(With the Oscars scheduled to be awarded on March 4th, I have decided to review at least one Oscar-nominated film a day. These films could be nominees or they could be winners. They could be from this year’s Oscars or they could be a previous year’s nominee! We’ll see how things play out. Today, I take a look at the 1931 best picture winner, Cimarron!)
“Be careful, Hank! Alabaster may be a little dude but he’ll mess you up.”
“No offense … but he’s from Oklahoma.”
— King of the Hill Episode 5.13 “Ho Yeah”
Some best picture winners are better remembered than others. Some, like The Godfather, are films that will be watched and rewatched until the end of time. Others, like Crash, seems to be destined to be continually cited as proof that the Academy often picks the wrong movie. And then you have other films that were apparently a big deal when they were first released but which, in the decades to follow, have fallen into obscurity.
1931’s Cimarron would appear to be a perfect example of the third type of best picture winner.
Based on a novel by Edna Ferber (who would later write another book, Giant, that would be adapted into an Oscar-nominated film), Cimarron is an epic about Oklahoma. The film opens in 1889 with the Oklahoma land rush. Settlers from all across America rush into Oklahoma, searching for a new beginning. Among them is Yancey Cravat (Richard Dix) and his wife, Sabra (Irene Dunne). Yancey is hoping to become a rancher but, upon arriving at the settlement of Osage, he discovers that the land he wanted has already been claimed by Dixie Lee (Estelle Taylor).
So, Yancey gives up on becoming a rancher. Instead, he becomes a newspaper publisher and an occasional outlaw killer. Soon, Yancey and Sabra are two of the most prominent citizens in Osage. Under the guidance of Yancey, Osage goes from being a wild outpost to being a respectable community. It’s not always easy, of course. Criminals like The Kid (William Collier, Jr.) still prey on the weak. As the town grows more respectable, some citizens try to force out people like Dixie Lee. Struck by a combination of personal tragedy and wanderlust, Yancey occasionally leaves Osage but he always seems to return in time to make sure that people do the right thing. When even his wife reveals that she’s prejudiced against Native Americans, Yancey writes a vehement editorial demanding that they be granted full American citizenship.
The film follows Sabra and Yancey all the way to the late 1920s. Oklahoma becomes a state. Sabra becomes a congresswoman. Oil is discovered. Throughout it all, Yancey remains a firm voice in support of always doing the right thing. In fact, he’s such a firm voice that you actually start to get tired of listening to him. Yancey may be a great man but he’s not a particularly interesting one.
By today’s standards, Cimarron is a painfully slow movie. The opening land rush is handled well but once Yancey and Sabra settle down in Osage, the film becomes a bit of a chore to sit through. Richard Dix is a dull lead and the old age makeup that’s put on Dix and Dunne towards the end of the movie is notably unconvincing. Considering some of the other films that were eligible for Best Picture that year — The Front Page, The Public Enemy, Little Caesar, Frankenstein — Cimarron seems even more out-of-place as an Oscar winner.
And yet, back in 1931, it would appear the Cimarron was a really big deal. Consider this:
Cimarron was not only well-reviewed but also a considerable box office success.
Cimarron was the first film to ever receive more than 6 Academy Award nominations. (It received seven and won 3 — Picture, Screenplay, and Art Direction.)
Cimarron was the first film to be nominated in all of the Big Five categories (Picture, Actor, Actress, Director, and Screenplay).
Cimarron was the first film to be nominated in every category for which it was eligible.
Cimarron was the first RKO film to win Best Picture. The second and last RKO film to win would be The Best Years of Our Lives, a film that has held up considerably better than Cimarron.
Cimarron was the first Western to win Best Picture. In fact, it would be 59 years before another western took the top award.
Though Cimarron may now be best known to those of us who watch TCM, it’s apparent that it was a pretty big deal when it was first released. Though it seems pretty creaky by today’s standards, they loved it in 1931.
