1951: The Year that The Fifties Got Dark

Now this is what I'm talking about. Much better, McCarthy-era America. This was a dark time for the United States in many ways and especially for Hollywood. So why not more dark and intense and powerful movies? Well here I finally got 4! Number 5 being the winner of course. Ironically, it's an overly cheerful (and actually pretty bad) movie but I found it to be the most depressing of the bunch. Before I launch into this year, I'd like to mention a glaring omission from my last entry. My buddy José Ferrer in his excellent Moulin Rouge performance had to appear as though he was about 3 feet tall. They say the actor helped to perfect the camera trick himself through various camera shots and of course ye olde "stand on your knees" trick. But it was absolutely convincing and I have no clue how they achieved it in 1952 because even today when people pull similar crap it looks awful. Usually when I think of something later that I should have mentioned, I let it go. But this was a big one so I thought I'd mention it. Right then, onward we go.

First up is a movie that I liked, but wasn't super enthusiastic about: Decision Before Dawn. It stars people I've never heard of and who didn't seem to do much else. That's a big plus for me (and the key to HBO's success I might add). Because there's no learning curve in terms of getting used to the actors being those characters. Plus, people looking to hit it big in Hollywood always put some more oomph in than people who have already made it. Now, I love the idea of this movie and I think it was well done through and through. But it doesn't need to be 2 hours long. It could really just be a Twilight Zone episode (albeit a decidedly non sci-fi one) in the sense that it has a great story arc which doesn't require much growth. The journey it takes you on isn't one which requires a lot of twists and turns. It essentially has one point to make. HOWEVER...in 1951 I imagine it would have taken an entire movie. Intrigued yet? It's about a group of German POWs who are recruited by the U.S. to spy on their fellow Germans, during the end times of WWII. Finally, a WWII movie that's a little different! They're all so similar usually. This was the first movie, literally the first, to show Germans in a sympathetic light. Not all of them of course. But the main characters are portrayed as conflicted, real people. This is good because it's so easy to think of the Nazis as this faceless organization that was unrepentantly evil. Some of them were, but not all of them. I won't spoil the plot of the whole movie but suffice it to say that by the end of it I imagine many audience members had at least somewhat re-thought their ideas of "the enemy" during wartime. The U.S. army characters in the film certainly do. This is a morally gray movie depicting one of the few times in United States history that is often viewed as black and white. Once again, I don't think there's anything wrong with it. I've just seen similar things before which fit into an episode of TV. But for 1951 this was huge news and certainly groundbreaking. So I applaud them for that and I think everyone involved did a great job.

An exceptionally dark and excellent film that I wasn't expecting at all is A Place in the Sun. This reverse-reminded me of a film I detested, entitled Sons and Lovers. I actually had to take about 10 minutes to figure out that it reminded me of that melodrama. Because I remembered the plot but forgot which movie it was. Anyway, in that one he's torn between two women but he's a douchey teenager. In this movie, the man is quite actually in love with both women I think. And plus, he doesn't intend to have this happen to him. He's lured away by a seductress harpy. And who better to play such a woman than Elizabeth Taylor? The Academy must have loved her as much as I do because she's popping up just about every year and I am absolutely fine with that. This is believable and the other movie wasn't. Because in the other one his angst didn't come from a believable place. In this one, he's caught between two very different types of society. Shelley Winters plays his blue collar girlfriend and she is also quite beautiful of course. She represents his roots, his childhood, his lineage. Elizabeth Taylor represents the future, excitement, intrigue. Old life vs. New life. There is no correct answer. I think he could have been happy with either woman. But let's get real: there's only one Liz Taylor. BUT Shelley Winters is pregnant and now he has some tough decisions to make. Ordinarily I'd call all of this melodramatic BS...but it works! I think the reason it works in this instance is that each woman represents something very interesting and different. Get ready for a weird-but-applicable reference: Glee. On that show, there's this over-arcing conflict for many of the characters between getting out of Lima, Ohio and staying to raise a family like the umpteenth number of ancestors before them. I would have no qualms with settling down in Lima, Ohio with Dianna Agron. But I'd rather go to New York with Lea Michele. Okay...I'd actually rather settle in Lima with Lea Michele but I hope you see my point. It's a legit conflict! Well, I don't want to spoil the plot but let's just say that the main character's decision-making in this film is a whole lot darker than I was expecting. And that's what made it so good. I cannot believe this movie was actually made in 1951 and that they allowed it to come out. That makes it even better. Entertaining side note: the main actor, Montgomery Clift, was gay in real life and Elizabeth Taylor apparently tried to "turn" him at one point by putting the moves on him a little bit. It didn't work...so I'm thinking that he was pret-tay pret-tay pret-tay gay. When we lost Liz, we lost the world's best Gaydar. She needs replacing and Scarlett Johansson: I'm looking at you.

