Sunset Boulevard

“She was the greatest of them all. You wouldn’t know, you’re too young. In one week she received 17,000 fan letters. Men bribed her hairdresser to get a lock of her hair. There was a maharajah who came all the way from India to beg one of her silk stockings. Later he strangled himself with it!”

Billy Wilder’s Sunset Boulevard is a wonderfully dark and cynical film about the relationship between a struggling hack screenwriter and a faded silent film star delusionally anticipating her return to the silver screen.  Joe Gilles (William Holden) is becoming more and more desperate to sell his stories.  He’s behind on car payments and in an effort to run from the bill collectors, he turns into the driveway of a decaying mansion and finds an empty garage perfect for hiding his car.  Inside, a woman calls to him, “You there, why have you kept me waiting so long?”  Having nowhere else to be, Joe goes inside and meets Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) and her faithful butler Max (Erich von Stroheim).

I’ve always interpreted the events in Sunset Boulevard to be wonderfully simple.  Joe was mistaken to be the funeral director for Norma’s pet chimp who has just died.  We don’t realize it yet, but Norma’s new pet has just walked in the door.  Throughout the film, Joe becomes Norma’s boy toy, she lets him live there while he works on an excessive screenplay Norma has written for her return.  Norma gladly towels him off as he exits the pool, buys him the clothes she wants him to wear and holds a grand New Years ball just for the two of them.  The mansion is his cage, all Joe is missing is a leash.

The film won the Oscar for art direction easily.  All the sets in or around the mansion are beautifully creepy with lavish detail.  As Joe describes, “The whole place seemed to have been stricken with a kind of creeping paralysis – out of beat with the rest of the world, crumbling apart in slow motion.”  Inside the mansion is a grand staircase, a projection screen hidden behind an oil painting and beautiful classic furniture.  There are dozens, perhaps near a hundred pictures of Norma all over the house.  One of my favorite sets is Norma’s bedroom full of satin veils and ruffles hanging from the ceiling and her bed looks like a viking ship.

Joe provides the perfect narration for this film about the dark side of cinema.  When we first hear his voice, it’s the cynical, ironic perspective of a man floating dead in a pool.  Somewhere along the story set in the past, the perspective changes from dead-floating Joe of the present to Joe in the shown scene.  The change isn’t that important and nearly impossible to detect because Joe’s style of speech is so consistent.  He’s obviously a writer, and some of his descriptions do teeter on the verge of hack (“She sat coiled up like a watch spring.”), but with this macabre style of story it fits.  He’s the perfect candidate to be thrown a story that feels like Edgar Allan Poe resurrected to write about Hollywood.

Nominated for best actress, Gloria Swanson steals the film with her oh so creepy Norma Desmond.  I always get a little shiver when she puts her fingers she moves like claws on Holden.  Her over expressive facial expressions of a silent film star, make it seem like she’s never left the screen.  Her eyes are so fierce, her painted mouth never has a real smile, but twists into sneers of repressed rage.  I love the way Norma gives me the creeps,  “Stars are ageless aren’t they?”

There have been some complaints about me ranking Sunset over the official Best Picture winner, All About Eve.  I do so thinking about what most of today’s viewers would appreciate more and relate to better.  Sunset has the more striking visual elements and more iconic characters.  The cynical and ironic narration by Holden is more understood by our modern age.  I’m not knocking Eve at all, that film does it’s own thing wonderfully, I just see more people loving Sunset and simply liking Eve.

And I do love Sunset Boulevard.  I love Norma’s desperate attempts to keep Joe, the scene at Paramount studios and Cecil B. DeMille’s cameo.  That shot with Joe floating in the pool blew me away and when he said, “Shh, you’re going to wake the monkey” I couldn’t get enough.  For this film to survive so well after sixty years, there must be more out there who also deeply love Sunset Boulevard.

“You don’t yell at a sleepwalker – he may fall and break his neck. That’s it: she was still sleepwalking along the giddy heights of a lost career.”

All About Eve

“My name is Addison DeWitt. My native habitat is the theater. In it I toil not, neither do I spin. I am a critic and commentator. I am essential to the theatre.”

Mr. DeWitt may be a bit conceded, but with that ego comes the ability to see one’s true motives.  In All About Eve, we first meet our characters as Eve becomes the youngest person to receive a prestigious award.  We would assume everyone to be proud of this girl who is finally being recognized.  but we are transported back to see the story of how this young girl has climbed so high so quickly, and all the people she’s stepped on along the way.

