Our Trip to the TCMFF 2024–Part 1

Here’s part one of my planned four-part series chronicling my husband’s and my visit to this year’s TCM Classic Film Festival. We weren’t originally planning on attending; but our plans were changed when I applied for a media credential (just to see what would happen) and I was approved! We purchased a Classic pass for my husband as it was comparable to my media pass. Last year, for our first festival, we went all out with the Spotlight pass, so this year was our first experience with the queue system. Knowing that people can be shut out of screenings, we kept that in mind as we planned our schedule. I’d read that people considered last year to be a more budget-conscious version of the festival to which they were accustomed. Having never attended before, we had nothing to which to compare it. We had an absolute blast at last year’s festival and had just as much fun (if not more) at this year’s.

We stayed at the Quality Inn on La Brea and Sunset Blvd. We even had a room with a view of the pool! The hotel was one of those 1960s hotels where the pool was in the middle of a courtyard with rooms around the perimeter. I was happy that we had an interior room and not one of the rooms with the door on the exterior of the building. Accessing our room would require someone to walk through the office. Since I booked only about 1.5 months out, it was the last hotel I could find that was within walking distance to the festival, was modestly priced, and had a King bed available. It was a fine hotel, but I think if we go to the festival again, I’m going to try and book earlier and stay at one of the hotels near Hollywood Blvd. The Quality Inn was very close to the In-N-Out on Sunset Blvd though. We may have taken advantage of it a couple times during our trip. In-N-Out has now expanded to Oregon, but it’s always so horrendously busy that the only time I’ve ever been there is when I’m in California. Our walk back to the hotel at night was fine, we didn’t have any issues with any people outside. However, I was walking back with my husband and sticking to well-lit busy streets. I would not recommend walking back alone.

Wednesday, April 17, 2024

This was our first full day in Hollywood. We’d flown in from Portland the night prior. Originally, I had plane tickets to fly into LAX Wednesday afternoon, but decided to switch to flying into Burbank Tuesday night instead. This was done to eliminate the stress of trying to get across Los Angeles in a short window when I needed to be at the TCMFF media event that afternoon. I can wholeheartedly recommend flying into Burbank versus LAX. Much smaller and less drama. Not to mention it’s only about 30 minutes from Hollywood versus 60+ minutes from LAX near Inglewood. We also decided to not rent a car this go around, as we were only planning on attending the festival–no Disneyland, sadly. It was outside of this year’s budget. Tuesday night was our first experience using Lyft or any ride-sharing service. I had a first time rider coupon, giving us 50% off our ride.

My photo of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. No cars in front!

On Wednesday morning, we had lunch at In-N-Out and then went over to the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel–the center of the TCMFF. Preparations were still underway with banners and signage being hung and line queues still being built. At noon, the gift boutique was scheduled to open in the lobby of the TCL multiplex. As one who always wants first crack at the merchandise if possible, my husband and I were there within five minutes of opening. They were still setting up the POS and doing training! I purchased a really neat old diner-style coffee mug that had the retro-style graphics TCM used in the mid-90s when it started. The back of the mug states “Perk Up with TCM!” I also purchased a 15th TCMFF shirt, a 30th anniversary TCM pin, and a 15th TCMFF refrigerator magnet. I like to collect refrigerator magnets and Christmas ornaments from places that I travel to during the year. Unfortunately, TCM did not have any Christmas ornaments in their boutique. If you’re reading this, to the “powers that be at TCMFF,” you should add Christmas ornaments to the boutique offerings.

In the afternoon, my husband and I waited in the lobby of the Roosevelt hotel to pick up our passes. My husband was able to pick up his pass right away, but I had to wait an hour for the media room to open. We both had a drink while we waited. I had a glass of rosé wine and my husband had a whisky-based cocktail called the Expat that also had some sort of spicy peppers. He must have liked it as he had two during our trip. Finally at 2pm, I was able to get my media pass in the “Writer’s Room” at the hotel. I was also given the choice between two books: the new book about Double Indemnity by Alain Silver and James Ursini; or Donald Bogle’s biography about Lena Horne. I opted for the former as it was a book on my wishlist already.

Judy Garland’s blouse from Meet Me in St. Louis. This was the actual blouse that was torn during Judy’s scuffle with Tom Drake on his porch. The mending on the sleeve can be seen.

After picking up our passes, we headed down to the Hollywood Heritage Museum near the Hollywood Legion to view the newest exhibit devoted to MGM stars and costumes. We received a special peek at the event via the Facebook TCMFF group which was having a party at the museum. Normally the museum is only open on the weekend. The exhibit was fantastic. I saw Johnny Weissmuller’s Tarzan loin cloth, a suit owned by Greta Garbo, a hat owned by Errol Flynn, one of Humphrey Bogart’s fedoras, the blouse Judy Garland wore in Meet Me in St. Louis when she beats up Tom Drake on his porch, Esther Williams’ gold catsuit from Million Dollar Mermaid, the painting Jean Harlow’s mother had commissioned after Jean’s untimely death in 1937, and so many more great costumes and artifacts.

My husband and I only had time to view the exhibit before it was back up the hill and back to the Roosevelt for the 4:30 media event. This was a really fun event as it wasn’t crowded and felt somewhat exclusive. Complimentary appetizers, beer, wine and other refreshments were available. We were able to see the hosts and hear what films they were most excited about introducing. Ben stated my favorite film, The Long Long Trailer, and I thought he was kidding. While I don’t know if that was really the film he was most excited about introducing, he was at the screening. I like to think he was being truthful. We were also given the scoop on the next season of TCM’s “The Plot Thickens” podcast. More about the media event in this post.

Errol Flynn’s hat.

After the media event it was back down the hill for the conclusion of the TCMFF Facebook party. We then went to Musso & Frank’s for a 7:30 dinner reservation and then went back to the hotel. After completing the trek from the Roosevelt to the Hollywood Heritage museum four times, our legs were spaghetti. I nursed sore legs and two huge blisters for the first two days of the festival. Shout out to CVS for having moleskin and blister pads available. Also shout out to ibuprofen which got us through some trying times. Lol.

Thursday, April 18, 2024

This was the official first day of the festival. I had lunch reservations at Miceli’s Italian Restaurant, a place I’ve been wanting to go for a few years now. This is where Lucille Ball went in 1956 to learn how to toss pizza dough. Alas, we did not get pizza because they were large and we didn’t want to carry around leftovers. Both my husband and I got sandwiches. He got a meatball sandwich and I got a chicken parmesan one. They were delicious. My husband also had this amazing caprese salad with burrata cheese. I tried Miceli’s house Italian dressing and it was delicious. Their dinner rolls were also fantastic. The calamari was also amazing. The next time my husband and I are in Hollywood, I want to go there for dinner.

The inside of Miceli’s Italian Restaurant in Hollywood

We were going to hoof it to Amoeba Music, but our legs said no. Instead, we decided to just hang out around the Roosevelt. In the afternoon, my husband and I decided that we wanted to try and get onto the red carpet bleachers. Not having Spotlight or Essential passes, we weren’t going to be able to see the stars of Pulp Fiction–John Travolta, Samuel L Jackson, Uma Thurman, and Harvey Keitel. My husband and I figured that the bleachers would be our best shot. At a little bit before 2:00pm, we saw that a line was already forming, so we got in line. My husband and I were #13 and #14, so we were definitely getting in. The queue was small and we were told by some of the red carpet bleacher veterans that basically only the people within the established queue would be admitted. Any stragglers who were well beyond the queue ropes were probably SOL.

John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson on the red carpet. (Photo provided by: TCM Classic Film Festival).

In the red carpet line, there was also question as to whether a second set of bleachers would be set up. After some sleuthing by another line member, it was determined that no, only one set of bleachers. Apparently, they used to use two bleachers but when the bleachers weren’t filled, it was decided to reduce it to one bleacher. It’s completely understandable. It looks bad for TCM and to the red carpet attendees to have a half-filled bleacher. That image doesn’t exactly convey enthusiasm and excitement for the festival. TCM employees Scott McGee and Yacov Freedman talked to the red carpet bleacher fans and flagged down the TCM hosts and red carpet guests for small interviews. Unfortunately, when the time came for the stars of Pulp Fiction, they were only able to wave and walk by as they needed to be inside. We were told that John Travolta wanted to come back out and see the fans, but unfortunately there wasn’t enough time. I believe this to be true as Travolta seems like a nice, personable guy.

Dave Karger and Lesley Ann Warren at the “Clue” screening. (Photo provided by: TCM Classic Film Festival).

After the red carpet, it was time for my husband’s and my first film. When White Heat (1949) was announced, I knew I wanted to see it on the big screen. But then the final schedule was released and one of my absolute favorite movies, Clue (1985) was scheduled, poolside. It was scheduled opposite White Heat. Oh TCM. Why do you do this to me? In the end, Tim Curry’s hilarious performance won out over Cagney. Making the screening even better was that Lesley Ann Warren, aka Miss Scarlett, was scheduled to appear. She was a great guest and still gorgeous.

The Clue pool screening was crazy. It was packed and we arrived late due to being part of the red carpet. We barely attended the opening night party. We attended in the sense that there were no lines at the bar and no one inside Club TCM at the Roosevelt. We went to the pool and were unable to find seats. Having insanely achy legs, the thought of standing for two hours did not seem appealing. Always one to try and stake out potential seats, I spotted a pair of reserved seats that were not occupied. I spoke with a TCM staffer and was told that if the guests for whom the seats were reserved did not show up at the start of the event, we could have the seats. My husband and I stood next to the seats for nearly an hour, hoping that these VIP people did not show. The TCM staffer even told another staffer that those seats were already spoken for by us, should the VIPs not arrive. At about five minutes before the screening, a pair of women showed up and spotted my seats. I made sure to stand as close to them as I could without actually sitting there. As soon as Dave Karger was introduced, Boom! I took the signs off the seats and sat down. I overheard the woman tell her companion, “they just dove in there and took the seats.” No I didn’t lady, I had dibs on them long before you showed up. I didn’t just “dive in.”

The ceiling of the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood.

Anyway, despite the cutthroat acquirement of seats at the Clue screening, we had a great time. Making it even better was that they showed all three endings in a row, which is how this film should be seen. After Clue, we walked down to the Egyptian to see a new-to-us film, Gambit, from 1966 with Shirley MacLaine and Michael Caine. This was our first time seeing the Egyptian and it was gorgeous on the inside. The romantic caper film, Gambit, was very entertaining and a fun way to end the evening. My other choice for that block was In Cold Blood at the multiplex, but Clue ended too late. I’m not about leaving screenings early. Every film/event we attended at the festival, we watched in its entirety. I’m glad we saw Gambit. We’re planning on adding it to our film collection.

