We figured it was time to have a place to talk about Steve’s latest video subjects that do not have an UMR page.
(Visited 1,785 times)
We figured it was time to have a place to talk about Steve’s latest video subjects that do not have an UMR page.
I have seen 14 top 1945 film noir movies. Favourites are Mildred Pierce, Scarlet Street, Spellbound, Detour, Hangover Square, Fallen Angel, Conflict, My Name is Julia Ross, Lady on a Train, The House on 92nd Street, Cornered, and Escape in the Fog. I have also seen Johnny Angel and Two O’Clock Courage.
Favourite posters and stills are From Mildred pierce, Scarlet Street, Spellbound, Detour, Fallen Angel, My Name is Julia Ross, Lady on a Train, Cornered, The Unseen, and Escape in the Fog.
Hi Flora, sorry for the late reply. Your tally 14 out of 20, is excellent as usual, you really do like your film noir. I managed a paltry 3 out of 20. Conflict, Scarlet Street and my favorite – Spellbound. I may have seen Fallen Angel can’t remember for sure. There are a few here I want to see when they pop up again on TV.
Thanks for commenting, much appreciated. Happy you liked the picture gallery. Next video hopefully on wednesday.
HI STEVE: Fine feedback from you; much appreciated by me. Good trivia about Dana Andrews and witty quip from Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler.
Laura is the face in the misty light
Footsteps that you hear down the hall
The laugh that floats on a summer night
That you can never quite recall
And you see Laura on the train that is passing through
Those eyes, how familiar they seem
She gave your very first kiss to you
That was Laura but she’s only a dream
Actually I never liked Christmas Holiday. My responses to your question about DD movies are:
1/I would be happy with ANY high rating given to It Ended with Myrna so no quarrel with your making it your No1
2/The two Durbin movies that I cherish most for a historical reason and a sentimental reason are respectively-
1945’s Lady on a Train as she met her future husband Frenchman Charles Henri David on that movie which he directed. After her retirement at the young age of around 27 they married in 1950 and lived as man and wife on his farm in France until his death almost half a century later in 1999. In the early days post-retirement she would sporadically re-visit the States to meet up with the likes of her old chum Judy Garland and on one occasion she dined with Brando at a private gathering. 71% rating and $89 million adjusted domestic box office gross in The Work Horse’s charts.
1943’s His Butler’s Sister co-starring Franchot Tone. It is the 1st DD movie that I can ever remember seeing on a rerun around 1951 at the old Picturedrome cinema in Belfast just down from John Long’s Corner which we young whippersnappers cheekily nicknamed Long Ladd’s Corner!!! So you will appreciate that film has powerful nostalgic memories for me. 66% rating and $149 million adjusted domestic box office gross allocated by The Work Horse.
Thanks Bob, as you might have guessed I’m not an expert on warbling teen sensation Deanna Durbin but I am intrigued by Lady on a Train, it probably inspired a recent hit movie – ‘Girl on the Train’ starring Emily Blunt.
Lady on a Train will pop up on the next noir video.
Glad you’re happy with It Started With Eve as the no.1 on Durbin’s video.
HI STEVE:
I have actually seen Emily Blunt’s 2016 The Girl on the Train but can’t rememeber much about it except that the strong lauguage used in it would not have been used in her day by my darling Deanna who famously proclaimed “The girls that I play are ones that every clean-cut guy would love to take home to meet his mother.”
If she had made that comment today she might well have added “and they are girls who would have refused to go out with a Bruce Willis character in a movie!” For good measure Deanna did add in her quote though “The Hollywood pin-up girls are for dissatisfied male erotics who feel neglected in certain ways by their own wives or grilfriends.” I wonder what DD would have thought of some of your ‘adulty’ posters and stills!?
Lisa Kudrow who plays Phoebe Buffay in Friends had a small role in Emily’s film and used labguage that would have embarassed even her free-talking mates in Friends! [with maybe the exception of Matthew Perry’s Chandler Bing as Matt got to make a couple of movies with Willis!]
The Bob, great comment, thanks. i have had a rough ten months. my dad diagnosed and treated for cancer, my mother broke her back, my dad fell and was forced into assisted living. my dad died 3 months ago. my mother developed pneumonia and died last week. i still have greatly admired your comments though deeper in your shadow than usual. you are in my thoughts and prayers. bob
Sorry to hear of your parents’ deaths, Bob. My father died in 2013 and it still affects me.
thank you
I am so sorry to hear about your parents and the last 10 months. Keep up the faith my friend. Thoughts and prayers.
thank you my friend.
My condolences,2 at once, terrible. My cousin died in July and her ex-husband in March, both of cancer.
thank you
I have seen 15 Top Film Noirs of 1943-1944. All of them are favourites: Double Indemnity, Laura, Shadow of a Doubt, Murder My Sweet (renamed as Farewell My Lovely starring Dick Powell sounds like a musical), Gaslight, The Woman in the Window, The Mask of Dimitrios, Ministry of Fear, Journey Into Fear, The Lodger, Phantom Lady, The 7th Victim, Christmas Holiday, The Fallen Sparrow and Experiment Perilous.
Favourite posters and stills are from Double Indemnity, Laura, Shadow of a Doubt, Murder My Sweet, Gaslight, The Woman in the Window, The Mask of Dimitrios, Phantom Lady, Christmas Holiday and The Fallen Sparrow.
Hi Flora, at least here at the UMR you know your comment might actually get thru, though Bob has had the occasional ‘delayed’ posting.
Murder My Sweet is known as Farewell My Lovely here in old blighty, and as you know it’s the original title of Raymond Chandler’s novel. I mean honestly why would anybody want to murder a sweet? 😉
Your tally 15 out of 20 is impressive. I’ve seen 8 of the 20, my favorites are The Lodger, Gaslight, Murder My Sweet, Shadow of a Doubt, Laura and Double Indemnity.
