A Valentino Dug Up

Beyond The Rocks (1922) Found Under Euro Rock

Illicit Lovers Behind, Husband In Front (at Right) --- A Given In Anything By Glyn 

The mating of eagles, as in Rudolph Valentino and Gloria Swanson (hold on --- shouldn’t her name go first?). Swanson lamented in late years that Beyond The Rocks was apparently lost, which by reason should have been and stayed so, but turns out there was a world class hoarder across the Atlantic with nitrate tucked safe away (not altogether --- it was deteriorating). So which is nuttier --- art or film collectors? And what of stamps, comics, butterflies? Whatever gets Beyond The Rocks back out there will serve, and even where the wait is ninety years and then some, that’s worth it for up-dredge of fresh Rudy. Story basis was Elinor Glyn, who maybe we should reevaluate, but that would mean reading her novels, so nix at this outpost. I do have a Photoplay edition for Beyond The Rocks, of which thickness is daunting. This movie could have had Valentino and Swanson throwing pies and still made a fortune, so intense was popularity they shared (and curiosity we've had since). She pulled Paramount oars better than he, Valentino from beginnings a chaff to authority. That was mostly for wife-nag at home, plus influence of others who had his ear (June Mathis a positive force, ones like Nazimova less so). Poor Rudy seemed a 20’s master at wrong moves.

A Ceremonial Sword For Madame Glyn --- She'd Wield It Right Through The Silent Era

Period Poofery a Must For Rudy, Even If It's Only a Flashback Sequence

The era was rife at folks marrying unwisely, only to have a right partner come along post-vows. Here it’s Gloria selling soul and body to a rich old “duffer” (so-called by titles) who you can’t imagine taking her abed. Along comes Rudy, twice to rescue from death, first drowning, then falling off a mountain. How else could Gloria show gratitude? Except she doesn’t, idea (hers) that they must rise above their mutual desire to do the “right thing,” movie shorthand for self-denial. Is this what we wanted in 1922, or were viewers more of a mind to see Rudy and Gloria throw caution to winds? Noted today, and maybe then, is fact he wears clothes better than she. Valentino was true sartorial resplendence. That’s one of big reasons he clicked. Plus the way Rudy moved in clothes. American men were bums beside him, ongoing basis for hating the hapless guy. Valentino was too often an onscreen object to gaze at, he and comptroller Natasha (the wife) scoffing at parts that would mirror the way his fans wanted their star. Few lead men went so against the grain of public preference as Rudy.

Many a Furtive and Longing Glance Exchanged in Beyond The Rocks. Here is One.

Some of Beyond The Rocks nitrate is eaten away. Infest begins in a couple of scenes and then get worse before relenting. It’s spooky to see already distant-from-us Rudy struggling against rot in the very frame that confines him. Makes me think of fate that stood in wings, but not much longer, for Valentino himself. What a contrast between he and Swanson. She'd last a seeming forever, even unto The Beverly Hillbillies and an Airport movie, while Rudy would fade before films could capture his voice. To be a real legend too often means dying young. If Beyond The Rocks had been just a rediscovered Gloria Swanson vehicle (there are plenty of those missing), there would have been considerable less interest. Valentino is the elixir here, Beyond The Rocks closing us in on nearly full account of his starring vehicles. What’s left to find --- A Sainted Devil, all of The Young Rajah, a few left of the early ones? I recall the Portal Publications poster repro of A Sainted Devil, bought for a dollar and hung in my boy room. Will I be around long enough to see that one rescued and restored?

