Movie Watch 2012: Shadow of the Thin Man

I'm not quite ready to submerge myself back into noir at the moment, so this evening I took the half-step of watching a Nick & Nora movie, Shadow of the Thin Man (1941).

Its definitely not the place to start with the series, and it seems to dial up the goofiness a few notches (especially with how the movie deals with Asta, Nick's loyal Fox Terrier).  In fact, the whole operation has the feel of a particularly high-end hour long police procedural series one might catch on ABC (its not bone dry and soul crushing enough for CBS, and there's not enough shame involved to qualify it for NBC).  Of course, Nick's habitual drinking would probably need to land the show on premium cable or late night on FX.

But this was a movie for folks who already loved the three prior Thin Man films.  By this movie, there's a Charles child, a maid and a whole lot of domesticity.  Nora is barely seen knocking them back.

Anyway, someone gets murdered and Nick and Nora get involved, and wackiness ensues.

I can't help but note that this movie was released in November of 1941.  Pretty tough time to be getting word of mouth out there.  Myrna Loy would become heavily involved in supporting the war effort, not making another movie until the 1945 follow up to this picture.

As with all previous Thin Man films, I recommend.

Also, again, Myrna Loy.

Signal Watch Watches: Queen of Outer Space

Sometimes I just record things off Turner Classic because the name intrigues me.  And that's how I wound up recording Queen of Outer Space (1958).

If you like your gender roles defined by the fevered visions of a clumsy 7th grade boy from 1957, have I got a movie for you!  

Possibly the most cheerfully sexist movie I've ever seen, Queen of Outer Space follows the misadventures daring exploits of three dimbulb brave astronauts in the far future of 1985. Whilst transporting a "professor" to a space station, things go awry and the spaceship lands on Venus.  Venus, wouldn't you know it, turns out to have a population of nothing but dames in high heels and mini-skirts toting ray guns.  Yes yes, its the kind of movie where space vixens all speak English, wear make-up and their hair is done up in the fashions of the day.  And they'd all be a lot better off if they had some men around.  Sure, they're ruled by a despotic queen (of outerspace), but they also have Zsa Zsa Gabor completely half-assing her way through the movie.

There's a cautionary tale in here both about the ravages of war and the victims left behind AND about what every little lady just wants a little smooching and she'll be fine.

No doubt, this is exactly the late night movie Amazon Women on the Moon was spoofing, and its easy to see why.  MST3K must never have secured the rights to this one, but it feels like the sort of thing they would have quite enjoyed working on.

SPOILER

I also like how the movie ends with the promise of sex, sex and more sex for our brave astronauts.  Well done, 1958.

END SPOILER

Yes, I heartily recommend this movie for all the right reasons and to see a just-past-her-prime Zsa Zsa doing her best to at least show up in this movie.


this trailer actually gets a few plot points wrong, but... whatever.

Here's the whole movie.

Movie Watch 2012: The Dirty Dozen

It's not that I hadn't seen The Dirty Dozen (1967).  I watched it on VHS back in 7th grade or so, and I remember sort of liking it, but the fact that its paced a bit slower than action movies of the 1980's meant that it didn't engage me as much as, say, Commando.  Since then, I've seen bits and pieces of the movie on cable, and, of course, the premise of the movie has been copied and borrowed from so often, as well as the idea of a rag-tag-bunch-of-ne'er-do-wells-think-outside-the-box-and-that's-why-they're-successful has been copied in everything from Suicide Squad comics to the Police Academy series.

this is not dissimilar to how I deal with new employees

Watching the movie now is fascinating as I know a bit more of the talent in the movie.   Not just Bronson, Borgnine, Telly Savalas and Lee Marvin.  Robert Ryan, Donald Sutherland, John Cassavetes, Jim Brown and others are in the film.  Its a real all-star fest.

As far as war pictures go, its a product of its time, reveling in the scrappy outsiders, but not quite celebrating them in the way we'd see in Kelly's Heroes by 1970, who were in the war for fun and profit.*

With such a large cast of soldiers, some played by stars, some not, all convicted criminals (not a spoiler, ya'll), it also fits in neatly with the sort of movie where anyone could go at any minute, which ups the ante when it comes to the tension of the flick.  Sure, some of these guys you aren't going to feel too badly if they go, but it all feels a bit like a suicide mission from the outset, so....



*I'm a Kelly's Heroes fan, by the way.  Terrific movie.

