Alanrode's Xanga

Insurance Noir

Mon, 09 Jun 2008 09:52:25 GMT

I came across this interesting piece in of all places, an actuarial journal, Contingencies. After obtaining the permission of the author, Dan Skwire, I have posted the on line PDF link. Enjoy!

http://www.contingencies.org/mayjun08/film.pdf

Mildred Pierce at the Million Dollar Theatre

Sun, 08 Jun 2008 21:12:18 GMT

After hosting the eighth annual Palm Springs Film Noir Festival, from May 29-June1, I made it back home in time for screenings of Mildred Pierce at the Million Dollar Theatre and The Damned Don't Cry- the latest entry of my continuing Femme Fatale Hall of Fame series at the Silent Movie Theatre. I'll be posting a detailed low down about the wildly successful Palm Springs noir fete- complete with photos- this coming week. For the present, I wanted to share some details about the Mildred Pierce event.

It was a distinct privilege to host a sold-out screening of Mildred Pierce (1945) at the restored Million Dollar Theatre at 307 South Broadway in downtown Los Angeles on Wednesday June 4th. The screening was part of the Los Angeles Conservancy's Last Remaining Seats series that is now in its 22nd year. For more about the LRS, the Million Dollar Theatre and the L.A. Conservancy, please check out this link:

http://www.laconservancy.org/remaining/index.php4

Here is the text of my introductory remarks. With a sold out house in a classic venue, I felt obliged to discuss some of the behind-the-scene details and key players involved in Mildred Pierce

Good evening, and what an evening! My thanks to Trudi and to the Conservancy for their gracious invitation to host for this truly special event; the reopening of the Million Dollar Theatre, Sid Grauman’s first show palace, as part of the Last Remaining Seats series.

Mildred Pierce is a timeless film; a movie that is thematically emblematic on multiple levels. A compelling saga about an American family wracked by dysfunction and tragedy that typically weren’t addressed in 1940’s Hollywood due to censorship problems, the story of an indomitably strong, ambitious woman- here was the template for what would be known as “the woman’s picture”- saddled with a fearful progeny of a daughter who had all of the qualities of a dog, save loyalty, and a seminal film noir wrapped into a flashback of deceit, betrayal and murder.

Mildred Pierce is also an honored film: Nominated for Best Picture in 1945 by the Motion Picture Academy with Joan Crawford winning the Best Actress Oscar, Ann Blyth and Eve Arden, both nominated for Best Supporting Actress with Ernest Haller and Randall MacDougall earning best cinematography and best screenplay nods as well.

In 2008, Mildred Pierce represents a visual time capsule of a Los Angeles that, in many ways, would exist only in memory or on film, but for the good work of the Conservancy. The Pierce home is still on Jackson Street on Glendale; however Jack Carson’s real estate office on the corner of Bel Air and Allen Ave also in Glendale is gone along Mildred’s restaurant that was shot at Kay’s Drive-In on the corner of Magnolia and Laurel Canyon in the Valley. The Monty Beragon mansion in the movie was on Arden Road in Pasadena, and that wonderful beach house that opens the film was the Rindge house in Malibu on what was then 26600 Roosevelt Highway, a mere 3.5 miles up the road from the Malibu colony.

Mildred Pierce was made at the apex of the studio system period as exemplified at Warner Brothers. And no director was more firmly identified with Warners than the estimable Michael Curtiz who helmed tonight’s film. Curtiz was one of the finest directors of any era; counting his European work; he helmed an incredible 172 feature films. Curtiz made his Warner’s debut in 1926 and worked at the studio until 1954. His films include some of the legendary titles of all time: Captain Blood, Charge of the Light Brigade, The Adventures of Robin Hood, Angels with Dirty Faces, The Sea Hawk, Casablanca, Yankee Doodle Dandy, Life with Father and one of my all time favorites that needs to come out on DVD… are you listening, Warners? The Breaking Point.

As a director, Curtiz was singleminded, often ruthlessly so. Supremo producer Hal Wallis, no slouch when it came to workaholism, tabbed Curtiz as “tireless”. (At this point, I ad-libbed a Curtiz story that was reportedly related years ago by James Cagney to Peter Bogadanovich that involved a bit actor who was playing a minister during the filming of The Sea Hawk (1940) that was directed by Curtiz. The actors were topside on a crowded ship set in a huge Warners soundstage with a 20 foot drop to the floor below. The poor guy who was the minister , trying to avoid a gesticulating Curtiz striding around the set and blocking out the scene, stepped backwards off of the ship and fell to the floor of the soundstage. Curtiz glanced down at the man laying unconscious and then whirls to his AD, roaring: “Get me another Minister!”)

But Warner Brothers was not a Garden of Eden for a directorial auteur. Curtiz directed the film, but the moving force behind Mildred Pierce was producer Jerry Wald. Hal Wallis had moved on after his famous falling out with Jack L. Warner over acceptance of the Best Picture Oscar for Casablanca. With credits like ACROSS THE PACIFIC, THE HARD WAY, DESTINATION TOKYO, Wald was in ascendance at WB, but Jack L. Warner desperately wanted a legitimate hit picture that was not a war film.