When Rip-Off Cavegirls Ruled The Earth

Creatures The World Forgot (1971) Is Just That

The saints deliver us from cave pics that stunk up cinemas from success of One Million Years B.C in 1966. Here was a near-last of them that didn't even have dinosaurs! That's like not putting chocolate in a Hershey Bar. I watched this for a first time on Sony HD because (1) it's a Hammer till now unseen, and (2) High-Def, which has brought me to alter of many I'd otherwise skip for balance of life. So how does one justify 92 minutes spent with cave-folk? You could say curiosity, but that dissipates by a reel's finish; from there it's a duty sit and a lugubrious one. Pre-history stuff was a closest talkies came to renewing silents. Did folks realize they were watching movies pretty much like Grandpop did? Then there's speculation over whether or not the print you're seeing is complete. Was nudity Euros got denied to us? There's forum dwellers aplenty who will tell you yes. As to whether that matters, well, yes, it's the only thing that does in pix so leaden. Maybe I'm harsh; as cave dramas go, Creatures The World Forgot could be worse, even as fans declare any of others to be better. There's no secret that whatever principal girl was cast would sell them, in this case Julie Ege, who comes in late (Creatures a multi-generational saga, like Cavalcade in fur tatters). Ege misses primitive look we expect --- probably the best at that was Martine Beswick of Prehistoric Women, the only actress I'm aware of that rock-dwelled on two occasions (Women plus One Million Years B.C.). Just imagine hope ingénues hung on being a next Raquel Welch (see above lure from Hammer) --- immortality borne upon the wings of a Pterodactyl.

Where Ruth Roman Was "All-Woman"

Vidor Shoots Dramatic Works with Lightning Strikes Twice (1951)

King Vidor getting away from MGM must have given him appetite for bug-eyed melodrama --- just look at hysteria wrought in these: Duel In The Sun, The Fountainhead, Beyond The Forest, Ruby Gentry, plus today's watch, Lightning Strikes Twice, a barely known WB he spoke of least in career overviews. Vidor after the war gave vent to fierce emotion, all out of drawer I'd call Tempest-Toss. Douglas Sirk's hothouse for Universal was ice-cooled beside these. Something set Vidor's blood at boiler as autumn years approached, him in 50's by the mid-forties and set upon exclamatory course that would last most of career's remainder. Did Duel In The Sun instill appreciation for stories told with corks out? The Fountainhead would be as robust, Gary Cooper gone caveman on Patricia Neal as he never would to clinch-mates again. This was GC tapping sensual reserve for a last time before surrender to Redwood forest of lead men past romantic prime. The Fountainhead seemed a most dynamic show ever when I saw it first in the mid-70's, inspiring sight-unseen purchase of Lightning Strikes Twice on 16mm months later (came cheap from a dealer who seldom watched his stock). The title promised much --- would Vidor hurl another bolt with this one?

It was minor Vidor, minor Warners, really minor everyone involved. A vehicle for Ruth Roman during brief moment when vehicles for her seemed a reasonable prospect, Lightning Strikes Twice lost a quarter-million for bad bet on an actress who'd not be a next Bette Davis, or even Virginia Mayo. Such was broken instrument of WB star-building after the war, their only big lick along these lines being Doris Day, w/ others trailed far behind and none to last so long as Day. Lightning Strikes Twice turns on unsolved murder in desert setting, at times Hitchcockian. I wonder if the property wasn't run by Hitch before Vidor took the ball. This was the sort of assignment directors got when their best years were behind them. Vidor suggested later that he shot scenes too hot for Warners to retain. Richard Todd is a wrong-man tabbed as killer, not unlike his Stage Fright for Hitchcock a couple years before. The writing perplexes where it doesn't confuse, but Vidor gooses tempo with forceful staging, much of it frisky enough for the rest not to matter. Lightning Strikes Twice is forgotten, but doesn't deserve to be. It shows up at TCM now and then, plus there's a Warner Archive DVD.

Marines, Let's Go!

