THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 50

 

BROKEN LULLABY (1932): Paul Renard, a French veteran of World War I, is haunted by killing German soldier Walter Holderlin during combat. In an attempt to ease his guilt, Renard he visits the victim's bereaved family -- and Walter's former fiancée Elsa -- intending to admit he was responsible. Unable to bring himself to tell the truth, Paul tells them instead that he and Walter were friends in pre-war Paris. Herr Holderlin's hatred toward France gradually melts, while his wife finally finds joy in life once and more. And as Paul is accepted as part of the family -- and falls in love with Elsa -- he finds himself more tortured than ever by withholding his secret.

A 180-degree change from the usual frothy comedies directed by Ernst Lubitsch, Broken Lullaby is an anti-war drama forcing the audience to understand the pain suffered by both sides of war. (One shot of a veteran's parade has the camera placed under the amputated leg of a soldier -- one of the most startling moments in a 1930s picture.) And as Herr Holderin (Lionel Barrymore in a sterling performance) gradually recognizes his generation's responsibility for sending its sons to their deaths, his own guilt-ridden outburst to his French-hating friends could have been written today. No doubt Broken Lullaby was one of the more mature, insightful dramas of 1932, with a message that still resonates over time.

Unfortunately, the movie is nearly derailed by Phillips Holmes as the tortured Paul Renard. Haunted -- perhaps going mad -- by killing the German soldier, Holmes' performance is out of a 1910 silent melodrama, when over-emoting was considered high drama. Contemporary audiences who might otherwise take to Broken Lullaby's message likely will find Holmes off-putting at best, laughable at worst. Why Ernst Lubitsch -- an expert at subtlety and sophistication -- encouraged Holmes' scenery-chewing is a mystery. Nevertheless, just for its unusual story (and poignant finale), Broken Lullaby is deserving of one go-round. Just try not to be distracted by Phillips Holmes' histrionics -- or occasional resemblance to Timothee Chalamet.

BONUS POINTS: The flashback to the scene in a foxhole where Renard finishes signing Walter's final letter home by holding the dead soldier's bloody hand. Unforgettable, tragic, and gruesome all at once.

THE WOMEN IN HIS LIFE (1933): Otto Kruger does his best Warren
William/Ricardo Cortez mash-up as the brilliant, womanizing, day-drinking lawyer Kent Berringer, who's never seen a criminal he didn't defend or a dame he couldn't deflower. His debauchery hits a wall when pure-at-heart Doris Worthing tries hiring him to defend her father for murdering her stepmother -- who happens to be Kent's ex-wife. The shock sends him on an alcoholic spree leading to his disbarment. Kent makes it his mission to find Tony Perez, the malefactor he believes really offed his ex.

The Women in His Life has everything one wants in a pre-code picture: a fast-pace; racy dialogue; pre-marital sex; and a general disdain for morality. There's also plenty for the eye, like beautiful art deco sets, and Kruger's fabulous tailored suits, provided by MGM's wardrobe department. I've seen plenty of these lush early '30s movies, and nobody looks as good as Kruger does here. I would kill for this stuff. And he'd defend me in court!

But Kruger is just one actor that makes The Women in His Life so entertaining for early talkie fanatics. From the very beginning, when the camera tracks down a row of busy telephone operators to the usual friends, lovers and suspects, there are faces more welcome than those of your own family. You know instantly upon seeing their names in the credits the characters they're going to play and how they're going to do it. In addition to Otto Kruger (far left), there's Roscoe Karnes as Kent's wisecracking assistant Lester (far right), C. Henry Gordon as oily criminal Tony Perez (in the chair), and Una Merkel as Kent's smartass secretary Simmy Simmons (not seen in the still). In a world spinning out of control, The Women in His Life makes for a comforting respite.

BONUS POINTS: In what appears to be a real copy of Variety, the front-page headline reads NUDIES EYE STAGE COIN. This could mean strippers wanting better pay, or low-budget, adult-only independent movies hoping to charge Broadway ticket prices. Feel free to come up with your own translation.