Wald thought he had it when he bought the rights to James M. Cain’s novel Mildred Pierce pub in 1941 for $15K on 3/15/44, and then the parade of writers started.

The producer tried to have Cain write a treatment- he couldn’t do it, Cain was a novelist, not a screenwriter. Jerry Wald’s method for story development included employment of a number of writers working on the same script without having exposure with the work of others on the script with the producer attempting to synthesize the different contributions into a coherent script. Wald also conceived the notion of telling the story in flashback after screening Fritz Lang’s The Woman in the Window with Curtiz.

Writers who contributed to Mildred Pierce included: Thames Williamson, Catherine
Turney, Albert Maltz- a thought provoking critique, Margaret Gruen, Randall MacDougall with Margaret Buell Wilder, Louise Randall Pierson, and none other than William Faulkner.

Despite the myriad contributions, the final screenplay was MacDougall’s and his name is the only one listed on the film’s titles. Justice for screenwriters in Hollywood remains a pending issue.

From the beginning, there was only one female lead seriously considered: Joan Crawford. Her two decade career at MGM had ended in 1943 and she was being extremely choosy about the script for her WB debut vehicle- a one picture deal. Crawford managed her career and stardom better than anyone. She knew this selection could either renew or finish her off. For Joan, this was the part. Yet despite the faded stardom; Joan was a personage that was treated in every way as a star. All of the correspondence that I reviewed-with the notable exception of Jack L. Warner- always referred to her as “Miss. Crawford”. Her contract with Warner’s gave her authority about the position of other actors on the titles. One production memo was appended thusly: “Miss Crawford has approved Carson/Scott co-star credit with Miss Crawford’s name on the screen”

In Mildred Pierce, Joan becomes larger than life with a truly seminal performance. Let’s face it; Joan Crawford remains larger than life and is meant to be seen in this theatre on the big screen.

The supporting cast was a different matter. Wald seriously tried to get Ralph Bellamy cast as Mildred’s husband, but bowed to fiscal realities and tapped Bruce Bennett, a relatively new contract player. In one of those strokes of good luck essential to a successful Hollywood career, Bennett went from appearing in a PRC Western directed by Lew Landers to playing opposite Joan Crawford in Mildred Pierce.

Ray Collins-remember Lieutenant Tragg from Perry Mason?-was busy, so dulcet-toned Moroni Olsen was hired as the avuncular homicide inspector. In a brilliant stroke of excellence, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, Eve Arden ably filled out the rest of the principal cast, but who was to play Veda, the daughter from Hell? Lest you think I am being too tough, Thames Williamson in his script treatment defined Veda: “A snobbish, go-getting, heartless little bitch.”

A plethora of ingénues including Martha Vickers, Mala Powers, Bonita Granville, Patricia Kirkland, Dierdre Gale, Mary Vallee, Virginia Vallee, Lynne Baggett were scrutinized until a young-17 years old- contract actress/singer at Universal named Ann Blyth was tested. Wald and Curtiz instantly knew they had their Veda. Miss Blyth’s performance remains an absolute stunner and although we are disappointed she could not join here tonight, she is ably represented by her daughter, Eileen McNulty and family who are here with us. Eileen, please take a bow.

That Mildred Pierce was made at all is a tribute to the tenacity of Jerry Wald who refused to acquiesce when Joseph Breen wrote him in early 1944, just to forget about making Mildred Pierce. The property was too controversial, with way too much forbidden subject matter. A script was finally approved months later, but that was after such shocking words as “God Awful”, WOP, “To Hell and Gone” and “Tart” were excised. One great line by Eve Arden to Jack Carson was also cut: “I hate to wrestle in the morning!”

The exquisite direction by Curtiz was accentuated by the memorable score composed by one of the greatest film composers of all time: Max Steiner.

For Jack L. Warner, aside from sending Wald a memo complaining that he couldn’t understand what the hell Butterfly McQueen was talking about it in the dailies, it was always a matter of money. He sweated bullets over the $1,342,000 budget at one point writing a memo to a legal functionary:

“I am not paying Crawford anything beyond her $100,000 guarantee because she was unable to work for a number of days”

For the record, Joan missed 1 and ½ days during the nearly three month production. Jack L. frequently viewed matters via a Byzantine perspective. Later on, when a writer complained to him about being blacklisted, Warner memorably responded: “There is no such thing as a Blacklist...and you’re not on it!” Joan Crawford would end up making much more money from Warners as Mildred Pierce was a smash hit at the box office as well as a huge critical success.

As Jerry Wald would write Sonny Werblin at MCA in response to a congratulatory letter:

“My biggest problem is what do I do for an encore”.

