The Horse's Head

#599) Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

OR “[Citation Needed]: The Motion Picture”

Directed by David Lean

Written by Robert Bolt and Michael Wilson. Based on the book “Seven Pillars of Wisdom” by T.E. Lawrence.

Class of 1991 

The Plot: While stationed in Cairo during World War I, British lieutenant T.E. Lawrence (Peter O’Toole) is sent to the Arabian desert to locate Prince Faisal (Alec Guinness) and assess his revolt against the Turkish Empire for Arab independence. Upon arrival, Lawrence defies Colonel Brighton (Anthony Quayle) and begins helping the Arabs, proposing a surprise attack on the Turks in Aqaba, Jordan. Lawrence enlists the help of two tribes – the Harith led by Sherif Ali iben el Kharish (Omar Sharif) and the Howeitat led by Auda Abu Tayi (Anthony Quinn) – and leads them across the desert, ultimately earning their respect as a natural leader. When the raid on Aqaba is successful, Lawrence is promoted to Major and is encouraged by General Allenby (Jack Hawkins) to continue his guerrilla war, unaware that the British have plans to control Arabia once the war is over. But all this history and political drama takes a backseat to the cinematic grandeur of the Hollywood epic.

Why It Matters: The NFR praises the film for its “remarkable beauty”, “sweeping wide shots”, and for Maurice Jarre’s “memorably rousing” score. The write-up does, however, point out that the film (as well as O’Toole’s performance) portray Lawrence with “marginal historical accuracy”. An essay by film critic Michael Wilmington is a detailed recap of the film and its production.

But Does It Really?: Even if you don’t like this movie, you have to admit you are in the presence of greatness. “Lawrence of Arabia” is David Lean at the height of his power, and the movie succeeds on every creative front (The editing! The cinematography! That score!). Yes, the movie plays fast and loose with some of the facts, but this movie clearly isn’t going for reportage. This is a film about an extraordinary man, played by an extraordinary actor giving one of the best film performances of all time, aided by an accomplished supporting cast. “Lawrence of Arabia” is classic filmmaking at its finest; the kind that can never be duplicated, only revered.

Everybody Gets One: Born in England to an Irish father and a Scottish mother, Peter O’Toole joined the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1952, and quickly found work in theatre and television. In 1959, O’Toole reached the West End playing a rebellious WWII private in the play “The Long and the Short and the Tall”. His performance here got him a few film roles, including the 1960 heist caper “The Day They Robbed the Bank of England”, which got him a screen test for “Lawrence” with David Lean. O’Toole won the role of T.E. Lawrence after Marlon Brando and Albert Finney turned it down. “Lawrence” was O’Toole’s fourth movie and first starring role.

Wow, That’s Dated: BROWNFACE WARNING: While “Lawrence” makes very progressive strides casting actual Middle-Eastern actors in several prominent roles, the film still casts British actor Alec Guinness as the Arabian Prince Faisal. I don’t care if Guinness does kinda look like the real-life Faisal, it’s still whitewashing!

Seriously, Oscars?: A hit upon release, “Lawrence of Arabia” received the most nominations at the 1963 Oscars (10) as well as the most wins (7). Among its wins: Best Picture, Director, Cinematography, Editing, and Score. Peter O’Toole lost Best Actor to Gregory Peck in “To Kill a Mockingbird“, the first of an eventual eight losses O’Toole endured over the next 44 years (though he did win an Honorary Oscar in 2003).

Other notes 

• Several film adaptations of T.E. Lawrence’s time in Arabia had been attempted since his death in 1935, with such names as Leslie Howard and Laurence Olivier attached at various times. Following their successful collaboration on “The Bridge on the River Kwai“, director David Lean and producer Sam Spiegel considered making a film on the life of Gandhi before ultimately deciding on Lawrence. The rights to Lawrence’s life and work were owned by his younger brother Arnold Lawrence, who reluctantly sold Spiegel the film rights to “Seven Pillars of Wisdom”, Lawrence’s memoir about his years in Arabia. The initial screenplay by blacklisted writer Michael Wilson was deemed too political, and playwright Robert Bolt (“A Man For All Seasons”) was brought in to make the film more a character study of Lawrence rather than a summation of historical events. Only Bolt was credited for the screenplay when the film was first released, but an investigation by the WGA in 1995 led to Wilson receiving an on-screen credit, as well as a belated Oscar nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay.
• Filming took place in three different countries over a 17 month period (with a two month break while cast and crew recuperated from various illnesses). Initially, the film was to be shot entirely in Jordan (King Hussein assisted the crew immeasurably during production), but more crew illnesses took the film to the more hospitable climates of Morocco and Spain. According to an issue of Variety at the time, “Lawrence” was the first major movie without a fixed budget (!) with the final price tag estimated between 13-15 million dollars (about 120-140 million today).
• Yes, there are plenty of historical inaccuracies within this film: events are moved around and conflated, characters differ drastically from their real-life counterparts, and everyone disagrees over how the admittedly enigmatic Lawrence should have been portrayed. Such is the delicate balance of presenting world history within a dramatic art form (Side note: Sam Spiegel defended the film as faithful to Lawrence’s “Seven Pillars of Wisdom”, which subsequent Lawrence biographers believe was embellished by the author). Regardless of the film’s historical foibles, I will advise that some prior knowledge of T.E. Lawrence and the Arab Revolt will help your movie experience. At the very least, keep the subtitles on to help keep track of the various people and places.
• Man that score just lures you in. You can’t think of Jarre’s main theme without immediately thinking of the desert. What surprised me was how much of the movie is scoreless, making its eventual appearances all the more special, magnifying the action to mythic proportions.
• As I previously gushed, Peter O’Toole is pretty darn great in this. He is more than up to the herculean task of carrying a four-hour movie, and delivers such a subtly brilliant performance you’d think he had been making movies his whole life.
• “Big things have small beginnings”. Not this movie. It has an overture for crissakes!
• It’s so odd to see Claude Rains as an old man, I’m used to seeing him in his heyday at Warner Bros. in the ’40s. Rains’ dry asides as the resident bureaucrat are the closest this movie gets to having comic relief.
• Ah, the match cut. Inspired by the French New Wave movement happening in the early 1960s, editor Anne V. Coates convinced David Lean (an accomplished editor himself) to cut directly from Lawrence blowing out the match to the sunrise in the desert, as opposed to a slow dissolve. In fact, most of this movie is straddling two eras of filmmaking: the film’s more conventional approach to the subject matter mixed with quick cuts and flashy camera pans. This juxtaposition of styles keeps the film watchable 60 years on.

