check out this episode!

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Acteurist oeuvre-view – Margaret Sullavan – Part 3: NEXT TIME WE LOVE (1936) & THE MOON’S OUR HOME (1936)

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Our third Margaret Sullavan Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode features another odd juxtaposition: Next Time We Love (1936), a melodrama of ideas that pairs Sullavan with Jimmy Stewart for the first time; and The Moon’s Our Home, a (flat) screwball comedy in which she co-stars with ex-husband Henry Fonda (1936). We do some deep reflecting on love, gender roles, and human potential, and try to get a grasp on the Sullavan persona. 

 

0h 1m 00s:            NEXT TIME WE LOVE (1936) [dir. Edward H. Griffith]

0h 46n 41s:           THE MOON’S OUR HOME (1936) [dir. William A. Seiter]

                                   

+++

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise’s latest film piece on Preston Sturges, Unfaithfully Yours, and the Narrative role of comedic scapegoating.

* Check out Dave’s new Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist’s 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project! 

*And Read lots of Elise’s Writing at Bright Wall/Dark Room, Cléo, and Bright Lights.*

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

Check out this episode!

Read Full Post »