Simply put, there is no encore for this film; it is a screen classic and I am delighted that we are here tonight in this beautifully restored, historical venue to watch it.. Please join me in savoring the one and only Mildred Pierce!

Facts about the Universal Studios Fire

Fri, 06 Jun 2008 10:17:49 GMT

In the wake of the fire that swept through Universal Studios last Sunday, there are a lot of rumors, emails and the like concerning the damage to vintage film prints. Instead of playing Chicken Little, here is some information from my partner-in-noir, Eddie Muller that I would like to put up for some balance and clarification. Thanks, Alan

To my colleagues,

I'm sending this note to short-stop rumors that have been swirling around in the wake of Sunday's devastating fire at Universal Studios. Conflicting reports have emerged regarding the extent of the damage, especially as it concerns the safety of studio's archival films. Film Noir Foundation director Anita Monga has spoken with our contacts at Universal as of this morning, and it has been confirmed that, while many prints of Universal films were destroyed in the fire, no archival source material was lost.

Our good friend Paul Ginsburg, Universal's VP of distribution, sent an email yesterday to theater bookers who had dates pending explaining that those dates would have to be canceled due to the loss of prints on-site at the Universal lot. Many of Universal's prints are, however, stored at Deluxe, and those films, and their pending playdates, are not affected. Many other Universal prints, and all film negatives, were unaffected. We can all be very thankful that Universal is wise enough to keep materials in various locations.

In the coming weeks we'll be better able to assess the immediate availability of specific titles (we have six Universal films scheduled for Noir City 7 in January, 2009), but for now it is reassuring to know that the damage from this incident is not as catastrophic as it might have been.

The Film Noir Foundation has pledged whatever support and assistance it can provide to our cherished colleagues at Universal. This was a close call: sets can be rebuilt, but once the original source material for a film is gone -- that movie is at risk of extinction.

Please let this information be known to others who may have a concern about the fate of Universal's film archive.

Regards,

Eddie

BTW: Here is some additional perspective on the Universal Fire from a New York Times article...

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/07/opinion/07kuntz.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

Alan

A Bum Rap

Mon, 26 May 2008 20:32:45 GMT

Conventional critical wisdom long ago pegged Victor Mature as 100% Hollywood beefcake; a rare Tyrolean-Swiss steak from Knoxville, Kentucky who was a graduate of the Cigar Store Indian Drama School. Replete with a toothy, Tyrannosaurus-like smile and sporting a wavy pompadour with a Crisco sheen, Mature was dismissed by those who recall him as De Mille’s bare-chested exponent of Philistine urban renewal in Samson and Delilah (1949) or being able to, as he put it, “…make with the holy look” in films like The Robe (1953) and Demetrius and the Gladiators (1954). However, before Mature got biblically pigeonholed by Hollywood, his work on screen, particularly in darkened 20^th Century Fox productions, proved to be diverse and distinguished.

After making his acting bones at the Pasadena Playhouse, Mature was inked by Hal Roach to alternately battle iguanas and emote at Carole Landis in One Million B.C. (1940).

After some non-descript film roles, the neophyte actor ended up scoring on Broadway opposite Gertrude Lawrence in the musical, Lady in the Dark. Fox signed him and Mature quickly showed a deft touch as a beleaguered red herring in Steve Fisher’s I Wake up Screaming (1941). For the first of what prove to be numerous occasions, Mature’s solid work would be overshadowed by either a co-star or a supporting actor. On this occasion, he was eclipsed by the obsessive psychosis of newcomer Laird Cregar who walked away with the picture.

Next was The Shanghai Gesture, a beautifully bizarre film that was shot before Pearl Harbor, but released to a box office fizzle a month after war was declared. A mélange of opium dens, prostitution and torture was nicely dished up by an ensemble of American and European actors playing Asians in accordance with contemporary Production Code dictates. Mature donned a fez and clipped off some pithy lines as “Doctor Omar”, but he was lost in the shuffle amongst Walter Huston, an exotic Gene Tierney and Ona Munson playing “Mother Gin Sling”. The Shanghai Gesture is a fascinating movie that is worthy of contemporary discovery.

After service in World War II, Mature returned to Fox and made a lasting impression as the tubercular Doc Holliday in John Ford’s classic My Darling Clementine (1946). Mature’s performance as the champagne swilling, fatalistic Holliday whose downward spiral reveals a lost love (Cathy Downs) amid a doomed one (Linda Darnell) was praised by none other than Darryl F. Zanuck and John Ford. Again, Mature was vying for screen time with Henry Fonda- one of his seminal portrayals as Wyatt Earp- along with Ward Bond, Walter Brennan among other worthies and the critics barely lifted an eyebrow his way.

Moss Rose (1947) is a forgotten period mystery helmed by the eclectic Gregory Ratoff. Adapted from Joseph Shearson’s book about a Cockney chorus girl with a yen for high society finery that leads to murder, Mature skillfully underplays alongside newcomer Peggy Cummins (who got the positive notices), Ethel Barrymore Vincent Price and bulbous eyed George Zucco. About the best Mature could achieve was a grudging

“…competent” from N.Y. Times grouch Bosley Crowther.