Eve (Anne Baxter) is first discovered in the rain waiting for ageing actress Margo (Bette Davis) to leave the theater by Karen (Celeste Holm), wife of prestigious play-write Lloyd Richards (Hugh Marlowe).  Karen takes pity on the star-struck girl and brings her to meet her idol.  Margo doesn’t seem likely to warm up to the girl until Eve tells her sob story that has lead her to have nothing to look forward to but the theater and seeing Margo perform.  Moved, Margo takes Eve in and she becomes a helpful assistant.  However, Eve starts overstepping boundaries and gets a taste of the spotlight.  Soon, Margo realizes this ambitious young Eve is using her and her friends to break into theater and become a star.

Lets go back to George Sanders’s Addison DeWitt, an Oscar winning role and hinge to the plot.  He’s our main narrator with flawlessly eloquent speech and dress to match.  While all of Eve’s new acquaintances believe her naive starstruck girl act, only Addison sees through the mask.  Instead of stopping her, he takes the opportunity to write about the budding new star and spreading the word to further her success.  He may be feeding the monster, but when he realizes the reach of her claws he cuts back and knows she really can’t go much higher without him.  She will one day have to take what she has dished out.

This may the greatest role Bette Davis ever played.  Being an aging star slowly conned by a young rival may have been a realistic role for the then just over forty actress.  She plays the role with such an honest gusto and presence proving that her personality can propel her further than Eve’s simple youth and beauty.  Compared to Gloria Swanson’s Norma Desmond, a similar role in Sunset Boulevard, Margo will be alright and still has friends if Eve takes all her stage presence, which is a much happier end that Eve or Norma are likely to find at their going rate.

While All About Eve won for Best Picture, I don’t believe most viewers today would agree.  It’s a fine film with wonderful acting, no doubt, but I feel like the story has been parodied and told so much that today’s viewer isn’t as likely to receive it’s full effect.  But if you enjoy films about treacherous women, fearfully aging stars or enjoy any of the actors, this is a must see.

“The cynicism you refer to, I acquired the day I discovered I was different from little boys!”

Father of the Bride

“I would like to say a few words about weddings. I’ve just been through one. Not my own. My daughter’s. Someday in the far future I may be able to remember it with tender indulgence…”

Weddings are everything a daughter dreams of and a father dreads.  With  so many bridal shows today only building up the bride, I’m afraid of how many modern brides are forgetting about their fathers.  The average wedding today is about $25, 000, a price that would bring Spencer Tracy’s Mr. Banks a swift heart attack.  Though today’s weddings bend rules more and more, there are still those who keep to the tradition of letting the bride’s father foot the bill.  Father of the Bride shows that there’s more stresses and sacrifices than money for the lovable patriarch.

The whole film keeps to the perspective of Stanley Banks (Spencer Tracy) from first hearing about his only daughter’s new boyfriend, through the stressful planning and all the wedding festivities.  Regularly, Stanley’s inner thoughts will enter over a scene, “You fathers will understand. You have a little girl. She looks up to you…”  It’s important to understand what Stanley is going through, how he comprehends this wedding and his motives behind all his actions.  No matter the price or the stress, one thing stays constant: he wants his daughter to be happy.

Most will remember the 1991 remake staring Steve Martin better than the original.  The remake sticks closely to the original script but adds Martin’s brand of comedy and updates a some details into the 90’s.  While I applaud keeping this lovable story alive for new generations, the idea of a sequel made me cringe, even as a child.

While I still love Martin and appreciate his interpretation, he’s no match for the wonderful Spencer Tracy.  He runs the film as his character is pushed by a runaway wedding.  On the surface, without aid of his internal thoughts, Tracy makes Stanley look like a cranky old man at times, “Orchestra?  No you’ve got the wrong number.”  When he is with his daughter, the hard surface melts away, he tries to make everything perfect for her and he becomes a big sweetheart.  None of these moments are overtly sweet or “awww” inducing, but simply wonderful and  heartwarming.  This perfect balance between cheap, cranky, sweet and lovable earned Tracy an Oscar nomination for best actor.

The nightmare Stanley has the night before the wedding is partially designed by Salador Dali.  After Dali’s hand in Spellbound, he was reluctant to work with another Hollywood film.  The images are less intense than Dali’s usual work.  In it, Stanley arrives late for the wedding, people glare and scowl at him and he sees the silhouettes of the couple and preacher.  As he tries to go down the checkerboard aisle, the floor sinks beneath him, pulls him down ripping his pants and stretching his leg.  He struggles futilely and is awakened when his daughter turns around and screams at the sight of him.  This scene is only about a minute long, but the idea from the images are clear: Stanley is nervous and reluctant to admit that his daughter is grown up.  I wonder how many brides father’s have had similar nightmares.