Next up is an uplifting-ish film that I had mixed feelings about but overall liked: Quo Vadis. The title is in reference to the apocryphal story of Saint Peter fleeing his matrydom and meeting Jesus. He then asks Jesus "Quo Vadis?" or, "Where are you going?" and Jesus says he's going to go get crucified again or something. So Peter goes and gets crucified instead of fleeing, but it's after continuing his ministry of course so it's a happy story (?). This scene actually doesn't happen in the movie (or if it did I missed it), but it does feature St. Peter asking the same question of God during a prayer. So it's kind of interesting because it's still a crisis of faith in that he's wondering what God's plan is but not in that he's an initial unwilling martyr. This is during the time of Nero sacrificing Christians to the lions so I'd probably be asking the same question if I was Peter. The story mainly focuses on a Roman centurion who falls in love with a Christian woman and gradually accepts her faith as his own. Now, would he have had the same religious awakening if it didn't eventually lead to getting into Deborah Kerr's pants? Probably not. But: mysterious ways and all that. The real highlight of the film is Peter Ustinov as Nero. He's such an over-the-top villain but it works so perfectly. Because if anybody at that point in history was a notorious moustache-twirler with no real sympathetic motivation, it was Nero. He's an unrelenting narcissist psycho and all of his servants have a serious case of the "it's real good you done that Anthony"s. Much of this movie is exactly what The Robe should have been. So it's pretty weird that this came out first...since you'd think they'd have improved on the formula instead of making it more terrible. The apostle Paul also shows up and it's interesting because he's portrayed more as a conflicted philosopher with sneaky ties to the Romans than the Odin of all hippies. Which is awesome because the former is how I think of him and the latter is how most people think of him (in slightly different terms). When they got to the major religious parts of the movie, such as the crucifixion of Peter, the film was framed like the various famous paintings that depicted the same events. So it's kind of cool in that it's giving you the story behind the painting but it also takes you out of the movie a bit. The film was also too long at almost 3 hours (!) and it's even worse that about a half an hour of that was focused on the main characters being fed to lions at the end. It takes away from the drama when you draw it out like that. It went on long enough to imply that they might escape...and then they didn't. So I was like: why have I been sitting here for half an hour? But overall: quite a good movie. And I do like a dark and powerful ending, even if it should've come a little sooner.