Victor Mature accomplished the majority of the dramatic heavy lifting in the classic noir Kiss of Death (1947) even if every movie goer in the whole wide sweet world was awestruck by Richard Widmark’s frenetic, ground-breaking turn as cold-blooded killer Tommy Udo.

Mature’s multi-dimensional characterization of star-crossed gangster Nick Bianco who reluctantly turns stoolie amid his wife’s suicide and a double cross in order to take care of his children and craft a new life with ingénue Coleen Gray was a revelatory portrayal. There is an authentic moral ambiguity and depth of character to Mature as the principal protagonist in Kiss of Death that made some of his severest critics finally take notice of his acting ability. His performance was the suspenseful glue that holds the entire picture together.

(Note: Patricia Morison’s role in Kiss of Death as Bianco’s wife who descended into alcoholic prostitution and eventual suicide by sticking her head into an oven was entirely excised from the picture by Zanuck who feared censor Joe Breen’s wrath. Miss Morison recently claimed that her part was cut out was because she wouldn’t succumb to DFZ’s sexual blandishments; her name still appeared on the film’s promotional material and posters)

Mature was reunited with Coleen Gray in Fury at Furnace Creek, a nicely turned oater with a veteran cast directed by H. Bruce “Lucky” Humberstone. Miss Gray recollected that Mature was a charming co-star with

“…hands the size of catcher’s mitts”. Gray also recalled that after politely but firmly turning down Mature’s advances during the Kiss of Death shooting, the relentlessly amorous actor shrugged it off and settled in as a wholly professional co-worker.

Cry of the City (1949) is probably one of the more underrated film noirs from the classic period. In a Cain and Abel saga of urban Italian boyhood friends ending up on opposite sides of the street, Mature, as Lt Candella the cop was matched against Richard (Nick) Conte, the amoral gangster. Beautifully written by Richard Murphy and helmed by Robert Siodmak, Conte has the meatier role; however he and Mature play off each other brilliantly until the Greek tragedy finale. Victor Mature again brought genuine depth to what could have been a pedestrian role.

From 1950 on, there would be fewer roles for Victor Mature that caused him to stretch dramatically as an actor. As the studio system was under siege due to anti-trust divestiture and nascent television, biblical pictures in varying degrees of Technicolor and Cinemascope became the order of the day. Sandwiched around the sword and sandal epics were several films such as Gambling House and The Las Vegas Story that proved to be mostly mediocre RKO features produced under the screwball stewardship of Howard Hughes. Exceptions to the indifferent quality of Mature’s later films included Richard Fleischer’s Violent Saturday (1954) and Anthony Mann’s rugged oater The Last Frontier (1955).

Even if his commercially popular, but critically panned biblical pictures might not hold up well, Victor Mature brought a genuine sense of tragic gravitas to his acting. Besides, who else could mouth some of the dialogue in those movies and not come across as occasionally absurd? It was probably with financial regret tinged with professional relief that Victor Mature handed off his toga and sandals to Charlton Heston in the mid 1950’s.

There would be more movies for Victor Mature into the next decade, but the golf course proved to have greater allure than sound stages. Mature, who invested his money wisely, viewed acting as a diminishing means to an enjoyable end. He was a self-deprecating and humorous man who bragged that he was no actor, “…and I’ve got 64 films to prove it.” A story about Mature and his old friend Jim Backus bears mention. The pair was working at RKO in Androcles and the Lion (1952) and walked across the street in Roman military regalia- armor, helmets, swords and bent plumes- to get lunch. After a flustered waitress haltingly told the actors that she couldn’t seat them in costume, Mature replied, “What’s the matter? Don’t you serve members of the Armed Forces?”

After a self mocking tribute of a movie star caricature in After the Fox (1966), Mature hung it up with the exception of few cameos. He doted on his daughter, born in 1975 to his fifth wife, and the leisure of Rancho Santa Fe, California before succumbing to leukemia in 1999.

Movie star, beefcake hunk, but a highly credible performer, Victor Mature was made of sterner professional stuff than typically given credit for. He might have gotten a bum rap from the critics, but a closer look at his career proves that, given the opportunity, the man could act.

As Time Goes By

Sat, 10 May 2008 21:54:33 GMT

The passage of time prepares one with a sense of acceptance for the death of admired personages; this musing is more of a personal “coming-to-grips” with the approaching finale to an era of popular culture that will shortly reside solely in films, books, the Internet and the remembrances of second generation intimates.

More than regret, I feel a sense of disappointment that the era of cinematic history which comprised a significant part of my baby boomer upbringing is becoming relegated to table book nostalgia as the last icons from the era of Old Hollywood depart due to exorable passage of time. .