(With the Oscars scheduled to be awarded on March 4th, I have decided to review at least one Oscar-nominated film a day. These films could be nominees or they could be winners. They could be from this year’s Oscars or they could be a previous year’s nominee! We’ll see how things play out. Today, I take a look at the 1948 best picture winner, Hamlet!)
Hamlet is a film of firsts.
It was the first British production to win the Oscar for Best Picture. In winning, it beat out three American films (Johnny Belinda, The Snake Pit, and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre) and one other British film (The Red Shoes).
It was also the first adaptation of Shakespeare to win Best Picture. Of course, it wasn’t the first Shakespeare adaptation to be nominated. That honor would go to 1935’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Adaptations of Romeo and Juliet would be nominated in 1936, 1961, and 1968. Henry V (which, like Hamlet, was directed by and starred Laurence Olivier) was a 1946 nominee. Then there was 1953’s Julius Caesar.The Dresser featured scenes from Shakespeare. Shakespeare in Love imagined the circumstances behind the writing of Romeo and Juliet. However, Hamlet was the first to win.
It also remains the only traditional Shakespearean adaptation to win. West Side Story updated Romeo and Juliet while Shakespeare in Love … well, let’s just not get into it.
It was the first Best Picture winner to be directed by the man starring in the movie. Laurence Olivier was nominated for both Best Director and Best Actor. He lost the directing Oscar to John Huston but he won for his performance as Hamlet. In winning, he became the first actor to direct himself to an Oscar.
Finally, Hamlet was the first of 24 films to feature both Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee! In fact, this was Lee’s film debut. Now, before anyone gets too excited, I should point out that Cushing and Lee don’t actually interact. In fact, Lee doesn’t even speak in the film. He appears in the background as a Spear Carrier and it’s pretty much impossible to spot him. He has no dialogue and wasn’t even listed in the final credits. From what I’ve read, I don’t think Lee and Cushing even knew each other at the time and, when they later met, they were surprised to learn that they had both appeared in the film. For his part, Cushing plays Osiric, the courtier who everyone remembers because he had such a cool name.
It’s always fun to play “what if.” Rosencrantz and Guildenstern do not appear in Olivier’s adaptation of the play. To modern audiences, that might seem strange but, really, that’s just because we’re all familiar with the two characters from Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. When Olivier filmed Hamlet, he excised portions of the play in the interest of time. (Hamlet uncut runs over four hours. Olivier’s version clocks in at nearly three.) Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, Fortinbras, and the second gravedigger are all dropped from Olivier’s version and, to be honest, none of them are particularly missed.
And yet … as I watched Hamlet, I found myself wondering what would have happened if Olivier had kept Rosencrantz and Guildenstern around and had cast Cushing and Lee in those roles. It probably wouldn’t have happened, of course. Cushing maybe but Lee was a total unknown at the time. Still, how amazing would that have been?
As for the actual film, Olivier’s Hamlet turned out to be far more cinematic than I was anticipating. Olivier’s camera snakes through the darkened hallways of Elsinore Castle while Olivier’s Hamlet veers between self-righteous fury and apparent madness as he seeks revenge on his Uncle Claudius (Basil Sydney). As Hamlet grows more obsessed with death and vengeance, the castle seems to grow darker and the hallways even more maze-like, as if the castle’s changing shape to conform with the turmoil in Hamlet’s mind. Among the cast, Jean Simmons is poignantly fragile as Ophelia while Eileen Herlie is the perfect Gertrude, despite being 12 years younger than the actor playing her son. Olivier gives a wonderfully physical performance as Hamlet, killing Polonious with a demented gleam in his eye and literally leaping towards his uncle at the end of the film.
If you’re one of those people who thinks that Shakespeare is boring … well, Olivier’s Hamlet probably won’t change your mind. One thing I’ve noticed about the “Shakespeare is boring” crowd is that nothing can change their minds. But, for the rest of us, Olivier’s Hamlet is an exciting adaptation of Shakespeare’s more difficult play.
You won’t miss Rosencrantz and Guildenstern at all. And seriously, Fortinbras who?
