Rope

I first saw Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope late one night in my old college apartment.  My roommate preferred to get to bed earlier, so I warned her about my movie and tried my best to be quiet.  Within twenty minutes, my vocal excitement had kept her awake and curious enough to see what the hell I was watching.  As I apologized and explained what was going on in the film, she stayed for a few minutes, standing, watching with me and getting just as worked up.  Soon, we were both on the couch, yelling directions at Jimmy Stewart and becoming far too stressed out.  It was a great moment for this Hitchcock fan.

In Rope, two young men, Phil (Farley Granger) and Brandon (John Dall), decide to pull off the perfect murder.  We come in just as they have killed their friend, David (Dick Hogan).  Instead of immediately disposing of the body, they tuck it away in a chest.  They have bigger plans this evening, a party.  What’s the point of pulling off the perfect murder without a little danger?  Guests include David’s mother (Constance Collier), father (Cedric Hardwicke), girlfriend Janet (Joan Chandler), Janet’s ex boyfriend Kenneth (Douglas Dick), and Rupert (James Stewart) whom the murderous boys admire and got their idea from.

Some may consider this Hitchcock’s ultimate longshot film.  It is mostly comprised of 10 continuous shots, edited together to give the illusion of one fluid piece.  Simply put, when the camera ran out of film, the shot dissolved, usually into the back of a character’s dark suit, and the new reel began from there, fading back in without missing a beat.  It gives you the feeling that you shouldn’t look away, or that you’re a silent guest at the party.  However, if you can keep a sharp eye, there are seven conventional edits throughout the film.

The longshots and other elements make the film feel like a play.  All the characters move within one connected setting, revolving around the chest that only Phil, Brandon and the audience can feel the weight of.  Many times, the camera follows characters around, it bounces a bit, feeling a bit like footsteps.  Its focus on different characters in a confined space, or closeups of tell tale objects is what really sets it apart from anything that could be put on stage.

Of course, my roommate and I were not shouting about the inventive camera work, but the suspense.  Whenever someone hung around the chest too long, or looked at it questioningly or *GASP!* was about to open it, levels of chaos exploded in our minds.  All we could do was hold our breath, yell like mad people and slowly exhale.  Over and over.  I think we were both glad the film was only about 80 minutes long, we couldn’t take much more of that thick tension.

It is not all about the chest that creates tension.  While Brandon is surprisingly calm about their perfect murder, Phil slowly becomes a nervous wreck.  Brandon’s grand idea of serving dinner on the vile chest, casually flaunting the murder weapon out in the open and inviting Rupert without Phil knowing is enough to send Phil into a drinking binge.  Surely someone as superior as Brandon won’t be caught because of his friend’s loose lips.

Most Hitchcock films are centered around murder, even a few other than Rope discuss how to pull off a perfect murder.  Here we get a warped philosophy behind a perfect murder.  You see, their old friend Rupert once discussed with them how an elite group could be allowed to pick off those with less meaningful lives.  There’s even a scene where Rupert and David’s mother casually joke about how murder could solve problems like unemployment and overpopulation.  This talk can be all fun and games, but they don’t know that Brandon and Phil have taken it very seriously and intend to prove that they are part of that superior group that can get away with murder.  How awful they must think of poor David.  And some of the ways Brandon justifies his murder are downright disturbing.

Rope is an ingenious murder mystery dinner, where the guests don’t even realize there has been a murder, but they pick up on the mystery.  They keep wondering where David could be, it’s not in his character to be so late.  Meanwhile, we sit on pins and needles, worried sick like Phil or jonesing on the excitement of being so close to danger like Brandon.  And all we can do is pray that Rupert does or doesn’t open that chest.

“By what right do you dare to say that there’s a superior few to which you belong?”

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

When a vacancy in the senate pops up, there is a mad dash to fill the seat with the right kind of person.  Under the thumb of James Taylor (Edward Arnold), the corrupt political boss, the governor looks for their new senator to be someone who won’t get in their way.  They find a young man who leads the Boy Rangers, Jefferson Smith (James Stewart), and send him off to Washington with the senior senator and friend of his late father, Joseph Paine (Claude Rains).

Once in Washington, Smith acts like a typical starry-eyed newcomer, wondering off to see all the monuments, fumbling with his hat around the pretty girls and naively thinking he can quickly make a difference with his new senate seat.  For Clarissa Saunders (Jean Arthur), Smith’s chief of staff, it’s almost too much to bear seeing such an innocent guy sent straight to the lions den without even realizing it.  She is well aware of the corruption going on between the men who hired Smith and has lost her faith in the government because of it.  But when Smith wants to propose a new bill for a National Boys Camp, he finds out about and sees how he could possibly take down the whole corrupt machine.  Saunders ends up coaching Smith and cheering him on as he does one of the craziest things that can happen on the senate floor, a filibuster.

