ONE TOUCH OF VENUS

Sleeping Beauty: Ava Gardner

ONE TOUCH OF VENUS (1948). Director: William A. Seiter.

"Debussy. Debussy does something to women." -- Mr. Savory.

"Personally, I go for Buzzy Balou and his Musical Crew." -- Molly.

Eddie Hatch (Robert Walker of My Son John) is a window dresser for Savory's department store. Mr. Savory (Tom Conway) has just acquired a $200,000 statue of Venus which he wishes to unveil and he instructs Eddie to make sure the curtain rises perfectly at the right moment. Eddie impulsively kisses the statue, and the next thing he knows it has come to life. Venus (Ava Gardner), Goddess of Love visiting from Olympus, is charmed by Eddie, and he is smitten with her, although he already has a girlfriend in clerk Gloria (Olga San Juan). Eddie's buddy, Joe (Dick Haymes of St. Benny the Dip) has a secret crush on Gloria, as secretary Molly (Eve Arden) does on her boss, Mr. Savory. Spotting her asleep in a model home on the first floor of the store, Savory determines to drape this goddess in gowns and make her his own. Will all of these lovers get together with the right person, and will Eddie have to go to jail for stealing a very expensive statue? One Touch of Venus, adapted from the Broadway show that starred Mary Martin, takes a while to get its footing (a third of the movie has gone by before anyone sings a song, for one thing), but it develops into a charming and well-performed musical comedy. Gardner [The Night of the Iguana] makes a luscious Venus, and is good in the role, although her singing is dubbed. The other performers are all on the money -- Sara Allgood has a nice turn as an anxious landlady --  and Eve Arden adds just that extra special sparkle that the proceedings require. The movie drops about half of the songs (Kurt Weill and Ogden Nash) -- some are heard in the background -- but retains "Speak Low;" "That's Him;" and "My Foolish Heart." Olga San Juan was in the original Broadway cast of Lerner and Loewe's Paint Your Wagon.

Verdict: Romantic tomfoolery perhaps, but it certainly has its delights. ***.

LYDIA

Merle Oberon

LYDIA (1941). Director: Julien Duvivier.

"If I can't have all there is I don't want less."

An unmarried elderly woman named Lydia (Merle Oberon) invites a few old male friends to a gathering where she reviews her life and loves over the past few decades. Bob (George Reeves) runs off with Lydia after her grandmother Sarah's (Edna May Oliver) disapproval, but they never make it to the altar. Frank Andre (Hans Jaray) is a blind pianist whose love for Lydia remains unrequited. Michael (Joseph Cotten) is all set to marry Lydia but she doesn't feel the passion for him that she feels for Richard (Alan Marshal of House on Haunted Hill), a handsome sailor who tells her he must go off to settle some past romantic affairs and to wait for her. Well, it'll be a long wait ... Lydia is an unusual and unpredictable movie in that it defies romantic Hollywood conventions and doesn't offer up a traditional happy ending, meaning some viewers will find it unsatisfying, but it's just that difference that makes the movie interesting. The performances are excellent throughout, with a luminescent Oberon; George Reeves [The Adventures of Sir Galahad] proving that he was more than just Superman (whom he would essay a few years later); Joseph Cotten as good as ever; Alan Marshal charming as the mountebank; and Edna May Oliver nearly snatching away the movie from everyone else with her peppery portrayal of the hypochondriac grandmother. Sara Allgood is also on target, as usual, as the mother of a blind boy (Billy Ray) that Lydia befriends and Gertrude Hoffman is fine in a very small role. This has a nice score by Miklos Rozsa as well. The film is in some ways similar to Letter from an Unknown Woman, particularly in its conclusion.

Verdict: Romantic yet uncompromising. ***.

THE ACCUSED

Douglas Dick and Loretta Young

THE ACCUSED (1949). Director: William Dieterle.

