TCM
TiVo ALERT
For
August
8–August 14
DAVID’S
BEST BETS:
THE
TRIAL (August 8, 8:00 pm): This is a most unusual but
fascinating film. Orson Welles directed it, wrote the screenplay
(based on the Franz Kafka book of the same name) and has a key role
in the film. On the surface, it's about Josef K. (Anthony Perkins), a
government bureaucrat charged with a crime that's never mentioned -
even though he asks about it several times - and is sentenced to
death. Dig deeper and you can see other things such as hopelessness,
persecution, failure and the frailty of life. The themes of the film
are very abstract with Welles making great use of camera angles and
amazing set designs.
MONSIEUR
VERDOUX (August
14, 2:00 am): While I'm a huge fan of Charlie Chaplin's silent
films, his "talkies" are his best movies - The
Great Dictator, Limelight, A
King in New York and Monsieur
Verdoux. The latter is
the darkest of comedies. Henri Verdoux (Chaplin) marries
and then kills rich widows to support his crippled wife and young
son. Chaplin is so charming that you find yourself sympathizing with
Verdoux even though he's murdering innocent rich old ladies.
While Chaplin is excellent, Martha Raye is fantastic as one of
Verdoux's intended victims who manages to avoid several attempts on
her life. The exceptionally funny scenes with Chaplin and Raye alone
are worth watching.
ED’S
BEST BETS:
ELEVATOR
TO THE GALLOWS (August 8, 10:15 pm): Director Louis
Malle made many a fine film, but none better than this 1958 effort
about a woman and her ex-paratrooper lover who plot to kill her
husband in the “perfect crime.” It’s a dark, stylish noir
thriller that owes much to the influence of Hitchcock and Melville.
(In fact, Hitchcock himself greatly admired the film.) Of course,
things do go wrong, but they go so deliciously wrong as to keep us
totally enthralled. What really makes the film is the strong,
sensuous performance of star Jeanne Moreau. Malle later claimed to
have discovered her, but Moreau was already a star of the stage and a
veteran of B-movies before she met Malle. But this was the film that
made Moreau a star. Photographed by none other than Henri Decae, it
contains some breathtaking shots of Moreau and Paris at night. For
those who haven’t yet seen it, it’s a definite “Must See.”
And for those who have seen it, it still rates a revisit.
LAWYER
MAN (August 9, 8:45 am): William Powell’s early
films are his most interesting, and this one is no exception. Powell
is Tony, a smooth-talking lawyer who defeats a political boss in
court and later gets involved with a showgirl (Claire Dodd), who, in
cahoots with the politician, frames Tony for a crime he didn’t
commit. Thereafter, unable to find legitimate work, Tony becomes the
rich, successful shyster everyone assumes him to be. What brings him
down to earth - and honesty - is the love of his loyal secretary,
Olga, played by Joan Blondell. The debonair Powell and the earthy
Blondell seem mismatched, but make for a good team, and it’s a
shame this was their only pairing. Powell shows strong indications of
the megastar he was about to become when MGM got their hands on him
and gave him strong vehicles that took more than 10 days to film.
WE
DISAGREE ON . . . ARSENIC AND OLD LACE (August 13, 2:45 pm)
ED:
B. Rare is the
comedy that does not tarnish with age. Most are a product of their
times and are thus trapped in that matrix. This film is indeed that
rare comedy - as funny now as it was back then, thanks to an
excellent script, great performances led by the one and only Cary
Grant and Peter Lorre (who had a definite talent for comedy), and the
direction of Frank Capra, who filmed this right before he reported to
duty making propaganda films for the U.S. Army Signal Corps. Shot in
1941, it wasn’t released until 1944 due to an agreement with the
show’s producers not to release the film while the play was on
Broadway. If you want to see Cary Grant at his comedic best, this
film is an essential.
DAVID:
C-. Cary Grant's comedies are a mixed bag. He's
wonderful in His Girl Friday. The Awful
Truth and The Philadelphia Story. While he's not
terrible in Bringing Up Baby, Gunga Din (which
is a buddy-film comedy/drama) and Arsenic and Old Lace,
the movies are pretty bad. (All of these films are being shown on
August 13.) Arsenic and Old Lace the movie is
basically Arsenic and Old Lace the play. The running
jokes aren't funny, the story is too staged, and the performances and
characters are greatly exaggerated just as you would see in a play.
It's too theatrical, which grows old very fast. As the movie
progresses, the characters become too animated giving me the feeling
that the actors are trying to out-ham each other. It turns the movie
into a sloppy mess with director Frank Capra failing to reign in any
of the actors.
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