PILGRIMAGE (1933): Or, A Mother's Love Gone Off the Rails. In 1917, small-town widow Hannah Jessop prevents her son Jimmy from marrying his knocked-up girlfriend by arranging for her son to be drafted in hopes of him being killed in World War I. And she succeeds!  A decade later, Hannah reluctantly joins other gold star mothers to attend a memorial ceremony in Paris, where she meets a young man in the same position as Jimmy was. Finally realizing what a bitch she's been, Hannah urges the young man's mother to allow him to marry his sweetheart. Hannah returns to the farm a changed person, begging forgiveness from Mary. As if that's going to bring back the old crone's son.

I give credit to director John Ford for making Hannah thoroughly detestable for most of Pilgrimage. She admits to Jimmy that she'd rather see him dead than wed Mary (or any woman), barely sheds a tear when getting word of his death, and refuses to acknowledge her bastard grandson. Actress Henrietta Crosman (born in 1861!) overshadows the other actors in the picture to the point where there's no need to mention them, yet she's never for a moment hammy. You just hate her, and continue doing so until the last reel when she finally admits to herself -- and eventually Mary -- what a terrible person she's been all these years. Frankly, I wouldn't have forgiven her, but I hold a grudge like you wouldn't believe.

There's some humor in the Paris scenes, such as Hannah and another farmer/mother successfully taking aim at every target in a shooting gallery. But that's enough fun and games; after the ceremony, she tells the other mothers that unlike their sons, hers was "no good" -- meaning he wanted to leave the farm and get married. There are precious few moments where Hannah's haranguing isn't heard, making Pilgrimage difficult but definitely fascinating to watch. I just kind of wish she fell off the ship returning home.

BONUS POINTS: During the scene when the grandson is teased by his classmates for being illegitimate, I recognized Marilyn Harris, best known as the little girl tossed in the pond in Frankenstein. Norman Foster, who played Jimmy, later became a director; his output includes a bunch of Mr. Moto and Charlie Chan pictures, the Orson Welles-produced Journey into Fear, and the noir classic Kiss the Blood Off My Hands. Glad he wasn't really sent to his death by his mother.

IF YOU COULD ONLY COOK (1935): Gentle, post-Code screwball comedy? A merry mix-up based on deception? Another one of those Depression era millionaire-goes-slumming farces? Sorta, kinda, and for sure. 

Auto magnate Jim Buchanan, unhappily engaged to a woman he doesn't love and fed up with his board of directors, walks out of his job and into Central Park, where he makes friends with the unemployed Joan Hawthorne. Mistaking Jim for one of her own kind, she finds them positions as cook and butler for former bootlegger Mike Rossini. Over the course of a week, Jim and Mike fall for Joan; Joan gets arrested for robbery for showing Jim's sketches for a new car to one of his business rivals; Jim is talked into returning to work and his fiancée; and Mike rounds up his hoodlum pals to eventually set things right for everybody. And if any of this comes as a surprise, you haven't seen a movie made before 1960.

If You Could Only Cook was Columbia's rare attempts at sophisticated comedy. The classy Brit Herbert Marshall (The Letter) is nicely self-effacing as Jim, who willingly loses a few stripes off his captain of industry position. It's easy to understand why he goes for Joan (Jean Arthur, who always sounded like a pack-a-day-smoking Minnie Mouse). She's a jumble of contradictions: smart yet naive, sexy but innocent, cynical but romantic. In other words, they're the kind of people ticket-buyers meet only in the movies.

And so are Marshall and Arthur's costars. Leo Carillo gives Mike Rossini the kind of Italian accent you'd hear in comedies like this. Another familiar voice belongs to the sandpaper-throated Lionel Stander (Soak the Rich) as Mike's sidekick Flash, who's suspicious of the new help from the get-go. Many cineastes tend to describe If You Could Only Cook as "unfairly underrated". To me, it's cute and charming but becomes laugh out loud funny only in its zany final 15 minutes, which is what you remember best after the closing credits.

BONUS POINTS: In the UK, Columbia Pictures falsely promoted If You Could Only Cook as a Frank Capra production. By way of apology, Columbia boss Harry Cohn gave Capra cut of movie's profits. 

                                                         ***********************

THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 46

 This Early Show entry is a mixed bag, with one great movie, one pretty good, one creepy, and a forgotten TV show starring a now-century-old legend. You can't say I don't deliver the goods.