Richard Widmark always commanded my attention. Regardless of the role or the movie, Widmark excelled at essaying transfixed characterizations that ranged from in-your-face resolve to pure psychopath. His work on screen invariably conveyed a sense of larger purpose along with the notion that hell (or a reasonable facsimile) was apt to break loose at any moment.

Widmark's noir portrayals are timeless: fiendishly giggling his way to instant stardom in Kiss of Death, rural jealousy begetting black rage in Roadhouse, his finest turn (IMHO) as the apotheosis of the noir loser, Harry Fabian, in the brilliant Night and the City and the sneering pickpocket who won’t wave the flag in Pick Up on South Street.

Widmark resolutely believed that being a movie star didn’t mean that you had to surrender the virtual private life. There would be no drinking, hell raising or scandals for Dick Widmark; it was all about his family, friends and home. He was devoted to his first wife and took care of her until she succumbed to the dreaded Alzheimer’s. Widmark shunned the talk show circuit from Steve Allen to Oprah Winfrey and though he left a partial, late-term legacy with some he worked with as a grouchy old man, the actor was simply being true to himself. The years of waiting around for his call on location or sound stages eventually dampened the inner flame for this most passionate of actors. When he died at age 93, Richard Widmark had long since settled comfortably into the sunset of a life well lived. A colleague who interviewed Widmark several years ago at his Connecticut farm told me that the actor couldn't’t have been more cordial and, in a natural gesture of class, insisted on personally driving his guest from his house to the local train station in order to see him off.

Equally admirable, if perhaps not as well known, was director Jules Dassin who stepped off this mortal coil last month at the ripe age of 96 years. Dassin was one of the last of the contract directors from the studio era (the only other survivor I can come up is Joe Pevney) who ended up having several careers in a Lazarus-like existence that would make one hell of a movie.

Dassin was born in Connecticut and grew up in New York City. Eons later, he would aver that being raised in a immigrant family of eight living in Harlem bequeathed him an ironlike sense of social consciousness that he never relinquished.

After an early fling at acting, Dassin worked as a director in the Yiddish theatre in New York with contemporaries that included the gifted character actor David Opatoshu. Dassin came to Hollywood in 1940 and gained rapid entry to that gilded Cadillac of the studio system, Metro Goldwyn Mayer.

What would have been a tremendous break for any other young director quickly turned to ashes. Dassin felt akin to a pharmacist’s apprentice who couldn't’t prescribe and compound the medicine, but had to be satisfied by merely doling out pills. The films that Jules Dassin helmed during his Metro years were entertaining- A Letter to Evie (1946) is a charming light comedy starring his lifelong friend Marsha Hunt-but unsatisfying fluff. Towards the end of his life, Dassin forbade any public screenings of his MGM films at tributes. When film historian and author Patrick McGilligan offered during an interview published in his excellent anthology Tender Comrades that the director specialized in comedy pictures while at Metro, Dassin responded: “I specialized in shit. They were awful. They were silly-as I was. I didn’t know what I was doing and God forgive me, I didn’t care.”

Cast adrift by Metro, Dassin found salvation in producer Mark Hellinger who engaged him to direct Brute Force (1947). A riveting saga of post war noir realism set behind bars, Dassin knew it was better, but still couldn't’t help being tough on himself for what he considered his acquiesence to forced artistic compromises. When I wrote to Dassin several years ago with some queries for my Charles McGraw book, I asked him if he was compelled to add “the women on the outside” flashback sequences in Brute Force (with Yvonne De Carlo, Ann Blyth, Ella Raines and Anita Colby) that seemed so incongruous to the overall theme of the movie. Dassin wrote me back in his own hand advising, “For the answer, read your own question. I was forced to add “the women” nonsense (by Hellinger and Universal) and when I watched the picture recently, I don’t forgive myself.” Even in his nineties, Jules Dassin was a film director who remained deadly serious about the integrity of his artistic vision.

After his breakthrough with The Naked City (1948), Dassin lost his patron saint in Hellinger, who died in December of 1947, but quickly found another in Darryl F. Zanuck at Fox. Zanuck didn’t care a whit about the director’s politics (“How the fuck did you become a Communist?” was as far as the mogul pursued matters) only his talent. With Thieves Highway (1949), Dassin hit his stride under the studio system, turning A.I. “Buzz” Bezzerides’ proletarian novel of working class injustice into a joyously blue-collar gem of a film noir.

With HUAC subpoenas falling onto Hollywood terra firma like autumn leaves, Zanuck hustled Dassin out of the country to direct Night and the City in London. Dassin moved so quickly that he filmed the adaptation of Gerald Kersh’s novel without even reading the book. It didn’t matter. Night and the City (1950) starring a frenetic Widmark and highlighted by some compelling photography, terrific supporting performances by Francis Sullivan, Googie Withers along with a legendary wrestler turned actor named Stanislaus Zbyszko is one of the more beautifully rendered film noirs of the classic period. Even though Zanuck played around with the UK and American versions (DFZ also diddled with the finale of Thieves Highway that caused a temporary rupture in his relationship with the aggrieved director) which had different sequences and music, nothing could spoil Night and the City, arguably Jules Dassin’s finest American film.

