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TM2YC's 1001 Movies (Chronological up to page 25/post 481)

TM2YC

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Trouble in Paradise (1932)
Director: Ernst Lubitsch
Country: United States
Length: 83 minutes
Type: Drama, Comedy, Crime

'Trouble in Paradise' is a delightful film, full of sparkling, sexy back-and-forth dialogue (I'm surprised they got away with some of it). Two master thieves fall in love when trying to rob each other and decide to go into "business" together. If you like Hitchcock's 'To Catch a Thief' (or any peak Hitchcock espionage film really) then this will feel familiar. Charlie Ruggles and Edward Everett Horton make a great comedy double-act as two suitors of the same lady, needling each other constantly. This is a firm step towards classic Hollywood film-making and out of the shaky early sound film period.


The original 'Scarface' next.
 

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Scarface (1932)
Director: Howard Hawks
Country: United States
Length: 93 minutes
Type: Drama, Crime

I'm not the biggest fan of the famous 1983 Oliver Stone remake of 'Scarface'. It's fine but Tony (Scarface) being such a horrible b*stard (with not a single redeeming feature) from start to finish, makes it difficult to empathise with him and to love the film. The same problem proves true for the original, which is very close in plot and characterization to the remake. Paul Muni is excellent in the title role but I think he plays a good guy better, in 'I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang'. A couple of awkward scenes seem tacked on, in which politicians (and a man who is an example of an upstanding Italian-American) discuss how wrong the Gangsters are... before we cut right back to the Gangsters having all kinds of illegal fun!


A Sternberg picture next.
 

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Shanghai Express (1932)
Director: Josef von Sternberg
Country: United States
Length: 79 minutes
Type: Drama, Romance

'Shanghai Express' is a movie as much about Marlene Dietrich gliding around looking seductive and mysterious, wreathed in cigarette smoke, as it is about political intrigue. A group of disparate strangers are bound together on a train journey through (then) present-day civil war torn China. It's very much an Agatha Christie style mystery, where nobody is who they first seem to be. The shady characters, turn out to be honourable and the respectable characters, turn out to be rogues. The moody cinematography is gorgeous...

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Tod Browning's infamous 'Freaks' is next.
 

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Freaks (1932)
Director: Tod Browning
Country: United States
Length: 64 minutes
Type: Drama, Horror

Directed by 'Dracula's Tod Browning, 'Freaks' depicts the backstage of a Carnival "freak" show.  The central theme is that sometimes humans are "ugly" on the outside and beautiful on the inside but sometimes it's the other way around. The cast is made up of real Carnival people with genuine deformities, so the acting isn't always perfect but it feels genuine. Browning ran away to join such a show when he was 16, so this must have been a very personal project.

Test screenings were a disaster with a few audience members vomiting (and one woman even threatening to sue MGM because she claimed the film caused her to miscarry) resulting in the studio slashing a third of the run-time, with that footage now forever lost. Watching it today when deformity and disability are no longer feared and despised, the film is not disgusting, or shocking but does still have a memorable David Lynch-style weirdness to it.


The book's first Spencer Tracy film next.
 

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Me and My Gal (1932)
Director: Raoul Walsh
Country: United States
Length: 79 minutes
Type: Comedy, Romance

Set among the New York/Irish working class, a year before the end of Prohibition, 'Me and My Gal' has no shortage of boozy fun. Will Stanton has a very memorable role as an absolutely paralytic fisherman, in some of the all-time-great drunk acting. The story is in no particular hurry to get anywhere and mostly we are just there to enjoy the badinage between a non-nonsense waitress (Joan Bennett) and the brash Irish waterfront Cop (Spencer Tracy) who has his eye on her. There is plenty of cleverly written dialogue between the pair, in the street lingo of the time:

Danny - "I never knew how much I liked you until the other night when you gave me the air"
Helen - "I guess it's the same with girls. They never fall hard, 'til they're dropped".

There isn't anything particularly remarkable about the film, it's just nicely enjoyable fun.


The first entry by Jean Vigo next.
 

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84 years ago...

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Zero for Conduct (1933)
Director: Jean Vigo
Country: France
Length: 41 minutes
Type: Drama, Political

'Zero for Conduct' (Zéro de Conduite) is a short film set in a French boarding school, as the kids rebel against the teachers. The French Revolution in microcosm is mixed with scenes of anarchism. It has some interesting visuals but didn't really do anything for me emotionally, or politically. However, the super slow-motion pillow-fight, with feathers floating down like snow-flakes, is an impressive sequence (NSFW - Contains some nudity):


The first of three Busby Berkely musicals next.
 

