Class of '54: Woman's World

We are looking at some favourites from one of my favourite years: 1954 - when I was 8 and discovered movies (starting with JOHNNY GUITAR and A STAR IS BORN), as per the 1954 label here.

Today its back to Jean Negulesco's comedy-drama WOMAN''S WORLD which finally is available in a good print, so I can chuck my ropey copy.  We have covered this here before, but its one movie that bears repeated views. As I said back in 2011: 

For me this 1954 Fox movie is the '50s in aspic. Its a fabulously entertaining variation on the '3 girls sharing an apartment and looking for love' genre that Fox and director Jean Negulesco did so well (HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIRE, 3 COINS IN THE FOUNTAIN, THE BEST OF EVERYTHING, THE PLEASURE SEEKERS) - here the 3 girls are married and visiting New York - cue great views of '50s Manhattan - as Clifton Webb, the head of a motor company, has to choose a new general manager so the top 3 candidates and their wives are being vetted too to see if they are suitable material for company events.

The 3 couples are out-of-towners Cornel Wilde and ditzy (or is she?) June Allyson, sophisticates on the point of divorcing Lauren Bacall and Fred McMurray, and ambitious Van Heflin and Arlene Dahl who will go to any lengths to get her man the position. The gals get to wear to some marvellous frocks, Allyson and Bacall play their usual personas so the unknown quantity here is Dahl who steals the film - particuarly when she enters poured into that green clinging sheath with a divine little fur-trimmed bolero which she knowingly removes as she puts the make on Clifton and lets him see how grateful she will be if Van is the man. June spills coffee on her cocktail dress so she can get to be alone with Clifton's all-wise sister Margalo Gilmore (who is advising him), while Bacall gets the measure of Dahl: "have a cookie, cookie"! Those early Fifties automobiles look good too as Clifton gets the measure of his three candidates at the factory .... 

Finally, once the manager is announced (right man, wrong wife - but that is soon rectified) they can all eat dinner! Clifton is in his element here and even seems to be (can it be possible in '54) a coded gay as he is not married and seems devoted to his general managers. Whatever, its an absolute treat to see anytime, a nice contrast to that other '54 star-studded executive drama EXECUTIVE SUITE. Arlene Dahl is the only cast member still here in her late 80s. 

Its one of a dozen or so '50s movies I simply adore - not classics like EAST OF EDEN, SUNSET BOULEVARD, ALL ABOUT EVE or A STAR IS BORN (though of course I love them too), but simple splashy, star-studded entertainments where fabulous gals wear fabulous clothes and live the high life, or the most delirious costume epics [more on them at Glamour label]. 
As well as WOMAN'S WORLD, bring on THE OPPOSITE SEX, DESIGNING WOMAN, LES GIRLS, THE RELUCTANT DEBUTANTE, HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIRE, THE BEST OF EVERYTHING, JUPITER'S DARLING, ITS ALWAYS FAIR WEATHER, QUENTIN DURWARD, MOONFLEET, THE PRODIGAL, THE EGYPTIAN ... i enjoyed all those as a kid, and still do now.

Next 1954 revival: THE SILVER CHALICE.

O'Hara

It was nice watching a new Sky Arts documentary on Maureen O'Hara, the latest of an occasional series, reminding one of much much we like the veteran actress who often seems overlooked in the pantheon of movie greats.

Maureen, now all of 95, is still going and received an honorary Oscar last year. She will of course be forever linked to those John Ford-John Wayne films, but has a great body of work, starting with those early films with Charles Laughton: Hitch's JAMAICA INN and THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME in 1939. Born in Dublin in 1920, she was soon in America. 
I particularly liked her and Lucille Ball as showgirls in Dorothy Arzner's DANCE GIRL DANCE in 1940. Maureen then became "The Queen of Technicolor" with that flaming red hair and all those pirate and adventure movies she did in the 1940s and into the '50s: THE SPANISH MAIN, AGAINST ALL FLAGS, THE BLACK SWAN, SINBAD THE SAILOR, THE FLAME OF ARABY, TRIPOLI, LISBON where she was teamed with the likes of Tyrone Power, Errol Flynn, John Payne, Ray Milland, and Rex Harrison in THE FOXES OF HARROW, as well as playing perfect wives for James Stewart and Henry Fonda in the Sixties. She and John Wayne were first paired in Ford's RIO GRANDE in 1950, then came their classic THE QUIET MAN where her Mary Kate Danaher is the spirited centre of the film. She and Wayne were also in Ford's THE WINGS OF EAGLES in 1957, and they were both in McLINTOCK! and BIG JAKE in 1971. She and Tyrone Power headed Ford's THE LONG GREY LINE in 1955.

