Let's get the second week of 2019 started off right, with one of the greatest songs from Depeche Mode, orginally from the "Music of the Masses" album. (And be assured that there is nothing strange in loving Depeche Mode!)
Monday, January 7, 2019
Musical Monday: Strangelove
Let's get the second week of 2019 started off right, with one of the greatest songs from Depeche Mode, orginally from the "Music of the Masses" album. (And be assured that there is nothing strange in loving Depeche Mode!)
Sunday, January 6, 2019
To Know Her is to Fear Her....
... and she's Jessica Drew, the only one TRUE Spider-Woman!
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| By Joyce Chin |
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| By Sean Izaak |
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| By David Finch and Danny Miki |
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| By Shonemitsu |
(And is this the beginning of a "Spider-Woman Sunday" series along the lines of the "Princess of Mars" one? Time will tell!)
Friday, January 4, 2019
'She-Wolf of London' is a disappointment
She-Wolf of London (aka "The Curse of the Allenbys") (1946)
Starring: June Lockhart, Don Porter, Jan Wiley, Sara Haden, and Dennis Hoey
Director: Jean Yarbrough
Rating: Four of Ten Stars
Young heiress Phyllis Allenby (Lockhart) comes to fear that she has fallen victim to a family curse and has begun committing grisly murders in a nearby park. Her fiance (Porter) sets about to prove her fears wrong by finding the real killer.
"She-Wolf of London" is a slightly lethargic thriller that's more of a mystery than a monster movie, despite the title. It could be that this is a movie that's become predictable given the hundreds of similar films that have been made since its release in 1946, but I pretty much knew how it was going to resolve some five-ten minutes in, as well the true reason for the Allenby curse's return.
Usually, I don't mind being right about guessing where a film is heading before it gets there, particuarly when the filmmmakers throw in some nice bits of misdirection that make me suspect I'm wrong... and the actions of Phyllis's insensitive friend Carol (Wiley) were so well orchestrated that they made me do just that--could she REALLY be that much of a bitch without trying, I had to ask myself? Unfortunately, in the case of this movie, when it does arrive at the ending I had already guessed, it completely botches it. Setting up Carol as a possibility for the she-wolf was really the only decent bit of storytelling here, everything else being very pedestrian and the ending being a suspenseless, badly written and badly staged cop-out.
I wish more effort and care had been put into giving "She-Wolf of London" a better ending. I became very interested in the film about halfway through when I realized that its storyline was very close to what the 1941 classic "The Wolf Man" (review here ) was originally supposed to be--a psychological thriller where the "werewolf" might just be a deluded psychopath whose "transformation" is a figment of a diseased mind--and this concept could have been put to far better use than it is here. I might have felt the letdown of the poorly executed ending more sharply because I got my hopes up for what was coming, but I suspect it's more likely the pathetic ending is simply the natural outcome of a production where quality wasn't a top priority. After all, this is a film set in 1890s London, with lead characters who are all British bluebloods, but none of the stars make even a halfhearted attempt at a British accent.
In the final analysis, this is a shoddy movie that is very solidly deserving of the 4/10 rating I'm giving it.
Starring: June Lockhart, Don Porter, Jan Wiley, Sara Haden, and Dennis Hoey
Director: Jean Yarbrough
Rating: Four of Ten Stars
Young heiress Phyllis Allenby (Lockhart) comes to fear that she has fallen victim to a family curse and has begun committing grisly murders in a nearby park. Her fiance (Porter) sets about to prove her fears wrong by finding the real killer.
"She-Wolf of London" is a slightly lethargic thriller that's more of a mystery than a monster movie, despite the title. It could be that this is a movie that's become predictable given the hundreds of similar films that have been made since its release in 1946, but I pretty much knew how it was going to resolve some five-ten minutes in, as well the true reason for the Allenby curse's return.
Usually, I don't mind being right about guessing where a film is heading before it gets there, particuarly when the filmmmakers throw in some nice bits of misdirection that make me suspect I'm wrong... and the actions of Phyllis's insensitive friend Carol (Wiley) were so well orchestrated that they made me do just that--could she REALLY be that much of a bitch without trying, I had to ask myself? Unfortunately, in the case of this movie, when it does arrive at the ending I had already guessed, it completely botches it. Setting up Carol as a possibility for the she-wolf was really the only decent bit of storytelling here, everything else being very pedestrian and the ending being a suspenseless, badly written and badly staged cop-out.