Could Black Panther be the first comic book movie to receive an Oscar nomination?
Last year, around this time, we were asking the exact same question about Logan. Logan didn’t pick up a Best Picture nomination but it was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay, which would seem to suggest that the Academy is slowly coming around to accepting that so-called “Super Hero Films” can also be legitimate Oscar contenders.
As for Black Panther, it is currently the most critically acclaimed and financially successful film of 2018. For those who say that there’s no way the Academy will ever nominate a comic book film for best picture, it should be remembered that there was a time when people said that Academy would never nominate a horror comedy for Best Picture. Much like Get Out, Black Panther could prove the naysayers wrong.
Anyway, here are my Oscar predictions for February. As always, it ‘s really way too early to be making these predictions. Usually, Sundance provides at least a little bit of a guide but this year, Sundance was pretty low-key. The most obvious Sundance Oscar contender — Burden — doesn’t even have a release date yet.
Also, the uncertain status of The Weinstein Company has thrown a lot of films into limbo. Some of the unreleased TWC films might find homes with other studios. Others will probably be left in limbo. Then again, even if those films do get a release, I doubt the Academy is going to nominate any films stained with the noxious fingerprints of the Weinsteins.
Even more than usual, the guesses below are random. At this time next year, we’ll probably look at this list and laugh. Some of you might laugh today.
(With the Oscars scheduled to be awarded on March 4th, I have decided to review at least one Oscar-nominated film a day. These films could be nominees or they could be winners. They could be from this year’s Oscars or they could be a previous year’s nominee! We’ll see how things play out. Today, I take a look at the 1994 best picture nominee, Four Weddings and a Funeral!)
(SPOILERS)
Four Weddings and a Funeral is truly an oddity. It’s a romantic comedy that works wonderfully well, despite the fact that there’s next to no chemistry between the two leads.
Hugh Grant plays Charles, a neurotic bachelor who lives in London and who, despite having been in several relationships, has yet to marry. As he’s explains it, he’s spent his life expecting love to hit him like a thunderbolt and it hasn’t happened yet. Andie MacDowell plays Carrie, an American who has one of those vaguely defined magazine jobs that are so popular in romantic comedies. Carrie and Charles meet over the course of … well, four weddings and a funeral. From the minute they first meet, they are attracted to one another but the path of true love is never an easy one. After spending the night with him, Carrie leaves for America. When Charles meet her for a second time, she’s now engaged to Sir Hamish Banks (Corin Redgrave), a rather boring politician.
Hugh Grant is perfectly cast as Charles. It can be easy to make fun of an actor like Grant, what with all the stammering and the carefully calculated charm. But it works perfectly in Four Weddings and a Funeral, in which Grant manages to believable as both a hopeless romantic and a committed cynic. Within moments of his first scene (in which Charles wakes up and realizes he’s late for a friend’s wedding), you forget that you’re watching Hugh Grant. He is Charles.
On the other hand, Andie MacDowell never convinces us that she’s Carrie. That’s not totally MacDowell’s fault, of course. Carrie is an underwritten character, one who serves more as a plot device than anything else. We’re never quite sure how she feels about Charles. For that matter, we never understand why she’s marrying Hamish. When she shows up at the film’s funeral, we’re left wondering if she’s really mourning or if she’s just showing up to be polite. Carrie never comes to life and MacDowell never feels comfortable in the role. When she gives a warmly received speech at her own wedding reception, the scene feels false because you never feel as if the words are coming from Carrie.
The film ends with Charles and Carrie finally getting together. Charles both swears his love for her and asks if she’ll agree to never marry him. We later see them in a snapshot, with a child. But, despite all of that, you never believe that Charles and Carrie are going to stay together. There’s just not enough chemistry between Grant and MacDowell to convince you that Carrie isn’t going to get bored and run off with whoever it is she meets at the next wedding she attends.