The original Father of the Bride is absolutely wonderful, charming and perfectly sweet.  If you have a wedding in the near future, you must see this film, don’t settle for Steve Martin.  And all you Bridezillas out there better thank your dads for putting up with all that you do.  Though he doesn’t really need the praise, it’s nice to know that he’s appreciated through this hard transitional period that is a wedding.

“But she’s not a woman. She’s still a child. And she’s leaving us.”

King Solomon’s Mines

Everything about this film is full of fun adventure.  Allan Quatermain (Stewart Granger) is an experiences hunter and safari guide in the heart of Africa.  He is sought out by Mrs. Elizabeth Curtis (Deborah Kerr), who wants to go on safari to search for her lost husband who was out searching for the fabled King Solomon’s Mines.  Allan agrees only after Elizabeth’s agreement to pay him handsomely, even if they turn back quickly.  Guessing by Elizabeth’s dress and demeanor, Allan doesn’t expect the journey to last long before she wants to turn back.  Lead by a mysterious map, Allan, Elizabeth, her brother John (Richard Carlson) and a few helpful natives set out on adventure, filled with close calls with the wild animals, encounters with the natives and romance.

While Allan is supposed to be the rugged safari man just doing his job for the money, Elizabeth is the stubborn English girl who doesn’t know anything about the wilds of Africa she’s determined to face.  Classic combination full of fun tension.  Along the way, she starts to realize that this safari is no picnic in the park.  After a few hissy-fits thinking that Allan has lead them through difficult terrain on purpose, she comes to her senses and cuts her long hair down to size.  A physical transformation to show her commitment if you will.  After her hair is somehow styled to beautiful perfection, Allan and Elizabeth start sharing more longing looks that just might land them in a tree.  And you know what goes on in trees.

If you have animal loving kids, they will be squealing with delight throughout the entire film.  Half the fun of King Solomon’s Mines are the animal encounters along the way.  There are dangerous rivers full of crocodiles and hippos, trees full of monkeys, creepy crawlies along the ground to make Elizabeth scream and a heart pounding zebra stampede just to name a few great moments.

In the realm of Best Picture nominations, King Solomon’s Mines seems like a laughable member.  The grass stained boy among men swirling brandy.  However, in the realm of 1950’s jungle-adventure, this is as great as it gets.  The Oscar winning cinematography shows off the beautiful African landscapes and the editing makes those wild animal moments feel heart pounding and dangerous.  There are even a few moments that seem like inspiration for some scenes in Raiders of the Lost Ark.  Sure the acting is a little cheesy and we predicted that love story from the beginning, but you’re going to have fun throughout the entire film.

“The only way out of this is… suffocation!”

Born Yesterday

Harry (Broderick Crawford), a junkyard tycoon, and his fiancé, Billie (Judy Holliday) are both less than refined.  They shout to each other from across halls and through open windows.  While in Washington D.C., Harry is trying to “make new business connections” and realizes Billie’s rough behavior and ignorance will only drive him backwards.  So, he hires Paul (William Holden), a man initially hired to interview Harry, to teach her some etiquette, but he teaches her more important things and soon she’s able to see her life in a whole new way.

Judy Holliday’s performance as Billie won the Oscar for Best Actress.  It’s a joy to watch Billie learn and grow with Paul’s help.  She always keeps that rough and slightly dumb edge to her voice, but when we begin to see her as more than some loudmouth broad we rejoice along with her.  She’s a strong character too, even when she’s brought down so low by Harry, she’s never out and can conjure up the courage to tell him to “Drop dead.”

Of course, there has to be a little romance, and it’s true that dumb blondes love the nerdy guys.  There have been films where I don’t care for William Holden, usually when he’s playing the strapping, troublesome love interest that can’t keep his shirt on.  Thankfully, Paul is the opposite, he’s helpful, smart, charming and witty.  Many times, Holden’s lines become the perfect springboard for Judy’s punchline and the chemistry works perfectly.

Most of Billie’s lessons revolve around the Washington D.C. setting.  Through it we see different monuments, building and important documents.  We see Billie’s first encounters with them and see how earnestly she wants to expand her mind.  Later, it’s fun to see her use her new knowledge of the founding fathers to help herself.

For those who can’t face seeing an old black and white movie, let me compare it to something you’re probably more familiar with.  The plot is similar to the ever popular, Legally Blonde.  Now, come on, even my husband enjoys Legally Blonde, and to put things just a little backwards, Born Yesterday is it’s 1950’s equivalent.  It’s charming, funny and heartwarming.  This is a witty delight that I encourage everyone to seek out.

“-Nobody’s born smart, Billie.  Do you know what the stupidest thing on Earth is?  An infant!
–Whadaya got against babies all of a sudden?”