Thanks again for commenting, always appreciated. Happy you liked the posters and stills. Next video on friday.
STILLS/LOBBY CARDS-Again despite the relative brevity of the 1943/44 noir video there are so many excellent ones to choose the VERY best from – but here is my own shot at the task:
1/3 for Dark Waters
2/When Strangers Marry -lesser-known Mitchum vehicle
3/2 for Fallen Sparrow
4/7th Victim
5/Lobby card for Phantom Thin Lady
6/ALL for The Lodger
7/ALL for Mask of Demetrious – wow!
8/2 for Woman in the Window
9/2nd one for Murder My Sweet
10/ALL for Shadow of a Doubt
11/ALL for Gaslight
12/Experiment Perilous-the beautiful Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler in her heyday
13/ALL for Laura. “I shall never forget the weekend Laura died- another of those detectives came to see me. I had him wait!” -a delicious Clifton Webb’s snobbish and waspish Waldo Lydecker. There were strong shades in that performance of Clifton’s snooty and aristocratic Elliot Templeton in Ty Power’s 1946 The Razor’s Edge.
14/ALL for Double Identity. Notice the clever billing of the 3 main stars all in their heyday. Babs and Eddie were bigger than Fred but HE was the voice-over visual protagonist through whose eyes the story was told so he was listed first; Stanwyck was listed 2nd; and Robinson 3rd but his name was in larger letters than the other 2. In all 3 other Stanwyck/ McMurray films SHE was billed before him
.
15/ALL for Christmas Holiday. In Somerset Maugham’s story Durbin’s character was a prostitute in a brothel; but Deanna balked at openly playing a hooker on screen so they termed her film character a “NIGHTCLUB hostess”. Critics claimed that the name-switch weakened the plot as it was therefore difficult to imagine her husband played by Eugene Kelly becoming as murderously enraged as he did by her “dishonoring his family name”. The ‘Joels’ can gripe as they wish though but I personally am glad that my innocent Deanna was never made to overtly play a “Lady of the Night” though that function can still be read through the lines!!! Maugham’s 1939 book Christmas Holiday is said to have been his “most political” work though I can’t recall the political aspect being recalled much if at all in the movie
AT 14 of PART 2 of TODAY’s POST I listed Double Identity instead of Double Indemnity – apologies,
Steve’s 1943/44 noirs video is full of wonderful vintage material which for my pleasure is easily worth 99% rating. Here is my own pick of the VERY best POSTERS. FL of course= foreign language versions of the posters. There are plenty of those in the video which added to my pleasure!
1/FL Dark Waters
2/FL Experiment Perilous
3/FL Fallen Sparrow
4/7th Victim – celebrated cult B movie
5/1st one for The Lodger
6/1st and FL ones for Journey into Fear
7/1st one for Suspect – wow!
8/FL for Murder my Sweet
9/FL ones for Woman in the Window
10/1st one for The Whistler
11/ALL Double Indemnity
12/ALL for Laura – was there ever a more photogenic actor in old black- and-white film noirs than Dana Andrews [often in slouched hat and trench coat]?
13/ALL for Phantom Lady-was she that obscure female in The Thin Man series with Bill Powell?
14/1st one for Ministry of Fear -leave de Pfeffel out of it STEVE – this is not a political commentary site!
15/ALL for Mask of Demetrious: the “old firm” of Greenstreet and Lorre in star-billed lead roles for once. They were also the two top-billed stars of 1946’s ‘lesser’ noir The Verdict.
16/ALL for Gaslight. Initially Ingrid Bergman’s agent who had great influence over her was not going to let her do this film as Boyer’s contract guaranteed him the top-billing spot. However she was so keen on the role that she pleaded with the agent until he relented. “As long as the names of Charles and me were of equal size I didn’t care,” Ingrid said. Tracy take note!
17/FL for Shadow of a Doubt –widow-murdering Uncle Charlie: Hitch’s male counterpart to his own Mother Bates!
Hi Bob, thanks for the review, generous rating (ooh), info and trivia, much appreciated. Glad you liked the posters, stills and lobby cards.
Bob, which of Deanna Durbin’s films do you consider the best, or she would have considered her best? On my Durbin top 20 video I have ‘It Started With Eve’ at no.1. Were you happy with that at no.1?
Four films scored 10 out of 10 from my sources – Murder My Sweet, Shadow of a Doubt, Laura and Double Indemnity.
My Video Top 5 –
Double Indemnity 9.15
Laura 8.8
Shadow of a Doubt 8.8
Murder My Sweet 8.3
Gaslight 8.0
The UMR critics top 5 –
Double Indemnity 9.4
Shadow of a Doubt 9.0
Laura 8.6
The Woman in the Window 8.5
Gaslight 8.3
IMDB Laura trivia – “Clifton Webb had to deal with the shock of seeing himself on-screen after a long absence from Hollywood. Watching the first batch of rushes that included his first scene in the tub when he meets McPherson, Webb nearly had a heart attack: “When I saw myself sitting in the bathtub looking very much like Mohandas K. Gandhi. I felt I might vomit. After it was over, Dana (Andrews) saved my life with a big swig of bourbon. The first shock of seeing myself had a strange effect on me, psychologically, as it made me realize for the first time that I was no longer a dashing young juvenile, which I must have fancied myself being through the years in the theatre. This movie is famous for the haunting “Laura Theme”. When asked why she had turned down the part of Laura, Hedy Lamarr said, “They sent me the script, not the score.” Vincent Price always considered this to be the best movie he ever made. Laura is ranked number four on the American Film Institute’s list of the ten greatest movies in the ‘Mystery’ genre.