Saddling Up For The War

Basically a training camp comedy/romance that suddenly got serious when a real-life war happened, To the Shores of Tripoli caught luck of timing to become a major hit for 20th in 1942. We barely know it today for dated content, but this was one for flags flown and goosing patronage to rout of the enemy. Tripoli became, thanks to Pearl Harbor, something more than time passed in seats. The Chicago Theatre first-run illustrates: "Precision drills" on stage, with "actual tank miniatures in operation," this daily from 10:00 AM, then for capper at 10:30 PM, the U.S. Marines "Crack Drill Detachment" and 30-Voice Glee Club. We might assume customers headed straight from the auditorium to enlistment stations, provided latter kept late hours (so query --- was recruitment and sign-up a 24-7 operation through WWII?). Why would boys duck service when training looked to be a lark like shown in To the Shores of Tripoli? Sunny clime of San Diego for boot camping, weekend dance with pretty nurses, Hershey Bars from the canteen --- who knew this was prelude to island-hopping hell and loss after loss the USMC would suffer in grim opener months of the war?

We can observe from seventy-five year distance and imagine WWII to be more fun than not, based on Technicolor pour over reality. Easy to smite To the Shores of Tripoli for misleading its public, but this was war. All had to be aboard for the struggle to stay free and continue to enjoy silly movies loose with the truth, but reassuring all the same and at a time where no questions need be asked re harsher truths of the conflict. Leave that to newsreels, which, sanitized as most were, at least showed men in actual field of combat instead of soundstage repose and being kissed by Maureen O'Hara. We'll never know how seductive To the Shores of Tripoli was to youth already with an itch to join. Pic was premiered March 1942, appropriately in San Diego, Marine camp location for cast/crew. Just picture high school graduates a couple months later crowding into boot camps eager to receive them, To the Shores of Tripoli and ones like it greasing the way.

1952 Cleveland Reissue with, Ouch!, B/W Prints

At least Zanuck realized what flight of fancy this was. "Nobody can accuse us of any great originality as far as plot or characters are concerned," said he in a 4/42 memo, which also pointed out rightly that "if the background and atmosphere are interesting, if the theme is patriotic, if the action is exciting, and if you have good comedy values, the fact that the plot is A-B-C doesn't make the slightest difference." Director H. Bruce Humberstone wanted to do To the Shores of Tripoli because he knew we'd be in a war by the time shooting was finished, or so he said to interviewing Jon Tuska decades later (Humberstone claimed that the last day of production was 12/7/41 --- did they work on Sunday?). There was last minute reshuffle when Pearl attack made changes urgent. An ending was scrapped (graduation from basic training), with a new one showing troops shipping out in wake of Dec. 7 attack. This would bring narrative even with headlines, and put To the Shores of Tripoli among first of service films recognizing recent events. Even with Technicolor, the show had been completed for an economical one million. It would more than triple that in worldwide rentals. Spring of 1942 saw To the Shores of Tripoli "continuing to make a bum out of every picture we have made in the last three years, including How Green Was My Valley" (Zanuck).

Here's suggestion for a double-bill: To the Shores of Tripoli with Laurel and Hardy in Great Guns, both begun as peacetime service shows, accent on lighter aspect of training programs, each benefiting from actual war that made them popular beyond merit of either. What we overlook now is how timely the two were, and basis this was for pleasing reviewers and the audience. To praise especially Great Guns seems irrational to us, but we weren't there in 1941 when it raised roofs of theatres nationwide. Laurel and Hardy were far more relevant here than they had been for years ... at least to 1941's reckoning. As for To the Shores of Tripoli, what more joy than spending ninety minutes inside a very camp to which loved ones might be dispatched. Such glimpse of their training to come had close-to-home significance for almost everyone in seats. What seems silly to us was like documentary for them. And to put Laurel-Hardy in uniform, on eve of a brand new war, seemed only natural (even though both were plenty old enough to have fought in the last war).

It mattered less that the team lost creative input. Just showing up was plenty enough. Frightful as their Fox films now seem (to some, but not all), going there could be argued as a right move, at least in context of the times. Options for L&H otherwise? More for Roach, likely streamliners, w/ distribution through United Artists no match for 20th Fox finesse in that area, or continued tours through presentation houses, a viable notion, but essentially vaudeville and constant on-the-road. To stay truly visible, Laurel and Hardy had to be on screens, and in new product. At least Fox got them out there and in front of large audiences. Plus the films were well-attended and presumably enjoyed. Fact they'd date, and be less appealing today, was fate Great Guns and rest of 40's L&H would share with To the Shores of Tripoli and so much of what came out in wartime, but viewed with WWII urgencies in mind, they can all still be appreciated and enjoyed. To the Shores of Tripoli streams in HD on I-Tunes, and looks fine.

