The OtherArena

[Steve Yohe]

I had never hear of the movie, but I watch everything shown on Eddie Muller's film-noir show on TCM. I also don't like films directed by Otto Preminger. But I watched the 1945 film FALLEN ANGEL tonight & I think it's the best mystery film, and one of the best films period, I've ever seen. The cinematography, writing, editing, art direction, music, casting, and even the direction (yea Otto) are perfect.

It's filmed like a noir film, but I would call it a mystery....and you might describe it as love story, but really is just about love. There is a crime, but I'm not going to say what type, because it's a surprise. In this type of film, I never have no problem figuring out who did the crime …. but with this I couldn't. The movie takes on a form I've never seen before. It's not an artsy movie, it's bare bone hard core, but idealistic. I think?

The case is great: Danna Andrews, Alice Faye, Anne Revere, Charles Bickford, John Carradine, and most of all Linda Darnell. I keep reading that Darnell couldn't act, but if so, I wonder what she is doing in this film. She kills in every scene.

Dana Andrews is one of the great actor....if he isn't drunk. He has pedigree, having made BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES...one of the great films. You can not see his acting. I think he was one of the best, when he wasn't drunk. He drank more that Lee Marvin & Gorgeous George together.

Alice Faye was a famous musical star, who was making a comeback with this film. She was pissed off with the cut of the film & didn't act again for 20 years. Yet she is great in it, and the movie should be a classic.

One of the great character actor, is in it....Anne Revere....she won a Oscar for playing the mother in NATIONAL VELVET to Liz Taylor (one of Ken's old girls). In 1951, her career was ruined by being blacklisted & she never made any more films. She did get Tonys for stage work. The funny part is that she was a direct descendant of Paul Revere. Her famous quote is: "I'm a free thinking Yankee rebel & nobody's going to tell me what to do."

So I think ****1/4. I hope John sees this movie some day. I want the DVD. It's called FALLEN ANGEL but it's impossible to tell which character is the angel in the title. --- Steve Yohe

[Steve Yohe]

Looking around on TCM today, I found a movie called REUNION IN FRANCE. I was going to pass until I saw it was a 1942 MGM movie with Joan Crawford and John Wayne. HOLY COW...what could go wrong there. So yeah, I bit on it. To start off answering the top question....YES Joan baby hit up on John Wane on the set. John couldn't handle that degree of action & passed.

This was a propaganda film, set in occupied France, which came off as a screwed up version of CASABLANCA. But everything is turn around. Crawford is Humpty Dumpty Bogart, Wayne is Ingrid Bergman, and Phillip Dorn was Paul Henreid. Dorn does get the girl, but Wayne flys off to Spain, and Crawford makes the sacrifice & stays in Paris with Dorn to fight all the Nazis.

To make this movie work, you had to believe that Joan had power over everyone, because everyone wanted & had to fuck her. Yeah. Joan kisses everyone in this movie. And she is good at it. She even kisses the Nazis guys. The Gestapo guy get a French Kisses. Wayne doesn't even talk to her....he just starts kissing. This movie is all Joan baby....John doesn't show up until 43 minutes into the film. Joan, like always, works her ass off.....it's acting, but I don't know if it's real acting....but she just pounds away...and she is good at it. I can see why she was a huge star with women. They even wanted to fuck her. I do think a French character should have some type of French accent. She doesn't. The Duke seemed to get the job because he was the only American star not in the war, hadn't kissed Joan, and had a bigger nose than Joan Crawford. He does punch a Nazis really good. His lines are terrible & he has very little to do, but be Mr Crawford....and he doesn't even get the girl. I wanted him to ride into Nazis Paris on a horse or a tank...with machine guns blazing. Wrong movie.

Also answering another question....I would fuck Joan Crawford....hell my 2nd full time girlfriend was crazy....why not?

I can't answer the question...who is Phillip Dorn?

So that's my review....give it **1/16. There is a story that the title was supposed to be GETTING THE DUKE OUT OF FRANCE.