• I first saw “Lawrence of Arabia” on the big screen for its 50^th anniversary in 2012. Watching it again on a decently sized HD TV wasn’t as bad an experience as I thought. You still get the sense of scale in the big tracking shots (tiny figures trekking across an endless desert), but of course, nothing can compare to seeing “Lawrence” on the biggest movie screen.
• Besides the aforementioned brownface, my main gripe with this movie are all the “day-for-night” shots. Obviously, filming in the desert would have been too dangerous at night, so we’ll make do with a dark blue filter over these “night” shots and ignore everyone casting their shadows over the sand.
• Omar Sharif gets possibly the best entrance in film history, emerging as a mirage-like dot on the horizon, steadily approaching Lawrence on camelback. Easily one of the best artistic compositions in this or any movie. You can spend days dissecting this scene, and I found this video essay a good starting point.

• Sure, Omar Sharif is giving a marvelously disciplined performance in this movie, but can we also acknowledge how handsome he was? That’s the face of a bonafide movie star. No wonder there’s that song about him in “The Band’s Visit“.
• I can never hear Alec Guinness talk about The Brightness without hearing Peter Sellers’ impression of him.
• Gazim wandering through the desert is timed to correspond with the sunrise. Come on! You have to marvel at the coordination it must have taken to get that shot right, considering you’d have to wait 24 hours for take two.

• Tonight on “What Nationality Are They Making Anthony Quinn Play This Week?”: Mexico’s native son is playing an Arab sheik (again). And I’m pretty sure this HD transfer gives away that Quinn is wearing a prosthetic nose. Still, better than Guinness in brownface.

• The scenes with Auda Abu Tayi’s tribe offers something the rest of this movie doesn’t have: women. Like “River Kwai”, David Lean once again offers us an epic sausagefest. One of the best sausagefests ever made, but still…
• Easily my favorite scene in the movie is when Lawrence agrees to shoot one of Ali’s men to end a blood feud between the opposing tribes, only to discover it is the man he went back to save from dying in the desert. It’s a heartbreaking moment; the first crack in Lawrence’s overconfident, optimistic armor.
• Remarkably, there were long passages of this movie where I didn’t take notes; partially to make sure I kept track of all the moving parts, but also because I was sucked into it. I was glued to my TV for the entire attack on Aquba. Not bad for a four hour movie.

• If Act 1 is about Lawrence’s triumphs during the war, Act 2 is his internal war and downfall. Watching Lawrence crumble as he experiences the unavoidable hardships of the world around him is captivating. This is one of those instances where an Oscar tally can misrepresent a film’s value. Peter O’Toole and Gregory Peck are giving equally electrifying performances, but in 1963 it made more sense to reward a five time nominee over a newcomer who had plenty of years to, as O’Toole would later put it, “win the lovely bugger outright”.
• Character actor/Arthur Miller go-to Arthur Kennedy plays Jackson Bentley, a fictional representation of Lowell Thomas, the journalist whose articles about T.E. Lawrence gained him and his subject worldwide recognition. Thomas was later a film producer, and can be seen at the introduction of another NFR entry – “This Is Cinerama“.
• Like Joseph Cotten in “The Thin Man“, Arthur Kennedy sounds aggressively more American than usual in this British production. Speaking of, while “Lawrence” was produced by a British company (Horizon Pictures), it was distributed by Columbia Pictures, hence its designation as an American film. Call it a “dual-citizenship movie”.
• My eternal gratitude, as always, to Robert A. Harris, who supervised a 1988 restoration of “Lawrence”, which saw the film returned to its 227 minute roadshow presentation for the first time in 26 years. The subsequent 4K restoration is so good I could only tell which scenes had been reinstated after doing some deep-dive research. Bonus shoutout to the cast members who came back to rerecord their dialogue. Only Alec Guinness gives away that any reconstruction has been done (though in all fairness he was 74 when he re-dubbed his lines).

• What is it with David Lean and blowing up railroad tracks while a train is passing? Not every director’s trademark has to be so expensive, ya know.