More Rail-Set Mystery

I Am A Thief (1935) Is Florey/Warners Confession

We're in pretty far before knowing who the thief, or thieves, are, but that won't reduce fun of a rail-set Warner programmer that gives effect of its moving train (vibrations, swishing water in glassware, etc.). Did realist touch come at director Robert Florey's insist? He was especially apt with low budgets, obliged at WB to stint as would be case at Paramount career summit (Florey in hindsight most celebrated for his B's). I Am A Thief sees diamonds stolen, replaced by fakes, confusion a risk if you leave the room or change channels. Ricardo Cortez is a smooth operator: could the titular confession be his? People (like me) gravitate to train thrillers partly because we travel lots less (if at all) that way, let alone in sleeping berths or club cars. I'd gladly tolerate a murder or two, other than my own, to engage such passage. Old movies appeal largely for show of different (read better) way folks then-lived. I Am A Thief then, is valued less as thriller intended than celebration of lifestyle we'll not get back.

Crosby Plays To The South

Dixie (1943) Is Bing's First Feature In Technicolor

Was there nothing of interest in Dan Emmett's life other than minstrelsy and fact he wrote "Dixie"? Judging by total fictionalization here, I'd guess not. Emmett was obscure to a 40's public beyond cleffing of immortal title song, a 19th century one-hit wonder. Other of Dixie music came of modern tunesmiths, done to Crosby measure and never mind fidelity to the period or unique format that was minstrelsy. That last gets in Bing's way for his having to cork up for most numbers and thus lost in crowd of similarly disguised ensemble. Recreation of minstrel shows is true to basics, but not detail. We get little sense of how hugely popular this format was back in heyday, peak of which predated even oldsters who went to see Dixie in 1943. Still, most at least knew what minstrels were, even as race sensitivity had begun process of discrediting them. WWII was spur to this --- I'd venture there would not have been a Dixie made even three-four years later. Advantage pic had in 1943 was nary mention of the current war, audiences having got exhausted with the topic, and eager for full escape from it. Still, the trailer lauded "Dixie" as "The Greatest War Song Of All Time," so there's at least a nod.

Six "New Songs" were on tap --- Crosby faithfuls Johnny Burke and Jimmy Van Heusen got a workout here. Beating of formula rug needed six writers, an always trouble with highest profile product where each party second-guessed the other. This was surprisingly Bing Crosby's first starring feature in Technicolor, a fact made well-known in ads, but he'd otherwise be poorly served, for Dixie wavers where he's not singing, the gags lame and a love triangle hardly to liking of viewers then or now. There's a running joke of Bing's mislaid pipe starting fires, as in to-the-ground, which is not only unfunny, but outright disturbing when one of blazes takes place in a crowded theatre. Was it wise to make light of disasters still in memory of many during that nitrate era when cataclysms often resulted in loss of lives? Theatre fires were simply not something to kid about, and I'm surprised Para brass didn't scotch the over-emphasized routine. Directing Dixie was A. Edward Sutherland, a comedy whiz from silents, but defeated by faulty makings here; he and Crosby had done much better by similar content in 1935's Mississippi. Dixie can be had on Region Two DVD, another of Universal's bearded transfers, a pity because this one could look great in HD with reclaimed Technicolor.