So, why does this film work so well? It works because it’s a love story. However, it’s not about the love between Charles and Carrie. Not really. Instead, it’s about the love between Charles and his friends. Because of the way the film is structured, we only get to see how these people behave at weddings and a funeral. We never really get to see what these people do for a living or what they’re like during the week. In fact, we don’t even find out how they all became friends in the first place.
But it doesn’t matter. The friendships feels real. The friendships feels authentic. You might not know how they all became friends but that doesn’t matter. By the end of the movie, you feel as if you could go to London and possibly run into any of these people going about their daily lives. They become real in a way that Carrie never does.
There’s Scarlett (Charlotte Coleman), who is Charles’s roommate and who gets flirty when she has too much to drink.
And then there’s David (David Bower), who is Charles’s younger brother. Both the actor and the character are deaf. One of the sweetest scenes in the film is when a woman who has been crushing on David attempts to show off her sign language skills. Everything she signs is wrong but David’s sweet smile tells us all we need to know about how he feels towards her.
Fiona (Kristin Scott Thomas) and Tom (James Fleet) are siblings. Fiona, who dresses in black, presents a hard exterior but, in one of the film’s more poignant scenes, she admits that the reason she’s never gotten married is because she’s been in love with Charles for ten years. Tom is a goofy optimist, the type who never doubts that he’s going to find happiness no matter what.
Gareth (Simon Callow) and Matthew (John Hannah) are as close to being married as anyone within Charles’s clique of friends. (Four Weddings and a Funeral was released twenty years before the legalization of same-sex marriage in the UK. If someone views the film 50 years from now, they’ll probably wonder why, exactly, Matthew is always described, by those outside of his central group of friends, as merely being a “close friend” of Garth’s.) Sadly, the funeral of the title is for the fun-loving Gareth.
It’s during the funeral, when Matthew reads a poem from Auden, that it becomes apparent that the heart of this film belongs not to Charles and Carrie but to their friends. Ultimately, Four Weddings and a Funeral is a celebration of the bonds of friendship. At the end of the movie, you’re happy, not because Charles and Carrie are finally together but because this unique and wonderful group of friends have all found each other. Everyone should be so lucky.
Four Weddings and a Funeral was nominated for best picture but lost to Forrest Gump.
(With the Oscars scheduled to be awarded on March 4th, I have decided to review at least one Oscar-nominated film a day. These films could be nominees or they could be winners. They could be from this year’s Oscars or they could be a previous year’s nominee! We’ll see how things play out. Today, I take a look at the 1949 best picture nominee, The Heiress!)
“I have been taught by the masters.”
— Catherine Sloper (Olivia De Havilland) in The Heiress (1949)
I’m not going to spoil too much of the ending of The Heiress, beyond saying that those are the words with which Catherine ends the film. Taken out of context, they may not seem like much. However, after you’ve spent two hours with Catherine, her father, and the man who claims that he’s in love with her, these are perhaps seven of the most chilling words ever uttered. When you hear them, you don’t know if you should cheer or be very, very afraid. Myself, I had both reactions but, then again, I often do.
The Heiress, which is based on a play that’s based on a novel by Henry James, takes place in 19th century New York City. Austin Sloper (Sir Ralph Richardson) is a widely admired and very successful physician. He’s also a very cold man, one who has never recovered from the death of his wife. He lives with his daughter, Catherine (Olivia de Havilland). Catherine is shy and is continually told that she’s plain and boring. She’s devoted to her father, though Austin is cruelly manipulative of her. Catherine, who has never been in a relationship, has pretty much accepted that she’s destined to be alone.
Or, at least, she has until she meets Morris Townsend (Montgomery Clift).
From the first minute that Catherine meets him, Morris seems to be perfect. He’s handsome. He’s intelligent. He’s witty. He’s charming. He’s Montgomery Clift, for God’s sake! For Catherine, it’s love at first sight and Morris says that it’s the same for him. Suddenly, Catherine’s life no longer revolves around her father. Now, she dreams of marrying Morris.