4th Luso World Cinema Blogathon–Favorite Mary Astor Performances

The Luso World Cinema Blogathon is an annual event hosted by Spellbound with Beth Ann and Critica Retro. I’ll admit that I didn’t know anything about Luso cinema, in fact, I didn’t know what “Luso” meant. Research revealed that “Luso” is a prefix used in relation to Portugal and Portuguese culture. From reading through the list of actors/actresses of Portuguese heritage, I learned that one of my favorites, Mary Astor, fits this description.

Mary Astor was born Lucile Vasconcellos Langhanke in Quincy, Illinois on May 3, 1906. Her father was German and her mother was American. Mary got her Portuguese heritage from her mother. Mary was homeschooled by her mother until 1919 when she sent a photo of herself to a beauty contest and became a semi-finalist. When she was 15, she began taking drama lessons and appearing in local productions. Mary submitted her photos to other beauty contests, eventually catching the attention of an employee at Famous Players-Lasky. She was then signed to a six-month contract at Paramount. Mary would eventually make her screen debut in 1921 at the age of 14.

Mary’s career in silent film had its ups and downs. In 1929, she briefly found herself out of work as her voice was deemed too deep for talkies. However, she appeared in a play with her friend Florence Eldridge (wife of Fredric March) which ended up getting her back into films. She started being cast in films again and was on her way to stardom. In 1935, Mary had an extra-marital affair and was later embroiled in a bitter custody dispute with her ex-husband. In many cases, an adulteress’ career would be over, but the scandal seemed to have little effect on her career. Mary would eventually win the Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 1941 for her role in The Great Lie.

Mary Astor’s career reached its peak in the 1940s with her Oscar win and appearance in the film noir classic, The Maltese Falcon, as Brigid O’Shaugnessy. As what happened with a lot of actresses back then, as soon as Mary hit 40 she was seen as a “mother” figure and was often cast in more matronly roles such as matriarch Anna Smith in Meet Me in St. Louis and Marmee in Little Women. Some of Astor’s best roles however come during this time when she took on against-type parts, such as playing a prostitute in Act of Violence or a madam in Desert Fury. Mary made her final appearance in 1964 in the small, but important role of Jewel Mayhew in Hush, Hush Sweet Charlotte.

Mary Astor had a lot of great roles in her long career. Here are my top 5 favorite Mary Astor performances:

Walter Huston and Mary Astor in “Dodsworth.”

#1 Dodsworth (1936). In this film, Mary plays “the other woman,” a role which typically isn’t sympathetic and is usually villainous. However, in Dodsworth, Mary’s performance as Edith Cortright and relationship with Walter Huston’s Sam Dodsworth is so beautiful that she is seen as the woman that Sam deserves. In this film, Sam and his wife Fran (Ruth Chatterton)’s daughter is all grown and married. Fran cannot accept being old enough to have a grown and married daughter. Sam retires and hopes to live a life of leisure with Fran. They’re planning on starting their retirement with an extended European vacation. While on the ocean liner, Sam meets Edith and Fran meets a young Englishman (David Niven) with whom she flirts. Sam ends up spending much of his time on the boat with Edith. While in Europe, Fran wants to be part of the jet set, spending her time living the high life while pretending to be much younger. Sam just wants to see the sights. As the Dodsworths find themselves growing apart, through a chance encounter, Sam reunites with Edith.

Mary’s performance in Dodsworth is very charming and sweet. She is what the film needs to offset the vain and materialistic Fran. While she is the “other woman” so to speak, Sam is such a nice guy and Fran is so awful, that we as the audience want Sam and Edith to be together.

Mary Astor and Joel McCrea in “The Palm Beach Story.”

#2 The Palm Beach Story (1942). Mary Astor’s performance in this film is unlike any other part that I’ve seen her play. While she doesn’t seem like the obvious choice to appear in a Preston Sturges screwball comedy, Mary is right at home. In this film, she plays the oft-married Princess Maud Centimillia. At the start of the film, she’s on her way home to Palm Beach, FL with her latest conquest, Toto. She pulls up to the dock in her yacht and immediately wants to drop Toto for Tom Jeffers (Joel McCrea). Tom is in town looking for his wife, Gerry (Claudette Colbert) who has traveled to Palm Beach from New York. While on the train to Florida, Gerry meets the Princess’ brother, John D. Hackensacker III (Rudy Vallee). John is instantly smitten with Gerry and takes her back to his home to give her a place to stay.

Mary Astor’s performance as the Princess is hysterical. Even though she’s taken Toto as her lover, she wants nothing to do with him as soon as she spots Joel McCrea. Her disdain for Toto is so clear and obvious, but he’s a dope and doesn’t pick up on it. The Princess constantly has to think of errands to send Toto on so she’ll go away. She’s also very funny when Gerry introduces her husband as “Captain McGlue” in an effort to hide the fact that he’s her husband. When Tom later reveals that he is not Captain McGlue, the Princess says: “Thank heaven for some things. That name!”

Clark Gable and Mary Astor in “Red Dust.”

#3 Red Dust (1933) In this film, Mary plays Barbara Willis, the wealthy wife of Gary (Gene Raymond) who is sent to oversee a rubber plantation in French Indochina. The manager of the rubber plantation is Dennis Carson (Clark Gable). Another visitor to the plantation is Vantine (Jean Harlow), a young prostitute on the lam. Vantine is instantly smitten with Dennis and he seems interested in her until he sees Barbara. Barbara is the polar opposite of Vantine. She is brunette, more classy and ladylike. In contrast, Vantine is a bleached blonde, a brash, and outspoken. Gary ends up coming down with malaria, which puts him out of commission and more importantly, away from Barbara. Dennis spends the week of Barbara’s visit seducing her until she finally succumbs to his advances. Meanwhile, Vantine looks on with intense jealousy.

This is a very sexy part for Mary Astor. She is given the chance to have the hot and heavy affair with the hunky Clark Gable. The entire film is sweaty and it feels sweaty. At one point, Barbara is caught in the rain and is drenched. She then shares a sexy kiss with Gable.

Mary Astor and John Barrymore in “Midnight.”

#4 Midnight (1939) In this film, Mary plays the wealthy Helene Flammarion, the wife of Georges Flammrion (John Barrymore). She is very openly having an affair with ladies man, Jacques Picot (Frances Lederer). At the beginning of the film, Eve Peabody (Claudette Colbert) crashes a concert attended by members of the Parisian high society. She ends up running into Marcel Renaud (Rex O’Malley) who invites her to play bridge with himself, Helene, and Jacques. Eve introduces herself as “Madame Czerny.” Georges enters the room and sees Eve. He pretends to recognize Madame Czerny.

Georges comes up with a scheme to break up his wife and Jacques. He proposes to Eve that she try and break up Jacques and Helene. If she succeeds, Georges will give her a good payoff to reward her for her efforts. He will also give her 50,000 francs and invites her to his and Helene’s home in Versailles for the weekend. Georges also puts Eve up in a suite at the Ritz and buys her a new wardrobe, worthy of her persona as Madame Czerny. Meanwhile, cab driver Tibor Czerny (Don Ameche) is looking for Eve, having fallen in love with her while her drove her around town. When he finally finds her, he is amused that she’s taken on his surname as her fake royalty name.

While Mary Astor is more of a side character in this film, she is very funny in her part as John Barrymore’s unfaithful wife. She has absolutely no discretion in her affair with Jacques. Mary excels in these parts playing a bit of a goody two shoes, but also classy and a bit rigid. She’s also great at delivering her lines with a bit of bitterness, cynicism, while also being very funny.

Mary Astor and Humphrey Bogart in “The Maltese Falcon”

#5 The Maltese Falcon (1941). This is perhaps Mary Astor’s most famous role, that of femme fatale Brigid O’Shaugnessy in John Huston’s directorial debut and Humphrey Bogart’s breakout role. In this film, Brigid introduces herself to Bogart’s Sam Spade as “Miss Wonderly,” but he soon figures out that she’s lying about her identity. She comes to Sam wanting help in finding out the whereabouts of her missing sister. All Brigid can say is that she came to town (San Francisco) with Floyd Thursby. Sam puts his associate, Miles Archer, on the case. Miles is murdered while investigating Thursby’s whereabouts.

Sam sets out to investigate Archer’s death, but is soon thrust into an even larger (more interesting) mystery. He goes to Brigid, now calling herself Brigid having abandoned the “Miss Wonderly” moniker, to find out more information about Thursby. Brigid confesses that she made up the story about her sister and revealed that Thursby was her partner. She also puts forth the theory that Thursby probably killed Archer. When Sam returns to his office, he encounters Joe Cairo (Peter Lorre) who is wanting help looking for a statue of a black bird.

The black bird investigation proves to be a lot more interesting, especially when it turns out that Brigid is acquainted with Joe Cairo. Sam also learns that Cairo and Brigid are part of a gang led by Kasper Gutman (Sydney Greenstreet). Wilmer Cook (Elisha Cook Jr.) is Kasper’s gunsel and eventual fall guy. The ending of the film where Sam calls Brigid out and says she was responsible for Archer’s death. This is Mary Astor’s time to shine. In the scene, she is heartbroken that Sam Spade, with whom she thought she was in love, sends her up the river. She pleads with him to not turn her over to the police, but to no avail. He “consoles” her stating that she’ll probably be out in twenty years. As she descends in the elevator, Brigid’s face is covered by the shadows of bars on the windows.

3rd Annual Agnes Moorehead Blogathon: Dark Passage (1947)

SPOILER WARNING: If you haven’t seen “Dark Passage,” the ending will be spoiled in this article. It is impossible to talk about Agnes Moorehead’s role in this film without discussing the ending. In a happy coincidence, “Dark Passage” is scheduled to air on TCM’s Noir Alley this Saturday, May 4th at 9:15 pm (Pacific) and on Sunday, May 5th at 7:00am (Pacific).

BOB (to MADGE): Why don’t you leave people alone? You’re not satisfied unless you bother people. Either it’s your family or your friends, people you don’t know…No feelings for you. No feeling at all, except I’m annoyed whenever I see you.