A 1974 Listening Device

The Conversation Seems Older Than It Is

Horse-and-buggy thriller from day when folks used pay telephones and reel-to-reel tape recorders, The Conversation looks to youth as Biograph shorts would for rest of us. The Conversation was referred to as an "art" film by marketers and audiences who sought to disparage it, Paramount stuck with distributing the thing so they could have more of Mafia shoot-ups from director Francis Coppolla, who did this between his first two Godfathers. Coppolla had co-formed a boutique firm with hot helmsmen (Peter Bogdanovich, William Friedkin) to make stuff most of a public wouldn't warm to. "The Director's Company" came afoul of internal conflict and ultimate collapse --- imagine these egos in a give-take situation, which was needed if the firm could thrive. The Conversation was no grievous flop, but Godfather grosses weren't had here, Coppola needing them to keep flow of studio blank checks. He'd next make partial artie of The Godfather's sequel, a letdown for viewers who preferred more of 1972 same, result grosses below half of what Corleones took a first time out.

The Conversation was shades of import hit Blow-Up from earlier (1966), but latter had sex, Euro novelty to overcome balky narrative. The Conversation was loner Gene Hackman tailing strangers for a faceless authority who may be planning murder, an angle that under livelier circumstance might make a good thriller, but it's mood Coppola was after, not movement. To that he succeeds, Hackman going about drab business of audio snooping with equipment we'd call hopelessly outdated, or to be kinder, charmingly quaint. There, then, is enhanced interest for The Conversation, reminder that life and making furtive living was a very different proposition in what was then thought of as modern times. This is one that could be effectively remade today on digital terms, a latter-day Hackman hacking his targets with devices unimaginable in 1974, but could such revisit maintain Coppola's restraint otherwise?

Best scenes are where least is happening, Hackman wandering among dealers at a surveillance trade show (do these still thrive?), inviting colleagues to his nerve center for listening in. The Conversation was meant to alarm us for how easy it was to be overheard, privacy a thing easily invaded and soon to disappear altogether as technology penetrated walls. How forward-seeing it was in that respect, what with modern surrender to an Internet that detects our every move, in or outside homes no longer barrier to intrusion. The Conversation was lumped among a cycle of "paranoid" pics and done years before such paranoia became simple and accepted reality of life. Was Coppola anticipating what would happen to us all in the 21st century? Seen in that sense, The Conversation is stern warning of hardship our tech gadgets would ultimately bring on. Could any 70's writer or director foresee the day our televisions would silently monitor viewing, buying, and social habits? Only difference now, it doesn't need a Gene Hackman to breech boundaries. We've willingly let these Wurdelaks in.

When Every Mother's Dream Was a Curly Locks Boy

Little Lord Fauntleroy a Classic Told and Retold

Illustration Art for the Novel by Reginald Birch

Nameless Youth Bears Burden of Fauntleroy Fashion

His name, if recognized at all, is an object of ridicule, an impossibly goody-good boy in curls and lace. The image was used to denote spoiled-rottenness in over-indulged Edwardian youth, a thing to be stamped out as the 20th century remade culture. David Selznick had read the 1886 novel as a boy and revered it. When he wanted to make his first independent movie of it in 1935, advisers warned that Fauntleroy was a hopeless "chestnut," best left to memories of Mary Pickford from a silent version in 1921. DOS went ahead anyway and got a hit out of Little Lord Fauntleroy. The story's been done since, several times, but I wonder how many cracked the book since a last World War. Past dwellers, adult and small fry, were enchanted by this tale of a Brooklyn lad who comes to inherit an English Earldom and wealth going with it, a dream Yanks harbored even if few would admit it. This was stuff of fantasy that made Little Lord Fauntleroy a cosmic best seller when new, and reprint stuff of folklore since.

Mary Pickford Essays a 1921 Fauntleroy ...

... and Plays Mother "Dearest" As Well.

I bought a copy off E-Bay, cheap as in nearly free. What a world the Internet has left us, where books have so little currency. Mine was clean, a reprint from 1943, and had a former owner's name written inside. Someone treasured this once. In fact, it was a Christmas gift. Can transferred ownership of a book also pass down luck or fate of a previous owner? Enough of that: Part of wanting this edition was color plates by illustration artist Reginald Birch, who had done pen-and-ink for the 1886 publication, and was called from obscurity to draw color updates for a 30's, and later, this '43 edition. Birch created the visual image of Fauntleroy, author Frances Hodgson Burnett having vividly, and lovingly, described the character in her text, but it was the illustrator that made a fashion plate of young Ceddie to delight of mothers who'd dress mortified boys in Fauntleroy outfits for decades to come. Orson Welles cited the fashion fad in The Magnificent Ambersons, where little Georgie Minifer, tricked out in Fauntleroy duds, is teased by a toughie ("Look at the girly-curly") and has to fight his way out of the insult.