• José Ferrer was already an Oscar winning actor and prolific stage director in 1962, and was hesitant to accept the small but pivotal role of the masochistic Turkish Bey who strips Lawrence down both literally and figuratively. Ferrer took the part after receiving a generous stipend (and a Porsche), and would eventually consider this performance as the best of his career. Also, is it just me or does he kinda look like Walt Disney in this?

• After three-plus hours of watching Lawrence slowly lose his confidence, the dam finally bursts with his unhinged cry of “No prisoners!” Lawrence’s vengeful slaughter of Turkish soldiers is another heart-wrenching sequence, and the character’s point of no return.

• I’ve always appreciated that despite its status as one of the great epics of all time, “Lawrence” ends with a close-up of our hero sitting quietly in a car as it drives him down a dirt road, contemplating everything that has transpired. You expect “The Sounds of Silence” to start playing in the background.

Legacy 

• “Lawrence of Arabia” was a hit, second only to “The Longest Day” at the U.S. box office. There was, however, a large amount of criticism reserved for this movie’s historical shortcomings, particularly regarding Lawrence himself (Arnold Lawrence publicly denounced the film as “pretentious and false”). Family and descendants of other characters filed lawsuits against Columbia, and most Middle Eastern countries refused to screen the film, although Omar Sharif was able to convince his native Egypt to reconsider.
• Following the success of “Lawrence”, Peter O’Toole and Omar Sharif became A-list movie stars; Sharif re-teaming with David Lean for his equally epic follow-up “Doctor Zhivago”.

• Practically every major filmmaker was influenced by “Lawrence of Arabia”, from Stanley Kubrick to Martin Scorsese to Steven Spielberg, the latter two even helping to get the 1988 restoration off the ground.

• As for lingering pop culture references, any movie that features characters traipsing through the desert has to evoke “Lawrence” by either its cinematography or score. From “Mad Max” to “Dune” to “Spaceballs” (“Nice dissolve.”)

• The closest this film has ever gotten to a sequel is the 1990 TV movie “A Dangerous Man: Lawrence After Arabia”, with a young Ralph Fiennes as Lawrence. Apparently it was this movie that got Fiennes cast in “Schindler’s List“, so at least some good came out of it.

• And finally, I didn’t know where else to put this, but no “Lawrence of Arabia” overview would be complete without Noël Coward’s alleged quip to Peter O’Toole after the film’s premiere: “If you had been any prettier, it would have been called ‘Florence of Arabia’.” Zing!

#41) All That Jazz (1979)

OR “Joe Biz”

Directed by Bob Fosse

Written by Fosse and Robert Alan Aurthur

Class of 2001 

This is a revised and expanded version of my original “All That Jazz” post, which you can read here.

The Plot: Joe Gideon (Roy Scheider) is an acclaimed Broadway choreographer turned film director, standing in for this movie’s real-life acclaimed Broadway choreographer turned film director Bob Fosse. An obsessive workaholic, Joe spends his days simultaneously rehearsing his new Broadway show and assembling a final cut of his new movie. Joe is also juggling quality time with his estranged wife/leading lady Audrey Paris (Leland Palmer), his daughter Michelle (Erzsébet Földi), and his girlfriend Kate (Ann Reinking), in addition to his occasional one-night-stands, a pill addiction, a smoking habit, and a flirtation with the mysterious Angelique (Jessica Lange). All of this takes its toll on Joe, who suffers a heart attack one day during rehearsal. “All That Jazz” meditates on death, the price of success, and the lies we tell ourselves and others. Oh, and there’s a bunch of songs in it too.

Why It Matters: The NFR calls it “Felliniesque” and praises the film for “mercilessly reversing the feel-good mood of classical movie musicals.”

But Does It Really?: Oh boy, this is tough. As much as I love “All That Jazz”, I recognize it is an acquired taste, with its morbid energy and inside-baseball look at show business, as well as the cries of narcissism often hurled at this movie. In true Fosse fashion, there’s a lot of “razzle dazzle” to distract the viewer from getting to know the real Joe/Bob, which can alienate viewers looking for a deeper dive. As for its cultural legacy, you rarely see “All That Jazz” get mentioned in modern media, with mainstream references to Fosse distilled down to his signature “jazz hands”. While its NFR standing is somewhat shaky, I’ll give “All That Jazz” a pass as an insight into Bob Fosse (more about that later), and also because despite its flaws, “Jazz” still manages to engage and entertain 40 years later.

Everybody Gets One: Most of the supporting cast were Broadway performers/previous Fosse collaborators. Among them: Ben Vereen (the original Leading Player in “Pippin“), Leland Palmer (also from “Pippin”), Cliff Gorman (seen here as a Lenny Bruce-esque stand-up a la Fosse’s “Lenny“), and Ann Reinking (several Fosse productions, as well as his girlfriend for most of the ’70s).

Seriously, Oscars?: While “All That Jazz” divided critics and audiences, the Academy ate it up, with “Jazz” tying “Kramer vs. Kramer” for most nominations at the 1980 Oscars (9). “Kramer” was the night’s big winner, but “Jazz” took home four trophies: Art Direction, Costume Design, Film Editing, and Adapted Score.

Other notes 

• In late 1974, Bob Fosse suffered a heart attack while editing his film “Lenny” and rehearsing the musical “Chicago”. After recuperating, Fosse began work with writer Robert Alan Aurthur on a script based on the Hilma Wolitzer novel “Ending”. The novel’s themes of death and grief served as the inspiration for what eventually became “All That Jazz”.