I wish more effort and care had been put into giving "She-Wolf of London" a better ending. I became very interested in the film about halfway through when I realized that its storyline was very close to what the 1941 classic "The Wolf Man" (review here ) was originally supposed to be--a psychological thriller where the "werewolf" might just be a deluded psychopath whose "transformation" is a figment of a diseased mind--and this concept could have been put to far better use than it is here. I might have felt the letdown of the poorly executed ending more sharply because I got my hopes up for what was coming, but I suspect it's more likely the pathetic ending is simply the natural outcome of a production where quality wasn't a top priority. After all, this is a film set in 1890s London, with lead characters who are all British bluebloods, but none of the stars make even a halfhearted attempt at a British accent.
In the final analysis, this is a shoddy movie that is very solidly deserving of the 4/10 rating I'm giving it.
Thursday, January 3, 2019
Who's greater than Tony the Tiger? Superman!
Then there was that time where Superman saved ZaSu from getting beat up by her abusive husband...
(We're presenting this slightly disturbing television ad, which aired during the Superman television series at some point between 1953 and 1958, because ZaSu Pitts was born on January 3, 1894--125 years ago today.)
(We're presenting this slightly disturbing television ad, which aired during the Superman television series at some point between 1953 and 1958, because ZaSu Pitts was born on January 3, 1894--125 years ago today.)
Wednesday, January 2, 2019
Thelma is a Bombshell for the Defense
Sneak Easily (1932)
Starring: ZaSu Pitts, Thelma Todd, James C. Morton, Bobby Burns, and Billy Gilbert
Director: Gus Meins
Rating: Six of Ten Stars
Attorney Thelma Tood (Todd) is defending a mad scientist (Burns) who has been accused of murdering is wife when juror ZaSu (Pitts) accidentally swallows a piece of evidence--which just happens to be a sample of the time-released high explosive of the madman's creation. Will ZaSu develop a case of terminal indigestion, or will the Thelma and the rest of the officers of the court find a way to save her before it's too late?
When I read a logline for this film--"Juror Zasu accidentally swallows a piece of evidence which just happens to be a time bomb."--it moved to the top of the list of things to watch. However, while amusing, this outing for these great comediennes is deeply flawed in several ways, almost all of them originating with the script.
The problems start almost immediately. Three minutes in, I felt like I had missed the beginning of the film, because so many questions are raised by the way Thelma Todd's attorney character is introduced. She is clearly an inexperienced attorney trying to inflate her image, but why? And how did she end up defending the mad scientist? Perhaps her apparent inexperience with court procedures is an indication that she isn't an attorney at all but is some sort of fraud? The sense of having missed out on a chunk of the story only deepened when an exchange between ZaSu makes comments to Thelma that not only establishes that they are closely acquainted but that they may even be roommates like they are in other entries in the series; how could ZaSu be on the jury in a murder trial if she has close ties to the defense attorney? It makes sense if Thelma is some sort of fraud and somehow managed to get ZaSu on the jury as a "ringer"... but, again, that means there's a chunk of story missing. I don't mind joining a story in progress when it comes to short films like these, but I do mind when it feels like I came in late.
Another problem is a bizarre repeat of footage during a high-speed driving sequence when ZaSu is being rushed to hopeful salvation in an ambulence. I thought maybe the DVD had skipped, but, no. For whatever reason, the filmmakers decided to insert the same few seconds of external footage of cars on a road twice in the same sequence, with only a short scene of the actors mugging it up in the ambulance in between. It's unncessarily distracting and looks sloppy and cheap. If it was done for comedy, I'm missing the joke.
Despite the flawed beginning, once ZaSu swallows the trial evidence, the film is utterly hilarious and top-notch. While Todd doesn't get to show off her flair for physical comedy, Pitts gets to do plenty of pratfalls. In fact, it many ways, Todd serves as the eye of a storm of craziness, as she is the only actor who isn't hamming it up... at least not until the explosive prelude to the film's twist ending.
"Sneak Easily" is one of 17 short films included on the two-DVD set containing
Starring: ZaSu Pitts, Thelma Todd, James C. Morton, Bobby Burns, and Billy Gilbert
Director: Gus Meins
Rating: Six of Ten Stars
Attorney Thelma Tood (Todd) is defending a mad scientist (Burns) who has been accused of murdering is wife when juror ZaSu (Pitts) accidentally swallows a piece of evidence--which just happens to be a sample of the time-released high explosive of the madman's creation. Will ZaSu develop a case of terminal indigestion, or will the Thelma and the rest of the officers of the court find a way to save her before it's too late?