Bruce Bennett as “Bob” and Agnes Moorehead as “Madge Rapf” in Dark Passage (1947)

This quote pretty much sums up every character in Dark Passage‘s relationship and feelings about Madge Rapf, portrayed by the brilliant Agnes Moorehead. She is the town busy body, known to everyone and liked by no one. She gets on everyone’s nerves with her persistence, suspicion, and tendency to insert herself into everyone’s business.

Madge Rapf is the ultimate woman scorned.

At the start of the film, Vincent Parry (Humphrey Bogart, whose voice is heard, but isn’t shown until about halfway through) escapes from the notorious San Quentin prison. As the audience, we only see the events transpire from Vincent’s perspective. He is picked up by a passing motorist, who soon starts to ask too many questions and is knocked unconscious by Vincent. Another motorist, Irene Janson (Lauren Bacall) picks Vincent up and smuggles him past the police roadblock and takes him to her apartment in San Francisco. Irene explains that she followed his case closely and knew who he was when she spotted him. She further explains that her father had been falsely convicted of murder, something that she believes has also happened to Vincent. Irene states that her father’s false conviction has inspired her to take an interest in instances of injustice.

Madge annoys Bob one too many times while Irene looks on.

Here’s where Madge comes into the story. Madge, it turns out, is acquainted with Irene and Bob (Bruce Bennett). Bob is a friend of Irene’s who wants to be romantically involved with her. How Madge knows Irene isn’t made clear, but she knows her, because she seems to know everyone. It is also revealed that Madge is well acquainted with Vincent and was the star witness at his trial. Her testimony, in which she claimed Vincent’s late wife had identified him as her killer, is what clinched his guilty verdict and placed him into a cell at San Quentin. Madge had made romantic advances toward Vincent, and when he rejected her, she delivered the false (but incriminating) testimony out of spite. She has resented Vincent ever since. When Madge hears about his escape and then thinks she hears his voice in Irene’s apartment, she becomes convinced that Vincent is going to murder her.

Vincent, needing to hide in plain sight from the police, takes the advice of a cab driver to visit the office of a disgraced plastic surgeon. At around 3am, Vincent arrives at the surgeon’s office and receives a “new look.” The new look is obviously the face of Humphrey Bogart, so that he can be seen in the film. There is an amusing scene earlier in the film where a photo of Vincent Parry is seen in a newspaper article. The man in the photo looks absolutely nothing like Bogart, which just goes to show how skilled the plastic surgeon is.

Bacall nurses Bogie back to health.

Before getting outfitted with a new face, Vincent had visited the apartment of his friend George, who lived near the doctor’s office. He asks George for a place to stay while he recovers from the surgery. Upon Vincent’s return, he finds George dead on the floor–a victim of murder. Vincent eventually ends up at Irene’s apartment. She assists him during his recovery and helps him with his new look and gives him a new name. Because this film stars married couple Bogie and Bacall, their respective characters start to develop romantic feelings toward one another.

Eventually, Vincent becomes suspicious of Madge, knowing that she has been hanging around Irene’s apartment. He also knows that she knows he’s around somewhere. Vincent shows up at Madge’s apartment to confront her over the deaths of both his wife and George. He presents a document outlining his accusations towards Madge and attempts to coerce her to sign it, which would serve as her confession. Madge refuses, knowing that without her confession, Vincent has no proof of his claims. Madge, still the woman scorned, is also upset that Vincent is in love with Irene.

MADGE to VINCENT: I’ve cried myself to sleep at night because of you. She’s (Irene) got you now. She wants you very badly doesn’t she? She’s willing to run away with you and keep on running and ruin everything for herself. But she wouldn’t care because she’d be with you and that’s what she wants. Well she doesn’t have you now. She’ll never have you. Nobody will ever have you! And that’s the way I want it! You’re nothing but an escaped convict. Nobody knows what you wrote down. They’ll believe me! They’ll believe me!

Agnes Moorehead as “Madge Rapf” to Humphrey Bogart as “Vincent Parry” in Dark Passage (1947)

Madge about ready to leap, she sure showed him!

Then, in the ultimate power play of a woman scorned, Madge jumps out the window and falls to her death. Vincent has a throwaway line where he tells Irene that Madge “stumbled and fell out the window,” however, it is fairly obvious that Madge jumped on purpose. Before she falls, she is seen grabbing something from the desk, presumably something with which to break the window. Then, she jumps. The window was closed and Madge wasn’t very far from it when she “fell.” There’s no way that Madge would have stumbled with such force that she would have broken the glass. The production code prohibited villains from getting away with their crime through suicide. Presumably, including the dialogue about Madge falling out the window was the film’s way of circumventing the production code.

Can you imagine someone hating you so much, they’d jump out a window to their death to avoid helping you?

The ending scene of Madge’s wrath is expertly performed by Agnes Moorehead. The contempt she feels towards Bogart’s character is so well acted and is felt by the audience. I also appreciate that she’s a bit over the top so that we can safely conclude that this woman is a bit bonkers so we don’t feel too bad for her that she dies. I love movies with scenes that come out of left field. The first time I saw Dark Passage, I didn’t expect Madge to jump. With Bogart there, it seemed like shooting Madge would be the obvious solution. For her to dramatically jump out the window instead, right after her speech where she explains that she won’t do anything to help him, was incredibly shocking and awesome.

TCMFF 2024: It’s a Wrap!

Last Sunday, April 21, the 15th Annual TCM Classic Film Festival came to a close. It was an amazing 3.5 days of classic film in sunny Hollywood. As a credentialed member of the media, this is just one of a few posts I have planned chronicling my time at the festival. In this post, I thought I would provide an overview of the festival. I’m planning on following up with post with a four-part series describing my experience at the festival, including the films that my husband and I saw and our overall impressions of this year’s festivities.

Thursday, April 18, 2024

During the afternoon, about four hours before the official festivities, attendees went to their first panel–So You Want to Put on a Classic Film Festival. In this panel discussion, organizers of the TCMFF past, present and future were on-hand to explain all the logistics and planning that goes into planning a festival of this magnitude. This panel replaced the traditional “Meet TCM” panel of years past.

John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson at the red carpet for “Pulp Fiction” (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies).

The red carpet was rolled out on Hollywood Boulevard in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre for the opening night film–Pulp Fiction. Almost the entire cast was expected to reunite at the festival, including John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Uma Thurman, and Harvey Keitel. The four main stars were scheduled to be interviewed onstage by Ben Mankiewicz prior to the screening. Aside from the stars of Pulp Fiction, other festival guests, including Floyd Norman, Mario Cantone, Cora Sue Collins, Lesley Ann Warren, Dana Delaney, and Kate Flannery also walked the carpet. George Chakiris was even present, though he did not present any films at the festival. He apparently made a cameo at the annual trivia contest, So You Think You Know Movies, hosted by frequent festival guest, Bruce Goldstein.

The opening party was held in Club TCM before attendees were off to either walk the red carpet, or to get in line for their first official events of this year’s festival. Clue (1985) with guest Lesley Ann Warren kicked off this year’s poolside festivities.

Friday, April 19, 2024

Mario Cantone and Floyd Norman. (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies).

Friday morning brought about the return of Disney’s El Capitan Theatre to the festival. Disney Legend Floyd Norman was on-hand to discuss One Hundred and One Dalmatians (1961) with TCM favorite, comedian Mario Cantone. At the multiplex, Bruce Goldstein, Shane Fleming, Steve Levy, and Bob Weitz, presented six Vitaphone shorts to a sold-out crowd. The shorts were projected in 35mm with the sound played back on their original 16″ discs. The discs were placed on a turntable built by the Warner Brothers Post Production Engineering Department. Meanwhile, over at Grauman’s Chinese Theater, Jodie Foster was the subject of the hand and footprint ceremony. Foster’s friend, Jamie Lee Curtis gave a tribute before the festivities. After the ceremony, Foster introduced Silence of the Lambs, the film in which she won her second Best Actress Oscar.

Jamie Lee Curtis and Jodie Foster at the TCMFF (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies)

TCMFF favorites, Ben Burtt and Craig Barron, presented their annual sound and special effects presentation with Them! (1954). Billy Dee Williams, subject of one of this year’s tributes, was at Club TCM to discuss his decades-long career. Movie historian Leonard Maltin was present during the afternoon to present Three Godfathers (1936), and then later a silent double feature Dad’s Choice (1928) and Paths to Paradise (1925) with one of the nation’s leading silent film accompanists, Ben Model, providing the soundtrack.

Steven Spielberg discusses Close Encounters of the Third Kind with Ben Mankiewicz (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies).

In the evening, director Steven Spielberg was onstage at Grauman’s with Ben Mankiewicz to discuss the making of Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). Gidget (1959) was the featured poolside film. Later that evening, director David Fincher was on-hand to introduce the IMAX restoration of his serial killer classic, Se7en (1995).

Saturday, April 20, 2024

Saturday morning started off with the return of nitrate films at the newly restored Egyptian Theatre, making its triumphant return after an extended closure. Film historian Alan K. Rode introduced Edward G. Robinson in Night Has a Thousand Eyes (1948). Later, the second and final nitrate of the festival, Annie Get Your Gun (1950), was presented.

Diane Lane discusses A Little Romance with Ben Mankiewicz. (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies).

The afternoon was sheer pandemonium at the TCL Chinese Multiplex with the screenings of A Little Romance (1979) with star Diane Lane, and The Big Heat (1953) with Gloria Grahame-super fan, Dana Delaney. The Mae West pre-code, She Done Him Wrong (1933) with an introduction by the hilarious Mario Cantone, was sold-out almost instantly. Those avoiding the insanity were probably over at Club TCM attending an event with makeup artist, Lois Burwell, the subject of the other tribute at this year’s festival.

Jeanine Basinger received this year’s Robert Osborne Award. (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies).

Later in the afternoon, film historian Donald Bogle was at the Egyptian to introduce The Mad Miss Manton (1938) with Barbara Stanwyck, Henry Fonda, and Hattie McDaniel. After this screening, film historian Jeanine Basinger was presented with this year’s Robert Osborne Award. She also introduced Westward the Women (1951) with Robert Taylor. Meanwhile, over at Grauman’s Chinese Theater, Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman were onstage introducing The Shawshank Redemption (1994) for it’s 30th anniversary. Inside the multiplex, comedian and Family Guy-creator, Seth MacFarlane, helped present a series of nine Fleischer cartoons that were recently restored through his foundation. These cartoons hadn’t been seen since their debut back in the 1930s and 1940s.

Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman and Dave Karger discuss The Shawshank Redemption. (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies)

The final poolside screening of the festival was Footloose (1984) in honor of its 40th anniversary. Meanwhile over in the multiplex, members of the cast of Little Women (1994) were reuniting for the film’s 30th anniversary. Closing out the evening was Jeff Daniels at the Egyptian introducing Dog Day Afternoon (1975). Former TCM Underground programmer, Millie De Chirico, introduced the final midnight film of the festival, Heavenly Bodies (1984). Good news! This film will be released on blu ray later this year!

Sunday, April 21, 2024

Cora Sue Collins. (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies).

The final day of the festival started with Fred MacMurray’s daughter, Kate, introducing Double Indemnity (1944) at Grauman’s Chinese Theater. She was also on-hand Friday morning to introduce her father in The Caine Mutiny (1954). Over at the Egyptian, cinematographer Caleb Deschanel presented a 70mm screening of Lawrence of Arabia (1962). Later that afternoon, director Alexander Payne introduced a 70mm screening of John Wayne’s The Searchers (1956). Back at Grauman’s, soap opera star Kin Shriner discussed his love of TCM and the film Sabrina (1954) with Dave Karger. Over at the multiplex, 97-year old Cora Sue Collins introduced the precode, The Sin of Nora Moran (1933). Miss Collins played the child version of Greta Garbo’s character in Queen Christina (1933).

During the festival on Sundays, a handful of timeslots are saved for repeats of films that sold out during the other days of the festival. They are labeled on the schedule as “TBA” and are typically announced Saturday afternoon. This year’s TBAs were The Big Heat (1953), The Prisoner of Shark Island (1936), The Good Fairy (1935), The Model and the Marriage Broker (1951), and Only Yesterday (1933).

Mel Brooks and Ben Mankiewicz (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies)

The closing event of the festival was the always-hilarious 97-year old Mel Brooks. Brooks is a 7-time guest of the festival and did not disappoint. Brooks was on-hand to not answer Ben Mankiewicz’s questions and to do his own shtick. He did eventually introduce this year’s closing film, Spaceballs (1987)–a spoof of Star Wars with It Happened One Night‘s plot, with some Alien, Alice, and The Wizard of Oz sprinkled in.

The Fab Five lead a toast to TCM and the TCMFF (Photo provided by: Turner Classic Movies).

The festivities were capped off with a toast by the five TCM hosts: Ben Mankiewicz, Eddie Muller, Jacqueline Stewart, Dave Karger, and Alicia Malone in Club TCM. The guests were handed glasses of champagne to toast not only the 15th anniversary of the festival, but also the 30th anniversary of TCM!

Here’s to many more years of the festival and TCM!

TCMFF 2024: Updates From the Field

This afternoon, Wednesday, April 17, I attended the media event. As this is only my second TCMFF and my first with media credentials, I had never attended this event. I didn’t know what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the crowd size in the Blossom Room at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel was moderate and the appetizers and refreshments were complimentary. The event was scheduled to run an hour. The first half hour was for mingling. I enjoyed seeing all the new costumes and props in Club TCM–including one of Errol Flynn’s costumes from The Adventures of Don Juan, his cape from The Adventures of Robin Hood, and one of Olivia de Haviland’s silk dresses from ‘Robin Hood.’

Ben Mankiewicz, Eddie Muller, Jacqueline Stewart, Dave Karger, and Alicia Malone take the stage at the Media Reception (photo by: James Ewing)

Ben Mankiewicz came out promptly on the half hour mark and introduced his four co-hosts. Before introducing the other hosts, Ben took time to remark that this year’s lineup of guests was one of the best ever–even better than the year they had a dog who looked like Lassie. Lol. Taking inspiration from Eddie Muller’s title, “The Czar of Noir,” each co-host was introduced as the “Czar” of something. Eddie was “The Czar of Noir,” Jacqueline Stewart was “The Czar of the Academy Museum,” Dave Karger “The Czar of All Things Hollywood,” and Alicia Malone “The Czar of Maine.” After this, Ben asked each co-host what movie they were most looking forward to introducing at the festival. I was happy to learn that Eddie will be introducing Double Indemnity which I plan to see. Ben joked that he was introducing my favorite film, The Long Long Trailer. As awesome as that would be, I’m fairly certain someone else has been lined up for that honor (4/23/24 UPDATE: Ben Mankiewicz DID introduce The Long, Long Trailer at the festival!!). Dave stated that he was excited to introduce The Prisoner of Shark Island, a 1936 film starring John Carradine. John’s son, Keith Carradine, will be on-hand to discuss the film. Dave stated he’d never even heard of this film and neither had TCM’s Senior Vice President of Programming, Charles Tabesh.

The promo video announcing the podcast that was shown. (Photo by: James Ewing)

The big reveal for the media event was that season five of “The Plot Thickens” podcast is debuting on June 6. This season will be devoted to director John Ford and is titled, “Decoding John Ford.” The podcast will feature extensive, unheard audio clips and it will even discuss the search for a lost John Ford film. While much of the podcast will feature John Ford telling his own story, there were some documents unearthed, written by Ford, that needed to be performed to be included in the episode. Tapped for the honor of playing John Ford was Eddie Muller, who reportedly went “method” for his voice performance as Ford. He joked that he stopped short of wearing Ford’s signature eye patch, as it interfered with his ability to see the script. The discussion then turned to why Ford wore the eye patch. The answer was that Ford supposedly suffered from “undisclosed eye issues.”

Eddie Muller goes “method” in his voiceover performance as John Ford in Season 5 of “The Plot Thickens.” (Photo by: James Ewing)

“The Plot Thickens” will debut on June 6, the 80th anniversary of D-Day. John Ford was one of the Hollywood directors tapped to create films for the War Department during World War II. The podcast’s debut will be celebrated with a two-day marathon of John Ford’s films on June 5 & 6 on TCM. Ford’s grandson, Dan Ford, will co-host the marathon with Ben Mankiewicz.

6th Golden Boy, A William Holden Celebration Blogathon: Sunset Boulevard (1950)

My post for this event is coming a little early, as I am leaving for the TCM Film Festival in Hollywood tomorrow night! I wanted to make sure I got my article finished before I leave, as I probably won’t have time to do so while I’m in California. I hope to see William Holden in Sabrina while I’m at the festival, but we’ll see. But I digress, today I am not talking about Holden in Sabrina, I am talking about Holden in his breakout role in Sunset Boulevard.

Prior to 1950, Holden’s career was languishing. His first starring role came in 1939’s Golden Boy, co-starring Barbara Stanwyck. Despite Stanwyck’s enormous help and use of her star power to keep Holden from being fired from the production (a kindness that Holden never forgot and repaid his gratitude by sending her flowers every year on the anniversary of Golden Boy‘s first day of production), this film did not prove to be the breakout hit Holden needed to be considered a movie star. He did appear in films with A-list actors such as Humphrey Bogart, Jean Arthur, Ray Milland, Veronica Lake, to name a few, but none of these films would provide Holden with an opportunity to breakout.

William Holden at the start of Sunset Boulevard

After returning from serving in World War II, Holden was placed in a variety of smaller films, where he played what he called “smiling Jim” roles. Holden grew weary of such films and wanted something that would actually challenge his acting ability and give him a different type of role to play. He found that in 1949 when he was offered the role of Joe Gillis, a down on his luck screenwriter in Billy Wilder’s next film, Sunset Boulevard. Wilder’s first choice, Montgomery Clift, had dropped out of the film’s production. Holden wisely saw Wilder’s film as his opportunity to do something different and accepted the role.

My favorite Sunset Boulevard poster.

Sunset Boulevard was the perfect showcase for what would become Holden’s trademark onscreen persona–the handsome and charming, yet flawed man who was cynical of the world around him. His persona is similar to Humphrey Bogart’s except that Holden was classically handsome and could charm anyone with a flash of his smile. Both Bogart and Holden’s characters were often cynical, but Bogart often imbued his performances with a vulnerable quality. Holden’s characters tended to be more heroic and called upon to do the right thing, even if he himself didn’t believe in it. In ‘Sunset,’ Holden ultimately has to do what’s right for Betty Schaefer and his friend (and her fiancé) Artie–even if it’s not what he would have wanted for himself.

Wilder’s film features a very unusual and somewhat macabre framing device–the story’s narrative is told by the corpse of Joe Gillis (Holden), who at the beginning of the film, is seen floating facedown in the pool at silent film star Norma Desmond’s mansion. Wilder’s previous film noir, Double Indemnity, also used a narrator who recounted the previous events leading to that moment. Except in that film, the narrator, Walter Neff, is still alive and is dictating his story into his boss’ Dictaphone. In ‘Boulevard,’ we see the lifeless frozen in time face of Gillis as he goes into his story:

JOE: Yes, this is Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California. It’s about five o’clock in the morning. That’s the homicide squad – complete with detectives and newspapermen. A murder has been reported from one of those great big houses in the ten thousand block. You’ll read about it in the late editions, I’m sure. You’ll get it over your radio and see it on television because an old-time star is involved–one of the biggest. But before you hear it all distorted and blown out of proportion, before those Hollywood columnists get their hands on it, maybe you’d like to hear the facts, the whole truth. If so, you’ve come to the right party. You see, the body of a young man was found floating in the pool of her mansion–with two shots in his back and one in his stomach. Nobody important, really. Just a movie writer with a couple of B pictures to his credit. The poor dope! He always wanted a pool. Well, in the end, he got himself a pool–only the price turned out to be a little high. Let’s go back about six months and find the day when it all started.

William Holden as “Joe Gillis” in Sunset Boulevard

The film then segues into the beginning of the flashback. Joe Gillis is at Paramount trying to sell a story idea he’s written, hoping that the studio will buy it and hire him to write the screenplay. A studio “reader,” Betty Schaefer (Nancy Olson) is already in the office talking to the studio head, advising him to turn down the story. Unfortunately for Betty, Joe overhears the conversation and is upset. Later, when returning home, Joe notices that he’s being followed by a pair of men looking to repossess his car. Trying to outrun and hide from the men, he turns into the driveway of a seemingly deserted mansion, and hides his car in the garage.

JOE: Wait a minute, haven’t I seen you before? I know your face…You’re Norma Desmond. You used to be in silent pictures. You used to be big.
NORMA: I *am* big, it’s the *pictures* that got small.

William Holden as “Joe Gillis” and Gloria Swanson as “Norma Desmond” in Sunset Boulevard.

