MA AND PA KETTLE GO TO TOWN

Marjorie Main and Percy Kilbride

MA AND PA KETTLE GO TO TOWN (1950). Director: Charles Lamont.

Pa Kettle (Percy Kilbride) wins another contest for a soda with the prize being an all-expenses paid trip to New York City! At first Pa and Ma Kettle (Marjorie Main) have trouble coming up with a babysitter for their fifteen rambunctious children, but along comes "Shotgun" Mike (Charles McGraw), a thief hiding out in town. Ma at least has some reservations about leaving the children with a complete stranger (although they prove to be more than he can handle), but she thinks he has a kind face, and off they go to Manhattan. There they encounter more problems with Mike's cronies, and discover some marital woes for son Tom (Richard Long) and daughter-in-law Kim (Meg Randall).

Richard Long and Meg Randall

Ma and Pa Kettle were introduced in The Egg and I and proved so popular that they got their own feature, Ma and Pa Kettle. This led into several sequels, of which this is the first. Ma and Pa Kettle Go to Town is not only consistently cute and amusing, with great performances from Main and Kilbride and good work from the rest of the cast, but it avoids the cliche of New Yorkers being portrayed as horrible city slickers taking advantage of the Kettles; in fact, the pair actually like New York and the people who live there (although, of course, they're just as glad to get home). Ma and Pa exhibit sheer delight in seeing Manhattan from a cab as they stand up in a hole in the taxi's ceiling, and there's a great bit with Pa dropping a cup of water from the top of the RCA building and encountering that same water later on.

Verdict: Very cute picture. ***. 

BLACK SPURS

Rory Calhoun and Linda Darnell

BLACK SPURS (1965). Director: R. G. Springsteen.

In Texas in 1885 Santee (Rory Calhoun of Night of the Lepus) is engaged to pretty Anna (Terry Moore) but he wants to wait to marry until he's made his fortune. He bids adieu to Anna and sets off to capture or kill the notorious bandit, El Pescadore (Robert Carricart), something he succeeds at. After this Santee becomes a full-time bounty hunter with many kills to his credit. Many. many months later he returns to his lady love only to learn that she has understandably married another, Sheriff Ralph Elkins (James Best) of Lash, Kansas. An embittered Santee decides to help a certain entrepreneur named Gus Kile (Lon Chaney Jr.) bring gambling and loose ladies to Lash no matter who gets hurt, but does the man have a chance at redemption?

Lon Chaney Jr. and Rory Calhoun

Black Spurs certainly has an interesting cast. Although Calhoun mostly shows the emotion of a rock, his co-players tend to be better, and this includes Linda Darnell in a small role as a madame. Darnell is a bit zaftig but not unattractive. She died in a fire before the film was released. Scott Brady plays, of all things, a priest, Richard Arlen owns the local saloon, and Bruce Cabot is an enforcer who zestily throws people out of town with a sneer or a heave. Patricia Owens and Jerome Courtland [Kiss and Tell] play lovers who aren't really married, and there is a brief appearance by pre-Star Trek DeForest Kelley as another sheriff.  Handsome Joseph Hoover has a rare (if small) speaking role as another one of Arlen's associates. Manuel Padilla Jr. [Tarzan and the Valley of Gold[ is cute as the little boy, Manuel, who loves to sing and eventually becomes disenchanted with his hero, Santee.

Black Spurs is by no means a great western but it features a basically sound storyline (albeit probably one that has been used in different variations many, many times over) and has some flavorful performances. Courtland and Owens each had one more theatrical film before doing some TV work; Courtland became a director. Calhoun and Moore had a great many more credits, and the latter is still acting today. Director R. G. Springsteen amassed nearly 100 film and TV credits, mostly working on westerns.

Verdict: Okay western for devotees. **1/2. 

THUNDER ON THE HILL

Ann Blyth and Claudette Colbert

THUNDER ON THE HILL (1951). Director: Douglas Sirk.

In Norfolk county, England, Sister Mary (Claudette Colbert) works at a convent hospital under the firm but loving Mother Superior (Gladys Cooper). During a flood which forces the whole town to seek shelter in the convent on higher ground, along comes a strange group of people: Valerie Carns (Ann Blyth) has been convicted of murdering her invalid brother, and she is accompanied by Sgt, Melling (Gavin Muir) and a female assistant known only as Pierce (Norma Varden), who are taking her to be executed. However, Sister Mary becomes convinced that Valerie is innocent, and she risks the wrath of the Mother Superior by not only playing detective, but by bringing Valerie together with the man she loves, Sidney Kingham (Philip Friend), who may not be convinced of her innocence.

Claudette Colbert and Philip Friend

Thunder on the Hill is an absorbing and well-acted picture, with an interesting interplay between Colbert (playing possibly the most sophisticated nun in the history of cinema) and a sympathetic Blyth, proving that Veda in Mildred Pierce was not just a fluke. Gladys Cooper gives her usual authoritative and highly adept performance as the Mother Superior, and there is also nice work from Connie Gilchrist as another nun; Phyllis Stanley as a rather bitter nurse (almost on the verge of overplaying at times); Michael Pate [Hong Kong Confidential] as the slow-witted Willie; and Robert Douglas [This Side of the Law] and Anne Crawford as the convent doctor and his wife, among others.