It was scoundrel time when Dassin returned to the States to direct Bette Davis in a play and, after being named to HUAC as a Communist, he waited around for a subpoena that never appeared. Far from fleeing the country, Dassin traveled to France to direct a film that he would ultimately be fired off of because of the Blacklist. The fact that Dassin was a member of the Communist Party of America for a brief period- (he quit in disgust in 1939 over the Nazi-Soviet pact) and had done nothing illegal- along with hundreds of others-didn’t matter. Rationality and fairness didn’t apply and Dassin wasn’t a man who could turn on his friends. Decades later, the personal betrayal of intimates like Lee J. Cobb still wounded him, but by then, he could rationalize the artist’s need to work. Dassin never could quite come to terms with the hedonistic behavior of Elia Kazan whom he considered the pantheon hypocrite of the Blacklist period.

After five years in the wilderness of unemployment and living in a foreign country came the triumph of Rififi (1955). Jules Dassin became the Fletcher Christian of the Director’s Guild- seemingly fated never to return home. Never On Sunday (1960) resulted in more honors along with meeting Melina Mercouri who would eventually become his second wife after the wonderful Topkapi (1964). More movies followed with his directorial career eventually petering out, but the activism of Jules Dassin continued. After his wife’s death in 1994, he managed the Melina Mercouri Foundation and spearheaded an international effort to have the Parthenon’s Elgin Marbles returned from the British Museum to their rightful home in Greece. Whether one agrees with Jules Dassin’s politics or not, his loyalty and sense of self was timelessly estimable. Besides, the man made some of my favorite movies.

It is of passing interest that Hollywood never awarded either Richard Widmark or Jules Dassin any individual or career honors. Just as they dissed other worthies such as Glenn Ford in favor of wunderkinds like Barbara Streisand, the award bodies are somewhat analogous to the Blacklist period in that politics, rather than justice, usually prevailed

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the passing of Joy Page, one of the last surviving cast members of Casablanca (1942). Miss Page was Jack L. Warner’s stepdaughter via his second wife and played the young Bulgarian immigrant whose husband is allowed by Rick (Humphrey Bogart) to win at roulette so the couple can buy a black market visa to America. Amazingly, the other implied benefit that skirted the Breen Office was that Joy’s character didn’t have to sleep with horny old Captain Renault (Claude Rains), to score that elusive exit visa. Casablanca continues to endure as a signpost of our cultural heritage, then and now.

Although Bogart, Bergman, Lorre, Greenstreet, Rains, Joy Page, Richard Widmark and Jules Dassin are no longer with us, we have, as Bette Davis informed Paul Henreid at the end of Now Voyager, “...the stars.”

Despite the vagaries of time, we will always have the movies.

Beefing about Blood

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 01:03:03 GMT

Wildly praised, Oscar nominated film is a major disappointment

I don’t know why I partially bought into the press release journalism that passes muster as legit movie criticism nowadays. There Will Be Blood has been lauded to the critical heavens as an all-time classic with one notable scrivener comparing Paul Thomas Anderson’s epic to Citizen Kane. High praise indeed. I knew better, but I still should have known better.

Part of it was my admiration of Daniel Day Lewis’ acting craftsmanship in My Left Foot and Gangs of New York. My interest was also piqued by Anderson’s stated inspiration of The Treasure of Sierra Madre (1948)-a pantheon classic and personal favorite- that he reportedly used as a template for his latest movie. And yes, I admittedly got a little dizzy after being bombarded by the pre Oscar media cacophony of rave reviews for a reputed epic that was a paean to great movies past.

After watching There Will Be Blood, I can state categorically that not only does this much-ballyhooed film not hold a candle to Citizen Kane; it is simply not a very entertaining movie.

Thomas, who’s wonderful Boogie Nights blew me away just over a decade ago used Upton Sinclair’s novel “Oil” as a premise for his latest film. It is an inspirational springboard that traces the evolution of Southern California’s petroleum boom during the first quarter of the 20^th century via Daniel Day Lewis’s powerhouse portrayal of oilman Daniel Plainview. Although the distinguished English actor’s turn is definitive Oscar material, it is a tour de force that simply cannot be sustained throughout the excessive run time. The inalienable directorial right of final cut once again becomes a virtual boomerang that initially enthralls and then exhausts over one hundred and fifty eight minutes of celluloid that is sorely lacking structure and pace. A prime example is the ending of the film. This rapid fast-forward in time exuded an artificial, tacked-on quality instead of the crafted culmination of a masterful tale.