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84 years ago...

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42nd Street (1933)
Director: Lloyd Bacon & Busby Berkely
Country: United States
Length: 89 minutes
Type: Musical, Comedy, Drama

'42nd Street' is the first of a trio of Busby Berkely choreographed Hollywood Musicals in the book. I confess I don't think I've ever seen one of his movies but it almost feels like I have, this being a favourite song of mine...


Most of the film is a look behind-the-scenes of the feverish weeks leading up to the production of a new Musical. It's full of smart, modern, witty dialogue and refreshingly modern female characters. The short-tempered banter is often pretty cheeky and risque. A female dancer fidgeting on the lap of a male Dancer remarks indignantly that she's sitting "On a flag-pole, deary. On a flag-pole!". Warner Baxter as tempestuous Producer Julian Marsh is a force of nature. His role would make this an ideal double-bill with 1948's 'The Red Shoes' and that film's obsessive Producer. For the final 15-minutes, the character stories are mostly dropped and the film is given over entirely to the actual Musical within the Musical. Despite the visually inventive dance numbers and clever set design, it lost me a bit here, especially with the dated singing style.


Busby Berkely's 'Footlight Parade' is next.
 

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Footlight Parade (1933)
Director: Lloyd Bacon & Busby Berkely
Country: United States
Length: 102 minutes
Type: Musical, Comedy, Drama

At first I found the super-rapid pace of dialogue in 'Footlight Parade' to be hard to follow (like they were being paid based on how many words they could squeeze into the picture) but once I'd caught up with who the characters all were, it was frenetic fun.  James Cagney plays a theatrical Producer of short live musical "Prologues", or "Units" used to preface movies (A practice I'd never heard of). Joan Blondell is his tough, hard-working, no-nonsense Secretary who keeps this particular Genius on the level. She is also in love with him (a fact clear to everyone except him) and stole the film from Cagney  for me.

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This is basically the exact same plot from '42nd Street' done again but done even better. The three Busby Berkely musical extravaganzas at the end are fantastically lavish and inventive but this time they find a way to more smoothly integrate the film's plot into the dance numbers. One of the characters is a prudish (but hypocritical) censor, who everyone hates and makes fun of. This combined with the film's later stages including scenes celebrating unmarried sex, prostitution, drunkenness, near nudity and drug-abuse must be seen as a big f**k you to the proponents of the "Hays Code" that would soon come into force 9-months later.


Busby Berkely's 'Gold Diggers of 1933' is next.
 

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Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933)
Director: Mervyn LeRoy & Busby Berkely
Country: United States
Length: 96 minutes
Type: Musical, Comedy, Drama

'Gold Diggers of 1933' is far and away the best of these three Busby Berkely films. The music, dancing and singing is a natural part of the story but there is still that big finale. This time we focus on several Showgirl flat-mates down in the Depression-Era gutter, looking at the stars. One of them falls in love with a songwriter, who is also heir to a fortune. The songwriter's two snobbish trustees try to breakup the match and we have enormous fun as the feisty Showgirls run rings round the pair of them. I just loved these characters and look forward to watching this film many more times in the future!

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With a cheeky marketing campaign like this, no wonder that censorship was right around the corner!


An early Cary Grant film next.
 

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She Done Him Wrong (1933)
Director: Lowell Sherman
Country: United States
Length: 66 minutes
Type: Drama, Comedy

'She Done Him Wrong' features one of Cary Grant's earliest performances (with his distinct invented mid-Atlantic accent already in place) but the main focus is the top-billed Mae West. She swaggers round the disreputable bar in which the film is set, dropping double-entendres, flirting lasciviously with every man who crosses her path and using them for sex, or financial gain. Apparently Censors tried to prevent the film from being made and it's not hard to see why with most of Mae West's dialogue. In my opinion, it all wraps up a little too neatly and morally to square with the boldly "immoral" body of the movie.


One of my favourite movies next.
 

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Had a double bill of Broken Blossoms and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari last night.

Whilst the abundant Yellowface in Broken Blossoms wasn't nearly as gross and offensive as Griffith's previous ventures, the story provides little to distract from this.

Caligari, however, had me hooked from the off. Every single frame was stunning, as German Expressionism tends to be. It had stellar performances from its leads, an incredible early movie monster in Cesare, whose legacy is seen today in Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger. Not to mention the ending, which I had to watch twice to fully appreciate.

