Romancefest 3: Sadiefest - Heaven Can Wait

HEAVEN CAN WAIT starts with an interesting premise – a recently deceased rich playboy (Don Ameche) assumes he’s destined to go to hell, so he voluntarily shows up to surrender himself to the devil (Laird Cregar). The devil, however, has different plans, as he asks Ameche to elaborate on exactly why automatically assumes he’s sentenced to eternal damnation by telling him his life story.

Turns out Ameche’s biggest crimes were that he was a spoiled only child of privilege, and that he had an insatiable appetite for women, which eventually made his 25 year marriage to the great love of his life (Gene Tierney) more difficult than it otherwise had to be.

To the movie’s credit, it fully exploits this premise, carefully going over the facts of the case of Ameche’s life from birth until death, not unlike more modern pictures like ANNIE HALL – this film is uniquely introspective for a movie from the early 40s. Perhaps this is because the director, Ernst Lubitsch, who was going through a divorce at the time of the film’s production, saw something personal in it.

Lubitsch, like Preston Sturges, is a director I’ve been meaning to bone up on for years but have been lazy about, for whatever reason. Even since I saw TO BE OR NOT TO BE years ago, I’ve thought, I need to check this guy out. So, I’m glad I finally have another Lubitsch under my belt.

Ameche and Tierney are great as the central married couple, and their relationship is believable and probably not quite as dated as most people would like to believe. Ameche resists the temptation to lay it on too thick as the playboy type, and mostly just acts like a decent (if impulsive) guy. Tierney’s beauty and grace makes it easily clear why Ameche would be fall so easily and deeply in love with her, and both actors do a credible job of playing their characters over several decades of life, in sickness and in health.

Like most films of the classic Hollywood era, HEAVEN CAN WAIT benefits from a stellar supporting cast including Charles Coburn as Ameche’s sympathetic and conspiratorial grandfather and Marjorie Main and Eugene Pallette as Tierney’s unhappily married parents who love to hate each other. Laird Cregar, who I mentioned earlier, also turns in a memorable performance as an uncharacteristically sympathetic lord of the underworld.

I have to admit, I’m not 100% sure I understand the point this movie is trying to make, if any. After all, if you take the events of the movie literally and look at them objectively, Ameche was a guy who did commit a few sins, at the expense of some people he purported to love. But, I guess maybe that gets to the point of the film, which is that you can’t really look at anyone literally and objectively because you’ll always have your own filter, or their filter, or someone else’s filter, obscuring the so-called truth, whatever that is.

I guess, if anything, it’s a comforting notion that even if you damn yourself to hell with your own guilty conscience, Satan himself might take pity on you.

Romancefest 3: Sadiefest - Brigadoon

BRIGADOON is a movie that has strengths and weaknesses that stem from the same elements. Here is a movie that takes place in Scottish highlands, but was shot entirely on soundstages. A modern movie like this, and even some movies contemporary to this one, would have taken full advantage of location shooting, with lots of scenic cinematography and local color.

So, on one hand, BRIGADOON seems like a missed opportunity. On the other hand, the sets for this film are magnificent and the matte backgrounds are amazing examples of a lost art, and they do provide breath taking scenery. No matter where it was shot, the movie is beautiful to look at.

The studio sets do help to provide the fairy tale atmosphere, however, which is appropriate for the magical tale of BRIGADOON, a small Scottish village that only appears once every 100 hears for 1 day. Gene Kelly and Van Johnson star as two American hunters on vacation in Scotland who stumble upon the village and become involved with the locals as they prepare for a big wedding.

It isn’t long before Kelly is in love with the sister of the bride, Cyd Charisse, and the two of them dance around the countryside collecting heather before Kelly even fully understands what’s going on. Of course, when he learns that the village is due to disappear and that he’ll need to decide whether he wants to stay or not, he realizes the gravity of the problem.

BRIGADOON as a vehicle for Kelly is an interesting choice. The dance numbers aren’t particularly spectacular, though they’re nice enough, and Kelly seems a little too savvy to buy into this fantasy world. Johnson fares better, however, getting all the best lines as a cynic who finds himself face to face with magic. There’s a great scene in which he sets up three lit cigarettes in three ash trays at the bar, just to keep people from sitting next to him.

Despite the fact that BRIGADOON is a fairly lighthearted fairy tale romance, the magical village has kind of a dark undercurrent to it. If any villager leaves the boundary of the village, all the other villagers and the village itself ceases to exist. Meanwhile, every 100 years, the villagers age only 1 day, the rest of the world changing around them. Most of the villagers view this as a blessing -- they’ve been saved from the ravages of the modern world by this miracle. But, it could also be viewed as a curse, as the villagers are doomed to never leave their small town and stand apart from the rest of the world for all eternity.