There Will Be Blood is a bravura one man show to the point of detriment. The principal supporting role of the youthful preacher-as-adversary (think of an adolescent Elmer Gantry on Vicadin) by Paul Dano was ultimately unconvincing, particularly when demonstrating his more devious side in private and then in the long waited, but predictable denouement. Dano had a tough road to hoe. The first actor cast in the part reportedly quit after being intimidated by Lewis’ blockbuster acting. In an interesting debut, youngster Dillon Freasier played Plainview’s young son and remarkably holds his own.. The rest of the supporting cast are faultlessly appearing ciphers or caricatures of little interest as their entire purpose is to provide a backdrop for Lewis who never relinquishes center stage. Paul Thomas Anderson should have taken greater note of the work of Tim Holt, Walter Huston, Bruce Bennett and Alfonso Bedoya in The Treasure of Sierra Madre.

The cinematography by Robert Elswit and production design, particularly the location filming in Marfa, Texas representing turn of the century Bakersfield is magnificent. There is a sequence of an oil well explosion and fire that is simply stunning. This visual panorama is intermittently disrupted by the original musical contributions of Radiohead rocker Jonny Greenwood. Enduring this abominable soundtrack reminded me of a story I heard Robert Towne relate about the initial musical score for Chinatown that was finally tossed out by director Roman Polanski after composer Bronislau Kaper told him the music was, “…an abomination on your movie”. Too bad Jerry Goldsmith wasn’t around for another 911 call.

Most of the cited issues with There Will be Blood could have been overlooked if Lewis’ transference from earnest oilman to paranoid Croesus elicited greater interest. This is the principle flaw of the movie. Don’t misunderstand; my expectations for a happy ending, deeper meaning or redemption were bupkiss. It was apparent early on that Plainview was a shit. The problem was that he was a boring shit. There was no spark, no layers of complexity, no diabolical charm, not too much of anything. Perhaps that was the point. In the end, I didn’t really care too much what happened to him and ended up not caring too much about There Will Be Blood. Yes, it is masterful looking film, but beyond that, there isn't much there. Paul Thomas Anderson is a superb filmmaker, but he needed to breathe much more depth into his main character and surround him with characters who mattered in order to reap full appreciation for all of the positive attributes of his movie.

In addition to Jerry Goldsmith, Anderson could have used some help from some other departed hands.

Anderson needed a Broni Kaper to tell him that his musical score sucked and while he was at it, the director should have screened Citizen Kane and figured out how Orson Welles made it all work.

Percy

Sat, 13 Oct 2007 15:29:39 GMT

No actor exemplified the downtrodden film noir schlemiel better than Percy Helton. If his hunched frame and marsupial-like features weren’t enough to convince audiences of his servile timidity, there was always the unique Helton voice which made his screen characterizations permanently distinctive. Never was a vocal inflection more perfectly suited to a performer.

Percy Helton uttered his lines with a breathy vocal lilt akin to the sigh of an exhausted calliope. When alarmed or threatened- a frequent occurrence- he reached a higher octave reminiscent of a damaged ukulele. Even though the diminutive performer seemed to be specifically constructed as a mid-century urban whipping boy, Helton’s thespian roots dated back to the nineteenth century.

He made his stage debut in 1896 with his vaudevillian father, Alf Helton, at the Tony Pastor Theatre on 14^th Street in New York City. Percy Helton was two years old. At age eleven, he appeared with David Belasco on Broadway in Return of Peter Grimm. The adolescent thespian had a long speech in the play that he recited verbatim over six decades later during a guest appearance on the Merv Griffin television show. In addition to his early stage work, he also appeared in several silent pictures filmed in New York.

During his career along the Great White Way, Helton worked for George M. Cohan for five years and appeared in a variety of productions opposite notables such as Lloyd Nolan, Helen Hayes and Peggy Woods. As he retained his youthful appearance and played adolescent roles into his twenties, Helton earned the nickname of “Dype”, short for the diapers that he appeared to belong in.

Helton worked exclusively in his native New York, treading the boards and appearing in several musical short films during the late 1930’s. Moving into middle age and acquiring a curved spine alternately ascribed to either late growth or osteoporosis, Helton’s career began to falter a bit as he finally outgrew playing juveniles. A Gotham film location shoot in early 1947 changed everything. Director-writer George Seaton cast the actor as a drunken Santa Claus in Miracle on 34^th Street. Helton was uproariously perfect as an inebriated St. Nick who passes out while rehearsing Jingle Bells for the Macy’s holiday parade and is replaced by the “real” Santa, Edmund Gwenn. Percy’s comedic turn in what would be a perennial holiday classic resulted in his continual employment as a film actor during the next quarter century. He was summoned to Hollywood by Twentieth Century Fox to play a bit part in Call Northside 777 (1948) and remained in L.A. for the rest of his life.

