Classic movie site with rare images, original ads, and behind-the-scenes photos, with informative and insightful commentary. We like to have fun with movies!
Archive and Links
grbrpix@aol.com
Search Index Here




Monday, November 29, 2021

Warner Cracks Whip ... Audience Lashed

 


Whiplash (1948) Is Postwar Treading of Warner Water


Boxer who also paints (as in art) Dane Clark is caught in net of tempting Alexis Smith and crook promoter Zachery Scott. This might have been serviceable melodrama ten or even five years before. Now it would suffer beside the better Body and Soul, an independent John Garfield did in order to get away from things like Whiplash at former address Warners, his bust-out thanks to the DeHavilland decision. Dane Clark served hash of what Garfield and Bogart cooked fresher before such yarns got tired blood. Still, it's WB with stock folk always welcome and customary tempo to relieve over-familiarity of situations. Variety called Whiplash "vintage prizefight fare," which wasn't complementary, reviewers for the trade having sat through endless reprise of bouts since Warner fighters were first gloved. Whiplash had been completed in June 1947, held from release as were others, "a huge backlog" the result. Such was accumulation that the studio shut down altogether for the month of December 1949 as distribution began working through stored-up titles.





Monday, November 22, 2021

Family Saga Gone Sour


Sweepings (1933) Teaches Tired Lesson That The Rich Don't Have It So Good



Lionel Barrymore builds a department store empire, but has nothing other than worthless kids to leave it to.  Depressioners understood that spawn of the rich was good for nothing, this a price the rich must pay for being rich. Robber barons losing out on life essentials was balm to have-nots. Wives, particularly second and trophy ones, were invariably faithless, steadfast mates from the climb up having been discarded once the tycoon made his pile. Precode could lay blame on the system, capitalism itself a breeder of decay within families. Spencer Tracy, Paul Muni, and Edward G. Robinson reaped bitter harvest of accumulating too much, while those who had excess fun at it, like a Warren William, got final reel death for a pay-off. All this was by way of telling viewers that they were better off with the little they had. Just enough dimes for movie tickets should be enough to fulfill most of life’s hope. To grab for more was to invite disaster, the American dream of wealth often as not a nightmare.



Sweepings was part of RKO’s 1932-33 season supervised by David Selznick. He’d been forthright in condemning RKO product, most of it flung out in bulk and indiscriminate as to quality. These had been overseen by William LeBaron, his policies an escort to receivership for the company. Motion pictures were as much piece goods to LeBaron, whose greater responsibility as he saw it was to service RKO's many affiliated theatres. Selznick thought of film in terms of individual achievement and felt that fewer, and better, would rescue the company. He was right to extent of ones he personally oversaw: Little Women, What Price Hollywood?, Topaze. Then there was King Kong, which Selznick enabled and supported through internal challenges to its concept and budget. His most valued relationships with co-workers were born at RKO, George Cukor an oft-associate after two he directed under DOS auspices, and John Cromwell would report to the later and independent Selznick shop thanks to work done on Sweepings. The film can be had on Warner Archive DVD.




Monday, November 15, 2021

Paramount-Wallis Update An Oldie


Peking Express (1951) Is Shanghai Express Done Over


Very obscure among Hal Wallis productions for Paramount release, this did not have a 60's network TV run as did most of his others, and I couldn't find listings for it among syndication packages. Did Peking Express go missing until Amazon began streaming it? New to me on seeing PK was fact that Wallis had merely remade Shanghai Express and used footage from the 1932 release directed by Josef Von Sternberg. A variety of trains turn up in Peking Express, which would be alright except that they're supposed to be the same train. This was a sort of melodrama folks could stay home and watch free on their tubes. Did Wallis do Peking Express mainly to economize and keep overhead-generating staff busy?



There is updating of the yarn to reflect political change since 1932 but bumps otherwise play out the same. Sold as "The First American Feature Set Inside Communist China," publicity ignored mention of
Peking's 1932 origin, and seized what opportunity there was to air democracy vs. totalitarian debate, a coat of varnish to obscure long beard of narrative. Corinne Calvet has the Marlene Dietrich part and Joseph Cotten does Clive Brook. Distinctly Anglo Marvin Miller attempts the Warner Oland warlord with paste-on slant to eyes, all mighty tired. I was surprised at class producer Wallis relying so on stock footage and reheated dialogue. There's attempt at action to buttress Calvet/Cotten romance, if limited to climactic chasing where cast membership fires away at process screens. William Dieterle directs after surface style of Sternberg, and there's a dynamic Dimitri Tiomkin score. Worth seeing for curiosity's satisfaction and strike-off of a rarity. 