• This film’s production was filled with setbacks. Richard Dreyfuss was originally cast as Joe Gideon, but bowed out shortly after rehearsals began. At the time, Dreyfuss cited exhaustion as his reason for departing, though later admitted he had creative differences with Fosse. Roy Scheider was brought in as a replacement, and production was pushed back a few months. During filming, co-writer/co-producer Robert Alan Aurthur died of lung cancer. Before filming wrapped, the film went over-budget (from $6 million to $9.5 million), and Columbia refused to give the film the additional $500,000 it needed to film its finale. In a Hail Mary move, executive producer Daniel Melnick showed a rough cut to 20^th Century Fox, who agreed to co-finance the film in exchange for distribution rights and sharing the profits with Columbia. Surprisingly, Fosse seemed in good health during all of this, joking that he had cut his smoking habit down to “five packs a day”.
• On paper, Roy Scheider seems an odd choice for Joe (even Fosse had to be convinced), but once you see the final film, it makes sense. In a departure from his more action-oriented filmography, Scheider is quite charming and personable, two necessary traits if your audience is to sympathize with a workaholic womanizer. And of course Fosse’s autobiographical proxy has a full head of hair.
• I’ve theorized that most movie quotes become famous because they are repeated throughout their film. “It’s showtime, folks” may be the exception. Joe says it several times while looking in his bathroom mirror, but does anyone ever recreate that moment in their own home nowadays? Just me?

• The opening montage of Joe’s dance audition is pretty wonderful, masterfully cut to George Benson’s cover of “On Broadway”. It ends with my favorite line in the movie: “That’s how you get a job.”

• Jessica Lange’s film career was just starting when she did “All That Jazz” (though she had already been raked across the coals for the “King Kong” remake). She is everything Angelique calls for: using her beauty and seduction to lure Joe towards the darkness. Lange was also occasionally romantically linked to Fosse around this time. Speaking of…
• Shout out to Ann Reinking, who is not only playing a character in a relationship similar to her real-life one with Fosse, but was willing to play the part after they had broken up AND still had to audition for it.

• One of the reasons I’m going easy on “All That Jazz” is because theater, by its very nature, is difficult to preserve. The National Recording Registry has many iconic cast albums among its ranks, and the NFR has several film adaptations of theater pieces, but a genuine theatrical experience is near impossible to preserve (bootlegs be damned). The next best thing is to preserve the creative process, and “All That Jazz” represents Fosse and his method. It’s not a one-to-one encapsulation (Ann Reinking repeatedly commented over the years that Joe Gideon was far worse than the real Fosse), but it’s as close as we’ll ever get to understanding one of the most influential figures in 20^th century theater.
• “All That Jazz” is one of the rare NFR movies to be nominated for a Stinkers Bad Movie Award: Worst Supporting Actor for Max Wright. Sure, the character’s a bit grating, but among the worst performances of the year? Please, the dad from “ALF” deserves better.
• Erzsébet Földi makes a strong film debut as Joe’s daughter Michelle. She succeeds at being an actual kid rather than an adult’s approximation of a kid. She’s like if Quinn Cummings from “The Goodbye Girl” had ballet training. Side note: Fosse’s real life daughter Nicole makes a quick cameo as one of the dancers in “NY/LA”.
• Leland Palmer makes a good stand-in for Fosse’s real life wife Gwen Verdon, although she’s about 15 years too young for the part. Palmer even sounds like Verdon in a few instances, especially when she sings.
• “Take Off With Us” is what Fosse does best: turning a simple, catchy song into an overly sexual production number. And it goes on a lot longer than I remember; a full eight minutes!

• Hot take: I’m on the fence about whether or not this movie is actually a musical. Initially, my argument was that the songs don’t progress the story the way they would in a traditional musical, and that before the finale there are only two numbers performed by the characters. On the other hand, if my argument is that the songs are too diegetic to be a musical, where does that put Fosse’s “Cabaret“, in which every song is performed as it would in real life? I’m still undecided, but I’m leaning towards classifying “All That Jazz” as a “movie with music” rather than a full-blown musical.
• The film’s other pre-finale number: Kate and Michelle dancing to Peter Allen’s “Everything Old Is New Again”. It’s a sweet moment in the movie, and the only time Joe actually allows himself to experience joy.

• I get the sense that Joe/Fosse doesn’t hate show business, but rather the people in it. Everyone outside his close circle is a nuisance: Ben Vereen’s fake entertainer, Max Wright’s demanding movie producer, Anthony Holland’s showy composer, John Lithgow’s envious director. That’s a lot of one-note caricatures for such a nuanced character study.
• In the subgenre of NFR movies you shouldn’t watch after eating: Fosse filmed an actual open heart surgery to show Joe’s operation, and it is unsparingly graphic. This is interspersed with a scene of the producers discussing the financial implications if Joe were to die on the operating table. And…is that Wallace Shawn as the insurance man? Huh. Forgot about that.
• And CCH Pounder too? Who isn’t in this movie?
• Oh man, that finale. Ann and Leland (as well as Erzsébet) finally show off some big dance moves, culminating with Roy Scheider and Ben Vereen’s duet of “Bye Bye Life” (a minimally rewritten “Bye Bye Love”). It is one of filmdom’s longer finales, but Fosse ties everything together nicely. My main gripe: you spend the whole movie without seeing Roy Scheider sing or dance and when he finally does, it’s kind of a letdown. At least Sam Rockwell busted a few moves in “Fosse/Verdon”.