I can't wait to get to The Phantom Carriage, but I hope Oprhans of the Storm and Within Our Gates are worth the watch as well.
 

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Zamros said:
Whilst the abundant Yellowface in Broken Blossoms wasn't nearly as gross and offensive as Griffith's previous ventures, the story provides little to distract from this.

If the portrayal is sympathetic and respectful (and if the story also highlights prejudice as a bad thing. Which 'Broken Blossoms' does), I think these old films almost get away with it.  Coincidentally, I'm about to re-watch another "Yellowface" film from the book. If it's disrespectful and from a later period like Mickey Rooney, or Peter Ustinov then it's hard to excuse.  Then again I'm not Chinese, so I'm not really qualified to pass judgement.
 

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Duck Soup (1933)
Director: Leo McCarey
Country: United States
Length: 68 minutes
Type: Musical, Comedy, Satire

I've seen the Marx Brother's 'Duck Soup' more times than I could count, starting from when I was a kid. I thought I knew every line and every shot but so dense is the humour in every frame, that I was still noticing new things to laugh at on this re-watch. 'Duck Soup' is unique in their Filmography because the satire is overtly political and the film makes no concessions to simple entertainment. There is no star-crossed couple at the center of the plot, there are no "pop" love songs and there isn't even a Harp/Piano break for Chico and Harpo. It's just total surreal comedic anarchy, aimed roughly at Politics but still careening off into a subplot about a fight with a Lemonade seller. There are a few deliberately overblown mock-Musical numbers, the best being 'Land of the Free/Hail Freedonia'. As sharp a Satire of hypocritical, vain politicians today, as it was then.

Groucho said:
If any form of pleasure is exhibited,
Report to me and it will be prohibited.
I'll put my foot down, so shall it be,
This is the land of the free!



A Greta Garbo film next.
 

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Queen Christina (1933)
Director: Rouben Mamoulian
Country: United States
Length: 97 minutes
Type: Romance, Drama

I've somehow managed to never see a Greta Garbo film until 'Queen Christina' but now I'm an instant fan. She plays the young Swedish Queen, raised to rule "like a man" in a time of perpetual conflict. Like a bachelor of the time, she hunts, she rides and her long list of lovers is famous.  Christina is also wise, loved by the people and rails against the stuffy male bureaucrats in her court (who want her to marry) and warmongers that seek to influence her.

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A serendipitous meeting with an exotic Foreign Ambassador changes everything. The dialogue between them is full of romance, poetry and eroticism. This and the exquisitely lit Gothic shots of Christina prowling her castle alone at night, make this what might be termed an early "Art House" film.  Such a shame that this was co-star John Gilbert's penultimate film (He died a couple of years after) because he's superbly charming. Even better in sound, than he was in silence. 'Queen Christina' is a masterpiece and really needs an HD release.


Next is a Luis Buñuel short Documentary.
 

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Las Hurdes: Land Without Bread (1933)
Director: Luis Buñuel
Country: Spain
Length: 27 minutes
Type: Documentary, Propaganda

'Las Hurdes: Tierra Sin Pan' is a short location "Documentary" about the extreme poverty in the remote Las Hurdes region of Spain, with the intent of influencing policy. The visual weirdness of Luis Buñuel is absent, instead he brings in the Surrealism by contrasting stark realistic images with a passionless, uninterested sounding vocal commentary (Like the Anti-Attenborough). Seeing this with a modern eye, that is familiar with the methods of propaganda and film-making in general, it's immediately obvious that scenes are staged and others provide no real evidence for the events that the commentary describes. I'm not sure if the intent was to deceive, or just a big Surrealist joke. Reading up on this afterwards, apparently Buñuel killed and tortured a couple of animals to get the shots he wanted... what a d*ck. This was mercifully short, if nothing else.


King Kong is next!
 

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King Kong (1933)
Director: Merian C. Cooper & Ernest B. Schoedsack
Country: United States
Length: 104 minutes
Type: Drama, Adventure, Monster

After the modern-feeling dialogue and acting of films I recently watched like 'Gold Diggers of 1933', 'King Kong' seems even more dated than it did the last time I watched it. The cast are uniformly wooden and the dialogue is cheesy but as an early Blockbuster "Creature Feature", the human cast isn't what really counts, it's the fun Special-Effects. I swear some of the matte-paintings here would still hold up today and 'King Kong' himself is beautifully animated. The sense of adventure and mystery as the film builds with impeccable pacing towards it's New York finale is near perfect. Overall, I much prefer the Peter Jackson remake, as the acting there is nop-notch and the characters (including Kong) have much more depth.