Verdict: Unusual mystery with a very interesting cast. ***. 

DOLL FACE

Perry Como and Vivian Blaine

DOLL FACE (1945). Director: Lewis Seiler.

"Doll Face" Carroll (Vivian Blaine) is a top burlesque performer who tries to go legit, but when one producer, Flo Hartman (Reed Hadley), finds out who she really is he refuses to hire her. Doll Face's manager and boyfriend, Mike (Dennis O'Keefe), comes up with the dubious notion of showing that she has "class" by hiring a ghostwriter, Fred (Stephen Dunne), to pen her memoirs -- as a burlesque queen! As Fred falls for Doll Face, and singer Nicky Ricci (Perry Como) tries to get dancer "Frankie" (Martha Stewart) to warm up to him, Mike decides to turn Doll Face's memoir into a Broadway show. Can Doll Face finally go legit? And will she wind up with Mike or Frank?

Stephen Dunne and Carmen Miranda

This was adapted from a play by Gypsy Rose Lee but Doll Face should certainly not be confused with Gypsy! The script for this is no world-beater, although most of the performers are game. Vivian Blaine had her most famous role in Guys and Dolls, but in this I found her lacking in distinction. O'Keefe is as buoyant as ever, and poor Carmen Miranda is given no romance and only one catchy number, "Chico from Puerto Rico." The songs by McHugh and Adamson [Four Jills in a Jeep] are pleasant, however, with "Here Comes Heaven Again" arguably being the best. Reed Hadley is fine as the producer, who ultimately opts to work with Doll Face, and Perry Como is mildly appealing as Nicky. Handsome Stephen Dunne is billed in this as "Michael" Dunne, the name he used in his earliest appearances. He later starred as "Steve" Dunne on The Brothers Brannagan for TV.

Verdict: Acceptable but rather minor musical. **1/2. 

PRETTY BOY FLOYD

John Ericson

PRETTY BOY FLOYD (1960). Director: Herbert J. Leder.

Charles Arthur Floyd (John Ericson) gets some bad breaks due to the poverty of the period, and winds up in jail. Now an ex-con, he has difficulty finding a job. He decides he might as well rob banks, and is always sure of giving some of his booty to his fellow Okies in need. But when he shoots a cop in cold blood, and is also suspected of being one of the hit men in a massacre in Kansas City in which both agents and crooks are murdered, the G-Men make him Public Enemy Number One. You can be certain that it won't end well for "Pretty Boy" Floyd.

Joan Harvey and John Ericson

Pretty Boy Floyd should have been a star-making part for John Ericson, who had already been seen to great advantage in such films as Rhapsody, where he was Elizabeth Taylor's leading man. Although Ericson gives an excellent performance in this, the movie is shoddy and cheap jack, poorly directed by Leder. Leder at least manages to get good performances across the board, with an unrecognizably young Barry Newman [Fatal Vision] scoring as Floyd's associate-in-crime, the fictional Al Riccardo. Joan Harvey is also fine as Lily, a married woman who becomes Floyd's gal pal, and Carl York makes an impression as Floyd's old buddy, Curly. Jason Evers (billed as Herb) plays a sheriff, Peter Falk is another gangster, and Al Lewis, "Ol' Grandpa" from The Munsters himself, certainly make his mark as a hoodlum who winds up begging for his life in front of fellow mobsters when he really screws up. Fabian played Floyd ten years later in A Bullet for Pretty Boy, which wasn't any better than this.

Verdict: Good lead performance in a disappointing gangster flick. **. 

HAYWIRE

HAYWIRE. Brooke Hayward. Originally published in 1977; updated 2011. Random House.

Brooke Hayward is the daughter of actress Margaret Sullavan and agent-turned-producer Leland Hayward. This memoir looks not so much at those two individuals, but at how their interactions affected Ms. Hayward and her brother and sister. Sullavan and the narcissistic Hayward divorced after the latter had an affair while she was out of town working oversea for months, and it left lasting scars, especially on Sullavan, who felt abandoned by her children when they went to live with their father. Both of the parents remarried.

Instead of a probing look at the parents, two interesting individuals, whatever their flaws, with seriously important careers, we mostly get the ruminations of their daughter, which at times become quite tedious in this lengthy if occasionally absorbing memoir, although, to be fair, she does a fair job of analyzing them at times. Although the author tries very hard to portray her family as some kind of dynasty, and their story as an epic tragedy, this doesn't quite work, and she seems oblivious to the fact that marital problems, suicides, mental health issues etc. also afflict people in tenements. In fact, entitlement screams at you from every page. Oddly, Ms. Hayward barely goes into her marriages to Dennis Hopper or Peter Duchin (son of Eddy Duchin), although that might have been of some interest to the reader. Despite the rave reviews (Ms. Hayward had connections, after all), I imagine many readers got tired of slogging through the book in search of juicy material. Another problem is that the book is poorly organized, jumping around in time when a linear narrative would have worked much better.