Now...talk about some dark stuff, well here's A Streetcar Named Desire. Holy. Freaking. Crap. I thought this was going to be some overdone melodrama like Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (which was also a Tennessee Williams play). This is an intense and disturbing character drama, also wayyyyyyyyyy out of place in 1951. And the stage play is even darker! Back then, I think I'd have been a theater snob instead of a film snob. Because that's where the edgy stuff was. The story centers on Blanche DuBois (a Southern belle in decline) staying with her sister Stella. And also Stella's husband Stanley, played by the criminally-robbed-of-an-Oscar Marlon Brando. All of the other major players won this year so it was really odd that he lost. My dad says he lost to Bogart due to a classic Academy "honorary Oscar" situation, and Brando won 2 years later anyway so I guess it's all good. Brando is so good that actors doing the role on stage today are encouraged not to watch the film. Because they'll inevitably try to emulate him and obviously fall short. Vivien Leigh is equally brilliant as Blanche, and she tragically ended up being the pre-modern Heath Ledger after this role. She had other parts for years afterward but then she started to lose her mind like Blanche and began to lose track of which events happened to her and which ones happened to the character. Anyway, at first I hated her performance. I thought it was hammy and overdone. Then it hit me. She's a woman who puts on an act for everybody, and the act is wearing thin. The ham is intentional because that's the character's character that she puts on. We see the real Blanche more and more as the film progresses. As it turns out, she's a widow. Her first husband killed himself because "she talked him into it." I read online later that in the play it was very clear that he was gay and she caught him with another man, so he killed himself out of shame. 1951, people. It was apparently understood by many audience members that this was the story, even though it's never explicitly stated in the film. Eventually, her madness takes over and comes to a head when Stanley rapes her. 1951, people. And this was pretty clear. You couldn't really perceive it another way. So he has her sent away to the looney bin and she drops her "kindness of strangers" line in a way that lived up to the hype (for once). The way I saw it, she depends on the kindness of strangers because everyone who knows her wants nothing to do with her. In the movie, Stella tells Stanley to get lost (prompting the famous Stella! Stella! reference) but in the play she stays with him. Wow. I sort of like the movie ending better but the play one is poetic too, in a way. I'd like to say we've evolved beyond some of the situations in this movie but I found the scene that introduces Stanley to be all too familiar. He's drunk and fighting a bunch of dudes and being a general ass when Stella says to Blanche, "isn't he wonderful?" Happens all the time. Hate that mess. So I'm glad she kicked his ass out. I've gone and failed to mention Karl Malden again...the poor guy has the misfortune of starring in great movies next to Brando and George C. Scott (Patton). He got an Oscar for this though, so I guess he won't mind that I forgot about him. Okay, I'm done gushing. Go watch it. Seriously. I see it as a huge turning point for cinema. This should have been the Best Picture, no question.

But instead, with this year's winner we got drivel set to music with An American in Paris. At the beginning of the movie there's a great scene where Gene Kelly nimbly moves around an exceptionally small apartment with grace, style, and humor. It's all downhill from there. There are narrators conversing with other narrators, needless dance sequences, and fluffy songs that go nowhere. Now here we have another case of a love story being entirely based in looks. He is smitten instantly by Leslie Caron when he sees her at a party. She shoots him back with a fairly buck-toothed smile and he remains smitten. And I'm thinking: is this a 30 Rock cutaway or what is this? Is this Peter Griffin saying "remember that time I was smitten by that buck-toothed girl for some reason?" I think Leslie was a beautiful girl and an incredible dancer. If he was smitten with her after seeing her dance, I'd understand. But it's just from looking at her! And he was already on a date with a better-looking woman. For you ladies: would you abandon Brad Pitt because you saw Woody Allen look-alike smiling at you from across the room? I say look-alike because I'd probably abandon Brad Pitt to go say hey to the real Woody Allen, because he's awesome. On top of that, Leslie's character was going out with Gene's character's best friend already. HE BROKE THE BRO CODE FOR SOME BUCK TEETH. Add to that the fact that the whole movie is a fluffy romance with no substance, much like many of the ones I've already derided, and I'm left wondering why it's considered such a classic by some. Others call it one of the most overrated movies of all time and I must agree. We never find out what happens to his friend or the woman he dumped. I thought they'd at least stick them together...but no. So two people's lives were essentially ruined when the loves of their lives left them. And we're supposed to go: "yayyyyyyyyy!" because the one guy who dances is with the girl who dances. That's depressing to me. They probably both killed themselves after the credits. It also holds some kind of record because the entire last 20 minutes or so has no talking and is just a big dance sequence. It is the single most unnecessary thing I've ever seen put to film and I've seen a lot of HBO nudity. The sequence does have a point, he was dreaming about what his life with Leslie might be like, and then she actually appears at the end to kiss him and stuff. If they didn't end up together for real, the end sequence would have still been overdone but at least it would've carried some poignancy. A nice, intimate dance sequence with just the two of them would have been nice. Instead it's the Transformers 2 Egypt shootout of 50s dance sequences. It shifts from location to location for no reason except to give the audience some variety. And it just keeps going. This would be fine if I was at some kind of Big Band/dance recital. There is no reason for it to exist from a film perspective. And it cost like half a million dollars or something crazy. This whole movie would be a perfectly acceptable high school play. Or even an acceptable movie, given the time period. But this won 6 Academy Awards and it took Best Picture from 3 more deserving movies and 1 movie that's so much more deserving that it's actually insulting. I am offended as a film buff on the level of my feelings toward Coppola's 1972 directing snub, Hitchcock's lifetime achievement snubbing, and of course the lack of a Dark Knight nomination. Appalling. But I did my best to remember this as an overall great year.