Austin isn’t happy about this. Despite showing his daughter nothing but disdain for most of her life, Austin suddenly become protective of her. He says that Morris only wants to marry her because she stands to come into a great deal of money. To prove his point, he announces that, if Catherine and Morris get married, he will disinherit Catherine and neither she nor her husband will ever get their hands on his money.
How will Morris respond to Austin’s threat? Well, you’ll have to watch the movie to find out and you really should! The Heiress is a great movie, featuring noirish direction from William Wyler and brilliant performances from by de Havilland, Richardson, and Clift. Dr. Sloper may be a monster but Richardson plays him with so much authority that it’s hard to dismiss his worries about Morris, no matter how much you may want to. Montgomery Clift, meanwhile, keeps you guessing about Morris’s intentions. And, finally, the great Olivia de Havilland deservedly won an Oscar for her performance as Catherine Sloper. Over the course of the film, Catherine goes from being a withdrawn wallflower to being a … well, I can’t tell you anymore. I don’t want to spoil the film any more than I already have. The ending will leave you shaken in the best possible way.
The Heiress was nominated for best picture but lost to All The King’s Men.
(With the Oscars scheduled to be awarded on March 4th, I have decided to review at least one Oscar-nominated film a day. These films could be nominees or they could be winners. They could be from this year’s Oscars or they could be a previous year’s nominee! We’ll see how things play out. Today, I take a look at the 1981 best picture nominee, Atlantic City!)
Welcome to Atlantic City, New Jersey!
It’s a city with a storied past and an uncertain future. It’s a place where old men on street corners can tell you stories about meeting Bugsy Siegel in the lobby of an old hotel that’s just been demolished. The decrepit remains of old Atlantic City co-exists next to half-completed luxury casinos and hotels. It’s a place where business deals are celebrated in the Frank Sinatra Suite and where a woman trying to make a very important phone call might find herself being serenaded by Robert Goulet.
It’s also the home of Lou (Burt Lancaster). From the minute we first see Lou, it’s obvious that he’s a man past his time. He walks up and down the worst streets of Atlantic City, dressed in a gray suit and trench coat. With his white mustache and his coolly professional manner, he looks like he belongs in an old movie and not hanging out in his shabby apartment or drinking in the local bar. When Lou was younger, he was acquainted with all of the big names: Siegel, Luciano, Costello, Lansky. Of course, he wasn’t ever much of a mobster. He used to run numbers. If pressed, he’ll tell some interesting stories but it’s not difficult to tell that he’s lying. (At one point, it’s mentioned that Lou’s Mafia nickname was Numbnut.) Now, Lou is an old man. Much like a condemned Atlantic City hotel, he’ll soon be due for demolition. He spends most of his time taking care of Grace (Kate Reid), the widow of a mobster. When he’s not responding to Grace’s demands, he watches his neighbor, Sally (Susan Sarandon).
Sally is originally from Canada. She came to America looking for a better life and ended up working as a waitress. Under the strict tutelage of Joseph (Michel Piccoli), Sally is learning how to be a blackjack dealer. Someday, she hopes that she’ll be able to move out of her apartment and into a communal house on the beach. Until then, she works hard every day and then returns to her apartment, little realizing that she’s being watched by Lou.
And then David shows up.
David (played by Canadian character actor Robert Joy) is Sally’s estranged husband. Sally knows that David can’t be trusted but she reluctantly allows him and his pregnant girlfriend (Hollis McLaren) to stay with her for a few days. David has stolen a large amount of cocaine from the Philadelphia mob. David wants to sell it but he quickly discovers that no one in Atlantic City is willing to deal with someone who they don’t know. Fortunately, for David, he runs into Lou. Lou, looking for a chance to be a real gangster and also wanting a chance to get closer to Sally, agrees to help David sell the cocaine. Unfortunately, for David, two hit men from Philadelphia have traced him to Atlantic City and are determined to not only get their cocaine back but to also kill David as well.