When I read a logline for this film--"Juror Zasu accidentally swallows a piece of evidence which just happens to be a time bomb."--it moved to the top of the list of things to watch. However, while amusing, this outing for these great comediennes is deeply flawed in several ways, almost all of them originating with the script.
The problems start almost immediately. Three minutes in, I felt like I had missed the beginning of the film, because so many questions are raised by the way Thelma Todd's attorney character is introduced. She is clearly an inexperienced attorney trying to inflate her image, but why? And how did she end up defending the mad scientist? Perhaps her apparent inexperience with court procedures is an indication that she isn't an attorney at all but is some sort of fraud? The sense of having missed out on a chunk of the story only deepened when an exchange between ZaSu makes comments to Thelma that not only establishes that they are closely acquainted but that they may even be roommates like they are in other entries in the series; how could ZaSu be on the jury in a murder trial if she has close ties to the defense attorney? It makes sense if Thelma is some sort of fraud and somehow managed to get ZaSu on the jury as a "ringer"... but, again, that means there's a chunk of story missing. I don't mind joining a story in progress when it comes to short films like these, but I do mind when it feels like I came in late.
Another problem is a bizarre repeat of footage during a high-speed driving sequence when ZaSu is being rushed to hopeful salvation in an ambulence. I thought maybe the DVD had skipped, but, no. For whatever reason, the filmmakers decided to insert the same few seconds of external footage of cars on a road twice in the same sequence, with only a short scene of the actors mugging it up in the ambulance in between. It's unncessarily distracting and looks sloppy and cheap. If it was done for comedy, I'm missing the joke.
Despite the flawed beginning, once ZaSu swallows the trial evidence, the film is utterly hilarious and top-notch. While Todd doesn't get to show off her flair for physical comedy, Pitts gets to do plenty of pratfalls. In fact, it many ways, Todd serves as the eye of a storm of craziness, as she is the only actor who isn't hamming it up... at least not until the explosive prelude to the film's twist ending.
"Sneak Easily" is one of 17 short films included on the two-DVD set containing
Tuesday, January 1, 2019
Welcome to 2019!
Our thanks to Alice White for making sure we're keeping with the times here at Shades of Gray. 2019 promises to be a very busy year.
(Although we're hoping that the next time she makes an appearance, she'll be wearing one of her many silly hats.)
(Although we're hoping that the next time she makes an appearance, she'll be wearing one of her many silly hats.)
Monday, December 31, 2018
The end of 2018 is almost here...
... and Dorothy Lee and Thelma White are counting down the final minute of what's been a busy year here at Shades of Gray...
... while Lilian Harvey is ready with a toast...
... and Bessie Love just keeps on partying, because she knows that 2019 is going to be even busier!
WE'LL SEE YOU NEXT YEAR (in just another minute)!
... while Lilian Harvey is ready with a toast...
... and Bessie Love just keeps on partying, because she knows that 2019 is going to be even busier!
WE'LL SEE YOU NEXT YEAR (in just another minute)!
This 'Conspiracy' isn't worth uncovering
Conspiracy (1930)
Starring: Bessie Love, Ned Sparks, Hugh Trevor, Gertrude Howard, Rita La Roy, and Donald MacKenzie
Director: Christy Cabanne
Rating: Four of Ten Stars
After killing a drug kingpin, Margaret (Love) is hiding from both the drug syndicate and the police, her identity as the killer still unknown. Then a crime writer turned amateur detective, "Little Nemo" (Sparks), decides to solve the case, gets onto her trail, and may expose her to cops and crooks alike.
When I reviewed "The Sawdust Ring", I said that I could easily see why D.W. Griffith was sure Bessie Love was going to be a star from the moment he first saw her, and why she did indeed become a huge star during the 1920s. In that film, she had a certain charisma that almost seemed to make her leap off the screen. In "Conspiracy", however, very little of that aura is evident... in fact, the performance she gives here barely distinguishes her from a generic "damsel in distress"-type character. (I might even argue that her performance seems a bit off, since she's playing a character who's been undercover with a drug gang for several months. Sure, she's just stabbed someone to death as the film starts, and later she's been cooped up with an obnoxious asshole for two weeks, but I would still expect something more than confusion and panic to each and every situation she encounters.)