This magical device does work as a nice metaphor for the problems of time and place that interrupt relationships in the real world. As usual, a fantastical device actually works better at illustrating mundane everyday problems than a more literal approach might, and Kelly’s ultimate decision at the end of the movie is that much more touching because of it.

Romancefest 3: Sadiefest - Love in the Afternoon

I was looking forward to LOVE IN THE AFTERNOON going into it, because I already love Audrey Hepburn, Gary Cooper and Maurice Chevalier, and already love writer/director Billy Wilder, who is responsible for not only several classics, but also a few that happen to be among my favorites.

Hepburn, beautiful as always, stars as a naive young cellist living in Paris with her father (Maurice Chevalier), a detective specializing in adultery cases. Hepburn can't help but be turned on by the sordid affairs Chevalier deals with, much to Chevalier's dismay. The story starts with Hepburn preventing a cuckolded husband (John McGiver) from murdering his romantic rival, Gary Cooper as a business tycoon playboy.

Hepburn and Cooper fall for each other and begin an anonymous romance, meeting each other in the afternoons. Hepburn knows all about Cooper, thanks to her fathers' sizable file on the serial philanderer, but Cooper knows nothing about her. This is Hepburn's first romance, and she's head over heels, but she protects herself by presenting it as one in a long string of romances, creating elaborate stories of her imaginary ex-lovers in order to impress Cooper.

For the first half hour, or so, the movie kept its momentum. Then it settled into the series of afternoons between Hepburn and Cooper and lost some steam. The final half hour and romantic climax proved to be great, but the whole movie sagged in the middle. This romantic comedy runs about 2 hours and 10 minutes, but it only has enough story for about 90 minutes.

That's not to say it wasn't basically enjoyable -- it's not one of Wilder's best, but a mediocre Billy Wilder film is better than most average films, anyway. It's still cute and funny and romantic, and Wilder gets a lot of mileage out of "The Gypsies" -- a musical quartet hired by Cooper at first to come to his hotel room and provide atmosphere for his romantic conquests, and later as loyal sidekicks who follow him all over Paris. Also, the relationship between Chevalier and Hepburn as father and daughter is poignant and even more effective than the romantic relationship here.

The heart and soul of the movie lies with Chevalier. Whether he's playing a gentle, loving father or a dirty old man, he always seems to have more inherent wisdom about the ways of love and sex than any other character in a given movie. He's one of those screen presences who simply radiates warmth just by showing up.

Sadie Says:

One of the things I love about Billy Wilder movies, is the introduction to many of his films. Like IRMA LA DOUCE, LOVE IN THE AFTERNOON starts out with a fine introduction with beautiful shots of Paris, a narrator (in this case Chevalier), a meeting with the characters, and a quick change in on what Billy Wilder does best--A love story.

LITA is not a love story of convention, but one filled with intimacy behind closed doors. It's not one that makes a whole lot of sense at first watch, but one that is left to the imagination, time, and distance. Close up shots make this movie. Often these films are hard to swallow and LITA is no exception, however the dynamic acting, cinematography, and the music of the Gypsies keep LITA high on my list as a not to be missed Wilder film.

What is also interesting to note about LITA, is that this is the first of twelve films written by Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond on the famous grounds of "The Lot" in Hollywood, CA. The Lot was a haven for Ernst Lubitsch, Billy Wilder, Preston Sturges etc. They went on to write many flicks including SOME LIKE IT HOT, IRMA LA DOUCE, THE APARTMENT, FORTUNE COOKIE and so on and so forth.

I love the idea of "THE LOT." A home away from home, solely for writers, famous ones and non-famous alike, to congregate, eat lunch, work, and bounce ideas off one another for days. In the era of classic Hollywood movies, writers were hired as is, to write great screenplays and nothing more. It seems like there actually might be value to this model of writing, as some of the greatest movies of all time have come out of this all-star writers think tank. LITA is no exception.

Romancefest 3: Sadiefest - Bull Durham

One of the worst things about being a guy who likes movies is that no matter how many movies you watch, there's always something you have wanted to see that you haven't gotten around to yet. This is most apparent when there's something I haven't seen that everyone else has seen, especially if they know I'm supposedly a movie guy. Everyone gets the old, "You haven't seen that?" thing, but I suspect I get it more than most.