Two of her late 1940s classics are the imperishable THE MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET in 1947, where she has great rapport with the young Natalie Wood, and SITTING PRETTY in 1948 where she is the mother of the children being babysat by Mr Belvedere (Clifton Webb). She was in good company too in OUR MAN IN HAVANA in 1959, with Alec Guinness, and Disney's THE PARENT TRAP was an enormous hit in 1961 with Hayley Mills as those twins. 
She was teamed again with Brian Keith in that early Peckinhah western THE DEADLY COMPANIONS in 1961. It seems impossible to see her THE BATTLE OF THE VILLA FIORITA, a Delmar Daves romance from 1965, One of her last roles was as John Candy's Irish mother in ONLY THE LONELY in 1991, before a long retirement in County Kerry, Ireland. She ran an airline for 10 years as well, when her third husband, Charles Blair, a pilot, died in a plane crash in 1978, so she took over their Antilles Airboats, a commuter seaplane service in the Carribean, scene of her many swashbuckling adventures. So she was the first woman president of a scheduled airline in the United States, Her autobiography "Tis Herself" is an enjoyable read too. 

Maureen had a good singing voice too and did some recordings and cabaret appearances. She would have been an ideal Mrs Anna in THE KING AND I, but it seems Oscar & Hammerstein would not consider "The Queen of Technicolor" ..... but we will always have Mary Kate and her QUIET MAN. I've just had to pre-order the Blu-ray out in November, as there are so many ropey prints of it out there ...

Clifton and Sophia

Thanks indeed to Daryl for posting this nice shot of Projector favourites Sophia Loren and Clifton Webb in BOY ON A DOLPHIN, 1957, on my Facebook page for my birthday. Delicious ! 

Vacation time: Holiday for Lovers / Bon Voyage!

HOLIDAY FOR LOVERS. Like Disney’s BON VOYAGE (below) this 1959 20^th Century Fox family comedy  (which I remember seeing as a child) starts out fun but soon gets tedious and one ends up begging for it to stop as it seems far too over-long and we lose patience with most of the characters. Jane Wyman coasts in both films, as the understanding wife and mother, but gets nothing much to do. Here, father is Clifton Webb, a consulting psychologist in Boston, whose older daughter Meg (Jill St John) a promising sculptor if you please, goes to Sao Paulo in Brazil to study with famous architect, Paul Henreid. She seems to be getting involved so parents and other daughter Carol Lynley are soon South America bound – cue endless airplane interiors, and lots of location shooting as our cast stand in front of lots of back projections of Sao Paulo, as it is obvious they never left the back-lot. Jill indeed seems smitten with the suave Henreid, but it turns out to be his boorish, beatnik son (Nico Minardos) she is romantically involved with, while Carol inexplicably falls for army fellow Gary Crosby. After trekking around Sao Paulo endlessly, the family head off to Rio and we see some of the carnival (maybe the same one used for the film BLACK ORPHEUS, also that year), and if that wasn’t enough local colour (all that’s missing is Carmen Miranda!), then it is off to Lima in Peru for a bull-fight. Then everything stops for a flamenco number or two from Jose Greco and the misunderstandings get sorted out, as we wind up in Trinidad – don’t ask! Directed by Fox reliable Henry Levin; at least Clifton gets to do a few South American dance steps. Fascinating though to luxuriate in air travel as it was over 50 years ago, and Sao Paulo certainly looks great, if not as teeming as it is these days. We like Clifton Webb a lot here at The Projector - see label, and Jane was certainly engrossing in that Sirk classic ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS. she was third choice here after Gene Tierney and then Joan Fontaine both had to drop out due to health reasons (or maybe they realised they really had nothing much to do here) - it would have been nice though to have seen Gene's LAURA re-teamed with her Waldo Lydecker! while Joan could raise those eyebrows and be more acerbic than bland Jane. 