It may sound like the set up for a standard crime thriller but Atlantic City is actually a thoughtful meditation on getting older, falling in love, and dealing with the fact that things change. Lou is a relic of the past, looking for one last chance to make his mark before, like the older buildings on the boardwalk, he’s demolished and forgotten about. Sally and David are the dreamers, hoping to build a future in America.
Louis Malle directs at a leisurely pace. Those looking for a hyperkinetic gangster film will be disappointed. There’s only two acts of violence in Atlantic City and Malle presents both of them in a low-key, matter-of-fact fashion. Instead, Malle focuses on exploring the lives and dreams of the film’s characters and Burt Lancaster rewards that attention with an absolutely outstanding performance as a dignified man who knows his best days are behind him but who still refuses to give in to defeat. It’s one of Lancaster’s best performances and he was rewarded with an Oscar nomination for best actor.
Atlantic City was nominated for best picture but lost to Chariots of Fire.
(With the Oscars scheduled to be awarded on March 4th, I have decided to review at least one Oscar-nominated film a day. These films could be nominees or they could be winners. They could be from this year’s Oscars or they could be a previous year’s nominee! We’ll see how things play out. Today, I take a look at the 1981 best picture nominee, On Golden Pond!)
On Golden Pond takes place in a cottage that’s located on a lake called Golden Pond. Hence, the title. As far as title’s go, it’s not a bad one. It’s a film about an elderly couple who spends every summer in that cottage. They’re in their golden years so I guess it makes sense that they would feel an affinity for Golden Pond.
That said, I think that an even better title for the film would be Everything Annoys Norman.
Norman Thayer, Jr. (Henry Fonda) is a cantankerous old man. He’s 79 and not particularly looking forward to celebrating his 80th birthday. He’s a retired college professor. His wife claims that the last time Norma was really happy was when Franklin Roosevelt was elected president. Norman likes to fish and still brags about the time he caught a legendary trout named Walter.
What Norman doesn’t like is having to deal with the world. When he stops to get gas, he loudly complains that, “in his day,” gas only cost eighty-five cents. When he’s told that there’s another “middle-aged” couple on the lake, he says that, unless he’s going to live to be 150, he’s not middle-aged. He gets frustrated because his memory isn’t as good as it used to be. When he goes out for a walk in the woods, he forgets where the path is and he has to return to the house. Sometimes, he calls people by the wrong name. At one point, he struggles to use a landline phone. (I can only imagine how annoyed Norman would be if he was alive today.) Norman doesn’t like to deal with anyone other than his wife.
Ethel (Katharine Hepburn) is Norman’s wife. She loves him. When she hears Norman referred to as being “a son of a bitch,” she replies, “That son of a bitch is my husband.” Ethel is used to Norman and his ways. As she puts it, she understands that he’s like a “lion” who has to roar just to remind himself that he still can. Ethel is … well, basically, she’s Katharine Hepburn.
Ethel has invited their daughter, Chelsea (Jane Fonda), to celebrate Norman’s birthday with them. Norman and Chelsea have a strained relationship. It’s implied that Norman was an emotionally distant and overly critical father and that Chelsea has never been able to forgive him. When she shows up with her new boyfriend, Bill Ray (Dabney Coleman) and his 13 year-old son, Billy Ray (Doug McKeon), Norman barely bothers to acknowledge her. With Bill and Chelsea planning on vacation in Europe, they ask if Billy can stay at the cottage with Norman and Ethel. Ethel agrees. Norman acquiesces.
On Golden Pond is a film that I wanted to like more than I actually did. After all, the film features two classic actors, Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn, appearing in their only film together. (Both Henry Fonda and Hepburn won Oscars for their work here.) Henry Fonda gives a good performance as a strong-willed man who is struggling to deal with his own mortality. As for Hepburn, it’s not a great performance, largely because Ethel is a thinly written role, but she’s Katharine Hepburn so it doesn’t matter. But almost everything about the film — from the tasteful music to the pretty but not overwhelming cinematography — feels more like something you’d expect to find in a television production instead of a feature film. On Golden Pond was based on a play and, with almost all of the action set in that cottage, it really doesn’t escape its theatrical origins. That said, it’s a sweet movie. The love between Norman and Ethel feels real. If nothing else, the film gave the great Henry Fonda his only Oscar.