Anyway, there are a few usual suspects that come up more often than others, and BULL DURHAM must be in the top 5. I've seen bits and pieces of it over the years, just never the whole thing. I've always known it was well liked, and always figured I'd like it. I just never got around to it. Until now. Now that I've seen it, I can stop saying I haven't seen it and you can stop saying, "You haven't seen it?"

One of the reasons I always figured I'd like it, aside from the universal praise for it, was the fact that I tend to like baseball movies. And, within the first few seconds of the movie, the baseball mythos gave me chills twice. The first time was the shot of Susan Sarandon approaching the minor league field at dusk, the lights illuminating the stadium from a distance. The second time was a few moments later, as the camera followed Sarandon through the dark tunnel and out into the bright ballpark, the field unfolding in front of her.

I think this was partly just because baseball is so ingrained in the cultural subconscious that it's tough not to react with nostalgia to shots like that, but also because it seemed to so accurately reflect my own experiences attending minor league games. I clearly remember the sights, sounds and smells approaching the ballpark on game night as a kid, and heading through that tunnel to see the field suddenly appear in front of me. The film lets you smell the grass, the beer, the hot dogs. And this is all before it even really starts.

Sarandon stars as a baseball groupie who delights in choosing one minor leaguer each year, blessing him with her sexual attentions, and improving his season before he moves on to the majors. I guess calling her a groupie is a little patronizing -- she's a three dimensional character who knows what she's doing and why she's doing it. She is not struck dumb by fandom and is not a tool for the players to use as much as the players are there for her to enjoy. She has a million philosophies about baseball and life, considers them to basically intertwine, and pulls from many literary and spiritual influences. Yes, she's kind of full of shit, but she kind of knows it. If you have to be full of shit, that's the way to do it.

Thing is, Costner is more of an intellectual match for Sarandon than Robbins is, and has something in common with her, spiritually, since both of them worship baseball as something more important than just a means to a material end.

BULL DURHAM is a perfect romantic comedy. Like the best romantic comedies, it doesn't dwell on the relationships at hand, specifically. Instead, it gives us a red herring, in this case baseball, and lets that stand in as a metaphor for what's really going on. To BULL DURHAM's credit, it knows way more about its red herring of choice than most movies like this tend to, so it never feels contrived. Because of this, no one would ever refer to it as that most dreaded, sexist term -- a chick-flick. Here's a Hollywood romantic comedy that doesn't feel contrived, doesn't feel sexist, and treats the sex lives of adults realistically as opposed to either shameful or magical. And, it's funny!

So, there's no wonder everyone loves BULL DURHAM. I do, too.

Sadie Says:

As Paul mentioned, when I recommended BULL DURHAM, I expected him to say, "Duh, I've seen it a million times." Much to my surprise and delight, Paul had never seen the film in its entirety, nor had he witnessed what I believe to be one the greatest romance and baseball movies of all time.

Fact: Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins met on this movie and fell in love. Goddamn I'm a sucker for offscreen romance. It still pains me personally that they "aimicably" decided to end their relationship several years ago and go their separate ways. However, in the case of BD, secretly, I always wished that behind the scenes Ms. Sarandon and Mr. Kostner got it on and were in fact the characters they embody so well.

Bring in a whole cast of misfit characters, a genius screenplay, and what was considered to be a "hot" bath scene and we got ourselves a classic movie. In many ways, this strong female lead in Sarandon (and so many others in Romancefest Sadiefest) are called on some of their shit. It doesn't in any way take away the intelligence, independence, or what I believe to be "cool factor" of these outspoken women, but in many ways these strong male leads bring them back to their most human and vulnerable state. This quality in film translates and is played out perfectly on the screen in Bull Durham in the style of many a Hepburn flick (see Philadelphia Story).

Never to be skipped on cable, Bull Durham holds up just fine on any day, even if it's supposed to be a rained out.

Romancefest 3: Sadiefest - Royal Wedding

Fred Astaire, Romancefest alum from such greats as TOP HAT and SWING TIME returns in ROYAL WEDDING. As usual, Astaire plays a song and dance man, this time teamed up in a brother and sister act with his guy crazy sister (Jane Powell). The two entertainers are married to their career, so Powell only has time to date guys for a couple days at a time, but she has a big enough appetite to keep the guys stacked up. Astaire, on the other hand, doesn't seem to have time for any romance at all, and neither performer cares to ever get married.