Ms. Hayward also ignores her career, although there wasn't much to it. Although she was rather amateurish appearing opposite Jerry Orbach in the film Mad Dog Coll, she displayed real ability in the Twilight Zone episode "The Masks." She only amassed 12 credits, however. She also had a brief modeling career although her looks were average.

If you actually want to read a biography of the great Margaret Sullavan, I recommend Margaret Sullavan, Child by Fate by Lawrence J. Quirk.

Verdict: Well-written but seriously flawed memoir. **1/2. 

STUPID RECENT MOVIE: THE FAVOURITE

Emma Stone as Abigail Hill

THE FAVOURITE (2018). Director: Yorgos Lanthimos.

Queen Anne (Olivia Colman) supposedly rules England but most of her decisions of state are made by her confidante and lover, Lady Sarah Churchill (Rachel Weisz). Into this household comes Sarah's cousin, Abigail (Emma Stone of La La Land), who once was a lady herself, but thanks to her now-dead alcoholic father, has become a mere servant subject to Sarah's patronizing attitude. But Abigail has her own ambitions, and manages to draw the attention and favor of the queen, eventually replacing Sarah in Anne's bed. But Sarah is not about to take that, uh, lying down, and Abigail may have to take drastic steps to remain "The Favourite."

Olivia Coleman as the queen 

The Favourite takes actual historical characters, uses some of the bare facts of their inter-relationships, then pretty much invents everything else -- The Favourite is the very epitome of "dramatic license." Thrown out of the queen's favor, Sarah did intimate that there might have been a sexual relationship between Anne and Abigail, and presented a very negative portrait of  the queen in her memoirs. However, later biographers, who were much more objective, say that Anne was not the dunderhead she was portrayed as in both the memoirs and this movie. While there is no doubt that history has often been subjected to LGBT erasure, there is no real substantiation that a lesbian love triangle existed in the palace in the first place (Anne's husband, Prince George, is never even mentioned let alone depicted, not that would necessarily have meant that she was strictly heterosexual.) But why let the facts get in the way of a good story?

Rachel Weisz as Sarah Churchill

Not that The Favourite necessarily has a good story. Everything is presented in very contemporary terms, vulgarized and dumbed-down, as if the film were a campy black comedy. The acting is professional but not especially memorable (even if Colman managed to net a Best Actress Oscar). The movie seems directed at a young, immature audience who wants their slice of history with lots of sex and a liberal sprinkling of "f" and "c--t" words. Because of the lesbian interplay, I'm also afraid some viewers will see this as some sort of progressive LGBT movie when it is anything but. While I'm not saying the film is homophobic as such, it's hard not to notice that the gay or bisexual ladies in it are pretty much presented as grotesque and not at all sympathetic. The director did not want to really deal with the sexuality of the characters or their attitude towards same, but then the characters are fairly one-dimensional to begin with. (Let me make it clear that I completely disassociate myself from viewers who hated the film simply because it presented LGBT characters.)

Queen Anne's court

Incredibly, The Favourite garnered Oscars and nominations and dozens and dozens of awards (GLAAD even nominated it as "Best Picture," although it didn't win.) What on earth has happened to people's critical faculties these days? The only award the film really deserved was for the cinematography by Robbie Ryan. As with the equally over-rated Moonlight or Call Me By Your Name this is an example of the Academy and Hollywood in general being overly impressed with a film because it is seen as progressive when it really isn't. The historical inaccuracies alone are enough to make this a sham of a production, and I can only imagine that poor Queen Anne, gay or not, is spinning in her grave.

Verdict: This is hardly history -- or herstory. **. 

CARNAL KNOWLEDGE

Art Garfunkel and Candice Bergen

CARNAL KNOWLEDGE  (1971). Director: Mike Nichols. Screenplay by Jules Feiffer.

In college post-WW2, two friends, Jonathan (Jack Nicholson) and Sandy (Art Garfunkel), contemplate getting laid and what type of woman they'd like to wind up with. Sandy begins dating Susan (Candice Bergen), but so does Jonathan, sleeping with Susan behind his friend's back.

Ann-Margret and Jack Nicholson

Years go by. Although married, Sandy wants more excitement in the bedroom and hooks up with the more aggressive Cindy (Cynthia O'Neal). while Jonathan shacks up with Bobbie (Ann-Margret of State Fair), who -- a la Rosalind Russell in Picnic -- is almost desperate to get married. Things don't go smoothly with either relationship, but then Jonathan is a complete chauvinistic pig -- his truly disgusting nature becomes even more apparent by the end -- and Sandy, although apparently more "sensitive," isn't much better.

Best friends? Garfunkle and Nicholson

Carnal Knowledge was a popular and admired film in its day, probably due to its frankness, but it doesn't hold up well. It is an absorbing picture nevertheless because of the acting and because there's some suspense over what will happen to the characters. Bergen, Ann-Margret, and Garfunkel (so good you wished he did much more acting) are all excellent, and while Nicholson was already falling into that certain stock "Jack Nicholson" mode, his performance is also good. O'Neal and Rita Moreno are quite effective in smaller roles.

