TCM
TiVo ALERT
For
August
23–August 31
DAVID’S
BEST BETS:
THE
ROARING TWENTIES (August 24, 6:00 pm): This 1939 film
features my favorite pairing of Humphrey Bogart and James Cagney.
Yeah, they only did three films together (and this is the last one),
but it's a classic gangster movie from Warner Brothers, the studio
that perfected the genre. Bogie and Cagney are two buddies during
World War I, who, along with Jeffrey Lynn, become fast friends in a
foxhole during the waning days of the war. The film follows them from
those last days of the war to the final days of Prohibition. Lynn's
secondary (and that's being kind) character becomes a lawyer while
Bogart becomes a bootlegger and lets Cagney in on the action. While
Bogart was never a big fan of his earlier films in which he plays the
stereotypical conniving gangster, he is outstanding in this film as
is Cagney. It's a lot of fun with shootouts, double crosses, dramatic
deaths and everything I (and others) love about these gritty Warners
films.
TWO
WOMEN (August 26, 8:00 pm): This
is Sophia Loren's best film and put her on the map as far as being an
outstanding actress and not just an incredibly beautiful woman. She
plays Cesira, a Roman woman who has to flee her hometown with her
13-year-old daughter Rosetta (Eleonora Brown) during World War II
with the Allies bombing the city. She goes to incredible lengths to
protect her child only for the two to be raped in an abandoned church
by Moroccan Allied soldiers. It's a hard-hitting film with a powerful
message and brilliant acting - Loren won the Oscar for Best Actress,
the first to earn that honor in a non-English speaking role.
ED’S
BEST BETS:
THE
THIRD MAN (August 29, 12:15 am): For a cinephile this
is a no-brainer if there ever was one. Screenplay by Graham Greene;
direction by Carol Reed; and starring Orson Welles and Joseph Cotten
in perhaps their greatest teaming (yes, even better than Citizen
Kane). This has been cited as the greatest British films of all
time and it’s difficult, if not downright impossible, to argue with
that assessment. Greene and Reed – along with the wonderful work of
cinematographer Robert Krasker – capture perfectly the decay of
postwar Vienna, once the jewel of European capitals. Cotten, as the
nominal hero, is ineffective almost to the point where we in the
audience become cynical and begin rooting for Harry Lime (Welles
playing a great, complex villain) to get away with his crimes. Those
familiar with the fiction of Graham Greene know that the dividing
line between good and evil is always thin and blurred. The
Third Man is a prime example of that philosophy.
THIS
GUN FOR HIRE (August 31, 10:15 pm): Every star has
that moment when he or she broke through the barrier from supporting
player to lead actor. For Alan Ladd, this was the film that
established him as a force to be reckoned with in the movies.
Directed by Frank Tuttle, it was adapted by W.R. Burnett and Albert
Maltz from Graham Greene’s novel, A Gun For Sale. The
screenwriters took the liberty of shifting the action from England to
America and gave the film a political slant (it was made in 1942 at
the height of World War II). Ladd is brilliantly menacing as Raven, a
hired gun out for revenge on his treacherous employer. Co-star
Veronica Lake also registers an impressive performance, as does Laird
Cregar, at his villainous best as Raven’s double-crossing employer.
Interestingly, Greene’s sequel to this book was also turned into
one of the classics of film, by the Boulting Brothers, and their film
made a star out of its lead, Richard Attenborough. The film? Brighton
Rock.
WE
DISAGREE ON ... YESTERDAY, TODAY AND TOMORROW (August
26, 2:00 am)
ED:
B-. If you enjoy
Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni, or more to the point, enjoy
looking at Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni, this is your cup of
tea. For me, as a fan of director Vittorio De Sica, this is somewhat
of a misfire. They star in three vignettes, the first of which, about
a woman who keeps getting pregnant to avoid prison for petty theft is
long and excruciating. The second, about a spoiled selfish woman, is
shorter, but has no punch line, as it were. (This is a comedy, after
all.) The third is the most interesting, with Sophia as a high-class
prostitute who befriends a young man studying for the priesthood,
saves me from giving the film an even lower grade. Marcello is a
steady customer with something more on his mind, but he can’t get
to first base. Sophia does her now renowned strip tease for Marcello
in this vignette, an act she would repeat in 1994’s Pret
a Porter (another
disappointing film). The biggest crime the film commits is in having
two of the most beautiful people in film history and no sparks
between them. Zero chemistry. That’s what ultimately does the film
in, although with the grade I’ve given it, I still recommend it
strongly.
DAVID:
A. Legendary
Italian Neorealist Director Vittorio De Sica built his well-deserved
reputation on films such as The Bicycle Thief, Umberto
D., and Two
Women. That's
what makes Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow even
more impressive as De Sica does a superb job with a completely
different film genre: a sex comedy. And this is a very funny sex
comedy. If you're going to make a sex comedy in 1963, you couldn't do
any better than to cast Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni. But De
Sica doesn't forget his roots and what made him a great director.
Each of the three vignettes in the film focuses on social classes and
the struggles of those in those groups to survive. For example, each
of Loren's characters use sex in different ways to exist. Above, Ed
describes the basics of the three segments. Of course, we differ on
the quality though we agree that the final one with Loren as a
prostitute and Mastroianni as a regular customer is the best. The
chemistry between the two actors and the ability of the director to
capture and showcase that chemistry in a way that is fun and
entertaining to watch is a testament to the talents and skills of the
trio. The first and third segments could have been made into quality
full-length motion pictures. Instead, we are treated to three shorter
films, which are all excellent and very sexy, particularly the final
one with Loren's iconic strip tease.
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