"What do you think suicides are? Some little person thinks their little problems are all that matter in the world." -- Dr. Tuttle

College psychology professor Dr. Wilma Tuttle (Loretta Young) is concerned with a brilliant but brash and difficult student named Bill Perry (Douglas Dick). When Bill forces a smooch on her at an isolated spot, she reacts by hitting him repeatedly and killing him. Instead of coming clean, she covers up and hopes his death will be attributed to a bad dive off of a cliff into the water below; he was wearing swimming trunks. Perry's lawyer, Warren Ford (Robert Cummings), who didn't really know Perry that well nor especially like him, comes to town and begins a romance with Wilma even as homicide detective Lt. Ted Dorgan (Wendell Corey) begins to get suspicious ... The Accused features a good lead performance from Young [Because of You], fine support from an especially notable Douglas Dick and the wry, sardonic Corey [The Big Knife], but Bob Cummings is horribly miscast [as he always was in movies like this] and is terrible. Another  problem with the movie is that while Perry does kiss Wilma forcibly and without permission, it doesn't necessarily mean he would have sexually assaulted her, and her viciously hitting him over and over again seems like literal overkill. Sara Allgood and Ann Doran are also in the cast, and Sam Jaffe offers a flavorful performance as Dr. Romley, whom Wilma finds ghoulish. Victor Young's score is a plus, and Ketti Frings' screenplay has some interesting dialogue. Unfortunately The Accused runs out of gas long before it's over. Dieterle directed Dark City and many, many others.

Verdict: Physician, heal thyself. **.

CITY WITHOUT MEN

CITY WITHOUT MEN (1943). Director: Sidney Salkow.

Tom Adams (Michael Duane of Redhead from Manhattan) is framed for  picking up Japanese in a boat, and wrongly convicted of collaborating with the enemy or something and sent to jail for several years. His fiancee, Nancy (Linda Darnell) not only vows to wait for him, but moves into a woman's residence right next to the prison where other wives and girlfriends wait patiently for their men to be released. The husband of the owner of the house, Maria (Sara Allgood) is in jail for life, and in the film's best scene, another wife, Mrs. Slade (Rosemary DeCamp), nearly collapses when her husband is executed at midnight. Other residents of the house include brassy Billie (Glenda Farrell), Winnie (Doris Dudley), Dora (Margaret Hamilton), and high-hattin' Gwen (Leslie Brooks of The Secret of the Whistler), who is dating Mr. Peters (Don DeFore) and hopes to learn where her husband (Sheldon Leonard) hid some money. Edgar Buchanan plays a shady lawyer who is ostensibly trying to help Nancy, but spends most of her money on booze. This is a "concept" movie that seems to have been cobbled together from cliches from other movies, and it's never convincing, becoming fairly ridiculous towards the end. Darnell is fine -- odd that she was cast in this bad "B" movie -- and Allgood, Farrell, DeCamp, and DeFore give very good performances as well.Years later Salkow directed Vincent Price in Twice-Told Tales.

Verdict: Not utterly terrible but not worth the time it takes to tell. **.

LIFE BEGINS AT EIGHT-THIRTY

Ida Lupino and Monty Woolley

LIFE BEGINS AT EIGHT-THIRTY (1942). Director: Irving Pichel.

"On the stage you're still a god. Off, you're still a hairy monster." 

Kathy Thomas is a lame young lady who lives and cares for her actor father, Madden Thomas (Monty Woolley), an irascible chap who is rather too fond of his liquor. Madden figures that he's all washed up in the theater, but he's offered a job by a neighbor, composer Robert Carter (Cornel Wilde), and then has a chance to star in a new production of "King Lear." But will he muff his chances for success with his usual self-destructiveness, and will his selfless daughter wind up an unloved spinster caring for her father for the rest of his life? Life Begins at Eight-Thirty doesn't dodge the tough questions about being a caregiver, especially for someone you love but find exasperating, and also ponders how much of a person's life they should give up for another's. [Of course, Madden is not exactly ready for a nursing home.]  The worst dialogue is given to Wilde, who's quite stiff as Robert and offers one of the least romantic proposals ever seen on film. Lupino and Woolley are excellent, but the picture is nearly stolen by Sara Allgood, perennial supporting player, who has one of her best and longest roles as Robert's wealthy aunt, who has been carrying a torch for Madden for many years.

