Movie Quote of the Week

It's things like this that can make a man a -- a Republican.
--Cary Grant, Once Upon a Honeymoon (1942)

Quote of the Week

A Humphrey Bogart, a Jimmy Stewart, a Cary Grant, a Spencer Tracy —- these were icons whose characters often dealt with female stars as equals, who had sex appeal to burn but weren’t defined by their libidos or their list of conquests, who dealt in violence sparingly or not at all. Likewise in Victorian fiction, in books as eagerly devoured by the masses as any blockbuster entertainment today: How often is a rake or cad presented as a worthy model, how often is a killer celebrated for his body count? How often does a Dickens or a Tolstoy or a Trollope leave the impression that the masculine ideal involves dealing violence indiscriminately and sleeping with every blonde who catches your eye? Is Steerforth the hero of “David Copperfield”? Is Wickham the male ideal held up by “Pride and Prejudice”? In Western literature, who better embodies “traditional masculinity” as an aspirational ideal —- Vronsky or Darcy? Angel Clare or Gabriel Oak? Raskolnikov the murderer or Raskolnikov the penitent?
--Ross Douthat, "The Left and Masculinity," New York Times Blogs, June 3, 2014

Just Because They Show It on Thanksgiving Doesn't Mean It's a Turkey

I don't know what inspired my local public television station to show the 1963 movie Charade on Thanksgiving night and I know even less about the reasons why my mother and my youngest brother chose to tune into it. I do know that it proved to be a remarkably good movie that even people who aren't as ardently dedicated to old movies as yours truly can appreciate -- which might explain why my mother and my youngest sibling could not help but watch it all the way through. Some critics have called it the "best Hitchcock movie that Hitchcock never made" and some may argue that it's actually a lot better than some of Hitchcock's lesser films. (For example, Hitchcock's The Trouble with Harry could have learned a lot about suspense from this flick.)

On paper, this movie should have been a failure. After all, there was a huge age gap between the two romantic leads and it's not a big coincidence that the male lead -- Cary Grant -- retired from movies two films after this one was released. (In his last movie, Walk, Don't Run, Grant didn't even pretend to be romantically interested in that movie's female lead and in the one before that, he was matched for some odd reason with younger actress Leslie Caron, perhaps in the vain hope of capturing the same chemistry found between Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn in this flick.) Moreover, Charade itself is a mixture of romance, comedy and suspense that could have easily proved tasteless in the hands of a lesser filmmaker than director Stanley Donen.

And yet it doesn't. I actually found myself laughing at lines of dialogue I never expected to find all that funny and being amused at the actors' reactions as often as their actions. The plot, for those unfamiliar with it, involved a young widow named Regina "Reggie" Lambert whose husband was discovered by the side of a French railroad track at the beginning of the movie. Not only did she have much reason to suspect her husband was murdered, but she soon discovered that he was also suspected of being a crook. One of his last actions involved stripping the apartment that he and Reggie had shared and selling the furnishings without leaving a single clue as to what he did with all the cash he got for them.

Moreover, Mrs. Lambert found herself being pursued by three thugs who were certain she knew where her late husband hid a fortune in stolen loot. Add to that a mysterious CIA agent who claimed to have been investigating her late husband and an equally mysterious person -- played by Cary Grant -- who might or might not be another government agent and poor Mrs. Lambert had her hands full trying to get herself free of a sticky situation.

I could say more but the movie is too good to spoil. Suffice to say that Hepburn and Grant make a great team and even if you don't particularly care for May-October romances like the one in this movie, you will probably still enjoy it. I would like to think that Cary Grant stopped making movies three years afterwards because he knew deep down that he would never top this movie. But I'm sure Grant's autobiography would have you believe something else. C'est la vie!

Movie Quote of the Week

When I find myself in a position like this, I ask myself what would General Motors do? And then I do the opposite!
--Cary Grant, Holiday (1938)

All the Classic Movies That I Have Seen

1. Wife vs. Secretary (1936).

It's blonde bombshell Jean Harlow as you have never seen her before, playing an ultra-efficient secretary. And, oh yes, Clark Gable and Myrna Loy are in this movie too. Gable plays Harlow's boss and Loy plays Gable's wife. All goes perfectly until Loy starts listening to female acquaintances who fear Gable is getting along too comfortably with his secretary. Suddenly Loy gets jealous and all Hades breaks loose.