Signal Watch Reads: Superman #5

Superman #5
Menace!
writer - George Pérez
penciller - Nicola Scott
inker - Trevor Scott
colorist - Brett Smith
letterer - Rob Leigh
cover - George Pérez & Brian Buccellato
associate editor - Wil Moss, editor - Matt Idleson

It seems like its been a good long while since I've talked Superman.  Not that anyone cares, but...  anyway.

Movie Watch 2012: The Trip

I'd been recommended the movie The Trip (2010) by a good pal who doesn't actually read this site, and so I should lie and say I selected the movie on my own.  We started watching the movie at his place two weeks ago, but I finally finished it last night on Netflix streaming.

Its a small, inexpensive movie from the UK featuring Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, and frankly, despite the fact that Mangum has very good taste in movies, I was skeptical.  The movie is about two actors named Steve and Rob (ahem) who go on a road trip through northern England.  The set-up is that Steve is writing an article about his trip for a UK publication, intending to bring his American girlfriend, but who departs for the States just before the trip (possibly ending their relationship).

Its a movie of First World Problems, and those of successful entertainers, but it still manages to keep the protagonists sympathetic both by making their problems sympathetic and basically relatable (and doesn't suggest Coogan, in particular, is exactly a victim).    Most curiously, the movie manages to balance out how the same things that make the two as popular as they are is both hilarious at times and flat out irritating at others, as is spending time in such close proximity for such a long time to someone you know so well.

The movie has large swaths of what I assume was improvised.  Its worth noting that the crew on this has worked together before, and clearly felt comfortable pushing one another both for better content and for some awkward moments.

Coogan's grappling with what is seeming like a near-miss of a huge career is contrasted against Brydon's apparent contentment, and what could have been a bit of oddly self-serving narrative actually works better than you'd think.  Coogan has had a less than hugely successful career in the US, including a smaller role in Tropical Thunder and in his starring turn in the not-great Hamlet 2.  One can't help but wonder exactly how much of this movie is just... is this just these two guys hanging out and letting someone film them in various scenarios?

Whether that's the focus of the movie or if we're to simply enjoy the banter, I'm not entirely sure.  Its not a life-changing film, but its very clever and occasionally outright funny.

I don't usually talk endings of movies, and I won't here other than to say that if you're going to make a movie about First World Problems, make sure it at least feels as if there's a point by the end.  This movie actually pulls that off pretty well, I think.

Noir Watch Extra: Tension

Between movies, we had a bit of downtime, and so Doug and I joined Jenifer at her swanky apartment where we watched a B-Noir, Tension (1949).

Before we get any further, I had never been less sympathetic to any noir character than I was to Richard Basehart as Warren Quimby, a man who has a dilemma at one point in the movie of picking between Audrey Totter and Cyd Charisse.  Go to hell, Basehart.

Tension probably has its roots in someone reading or seeing The Postman Always Rings Twice and the pot boiler melodramas of the era.  Postman had been adapted in 1946, and while there are limited similarities, you can see that the characters are sort of pushing around what the characters did when and why.  The movie also lifts from Superman comics and Charles Atlas ads, and so one must tip their hat to the writers and director for borrowing from the best.

Noir City Special! "Laura" and "Bedelia"

On my final night in San Francisco I joined Lauren (a trooper for making it out though still weak from several days of illness), Doug, Kristen, Morgan and (of course) Jenifer for a double feature of Laura (1944) and British noir film, Bedelia (1946).

It was an interesting contrast between the two movies, and I haven't seen all that much British noir.  Really, aside from Brighton Rock a year and a half ago, not much else pops immediately to mind.

Laura, of course, I'd seen before a few times (I own it on DVD), and I've covered it here before in brief.

On this viewing, I particularly appreciated Clifton Webb as Waldo Lydecker.  Webb plays the role pitch-perfect as the effete, urbane and witty sophisticate, perhaps at home at the Algonquin Round Table.  With a house full of fans of the film, it was a lot of fun.

It still feels like a rather small movie, and there's no hint of the war-time release, but its still an effective picture.  Further, its not a movie that leans too heavily on Laura's place as a woman making her helpless from a financial perspective, which seems right for the time.  She may have received a break from Waldo, but she earns her place in the advertising world, and, in fact, its the towering Vincent Price who weasels for money, unable to support himself.

Noir City Special! Noir Watch: "The Killers" and "Point Blank"

On Saturday night, the Noir City festival scheduled two films from the 1960's, both starring Angie Dickinson and Lee Marvin.  Angie Dickinson appeared as a special guest and we all got to enjoy Eddie Muller's interview conducted on stage.  I am happy to say that Ms. Dickinson lived up to the hype.