THE CRIMINAL CODE (1930): Just as the first phase of movie musicals was overstaying its welcome, prison dramas took hold, and The Criminal Code was one of the best. Robert Graham is on his sixth lap of a ten-year prison stretch for manslaughter. Mark Brady, the new warden -- and former D.A. who sentenced Graham -- hires him as a chauffeur, giving the young man a daily taste of freedom and for Brady's daughter Mary. But before Graham can make a move on her, he's thrown in the prison "dungeon" for refusing to squeal on a fellow prisoner named Galloway, who stuck a shiv into a stoolie -- even though it means losing his chance at parole. 

The Criminal Code -- better looking than your average Columbia movie of the time -- is remembered mainly as the movie that allegedly inspired director James Whale to hire Boris Karloff (as Galloway) for Frankenstein later that year. There's far more to the movie than that, as it also shows how its director Howard Hawks was already polishing his fast-talking, multi-conversational style in only his second talkie. It's on display primarily in the first few minutes, but Hawks seems to have urged Walter Huston (Brady) to not only keep up the speed but intensify it along the way. And while Huston looks the part of the D.A.-turned-warden, he has an amusing habit of muttering "Yeah" -- both as a statement and a question -- while chewing on a cigar in a possibly unintentionally nasal imitation of Edward G. Robinson. 

As for the others, Phillips Holmes (Men Must Fight) makes for a sympathetic Graham, who over time has gone mad in stir. A young, dreamy-eyed actor, Holmes is convincing and empathetic as the nice guy-turned-grimy prisoner. And then there's Boris Karloff who admires Graham so much for keeping his yap shut that he willingly pays the ultimate price himself. Had Frankenstein not come along, he'd have probably gotten typecast in criminal roles. (He also played a prisoner in the now-lost French language version of Laurel & Hardy's first feature Pardon Us.) But it's Hawks himself who's the real star of The Criminal Code, putting his mark on almost every scene, bringing a welcome fervency into what could have been a routine melodrama.

BONUS POINTS: An unexpectedly young (and dramatic) Andy Devine is the prisoner who provides the weapon when a brutal prison guard gets what's coming to him.

THE LIMEJUICE MYSTERY, OR, WHO SPAT IN GRANDFATHER'S PORRIDGE? (1930): Any one-reeler nearly a century old with a title like that deserves a looksee. Until you looksee it for yourself. Then you realize how you just wasted eight precious minutes of your life -- or if you're pupaphobic, terrified to near death, for the cast is made up entirely of marionettes. 

A UK production, The Limejuice Mystery has a plot that... well, doesn't really exist. A murder happens in a bar in London's Limehouse district. (We know that because "Limehouse Blues" is heard almost incessantly on the soundtrack.) As weeks pass without the police coming any closer to solving the crime, master detective Herlock Sholmes is literally begged to step in to help. Not that he actually steps in. As with all the marionettes here, he more or less slides across the floor as if, er, moved via strings controlled by drunks. And if you think the name Herlock Sholmes is witty, his "co-star" is named Anna Went Wrong, as if out of one of those pornographic Tijuana Bibles.

There's no dialogue here, because The Limejuice Mystery is a wonderful example of pantomime that the British music hall in known for. Well no, that's not true. It's because providing dialogue would have been a tremendous waste of time and effort. As with the nightmarish I Am Suzanne! , its alleged appeal lies strictly in watching pieces of wood carved into grotesque-looking humans getting dragged around like a dog by its cruel master. The Limejuice Mystery exists in a good print on YouTube, while movies highly-regarded in their day have vanished without a trace. That's the real mystery here.

BONUS POINTS: Nobody actually spits in grandfather's porridge. 

THE LAST CROOKED MILE (1946): Private dick Tom Dwyer horns in on a police investigation of a bank robbery in order to collect the reward money. He starts by cozying up to nightclub thrush Sheila Kennedy, former girlfriend of the robbery leader named Jarvis who, along with his two assistants, were killed when their getaway car took  swan dive off a cliff. Dwyer is convinced the money is hidden somewhere in the getaway car, now restored and on display at a carnival. But before he can get his mitts on the dough, he has to get past "Wires" McGuire, a criminal whose trademark is strangling people with -- you'll never guess -- a wire. No more wire hangers!

