THE EARLY SHOW, PT. 58

One of these selections proves how even the most talented people can fall on their butts, while another is a warning that just because you've got a title everybody has pleasant memories of doesn't mean it's going to work again. As for the other two -- don't judge a movie by its cast, and pay attention to your feet. Sounds interesting, right?

ONCE IN A BLUE MOON (1934): Three of the four movies made by Ben Hecht & Charles MacArthur for Paramount ranged from good to great. So perhaps it was inevitable that the fourth would miss the mark. But that would put it gently, for Once in a Blue Moon is the kind of shockingly bad, amateur-night debacle of a mess of a misfire that appears once in a you-know-what. 

And it's not like it doesn't have a good idea for a comedy, as it follows a group of post-Revolution Tsarist royals hiding out with a one-man traveling circus run by a magician named Gabbo the Great. Unfortunately, insipid subplots including (but not limited to) a sick horse, a counterfeiting machine, and children saving the day toss whatever chance Once in a Blue Moon had as an offbeat political satire right into the samovar. And that's not including blah dialogue, terrible acting, and overall dismal production. If wasn't for the Paramount logo, you'd have no idea it was released by one of the majors. 

The only interest that Once in a Blue Moon might generate today -- and it's pretty thin --is that it's the only starring feature for the once-acclaimed, now-forgotten comedic stage actor Jimmy Savo, whom Charlie Chaplin hailed as the world's greatest pantomimist. But this being a talkie, Savo's pantomime is tertiary to his irritatingly cloying delivery and relentless pathos-with-a-capital-P. (The love he shows for his horse borders on bestiality.) Maybe his shtick worked onstage, but it's insufferable onscreen unless you're between the ages of three and four. And there weren't enough of them, as the movie lost $350,000 -- the equivalent today of almost $7,000,000. 

Locked up in the Paramount vault for two years until its 1935 general release (1936 in New York!), Once in a Blue Moon's 67-minute runtime, sloppy editing, and occasional explanatory intertitle suggest a whole lot was left on the cutting room floor; the promo ballyhoo promising "A CAST OF 600" was obviously an act studio desperation. I'm glad I watched it, though, just to see just how far off the rails a couple of talented guys like Hecht & MacArthur could fly. The answer: very. 

BONUS POINTS: Once in a Blue Moon marks the movie debut of future movie mainstay Howard DaSilva as a Communist revolutionary. A couple of decade later, DaSilva would get caught up in the Hollywood Red Scare. C'mon, guys, it was only a movie!

BLIND ALLEY (1937): If you've seen it once, you've seen it a dozen times: A killer and his gang are on the run when they make themselves at home with a nice family until the coast is clear. Blind Alley shakes things up, as the captive dad is a shrink who begins an ad hoc psychiatric session in order to figure out how the killer got this way and have him surrender to the authorities. Sort of like Bogart's The Desperate Hours meets Montgomery Clift's Freud, only with Chester Morris and Ralph Bellamy. Sound like a letdown? Eh, not really.

While it seems naive some nine decades later, Blind Alley is actually fascinating, seeing that it takes seriously the idea of psychiatry, including dream analysis, getting to the root of a criminal's behavior. (Wilson's bizarre nightmare, shown in a solarized negative, is unique for its time.) Morris gives an in-your-face performance as the psycho killer, although he often sounds like he's aping James Cagney. Bellamy probably has the more difficult of the two roles, as he's playing a shrink calmly analyzing a criminal with a chip on his shoulder and a gun in his holster.  And he's not getting paid for it, either!

The who-the-heck-is-she Rose Stradner makes zero impact as Shelby's wife, so it's up to Ann Dvorak to carry the femme portion of the show. Possessing a distinct beauty and style, Dvorak (pronounced VOR-zhack) had a good start in movies before being shunted into lower-budget pictures like Blind Alley. Watch her carefully here -- you can feel she's better than the material she's been given. Yet while you may not find Blind Alley any more believable than Dvorak does, you'll be surprised just how entertaining a movie with a well-worn story can be. And if you don't believe me, Columbia shot a remake 11 years later as The Dark Past with William Holden and Lee J. Cobb as the killer and shrink respectively, and it was still good. Just not as good without Chester Morris and Ann Dvorak.