Stewart’s performance is just wonderful as the innocent Mr. Smith.  From the very beginning, when we hear the governor’s sons going on about Mr. Smith, we know he’s going to be a special kind of person.  The earnest way he is so amazed by all the monuments and history of Washington is cute and refreshing compared to all the bleak corruption around him.  Even if you find his innocent fascination goofy, we see that he’s very kind, especially to the boys who run errands on the senate floor.  I’d wear that Boy Ranger pin with pride.  And when it comes time for Smith to filibuster, which seems like a hopeless cause for quite a while, Stewart does a wonderful job making his long-winded bravery something to admire.

I first saw this film in high school US government class, my teacher thought it was perfect for illustrating some of the aspects of senate processes.  That one scene where Saunders explains the entire process that a bill goes through is quite educational, if you can keep up with her.  A filibuster isn’t something you see very often, but the film also explains the rules behind that as well.  We see that being a senator can be a crafty business, even if you’re not dealing with any corruption.

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is a really great film that hold up well to a twenty-first century audience. I believe this is Frank Capra at his best and Stewart at his sweetest.  It’s smart, patriotic with honest values that doesn’t get too sweet or cute.  The balance is just right.

“All you people don’t know about lost causes.  Mr. Paine does.  He said once they were the only causes worth fighting for.”

You Can’t Take it With You

I think most people are embarrassed by their family at one point or another.  It’s almost natural at some ages.  But when we grow out of that and can step back and see that we love our folks for all the odd things we used to be shy about, what a great revelation.

In Frank Capra’s You Can’t Take it With You, greedy company owner Anthony P. Kirby (Edward Arnold) is about to create a monopoly, all he needs is to buy one last house.  His son, and therefore vice president, Tony (James Stewart), is less interested in business and is seeing his stenographer, Alice (Jean Arthur).  As he talks of marriage there is that need to meet her family.

Alice’s grandfather, Martin Vanderhof (Lionel Barrymore), owns that last house that Kirby needs for his monopoly.  Inside that house, holds a family doing whatever it is they love most.  Alice’s mother is writing a play, her father builds fireworks, and her sister dances to her heart’s delight.  The family’s house is always buzzing with music, movement and visiting friends.  When Tony first meets everyone, he’s bowled over seeing everyone doing just as they please with no interest or concern with money.  We can see an instant admiration for the idea, but with his business upbringing becomes confused by it.

As the big day for the Kirbys to come over and meet the Vanderhofs nears, Alice politely asks her sister not to dance, nor her mother to talk about her play.   It’s normal for us to sweep a few things under the rug when we’re expecting company.  However, Tony wants his parents to meet Alice’s family in their natural state and brings them over a day early, acting like he got the days mixed up.  He could not have come over to a more hilarious scene.  The rest of the film is a wonderful misadventure and comparison of the miserably rich and happily poor families.

One of my favorite moments is the way Mr. Kirby is portrayed when he first meets the Vanderhofs.  He looks like a miserable toad stewing in unsavory mud.  The family offers him a chair, that every time he moves a certain way it hit him in the back of the head.  He sinks deeper in his muck with every annoying jolt.  The family tries to be friendly and make polite conversation, but it turns to the fact that Kirby has horrible indigestion, which they diagnose as ulcers.  I doubt a more miserable creature had ever entered that happy home.

You Can’t Take it With You is full of wonderfully fun moments and great values about the importance of family and living happily.  As kids, we are encouraged to pursue whatever it is that we love to do.  Sadly, as we grow into adulthood and find our lives ruled by money, that can become more difficult.  This film may be a little unrealistic, but it puts everything into the correct perspective.  I’d rather be a happy film-blogger than an office slave caged in a cubical, I’m thankful for this opportunity and no one has scolded me for it yet.

“Well, Sir, here we are again. We’ve been getting along pretty good for quite a while now – we’re certainly much obliged. Remember all we ask is just to go along the way we are, keep our health; as far as anything else is concerned, we leave that up to you. Thank you.”

How the West Was Won

Do kids still play Cowboys and Indians today?  I’m guessing that game was at it’s peak around the early sixties with the abundance of Westerns in theaters throughout the fifties.  From what I remember, the game was basically the Indians making a bunch of noise and throwing pretend arrows or tomahawks at the cowboys who would eventually win by shooting the Indians with their pistols.  It was assumed, unless I decided to argue some history and yell, “Custer’s Last Stand!” that the cowboys were the good guys and would always win.  There are so many more interesting old west situations for kids to think up, maybe after seeing How the West Was Won kids became a little more creative with their games.