Verdict: Entertaining comedy-drama with equal parts cliche and insight. ***.

HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY

The real stars: Donald Crisp and Sara Allgood

HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY (1941). Director: John Ford.

A look at the lives of several residents of a Welsh mining town, especially focusing on Mr. and Mrs. Morgan (Donald Crisp and Sara Allgood), and their youngest son Huw (Roddy McDowall)  and daughter Angharad (Maureen O'Hara). There are marriages, births and deaths, and a split between Morgan and his older sons, and indeed the other miners, when he doesn't support a strike. In the meantime Angharad marries the mine owner's son while pining for minister Gruffydd (Walter Pidgeon), causing some tongues to wag. Although Pidgeon and O'Hara are the top-billed "stars" [Pidgeon just sort of says lines while O'Hara is fine], the real stars of the movie are Crisp and Allgood, both of whom are superb; Allgood probably never had as good or large a part as this. Young McDowall is also excellent. The film is beautifully photographed by Arthur C. Miller, and has a fine score by Alfred Newman. There are some striking and touching tableaus throughout the movie. John Loder and Patric Knowles are two of the older sons. Barry Fitzgerald and his brother Arthur Shields [who overacts in this] have smaller roles.Ethel Griffies is a gossiping housekeeper. Some may prefer The Quiet Man, but this is a far superior film, and one of Ford's most memorable achievements.

Verdict: Just lovely. ***1/2.

THE STRANGE AFFAIR OF UNCLE HARRY

THE STRANGE AFFAIR OF UNCLE HARRY (1945). Director: Robert Siodmak.

Harry Quincey (George Sanders) lives with his two sisters, Hester, a widow (Moyna MacGill) and a supposedly sickly younger woman named Lettie (Geraldine Fitzgerald), who doesn't react well when she learns that Harry is going to marry a pretty co-worker named Deborah (Ella Raines), leading to assorted complications. Although the incest theme is extremely overt, the production code necessitated an unbelievably annoying ending to the film. However, the movie is absorbing and generally well-acted. Sanders subdues his naturally rakish personality to play a shyer kind of fellow and Raines and MacGill are excellent, as is the always reliable Sara Allgood as the opinionated maid. Fitzgerald doesn't always quite seem to have a handle on her often repellent character, and some of the revelatory sequences are handled in a perfunctory manner. And that ending ...! Still, the picture is quite entertaining.

Verdict: Rumors that this was remade as Toys in the Attic are untrue. **1/2.

BETWEEN TWO WORLDS

Paul Henreid

BETWEEN TWO WORLDS (1944). Director Edward A. Blatt.

Long and rather tedious remake of Outward Bound has a couple who committed suicide (Eleanor Parker; Paul Henreid) finding themselves aboard a passenger ship heading toward eternity – only the other passengers don't realize that they themselves are also dead. Thought-provoking premise is given half-baked, overly literal and preachy treatment, and the many stilted performances don't help. Aside from an excellent speech at the very end of the film, John Garfield is in no way showcased to advantage in the film, playing it all in one note and revealing little of his character's inner torment. His girlfriend in the film, Faye Emerson, doesn't even appear to be an actress (although she plays one); she has some nice moments, again at the conclusion, but is otherwise astonishingly inept. However, Edmund Gwenn is splendid as the chief steward, and Sara Allgood scores, as usual, as a kindly older lady. Henreid gives one of his more memorable performances, and Parker is superb. By the time Sydney Greenstreet shows up as the “examiner” to determine exactly which place the passengers go -- Heaven or Hell – the movie just implodes.

Verdict: Have a nice nap instead. *1/2.