Triangle: Bergen, Garfunkel, with Nicholson in background

But one is left with the sensation that this screenplay was an old and unsatisfactory stage play dusted off by Jules Feiffer and turned into a movie by a compliant Mike Nichols working in a Woody Allen mode. The movie, deliberately paced and with long takes, is expertly shot by cinematographer Giuseppe Rotunno [Haunted Summer]. Some scenes, such as when Jonathan shows Sandy and his new girlfriend slides of all of the women he's screwed (Susan gets in there by "mistake"), are quite contrived. Mike Nichols also directed Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Verdict: Two pigs in a poke. **1/2.

BERNARDINE

Pat Boone and Dick Sargent

BERNARDINE (1957). Director: Henry Levin.

Some high school pals in a club imagine the perfect woman and for unaccountable reasons call her "Bernardine." One afternoon Sanford Wilson (Dick Sargent) meets a beautiful young lady named Jean (Terry Moore of Mighty Joe Young), and he is instantly smitten -- she is his Bernardine. The other guys in the club also think Jean is special, but her relationship with Sanford hits the rocks when she meets Langley (James Drury), the handsome older brother of Sanford's friend, Beau (Pat Boone). With a little help from his friends, Sanford tries to win the hand of fair lady.

Terry Moore and Dick Sargent

Although Pat Boone and Terry Moore are top-billed in Bernardine, the main character and the one who gets the most running time, is Dick Sargent's Sanford. Pat Boone, playing a very unlikable person (although most of the boys in the film are unlikable) does have some screen time and gets to warble three numbers, the okay title tune, the highly sexist "Technique," and the more memorable "Love Letters in the Sand," which I believe was a big hit for Boone, who kind of imitates Der Bingle a bit. Terry Moore actually has very little to do in the film considering she is the leading lady. Bernardine asks us to accept Sargent, Boone, Ronnie Burns, and others as high school students when they have clearly left their teenage years far behind them. This makes their behavior at times seem borderline grotesque. They are particularly obnoxious to a nerd named Kinswood (Hooper Dunbar), although eventually he's somewhat accepted by the others.

Janet Gaynor

Natalie Schafer plays Boone's mother in a couple of brief scenes, but the stand-out in this is Janet Gaynor [Sunrise], who plays Sargent's mom and is given a couple of strong moments. "It's crazy, it's wild, it's improbable -- but don't tell me you passed!" she says to Sanford, who is not a great student. Sargent has some good moments, too, but again he's too old, his character isn't very appealing, and the more serious moments when he's dealing with heartbreak are almost worse than the comedy sequences. Although Sargent subsequently appeared with Boone in Mardi Gras, his film career never really developed and he mostly did television. Walter Abel and Dean Jagger are also in the film. This was Pat Boone's first movie and Janet Gaynor's last; she had two television credits after that.

Verdict: In spite of "Love Letters in the Sand," this is so bad it's depressing. *1/2. 

INDECENT / VANITY FAIR

Myrna Loy as Becky Sharp

INDECENT (aka Vanity Fair/1932). Director: Chester M. Franklin.

"I do hope I'm going to give satisfaction." -- Becky.

Becky Sharp (Myrna Loy), who has beauty and brains but no money, gets a taste of the good life when she is taken in by her wealthy friend, Amelia (Barbara Kent). Amelia's brother Joseph (Billy Bevan) has a yen for Becky, but while she almost tricks him into marriage, he manages to get out of the trap. Becoming a governess for Sir Pitt Crawley (Lionel Belmore), Becky is caught between the lustful advances of Sir Pitt and the more refined passes of Crawley's son, Rawdon (Conway Tearle), whom she marries. But things don't go smoothly for the couple after Rawdon is disinherited by his jealous father. And things get worse after that ...

Billy Bevan and Myrna Loy

Indecent is a credible, updated version of Thackeray's "Vanity Fair" which revises things due to the change in locale and time period -- there are no references to Napoleon or Waterloo in this version -- but remains fairly faithful to the basic events and spirit of the story. Although not as bombastic as Miriam Hopkins in the later Becky Sharp, Loy gives a very good performance in this, and she has a host of talented if lesser-known co-stars. There is some inventive camera work in the film, which is not that slow-moving, and the finale, with Loy facing her older self in the mirror, is quite grim.

Verdict: Entertaining pre-code drama. ***.

WHAT MAKES SAMMY RUN?

Dina Merrill and Larry Blyden

WHAT MAKES SAMMY RUN? NBC Sunday Showcase 1959. Director: Delbert Mann.

"You're intelligent but not smart." -- Sammy to Al.

"Just the opposite of you." -- Al to Sammy.

Sammy Glick (Larry Blyden) is a copy boy for a major NYC newspaper where Al Manheim (John Forsythe) is a columnist. Sammy is going places, and at first he seems admirably full of ambition and initiative. Glick manages to get his own column, then takes a screenplay written by Julian Blumberg (Milton Selzer of Blood and Lace) and sells it to Hollywood. Sammy takes both Al and Julian to LA with him, but somehow Julian's name is left off the credits for the movie. Al realizes that Sammy has a dark side, that he treats people like supernumeraries even though they are the ones with the talent. Al watches helplessly as novelist Kit Sargent (Barbara Rush), who is now writing screenplays for Sammy, falls in love with him even though he wants her for himself. But there are surprises in store for all of these characters ...