Okay, to be fair, the movie is not quite as melodramatic as the title makes it seem. And I found it hard to imagine any character played by Myrna Loy having cause to be jealous of anyone, even an internationally famous sex symbol like Jean Harlow.

And yet after seeing how quickly my own relationship with my former novia was undermined by the insinuations of mi novia's parents (mi novia would say one thing and after a five-minute conversation with her parents, turn around and say the exact opposite), I find the plot of this movie a lot easier to believe than I used to.

Still, Myrna Loy being jealous of another woman...who would have thunk it?

2. Blonde Venus (1932).

No, Marlene Dietrich isn't the most convincing actress in the world when it comes to playing German hausfraus. In fact, she seems more convincing in this movie when she puts a veil in front of her face and pretends to be a Spaniard than when she plays a loving German housewife and mother.

And one has to wonder just how serious one should take a movie in which the main romance starts off as the result of blackmail. (Oh, those oh so romantic Europeans!)

Yet this movie manages to be intriguing despite itself. Among other things, it features an early appearance by Cary Grant, who plays a gruffer character than his usual persona, and a surprising number of nude scenes (none of which feature Ms. Dietrich, alas).

Since the movie begins when Dietrich's future husband catches her skinny-dipping with her co-workers in a local pond, it's tempting to see this movie as an updated version of the old Swan Maiden legend. But Ms. Dietrich never dons any type of bird outfit in this movie. Indeed, the closest she comes to such an outfit is when she puts on a gorilla suit for a musical number.

For that matter, one can see a parallel between this movie and Ibsen's The Doll's House since like Nora, Dietrich's character is forced to do something not quite kosher in order to help out her ailing husband. Word gets out about what exactly Ms. Dietrich did and the couple separate.

Do they get together again? See the movie and find out. But, given the sentimental nature of certain scenes, you can probably guess the ending long before it happens.

All the Classic* Movies That I Have Seen

1. Only Angels Have Wings (1939).

Cary Grant played a snarky guy who had been jilted by a former girlfriend and now had difficulty relating to any female. So totally not the type of guy I can identify with right now...

The film was one of those subtle thrillers in which the arrival of a key character was announced with a flash of lightning and a sound of thunder.

And yet in spite of it all, I kinda liked this film. If nothing, its ending was very memorable and emotionally satisfying.

Though I was kinda surprised to see Jean Arthur of all people -- an actress best known for playing homebodies like the mother in Shane and demure reporters like the one in Mr. Deeds Goes to Town -- playing a showgirl. Granted, she didn't fit the image one usually thinks of when one thinks of showgirls. (There's no way Ms. Arthur would ever be mistaken for, say, Jane Russell or Joan Blondell.) But she managed to pull it off.

I was even more surprised to see Rita Hayworth make an appearance. And though she played a character named Judy, Cary never once said the obvious “Judy, Judy, Judy” line so often attributed to him by celebrity impersonators. Yet another Hollywood myth bites the dust.

2. Holiday (1938).

Yet another Cary Grant movie. No, I don't have a thing for Cary Grant but I do admire his movies. And quite frankly, who wouldn't want to be a member of any club that has Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn in it?

This movie has been eclipsed by its more well-known successor The Philadelphia Story, which is a shame. Both Grant and Hepburn gave memorable performances, and Lew Ayres actually managed to play the type of character I didn't think was possible -- an alcoholic character which was actually sympathetic.

Perhaps, it was because Ayres's character displayed a certain self-awareness about his drinking that certain characters in more recent films (Sideways, Crazy/Beautiful, etc.) have not. Ayres' character did not really ask us to pity him for his condition; indeed, he showed far more pity for his sibling (played by Katharine Hepburn) than for himself. And though we were not really told the reasons for his constant drinking (there was some hint of a riff between him and his father but it was never fully explained in detail), director George Cukor wasn't above dropping a few hints that might or might not have meant something. (For example, the way he responded to certain remarks Ms. Hepburn's character made about Mr. Grant's character.)

Anyway, the result was an enjoyable movie that really deserved to be far more well-known.

* “Classic” in this case meaning “made before 1970.”