Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Warner Brothers – 1939: THE ROARING TWENTIES and DUST BE MY DESTINY [Plus: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto]

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Warner Brothers, 1939: this is a big one, a double feature of Dave Faves, The Roaring Twenties, directed by Raoul Walsh and starring James Cagney and Priscilla Lane (among others), and Dust Be My Destiny, directed by Lewis Seiler and starring John Garfield and Priscilla Lane again. We take the opportunity to contrast Cagney and Garfield, Warners’ characteristic “proletarian” male stars of the early 30s and late 30s respectively, teasing out what they mean for the evolving American Left. Then, the return (again) of Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto: we briefly discuss Elia Kazan’s Splendor in the Grass (1961), comparing it stylistically and thematically to David Lynch’s Fire Walk with Me. But why didn’t Sheryl Lee get an Oscar nom, like Natalie Wood?

 

Time Codes:

0h 01m 00s:                THE ROARING TWENTIES [dir. Raoul Walsh]

0h 44m 34s:                DUST BE MY DESTINY [dir. Lewis Seiler]

1h 22m 41s:                Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – SPLENDOR IN THE GRASS (1961) [dir. Elia Kazan]       

Studio Film Capsules provided The Warner Brothers Story by Clive Hirschhorn

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

 

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Acteurist oeuvre-view – Daniel Day-Lewis – Part 4: EVERSMILE, NEW JERSEY (1989) & THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS (1992)

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In this episode of our Daniel Day-Lewis Acteurist Oeuvre-view, we go from the depths of obscurity, the straight-to-video Eversmile, New Jersey (1989, directed by Carlos Sorin), to the heights of box office success, with Day-Lewis’s first, and only, Hollywood action movie, The Last of the Mohicans (1992, directed by Michael Mann).We praise the hilarious slice of madness that is Eversmile, New Jersey, in which Day-Lewis plays a quixotic missionary for “dental consciousness” in Patagonia, arguing that it contains a great Day-Lewis performance, and discuss The Last of the Mohicans’ treatment of the French and Indian War. 

Time Codes:

0h 01m 00s:    EVERSMILE, NEW JERSEY (1989) [dir. Carlos Sorin]

0h 29m 30s:    THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS (1992) [dir. Michael Mann]

0h 58m 47s:    Listener Mail with Adam {on the mystery genre}

+++

* 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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Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – MGM – 1939: BABES IN ARMS and MIRACLES FOR SALE

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MGM, 1939: the beginning of an era, as the Freed Unit gets started with the first Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland musical, Babes in Arms (directed by Busby Berkeley), and the end of an era, with Tod Browning’s last film, the supernaturally tinged locked room mystery and bid for B-seriesdom, Miracles for Sale. Reflecting on the role of the blackface number in Babes in Arms prompts us to take a deep dive into the relationship of race to the concept of “American entertainment,” and then at the end of the episode we return to problematic racial representations in classical Hollywood cinema, in the very different context of feminist film theory and psychoanalysis, in response to a listener email about our series on the Sternberg-Dietrich films. 

 

Time Codes:

0h 01m 00s:                BABES IN ARMS [dir. Busby Berkeley]

0h 46m 09s:                MIRACLES FOR SALE [dir. Tod Browning]

1h 02m 30s:                Listener Mail with Dylan

             

           

Studio Film Capsules provided 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! 

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

 

Check out this episode!

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March Special Subject – Henry James Book Club – THE HEIRESS (1949) & THE INNOCENTS (1961) + reading Washington Square (1880) and The Turn of the Screw (1898)

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In this Book Club edition of the podcast, we finally have a chance to explore the work of Friend of the Pod Henry James. We look at James’s short novel Washington Square (1880) and long short story “The Turn of the Screw” (1898), and two of their adaptations, The Heiress (1949, directed by William Wyler) and The Innocents (1961, directed by Jack Clayton). We focus on the arcs of the heroines in the two works and the very different directions in which the adaptations take them, as well as the acting opportunities they present for Olivia de Havilland and Deborah Kerr. We also praise the performances of Ralph Richardson as Austin Sloper and Martin Stephens as Miles, two very tricky, eminently Jamesian roles. But is Henry James unadaptable? We give our verdict. 

Time Codes:

0h 01m 00s:    Henry James: Quantum Romancer

0h 09m 30s:    Washington Square & THE HEIRESS (1949) [dir. William Wyler]

0h 43m 38s:    The Turn of the Screw & THE INNOCENTS (1961) [dir. Jack Clayton]

+++

* 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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Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Paramount – 1939: CAFE SOCIETY & DISPUTED PASSAGE (Re-Upload)

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We start off 1939 with a bang with two Paramount movies that gave us a lot to discuss. First, Cafe Society (directed by Edward H. Griffith), the first of several pairings of Fred MacMurray with early Hitchcock blonde Madeleine Carroll, with an original screenplay by future Columbia Pictures producer Virginia Van Upp, takes the screwball (for the most part) out of class-conscious 30s romantic comedy, replacing it with a high degree of sexual tension and, especially, an unusual focus on the moral growth of the heroine. We discuss the textual evidence of female auteurship and note certain similarities with Dorothy Arzner’s The Wild Party (discussed in our Clara Bow series). Next, we explain why Frank Borzage’s Disputed Passage, based on the Lloyd C. Douglas novel, is really a superhero movie, in what sense it is and isn’t a soap opera, and how it’s not about the proper way to be a doctor but rather about the proper way to lead the religious life. And in our returning (again) Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto segment, we revisit the great I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang (1932) and its subtextual subject matter of the corruption and perversion of the South by slavery, as a particular instance of the human tendency to find opportunities to create systems of cruelty.   

Time Codes:

0h 01m 00s:     CAFE SOCIETY [dir. Edward H. Griffith]

0h 37m 19s:    DISPUTED PASSAGE [dir: Frank Borzage]

1h 13m 45s:    Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – I AM A FUGITIVE FROM A CHAIN GANG (revisited)

      

Studio Film Capsules provided The Paramount 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! 

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

 

Check out this episode!

Read Full Post »

Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Paramount – 1939: CAFÉ SOCIETY & DISPUTED PASSAGE

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We start off 1939 with a bang with two Paramount movies that gave us a lot to discuss. First, Café Society (directed by Edward H. Griffith), the first of several pairings of Fred MacMurray with early Hitchcock blonde Madeleine Carroll, with an original screenplay by future Columbia Pictures producer Virginia Van Upp, takes the screwball (for the most part) out of class-conscious 30s romantic comedy, replacing it with a high degree of sexual tension and, especially, an unusual focus on the moral growth of the heroine. We discuss the textual evidence of female auteurship and note certain similarities with Dorothy Arzner’s The Wild Party (discussed in our Clara Bow series). Next, we explain why Frank Borzage’s Disputed Passage, based on the Lloyd C. Douglas novel, is really a superhero movie, in what sense it is and isn’t a soap opera, and how it’s not about the proper way to be a doctor but rather about the proper way to lead the religious life. And in our returning (again) Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto segment, we revisit the great I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang (1932) and its subtextual subject matter of the corruption and perversion of the South by slavery, as a particular instance of the human tendency to find opportunities to create systems of cruelty. 

 

Time Codes:

0h 01m 00s:     CAFÉ SOCIETY [dir. Edward H. Griffith]

0h 37m 19s:    DISPUTED PASSAGE [dir: Frank Borzage]

1h 13m 45s:    Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – I AM A FUGITIVE FROM A CHAIN GANG (revisited)

      

Studio Film Capsules provided The Paramount 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! 

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

 

Check out this episode!

Read Full Post »