• I dunno Fosse, I don’t think I believe that “all characters are fictitious” disclaimer during the credits. Seems a little too coincidental for my tastes…

Legacy 

• After its initial theatrical run, “All That Jazz” took a backseat to Fosse’s more famous work (“Cabaret” et al). The film, however, is not without its fans (apparently Stanley Kubrick loved it), and still gets the occasional shout out from movie buffs like me.

• Whenever “All That Jazz” is directly referenced in pop culture, it’s usually just the title, or a quoting of the aforementioned “It’s showtime” line. The latter has been repeated in such shows as “Better Call Saul”, “Family Guy”, and “American Horror Story” (do you think Jessica Lange noticed?).

• The making of “All That Jazz” is touched upon in the limited series “Fosse/Verdon” (though mainly just how self-referential it was). Series producer Lin-Manuel Miranda makes a cameo as Roy Scheider.

• Bob Fosse only directed one more film after “All That Jazz”: the 1983 drama “Star 80”. This made “Jazz” Fosse’s last musical film. Fosse died in 1987 of a heart attack on his way to the opening of his “Sweet Charity” revival. Fosse’s legacy has carried on since his passing, and a revival of “Chicago” (choreographed by Ann Reinking in Fosse’s style) has been playing on Broadway for the last 25 years.

Further Reading: Robert Alan Aurthur was posthumously nominated for two Oscars for “All That Jazz”, and his daughter Kate wrote this article recounting her experience attending the ceremony with her mother as his proxy.

#598) Love Me Tonight (1932)

OR “Tailor’s Delight”

Directed by Rouben Mamoulian

Written by Samuel Hoffenstein & George Marion Jr. and Waldemar Young. Based on the play “The Tailor at the Castle” by Léopold Marchand and Paul Armont. Score by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart.

Class of 1990 

The Plot: Maurice Courtelin (Maurice Chevalier) is a tailor in Paris who always has a song in his heart. While trying to collect money from his client, the fast-talking Vicomte Gilbert de Varèze (Charlie Ruggles), Maurice tracks him down at the chateau of Gilbert’s uncle the Duc d’Artelines (C. Aubrey Smith). Complications arise when Gilbert introduces Maurice as the “Baron Courtelin”, and Maurice falls for the Duc’s niece Princess Jeanette (Jeanette MacDonald). There’s music, romance, comedy, and Myrna Loy as a thirsty Comtesse.

Why It Matters: The NFR calls it “one of the most original of 1930s musicals”, praising Mamoulian’s direction, the “effervescent” script, and the two leads (apparently Chevalier has “saucy charm”). An essay by movie musical expert Richard Barrios is a love letter to the film’s creativity.

But Does It Really?: While not the most iconic of early movie musicals, “Love Me Tonight” may have been the first musical to crack the code. Previous musicals of the era were typically revues of unrelated songs and acts, but “Love Me Tonight” effectively weaves its songs into the story and characters, creating an enjoyable experience that holds up reasonably well 90 years later. There are more famous musicals on this list for sure, but none of them would be here without the stepping stone of “Love Me Tonight”.

Everybody Gets One: Lyricist Lorenz Hart was introduced to composer Richard Rodgers in 1919, and the two spent the next 24 years writing 26 musicals. Among the songs these shows spawned were such staples as “The Lady Is a Tramp“, “Blue Moon” and “My Funny Valentine“. Unfortunatley, Hart’s frequent bouts with alcoholism led to some tensions with Rodgers, and the two parted ways shortly before Hart’s death in 1943. “Love Me Tonight” was one of several movie musicals Rodgers & Hart were commissioned to write during the 1930s.

Title Track: We’ll talk more about the title number later, but I will take this time to voice my disappointment that nobody in this movie sings the Tom Jones song also called “Love Me Tonight”.

Seriously, Oscars?: “Love Me Tonight” was released in August 1932 which, due to the Oscar’s off-calendar eligibility period, meant it couldn’t compete until the 1933 Oscars. Ultimately, “Love Me Tonight” received zero nominations. Paramount’s Best Picture contenders that year were “A Farewell to Arms” and fellow NFR entry “She Done Him Wrong“.

Other notes 

• Leave it to the man who directed “Applause” to bring something new to the movie musical. You can see Mamoulian’s influence in the first scene, a non-verbal sequence in which the entire town begins its day in a rhythmic routine crescendoing to the opening number. It’s like they all live in the town from “Beauty and the Beast“.