Barbara Rush and John Forsythe

What Makes Sammy Run?  is a prime example of the "golden age" of television, where there were meaty scripts and fine actors doing exemplary work, and everyone is at their best in this. Blyden, an excellent performer who died much too early at 49, is superb as Sammy, and I don't think I've ever seen John Forsythe, Dynasty be damned, to better advantage. Barbara Rush is also excellent, as is Dina Merrill [Butterfield 8] as Laurette, the amoral daughter of studio boss H. L. Harrington (an equally good Sidney Blackmer); in fact, I don't think I've ever seen Merrill better. David Opatoshu also scores as production chief Sidney Fineman, who is pushed out in favor of Sammy. Monique van Vooren [Tarzan and the She- Devil] credibly plays a movie star who loses her appeal for Sammy once her movies start slipping at the box office. And there are a host of good character actors in supporting parts as well.

Forstyhe, Monique van Vooren, Blyden, Merrill

What Makes Sammy Run? may have lost some of its edge to certain viewers because the basic themes and characters have been used and re-used many times over the years. I can't count all the times I've seen shows about bitter, self-hating associates complaining about an essential heel (in and out of show business), and backstabbing producers and others are commonplace today both on and off the screen. This was based on a novel by Budd Schulberg, who turned it into a musical (starring Steve Lawrence) co-written by Schulberg's brother, Stuart. (This TV version does not include the songs.) Neither the novel nor the musical were ever turned into a movie, mostly because people feared it would be considered anti-Semitic because Sammy was Jewish. Back in the day Schulberg argued that most of the characters, some of whom were decent guys like Al Manheim, were also Jewish; it was a true cross-section. I have never read the novel, so I don't know if Schulberg explained part of Sammy's hunger not just on his poor tenement upbringing but as a reaction to blatant anti-Semitism -- this is not delved into at all in the TV version.

The TV production makes one major change in that it offers Sammy redemption. In the original story, Sammy is all for pushing Fineman out so that he can take his place, but in the TV show he sticks up for Fineman, tells Harrington that he, Sammy, not only owes Fineman a lot but that Fineman is the best man for the job. This doesn't help Fineman but at least Sammy makes a sincere effort. One could argue that this is out of character for Sammy.

Verdict: A classic in every sense of the word. ***1/2. 

GOOD NEWER MOVIE: LA LA LAND

Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone 

LA LA LAND (2019). Written and directed by Damien Chazelle.

Mia (Emma Stone of The Amazing Spider-Man) is an aspiring actress going on auditions and working as a barista in L.A. She encounters jazz musician Sebastian (Ryan Gosling of All Good Things), who proves quite obnoxious at first. Gradually the two warm up to one another and begin a relationship. But both have ambitions that may interfere with the permanency of their union. And their idea of success may not be the same. Periodically they and others break into song.

Emma Stone

First let me make it clear that La La Land is not on the list of really superb musicals a la Singin' in the Rain. When Stone and Gosling dance you won't in any sense of the word be reminded of Fred and Ginger or Gene Kelly, and they both have mediocre voices. But if you take it on its own terms La La Land has its rewards. The two leads, neither of whom is conventionally attractive, give very good performances and the songs they warble are at least pleasant.

Stone and Gosling 

Linus Sandgren's cinematography is first-class, and there's an interesting opening production number on the freeway. La La Land gets high marks for being visually arresting. But the chief thing I liked about the movie is its coda, a long sequence in which Emma encounters Sebastian years later -- and as people will do -- imagines what her life would have been like had she married him instead of her husband. I think it is this finale that resonates with most viewers and has perhaps led many people to over-rate the movie. Still, it's romantic, well-acted, and good to look at. Damien Chazelle also directed Whiplash. Ryan Gosling is not to be confused with Ryan Reynolds [Green Lantern] even though they look alike.

Verdict: Not a classic but entertaining enough. ***. 

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

HAPPY HALLOWEEN.

We've got a fresh crop of Halloween horrors this week at Great Old Movies: two Brian De Palma shockers; a modern horror film that eschews the supernatural for common sense; a "classic" starring the ever-delightful Chucky; and the colorized version of a very old favorite with Vincent Price.

And check out some more horror films over at my brother blog, B Movie Nightmare!

Have a great night! 

HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL -- IN COLOR!

Who's the bigger bitch? Vincent Price and Carol Ohmart

HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL (colorized/1959). Produced and directed by William Castle.