Perhaps Love was modulating her performance to be complimentary to the boring, bland stock hero played by Hugh Trevor. Maybe she was trying to be lowkey so Ned Sparks' supremely annoying, grumpy old man character would seem even more annoying and grumpy. Or maybe she knew she was in a badly directed third-rate movie with a weak script full of squandered opportunities and only one mildly interesting twist, and she wasn't giving it her all. Whatever the reason, there are only two times in "Conspiracy" where we see glimmers of the Love that graced the screen 15 years earlier: During the obligatory insta-romance-sparking scene where she tells her tale of woe to Trevor's dull alleged man of action, and during the scene where Sparks' character threatens to turn her over to the police, and she in turn threatens to bash his brains in with a paperweight.
Still, even if Love had given the performance of her career, she probably couldn't have saved this movie which leads with its very best scenes and then steadily goes down hill. The biggest problem here, really, is that the filmmakers couldn't decide if they were making a comedy or a thriller or a melodrama; or if the central character was Margaret, Love's caught-in-the-middle woman on the run; Little Nemo, Sparks' annoying and obnoxious and played-strictly-for-laughs crime writer; or Trevor's boring feature section reporter. It also doesn't help the movie that anything remotely suspenseful happens off-screen or in a flashback (where we already know the outcome).
As terrible as this movie is, and as disappointed as I was with Bessie Love's performance, I did keep watching. Ned Sparks as Little Nemo was entertaining in a train-wreck sort of way... and I watched with captivated awe while Sparks and Gertrude Howard (as Little Nemo's beleaguered black housekeeper) played through a series of comedic (but extremely unfunny) and deeply racist exchanges. Also, Rita La Roy's femme fatal-ish character that shows up at about the halfway point as an agent of the drug ring trying to milk Little Nemo for information and seduce him into turning Margaret over to the gang when he finds her, was a lot of fun.
Unless you're a huge Ned Sparks fan (I think this was the closest this accomplished character actor ever came to playing the lead); want an opportunity to be able to tell exactly how brilliant Bessie Love is in some of her other roles; or are looking for an old movie with some racists scenes to fill you with righteous outrage, there are far better movies to spend your time on. (But if you do decide to check it out, I recommend you watch it for free on YouTube.)
Starring: Bessie Love, Ned Sparks, Hugh Trevor, Gertrude Howard, Rita La Roy, and Donald MacKenzie
Director: Christy Cabanne
Rating: Four of Ten Stars
After killing a drug kingpin, Margaret (Love) is hiding from both the drug syndicate and the police, her identity as the killer still unknown. Then a crime writer turned amateur detective, "Little Nemo" (Sparks), decides to solve the case, gets onto her trail, and may expose her to cops and crooks alike.
Perhaps Love was modulating her performance to be complimentary to the boring, bland stock hero played by Hugh Trevor. Maybe she was trying to be lowkey so Ned Sparks' supremely annoying, grumpy old man character would seem even more annoying and grumpy. Or maybe she knew she was in a badly directed third-rate movie with a weak script full of squandered opportunities and only one mildly interesting twist, and she wasn't giving it her all. Whatever the reason, there are only two times in "Conspiracy" where we see glimmers of the Love that graced the screen 15 years earlier: During the obligatory insta-romance-sparking scene where she tells her tale of woe to Trevor's dull alleged man of action, and during the scene where Sparks' character threatens to turn her over to the police, and she in turn threatens to bash his brains in with a paperweight.
Still, even if Love had given the performance of her career, she probably couldn't have saved this movie which leads with its very best scenes and then steadily goes down hill. The biggest problem here, really, is that the filmmakers couldn't decide if they were making a comedy or a thriller or a melodrama; or if the central character was Margaret, Love's caught-in-the-middle woman on the run; Little Nemo, Sparks' annoying and obnoxious and played-strictly-for-laughs crime writer; or Trevor's boring feature section reporter. It also doesn't help the movie that anything remotely suspenseful happens off-screen or in a flashback (where we already know the outcome).
As terrible as this movie is, and as disappointed as I was with Bessie Love's performance, I did keep watching. Ned Sparks as Little Nemo was entertaining in a train-wreck sort of way... and I watched with captivated awe while Sparks and Gertrude Howard (as Little Nemo's beleaguered black housekeeper) played through a series of comedic (but extremely unfunny) and deeply racist exchanges. Also, Rita La Roy's femme fatal-ish character that shows up at about the halfway point as an agent of the drug ring trying to milk Little Nemo for information and seduce him into turning Margaret over to the gang when he finds her, was a lot of fun.