On Golden Pond was nominated for Best Picture but lost to Chariots of Fire.
(With the Oscars scheduled to be awarded on March 4th, I have decided to review at least one Oscar-nominated film a day. These films could be nominees or they could be winners. They could be from this year’s Oscars or they could be a previous year’s nominee! We’ll see how things play out. Today, I take a look at the 1988 best picture nominee, Working Girl!)
Welcome to the 80s!
Yes, Working Girl is definitely a film of its time. It’s a film that’s obsessed with big things: big dreams, big offices, big money, and big hair. It’s a movie where the heroes talk about hostile takeovers and where everyone’s dream is to eventually to be an executive on Wall Street. You know all of those people who claim that The Big Short is the greatest movie ever made? I can guarantee that the majority of them would totally hate every character in Working Girl.Working Girl is such a film of the past that it even features Alec Baldwin doing something other than bellowing at people. In fact, Baldwin’s actually sexy in Working Girl. It was strange to see him in this film and realize that he was the same actor who currently spends all of his time picking fights on twitter and defending James Toback.
Of course, Alec Baldwin has a relatively small role in Working Girl. He plays Mick Dugan, the type of blue-collar guy who gives his girlfriend lingerie for her birthday (“I just wish you would get me something that I could wear outside,” she says as she tries it on) and who then proceeds to cheat on her while she’s off at work. From the minute we first meet Tess McGill (Melanie Griffith), we know that she deserves better than Mick.
Tess is a professional administrative assistant. She’s just turned 30 but she’s not ready to give up her dreams and settle for a life of fighting off coke-snorting executives and coming home to some guy like Mick. (Speaking of early performances from infamous actors, one of the coke-snorting executives is played by Kevin Spacey.) Tess has got a bachelor’s degree in Business. As she puts it, she has a “mind for business and a bod for sin.”
She’s also got a new boss, an up-and-coming executive named Katharine Parker (Sigourney Weaver). It turns out that Katherine is 29 years old. (“I’ve never worked for someone younger than me before,” Tess says as Katherine gives her a condescending smile.) Katharine encourages Tess to think of her as being a mentor. If Tess has any ideas for investments, she should feel free to bring them to Katharine. Of course, when Tess does so, Katharine claims that her bosses shot the idea down. It’s only after Katharine breaks her leg in a skiing accident and is laid up in Europe that Tess discovers that Katharine has actually been stealing her ideas and not giving her any credit for them.
What is Tess to do? Well, she does what any of us would do. She passes herself off as an executive and presents her idea to Jack Trainer (Harrison Ford) herself. Jack is impressed with the idea but he’s even more impressed with Tess. Of course, complicating things is that Jack was once in a relationship with Katharine and Katharine still thinks that she’s going to eventually marry Jack. And, of course, there’s the fact that Tess is lying about actually being an executive…
Working Girl is a frequently amusing film, elevated by performances of Melanie Griffith and, in the role of Tess’s best friend, Joan Cusack. Add to that, Harrison Ford is remarkable non-grouchy as Jack Trainer and Sigourney Weaver appears to be having the time of her life playing a villain. Even as I laughed at some of the lines, here was a part of me that wished that the film had a bit more bite. At times, Working Girl tries too hard to have it both ways, both satirizing and celebrating Wall Street culture. In the end, the film works best as a piece of wish-fulfillment. It’s a film that says that not only can you win success and Harrison Ford but you can get your bitchy boss fired too.
Despite being a rather slight (if likable) film, Working Girl was nominated for Best Picture of 1988. However, it lost to Rain Man.