However, the mansion is not deserted! It in fact belongs to former silent film star, Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson). Norma hasn’t made a film for over twenty years, but still believes she’s every inch the major Hollywood star. She ambles around in her cavernous mansion, filled with luxurious and expensive decor. Photographs of Norma (real photographs of Swanson during her silent film career) in her heyday are prominently placed throughout the home. Evenings are filled with Norma watching herself perform in her films. Norma is determined to make a comeback, despite hating the word “comeback.” She prefers to think of it as a “return,” a return to the millions of people who won’t forgive her for deserting the screen. Norma’s comeback is set to be a new adaptation of Salome, a script that she has written for herself.

The very bizarre monkey funeral sequence.

Norma’s butler, Max (Erich von Stroheim), exists solely to feed into Norma’s disillusions about her level of celebrity. He gives into her every whim, whether it’s holding a funeral for her dead monkey or organizing a New Years Eve party, complete with an orchestra, for no guests. Max to his credit, is cognizant of Norma’s mental state and takes precautions, such as removing the door knobs so that she cannot lock herself inside when she decides to harm herself. Despite how crazy and funny Norma seems on the outside, inside this is a woman who is struggling and is in desperate need of some therapy and mental help. Norma is a tragic figure in this film.

Having heard that Joe is a writer, Norma hires him to help her with her Salome script. Joe finds the writing abysmal, but with his car about to be repossessed, and his rent in arrears, he realizes that he cannot afford to turn her offer down. Norma has Max set up a room for Joe and soon he’s part of Norma’s life. Norma is ecstatic having Joe around and treats him to champagne, and invites him to engage in one of her favorite pastimes–watching her own movies.

NORMA: We didn’t need dialogue. We had faces!

Gloria Swanson as “Norma Desmond” in Sunset Boulevard

Norma entertains Joe with her delightful Charlie Chaplin impression.

The deserted mansion implies that Norma is a bit of a recluse. She does have some visitors, such as “the Waxworks” i.e., her silent film friends who come by once a week to play bridge. This is such a fun sequence, if only to see Buster Keaton, who was known to be an excellent bridge player. He memorably says “Pass” twice during the game. Joe’s continued presence in the home inspires Norma to have Max dust off her old car, a 1929 Isotta Fraschini. By this point, Joe’s work on Norma’s script is long done, and he continues to live with Norma, indulging her fantasies and delusions. She’s tired of Joe’s “dreadful” shirt, his boring sports jacket, and his baggy pants. Norma takes Joe shopping for a brand new wardrobe, and this is the scene that cements Joe’s new status in Norma’s life–kept man. The salesman at the men’s clothing store has a memorable line that sums up Joe’s entire situation when he’s hesitant to allow her to buy him an expensive Vicuna overcoat over the less expensive camel’s hair:

SALESMAN: As long as the lady is paying for it, why not take the Vicuna?

This scene always makes me laugh.

Joe does take the Vicuna and with that starts the second act and one of the most memorable sequences in the film, Norma’s New Years Eve party. She has Max hire an orchestra, put together an enormous spread of food and champagne, everything that would make for a great party. Joe comes down the grand staircase in a beautiful tuxedo with tails and marvels at the scene. He takes Norma’s hand and while dancing, he innocently asks where the other guests are. There are no guests she exclaims, gleefully. Joe realizes that Norma has fallen in love with him. Hmm. Apparently he didn’t realize that when she bought him a brand new wardrobe? Then comes one of my favorite Norma Desmond quotes when she tries to offer Joe a New Years Eve gift:

JOE: Norma, I can’t take it. You’ve bought me enough.
NORMA: Shut up! I’m rich. I’m richer than all this new Hollywood trash. I’ve got a million dollars.

William Holden as “Joe Gillis” and Gloria Swanson as “Norma Desmond” in Sunset Boulevard.

Perhaps the only time we ever saw Jack Webb smile.

Joe eventually leaves and heads to the New Years Eve party of his friend, Artie Green (Jack Webb). As an side, I think this film is the most animated performance I’ve ever seen from Jack Webb. But I digress. Artie’s party is definitely a more raucous and less refined affair than Norma’s party for two. While at the party, Joe runs into Betty again and learns that she’s Artie’s fiancée. However, the two start talking “shop” and discussing Joe’s story idea. Betty comes up with a concept that works with Joe’s idea but changes the setting and characters’ occupation. The two seem to develop an affection for one another as they discuss Joe’s story and get excited by its potential. Eventually though, Joe has to leave and return to Norma.

This scene sets up the overall main conflict of the film: Norma’s obsession with Joe versus Joe and Betty’s burgeoning love affair. When Joe returns home from Artie’s, he learns that Norma attempted suicide over his leaving. Feeling guilty, Joe goes to Norma’s room and ends up wishing her a Happy New Years and kisses her. Talk about mixed signals.

Throughout most of the remainder of the film’s running time, Joe is secretly leaving Norma’s home in the evenings and meeting up with Betty at Paramount. The two are excitedly working together on a story treatment that they hope to sell to the studio. Betty tells Joe about her dreams and past which only endears her to him. She also wants to be a screenwriter and hopes this story may earn her a promotion from reader. Joe is endeared by Betty’s youth and optimism and finds himself falling in love with her. This causes him to feel conflicted, as he doesn’t want to steal his friend’s girlfriend.

JOE: How old are you anyway?
BETTY: Twenty two.
JOE: That’s it–there’s nothing like being twenty two. Now may I suggest that if we’re ever to finish this story you keep at least two feet away from me…now back to the typewriter.

William Holden as “Joe Gillis” and Nancy Olson as “Betty Schaefer in Sunset Boulevard.

Norma returns to Paramount to see Cecil B. DeMille.

Norma’s opportunity to make a “return” seems to come when she’s contacted by Gordon Cole at Paramount. He wants Norma to come down to the studio and talk about Cecil B. DeMille’s next film. Norma had Max deliver her completed draft of her Salome script to DeMille, so naturally, she thinks that Mr. Cole wants her to come down to discuss it. Norma makes her triumphant return to Paramount, despite only being allowed in because the old studio guard recognized her. When she arrives, DeMille is in the middle of shooting a scene for his next film. He has her sit down and while she waits, the lighting man recognizes her and shines a spotlight on her. Then other employees are heard in succession, saying Norma Desmond’s name. This sets up one of my favorite lines in the movie:

PARAMOUNT SECURITY GUARD: Why I thought she was dead!

Betty and Joe start to fall in love.

The final act of the film is where Norma’s obsession with Joe and Joe and Betty’s late night story writing plot lines come to a head. Norma begins to become suspicious of Joe’s late night trips. She finds out about Betty and becomes extremely jealous and telephones her over and over. Joe overhears Norma talking to Betty and interrupts the call. Knowing that he needs to end things with Betty as to not hurt Artie, he tells her to come over to Norma’s home. When he does, he essentially explains to her that he’s the kept man of Norma Desmond and runs her out of his life by pretending to brag and gloat about the lavish lifestyle he’s living with Norma. While we’re led to believe that Joe is just saying these things to drive Betty away and back to Artie, one has to wonder if he truly believes his lie. Despite thinking Norma was nuts at the beginning and just accepting what he thought would be easy money, Joe seems to enjoy his time with Norma. He lives lavishly, enjoys nice food, champagne, her pool, she has everything he wants. It’s easy to see why Norma would be in love with him. He’s young, he’s handsome, he’s charming, he has everything an aging woman would want. I could write a whole article about how Norma Desmond is truly the victim of Sunset Boulevard, despite murdering Joe. But that’s for another day.

Norma’s 1929 Isotta Fraschini

Max finds out the truth about why Paramount wanted to see Norma on the lot. It wasn’t for Salome, but rather they wanted to use her car in a film. Upon hearing the reason, Cecil B. DeMille cannot in good faith hurt Norma’s feelings and tells Gordon Cole to find another car. Once again the people in Norma’s life protect her from the truth. Joe FINALLY grows a back bone and some self-respect and decides to leave Norma’s home. Except she’s a woman scorned and she will not let him leave. While walking past the pool, Norma shoots Joe three times and he collapses, face first into the pool. That brings us back to the beginning of the film.

JOE: Well this is where you came in. Here’s that pool again, the one I always wanted.

William Holden as “Joe Gillis” in Sunset Boulevard.

Norma Desmond’s final scene in Sunset Boulevard is spectacular. The police are on the scene, ready to take Norma in for murder. Hedda Hopper is there, wanting her paper to take her story direct, live from Norma’s bedroom. Reporters with newsreel cameras, to capture Norma’s arrest are huddled around. Every one is there, except Norma’s grip on reality. Her madness has finally reached its peak. Max, no longer complicit in maintaining Norma’s fantasy life, uses her delusions of grandeur against her to lure her into the waiting police car. As Norma’s former director, Max positions himself amongst the newsreel cameras, telling Norma that they’re here to start shooting Salome.

Norma’s descent down the stairs is completely surreal. As she makes her way to the bottom, everyone else in the scene remains completely still. Norma makes her way towards Max, arms reaching out towards the camera. She’s ready to make her triumphant return. Norma makes a speech about how happy she is to be back in front of the camera. She looks completely bonkers as she finally makes her way to her mark to start filming her scene. Reaching out one more time towards the camera she says in an oft-misquoted line:

NORMA: All right, Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my close-up.

Gloria Swanson as “Norma Desmond” in Sunset Boulevard

Favorite Stars in ‘B’ Movies– Steve McQueen in “The Blob” (1958)

Beware of the blob, it creeps
And leaps and glides and slides
Across the floor
Right through the door
And all around the wall
A splotch, a blotch
Be careful of the blob

“The Blob” performed by The Five Blobs in “The Blob” (1958)

And so begins the greatest movie theme song of all time–the theme song to the 1958 sci-fi classic, The Blob. The theme song was written by Burt Bacharach and Mack David. Bacharach of course would later go on to win two Best Song Oscars, most notably for “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head” from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. However, for my money, “The Blob” is his best tune, an earworm so catchy that it’ll stay with you days, even weeks after watching the film. My husband and I saw this film at The Hollywood Theatre on our 11th anniversary a couple years ago. It was awesome seeing it up on the big screen.