BON VOYAGE!, 1962. Comic adventure awaits the Williard family from Terre Haute, Indiana, when Harry packs up the wife and kids and sets sail on a long-awaited “dream” vacation to romantic France. However, their trip includes some unforeseen adventures: his wife Katie is pursued by a Hungarian admirer, his daughter Amy meets a brash young playboy, and Harry himself gets hopelessly lost on a tour of the Paris sewer system (he is a plumbing contractor)! Join the Williards for a hilarious, whirlwind trip they’ll never forget!

So says the blurb, but this is Disney corn which at 132 minutes is way overlong, with terrible pacing from Disney hack James Neilson, but it looks like they really went to France on a transatlantic liner which takes up most of the first half of the film. Fred McMurray and Jane Wyman coast on autopilot, Deborah Walley (wasn’t she a GIDGET?) is a pallid daughter, while Disney kids Tommy Kirk and Kevin Corcoran reprise their usual roles. Its all an over-long travelogue around Paris – Francoise Prevost has a good moment as the coded  working girl who tries to pick up Fred, and then his son; Ivan Desny pursues Jane, Michael Callan gets to dance a bit and finally Jessie Royce Landis has some fun as his overbearing snooty society mother (above), while British Richard Wattis also pops up, as it all finishes up on the Riviera. 

Sitting Pretty, 1948

Hummingbird Hill is a typical suburban community, where attorney Robert Young and his wife Maureen O'Hara have trouble finding a nanny to care for their three boisterous kids. Tacey (Maureen) places an ad for a live-in babysitter and general helper (a little light housework is expected), after the last maid departs. Lynn Belvedere accepts the position but turns out to be a man -
but Mr Belvedere is a self-proclaimed genius who proves to be an expert at everything, including children. Mr. Belvedere works miracles with the children and the house but what does he do on his evenings off?. And when Harry has to go out of town on a business trip, a nosy parker starts a few ugly rumors. But everything comes out all right in the end thanks to Mr. Belvedere...

Finally, a dvd of SITTING PRETTY - I know I saw this as a kid at a Sunday revival but it just has not been available since, but I have now got a Spanish dvd, with Spanish optional dialogue and sub-titles, and a booklet in Spanish! I have also got "Sitting Pretty" the biography of Clifton Webb (Clifton wrote the first 6 chapters himself before his death in 1966), which I shall now read with renewed interest. We like Clifton a lot here, as per my other posts on him as a 'Person We Like', and Jean Negulesco's films like WOMAN'S WORLD and BOY ON A DOLPHIN, where he is ideally cast with the likes of Lauren Bacall, Arlene Dahl and the young Sophia Loren ... Of course his '40s hits like LAURA (where his Waldo Lydecker is as iconic as George Sanders' Addison De Witt in ALL ABOUT EVE) and THE RAZOR'S EDGE are also marvellous viewing anytime, and so it is with SITTING PRETTY.

Seeing it again now at this remove is quite interesting. We don't actually see too much of Mr Belvedere - he does not appear until 23 minutes in of this 82 minute film, as we mainly focus on our married couple and their gossipy neighbour Clarence Appleton (Richard Haydn at his prissiest) who lives with his domineering, nosey mother. Appleton comes across as the nosiest, campest, annoying closet case imaginable (if such a term was in use then) - and his scenes with Clifton's Belvedere crackle - like two enemy cats hissing at each other. This is deliciously funny now of course.