Annabelle Loring (Carol Ohmart of The Scarlet Hour) has conceived of the idea of holding a party in a supposedly haunted house and having the guests arrive in hearses. Unfortunately, her husband, Frederick (Vincent Price), has his own ideas, and chooses the guests himself, offering all of them $10,000 if they stay locked in the house all night. There's no love lost between Frederick and Annabelle, whom her husband sees as nothing more than an amoral gold-digger. The guests -- test pilot Lance (Richard Long); gambling columnist Ruth (Julie Mitchum); psychiatrist David (Alan Marshal of Lydia); Loring's employee Nora (Carolyn Craig of Giant); and the house's weird owner Watson Pritchard (Elisha Cook Jr.)  -- can only wonder what, if anything, the Lorings are up to. Then somebody is found hanging ...

Carolyn Craig and Richard Long

Discovering that House on Haunted Hill had been colorized gave me an excuse to watch this guilty pleasure all over again and despite its lack of logic and its kind of clunkiness, it is a pleasure. Chief among the delights is the interplay between Price and Ohmart, who are wonderful as the combative and sneaky spouses. We mustn't forget the creepy and melodramatic score by Van Alexander which works beautifully with this kind of pseudo-scary and definitely amusing material. A scene late in the picture with a skeleton rising out of a pool of acid in the house's basement  undoubtedly had all the kids in 1959 screaming their heads off with delight. Hokey it may be, but the flick is a lot of fun.

As to the colorization, which is well done, I have to wonder if it really adds anything to the picture. At least the addition of color doesn't strip the film of atmosphere, thank goodness, which it has in abundance despite its often silly but always-macabre tone. Julie Mitchum was the older sister of Robert Mitchum; this was the last of her eight credits.

Verdict: Perfect Halloween viewing. ***. 

CHILD'S PLAY (1988)

Best Buddies? Chucky and little Alex Vincent

CHILD'S PLAY (1988). Director: Tom Holland.

A very nice widow named Karen Barclay (Catherine Hicks) wants to get her little son Andy (Alex Vincent) a popular "Good Guy" doll but finds it too expensive. However, she manages to acquire one from a street vendor and brings it home to her delighted six-year-old son. Neither of them realize that the doll -- Chucky by name -- has been possessed by the spirit of nasty strangler Charles Lee Ray (Brad Dourif of Dario Argento's Trauma), who is out to get revenge on certain people, such as cop Mike Norris (Chris Sarandon), and anyone else who gets in his way. But both Andy and then his mother will have a tough time convincing anyone that this weird little doll is actually alive ...

Chris Sarandon and Catherine Hicks

Child's Play manages to be both suspenseful and creepy in spite of its absurd premise, thanks to some adroit direction and editing and the casting of Catherine Hicks, who is quite good as the mother, and little Alex Vincent, who is sympathetic and appealing as the innocent and rather resourceful Andy. Chris Sarandon [The Light in the Piazza] plays the cop on the case as the stereotypical blase and gruff detective and is okay on that level. But one might wonder why no one would think Chucky was a pygmy or midget before they would accept a supernatural explanation. It's also a little strange that no one in the subway remarks upon a six-year-old traveling by himself on the subway -- we New Yorkers are not that indifferent to what's going on around us.

Don't make Chucky mad

One of the best sequences has Chucky attacking Norris as he drives in his cop car, desperately trying to keep his body up off the seat when Chucky starts trying to thrust a knife into his private parts. Considering his small size, Chucky manages to inflict a lot of damage on certain individuals, such as Karen's friend, Maggie (played by Lee Grant's daughter, Dinah Manoff), who babysits Alex when Karen has to work and comes afoul of that demonic plastic toddler. An interesting touch is that the spell that put the dying Dourif's spell in the doll will eventually turn him completely human. (Although Dourif tries his damnedest to have his consciousness wind up inside Andy, he might as well stay inside the doll as in either case he'll still be a child.)

Child's Play was so successful that it was followed by several sequels, and also engendered a terrible remake that just came out this year. Tom Holland also directed the memorable Fright Night, which starred Sarandon. Child's Play may have been influenced by a segment of the TV film Trilogy of Terror, which also featured a lively killer doll.

Verdict: Appealing players help put over this pretty exciting horror flick. ***. 

REGRESSION

Ethan Hawke

REGRESSION (2015). Written and directed by Alejandro Amenabar.

In 1990 Detective Bruce Kenner (Ethan Hawke of Sinister) investigates a case wherein a 17-year-old girl, Angela (Emma Watson), has accused her father, John (David Dencik), of raping her. She also tells stories of numerous masked people -- Satanists -- coming into her room and holding unholy rituals. Kenner doesn't believe in Satan, but he does believe that there are cults of Satanists performing rituals involving animal and even child sacrifice. As he investigates further, he becomes more and more paranoid, and is convinced people are following him. He also discovers that at least one police officer, George (Aaron Ashmore of Fear Island), may be one of the Satanists.

Hawke and Aaron Ashmore

One thing I liked about Regression is that it isn't the usual sub-literate Church vs Satan movie. I believe the lack of supernatural and grisly events is what turned many critics against the picture, as it is absorbing, well-acted, and well-made for the most part. Hawke and Watson are fine, and there is also good work from Ashmore, Dencik, David Thewlis [Wonder Woman] as a psychiatrist, Peter MacNeill as the chief of police, Lothaire Bluteau as a creepy Reverend, a dynamic Dale Dickey as Angela's grandmother, and Devon Bostick as her troubled brother, Roy. (If I have one quibble about the film is that it's hard to feel complete sympathy for a character who throws his son out of the house for being gay, although this is not necessarily condoned.) 