At times it's difficult to figure out if Republic Pictures' The Last Crooked Mile is supposed to be taken seriously. Former cowboy star Don "Red" Barry plays Dwyer like a combination of James Cagney and Dwayne "Dobie Gillis" Hickman -- ready to throw a punch minute, spout goofy dialogue the next. Even the ever-reliable Sheldon Leonard (as McGuire) verges on laughing at one point, as if he doesn't know what's going on. But once it settles down, The Last Crooked Mile is quite an enjoyable 67-minute outing.

But it's B-queen Ann Savage as Sheila Kennedy who got me watching it. Almost unrecognizable at times with dark hair rather than her usual

blonde, Savage is more vulnerable here than in her best movie, Detour, even if she appears to know more than she lets on. A nice twist is the way Dwyer starts romancing her despite having a girlfriend named Bonnie. Is he really starting to fall for the moll, or does he suspect her as being part of the bank heist? You'll have to find out for yourself. All I can tell you is that I was 50% fooled -- which is something else you'll have to figure out yourself by watching the movie to its very last crooked mile.

BONUS POINTS: Barry and Savage have a couple of surprising moments with risqué dialogue that wouldn't have been out of place in a 1930s pre-code movie, proving the censors weren't very bright.

MOTHER'S DAY (10/21/58): Judging by the hoopla surrounding Dick Van Dyke's
99th birthday, you'd think that Mary Poppins and his first sitcom were the only things ever starred in. Why oh why did no one ask him about hosting Mother's Day, ABC-TV's kinder, gentler rip-off of Queen for a Day? Unlike the latter's cruelly exploitative nature, Mother's Day pit middle-aged women against each other in friendly challenges all moms apparently should know, like telling raw eggs from hard-boiled by touch alone, or figuring out which of a half-dozen steaks weighs four pounds. Women sure had it easy in the '50s!

Mother's Day's contestants were submitted by the loved ones of women who were deemed worthy of prizes provided by the producers -- mink stoles, tea sets, portable record players, and a vacation to one of a half-dozen glamorous cities. (The Latin Quarter, where the show aired from, was probably the classiest joint any of the contestants or audience members ever visited.) In addition to those eggs and steaks stumpers, the moms in this episode are submitted to a memory test and, in the weirdest moment of any game show in history, telling the difference between a dynamite cap from three similar-looking harmless devices -- as we're reminded, kids playing in vacant city lots are forever bringing home explosives. 

And as for Dick Van Dyke, no daytime host was ever more affable; women at home probably considered him such a nice young man. Today, he's the only reason worth watching Mother's Day if only to learn that legends had to start somewhere, even if meant wiping egg yolks off their hands. Well, also to remind us that live lunchtime programs like this and The Liberace Show ("next on most of these stations") were the closest housewives had to a vacation from their humdrummiest of lives. 

BONUS POINTS: One of Mother's Day's sponsors is Betty Crocker's hot cereal Protein Plus, back when it was pronounced Pro-Tee-In. Just to show my age, I remember hearing that pronunciation in commercials.

                                                 ***************

THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 4

 The more I search out cinematic and televisic curios, the more I realize my life is nothing to brag about. I also realize there's no such word as televisic. But while classics are continually rerun and rehashed, I can shine the spotlight anew, for just a few paragraphs, on the forgotten and ignored... before they're forgotten and ignored once again.

,

BY WHOSE HAND? (1932):  Jim Hawley, a fast-talking reporter (is there any other kind?) hops a train where escaped convict Killer Delmar is said to be hiding in one of the cars. While Jim is distracted by a cutey named Alice, a jewelry dealer named Chambers (who's almost a double for Piers Morgan) is murdered after unwittingly smoking marijuana -- but by whom? The unseen Killer Delmar? Eileen, the woman Kenneth was last seen with in the club car? Chick, Delmar's partner in crime who ratted him out? And  what's really in the coffin that's allegedly carrying a widow's late husband anyway? 

