TEN FAVOURITE MOVIES

It was my good fortune to be a member of a family owning various entertainments in my home town of Aberdeen, Scotland, among which were some dozen local cinemas. My agreeably misspent youth was particularly stimulated by free admission to “the flicks”, as we called them. An impressionable young lad, I must have seen hundreds of movies between the late 1940s and the late 1960s and I here feature some I particularly liked at the time, or caught up with later, in the hope they will stir happy memories for my readers too.

1.       The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)

Errol Flynn madly swashbuckling

  

This is a terrific movie, with excitement, spectacle, wit, colour and glamour in abundance, not to mention the twang and thud of arrows hitting their targets. Athletic Errol Flynn (Robin) was never better, Olivia de Havilland (Marian) contributed melting beauty, Alan Hale (Little John) and Eugene Palette (Friar Tuck) were superb supports while Claude Rains (King John) and Basil Rathbone (Sir Guy of Gisborne) laid on the villainy with a trowel. Not the least pleasure was the inspiriting musical score by Erich Korngold. An unbeatable swashbuckler.

2.       The Wizard of Oz (1939)

Judy Garland (Dorothy) singing Over the Rainbow was just one of the treats. As a youngster I loved Jack Haley (the Tin Man), Ray Bolger (Scarecrow) and Bert Lahr (the Cowardly Lion) – it was the special fantasy of my generation. Following the Yellow Brick Road to Frank Morgan’s Wizard, after many adventures, was a rite of passage for 6-year-olds. We loved it all - and Toto too.

Dorothy following the Yellow brick Road

3.       Now, Voyager (1942)

Bette Davis was a great star and this romantic and emotional melodrama showed off her talents to great effect. She plays mousy Boston spinster Charlotte Vale cruelly dominated by her mother (Gladys Cooper). On the verge of a breakdown she enters a clinic run by the shrink Dr Jaquith (Claude Rains). She recovers her confidence and immediately goes on a cruise to South America with a stunning new wardrobe. She meets on board unhappily married Jerry (Paul Henreid), who has a troubled daughter Tina. They fall in love but decide not to see each other again. 

Bette morphs from mouse to vamp

      

Charlotte astounds her Boston family with her change of character, briefly gets engaged to a local socialite and defies her infuriated mother who drops dead with a heart attack. Feeling guilty, Charlotte returns to Dr Jaquith’s clinic but there meets Jerry’s Tina and takes her under her wing. Reunited platonically with Jerry she becomes a second mother to Tina, who lives with her. Although not everything has quite worked out she gasps to Jerry “Don’t let’s ask for the Moon, we have the Stars!” A first-rate weepie, the film is also famous for Henreid lighting two cigarettes at the same time and giving one to Davis, often seen in Bette’s later films (long before smoking became politically incorrect!).

4.       Casablanca (1942)

Bogart and Bergman smoulder

A perennial favourite, Casablanca is so familiar many can recite whole scenes word-for-word. A wartime morale-booster, it has Rick (Humphrey Bogart in dazzling form) as the hard-bitten bar and gambling joint owner in Vichy Casablanca cooperating with cynical chief of police Capt. Louis Renault (Claude Rains, yet again!). Rick is surrounded by a rum crew of characters – small-time criminal Signor Ugarte (Peter Lorre), rival bar-owner florid Signor Ferrari (Sydney Greenstreet), his loyal head waiter Carl (S.Z. “Cuddles” Sakall) and crooning pianist “Play it again” Sam (Dooley Wilson). Rick’s rackety life is interrupted by the re-appearance of his former lover from Paris, Isla Lind (Ingrid Bergman) on the arm of husband Czech resistance hero Victor Lazlo (Paul Henreid). Rick complains: “Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.”

The plot is decidedly convoluted but much revolves around Victor and Isla’s efforts to get hold of letters of transit allowing the holder to fly to neutral Portugal and the efforts of Nazi Major Strasser (Conrad Veidt) to prevent his enemy Lazlo escaping. A great rousing scene sees the French patrons of Rick’s bar singing The Marseillaise to drown out The Watch on the Rhine from the Germans. There are many past misunderstandings between Rick and Isla to resolve, but Rick eventually comes good, nobly renounces Isla, helps her and Lazlo to escape by plane, shooting Strasser dead and then walking into the sunset to new pastures with his accomplice Capt. Renault, declaring “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship!”.