Again, we also see this new '40s style suburban living, with those roomy large houses and large cars, all very Hollywood dream factory showing post-war living in the late '40s where everyone is well-off and even have servants (as in A LETTER TO 3 WIVES, ROADHOUSE etc), It also has that 20th Century Fox look in spades, as directed by Walter Lang. O'Hara of course is an attractive presence and makes an ideal mother, as she did the year before in THE MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET.  The superior Mr Belvedere does not actually interact with the children much - even when the baby throws baby food at him we do not see Belvedere retaliating by throwing the baby food dish over the infant, but just hear him scream.... Mr Belvedere is an expert dancer too as we see in that nice scene where he and O'Hara dance - Clifton was of course a champion dancer in the 20s. The ending is nice too with the bigots routed, and a new baby on the way .... and Mr Belvedere's book about Hummingbird Hill and its residents a runaway success. 

Clifton went on to play Mr Belvedere two more times, as well as films like DREAMBOAT, the 1953 TITANIC and THREE COINS IN THE FOUNTAIN, a very individual star ... as per Clifton label.  A 1940s comedy classic then! 

John, Maureen, Clifton, Sophia ....

Rainy day doodlings: THE QUIET MAN was on again yesterday .... in a movie of magic moments I love that scene where Wayne's Sean Thornton first sees Mary Kate Danaher ..... we like Wayne in lots of movies: those Ford and Hawks classics - THE SEARCHERS with Jeff Hunter and Natalie Wood, RIO BRAVO with Feathers (Angie Dickinson) and Colorado (Ricky Nelson), and the bliss that is Hawks' HATARI; his Joe January in Hathaway's Sahara western LEGEND OF THE LOST with the blooming Sophia Loren in 1957 (Loren label), the still delighful NORTH TO ALASKA (Westerns label) also for Hathaway, and of course here in THE QUIET MAN with another of his perfect co-stars Maureen O'Hara.

Maureen's MIRACLE ON 34th STREET is on tomorrow, with the even younger Natalie Wood (I must get around to GYPSY and LOVE WITH THE PROPER STRANGER soon) its one I am not that familiar with, I may only have seen it once ... so we will tune in again, particularly now with Christmas rushing at us. 

 
The Maureen one I do want to see though is SITTING PRETTY, her 1948 comedy with Clifton Webb as Mr Belvedere, the baby-sitter. This seems impossible to obtain now here in the UK.  I saw it when I was a kid though, at one of those Sunday matinee revivals, but obviously I would appreciate it a lot more now. Maureen's book was a good read and she is still going strong in her 90s ... 

I have done an 'appreciation' on Clifton here,  see label - particularly his Negulesco films I like, like WOMAN'S WORLD and BOY ON A DOLPHIN, with Sophia. There is also a book on Clifton, which I just had to order ... there was 1 copy left and I had to have it. Seems he began it himself and did the first half dozen chapters .... should be a fascinating look back at his career and that Hollywood gay era in the 40s and earlier ..... his early career as a dancer, and hits like LAURA, and his family movies like CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN, to his later waspish roles. I particularly like his art collector in BOY ON A DOLPHIN (below, with Sophia), as mentioned before here ...
The Clifton book has got good comments - The Zanucks regarded him as "family": There has never been a replacement for him; he could do everything and did it in a singular style that could never be repeated. He was 20th Century Fox's most unlikely star ... who was also a meticulous and devoted friend".

Titanic, 1953

Fanscination with The Titanic rolls ever onward - in its centenary year. We will soon have a new 4-part series written by Lord Julian Fellows (DOWNTON ABBEY), and of course whatever one thinks of James Cameron's 1997 blockbuster, the second half after the iceberg hits is stunningly well done as one really feels the ocean invading and sinking the ship ... so it was interesting to catch Jean Negulesco's 1953 version. Winner of three Academy Awards, the 1953 TITANIC holds up well, even on a much smaller budget - as does the 1958 A NIGHT TO REMEMBER, with Kenneth More, perhaps the best all-round version of events without silly stories at the forefront.

Fascination with the fate of the huge and opulent liner is as strong as ever, especially since improved technology has led to more breathtaking visits to the ship's resting spot on the floor of the Atlantic where state-of-the-art robots with cameras explore the crumbling interiors of the still eerily majestic but rapidly decaying wreck.