Well, the 1950s are coming to a close. Sometime in the next decade we'll be back to a 10 nominee structure and that is very daunting. Although starting on Monday I will once again be employed part-time (it only took 15 months!) so I'll probably take more time to watch Oscar nominees. Which makes absolutely no sense. But that's how I do. I don't even have enough of a clue about next year's movies to come up with accurate snarky predictions so I'm just going to guess. So all I might know for now is that it will include an overblown depiction of the mother of humanity, a lost Indiana Jones adventure, and a colloquially very gullible person.

1952: The Year that We Went Sans the Exclamation Mark

Literally just as I figured out how to add links to my posts they went and changed the design! Now I'm all confused again. And the font is smaller so now I'll be all confused as to when my opening paragraph has reached its usual length. So this is either going to be my longest entry ever or my shortest. Right then, here we go I guess. Is it time yet? I don't know.

First up we have a movie that I've actually been a fan of for a long time: High Noon. Funny story, on Safari this seems to be working normally. Crisis averted! Right then. The thing I like about this movie, or one of the things anyway, is that it was actually pretty innovative for the time. Because it takes place in real time. The bad guys are coming for him at High Noon and the clock ticks onward for most of the film. That's basically the whole plot. But here's a great example of how a movie can be thin on plot but high on style. It was robbed for Best Picture and I'm not the only one who says so. I'll explain why near the end. The film begins with the hauntingly beautiful tune "Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darlin.'" I'm not a big fan of folksy country tunes (unless they're sung by hot blondes) but this one is truly beautiful. Not just because of the lyrics but also because of how the lyrics pertain to the story. Hear that Michael Bay? It can be done. And unlike many of the nauseatingly cheerful films of the time, especially Westerns, this one is misery the whole way through. NOBODY wants to help this guy. No one except for a kid who's too young to fight and an old man who's too frail. He might've even been blind or something, it's been a while since I've seen it. There's also the added plot element of Gary Cooper's wife in the movie, who is played by Grace Kelly. Before you get all excited for him, she's a Quaker who opposes violence of all kinds. So if he is to stay and fight the bandits, will he die or will he lose his wife? That's some actual drama there. Seriously. Because they don't hammer it into you. You're just aware of it and it adds suspense. Without spoiling anything, the finale of the film packs a lot of personal emotion and is surprisingly well done. It's not overdone and it's not done unrealistically. One guy versus four guys. No matter how good you are, you aren't going to gun down all four at once. They keep that in mind, thus not ruining the realistic feel of the story. Don't worry, it has a happy ending. But it earns it. Those are my kind of happy endings: the ones that come at the end of a full movie of misery and pain. Also: the show, Happy Endings. Also: no, nevermind.