Monday, November 08, 2021

Dear Ruth Graduates to Dear Wife

 


A Paramount Idea of Family Comedy


Push that panic button, here comes another irrepressible 40's teen! Households seemed overrun with them, Edward Arnold often a beleaguered Dad undergoing embarrassment brought on by precocious offspring. He'd spawn Virginia Weidler in The Youngest Profession (1944), Joyce Reynolds in Janie, and later Joan Leslie in the sequel Janie Gets Married, then, and most repeatedly, Mona Freeman for a series of domestic comedies utterly forgotten today, Dear Ruth (1947), Dear Wife (1950), and Dear Brat (1951). Two thirds of the latters are, at least were, accessible on Amazon streaming, Dear Wife and Dear Brat, both owned by Paramount. Dear Ruth went with the 1958 dump of pre-49 Paras to MCA, and has been out of circulation for years.



Joan Caulfield and William Holden were centered in the first two, but did not participate in the third. Edward Arnold and Mary Philips (a former Bogart wife) appeared as parents in all three, Mona Freeman the ongoing cause of misunderstanding and family disaster. She's in fact worse than a "brat"… today you'd be advised to put her on Ritalin and have done with the problem. Holden did these at point of gun that was his Paramount contract, Dear Wife bringing down curtain on his "Smiling Jim" ordeal for the studio, his next a salvation that was Sunset Boulevard. Fun comes of swipes at local politics, obnoxious radio programming, and what'll kids think of next before they took up rock and roll and became a real problem for grown-ups. The Wilkins family isn't rich, but they have a live-in maid, and they always dress for dinner. Pain in the rear that daughter is, she's never insolent or surly with Mom or Dad, movies maintaining as of 1950 that parents and child could reason together. That would end with a thud before long.





Monday, November 01, 2021

Economy Size Crosby


 Mr. Music (1950) To Keep a Star Franchise Going


Paramount was economizing, and how. The war boom was past, and time had come to tighten belts. Para prexy Barney Balaban sent commandments from New York: $1.5 million the limit for feature budgets. 1948 initiated the policy, enforced by production head, and known penny-pincher, Henry Ginsberg. Notable directors Frank Capra, William Wyler, and Leo McCarey had lately signed on and were incensed. How could you make passable pics with so little money? Cecil B. DeMille was exempt for fronting his spectaculars over and above the $1.5 Paramount kicked in, loaning banks good for balance and assuring C.B.'s half-ownership of negatives. Samson and Delilah was done on these terms and stood out like a rose among release schedule thorns for a 1949-50 season.



Paramount hosted sales delegates at a 3/49 gather to cheerlead upcoming product, of which Mr. Music was inked for September start. Bing Crosby addressed the crowd via phone hookup from Frisco and made "an eloquent (twenty-minute) plea for all-out cooperation between studio workers, production execs, and sales representatives," most of whom were en masse to lend eye and ear. A studio party followed at the commissary to which 350 attended, including whatever Paramount stars were within town limits. Such conclaves were crucial and attendance was compulsory. It was understood that Crosby was Number One among Para personalities, but that wouldn't loosen the purse for Mr. Music, ultimately finished at negative cost of $1.7 million, an overage, but no worse than those for Copper Canyon ($1.7) and Let's Dance ($2.10 and being done concurrently). Balaban's $1.5 ceiling was more hope than realization, and would be raised in accordance with realities to $1.75 million by December 1949, optimism maintained thanks to lowering of studio overhead from 32% of a year before to 27% in 1949.




Mr. Music
had nearly a year's wait before release. In ahead for April 1950 was Riding High, starring Bing Crosby and directed by Frank Capra. Then there was a major reissue of Going My Way set for July 4 launch, with new advertising accessories and circulation through late summer and fall. Paramount had to guard against overexposure of Crosby just as later was case with Elvis Presley. Still, Bing's twentieth anniversary "as a star" was just ahead, said Variety, and toward celebration of that, Paramount teamed with CBS and Decca, "Crosby's home base network and waxery," with bally keyed to Mr. Music, the star's forty-second picture and set to open 12/20/49 in New York. "Bingsday" was recognized via radio specials, disc promotions, and covering of Mr. Music tunes by other artists including Frank Sinatra, Vic Damone, and Perry Como.