• Interestingly enough, I think movie musicals needed the Great Depression to survive and evolve. Moviegoers were looking for escapism once the Depression hit, and who wouldn’t want to escape to a story of romance and royalty in Paris?
• Maurice Chevalier had been a sensation in both France and America in the 1920s, and became interested in film acting once sound came along. His early films with Paramount were box office hits, with “The Love Parade” and “The Big Pond” even earning him Oscar nominations. His 1932 film “One Hour With You” paired him with Jeanette MacDonald (a stage performer making her film debut) and was the biggest hit of his career. “Love Me Tonight” was tailored to both Chevalier and MacDonald’s talents, hence why they share first names with the lead characters. Side note: Whenever he performed in English, Maurice Chevalier always used a more pronounced embellishment of his natural French accent. He didn’t actually sound like that all the time.
• I’ve read that all the singing in this film was pre-recorded, but it sounds live to me. Maybe it’s a combo of the two?
• Charlie Ruggles is one of those actors who I’m more familiar with because of this blog. Before this, I only knew him as the Grandpa from “The Parent Trap”, turns out he had a long career as a comic character actor.
• Easily the most memorable song from this movie is “Isn’t It Romantic?”, presented in a novel approach. It begins with Chevalier singing in his tailor shop (with the camera showing his multiple reflections in the dressing room mirrors), and the song’s infectious melody travels from character to character until it reaches Jeanette MacDonald in her chateau. Very ahead of its time, and still a memorable number.

• This is my first experience with Jeanette MacDonald, one of the biggest movie singers of the day. She has that ’30s operatic sound I associate with early films: it’s beautiful, but I have no idea what she’s saying. Also, Jeanette MacDonald kinda looks like Gracie Allen, doesn’t she?
• I’m enjoying Charles Butterworth as Jeanette’s well-meaning but boring suitor. Apparently Butterworth was Daws Butler’s inspiration for the original voice of Cap’n Crunch. I definitely didn’t see that coming.
• What’s the deal with the three elderly aunts? Did this become “MacBeth” all of a sudden?
• Myrna Loy is always worth the trip out, especially here as the man-hungry ingenue, a far cry from the more sophisticated, mature women of her later career.

• Gabby Hayes is in this? I didn’t realize he made movies where he wasn’t a grizzled prospector in the old west.
• I’m enjoying the usage of “Lover”, a very romantic song, being sung to a horse.
• “Mimi” is performed in what I call the “Jonathan Demme Shot”; whenever we cut to Chevalier or MacDonald they are staring directly at the camera. It’s a bit unsettling.

• “Love Me Tonight” was filmed pre-Code, meaning that the film could be a little more suggestive with its dialogue (I’m still shocked someone says “nymphomaniac”). A re-release of the film in the 1940s (under the Code) saw the deletion of about 10 minutes of the more provocative dialogue and scenes – including Myrna Loy in some risqué negligee. Sadly, these moments have never been seen since their deletion.
• First rule of ’30s musicals: if someone says a line that rhymes, they’re about to start singing.

• Thunderbolt, the horse initially selected for Maurice to ride, is described as “fast and furious”. Hopefully that horse knows how to Tokyo Drift.
• This movie’s romance is a variation of “He’s a jerk but she’s okay with it” called “They’re both jerks but we’re all okay with it I guess”. It must be the music.
• Ooh, a joke that plays with the film’s frame rate. Rouben you clever bastard.
• “I’m an Apache” is another simple number filmed artistically: Chevalier regales the crowd while his shadow looms tall in the background. I don’t know what it means, but it looks great!
• Why do so many movies have a guy kissing a sleeping woman? What is this, a Disneyland dark ride?

• Interesting choice for the title number; “Love Me Tonight” is an inner monologue song! Maurice dreams the song while he lies in bed, imagining his confession to Jeanette. It makes lip-synching a lot easier, that’s for sure. The last shot is a split screen of Maurice and Jeanette asleep in their separate beds, but composed in a way that it looks like they’re sharing a bed. We won’t see something this suggestive again until “Pillow Talk” in 25 years.
• “The Son of a Gun Is Nothing But a Tailor” goes on way too long, but wins for best rhyme in the movie: “I’d rather throw a bomb on her/than have her wed a commoner.” Hart earned his paycheck that week.
• The finale is exciting, and the engineer who refuses to stop the train is my favorite character. “What’s the trouble?” “I love him.” “That’s not a real trouble.”

Legacy 

• “Love Me Tonight” plays today as the next step in the evolution of 1930s movie musicals. I’d argue that the step immediately after this movie was the Astaire/Rogers musicals RKO cranked out in the coming years.

• Several of the songs from “Love Me Tonight” became standards, including “Lover”, “Mimi”, and “Isn’t It Romantic?”
• Jeanette MacDonald and Maurice Chevalier would make a few more musicals in the ’30s, and we’ll see MacDonald again when she teams up with Nelson Eddy in “Naughty Marietta“.

• Maurice Chevalier left Hollywood in 1935, returning to his native France. After some (cough) controversies during the war, Chevalier returned to Hollywood (albeit on-location in France) in 1957 to star in Billy Wilder’s “Love in the Afternoon”. Chevalier’s film career peaked in 1958 with “Gigi” and an Oscar for lifetime achievement.

• Rouben Mamoulian would reunite with Richard Rodgers (following the latter’s teaming with Oscar Hammerstein) not in film, but on the stage. In 1943, Mamoulian directed Rodgers and Hammerstein’s first collaboration for Broadway, “Oklahoma!”, which revolutionized musical theater in a manner not unlike what we see in “Love Me Tonight”.
• Perhaps this film’s most amusing legacy: Paramount took the film’s most iconic song and used it for the 1948 musical comedy “Isn’t It Romantic?” with Veronica Lake and Billy De Wolfe. Poorly received upon release, Leonard Maltin’s more-recent critique holds the record for shortest movie review: “‘Isn’t It Romantic?’ No.”