Verdict: Nominal horror film has the courage to eschew graphic, nauseating gore and keep the devil out of the equation. ***. 

THE EDDY DUCHIN STORY

Tyrone Power and Kim Novak

THE EDDY DUCHIN STORY (1956). Director: George Sidney.

Eddy Duchin is a brash, talented pianist who comes from Boston to New York to play with a band, but discovers it's not as easy as he thought. Nevertheless he works his way up to becoming a bandleader (although how he does this is never quite shown). He also marries a socialite, Marjorie (Kim Novak), and the two have a son, Peter. Life seems wonderful for Eddy, but he doesn't know that there is more than one tragedy in his future.

Rex Thompson as Peter Duchin

The Glenn Miller Story (starring Jimmy Stewart) had already been filmed two years earlier, and eventually other musicians besides bandleaders, such as Gene Krupa, would get the biopic treatment. Although The Eddy Duchin story is heavily fictionalized with a lot of dramatic license, most of the basic facts of Duchin's life are presented unflinchingly, and in fact this is one "musical" that is quite depressing. There are many contrived, if moving, sequences in the film, such as one with Duchin bonding with a little Asian boy while in the service. Power's performance is good, but it's Hollywood acting, not the kind of consummate emoting that would signify a really great performance. Kim Novak is lovely and adept as Marjorie, and Rex Thompson is excellent as young Peter at about age ten. A sequence when Eddy has to give his son some particularly disturbing news has Thompson out-acting Power.

Victoria Shaw and Tyrone Power

Eddy Duchin also has a superior supporting cast, with James Whitmore as a club owner and loyal associate of Duchin's; Frieda Inescort and Shepperd Strudwick as relatives of Marjorie's who raise the boy; and Victoria Shaw [The Crimson Kimono] as Chiquita, another relative who befriends Peter and eventually becomes his mother. I wondered where Gloria Holden of Dracula's Daughter might be, then realized at the end that she had played  Eddy's mother (quite well by the way)! The film is greatly bolstered by a score by George Duning and especially Harry Stradling's superb widescreen cinematography.

One thing the film ignores, which might have contributed more drama to the screenplay, is that Duchin was Jewish, and Marjorie was bounced out of the social register when she married him.

Tyrone Power was 43 when he made this film, two years older than Duchin was when he died of leukemia. Power himself would be dead in two years. Even with make up and Hollywood lighting, Power, although still handsome, generally looks in his fifties or older.

Verdict: Moving if manufactured biopic with good performances and a beautiful and classy look to it, thanks to Harry Stradling. ***. 

CARY GRANT, DARK ANGEL

CARY GRANT, DARK ANGEL Geoffrey Wansell. Arcade; 2016.

This updated version of Wansell's biography of Grant is a coffee table trade paperback loaded with photographs. The book keeps hinting at Grant's "dark side," which numerous co-stars, friends and directors apparently noticed, but it's never really explored in any depth, although there are details of the actor's problematic relationship with his mother. As usual, the book notes that Grant and Randolph Scott lived together even after Grant's first marriage -- Grant's first five marriages all failed, and his sixth ended with his death -- but is coy about everything else. Apparently Grant was a terrible husband until his more mellow final years. The author does a perfectly workmanlike job of exploring Grant's various film roles, his affairs, and Hollywood career, but whether Grant was gay or bisexual and desperately needed the heterosexual facade of a movie star, or whether he was just the stereotypical much-married Hollywood actor, this book doesn't reveal.  Much of the book covers very well-tread territory.

Verdict: Not bad for what it is, but there's nothing really new here. **1/2. 

MURDER IN NEW HAMPSHIRE

Hank Stratton and Helen Hunt

MURDER IN NEW HAMPSHIRE: THE PAMELA WOJAS SMART STORY (1991 telefilm). Director: Joyce Chopra.

Pamela Smart (Helen Hunt) is the media director of a high school in New Hampshire. She begins work on a project with several teens, and begins an affair with one of them, 15-year-old Billy Flynn (Chad Allen). Pamela assures Billy that her love for him is genuine, but that her supposedly abusive husband, Gregg (Hank Stratton) will make her life miserable if she divorces him. Pamela importunes Billy, with the help of some friends, to murder Gregg, and after some agonizing, he does. Pam is sure that the police will never figure out her involvement, but people, after all, will talk ...

Chad Allen as killer Billy

Murder in New Hampshire is based on real-life events, some of which were later fictionalized in the film To Die For. This is a fairly standard TV movie with some good acting, but it is never what you could call riveting film-making. Allen, who was 17 at the time, probably makes the best impression as the gullible Billy, although there is good work from Stratton and from Ken Howard and Michael Learned as Gregg's parents. Hunt is also good, but she doesn't get across the hardness and sheer dumb dead-commonness of Pamela Smart. Chad Allen, who is openly gay, later appeared in the film Save Me (along with many others), and again proved what a fine actor he is.