Bogart and Bergman were both terrific, “As Time goes by” is unforgettable and the brisk dialogue never falters in this supremely romantic entertainment.

5.       Random Harvest (1942)

Greer Garson won an Oscar for her performance in Mrs Miniver in 1942, but I prefer her as Paula Ridgeway, the music hall singer who protects “John Smith” (Ronald Colman) whom she calls “Smithy”, the shell-shocked amnesiac officer who had wandered away from an asylum on Victory Night in 1918. They marry and are blissfully happy in their country cottage, while Smithy knows nothing of his background.

Garson and Colman tear the heartstrings

One day Smithy is in Liverpool for a job interview when he is knocked down by a taxi. His memory of his background floods back but he totally forgets Paula and their happiness together. His real name is Charles Rainier, son of a wealthy but mismanaging businessman. Charles revives the business and Paula, now known as Margaret, becomes his still unrecognised secretary. He enters parliament and marries Margaret, although he realises there is a gap from his past life. A combination of circumstances brings both back separately to their old country cottage. A long neglected key opens the front door with its creaking gate – lovely Margaret/Paula cries out “Smithy!” and honourable Charles responds with “Paula” and they are in each other’s passionate arms.  I know it is pure hokum: yet at least 2 boxes of Kleenex are required for this classic weepie.

6.       The Best Years of our Lives (1946)

This was an enormous US success in 1946, sweeping the Oscar board and is a tribute to the fortitude and decency of America. It follows the troubled return home of three war veterans in 1945, who meet on the plane home, and their efforts to rebuild their lives.

Homer, Fred and Al, the three returning veterans

Al Stephenson (Fredric March) was an infantry sergeant married to everyone’s favourite American wife Milly (Myrna Loy) with a grown-up daughter Peggy (Teresa Wright). Fred Derry (Dana Andrews) was an air force captain married to unfaithful cocktail waitress Marie (Virginia Mayo). Homer Parrish (Harold Russell) lost both hands in the Navy and is engaged to Wilma (Cathy O’Donnell) – Russell was in reality a maimed soldier with prosthetic hooks as hands.

Al returns to his old job as a loan officer in the local bank, criticised for making an unsecured loan to a veteran to set him up in business and responding in public that it is the duty of all Americans to give such people a helping hand. He tries to restrain his daughter Peggy who is attracted to Fred and dislikes Marie. Fred wanted to do better than return to his former employment as a soda jerk but jobs were scarce and he had no alternative. Marie despises his lowly status. Homer’s disabilities appal and repel his and Wilma’s parents, who try to separate the pair, but Wilma is steadfast in Homer’s support. 

The three meet regularly and encourage each other. Eventually Fred discovers Marie’s infidelities and they divorce. Fred plans to leave town but wanders to a nearby airfield packed full with the wrecks of old aircraft including the B-17s he flew, bringing back proud, vivid memories. The scrap metal on the planes is to be used for building houses and Fred is given a new job with the building company. Homer and Wilma get married, Fred is best man, Al, Milly and Peggy are there and Fred and Peggy talk about their hard but bright new future together.

Fredric March was always a pleasure to watch and Dana Andrews surprised by how good he was. The playing by Harold Russell could not fail to move. The film had a powerful integrity and exuded the hopeful spirit of post-war America.

7.       Carousel (1956)

Rodgers and Hammerstein never wrote a better musical and the songs resonate strongly with me still. Billy Bigelow (Gordon MacRae) is a feckless fairground barker in Maine attracted to innocent mill-girl Julie Jordan (Shirley Jones). They woo -If I loved you - and we meet Julie’s engaged friend Carrie Pipperidge (Barbara Ruick) who looks forward to When I marry Mr Snow. Billy quits his job and marries Julie; they stay with Julie’s cousin, Nettie (Claramae Turner) - June is bustin’ out all over. Billy is tempted to go back to his carousel, but is thrilled to hear that Julie is pregnant - My Little Girl. Desperate for cash, Billy tries to rob the mill-owner while everyone is away at a clambake. Julie is warned by her friends of the perils of love - What’s the use of wond’ring – and Billy botches the robbery and falls on his own knife, killing himself. Nettie sings You’ll never walk alone.