20th Century's contribution to the story hold the interest with Clifton Webb and Barbara Stanwyck heading the cast as an ill-matched couple; she is in fact leaving him and returning to America with their children as he joins the ship at the last minute to reason with her. Webb and Stanwyck bring their expertise to this soap opera story and it remains very affecting. Add in young Robert Wagner, more like a 50s teenager than a 1912 one, and Thelma Ritter as the famous Unsinkable Molly Brown, and Brian Aherne as the captain and the stage is set for some dramatics. Negulesco keeps it going nicely and it has that early 50s 20th Century Fox look in spades.

The tempestuous exchanges between Webb and Stanwyck are strongly and believably acted, and then we have the sinking of the vessel - not as graphically done as in the later versions, but suitably stiff upper lip to the end. Interesting to compare these versions this anniversary year, we shall be hearing more about them.

"The Throb of Manhattan"

ITS ALWAYS FAIR WEATHER, 1955, may well be my very favourite musical (after A STAR IS BORN and THE BANDWAGON of course) - it and those sophisticated musicals from 1957 [LES GIRLS, FUNNY FACE, SILK STOCKINGS, THE PYJAMA GAME, bits of PAL JOEY] are my perennial favourites, ever since I saw them as a child at Sunday afternoon matinees - BRIGADOON was another but it it not quite in that league, but I prefer them to the over-hyped SINGING IN THE RAIN or AN AMERICAN IN PARIS both of which show Kelly at his most grating (of course, as per Musicals label, I also love ON THE TOWN, MY SISTER EILEEN, KISS ME KATE, SWINGTIME, GYPSY, LES DEMOISELLES DE ROCHEFORT among others...)

Good to see that ITS ALWAYS FAIR WEATHER is being revived by the London National Film Theatre in their season on MGM musicals - it cries out to be seen on widescreen, using as it does, multiple images when our 3 wartime buddies reflect on their lives now. It seems to have been a troubled shoot, co-directors Kelly and Stanley Donen fell out, Kelly and Charisse don't have any number together, she has one marvellous dance number "Baby You Knock Me Out" at the gym (where, as Pauline Kael put it, "Cyd Charisse is benumbed until she unhinges those legs") wearing that terrific Helen Rose ensemble, and Gene has the very inventive roller-skate number and of course when the 3 guys dance with the dustbin lids, so it is all very innovative, just as original musicals were dying, it was mainly films of Broadway shows after this.

It is the perfect mid-century story of 3 wartime buddies meeting up 10 years later in 1955 and realising that they don't like each other much now, and indeed Kelly and Dailey don't much like themselves either. Gene is mixing with hoods and managing a dumb boxer, while Dan Dailey has risen to "Executive Vice-President" level in advertising and is sick of the advertising game as he lets rip in his terrific solo number "Advertising-wise". Cyd Charisse is the television researcher who stumbles across the 3 wartime buddies and realises their reunion is ideal for her television show "Midnight with Madeline" for "The Throb of Manhattan" spot where saccharine stories are featured. This is the early days of live television and the movie is a splendid satire on those artificial tv hostesses like Madeline and her diva tantrums. Dolores Gray is stupendous here, and has one of the best numbers ever "Thanks a lot but no thanks" which is a delirious treat with that ritzy gown and that killer line:"I've got a man who's Clifton Webb and Marlon Brando combined"!. Then hood Jay C Flippen and his goons invade the studio where the live broadcast is being made, as they are after Gene who has thrown the fight once he realised his boxer has been bribed to lose it. Cyd gets the hoods to confess on live air, Madeline has a hit show, the 3 buddies realise they are still friends after all. It's a perfect conclusion as Cyd joins Gene and the the guys back at the bar where they vowed to meet up 10 years previously.