Listen to This: The only Rodgers and Hart song on the National Recording Registry is Ruth Etting’s 1930 rendition of “Ten Cents a Dance”. Interestingly enough, neither Maurice Chevalier or Jeanette MacDonald has made the list.

Five years ago I had a dream: a dream to watch a bunch of movies and to write a blog about them. Back then I had no idea how far I’d make it, “but the prospect of the attempt sounds like a lot of fun”. Well, here we are, five years and almost 600 movies later, and I must admit it’s still a lot of fun.

As always, I want to give a shoutout to my fellow NFR binge-watchers: NFR Completist, The Film Patrol, Merry Watches Movies, and Registering the Registry. Bonus shoutout to Merry Watches Movies, who is simultaneously listening to every entry in the National Recording Registry at her second page Merry Merry Listens. I don’t know what prompted this, but godspeed Merry.

I also want to give mention to The National Film Registry Fan Site. Rather than watching and chronicling every film on the list, the NFRFS is a fanmade directory of all 825 movies, and where to view/purchase them online. A very valuable resource for anyone attempting this endeavor. Where were you five years ago?

And finally, thank you, dear reader. Thanks for checking in these last five years and indulging me in my never-ending movie marathon. And as always, let’s keep taking care of each other.

Happy viewing,

Tony

#597) The Maltese Falcon (1941)

OR “Follow That Bird”

Directed & Written by John Huston. Based on the novel by Dashiell Hammett.

Class of 1989

The Plot: San Francisco private investigator Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) is approached by Ruth Wonderly (Mary Astor) to track down her missing sister. When Spade’s partner Miles Archer (Jerome Cowan) is shot dead while investigating, the suspiciously stoic Spade takes the case (despite being a prime suspect). Spade soon learns that Wonderly is actually Brigid O’Shaughnessy, in town as part of the search for “The Maltese Falcon”, a jewel-encrusted 16th century statuette expected to be worth a fortune. During his investigation, Spade also crosses paths with two other crooks looking for the Falcon: the effeminate Joel Cairo (Peter Lorre), and the intimidating Kasper Gutman, aka “The Fat Man” (Sydney Greenstreet). The ensuing suspense is, for lack of a better word, priceless. 

Why It Matters: The NFR ranks “The Maltese Falcon” as “[a]mong the most influential movies to emerge from the Hollywood studio system”, praising Huston and Bogart for “captur[ing] the true essence of Hammett’s story”. An essay by film critic Richard T. Jameson successfully encapsulates the film and its production.

But Does It Really?: Now that’s a damn good movie. “The Maltese Falcon” is many things – a thrilling mystery, a faithful page-to-screen adaptation, the prototype for all film noir- but above all it is a thoroughly entertaining movie from beginning to end. In his directorial debut, Huston successfully translates the novel’s spirit, while maintaining a relentless pace that always keeps you on your toes. The ensemble is led by a never-better Bogart, to say nothing of the other outstanding cast members, all of whom add to the film’s excitement and mystery. “Falcon” holds up remarkably well 80 years later, and will continue to endure for years to come.

Wow, That’s Dated: Just the usual sexism that I’ve come to expect from the golden age of Hollywood. It’s not overwhelming here, but it’s definitely there. And I still don’t know what to make of Sam’s line to Cairo “When you’re slapped, you’ll take it and like it.”

Title Track: Perhaps to help differentiate this “Maltese Falcon” from its earlier film adaptations, Warner Bros. wanted to retitle this film “The Gent from Frisco”. Thankfully, Huston was able to persuade the powers that be to keep the original title.

Seriously, Oscars?: A hit upon release, “The Maltese Falcon” received three Oscar nominations: Picture, Screenplay, and Supporting Actor for Sydney Greenstreet. In a field of such strong contenders as “Citizen Kane” and “Sergeant York“, “Maltese” lost all three nominations – two to “How Green Was My Valley“. Although Mary Astor was not even nominated for her work in “Falcon”, she did win Best Supporting Actress that year for her role in the melodrama “The Great Lie”.

Other notes

• John Huston began his show business career as a screenwriter, writing and polishing screenplays for Warner Bros. starting in 1937. When Huston wanted to start directing his own scripts, Jack L. Warner agreed on the condition that Huston’s next screenplay was successful. The script was “High Sierra”, a hit upon its release in January 1941. Huston chose to adapt “The Maltese Falcon” as his first movie, a risky choice given that Warner Bros. had adapted the novel to film twice in the last decade (a pre-code version in 1931, and again in 1936 as the comedy “Satan Met a Lady”). The story goes that Huston’s first draft of the screenplay (a straightforward write-up of the novel’s events) was prematurely sent to Warner and the film’s producer Henry Blanke. To Huston’s surprise, the script was immediately approved and put into production.
• With the budget of a B-movie and only six weeks to film everything, Huston maximized his shoot by storyboarding the entire movie in advance, and writing detailed camera instructions into the script. The shoot was by all accounts an enjoyable one, with Huston and the cast engaging in practical jokes between set-ups. Thanks to Huston’s preparedness, shooting wrapped under budget and two days ahead of schedule.
• George Raft was the first choice to play Sam Spade, and turned it down (allegedly he did not want to work with a novice director). Thankfully, second choice Humphrey Bogart accepted the role. With a string of supporting parts in gangster pics under his belt, you can see how Bogart became a star after this: Sam Spade is the ruler of all he surveys in this movie. Totally in control, cryptic yet always charismatic, a star turn if ever there was one. Plus the character’s constant jadedness provides an entertaining running commentary.