Julie is won over by Billy

Years later, up in heaven, the Starkeeper (Gene Lockhart) gives Billy a day on earth to help out widowed Julie and her unhappy, teased daughter Louise (Susan Luckey) Unseen Billy murmurs words of encouragement and love to Louise and Julie who sense his presence. At Louise’s high school graduation the local doctor (aka Gene Lockhart the Starkeeper) recites the verse of You’ll never walk alone and this great anthem is taken up by a celestial choir as Billy ascends a glittering staircase to heaven. 

By this time I am blubbing uncontrollably at the ecstatically melodic beauty of it all.

8.       12 Angry Men (1957)

A classic movie with only about three minutes outside the claustrophobic confines of the jury room where 12 very varied men try to persuade the others of their views on the murder case against a young immigrant. Famously Henry Fonda asks for proper deliberation in what the others view as an open and shut guilty case. Slowly his eloquence wins over the waverers, with reasonable doubt sowed in their minds over a supposedly rare switchblade, what people heard over the noise of the L-train and the defective eyesight of a key witness.

A Jury vote is taken

Fonda tackles the hard-core – ignorant Jack Warden only interested in catching a ball-game, Ed Begley bigoted against slum-dwellers, E G Marshall, the logical stockbroker finally won over and malevolent Lee J Cobb, wrestling with his demons over his broken relationship with his own son. The whole acting ensemble plays brilliantly and this absorbing, intelligent film is deservedly admired.

9.       Sweet Smell of Success (1957)

"Match me, Sidney" demands J.J.

A film noir if ever there was one, the movie follows the relationship of ruthlessly arrogant but powerful newspaper columnist J.J. Hunsecker (Burt Lancaster) with Sidney Falco (Tony Curtis), a slimy New York press agent, both protagonists acting wonderfully well. The plot revolves around J.J.’s hatred of his sister’s jazz musician boyfriend and a scheme to plant drugs on him, using Falco. Even amoral Falco jibs at this villainy. The evocation of Mid-town New York with its bars, favoured restaurants, dark clubs, crowded sidewalks, pushy celebrities, dubious politicians and corrupt cops is unforgettable. Lancaster and Curtis surpassed themselves in what seems like a quintessentially American movie – but the director was a fellow-Scot, Alexander MacKendrick!

10.   North by Northwest (1959)

This is Hollywood, rather than foggy London, Hitchcock and is hugely entertaining. Suave, grey-suited New York advertising man Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) is kidnapped in a case of mistaken identity, taken to an estate on Long Island, questioned by smooth but sinister Vandamm (James Mason), believing he is someone called Mr Kaplan. His abductors fill him full of Bourbon and send him driving downhill on a cliff road on his anticipated last journey. He somehow survives and his abduction story is not believed the next morning – he is taken for a drunk. Trying to track down Mr Kaplan, Thornhill has a meeting with a diplomat in the UN Building who is murdered with a knife in his back – Thornhill becomes the prime suspect. 

He flees in a train to Chicago, where he meets and is attracted to Eve Kendall (Eva Marie-Saint) not knowing she works with Vandamm. Sent to a rendezvous at a deserted scrubland crossroads, Thornhill is attacked by a machine-gun-toting, crop-dusting bi-plane; he only just escapes in a maize field and the plane crashes spectacularly into a petrol truck. Believing Eve sent him to his death, Thornhill has himself arrested at an art auction where his eccentric bids causes consternation. He is handed over to The Prof, a CIA spymaster who explains there is no Mr Kaplan, merely a diversion to protect Eve who is a CIA double agent. Willing to help Eve, Thornhill helps her to conceal microfilm from Vandamm and they both escape in a chase over spectacular Mount Rushmore. Two of Vandamm’s heavies are killed and Vandamm himself is captured. The Free World breathes again and Thornhill and Eve live it up on a sleeper train returning home.

Cary Grant runs for his life

The whole confection is carried off with brio with Cary Grant contributing his rich cocktail of easy charm, good humour and sophistication.  A splendid night at the movies!

SMD

30.06.14

Text Copyright © Sidney Donald 2014