BONUS POINTS: Pre-TV fame alert: Milburn Stone (Doc on Gunsmoke) and John Hamilton (Perry White on Superman) briefly sit together in the front seat of a car. 

SHAKE HANDS WITH YOUR FEET (C. 1949): Have you ever given a thought to
your feet? And why not? Maybe this 15-minute educational short from the American Podiatry Association will put you on your toes. 

By the way, did you know that people spend more time on their hair than their feet? That's what the narrator says, although I've never met anyone who stands on their hair. But I stand proudly with the 72% of the population over the age of 2 who, over 75 years ago, had a foot disorder (for me, it's plantar warts, in case it's slipped your mind). Although I bet many of that 72% can't stand at all. And to that, I'll posit that 99% of today's population won't stand to watch anything called Shake Hands with Your Feet.

These medical shorts have always mystified me. Where were they shown -- classrooms, town halls, carnival tents? And since this particular one was released during National Foot Health Week -- God, how boring was life then? -- this film had an even shorter than usual lifespan. But as with these mini-documentaries, there's plenty of real people to remind us that only movie stars looked good in the late '40s. Oh, and don't get me started on those close-ups of gross-looking feet. As for fashion -- there's a five year old boy dressed like your grandfather. And, like grandpa, he's going to podiatrist. Damn, kid, get rid of those old man shoes and put on a pair of sneakers!

There's another piece of information that I found more interesting than any advice offered (like wash your feet). And that is, there was a time -- like circa 1949 -- foot inspection examinations by the local Boards of Health were compulsory in many public schools. These days, MAGA would probably doxx those docs. 

BONUS POINTS: Thanks to the narrator, we can hear that "chiropodist" was pronounced with a "ch" back in the day. 

SOME LIKE IT HOT (Unaired TV pilot, 1961): For every movie comedy made into a hit TV series, there are a half-dozen flops. One that never even made it past the pilot episode was Some Like it Hot, based on the Billy Wilder farce. 

Wait a minute, I hear you ask, how were they going to make a series out of two guys in drag on the run from the same hoodlums every week? See, that's why you're not a TV producer. Jerry and Joe -- the characters played by Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon -- undergo surgery to give them new faces. Home free, right? No way. Now the feds make them get into drag again and send them undercover to get the goods on the same hoods who pulled off the gangland killings they witnessed in the movie. And once they do, they go on the run again. Rinse, lather, flip the channel. 

In one of television's more blatant bait-and-switch tactics, Curtis and Lemmon repeat their roles in the first scene while awaiting both their surgery and obnoxious laugh track. (They must have been paid a bundle for their five minutes on screen.) Post-op, singer Vic Damone and journeyman actor Dick Patterson take over for them, while Tina Louise is in the unenviable position of trying to make people forget Marilyn Monroe. (A brief appearance by Rudy Vallee seems to be based on Joe E. Brown's role.) You can also spot supporting actors from the Some Like it Hot movie and The Untouchables TV series. For anyone who was around in the early 1960s, it's like a reunion of your favorite relatives.

As for the leads, Damone is better than expected and Patterson pretty much
nails Lemmon in delivery and physical humor, although they often come off as Martin & Lewis knockoffs. While it never would've been held in legendary regard as the original had it gone to series, the pilot for Some Like it Hot is, objectively, no worse than most of the sitcoms of its time: dopey, no real laughs, and overacting standing in for thoughtful comedy. Think of it as Some Like it Tepid. 

BONUS POINTS: Liberace's violinist brother George has a cameo as a violinist. 