Unless you're a huge Ned Sparks fan (I think this was the closest this accomplished character actor ever came to playing the lead); want an opportunity to be able to tell exactly how brilliant Bessie Love is in some of her other roles; or are looking for an old movie with some racists scenes to fill you with righteous outrage, there are far better movies to spend your time on. (But if you do decide to check it out, I recommend you watch it for free on YouTube.)
It's almost 2019...
... and people are practicing their best kicks as they prepare to kick 2018 right the heck out of here!
Sunday, December 30, 2018
Horror movie giants at their best
The Body Snatcher (1945)
Starring: Boris Karloff, Henry Daniell, Russell Wade, Bela Lugosi, and Edith Atwater
Director: Robert Wise
Rating: Nine of Ten Stars
In this loose adaptation of a Robert Louis Stevenson short story, a young medical student (Wade) becomes drawn into the twisted relationship between a brilliant but coldhearted surgeon (Daniell) and a strange coachman who moonlights as a body snatcher to provide the doctor with research specimens (Karloff).
"The Body Snatcher" is a one-stop spot to discover why producer Val Lewton, actor Boris Karloff and director Robert Wise are held in such high regard by horror movie fans and filmmakers.
Lewton's touch is all over this film, and there is barely a scene that doesn't feature terror technqiues that filmmakers copy and rely on to this very day. Karloff gives one of the very best performances of his career, oozing greasy charm and quiet menace with every word and gesture. And then there's the very chilling scene where he's just choked a man to death, is sitting over the corpse, and then reaches out to stroke his pet cat. And, finally, Wise mounts a brilliantly structured film where the mystery and tension keeps mounting until the end, and every scene is perfectly paced, framed and lit. Much gets said about film noir, but the use of light and shadow in black and white horror films like this one is far more important that in crime dramas, and here Wise uses the medium to perfection.
And, of course, the stars are backed up by an excellent supporting cast, including Bela Lugosi in his final horror role for a major studio. Lugosi's role is small, but he brings a level of raw creepiness to his character, creepiness born more of stupidity than the evil that wafts from Karloff's character.
In retrospect, the fact that Lugosi dies in a very key scene in the film is something of an allegory for his career, as well as Karloff's. In the scene in question, Lugosi ends up dead on the floor and Karloff reaches out to pet a cat in a very creepy moment. This was the second-to-last film Lugosi made for a major studio, and his career and life were mostly a downward spiral from here, while Karloff's career in horror films continued to flourish.
Starring: Boris Karloff, Henry Daniell, Russell Wade, Bela Lugosi, and Edith Atwater
Director: Robert Wise
Rating: Nine of Ten Stars
In this loose adaptation of a Robert Louis Stevenson short story, a young medical student (Wade) becomes drawn into the twisted relationship between a brilliant but coldhearted surgeon (Daniell) and a strange coachman who moonlights as a body snatcher to provide the doctor with research specimens (Karloff).
"The Body Snatcher" is a one-stop spot to discover why producer Val Lewton, actor Boris Karloff and director Robert Wise are held in such high regard by horror movie fans and filmmakers.
Lewton's touch is all over this film, and there is barely a scene that doesn't feature terror technqiues that filmmakers copy and rely on to this very day. Karloff gives one of the very best performances of his career, oozing greasy charm and quiet menace with every word and gesture. And then there's the very chilling scene where he's just choked a man to death, is sitting over the corpse, and then reaches out to stroke his pet cat. And, finally, Wise mounts a brilliantly structured film where the mystery and tension keeps mounting until the end, and every scene is perfectly paced, framed and lit. Much gets said about film noir, but the use of light and shadow in black and white horror films like this one is far more important that in crime dramas, and here Wise uses the medium to perfection.
And, of course, the stars are backed up by an excellent supporting cast, including Bela Lugosi in his final horror role for a major studio. Lugosi's role is small, but he brings a level of raw creepiness to his character, creepiness born more of stupidity than the evil that wafts from Karloff's character.
In retrospect, the fact that Lugosi dies in a very key scene in the film is something of an allegory for his career, as well as Karloff's. In the scene in question, Lugosi ends up dead on the floor and Karloff reaches out to pet a cat in a very creepy moment. This was the second-to-last film Lugosi made for a major studio, and his career and life were mostly a downward spiral from here, while Karloff's career in horror films continued to flourish.
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