That is, until they're summoned to England during the weeks leading up to titular wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip in order to perform their successful stage show in London. Brother and sister find unlikely romances in the likes of a dancer in their upcoming show (Sarah Churchill) and a Lord who has as healthy an appetite for women as Powell has for men (Peter Lawford). Unfortunately, Churchill is in the middle of a long distance relationship with an incommunicative fiance and Powell is having second thoughts about committing the rest of her life to Lawford and giving up her career.

Of course, as with most Astaire films, ROYAL WEDDING has a plot that is a mere clothesline to hang the show stopping song and dance numbers on, and this movie has a couple of Astaire's most famous, including one number in which Astaire transforms an inanimate hat rack into a lively dance partner and another in which Astaire seems to defy gravity as he dances on the ceiling and walls of his hotel room. There's also a funny scene in which Astaire and Powell attempt to perform on the tilting stage of an ocean liner, slipping and sliding and watching props fly by.

Watching the movie is worth it for these scenes alone, though the non-dancing climax is also memorable as Astaire and the rest of the cast are intercut with what appears to be actual footage of the famous royal wedding as they chase each other to the alter.

There's also a memorable supporting cast including Keenan Wynn in a dual role as both an American and British theater agent, playing against himself in a couple comedic scenes. My favorite supporting player, however, was Albert Sharpe as Churchill's father, who owns a pub in London and laments his separation from his wife. This is just a subplot, but Sharpe is so great in his little bits of screen time, I fell in love with him. The way Astaire and Sharpe form a supportive little friendship was genuinely touching, even more touching than the central romantic relationships.

The films of Fred Astaire look and feel deceptively like shallow fluff, but they're more than that. The expression of character, story and emotion through these insanely complicated dance numbers is something that is uniquely cinematic, and like the best art, it is able to articulate the intangible stuff of humanity more exactly in an abstract way than it could ever be expressed in a literal way.

One note for AVphiles -- apparently MGM let ROYAL WEDDING slide into the public domain, so it is widely available in lots of different bargain basement releases. Because of this, the source material for these releases isn't always the best. I watched it on the "watch instantly" feature on Netflix, and it was a shitty print, so I'm assuming this must be from one of these small-time releases. It's my understanding there is a good release available from Warner, so if you want to watch the movie, I recommend seeking this out.

Sadie Says:

Since the last Romancefest, there has indeed been a royal wedding in England, so it only seemed appropriate to watch ROYAL WEDDING! I originally discovered and purchased my copy of this movie for around 99 cents at a Rite Aid somewhere in Los Angeles (thank you public domain). It was probably after 2:00 in the morning, I probably also got some sour patch kids, and I can only assume some cheap wet & wild nail polish. I remember being really surprised to find that this classic gem contained the famous Astaire dancing on the walls and ceiling number "You're All The World To Me."

The number is still amazing and really does make you wonder how they did that? After looking it up a few years ago, I found out that MGM built the set inside a revolving steel barrel and mounted the camera and operator to the floor so they would rotate along with the room. It's a technique that has since been repeated and still used to today in film, music video, TV, you name it.

The other numbers aren't half bad either. Lots of singing, lots of dancing, a trip to Haiti, some brother/sister dynamic duo action (a story that echoes Astaire's ascent into show business), and lots of real footage of Queen Elizabeth's Royal Wedding. Clearly this fascination with Royal Weddings has been around for a lot longer than Wills and Kate, and ROYAL WEDDING is the perfect place to see the mayhem first hand.

Romancefest 3: Sadiefest - Xanadu

If you ever wanted to see a movie about a frustrated artist who fulfills his dreams by creating the greatest roller disco the world has ever seen, then XANADU is the movie for you.

If not, you better skip it.

XANADU is one of those movies where I’m tempted to say you have to see it in order to believe it. But, I don’t want to mistakenly recommend actually watching it. So, maybe it’s okay for you to go through life not quite believing XANADU exists?

The afore-mentioned frustrated artist (Michael Beck) works for a record company, duplicating album covers, when he comes across a cover featuring a girl he recently ran into who kissed him and then disappeared in a flash of light, like the Enterprise when it goes into warp speed. Beck decides he must find this woman.

This is Olivia Newton-John. Thanks to an early scene in which a mural on a brick wall comes to life, with more flashes of sci-fi light, we know Newton-John is a supernatural being. Turns out she’s a muse, sent from above to help Beck achieve his disco dreams.

Also on hand to help is Gene Kelly in his last screen performance as an old man who sits on the beach playing the clarinet. Turns out he once ran a sweet club and wants to run one again. So, Beck, Kelly and Newton-John team up to transform a gloriously art-deco (but broken down) auditorium into Xanadu, the roller disco to end all roller discos.