(With the Oscars scheduled to be awarded on March 4th, I have decided to review at least one Oscar-nominated film a day. These films could be nominees or they could be winners. They could be from this year’s Oscars or they could be a previous year’s nominee! We’ll see how things play out. Today, I take a look at the 1938 best picture winner, You Can’t Take It With You!)
“You can’t take it with you.”
If there’s any one belief that defines the worldview of Martin Vanderhof (Lionel Barrymore), it’s this. It doesn’t matter how much money you make in your life. It doesn’t matter how successful you are at business or anything else. The fact of the matter is that, when your time is up, you won’t be able to take any of that stuff with you. Instead, Grandpa Vanderhof (as he’s called by his large family) believes that the most important thing to do during your lifetime is to make friends and pursue what you’re truly interested in.
Vanderhof has another belief, one that particularly appealed to be me. He has never paid income tax. He doesn’t see the point of giving money to the government when he doesn’t feel that they’ll make good use of it. When an outraged IRS agent (Charles Lane) stops by Vanderhof’s sprawling house and demands that Vanderhof pay his taxes, Vanderhof refuses. When the IRS man argues that the income tax is necessary to pay for the Presidency, the Congress, and the Supreme Court, Vanderhof offers to give him five dollars. “Hell yeah!” I shouted at the TV. With an attitude like that, Vanderhof should have moved down here to Texas. We would have elected him governor.
Grandpa Vanderhof is the head of a large and cheerfully eccentric family, all of whom live together under the same roof. Penny (Spring Byington) writes novels because, years ago, a typewriter was accidentally delivered to the house. Her husband, Paul (Samuel S. Hinds), has a basement full of fireworks. Essie (Ann Miller) loves to dance and spends almost the entire movie twirling from room to room. Her husband, Ed (Dub Taylor), is a xylophone player.
Of course, it’s not just family living in the Vanderhof House. There’s also Potap Kolenkhov (Mischa Auer), a Russian who is “teaching” Essie how to dance. There’s Rheba the maid (Lillian Yarbo) and Donald (Eddie Anderson) the handyman. Actually, the house appears to be open to just about anyone who wants to stay.
And then there’s Penny’s daughter, Alice (Jean Arthur). Alice is the most “normal” member of the family. She has just become engaged to Tony Kirby (James Stewart) and she is still trying to figure out how to introduce Tony’s stuffy parents (Edward Arnold and Mary Forbes) to her eccentric family. What she and Tony don’t know is that Mr. Kirby is currently trying to buy up all the houses that are near a competitor’s factory. Only one homeowner has refused to sell. The name of that homeowner? Martin “Grandpa” Vanderhof.
It all leads, of course, to one chaotic dinner party, one lively night in jail, and a huge fireworks display. It also leads to true love, which is nice. Jimmy Stewart and Jean Arthur are even more adorable here than they were in Mr. Smith Goes To Washington.
Based on a Pulitzer-winning play by George S. Kaufman, You Can’t Take It With You was the second comedy to win the Oscar for Best Picture. The first comedy to win was 1934’s It Happened One Night. It’s probably not coincidence that both of these films were directed by Frank Capra.
Seen today, You Can’t Take It With You seems a bit slight for an Oscar winner. Grandpa Vanerhof is a lovable eccentric. Tony’s father is a stuffy businessman. Hmmm … I wonder whose philosophy is going to be victorious at the end of the movie? Still, predictability aside, it’s a delightfully enjoyable film. While it never quite escape its stage origins, it features wonderful performances from all the usual members of the Capra stock company. James Stewart and Jean Arthur are a charming couple while Lionel Barrymore gives a performance that is so warmly likable that it’s hard to imagine that, just 9 years later, he would be so perfectly cast as the heartless Mr. Potter in It’s A Wonderful Life. Of course, my favorite member of the member was Essie, mostly because I also like to dance from room to room. While it’s hard to justify awarding it Best Picture over The Adventures of Robin Hood and Grand Illusion, You Can’t Take It With You is still a wonderfully fun movie.
It’ll make you smile and laugh. Who can’t appreciate that?
Through the Shattered Lens 