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MOVIE OF THE DAY: "CRIME WITHOUT PASSION" (1934)

As the Greek Furies of vengeance swoop over New York in search of their next victim -- yes, you read that right -- they land in a courtroom where Lee Gentry, the self-described "Champion of the Damned", is smoothly clearing another (guilty) client charged with murder.

But what Grant doesn't count on is eventually firing a trigger. Having accidentally shot his ex-flame Carmen Brown, Grant must now use every trick he's ever used to clear himself of murder. 

Retracing his steps, destroying some pieces of evidence while creating others, he appears to be on the verge of his greatest triumph yet -- emphasis on "appears". No wonder why the Furies are laughing like Greek hyenas.

 

Would you trust this man to clear you of
murder?

 The first of Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur's four picture deal with Paramount, Crime Without Passion was also Claude Rains' first movie following his talkie debut in The Invisible Man, thus allowing audiences a view of the face behind the voice. 

While his (apparent) toupee and Snidely Whiplash mustache are initially distracting -- perhaps he's supposed to look like a caricature of the archetypal sleazy lawyer -- Rains' silky delivery, matched with his undeniable talent quickly put any trepidation aside. 

"Look at me when I'm lying to you!"

Rains also convincingly plays Grant as a self-pitying cad juggling two women at once. The first, Whitney Bourne, is a high society dame, while his sidepiece, Carmen Brown, dances at a Times Square nightclub.  Carmen threatens suicide after being cut loose, leading to the chain of events that puts the crafty lawyer in jeopardy.

 

 

Never trust a lawyer you can see through.

Grant panics -- he's not used to being on this side of a crime. Only one person is smart enough to provide advice: himself, appearing in ghostly form, reminding Grant of all the ways he's gotten clients off the hook. He obviously never heard the cliche about a person acting as his own lawyer having a fool for a client. But at least Grant is a classy fool.

 

They're more interesting than pigeons flying,
overhead, that's for sure.

More than other Hecht-MacArthur pictures, Crime Without Passion is
often a technical marvel, thanks to cinematographer/associate director Lee Garmes, and  Slavko Vorkapich, who helped create the montages and remarkable prologue of the Furies wreaking havoc over Manhattan. Bizarre today, they must have been overwhelming in 1934.

MacArthur (left) and Hecht (right)
buttonhole their star.

 Crime Without Passion has a few in- jokes for observant audiences. Hecht and MacArthur share a cameo as newspaper reporters -- their original profession --  talking to Grant following another courtroom triumph. That's one way of keeping production costs down.

Helen Hayes notices the camera while
Fanny Brice seems to be scrolling through
her 1934 iPhone.

Another surprise for the sharp-eyed are Broadway stars Fanny Brice and Helen Hayes sitting in a theater lobby as Grant creates an alibi. Further in-jokes: Hayes was married to MacArthur, while Brice's "Baby Snooks" character was parodied earlier in the movie by another actor. These private japes are almost as dizzying as the montages.

 

 

What's the matter with these kids today?

  Filmed at Paramount's Long Island City studio, along with a handful of West Side location shots, Crime Without Passion drags only when the character of Carmen Brown is onscreen, due to her syrupy dialogue, and the fact that her portrayer, Margo (yes, just Margo) was only 16. Her whiplash dance routine, where it appears her head is ready to fly off, more than makes up for it.

 

 

As with the other Hecht-MacArthur Paramount productions, Crime Without Passion is unavailable on DVD but easy to find on YouTube (in a somewhat muddy print) and Ok.Ru video in far better condition here. It's one of the few movies on this blog where "you've never seen anything like it" is a compliment. Just watch out for the Furies. They take no prisoners.

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Another Hecht-MacArthur production, Soak the Rich, can be found here.

MOVIE OF THE DAY: "SOAK THE RICH" (1936)

Humphrey Craig finds himself under attack on three fronts. As a multi-millionaire in the Depression, he's known as "the most hated man in America." He's upset over a new super tax on the wealthy. And, worse, his daughter Belinda has fallen in with a group of Communists at the college he founded. What's a plutocrat to do?