• The corner of Bush and Stockton where Archer is shot is a real-life San Francisco location, and today is commemorated with a plaque featuring a major spoiler.
• I always forget how fast everybody talks in old movies. It’s not at an overlapping Hawksian speed, but it’s still fast. No wonder this movie is so short. Despite this, Huston already knew a pivotal rule of filmmaking from the beginning: shoot the most important dialogue either in close-up or from a new angle; this subliminally tells your audience to pay attention.
• Mary Astor’s great in this. Her Brigid is a complex spinning coin who never truly lands heads or tails until it’s too late. You can see the gears turning in Brigid’s head as each of her lies is called out. It’s method acting before the term existed. 

• And then we get to Peter Lorre, one of filmdom’s greatest character actors. You never forget a Peter Lorre performance, especially here as a sophisticated, neurotic criminal. The character’s homosexuality had to be toned down, but come on; the gardenia scented card, the phallic umbrella handle. We all know what’s up.

• I’ve always wondered if you could ever replicate taxi cab chases in a modern movie. It’s not like you can tell your Lyft driver to “follow that car and step on it!” Too many insurance risks. And oh, the awkward small talk.
• He doesn’t show up until halfway through the movie, but Sydney Greenstreet is worth the wait. A stage actor making his film debut, Greenstreet nearly steals the show with his menacing theatricality. He’s so good you forget that his story of the Falcon’s history is just him talking for seven minutes!

• My favorite moment is when Spade, while being interrogated by the district attorney, rattles off what he knows about the case at a break-neck pace, stopping only to check in with the stenographer to ensure he’s getting it all down. It’s hilarious.

• I spent a lot of this movie trying to remember where I know Elisha Cook Jr. from, his boyish good looks standing out against his angular features. After some research, my conclusion is that I’m recognizing him from other NFR films I covered early on, including “The Big Sleep” and “Rosemary’s Baby“.

• Perhaps the greatest walk-on cameo in film history: John Huston’s father Walter (already a well-known stage and film actor in 1941) as the ill-fated Captain Jacoby. The elder Huston stumbles into Spade’s office, his hat tucked down to obscure his face, delivers the package, mutters his line, and falls down dead. 
• I realized that “Maltese Falcon” shares a lot with “Treasure of the Sierra Madre“, Huston’s later film that I admired but couldn’t fully get into. Both are movies about a group of strangers on a quest for an alleged fortune. While both show the dangerous extents greedy people will go to, “Falcon” meditates more on perceived value vs. actual value. Of course, now that I think about this, you can apply that to pretty much all of Huston’s movies.
• The only weak link in this ensemble is Gladys George, sporadically popping up as Archer’s widow, an overdramatic Miss Havisham-type clad in black. It’s a very one-note performance, not aided by the deletion of most of Ida’s characterization from the novel.
• [Spoilers] The last act of the movie is a surprisingly intense summation of events, expertly handled by Huston and his ensemble. The highlight is – of course – the awaited arrival of the Falcon, and the revelation that it is fake. This is followed by Cairo going full Peter Lorre on Gutman. With his bulging eyes and gritted pronunciation (“You bloated eediaht! You styupid fat-head!”), it’s like he’s turning into Ren from “Ren and Stimpy” right in front of us.

• The film’s most iconic line is a paraphrase from “The Tempest” (“We are such stuff as dreams are made on”), and is original to the movie. My favorite part is that “The stuff that dreams are made of” is technically not the last line. That distinction goes to Ward Bond’s follow-up: “Huh?”

Legacy

• “The Maltese Falcon” was a hit and jumpstarted the careers of both John Huston and Humphrey Bogart. While it predates true film noir by a few years, “The Maltese Falcon” is often cited as the genesis of the genre.
• Warner Bros.’ proposed sequel, “The Further Adventures of the Maltese Falcon”, quickly stalled due to Huston’s salary demands and the cast’s unavailability. Huston would write a pseudo-sequel a few years later called “Three Strangers”. When it was discovered that the film rights to the character of Sam Spade had reverted back to Dashiell Hammett, the script was re-written as a separate entity (though the final film does star Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre).

• John Huston would continue to direct movies for the next 46 years! His filmography has plenty of classics in it, and span a wide array of genres. He even directed “Annie”!

• “Maltese” was the beginning of a beautiful friendship (if you will) for Huston and Bogart. The two collaborated on five additional films, including “The African Queen“, which earned Bogie his long overdue Oscar.

• Film noir got a bit of a resurgence in the ’70s (I blame “The Long Goodbye”), which ultimately devolved into parody. The 1975 comedy “The Black Bird” saw George Segal as Sam Spade Jr., inheriting his father’s detective business and getting mixed with criminals still trying to find that damn bird. Despite appearances by original “Falcon” actors Lee Patrick and Elisha Cook Jr. reprising their roles, “The Black Bird” failed to take off.

• As for the prop Maltese Falcon itself, the statuette used in the film has become – somewhat ironically – one of the most valued and sought after movie props in history. At least three Falcon statuettes made for the film are known to exist, and have had their share of owners over the last 80 years. The only one verified to have been in the final film (noted for its bent tail after Bogart dropped it) was sold at auction in 2013 for over four million dollars! That’s over 10 times the budget of the original film!