Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Universal – 1943: THE STRANGE DEATH OF ADOLPH HITLER & SON OF DRACULA

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Universal 1943 is a strange one, starting with The Strange Death of Adolph Hitler, starring Ludwig Donath as a reluctant Nazi collaborator who’s forced to impersonate Hitler, and continuing with Robert Siodmak’s Son of Dracula, with Lon Chaney Jr. as a hapless Dracula who falls victim to femme fatale Louise Allbritton. We discuss WWII AU scenarios, the Twilight Zone scenario of being a soul trapped in Hitler’s body, and the comedy team of Frank Craven and J. Edward Bromberg as a down-to-earth doctor and sub-Van Helsing forced to confront supernatural shenanigans and, worse, a wayward woman with a plan. 

Time Codes:

0h 00m 45s:      THE STRANGE DEATH OF ADOLPH HITLER [dir. James P. Hogan]

0h 29m 59s:      SON OF DRACULA [dir. Robert Siodmak]

 

Studio Film Capsules provided by The Universal Story by Clive Hirschhorn

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

                                   

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* 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

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Special Subject: Film Noirlsons by Phil Karlson – KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL (1952), 99 RIVER STREET (1953), FIVE AGAINST THE HOUSE (1955) and THE PHENIX CITY STORY (1955)

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July’s special subject is a sampler of noirs by 1950s noir auteur Phil Karlson: Kansas City Confidential (1952), 99 River Street (1953), 5 Against the House (1955), and The Phenix City Story (1955). We discuss one-time Fox musicals leading man John Payne’s transformation into the ideal shlubby, haunted noir protagonist, Karlson’s take on the hysterical male trope, his use of violence, his delineation of the ideal woman, the progressive and reactionary tendencies in his movies, and the lies and authenticity of his arguable masterpiece, The Phenix City Story. And much more, of course!

Read Gareth Hedges’ thesis!

Cinematic Memory and the Southern Imaginary: Crisis in the Deep South and The Phenix City Story

Time Codes:

0h 00m 45s:    Brief introduction to Phil Karlson

0h 05m 45s:    KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL (1952) [dir. Phil Karlson]

0h 27m 44s:    99 RIVER STREET (1953) [dir. Phil Karlson]

0h 56m 42s:    FIVE AGAINST THE HOUSE (1955) [dir. Phil Karlson]

1h 19m 14s:    THE PHENIX CITY STORY (1955) [dir. Phil Karlson]

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* Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring

* 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 piece on Gangs of New York – “Making America Strange Again”

* Check out Dave’s 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

We now have a Discord server – just drop us a line if you’d like to join! 

Check out this episode!

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Acteurist Oeuvre-view – Dorothy McGuire – Part 10: THIS EARTH IS MINE (1959) and A SUMMER PLACE (1959)

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This week’s Dorothy McGuire episode continues the trend of unusual wife and mother roles with two family melodramas from 1959, Henry King’s tale of an economically and psychologically troubled viticulture dynasty, This Earth Is Mine, and Delmer Daves’ frank, sex-positive look at sexual mores among the respectable middle classes during the late 1950s, A Summer Place, which had contemporary reviewers reaching for the smelling salts. Whether playing a sympathetic adulteress who has to deal with her teenage son’s inconvenient libido in addition to her own or a love-thwarted wife who wants to appropriate the family patriarch role, McGuire is a far cry from the typical housewife of 50s TV. 

Time Codes:

0h 00m 45s:         THIS EARTH IS MINE (1959) [dir. Henry King]

0h 34m 03s:         A SUMMER PLACE (1959) [dir. Delmer Daves]

+++

* Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring

* 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 piece on Gangs of New York – “Making America Strange Again”

* Check out Dave’s 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

We now have a Discord server – just drop us a line if you’d like to join! 

Check out this episode!

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Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – RKO – 1943: THE FALLEN SPARROW & THE SEVENTH VICTIM + FEAR & MOVIEGOING IN TORONTO

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For our RKO 1943 episode, we look at two films that exemplify the nascent RKO noir style: Richard Wallace’s The Fallen Sparrow, starring John Garfield as a traumatized Spanish Civil War veteran hunted by Nazis and the Val Lewton production The Seventh Victim, starring Kim Hunter as a sheltered young woman who wants to find out about the sorrows of the world and does not want to be told to drink her milk. Featuring cinematography by Nicholas Musuraca and scores by Roy Webb, these films embrace opacity and ooze paranoia while presenting portraits of sophisticated New York milieus harbouring evil in their midst. And, keeping to the noir theme, in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto we discuss a 30th anniversary screening of Brian De Palma’s Carlito’s Way, starring Al Pacino as a gangster who carries his doom around inside him. 

Time Codes:

0h 00m 45s:      THE FALLEN SPARROW [(dir. Richard Wallace]

0h 29m 14s:      THE SEVENTH VICTIM [dir. Mark Robson]

1h 09m 06s:      FEAR & MOVIEGOING IN TORONTO – Brian De Palma’s Carlito’s Way (1993) at The Revue Cinema

 

Studio Film Capsules provided by The RKO Story by Richard B. Jewell & Vernon Harbin

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

 

We now have a Discord server – just drop us a line if you’d like to join! 

Check out this episode!

Read Full Post »