A film I'm much less enthusiastic about, but don't hate, is Ivanhoe. This is one of my dad's favorites actually. And it was funny because when I told him I thought it was so-so he presumed I was miffed at the lack of fighting. While I do think the fighting could have been improved, I'm actually more bored during fighting scenes nowadays than anything else. Unless it's a really personal confrontation. Back when I was younger, not even too long ago, I'd zone out until the fight scenes. I'd sort of pay attention of course but the fights were the highlight. Then last year I was watching an episode of The Tudors and looked down to read an article during this big battle because I was bored. I sat, stunned...waiting for my AARP card to come in the mail. Anyway, my real issue with this movie is that they focus too heavily on the love story. Which is funny, considering how many movies I've ripped lately for not focusing on the love story enough. So why does a movie that's about far more interesting things than shagging spend so much time with the love triangle? It's got Richard the Lionheart and Robin Hood (though they don't call him that) and the Crusades are going on and family feuds and all kinds of mess. But what do they focus on? Hammy romance. Any movie that has a woman overly swooning and falling into the main character's arms while saying, "oh (title character)!" then they've lost me. And nothing against Joan Fontaine, but who would pick her over Elizabeth Taylor? No one. Literally no one. I'd pick Rita Hayworth above Liz but that's about it. And this was back in the days when women weren't exactly big in the character development department (nor the men in many cases) so it's not like you can say "oh well Joan had a better personality." They were both Penelope Pitstops in distress and one is way hotter than the other. Just saying. So the parts that weren't the love triangle I thought were quite good. The fight at the end was a little ridiculous because it was two people on horseback fighting each other (not jousting) and since this would be a difficult battle to do in real life, let alone in a fake fight where no one can actually get hurt, it just ends up being a little slow and awkward. They continue on foot eventually and then it picks up, so I suppose that was good anyway. Overall though, I found the movie to be too "Hollywood-ized" to be overly great. It still beats most of the 50s movies I've had to sit through though.

Next up is a movie that shares almost an entire title with another nominee but almost entirely no plot elements: Moulin Rouge. I say almost the same because it's sans the exclamation mark. And man is it ever...this film is freaking depressing. Loved it! It takes place in the same historical location, the actual Moulin Rouge, and it's also a story of lost loves. But it's based on a lot of true events, or at least a real person: Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. I presume many of the events actually happened too. But I also don't care because it's a great movie so whatever artistic liberties they took were good ones. I did mix up the blondes in the movie, because I could only tell which one was Zsa Zsa Gabor when she was speaking. She was the only weak point actually. Both because I mixed her up with the other girl, causing some confusion, and because her acting was a bit hammy. Although as the movie went on, I actually saw the wisdom in that. Because her character is shallow and fake. So it's only fitting that she would act so fake all the time. Everyone fades into the background as compared to José Ferrer though, as Henri. He was a real-life disfigured painter and hopeless romantic. He wasn't Phantom of the Opera disfigured, but instead incredibly short. Not a midget or a dwarf exactly...he had some kind of medical condition (due to inbreeding, gross) that prevented his legs from healing after a childhood injury. The flashbacks throughout the film of course being some of the best parts. I'm a sucker for flashbacks. As many already know, I'm a big fan of the disfigured in movies. Also the villains. Because they're usually products of a cruel society. As I might have mentioned before, in a non-shallow society the Phantom of the Opera would've been a billionaire playboy. Because he was a musical genius, an athlete, and even an inventor. In this case, Henri's disfigurement is what makes him an incredible painter. Like many though, he falls for the wrong sort of woman. The tragedy being that he really believed she wouldn't care about his legs. When she eventually leaves him, is it really due to his condition or is it because of his self-perception? It's a moot point, because he'll never be rid of either. Lots of other tragic and beautifully done stuff happens but I'll spare you, because I want you to have a pleasant day without medication. I'll just point out that at the end of the movie, as happened in real life, he became the only living man to have his work displayed in the Louvre. As he is being given this news, he drifts off into eternal sleep; not dreaming of his accomplishments but instead the Moulin Rouge and its wonderful dancers, whose world he could never truly be a part of.