Frank Capra's first appearance in the book is next.
 

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...and the superior but NSFW poster...

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The Bitter Tea of General Yen (1933)
Director: Frank Capra
Country: United States
Length: 88 minutes
Type: Drama, Romance, Political

I've watched the 'The Bitter Tea of General Yen' before, when I was having a post-'Double Indemnity' Barbara Stanwyck phase. The story explores the deep attraction between a white American Christian Missionary (Stanwyck) and a despotic Chinese Warlord who keeps her prisoner (I'm sure such an interracial romance was controversial at the time).  It's the first of four films in the book by the famous Frank Capra and is very different to his more familiar 'It's a Wonderful Life'-type fare. The scenes of the Chinese civil war are quite violent and the film doesn't shy away from showing us the slaughter. This is contrasted with the lavish interior set dressing of Yen's palace, which is something to see, utilising genuine Chinese art and antiques.

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Yen is a really complex and fascinating character. Having prisoners lined up and shot in one scene, yet recieting poetry in another. He is played by Nils Asther in a mostly convincing makeup job, with a sensitivty to accent and manerism. It would've been preferable to have an actual Chinese actor play the part but as they didn't, I can't imagine a better job being done than this.


A Laurel & Hardy comedy next.
 

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Sons of the Desert (1933)
Director: William A. Seiter
Country: United States
Length: 62 minutes
Type: Comedy

I've seen Documentaries and one or two shorts but this was my first full Laurel & Hardy feature. I rate their brand of predictable slapstick-humour lower than the genre's other stars (This could be re-titled "Pratfall the Movie") but I had plenty of chuckles with this. The second half is where the best laughs can be found as Stan and Oliver run round panicked, seemingly in mortal terror of what their wives and what they are going to do to them if they discover they've been lying. I particularly enjoyed Stan's "Malapropisms" like "Exhausted", instead of "Exhalted" and "Typhoid", instead of "Typhoon".


A W.C. Fields comedy next.
 

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It's a Gift (1934)
Director: Norman Z. McLeod
Country: United States
Length: 68 minutes
Type: Comedy

'It's a Gift' could almost be a straight drama about a guy's struggles through life but one that just happens to have loads of slapstick accidents. That realistic veneer takes this above 'Sons of the Desert' (which has a similar plot) for my tastes. You could never be mistaken for thinking that Laurel & Hardy's characters where real people but W.C. Fields' hapless store-owner feels totally believable. There is a hilarious sequence involving a blind old man causing chaos. The film sags in the middle when the plot is slow to get going but is otherwise a good laugh.


A Nazi rally next (something to look forward to :dodgy: ).
 

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Triumph of the Will (1935)
Director: Leni Riefenstahl
Country: Germany
Length: 114 minutes
Type: Documentary, Propaganda

The meaning of the title 'Triumph of the Will' hadn't really occurred to me for some reason before watching this, less about a symbolic "victory" and more a literal Ancient-Roman style military Triumph. The vast scale of this Triumph would have been astounding and impressive at the time but is chilling now. Leni Riefenstahl does everything she can to make Hitler seem otherworldly, heroic and impressive. She opens the film with some stunning aerial photography flying through the clouds as Hitler arrives on his plane. It's clear intent is to make him seem like a God descending from the heavens (I half expected to hear 'Ride of the Valkyries'). Other attempts to puff him up are less successful, like editing footage of Hitler greeting the crowds, together with close-ups of young women licking their lips and gazing adoringly. It was laughable and only served to underline how awkward, unpleasant and small he actually looks.

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I was expecting to be offended by the content of this film but there is nothing here to betray what the Nazis where really about. It's all vaguely positive stuff about strength, unity, faith etc with each speaker shouting "Deutschland!" 400 times. I'm not sure if this was a case of the Nazis being careful to present a clean image to Riefenstahl, or if Riefenstahl was carefully editing out the odious parts to present a clean image to us the viewer. I watched parts of the last GOP Convention and that had way more offensive hate-filled speech than 'Triumph of the Will'... but a comparable amount of flags and eagles. The inventive camera-work and the fascinating political-context made this a much less tedious watch than I feared. The endless marching footage towards the end got extremely tedious though.


Jean Vigo's only feature next.
 
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