The Blob starts out like many other 50s sci-fi films. A pair of teenagers, Steve (Steve McQueen, in his screen debut) and Jane (Aneta “Miss Crump from The Andy Griffith Show” Corsaut) are necking at lover’s lane. They see what appears to be a meteorite cascading through the sky and hear it crashing. Steve and Jane drive off to see what it was, but an old man and his dog get to it first. The old man finds the meteor and pokes it with a stick. When he does, it splits open and a mysterious bloblike creature (i.e. “the blob”) escapes and attaches itself to the man’s arm. In pain and unable to get the blob off, the man runs out into the road, nearly being hit by Steve. Steve and Jane take the man to see Dr. Hallen.

In a moment of desperation before her inevitable consumption by the blob, Nurse Kate tries to subdue it with a glass of water.

Dr. Hallen subdues the man with an anesthetic and sends Steve and Jane back out to the site and look for information. While Steve and Jane are gone, Dr. Hallen decides that the old man’s arm must be amputated. During this entire time, between the blob’s escape from the meteor and staying at Dr. Hallen’s, the blob has grown in size. Before Steve and Jane return, the blob fully absorbs the old man, Dr. Hallen, and his nurse Kate. This scene features a lot of delightful screaming by Kate. Screaming, while standing completely motionless and not trying to escape at all, is a common trope in 50s sci-fi. The blob grows and becomes more red with each subsequent victim.

At this point, Steve, Jane and his other “teenage” friends try to warn the police about the blob. I am not convinced that any of the teenagers in this film are actually teenagers. Steve McQueen was 28 and looks every inch of it. Aneta Corsaut was 25. I can see why McQueen wanted to avoid discussing this film. His screen debut is not flashy, it’s not a star-making role. McQueen doesn’t really do anything in this film other than warn the adults about the blob. The real star of this film is the blob. He should have gone onto bigger and better things.

But I digress. The police investigate Steve’s claims but are unable to locate the blob or any victims. They assume that Steve is playing a prank on the police and ignore his subsequent warnings. As these films tend to go, Steve and Jane have continued run-ins with the blob and find more and more victims. The police continue to ignore them until they have their own encounter and see the blob with their own eyes.

The blob oozes through the front doors of the Colonial Theater.

In The Blob‘s most famous sequence, one that is also featured in Grease, another film that features near-30 year olds playing teenagers, the blob is seen creeping through the vents in the projection booth of the local Colonial Theater. Steve and Jane continue to warn everyone of the danger, but to no avail. They are vindicated when the blob completely absorbs the projectionist, and then takes over the theater. The crowd flees the theater in panic, while the blob oozes through the front doors. As an aside, at the annual Blobfest in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, people can participate in a reenactment of this scene. Participants can run screaming, out of the now-restored Colonial Theater, trying to escape being consumed by the blob.

At the film’s conclusion, the now enormous blob completely absorbs a diner, complete with customers inside. The police, now finally believing Steve’s claims, try to figure out how to take the blob down before he consumes the entire town. They try to electrocute the blob, but all that accomplishes is setting a fire elsewhere. Steve notices that the blob recoils when coming in contact with the cold CO₂ fire extinguisher liquid. He comes up with a plan to acquire as many fire extinguishers as possible from a variety of sources. Copious amounts of fire extinguishers in hand, the firefighters, police and students spray the blob. Now frozen, the Air Force is contacted to carry the heavy frozen blob to the Arctic. However, he’s not dead.

The best thing about this film is the blob. He’s some sort of alien that crashes to earth. His only way to stay alive is to eat people. With every person consumed, the blob grows in size and becomes more and more red. At the beginning of the film, he was a tiny blob, maybe 5″ in diameter and was semi- translucent. By the end of the film, he’s grown to gargantuan portions and is a deep deep red. I love that the film has no resolution. The blob, while frozen, is not defeated. Freezing him was a temporary solution.

The film warns that the blob will stay away as long as the Arctic stays cold. Oops. With the arctic melting, are we in danger of the blob’s imminent return? The answer is a resounding “yes,” because apparently at the aforementioned “Blobfest” in Pennsylvania, fans of the blob can meet the star of the movie, the blob himself, in person! It’s only a matter of time before he wrecks havoc again.

The Second Master of Suspense Blogathon–“The Birds” (1963)

I first saw The Birds in the 90s when I was in middle school. It was supposedly “very scary” but I didn’t find it scary in the slightest. In fact, back then and even now, I find parts of it very funny. Because of Hitchcock’s known fondness for macabre humor, it’s hard to know whether Hitchcock purposely intended for these scenes to be funny. There are also parts of this film that I find very bewildering. I also love the birds in The Birds and think that they are 100% the heroes of the film.

The peach-faced lovebirds are adorable and need their picture in this article.

The Birds, based on Daphne du Maurier’s 1952 short story of the same name, starts with socialite and known party girl, Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren) in a San Francisco pet shop. She seems to just be browsing. The shop proprietor, Miss Inch from The Parent Trap, steps away for a second. While she’s out of earshot, lawyer Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor) enters the shop looking for a pair of lovebirds for his sister Cathy’s (Veronica Cartwright) birthday. Mitch recognizes Melanie as the party girl whose picture he saw in the newspaper. It seems she had been arrested for pulling a practical joke and due to her notoriety as a raucous socialite, she made the local newspaper. Knowing that she doesn’t work at the pet shop, Mitch pretends to mistake her as an employee and asks her technical questions about birds. She tries to pretend that she knows about birds, but fails. Mitch tells her that he knows about her and leaves. Resenting that Mitch made her out to be a fool, Melanie purchases the lovebirds and decides to deliver them to Mitch herself.

Mitch and his mother (or lover?) Lydia

Melanie ends up following Mitch to his weekend home in Bodega Bay, about an hour outside of San Francisco. When she arrives in town, she asks around town for the location of Mitch’s home as well as the name of his sister. She’s directed to the home of the local school teacher, Annie Hayworth (Suzanne Pleshette) who is Cathy’s teacher. In addition to learning Cathy’s name, she also learns that Annie is Mitch’s ex-girlfriend who broke up with Mitch over his overbearing mother, Lydia (Jessica Tandy). Melanie also earns an invitation to stay with Annie at her home. As an aside, the whole Mitch/Lydia dynamic is odd. First of all, she seems much too old to be Cathy’s mother. It would be more believable if Cathy were Mitch’s daughter. This change in the storyline wouldn’t affect the plot. But aside from that, there are also scenes between Mitch and Lydia, where they oddly seem like romantic partners versus mother and son. I find some of their scenes strange.

Anyway, Melanie ends up renting a boat and rowing across the bay to Mitch’s farmhouse. She breaks into his home and delivers the lovebirds. She then returns to her boat so she can wait for Mitch to enter the home and find the lovebirds. He does and quickly finds Melanie. When Lydia meets Melanie, she is cold to her, because she resents any woman in her son’s life. She is very much the jealous lover even though she’s Mitch’s mother. Anyway, it is after Melanie’s burglary of Mitch’s home is when the birds start attacking!

The birds assemble on the jungle gym, ready to make their move.

Melanie is hit by a seagull upon returning to shore to return the boat. Mitch sees her and tends to her injury. Later, the children at Cathy’s birthday party are attacked by a flock of birds. Throughout the film, there are random bird attacks, which are unexplained. Never once in Hitchcock’s narrative does he try to offer a rational explanation for the bird attacks. The randomness and severity of the attacks is what lends the horror to The Birds. Hitchcock also opted to not use any sort of soundtrack or score, instead choosing to only utilize the sound of the birds to punctuate the action in the film. There are also large chunks of the film where there is no sound at all, except the diegetic and ambient sounds present within the film.

The birds finally do what the audience wanted to do–put an end to that god awful song.

The absolute best example of Hitchcock’s use of silence and specific diegetic and ambient sounds is in the climactic scene when the birds attack the children at the school. To get this off my chest, I have to say that the song that the kids sing is so annoying and so awful, that I don’t blame the birds for attacking. The birds were doing the audience a favor. That song is irritating. I applaud the birds for putting an end to it. This is why they are the heroes of the film. Hitchcock also uses silence and diegetic sound very effectively at the film’s end, when the Brenner family walks an injured Melanie out of the house into the car, while the birds sit perched in silence. It’s very eerie and uncomfortable.

The hysterical mother in the diner.

Earlier in this article, I mentioned there are scenes that I find funny. Some scenes I think are intentionally funny, like the lovebirds leaning into every curve while Melanie is driving. One scene that I doubt is supposed to be funny but is funny is the scene when Mitch and Melanie are trying to find Cathy after the bird attack at the school. They go to Annie’s home and find Annie dead on the stairs, victim of the bird attack. Then, Melanie asks “Where’s Cathy?” Suddenly, Cathy pulls open the curtains and is sobbing in the window. For whatever reason, Cathy’s hysterical crying combined with the dramatic curtain pull makes me laugh. I know that’s probably terrible. Unfortunately, I cannot find a photo of Cathy in the window to support my statement. The other part that makes me laugh is the distressed mother in the diner. I also love that the other diners, like the bird lady, casually discuss the murderous birds. The distressed mother’s children are unaffected by the talk, but the mother is determined that her children are scared to death. I choose to believe that this mother deserves the stress as payback for wrecking Henry Fonda and Vera Miles’ lives with her false accusations in The Wrong Man.

Melanie in the phone booth

One of the highlights of The Birds is the big explosion at the gas station. The birds attack a gas station attendant and he and the other employees run inside. Because of the attack, the gas attendant drops the gas hose on the ground, leaving a trail of gasoline. The birds start to attack and Melanie takes refuge in a phone booth. The scene of Melanie in the phone booth with birds hitting the glass walls is one of the famous scenes in the film. This scene concludes in spectacular fashion with a customer lighting a cigar at the gas station, igniting the massive trail of gasoline. A huge explosion levels the gas station. Melanie returns to the diner. Then, the distressed mother launches into her diatribe, accusing Melanie of bringing about the bird attacks and being evil.

MOTHER: Why are they doing this? Why are they doing this? They said when you got here, the whole thing started. Who are you? What are you? Where did you come from? I think you’re the cause of all of this. I think you’re evil. EVIL!

Doreen Lang as “Hysterical Mother in the Diner” in The Birds (1963)

I love that The Birds does not have a resolution. As far as we know, the birds are still out there, running Bodega Bay.

The birds reign supreme at Bodega Bay

TCMFF 2024–Tentative Picks!