What could top that in terms of drama this time around? Nothing. So it's good that I'm about to annihilate The Quiet Man. It was the only "real movie" made by Republic Pictures, a company mostly known for whatever the 50s version of lesbian robot vampires was. I actually saw this movie in like 9th grade or something crazy like that. When I say in 9th grade, I mean in class. Like actually in a 9th grade classroom with other 9th graders. Not exactly the best environment for watching an intense character study. Or for terrible movies that try and fail to be intense character studies, in this case. The overall plot sounds pretty good: an American boxer who accidentally kills a man in the ring decides to get away from it all and go back to the peaceful Irish town where he was born. I don't know how they got John Ford to direct this and I don't want to know. They say it's known for its lush photography. Well I'm sure there are lots of "On Golden Blonde" type movies that have some non-euphemistic lush photography too. People also love the comical fight at the end. Which to me was neither funny nor dramatic. Maybe the movie is entertaining if you're living in a small Irish town where all of the ridiculous cultural norms are still in play. Such as appealing to a woman's brother before being able to marry her. On that subject: who would believe that Maureen O'Hara in a small town is still single in her 30s? NO ONE. She would be the first person every guy in town would be after. So how do they explain this? "Well, she's feisty." So she's finally won over by John Wayne? Okay I don't know where John Wayne ranks for women, but is he a 9? I doubt it. And that's where I'd put her. Once again: we're talking about a romance that's entirely based on looks because they haven't given us anything else to work with. Makes no sense. But her brother still hates him and so she doesn't receive her birthright. So he has to beat up her brother and take her rightful land ownership or something. Instead of having a High Noon esque moral dilemma of "should I fight him and lose myself? Or should I leave it alone and lose her?" he has a Marx Brothers style fight with the brother. A fight that culminates with them getting drunk in the bar, while still fighting. The happy ending is John Wayne stumbling home drunk to his wife, and she's all happy because he did his duty as a husband. For realsies. That's the ending. It so much defies what a good movie is, or even how a good movie should be built, that I really felt like I was missing some kind of satire. As far as I can tell: I wasn't.

Now we move on to this year's winner: the empirically overrated The Greatest Show on Earth. Since the behind the scenes is far more interesting than the movie, I'll start with that. Apparently, the only reason this won was that it was directed by Cecil B. DeMille and he helped McCarthy. This gave him some obvious street cred. I might not believe this except that I know for a fact that a ton of what happened back then in Hollywood was McCarthy related. Including, but not limited to, casting choices, who was and wasn't allowed to be listed in the credits, and of course who was allowed to work in the town ever again. Pretty crazy stuff, and not too long ago really. We have Mel Gibson but that's about it. And he's still allowed to make stuff obviously, he's just societally blacklisted. For the record, I stand by what South Park says: "Mel Gibson is crazy but he knows how to make movies." Now then, to the movie. It's pretty bad. Actually, it's more that it's not really a movie. It's basically a scripted documentary. Most of it does little more than show you a behind the scenes of what it's like to work at a circus. Interesting? Sure. But it's not a movie. There are very few actual characters, especially for a 150 minute movie, and most of it is just circus acts. You might as well just go to the circus. It has all of the excitement with none of the forced character scenes. Also more excitement. And probably shorter. Even still, there are exactly 3 things I liked about it. Only one of which is intentional. 1st: Charlton Heston is dressed an awful lot like Indiana Jones, and since this was the first movie Spielberg ever saw...I have to wonder. 2nd: Jimmy Stewart plays a clown. Jimmy Stewart has what is possibly the most ridiculous voice in the history of acting, and this was the one time that I've seen where he toned it down for a part. I find this very amusing. 3rd: there was a line in the movie where I was about to blurt out "that's what she said!" only to have a snarky woman in the movie give a 50s era implied "that's what she said." This was hilarious because it was 1952, the era of good wholesome movies. Amazing! That one line was literally worth sitting through the rest of the movie. Almost. There's a lot more plot in there than I give it credit for, true, but there's still too much fluff. And if you're going to foreshadow someone falling to their death from the trapeze, make sure they actually do. That's how Chekov's trapeze is supposed to work. But no, DeMille seemingly figured that if he pumped enough budget and extras into a movie, it'll be good all on its own. He was 50s James Cameron. I'm not alone in my thoughts. My dad, who is a fan of old movies almost exclusively, said it wasn't very good. And it was given the equivalent of an honorary Razzie award in a book written by one of the guys who gives out the Razzies nowadays. McCarthy did a lot of things that were of questionable morality. Propelling this to Best Picture over High Noon and Moulin Rouge? Probably the worst.

Kidding! I normally like to let my sarcasm sit and fester, but you know...sore spots. I've actually already seen most of 1951 for whatever reason. Actually the reason is that I like to keep my Netflix disc queue moving and I watch Instant Watch movies less often because I can watch them anytime. If that makes sense. Anyway, next year promises to be rant-inducing like always. All I know for now is it will include one of the most iconic performances in film history, the most gorgeous starlet in film history, and the most excessive scene in film history.