Choreographer Michael Kidd is ideal as the family man, Dailey has one of his best roles (apart from his father in THERE'S NO BUSINESS LIKE SHOW BUSINESS), Cyd and Gene sparkle as they spar with each other, and Dolores steals the show. What's not to love? It is a dark, sometimes bitter take on ON THE TOWN a decade later as the 3 buddies meet again - by 1955 though Sinatra had gone on to solo projects and was "difficult" and Jules Munchin was not a name enough. Produced of course by Arthur Freed, with songs by Andre Previn, script by Comden and Green; perfect entertainment then, but see the widescreen version, not panned and scanned! The DVD includes a fascinating 'Making-Of' chronicling the fallout between Kelly and Donen, and several out-takes including a terrific inventive (that word again) deleted number between Kelly and Charisse "Love is Nothing But a Racket" which has been unseen for far too long, and Michael Kidd's solo spot with some kids, but Gene did not want that included, after his number with kids in AN AMERICAN IN PARIS! Essential stuff then.

I met Gene at a recording of an interview of his for the BBC in 1975 - Donen of course went on to direct several of my enduing favourites: those Audrey Hepburn films like TWO FOR THE ROAD and CHARADE, Kendall in ONCE MORE WITH FEELING, Peck and Sophia ideal in ARABESQUE, and the marvellous BEDAZZLED with Pete and Dud and Eleanor Bron in 1967. We won't mention STAIRCASE or LUCKY LADY!

People We Like: Clifton Webb

Clifton Webb [1998-1966] was a phenomenon. A famous dancer in the ‘20s, he became a leading man in the ‘40s and ‘50s when audiences loved his acerbic waspish persona. He led several box-office hits, was friends with all the in-crowd (the Oliviers, Coward, the Bogarts, the Lufts as per all those photographs) while remaining, in that conservative era, a “confirmed bachelor” who famously lived with his mother, Maybelle.

In his twenties he was a professional ballroom dancer and appeared on the stage and in silent movies (which came in useful later in his 1953 comedy DREAMBOAT). His theatre career is fascinating too. LAURA in 1944 was his first big success as the effete Waldo Lydecker in Preminger’s hit thriller, a movie that endures and remains fascinating anytime. Then there was his vain snob Elliott Templeton in THE RAZOR’S EDGE in ’46 – both of which won his Oscar nominations. Then there was Mr Belvedere, his fastidious, finicky, fussy, abrasive and condescending baby sitter in SITTING PRETTY, ’48. I saw that at a Sunday matinee as a kid in the ‘50s, its one we need to see again, there were several more MR BELVEDERE films.



Other popular hits saw him as fathers with large families in the likes of CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN and BELLES ON THEIR TOES. DREAMBOAT saw his as the ex-silent star, now a sedate college professor, whose old silent movies are revived on tv, with Anne Francis and Jeffrey Hunter as his daughter and her beau. Negulesco cast him opposte Stanwyck on that 1953 version of TITANTIC, where he does the noble thing. Young Robert Wagner, whom he seems to have mentored, was the juvenile lead. He was also Sousa in MARCHING ALONG.

The 1950s saw those successes THREE COINS IN THE FOUNTAIN, ’54 though I do not care for his role in this – he is perfect though as Ernest Gifford, the motor magnate in WOMAN’S WORLD, also for Negulesco, in ’54 (see separate post below). THE MAN WHO NEVER WAS was a success in 1956, where he masterminds this plot to fool the Nazis, and was followed by another successful Negulesco film, my childhood favourite BOY ON A DOLPHIN, as Victor Parmalee the avid art collecter who wants the statue that Greek diver Sophia Loren finds. He and Loren play nicely together, and the film, a programmer really, still plays nicely today – this is the one that introduced Loren to international audiences, emerging from the Aegean in that wet dress …

THE REMARKABLE MR PENNYPACKER and HOLIDAY FOR LOVERS (on vacation with wife Jane Wyman and daughters Jill St John and Carol Lynley) followed in ’59, pleasant holiday fare really. His last film was SATAN NEVER SLEEPS in 1962, which I have not seen, where he and William Holden are priests in China, for Leo McCarey. Clifton lived with his mother until her death aged 91, six years before his own death in ’66. He remained a star to the end and is always eminently watchable now.