Despite its short running time, By Whose Hand? takes a while to pick up steam (Get it? Train, steam?). There's way too much time devoted to the cinematic bacteria known as "comedy relief" -- here, an unnamed drunk who pesters Jim Hawley throughout the movie, and a cutesy couple on their honeymoon. But once Killer Delmar escapes from the coffin (trust me, it's no surprise) and Chick the rat breaks out of his handcuffs (smart cops they have there in L.A.), things start getting good. Meaning creepy and violent.

While Ben Lyon has the lead as Hawley, Nat Pendleton impresses in one of his few non-comedic roles as Killer Delmar, giving him the chance to go full scary psycho killer.  And it's great to see Dwight Frye in a non-horror role, here as Chick the rat, who gets a fine death scene after a shiv in the back: only the second of five -- five! -- murders on this train ride. Don't they sell insurance for things like this?

BONUS POINTS: By Whose Hand? is told in flashback, beginning with the first murder at midnight before we see the hands of a clock go backwards to 8:00, where the story proper begins. Also, props to Pendleton for crawling and walking atop a real speeding train, where he later gets into a fight with Ben Lyon. 

CLIMAX! (1954): Live plays were a staple of 1950s television. One evening, the CBS series Climax! presented the first portrayal of James Bond in Casino Royale.  This being a one-hour presentation (51 minutes without commercials), certain liberties were taken with the story.

At least I presume they were. While I have only dim memories of the 1967 movie spoof with Peter Sellers and Woody Allen, and never saw the more recent remake, I can safely state that there was more to them than just a game of baccarat at the titular gambling house. 

Another difference is that here, James Bond --  Jimmy to his friends -- is an American agent. Felix Leiter, his American counterpart, is now British and renamed Clarence. There are no CGI explosions or dangerous motorcycle leaps over rooftops either. 

In fact, any James Bond fan will be mighty disappointed watching faded kinescope originally broadcast "From Television City in Hollywood!" as the announcer proudly boasts. Bond has to win a long round of baccarat in order to clean out the bankroll of his archenemy Le Chiffre. But if he does, Le Chiffre will kill Bond's former lover Valerie. Hey, Jimmy, she's an ex, not your current squeeze, remember? Take the money and run!

Nelson's OK -- he's kind of like Glenn Ford's kid brother -- but he's not the 007 today's audiences know. But you can't take your eyes off the short, stout, flinty-eyed, chain smoking Peter Lorre as Le Chiffre, a French spy working for the Russians as played by a Hungarian with a German accent. Between that and the reversed nationalities of the good-guy agents, it's difficult to keep track of who is what.

BONUS POINTS: The cigarette endlessly dangling from Peter Lorre's lips like a broken diving board. Nobody in a tuxedo has ever looked so sleazy, even when he's not trying to. Unless he is.

THE DEVIL IS DRIVING (1932):  Gabby Denton gets a job as an auto mechanic at the garage run by his strangely-named brother-in-law Beef Evans. Gabby learns that the garage, located on the bottom floor of an eight-story building, is also the center of a car-theft ring apparently run by a hoodlum named Jenkins. When Beef's young son is almost killed by one of the stolen cars, he  threatens to turn Jenkins over to the cops, leading to his violent demise. A lucky film shot by a newsreel cameraman proves how "Beef" died. Justice is served, and Gabby marries Jenkins's mistress. Sloppy seconds, Gabby, sloppy seconds!

A snappy little Paramount pre-code, The Devil is Driving doesn't quite live up the the promise of its title or great trade advertisement, but is still a good way to spend 64 minutes.  Edmund Lowe, a former silent movie leading man, made a good transition to sound; the repartee of wisecracks and risqué come-ons between he and leading lady Wynne Gibson is amusing and a little shocking today. (Lowe, looking for his hat: "What are you sitting on?" Gibson: "Oh, Judge, do I have to answer?")

George Rosener almost steals the show as a nasty deaf-mute nicknamed, naturally, Dummy. Allegedly Jenkins's servant, Dummy is the real brains behind the organization, communicating to his underlings via an electric autopen hooked up to machines throughout the building. I wish more criminals were this cool.