A week ago Thursday (March 28), TCM finally dropped the full schedule for the upcoming TCMFF. Since then, I have been pouring over the schedule, discussing the various schedule conflicts with my husband. We’ve identified the screenings that we absolutely cannot miss, screenings that we’re interested in, but don’t necessarily have to do, and other screenings to which we’re indifferent. This year’s schedule is absolutely killer, despite presenting some agonizing conflicts. This schedule is so good, it feels like it was designed just for me. Last year, we attended the festival with the awesome Spotlight passes. This year however, I am attending with a Media pass and my husband will have the comparable Classic pass. We will be getting experience with the line queuing and the numbering system. I’ve read about how the lines work in previous festivals and understand the protocol. Last year, I wanted to make sure we saw something in every venue so we could see what they’re like. This year, I want to make sure to see something in the two new venues–El Capitan and the Egyptian.

Here is the tentative schedule that my husband and I agreed upon, though in many cases, it is subject to change.

Wednesday

We’re flying into Burbank from Portland Tuesday night. Luckily, our flight is a little less than 2.5 hours, so it won’t be too daunting. Originally we were going to fly into LAX on Wednesday afternoon. However, with a 1:30pm arrival time on Wednesday afternoon with a media event scheduled ~4:30pm, I decided that it would be too stressful to try and get across Los Angeles to Hollywood in 3 hours. I could already feel myself becoming anxious trying to be on time and at the time I was still 1.5 months away. Regardless, I rearranged our plans so that we’d already be in town on the day we have a lot planned.

On Wednesday, my husband and I will need to pick up our passes. I am hoping that we may have time Wednesday morning to possibly go to Larry Edmunds book store. We will also be attending the Facebook TCMFF Group party at the Hollywood Heritage Museum. The museum has an MGM costume exhibit that we plan to see during the party. My husband and I will need to leave the party briefly to go back to the Roosevelt for the 4:30pm media event. Afterwards, we’ll head back to the party. We then have a 7:30pm Musso & Frank reservation. Will this be the year that my husband finally orders the Welsh rarebit that he’s been dying to try? We’ll see. Last year he was supposed to try it and then ordered a pork chop instead.

Thursday

I have a lunch reservation at Miceli’s on Las Palmas Ave. for late Thursday morning. It is where Lucille Ball went in 1956 to learn how to toss pizza dough for the “Visitor From Italy” episode of I Love Lucy. I will try to go to Larry Edmunds this day if I don’t make it on Wednesday. I also want to go to Amoeba Music, but we won’t have a car this year. The walk is about 30 minutes, which isn’t bad, but we’ll need to see if we have time. The festival doesn’t officially kick off until 5:00pm with the opening night party. We’ll definitely be attending that. Prior to the party is a panel about the ins and outs of running a festival and then later the annual trivia event. Both sound interesting, but we’ll see if we go to either.

I made this schedule myself in Excel just to visualize the conflicts.

Right off the bat, first block of the schedule and there’s a major conflict. Pulp Fiction can already be removed as it is the opening night film reserved for Spotlight and Essential passholders. When White Heat was announced, that was the film that I wanted to see… but then the schedule came out and Clue is scheduled opposite White Heat. Clue will be a poolside screening and Lesley Ann Warren, aka Miss Scarlett, will be present. I love Clue. It is hysterical. I am curious whether they’ll show all three endings in a row during the screening. Frankly, they should because it is the only way to watch this film. I am anticipating the Clue screening to be packed to the point where we probably won’t get a seat; but it’ll probably be our only chance for a pool screening if we were to attend any of the three awesome pool screenings that are planned.

Pick: Clue
Plan B: White Heat

Our two main choices for the second and last block of the evening are In Cold Blood in theater 1 at the multiplex or Gambit at the Egyptian. I’ve never seen In Cold Blood and I love true crime, so this would be a great pick. The con with this pick is if we see Clue, it ends at the time that In Cold Blood starts. We don’t want to leave Clue early, because seeing all the endings is the whole point of the film. You watch the entire film to get to this ending. I am also not a fan of leaving screenings early, as I don’t really want to come home having seen 75% of a dozen films. With that said, if we see Clue, it only makes sense to see Gambit, as we’ll have 30 minutes between screenings. If we see White Heat, we’d have 30 minutes to make it to In Cold Blood, or we could just stay at the Egyptian and see Gambit.

Pick: Gambit
Plan B: In Cold Blood

Friday

The first full block of the day is an easy decision. 101 Dalmatians is the only film scheduled at Disney’s El Capitan Theater and I want to see the inside. We’ve seen the outside of this theater every single time we’ve been in Hollywood (at least a half a dozen times) and have never been inside. Disney animator, Floyd Norman, is scheduled to appear with the hilarious Mario Cantone. I also discovered that Mr. Norman and I have the same birthday! El Capitan is also next to Ghirardelli, so a coffee/ice cream breakfast might be the perfect choice for this event. Were 101 Dalmatians not scheduled, I’d probably go see The Caine Mutiny or the Vitaphone feature.

Pick: 101 Dalmatians
Plan B: There is no Plan B.

This block is a tough one. I would go see The Little Foxes, however it starts when 101 Dalmatians ends. Like I said before, I don’t particularly want to leave a movie early. The big con to this is that Mario Cantone is also introducing ‘Foxes’ which stars Bette Davis. Cantone does a hysterical Bette Davis impression. I have to hope that maybe The Little Foxes will be a TBA on Sunday. I would go see Them!, but it starts 15 minutes after ‘Dalmatians’ ends. I’m not sure that we’ll be able to get in on time to see the screening. Leonard Maltin is introducing Three Godfathers which I’ve never seen; but it’s in theater 4, so I’m not sure we’ll get in. The TCM Archive Project is the panel that looked the most interesting to me. I’d also never heard of The Model and the Marriage Broker before it was announced. This is a block that could really go any way and we couldn’t come up with a definitive plan. We might try to get into Them! and use the panel or maybe ‘Model’ as a back-up option if Them! is full. We may also use this block to get lunch if we’re hungry.

Pick: Them!
Plan B: The TCM Archive Project panel, The Model and the Marriage Broker, or lunch!

In this block, my choice is It Should Happen to You with Jack Lemmon and Judy Holliday. This is such a fun film and would be a great afternoon movie. The Hearst newsreel presentation seems interesting, but I don’t know if it’s interesting enough to give up Jack and Judy. I like That’s Entertainment, but it’s really just a big clip show. I don’t know that I need to see it in the theater.

Pick: It Should Happen to You
Plan B: There is no Plan B at the moment.

This Gidget poolside screening is killing me because it’s perfectly staggered between two movie blocks. I love Gidget. I have seen it dozens of times. This seems like a no-brainer. I suggested this movie as a poolside in last year’s after the festival survey. I feel like I manifested this event to happen. However, I don’t think we’ll be going to this screening. If James Darren, Moondoggie himself, were scheduled to attend, it’d be a no-brainer, Gidget is what I’d watch. However, Moondoggie is not the scheduled guest. Without Moondoggie, the excitement for this selection is a little diminished. I love Rear Window, but I’ve seen it in the theater four times. I’m not sure that I need to see it again at the cost of seeing something else. I’ve never seen Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Steven Spielberg will be in attendance. This film is also scheduled at Grauman’s, so it seems like the perfect venue to see it.

Pick: Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Plan B: Gidget

If I go see Gidget, then none of these films even matter. However, we probably won’t be seeing this film and will probably be at Grauman’s for Close Encounters of the Third Kind. With that said, my choices for this block are Jailhouse Rock and It Happened One Night. We could stay at Grauman’s and see Se7en, but I don’t know that I can watch that movie so late at night. It’s pretty gruesome. I think I’d rather end the evening with something a little more upbeat. My husband and I have seen Jailhouse Rock in 35mm in the theater before. I’ve seen It Happened One Night in the theater, but my husband hasn’t. There’s also a film scheduled in Sunday’s block which uses the plot of ‘Night’ in its narrative, so it’d be a nice companion piece. Also, if I don’t see White Heat on Thursday, seeing It Happened One Night would be my chance to see the Egyptian, if I haven’t already.

Pick: It Happened One Night
Plan B: Jailhouse Rock

There’s only one midnight film–it’s a film devoted to sharing the dangers of drinking and smoking. It sounds pretty funny and it’s short. It’s also the midnight film that fits best in our schedule. I think if we see Jailhouse Rock, which ends at 10:45pm, my husband is going to want to go back to the room, he won’t want to wait an hour for another film so late at night. It Happened One Night ends at 11:30, so it’s possible to make it to this screening. However, we need to get up early for the greatest screening of the entire festival on Saturday AM, so it’s possible that we’ll skip the midnight movie and go back to the hotel for bed. We went to last year’s midnight movie, Xanadu, and it was amazing.

Pick: The Road to Ruin (it’s the only choice, lol)
Plan B: Going back to the hotel for bed

Saturday

MY FAVORITE MOVIE OF ALL TIME, The Long Long Trailer, is scheduled during the Saturday morning block. It’s a no-brainer. This is the film we’re seeing. It’s in the tiny theater 4, so we’ll have to get in line early. I am not missing this screening. It has been my absolute dream to see my favorite movie of all time in the theater. If The Long Long Trailer wasn’t scheduled and it was some other movie, I’d be going to the nitrate screening at the Egyptian, Night Has a Thousand Eyes. However, ‘Trailer’ is scheduled, I cannot give up this choice. I am not willing to risk seeing something else with the hope of it becoming a TBA on Sunday. The. End.

Pick: The Long Long Trailer
Plan B: There is no plan B. I have to see The Long Long Trailer.

This block features my only other chance to see a nitrate, Annie Get Your Gun at the Egyptian. However, I don’t really like this movie. I find Betty Hutton really annoying. Do I go to a movie I don’t really like just to see a nitrate? My husband said he was indifferent to nitrate and expressed the idea that I shouldn’t go see a movie I don’t like if I could see something else. That is a fair statement. Mario Cantone will be introducing Mae West in She Done Him Wrong during this same block. I can only imagine his Mae West impression (if he does one), so I feel that this might be worthwhile. It’s also in the same theater as The Long Long Trailer, so it’d be easy to get in line early. We could also get in the theater 4 line again to see Queen of the Mob which sounds interesting, or go to lunch. I am also interested in The Big Heat with Dana Delany if we don’t see Mae West.

Pick: She Done Him Wrong & Queen of the Mob
Plan B: The Big Heat or Annie Get Your Gun, or forgo ‘Mob’ and get lunch.

I love North by Northwest, but I’ve seen it in the theater a few times. The Phenix City Story is a film noir that I’ve never seen. My choice in this block is The Mad Miss Manton at the Egyptian with Barbara Stanwyck and Henry Fonda. That’ll probably be where we’ll be.