Inspired by Pres. Roosevelt's Revenue Act of 1935, which taxed up to 75% of the wealthy's income, along with the insurgent American Communist Party, Soak the Rich tackles politics in a way few comedies of its time did, lampooning both the left and the right, finding little if anything positive to say about either.

Humphrey Craig, freely admitting to wallowing in "my orgy of self-pity," bemoans FDR being "blind to the wounds of the millionaire." Almost killed by a bomb mailed from The Society for the Abolition of Monstrosities, he sighs, "There's only one safe place for a capitalist -- Russia!"

I couldn't get rid of the parasitic watermarks plastered
over this lobby card by the craven capitalists at
Almay Stock Photos.

The campus Commie, Kenneth "Buzz" Jones, isn't much more intellectually aware, his speech to fellow Reds being little more than a fast-talking pep rally peppered with clichés, as he protests the suspension of a leftwing economics professor. "They don't want any intellectuals in this university," he bellows. "All they want is capitalistic tango dancers, and capitalistic ukulele players!" Then really revving up the crowd, Buzz gives them a much-needed heads-up:

Do you know what the world's going to say to what we're going to do? The world's going to say, One: we're nuts. Two: That we're a bunch of long-haired radicals. So I say, the first thing we do is everybody gets their heads shaved. That'll dispose of the second charge.

A gun and a fireplace shovel are no match for an
angry Commie.

Humphrey Craig's daughter Belinda gets caught up in the movement, swearing to Buzz, "I want to be a radical, too!" as if joining a sorority. But Buzz, feeling their mutual attraction, wants no part of it, fearing that a relationship would doom his dream of building a utopian paradise. "What about the Russians," Belinda asks, "don't they kiss?" "Not while they're working," he replies sternly. 

You can see where Soak the Rich is going by the end of the second reel -- Red Meets Girl, Red Falls In Love -- but that's the way romantic comedies work. Still, while there's nothing inherently wrong with Soak the Rich, there's something slightly off. 

For while its dialogue is sophisticated and, at times, laugh-out loud funny, its pace is often sluggish. Occasionally, there are pauses as if allowing for audience laughter. And while the male leads Walter Connelly (Humphrey Craig) and John Howard (Buzz Jones) are quite funny, Mary Taylor plays Belinda as if in a Xanax-induced haze which has also given her a faux-British accent. A model by trade, Taylor understandably has only four movies to her resume. 

Muglia appears to prefer Belinda in a
Bazooka Joe outfit.

A brief subplot with Belinda's kidnapping by a nihilist named Muglia -- the sole member of the aforementioned Society for the Abolition of Monstrosities -- goes nowhere, apparently being nothing more than an excuse for the script to provide more political jokes. And when spoken by frog-voiced Lionel Stander, they are kind of funny: "I can put Stalin in one pocket, Lenin and the other, and still have room for Karl Marx. Three peanut brains -- hah!" But as amusing as it is, the scene could have been eliminated to tighten the movie's 85-minute running time.

Maybe if Paramount released Soak the Rich on Blu-Ray,

I wouldn't have to resort to taking crummy-looking
pictures of grey market prints off the internet.

As part of their carte-blanche, four picture deal with Paramount, Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur -- who appear in the opening credits -- were offered the rare opportunity to write, produce and direct without any studio interference -- which, oddly, might be part of Soak the Rich's problem. These guys were first and foremost writers who didn't think they needed help with direction. A more seasoned, objective eye could have made it an even better picture.

Still, Soak the Rich's imperfections have never warranted the negative reviews garnered upon its original release, or from, say, Leonard Maltin's original movies-on-TV book, which rated it "BOMB". Like the three other Hecht & MacArthur Paramount releases, Soak the Rich has never aired on TCM, and is available only through independent DVD sellers. Heck, most of them can even be watched for free on YouTube and Vimeo.

Hey, that just means The People don't have fork over their hard-earned pay to The Man. Up with the movie bootleggers, down with parasitic copyrights!

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