The story, narrated by Spencer Tracy, follows the Prescott family through fifty years in the old west.  Around the 1830’s the family sets westward on the Erie Canal and loses the mother and father when their raft gets into rapids.  From there, sisters Eve (Carroll Baker) and Lilly (Debbie Reynolds) split.  Eve marries Linus (James Stewart), a mountain man who has helped the family along the river, and sets up a farm where their parents are buried.  Meanwhile, Lilly continues westward, eventually landing in California to make and lose a fortune during the Gold Rush.  The Civil War brings tough choices to Eve and her boys.  Later, her son Zeb (George Peppard) becomes a Marshal trying to keep peace between the Indians and the men building a railroad right through their hunting grounds.

This film tries to be as big as all of the old west.  There’s pioneers, mountain men, cowboys, Indians, wagon trains, the Civil War, the Gold Rush, train bandits and a buffalo stampede.  Problem is it just feels like Hollywood just trying to make the biggest western ever and teach some history.  I don’t think they taught it too well, but giving John Wayne the role of General William Tecumseh Sherman will keep the kids from getting bored with their learning.

You might notice that the whole film looks like a panoramic postcard that got folded into thirds.  That’s because this is a Cinerama film, which was to be shown specifically at a Cinerama theater.  It was where three 35mm reels simultaneously projected onto a curved screen, like a non-digital IMAX of the 50s and 60s.  I’m sure it was a sight to see back then, but consequently, on all other mediums save for their specific screens there is that annoying “crease” where the separate films meet.  It’s a great idea, I was rather impressed reading about this idea, but the crease does take some getting used to.

I must say that the buffalo stampede is an amazing scene.  You will not believe how many buffalo are running around, I was completely gobsmacked.  And the angles of this captured on film are so daring, I wondered how many of their cameras were just trampled.  If epic westerns or stories of old western history don’t catch your attention, just skip straight to the stampede scene, crank up the stereo and watch it over and over.  It’s by far the best part of the film.

“This land has a name today, and is marked on maps. But, the names and the marks and the maps all had to be won, won from nature and from primitive man.”

The Greatest Show on Earth

Cecil B. DeMille brings the circus to the movies in his second to last film ever.  Working with Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus, he created a drama centering around the big top, using actual circus performances within the film and making his actors learn their characters specific acts.  That meant that Gloria Grahame really had to put her head under an elephant’s foot.

The story follows a traveling circus.  Charlton Heston plays Brad, the leader of the whole circus who’s always thinking of the next show and all the details that go into making sure the show goes on.  Holly (Betty Hutton) tries to be his girlfriend, but Brad is more concerned with her trapeze act.  When Brad hires the famous Sebastian (Cornel Wilde) as the center ring trapeze act, Holly is upset and wants her spotlight back.  She and Sebastian start a live competition during their acts, trying to match and one-up each other forty feet in the air with no nets.  It’s daring, breathtaking and dangerous.  Brad looks on trying to decide when to pull the plug, but the audience is eating it up faster than cotton candy.  It’s only a matter of time before someone gets hurt.

My favorite role in this film is Jimmy Stewart as Buttons the Clown.  For viewers out getting popcorn during the opening credits, they might not notice that familiar face behind the clown makeup.  I think that was what DeMille was going for, especially when later in the film a picture of Stewart is shown.  I can just imagine people in the audience gasping, “That’s Jimmy Stewart, I didn’t know he was in this movie!”  I laughed at first, unable to imagine Stewart pulling off a decent clown, but was pleasantly surprised.  He’s fun and really great with the physical comedy.  Plus, it’s nice to see that he can wear floppy shoes and a goofy hat, rather than a suit.

The great thing about this film is the service DeMille did for thousands of kids to see the circus.  Circuses can’t possibly travel to every town, but nearly ever kid had heard of them.  So why not put Ringling Brothers on film and bring the circus to them?  A story even goes that Steven Spielberg’s father took him to see this film at four years old, telling little Steven that he was taking him to the circus.  I’m sure many of that generation had similar experiences.

Today, Ringling Brothers travels to arenas all over the country and very few circuses bring their own big-top.  The stunts are more dangerous and spectacular.  Many who see The Greatest Show on Earth now will laugh at the little circus parade and wonder when the sphere with motorcycles racing inside will happen.  But I hope that others can appreciate the colorful spectacle before them, enjoy the plot behind the scenes and remember DeMille for his beautiful accomplishment.  For kids and adults alike, this really was The Greatest Show on Earth.

“We bring you the circus, pied piper whose magic tunes greet children of all ages, from six to 60, into a tinsel and spun-candy world of reckless beauty and mounting laughter and whirling thrills.”

The Philadelphia Story

Wait…this was a comedy?

Shortly after Tracy (Katharine Hepburn) and Dexter (Cary Grant) are married they have a heated divorce.  Two years later, she’s getting ready to marry respectable George.  Dexter has plans to spoil the big day and even get it in the dreaded tabloid, Spy, after blackmailing Tracy with a juicy story about her father and a dancer.  James Stewart plays Macaulay Connor, a talented writer trying to find the balls to resign from Spy, but until then, covering Tracy’s wedding.  But the night before the wedding, everyone gets drunk and scandalous incidents occur that could ruin the big day.