Hank Stratton  as Gregg Smart

Smart, who is serving a life sentence, was recently interviewed on Dateline. She maintains her innocence to this day, and refuses to show remorse or admit her guilt, two things she must do if she ever wishes to be paroled. (Flynn and the other boys have all been paroled.) She downplays the fact that she had an affair with a minor, a fact that might well have sealed her fate even if she were, improbably, innocent. The point was made, as it should be, that the true victim in this is Gregg Smart, who by all accounts was a perfectly nice guy. Joyce Chopra later directed a somewhat better telefilm, The Danger of Love, which was about another sociopathic lady, Carolyn Warmus, who murdered her boyfriend's wife. Not surprisingly, Smart and Warmus became friends in the penitentiary!

Verdict: Fair-to-middling TV version of a fascinating case. **1/2. 

TO DIE FOR

Nicole Kidman

TO DIE FOR (1995). Director: Gus Van Sant.

"You're not anybody in America unless you're on TV." -- Suzanne Stone.

Suzanne Stone (Nicole Kidman of Eyes Wide Shut) is determined to have a career in broadcasting, and using her perch as weather girl for a local channel, works with some young people on a documentary that she hopes will get attention. Suzanne is beginning to believe that her loving husband, Larry (Matt Dillon), will only hold her back from her ambitions. Beginning an affair with the boy Jimmy Emmett (Joaquin Phoenix of The Village), Suzanne tells Jimmy that the only way they can be together permanently is if Larry is out of the picture ...

Joaquin Phoenix

To Die For was inspired by the real-life Pamela Smart case as seen in the earlier telefilm Murder in New Hampshire. It may seem in bad taste that this story -- although the names have been changed along with certain incidents, and Suzanne is much more over-the-top than the real Smart -- is played as a very dark comedy, but the film has a serious undertone throughout, and "Larry's" death is in no way made fun of. The one person who comes in for drubbing is Pamela/Suzanne, who is depicted as a self-absorbed and narcissistic monster. The audience laughs at her and her outrageousness, not with her. Based on Joyce Maynard's novel, Buck Henry's screenplay delves into celebrity, sociopathology and other trenchant topics in very entertaining fashion. 

David Cronenberg

Nicole Kidman is perfect as Suzanne, and there is also good work from Phoenix as her young lover; Dan Hedaya as Larry's father; Holland Taylor as Suzanne's mother; Illeana Douglas as Larry's sister; Casey Affleck as one of Jimmy's murdering buddies; Alison Folland as Lydia, a friend of Jimmy's; and an uncredited George Segal as a slimy newsman who gives Suzanne some sexist tips. David Cronenberg, who directed many of his own movies, shows up at the end as a hit man pretending to be a Hollywood producer. Suzanne's final fate in this movie is perhaps more satisfying than what happened to Pamela Smart, who is still in the penitentiary as of this writing!

Verdict: Absorbing, very darkly amusing film with a strong lead performance. ***. 

ACT OF VIOLENCE

Robert Ryan

ACT OF VIOLENCE (1949). Director: Fred Zinnemann.

Frank Enley (Van Heflin) is a respected man with a wife, Edith (Janet Leigh), and an infant son. Into their lives comes Joe Parkson (Robert Ryan), a friend and associate of Frank's during the war. Trying to save the lives of his men in a German POW camp, Frank made a terrible mistake, and these same men died torturous deaths. Joe is one of the survivors and has come to kill Frank, whose guilt and shame is at times overpowering. A woman Frank encounters named Pat (Mary Astor), puts him in touch with someone who can help, but then he learns that the plan is to murder Parkson ...

Van Heflin, Mary Astor, Berry Kroeger

Very well directed by Fred Zinnemann, Act of Violence is a superior crime film with some excellent characterizations and performances. The film doesn't offer easy answers, as even Frank himself wonders how noble or base his motives may have been during the war. Heflin turns in another sharp turn as Frank, and I don't think I've ever seen Janet Leigh better. Ryan has less to do than the others but he is effective and is given some fine moments. Phyllis Thaxter also makes an impression as Ann, a woman who is in love with Joe and tries to talk him out of murdering Frank. Strangely, the only performance that doesn't work at all is Mary Astor's, herein miscast as a middle-aged barfly, one of the few if only times I haven't been impressed with her work. (Her introduction into the story is rather contrived as well). Berry (sic) Kroeger [Atlantis the Lost Continent] certainly scores as the sinister Johnny, who plans to kill Joe for money.

Van Heflin and Janet Leigh

There are some comparatively minor problems with Act of Violence. It makes little sense that Edith wouldn't have had Joe arrested when he forces his way into the house, at gunpoint no less. That would certainly have gotten him off the streets for quite a while. The ending of the film is ill-conceived as well, although it gives Frank a chance at redemption. Unusual for a film made in the forties, there are no opening credits except for the title, with the rest of the credits coming at the very end. An interesting question: by refusing his superior officer, Frank's orders, was Joe more responsible for the men's deaths than Frank was?

Verdict: Worthwhile forties melodrama with more depth than usual. ***.