It had a major director in Jules Dassin...who made NIGHT & THE CITY...the best wrestling movie of all time. The producer was Joseph Mankiewicz.

John, your the only one reading this...other than Ken.....did you ever see the movie SLEUTH (1972)? I would like your opinion on that one. ----Steve Yohe

[jdw]

[Steve Yohe]

Watched Micharl Curtiz's THE BREAKING POINT (1950) with John Garfield tonight. It is one of the few true perfect films. Everything works. Great acting with Garfield, Phyllis Thaxter, Juano Heranatez, Patricia Neal, and Wallace Ford. Said to be a remake of TO HAVE & HAVE NOT, which was supposed to have been made from a Hemingway book, but this is a way better movie, and Garfield out acts Bogart. It's film noir at it's best. ****1/4. This is a film that Sam Peckinpah studied & liked. Has a gunfight on a boat with Garfield shooting it out with 4 gangster's, that is as good as anything Sam ever filmed. The movie also has a lot of heart, with great stuff going on with Garfield and his wife Phyllis Thaxter.

It was Garfield's favorite role, but it bombed because he had put on the list of un-American activists put out by congress. So Warner Brothers didn't push the movie. Great movie. Film at Newport Beach where I used to hang out as a kid. ----Steve Yohe

[Steve Yohe]

Wondering If John Williams is watching PERRY MASON on HBO? Does the great John have HBO?

I've been watching PERRY MASON and enjoying it ..... them trying to make something out of a famous TV show that was locked into the same phony unrealistic finish each week. If it was a wrestler it would have been the Sheik .... or for the younger people ... Hogan. It was interesting....then came last night's show (week 6?). I thought it was terrible. The courtroom stuff was really weak. The whole show fell apart for me. Nothing worked. I wondered if there was a new director or something. I also think Matthew Rhys is missed cast. Everyone else is fine. But I've loss faith in the show. Sorry because I was enjoying it. ---- Steve Yohe

[jdw]

I got tired of HBO years ago, and it (and Showtime) bit the dust when I adjusted my cable packages.

Now I have a variety of streaming items - Netflix, Amazon Prime, Acorn, BritBox... might be another one in there. Anything off HBO that I want bad enough, like Chernobyl, I can get on blueray/dvd down the road.

[Steve Yohe]

About a month ago, during my insolation, I turn to TCM and watched a movie called A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH (1946) staring David Niven & Kim Hunter. I had never seen the film before, and it probably is famous, but it left me with the feeling, that it is one of the best movies I've ever seem. It was directed by Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger....and I didn't know them either. ****1/3. It was a Hollywood production filmed in England, and it has all the great English actors of that era in it. The story seems stupid.....An English piolet on a bombing run....makes a distrees call & the radio operator who is an American girl.... he tells her his plane is shot in hell ... and all his men had baled out .... leaving him with his dead gunner & a parashot that has been shot up too... he says he is going to die in 5 minutes but wanted to give his position before jumping from the plane to his death..... which he picks because he doesn't want to burn up. In a very poetic talk they fall it love ... you know, it's David Niven at his best. In what seem to be in the middle of it .... he falls to his death. But he lives...finds the American girl, & they are in love. OK... no one in this film uses the words heaven, god or angel .... but I am because I can't figure out how to write this without them. So as it goes, it turns out that he should have died .... and it was the first time in 3,000 years that that type of mistake had been made....so a "kind of" angel of death is sent to get Niven .... but he refuses to go .... because he was in love .... and things had changed .... he had been willing to die, but the situation had changed & it wouldn't be fair to the girl or him. So this Angel goes back up to .... you know up there (you guys who believe in god can help me with this) ... he talks it over with all the the dead people up there & (after I skip over about an hour of the movie) they decide there need to be a trial to figure out what's the fair thing to do. Niven is given his choice of anyone in the history of time to defend him. Lincoln is mentioned. So the trial is the end of the movie & it is wonderful. That crazy story works. The acting is just great. It's one of the perfect movies & it was a very hard film to pull off. It may be as good as any movie ever made. I hope I talked someone into watching it some day.---Steve Yohe