The plot sounds like it could be hilarious, but it’s dry as a bag of bird seed.  There are some decent one-liners, a joke or two, but they just don’t stick the landing.  The plot tries too hard when at first, Tracy has to jump through hoops trying to trick Macaulay all day.  But after she’s good and wasted she’s all over him in the backyard.  The only honest laugh out of me this entire film was when Stewart says, “Wee!” while being spun drunk in a wheelbarrow.

Most of the funny parts are snuffed too quickly to get a laugh, or any emotion, out.  I guess towards the end, when half an hour is spent dwelling on whether Tracy slept with Stewart is supposed to be funny.  Maybe it was back then, but now it was just watching a hung-over bride have her virtue on trial by three men (and her little sister).  It could have been so much funnier, without treading into rude or raunchy waters, like it surely would today.

Stewart is fun to watch though, especially when he’s drunk enough to stumble into Dexter’s home at four in the morning with a bottle of champagne and a Dixie cup.  The earliest of Stewart’s movies I had seen before this was Rope (1948), so the moment he walked on screen with his hat askew like a skinny, plucky kid I immediately said, “Holy crap, he’s so young!”  He’s the one thing that pulls this soggy story out of the water and gets the viewer interested.

Hepburn portrays Tracy too much as a snobby bitch/loose whore to really captivate the viewers.  They desperately try to steer her away from those traits, but really that’s what we’re all thinking.  She has human moments, but they’re fleeting and soon she’s either down in her gutter or back on her pedestal.  Stewart’s real, and that’s why he wins for Best Actor.

So how can I recommend The Philadelphia Story? Well, Stewart, Hepburn and Grant fans can put this on their list.  People who like socialites and big parties from the ‘40’s, sure, why not?  Everyone else might just shrug and go, “Meh.”

“I thought all writers drank to excess and beat their wives. You know one time I secretly wanted to be a writer.”

Anatomy of a Murder

Anatomy of a Murder is a courtroom drama staring James Stewart as lawyer Paul Biegler.  He’s defending Frederick Manion (Ben Gazzara) who killed a local bar tender who raped his wife.  They decide to use a plea innocent with a reasoning of temporary insanity.  When court opens, Biegler is up against two lawyers, including a celebrity prosecutor Claude Dancer (George C. Scott), and like a very boisterous chess game, they must outmaneuver each other in this courtroom battle.

With the striking visual credits, James Stewart and the ideas that come to mind with a word like Murder I was expecting something in a more Hitchcock fashion.  Though, it’s not likely you’ll be bored by this legal battle.  Stewart and Scott keep everything lively, fresh and loud.  They shout “Objection!” until it’s just second nature.  Watching the two lawyers saunter around each other is fun and a surprise comes up from time to time.  It’s not very suspenseful, but there’s no cut and dry winner until the very end.

Now, I have to bring up a brief bit of film history.  It’s only by Hitchcock’s passive-aggressive plan to keep Stewart out of his 1959 film, North by Northwest, that Stewart was even in Anatomy of a Murder.  You see, Stewart had starred in four of Hitchcock’s films since 1948, Rope, Rear Window, The Man Who Knew Too Much and in 1958, Vertigo.  Naturally, Stewart seemed to assume that Hitchcock wanted him to play the lead in North by Northwest, and was getting very excited about the role.  But, Hitchcock thought that Vertigo had done so poorly because Stewart was starting to look too old, and wanted Cary Grant as his next star.  Realizing the misunderstanding, Hitchcock delayed production until Stewart was committed to the role in Anatomy of a Murder and had to turn down Hitchcock.

James Stewart was one of the great actors in the Golden Age of Hollywood.  Now, I have not seen his Oscar winning performance in The Philadelphia Story yet, but as far as I’ve seen, Stewart plays Stewart in different roles.  By that, I mean he can act and well, he holds our attention and commands the screen like and expert, but he is the same character in every movie.  Stewart as a small time lawyer acts and talks the same as Stewart as a banged up photographer and as a man searching for his son.  That’s why he’s so popular, to this day.  You always know it’s him.

I believe Anatomy of a Murder was nominated because of its compelling story and fast paced courtroom scenes.  Some people will imagine courtroom scenes to be boring, with lawyers that drone and a jury that can’t keep their eyes open.  This is the opposite.  Both lawyers fire off like loose cannons every few minutes.  Their interrogations are very telling and can range from emotional to laugh out loud comical.

Watch Anatomy of a Murder if you are a James Stewart fan or just enjoy courtroom battles.

Also, if you’re a fan of George C. Scott, go back to my previous post.  I apologize,  I just got too wrapped up on other parts of the film to mention that he plays a great part in The Hustler as well.