Variety
reviewed Mr. Music well ahead of release in August 1950. "Cliché elements" were noted, but might have been expected. It was the songs that drew closer evaluation, ones by Johnny Burke and Jimmy Van Heusen getting an appreciative nod though lacking "at-first catchy quality." Crosby's relaxed style had over time cornered him into playing idlers, thus first halves spent just waking his characters up, in this case a songwriter who'd rather play golf than compose. There's edge to Crosby here when others get too close. Charles Coburn and love interest Nancy Olson try getting him off the duff to at-times hostile response, Bing's Broadwayite an almost forerunner to his Frank Elgin in The Country Girl. Mr. Music was reprise of Accent On Youth, which was May-December themed but now less an issue between Crosby and Nancy Olson. He was 46 to her 21 when Mr. Music was made, and maybe age difference registers not so much thanks to Olson seeming older than ingénues she'd play, thus congenial with comparative old-timers like Bing.

grbrpix@aol.com
  • December 2005
  • January 2006
  • February 2006
  • March 2006
  • April 2006
  • May 2006
  • June 2006
  • July 2006
  • August 2006
  • September 2006
  • October 2006
  • November 2006
  • December 2006
  • January 2007
  • February 2007
  • March 2007
  • April 2007
  • May 2007
  • June 2007
  • July 2007
  • August 2007
  • September 2007
  • October 2007
  • November 2007
  • December 2007
  • January 2008
  • February 2008
  • March 2008
  • April 2008
  • May 2008
  • June 2008
  • July 2008
  • August 2008
  • September 2008
  • October 2008
  • November 2008
  • December 2008
  • January 2009
  • February 2009
  • March 2009
  • April 2009
  • May 2009
  • June 2009
  • July 2009
  • August 2009
  • September 2009
  • October 2009
  • November 2009
  • December 2009
  • January 2010
  • February 2010
  • March 2010
  • April 2010
  • May 2010
  • June 2010
  • July 2010
  • August 2010
  • September 2010
  • October 2010
  • November 2010
  • December 2010
  • January 2011
  • February 2011
  • March 2011
  • April 2011
  • May 2011
  • June 2011
  • July 2011
  • August 2011
  • September 2011
  • October 2011
  • November 2011
  • December 2011
  • January 2012
  • February 2012
  • March 2012
  • April 2012
  • May 2012
  • June 2012
  • July 2012
  • August 2012
  • September 2012
  • October 2012
  • November 2012
  • December 2012
  • January 2013
  • February 2013
  • March 2013
  • April 2013
  • May 2013
  • June 2013
  • July 2013
  • August 2013
  • September 2013
  • October 2013
  • November 2013
  • December 2013
  • January 2014
  • February 2014
  • March 2014
  • April 2014
  • May 2014
  • June 2014
  • July 2014
  • August 2014
  • September 2014
  • October 2014
  • November 2014
  • December 2014
  • January 2015
  • February 2015
  • March 2015
  • April 2015
  • May 2015
  • June 2015
  • July 2015
  • August 2015
  • September 2015
  • October 2015
  • November 2015
  • December 2015
  • January 2016
  • February 2016
  • March 2016
  • April 2016
  • May 2016
  • June 2016
  • July 2016
  • August 2016
  • September 2016
  • October 2016
  • November 2016
  • December 2016
  • January 2017
  • February 2017
  • March 2017
  • April 2017
  • May 2017
  • June 2017
  • July 2017
  • August 2017
  • September 2017
  • October 2017
  • November 2017
  • December 2017
  • January 2018
  • February 2018
  • March 2018
  • April 2018
  • May 2018
  • June 2018
  • July 2018
  • August 2018
  • September 2018
  • October 2018
  • November 2018
  • December 2018
  • January 2019
  • February 2019
  • March 2019
  • April 2019
  • May 2019
  • June 2019
  • July 2019
  • August 2019
  • September 2019
  • October 2019
  • November 2019
  • December 2019
  • January 2020
  • February 2020
  • March 2020
  • April 2020
  • May 2020
  • June 2020
  • July 2020
  • August 2020
  • September 2020
  • October 2020
  • November 2020
  • December 2020
  • January 2021
  • February 2021
  • March 2021
  • April 2021
  • May 2021
  • June 2021
  • July 2021
  • August 2021
  • September 2021
  • October 2021
  • November 2021
  • December 2021
  • January 2022
  • February 2022
  • March 2022
  • April 2022
  • May 2022
  • June 2022
  • July 2022
  • August 2022
  • September 2022
  • October 2022
  • November 2022
  • December 2022
  • January 2023
  • February 2023
  • March 2023
  • April 2023
  • May 2023
  • June 2023
  • July 2023
  • August 2023
  • September 2023
  • October 2023
  • November 2023
  • December 2023
  • January 2024
  • February 2024
  • March 2024
  • April 2024
  • May 2024
  • June 2024
  • July 2024
  • August 2024
  • September 2024
  • October 2024