Pick: The Mad Miss Manton
Plan B: North by Northwest or maybe The Phenix City Story.

This is probably the toughest block in the entire festival. The Shawshank Redemption has Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins in attendance. It is a great movie. This is what my husband was all excited to see when it was announced, but then he saw the schedule and saw the animation presentation. He loves animation and when he saw that these are animated shorts that haven’t been seen for decades and it’s presented by Seth MacFarlane, he was torn. I am also interested in International House, as it’s a precode presented by Bruce Goldstein who was awesome during last year’s presentation of Footlight Parade. I’ve never heard of this movie, but it sounds really good. I’m hoping that it’ll be a TBA on Sunday. I also love Footloose and it kills me that it’s at the pool during this time, but Kevin Bacon isn’t going to be present, so some of the luster of that selection is lost. I think my husband has decided to forgo ‘Shawshank‘, which I’m sure will be absolutely packed, in favor of the animation presentation.

Pick: Back From the Ink: Restored Animated Shorts
Plan B: The Shawshank Redemption or International House

The Saturday evening block is a little up in the air. I think we have it narrowed down to two choices–On the Waterfront and Dog Day Afternoon. Both films start about an hour after the animation shorts series ends. Both films end at midnight though, which is the same time that the midnight film, Heavenly Bodies, starts. There are two midnight films scheduled during the festival and if I were to attend one, ‘Bodies’ would be it. My husband and I have seen ‘Waterfront’ in the theater before. I don’t think either of us have seen ‘Afternoon’. This film is also being introduced by Jeff Daniels, who would be cool to see. We could also see Summer Stock, though we’ve both seen it many times. I despise the “Heavenly Music” number though. Seeing Summer Stock would be the easiest way to see the midnight film.

Pick: On the Waterfront or Dog Day Afternoon
Plan B: Summer Stock

Like I said before, the midnight screening is Heavenly Bodies. Our seeing this film is contingent on what we see in the block preceding it. If we see Summer Stock, we’ll probably hop back in line for the midnight film. If we see either On the Waterfont or Dog Day Afternoon, we’ll head back to the hotel to go to bed.

Pick: Heavenly Bodies
Plan B: Bedtime

Sunday

Sunday morning is the last day of the festival and what better way to kick of the day than with Double Indemnity at Grauman’s? I’ve seen Double Indemnity in the theater multiple times, but I love this movie and I’ve seen the outside of Phyllis Dietrichson’s home in the Hollywood Hills. We could easily spend the entire day in Grauman’s because every movie scheduled is awesome; but we’ll see. It all depends on the TBA films.

Pick: Double Indemnity
Plan B: No plan B

My choice in this block is to stay at Grauman’s and catch Sabrina. However, should the TBA be something that I’m interested in, I’ll probably go there. I’ve seen Sabrina in the theater before.

Pick: Sabrina
Plan B: Possible TBA depending what it is

This block has three TBAs so this schedule could really go any way. As it stands, my choice is Chinatown at Grauman’s, as it is the quintessential Los Angeles film. However, I could be swayed to one of the TBAs depending what it is. I love Almost Famous too, but I don’t know that I absolutely have to see it at the festival. I saw Almost Famous in the theater in high school when it came out in 2000.

Pick: Chinatown
Plan B: One or more of the TBAs depending what they are

The final block of the night is devoted to Spaceballs with Mel Brooks himself in attendance. When Mel was announced, it became my husband’s and my absolute #1 pick for the festival. Were Mel not attending, we’d be at the Egyptian seeing Sherlock Jr. We absolutely cannot give up a chance to see 97 year old Mel Brooks in person. Spaceballs is also the film I alluded to earlier when discussing my choice to see It Happened One Night. Spaceballs, while appearing to be a Star Wars parody, uses the plot of ‘Night’ to structure the main plot of its narrative. After Spaceballs, we’ll be at the party. I can only hope that the TBA isn’t something I absolutely wanted to see like White Heat, because that TBA will be SOL.

Pick: Spaceballs
Plan B: There is no plan B

The Mismatched Couples Blogathon– Grumpy Old Men (1993) & Grumpier Old Men (1995)

Grumpy Old Men and its sequel, Grumpier Old Men, are more or less The Odd Couple 25 years later. Felix and Oscar are no longer roommates in New York City. They’re now neighbors living in the small midwestern town of Wabasha, Minnesota. Felix and Oscar are still alone, but are single and ready to mingle. The two men are polar opposites in every way, but are friends despite how incompatible they seem on the surface. They are the epitome of a “mismatched couple.”

Grumpy Old Men and Grumpier Old Men are more or less one film, as the second film continues the story a few months after the events in the first film. Grumpy Old Men spans winter and spring and Grumpier Old Men covers summer and autumn. My family always watches both these films on Thanksgiving after our annual viewing of Planes, Trains and Automobiles. Grumpy Old Men features Thanksgiving and Christmas, and we’ve found we can’t watch the first film without immediately watching the other. I have always accepted the events of both films taking place over a calendar year, despite the actual films being released two years apart. Both films are chock full of mismatched couples, covering a wide span of relationship types, from friendship to romance.

Jack Lemmon and Burgess Meredith as John and John Sr.

In the Grumpy Old Men series, Jack Lemmon plays John Gustafson, a widower and former teacher living alone in his beautiful Craftsman home in Wabasha. He survives off frozen meals and canned food and doesn’t seem thrilled about it. His daughter, Melanie (Darryl Hannah) and granddaughter come to visit often. His daughter’s relationship with her husband is on the rocks, and John isn’t upset to see it fall apart. John’s father, John Sr. (Burgess Meredith) is in his 90s and spends much of his time settling feuds between John and Max. John, Sr. is the polar opposite of his son. He eats unhealthily, smokes, and uses crass language. John’s biggest struggle in this film is that he owes a large sum of back taxes to the IRS and spends much of the film trying to dodge the collector.

Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau as John and Max.

Meanwhile, John’s neighbor and exact opposite Max Goldman (Walter Matthau), also a widower, spends his time in his messy home watching television, happily eating frozen and canned food, and terrorizing John by playing pranks on him. Even Max and John’s pets are contrasting. Max’s dog is a drooling, smelly, one-eyed bulldog named Lucky who is regularly encouraged to terrorize John’s cat named Slick. Max’s son, Jacob (Kevin Pollak) is running for mayor. He is also the opposite of Melanie, John’s daughter. Aside from the obvious male/female difference, Melanie is tall, Jacob is short. He also harbored a crush on Melanie as a child and sees his golden opportunity when her marriage falls apart.

Walter Matthau and Ann-Margret as Max and Ariel.

Tensions between John and Max heat up when a new neighbor, Ariel Truax (Ann-Margret) moves to town from California. She purchases a home catty corner from John and Max. Compared to the more conservative residents of Wabasha, Ariel is a breath of fresh air and a curiosity to the other residents in town, specifically the men. She purchases all kinds of exotic homeopathic medicines and remedies from the local pharmacy–so exotic in fact that they have to be mail-ordered. Ariel paints, sculpts, cooks exotic foods, and zips around town on her bobsled. She runs outside in her leotard to make snow angels and overall has a zest for life. She always wants to take chances and risks on anything that is a new experience. John and Max both seem resigned to letting things happen to them, versus making things happen for them. The men are both enchanted by Ariel, because duh it’s Ann-Margret, so she’s also gorgeous, and try to do their best to woo her. In the end, John wins and Max is upset and disappointed.

The tension over Ariel brings to light the root cause of John and Max’s feud–after high school, John married Max’s high school sweetheart. John tries to smooth over the situation by saying that his wife ended up cheating on him and was not a prize. He further reiterates to Max that he lucked out with the woman he eventually married. However, Max is still hurt that once again, John has ended up with the woman he was interested in. Despite being opposites, Ariel’s interest in John ends up being a boon to his life as her love for life leads him to try new things and helps pull him out of his rut of loneliness that he was experiencing throughout much of the beginning of the film.

Sophia Loren as Maria

However, Max might have lost out on Ariel, but he has a happy ending yet to come in Grumpier Old Men. His polar opposite, an Italian woman named Maria Sophia Coletta Ragetti (Sophia Loren), the cousin of local resident “Spaghetti Ragetti,” opens up a “ristorante” in Wabasha. Because it’s Sophia Loren, she is of course absolutely gorgeous and turns the heads of every man (and woman) in town. She’s also of course, European, which also makes her standout in this small midwestern town. Maria arrives during the summer in Wabasha and purchases the now vacant bait shop. The bait shop’s proprietor, Chuck (Ossie Davis) had passed away during the winter, in Grumpy Old Men. Both John and Max are upset that their beloved bait shop is being converted into a restaurant. Presumably they are upset as this forces them to accept that their friend Chuck is really gone.

John and Max do their best to ruin Maria’s restaurant. They switch out her red paint with yellow while she’s repainting, they change around signage to divert drivers away from the restaurant, everything they can to ruin it. Their efforts almost succeed when Maria has no customers on her opening night; however, when Ariel hears about what they’ve done she forces them to apologize. As one can imagine, this behavior does not present Max in the most appealing light, but he eventually charms Maria into going out on a date with him. Here is this man, definitely not conventionally attractive, with this gorgeous sophisticated Italian woman. Max buys her cheap jewelry (unaware how cheap it really is), tries to cook dinner for her but ends up with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and really puts forth an effort. They keep up an antagonistic front, with Maria calling Max an “ox” and him calling her a “nag.” In the end they fall in love and their name-calling transforms into “ox” and “nag” being pet names for one another.

Despite all the differences between the various couples (friendship, family and romantic) described within this article, the core commonality they all have is love. John loves his father, John Sr. Max and John love each other despite their feud. When John has a heart attack and is hospitalized on Christmas Eve, Max is at the hospital to see him. When the nurse asks him if he’s a friend or family, Max hesitates and then says poignantly, “friend.” Ariel is at John’s beside pleading with him to stay with her. John and Max love their respective kids and each other’s kids. Melanie and Jacob eventually fall in love and elope. John and Max love their respective spouses, Ariel and Maria, despite the rocky starts both couples had. Even John Sr. finds love when he starts wooing Maria’s mother, “Mama,” (Ann Morgan Guilbert) a very conservative traditional Italian woman. At first she’s put off by John Sr.’s crass pick-up lines and innuendo, but eventually finds him charming. At the end of the Grumpy Old Men films, love triumphs over anything else.

JOHN: Moron!
MAX: Putz!