This year's Noir City programming strayed into (gasp) some color-era films, which immediately raises eyebrows and draws some suspicion regarding whether its true noir, at least partly because the societal forces that drove the era most thought of as noir were now passing into the rearview mirror.  By the 1960's, we'd had World War II and Korea, and were headed for Vietnam, but the US was firing on all cylinders economically.  But the underlying questions of the corruption caused by wealth (or opportunity for wealth), and the irrational things a guy will do for the wrong girl seemed as universal as ever.

The Killers (1964) is, ostensibly, based upon the Ernest Hemingway short story of the same name, but is really based upon the 1946 film starring Burt Lancaster and Ava Gardner.  Only the barest hints of the original short story remain, and the template of two intimidating thugs shaking down unprepared chumps wasn't exactly fresh by 1964.

Still, the movie works in all the ways it should as a competent heist movie.  As mentioned, the film stars Marvin as one of the pair of contract killers and Dickinson as the love interest of John Cassevetes as the film's protagonist.  In the world of seeing things you thought you'd never see, the first shot of Ronald Reagan* as Jack Browning (Reagan's final film role) paired with a pre-Mr. Roper Norman Fell as his thuggish companion drew an audible reaction from the audience at The Castro.

Someone at DC Comics realized you can use the images of heroes to do more than sell t-shirts

Something that has long bothered me about superhero comics and their fans (and very often their creators) has been how disconnected the industry is from doing anything that isn't completely self-interested.  Its an oddity of superhero fandom that this genre, which began with the concept of someone using their talents altruistically so infrequently seems to capable of leveraging the ideals of their characters in either their own business or in public dealings.

Of course the media-saturated generation of which I suppose I am a part has decided the way to help is to become a costumed crime-fighter/ person who wears a costume and parades around (aka: The Reals) instead of just cutting a check to the Red Cross.

The only person I have personally met who has merged the two ideas is Austin's Jarrett Crippen, aka: The Defuser, who used his win on Stan Lee's Who Wants to be a Superhero? to promote his charity work with groups like Scare for a Cure.

Well, DC Entertainment apparently has signed on to work with a program called We Can Be Heroes that is an umbrella project to work with several groups fighting hunger in the Horn of Africa.  You can see the site, but be aware that music will play automatically (and, curiously, not the Bowie song).

Giving now will mean DC Entertainment will match your donation by 100%.  I tip my hat.

Yes, cynically you can say that DC is looking to promote their characters, but whatever the case, they are trying to do something other than just turn a dollar.  Its a step toward remembering that these are characters who represent goodwill and assistance for others, and that you don't just punch away every problem.  If putting Superman and Aquaman on a coffee mug is what it takes to promote awareness and drive funding for the organization, I'm all for it.

Noir City Guest Post! Jenifer talks "Gilda" and "The Money Trap"

Hey Signal Corps!  Jenifer has offered to provide commentary on films during the remainder of the Noir City Festival.  I'll be posting her musings as she sends them in.  Hope you enjoy.




Tonight, Noir City offered the best of Rita Hayworth, in Gilda (1946), and her not-so-best, The Money Trap (1965). Both pair her with Glenn Ford, and show the chemistry the two had on screen even after 20 years.

Gilda is well known and documented, but for those who don't know, Gilda was a vehicle for Rita Hayworth that established her as a love (sex) goddess. It's an example of how producers worked around the strict Production Code enforced on movies at the time. In Gilda, the sexual symbolism is everywhere, and the innuendo beautifully done.

The Money Trap is an odd little film starring Glenn Ford. He plays a cop married to the young, beautiful, and once-rich Elke Sommer. They aren't rich anymore, but they "live rich". Investigating what looks like a burglary where the home-owner shot the burglar, he is tipped off to a safe full of money. Encouraged by his equally money-driven partner, Ricardo Montalban, the two plan to break into the safe themselves. 

Rita Hayworth plays a long-time childhood friend and girlfriend of Ford's, married to the burglar who was killed. Though shockingly presented, it's clear that her character is meant to be run-down and aged, drinking too much, married to a crook, and waiting tables in a bar. She was 47, practically an elderly woman by movie and social standards of the time. It's a shame she wasn't that age now, when women in their forties are still seen as beautiful and even sexy.

Innuendo does not exist in this film. Everything is stated plainly, as that had become more acceptable in film. Rita has the best line. While she and Ford reminisce in a car, he tells her the time they were together on the roof of her building was his first. She says, "I know. You acted like you just discovered America." Later when they reconnect she calls him Columbus.