Freddie Bartholomew Makes Boyish Merry On the Selznick-International Lot  

Burnett (and Birch) created a paragon child, flawlessly mannered, "with the mop of yellow love-locks." The author's was an era when children were seen more, heard less. It was joy to dress them up like little dolls. Ceddie wouldn't wait long to be pilloried. By time movies came, his image needed butch makeover, a boy wise to the streets and much more a fish out of water once taken to England. Mary Pickford made a highest-profile silent version where she'd essay both mother ("Dearest") and child. She kept signature blonde curls that a Jackie Coogan or others of child fraternity would not have dared wear. She was sorry later for doing both parts ("I should have used a little boy"), but her public was game --- worldwide rentals $1.5 million, lushest so far of her United Artists vehicles. Pickford was an event with each time out, being awaited like Christmas by filmgoers. Little Lord Fauntleroy amazes still for size and expertise, among its miracles a scene where Mary as Ceddie kisses Mary as Dearest on the cheek, a trick even talkies shrunk from trying. Pickford had put herself in a spot where each show had to top all of ones before, and that sometimes weighed on pace (Little Lord Fauntleroy nearly two hours long).

Director John Cromwell Goes Over Production Design with 1936 Staff

Reading Little Lord Fauntleroy roused fond memory for many well into a next century. 1880's setting was what Pickford called (in an introductory title) "the era of Mother and Father." Her 1921 audience would have looked back to then as we would to the late 70's, so yes, the story yielded nostalgia for simpler time, whatever its dated literary aspects. 1936 however, when David Selznick's remake appeared, was that much further out, and this audience would not countenance a Ceddie with curls of gold. Selznick and updating writers scrubbed influence of Reginald Birch art to look instead at recent hit that was DOS's own for MGM, David Copperfield, a boy-meets-world recount that worked and didn't seem old-fashioned beyond an also period setting. To further link his chain, Selznick borrowed Freddie Bartholomew from Metro. The project was class in all ways, Selznick knowing this first as an independent would sink him, or not, among majors he was set on competing with. Cost climbed to $585K, some said higher, this a-plenty, but got back thanks to $1.7 million in worldwide rentals. Selznick liked literary adaptations with his name affixed; it bespoke quality he'd want the new company to represent. To much of patronage, Little Lord Fauntleroy seemed like an MGM picture in all but logo.

A New Fauntleroy Day: Now The Fashions Are For Women 

Dolores Costello Is Back and and Selznick's Got Her

Selznick liked to use names others had laid aside. Dolores Costello as Dearest brought a Madonna quality untapped when she came to, then went from, Warner specials at dawn of talk. Bartholomew is obliged to take up fists and do minor mischief in accord with 30's expectation, whatever a break this was from Ceddie in the book. There was not a lot of action to the narrative, mostly talk to help opposing figures find common ground. Selznick would have noted slack in the rope, but felt the property good enough, beloved enough, to go ahead. 1936 was near a last year Hollywood could reasonably take on Fauntleroy, war and breakdown of a UK class system spelling all-stops to further Hollywood remaking. It took television to try again, much later, to kit out Fauntleroy as period quaint. Selznick's version remains a likely, if sentimental, best --- he took medicine straight and expects us to --- check the deluxe trailer on a now OOP disc (from Anchor Bay) where he shows players/staff backstage and on the lot, Little Lord Fauntleroy an event not to be '36 missed. Kino has a Blu-Ray, which I haven't seen (mixed reviews). Otherwise, there are numerous Fauntleroys at DVD-large, thanks to Selznick's version having lapsed into the Public Domain some forty years ago.