But the real star of The Devil is Driving is the art deco building that doubles -- make that triples -- as a garage, speakeasy, and criminal enterprise, helping to create the most unusual murder scene ever. After locking the unconscious Beef Evans inside a locked garage with a car's motor running, the thieves prop his dead body behind the steering wheel. They then send the vehicle driving several flights down the winding entryway and into traffic, where it's promptly smashed by a truck. Remember that when approaching a parking garage.

BONUS POINTS: Non-stop barrage of dialogue like, "There's a new style for wiseguys like you: they're wearing their socks in their nose!" And if you're talking to someone with a bad attitude, answer them with, "What's in your shirt?" Nobody will understand you, but at least these things should diffuse the situation.

THE LINE-UP (1929): This very low budget, 3-reel short encapsulates everything negative about early talkies. Long, static takes. Bad dialogue. Worse acting. Terrible audio.Never trust an indie studio called Classic Pictures, Inc.

Pressed for cash in order to save his nightclub, Edward Farron accepts $5,000 from a shady guy named Johnson to deliver an envelope to an even shadier guy named -- wait for it -- Bum Chiggers.  Cops later arrest Farron for unknowingly giving Chiggers money to kill gangster Whitey Harris. (Always make sure you're not delivering orders to hitmen.) Dragged to the station house, Farron starts to spill the beans when he's shot by a cop -- who turns out to be the aforementioned shady guy Johnson. Farron survives the shooting better than the audience does the movie.

The Line-Up is hypnotic in its mediocrity. The establishing shot at the nightclub lasts several seconds while the actors sit still at their tables without moving or saying a word. Others practically walk into the camera. Whenever Viola Davis, as Farron's fiancée Alyce Vernon, opens her yap, all you can think is, She can't be serious... can she?  In one scene, perhaps being too far from the microphone, the actors are almost inaudible, which, upon retrospect, is a blessing. No coincidence that the sound engineer is listed as George Crapp.

Want more? The set dresser didn't do a thing to make the crummy nightclub look any better than it did before Farron's $5,000 makeover. The editor didn't remove the long moment of Viola Davis looking at director Charles Glett for her cue before speaking.  Glett himself can be head yelling "Cut it!" to the cameraman at the end of two scenes. What kind of bootleg hooch was floating around this set?

How a single print of The Line-Up survived while major studio releases have vanished forever is one the inexplicable mysteries of cinema. I intend to watch it a few more times just to make sure I didn't imagine it.

BONUS POINTS: Introductory shots of the climactic line-up -- with close-ups of cops in eye masks and suspects twitching and sweating -- are played out in dead silence, resembling an outtake from a David Lynch picture. 

70,000 WITNESSES (1932): When college football player Wally Clark drops dead
during a football game, suspicion falls upon quarterback Buck Buchanan, the brother of gambler Slip Buchanan, who's placed a goalpoast-high stack of money on the game. It doesn't help that Slip slipped Buck what was supposed to be a vial of a harmless knockout drug to pour into Wally's water. Police Detective Dan McKenna puts Buck on the hot seat before hitting upon an idea. He orders the two teams to replay the game from the second half on, convinced that somebody will crack under pressure. Nitroglycerine is involved, too, but not in any way you've ever considered.

70,000 Witnesses was Paramount's second gangster-throws-college-football game picture of 1932, the other being The Marx Brothers's Horse Feathers. David Landau played the gangster in the latter, and the detective here. Phillips Holmes, a near-twin for Tom Brady, is the pretty-boy quarterback Buck, whose college education has been paid for by his brother. Gangsters don't do good deeds without expecting something in return, you know, family or not.

Director Ralph Murphy brings some panache to the overall look of the movie, making good use of  dramatic lighting, close-ups, and quick editing, particularly during the detective's third degree of the players. If you can put up with Charlie Ruggles's comedy relief as a tipsy sports writer, 70,000 Witnesses is an enjoyable sports/murder mystery/  comedy/ drama, and the only one where the coroner pronounces the official cause of death as "an explosion in the brain." No guns, either.

BONUS POINTS: Producer Charles R. Rogers brought over a passel of supporting actors from his previous movie, The Devil is Driving, including George Rosener as the owner of the restaurant where Slip Buchanan works out of. Rosener proves to be as creepy wearing a toupee and talking as he was bald and mute.

                                                             ***************