Percy Helton racked up an impressive string of film noir credits over the next several years, beginning with the seldom-seen Larceny (1948) starring John Payne, Dan Duryea and a boisterously brassy Shelley Winters. Helton plays a servile hotel manager who searches for his registration book that he misplaced under, “…my jiu-jitsu manual.” In Robert Siodmak’s superbly crafted Crisscross, (1949), Helton essays a memorable turn as a Bunker Hill barkeep. When a cuckolded Burt Lancaster returns to his former nocturnal haunt in search of femme muse Yvonne De Carlo, he encounters Percy tending bar. Burt gets cute with his inquiries, not wanting to own up to the Statue-of-Liberty-sized torch he is resolutely carrying for Yvonne. Helton quickly tags Lancaster as an undercover liquor “checker” before having to apologize for the oversight. Later on, the perpetually regretful bartender has to “take the liberty” of breaking Lancaster’s heart. He informs him that Yvonne has eloped with lowlife crook Dan Duryea and double-crossed him once again. Helton neatly summarizes the age-old bartenders’ credo about personal entanglements in a mournful tone to a female lush whose posterior polishes a barstool every evening: “I don’t get involved. Nowadays, it doesn’t pay.”

The Set-up (1949) features a classic Helton portrayal of a beaten-down boxing trainer who works in ham-and-egger Robert Ryan’s corner. Percy vainly warns Ryan’s obtusely corrupt manager (George Tobias) that he had better let their fighter know that the fix is in and a dive to the canvas is in order: “Stoker can still punch… you gotta tell him!” Treading in a sea of bottom feeders, Percy is just another minnow, getting ripped off for a miniscule slice of the crooked payoff and literally running away from the ring after Ryan scores an upset knockout, abandoning the helpless palooka to face the wrath of the crossed gamblers.

The Crooked Way (1949) included a memorable Helton portrayal of a pitiful loser. A flunky mired in servitude to a nut-job gang boss (a near-drooling Sonny Tufts), Helton constantly totes his only friend, a pet cat named Hector, around with him while intermittently sneezing because of an allergy to feline dander! He attempts to protect his pet when a gangster firefight erupts, but ends up getting a bullet in the back for his trouble. Not that the actor was unfamiliar with gunfire.

Percy Helton went “over there” to Europe with the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) during World War I, experiencing battlefield combat for nineteen months. The diminutive actor was reportedly awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Army’s 2nd highest military decoration for extraordinary heroism in battle. Settling quietly in a Hollywood apartment, Helton became the first vice-president of the noted thespian club, the Masquers, and enjoyed a long, successful marriage with his wife Edna, a former Ziegfeld dancer.

Before film noir began to disappear from theatre marquees and morphed into televised crime dramas, Helton continued to make an indelible imprint in dark cinema: Never Trust a Gambler (1951), The Tall Target (1951), Vice Squad (1953) Crashout (1955), No Man’s Woman (1955) and Terror at Midnight (1956). Although he appeared in hundreds of television shows and films of different genres, the actor’s most unforgettable turns proved to be a bookend set of seminal film noirs.

Helton was memorably repellent as a corrupt coroner who gets too greedy for his own good while trying to shake down private eye “Mike Hammer” in the iconic Kill Me Deadly (1955). Instead of being filled with greenbacks, Percy’s extended hand is memorably slammed in a desk drawer by a grinning Ralph Meeker as a dubbed (and fake sounding) shriek gradually subsides to an actual Helton whimper.

There is no doubt that Percy Helton’s most compelling screen performance was in Russell Rouse’s uniquely perverse Wicked Woman (1953). The rangy Beverly Michaels stars as a weirdly moist tramp with blown-out, peroxide hair and an attitude to match. Her saga begins when she gets off a bus in a Bo hunk town and moves into cold water flat. Third-billed Percy Helton is “Charlie Borg”, a perpetually horny tailor who resides directly across the hall. Helton’s jaw hits the floor as he becomes immediately transfixed with the six foot tall blonde. After landing a job as a cocktail waitress, Beverly occupies her time seducing married saloon owner Richard Egan, convincing him to unload the gin mill by forging his wife’s signature so the star-crossed pair can lam off to Mexico. At the same time, the greedy Michaels strings Percy along, titillating his over-active libido in order to borrow money from him. After dodging his direct advances, an increasingly pressured Beverly ends up being blackmailed by Helton who discovers her chicanery to fleece Egan’s alcoholic wife and skip town. The audience is led to believe that a grotesque coupling occurs. The entire situation finally explodes when an enraged, scantily clad Beverly Michaels cuffs a whining Helton around like an errant Chihuahua after she is caught by Richard Egan being lasciviously pawed by her ardent neighbor. With a total absence of morality amid bizarre characterizations, Wicked Woman remains a highlight reel of mid 20th century camp.

The “Charlie Borg” performance was a personal highlight for Percy Helton who continued working steadily until he passed away in 1971 at the age of seventy-seven. While visiting San Francisco with his wife shortly before his death, Percy was complimented about his work in Wicked Woman. The slight thespian replied with a breathy sigh that it was his favorite movie. Edna Helton immediately chimed in, revealing that her “Perc” had the one sheet poster of Wicked Woman hanging on the wall above their bed back home in Hollywood!