The movie has at least one good moment, a dance scene between Kelly and Newton-John. It also has some good music performed by Electric Light Orchestra. And, Newton-John carries over her same enthusiastic and sweet screen presence from GREASE.

But, that’s about all XANADU has to offer. Almost everything else is a mess. You could argue the movie is hopelessly dated and that you kind of have to view it on its own terms in order to enjoy it, but I’ve seen plenty of other films from the late 70s and early 80s that do not suffer from this problem, and plenty of others that do have this problem, but overcome it anyway.

The problem begins with Beck as the leading man but continues into the thrust of the story. He’s pretty bland and forgettable in his performance, but he also has basically nothing to work with. All he really has to do is to stare into Newton-John’s big, beautiful eyes like a loyal puppy dog and even that seems to be a problem. Even the great Gene Kelly seems wasted here – on one hand, he provides the film’s only moment of genius, and on the other it’s frustrating and a little embarrassing that he’s in this mess in the first place.

Just as a quick example – FOOTLIGHT PARADE was similarly built on a flimsy premise that was just an excuse for a bunch of dance numbers. The difference is, PARADE crackled with intensity and moved at a rapid fire pace. XANADU, on the other hand, lazily wallows in decadence. PARADE’s song and dance sequences were mind blowing enough to stop the show and get away with it. XANADU’s are poorly executed and confusing. They stop the show, all right.

Sadie Says:

This movie is ridiculous. I can't figure out how this film got made in the first place, but once a decade, I'm really happy that somebody owed somebody a favor. I'm pretty into the roller disco scene, so there you go. In addition, the Electric Light Orchestra score is hard to ignore. If you're into ELO, then this should not be missed. Full Discloure: This film is probably best watched under the influence of something...anything....really....I'm serious...

The Fred Astaire counterpart to this film is FINIAN'S RAINBOW, a film that has a much more traditional musical score, but is equally out there in plot. The flick involves a leprechaun and a whole lot of shenanigans. As i'm thinking about it all, my best guess is that for someone who is a fan of old films, I've always been interested to see how these magnificent men of the of musical make even the worst of films watchable ones. Gene Kelly can make even the most ridiculously plotted film (considered by many a critic), a masterpiece.

Romancefest 3: Sadiefest - High Society

In HIGH SOCIETY, a young socialite often accused of being an ice queen (Grace Kelly) finds herself torn between three suitors on the eve of her wedding – her bland but decent fiancé (John Lund), her Jazz musician ex-husband who lives in a neighboring mansion (Bing Crosby), and a tabloid journalist sent to cover the nuptials (Frank Sinatra).

Sound familiar? Maybe that’s because this is a remake of the famous PHILADELPHIA STORY. This one takes a unique angle by adding the trappings of a musical to the proceedings, and one of the movie’s strengths is the way Louis Armstrong and his band (as themselves) are incorporated to help tell the story in musical narration and funny side dialogue.

One of the movie’s weaknesses, though, is the fact that it’s a remake of THE PHILDELPHIA STORY. It’s not that Kelly, Crosby and Sinatra aren’t any good. They are. They just aren’t Hepburn, Grant and Stewart. But who is? No one. It’s not really a fair comparison, and it definitely takes balls to remake a film starring three of the greatest movie stars of all time, but there you have it.

The movie shines during the musical sequences. There isn’t much in the way of complex set pieces or dance numbers, but Crosby, Sinatra and Armstrong each have undeniable stage presences and you don’t want to look away when they’re strutting their stuff. My two favorite sequences were probably the one featuring Crosby introducing Armstrong and his band, as each member got to show off, and a scene where Sinatra and Crosby drunkenly face off (and become buddies) while singing in the library-turned-bar. It’s clear the elements were here to make a classic, I’m just not sure their best use was at the service of remaking THE PHILADELPHIA STORY.

Visually the movie doesn’t give us much to look at. It’s shot in color and VistaVision and oddly sticks to long shots for what should be a fairly intimate story. Instead of a series of romantic close ups, we get big widescreen shots of… drawing rooms and backyards. This reduces the performers to little figures walking around immense sets, which might work in some movies, but is wrong for this one.

I didn’t notice this as much in THE PHILDAELPHIA STORY, but for much of the running time of HIGH SOCIETY I found it a little hard to sympathize with Kelly’s conflicted bride. She threw off a perfectly good husband, the laid back, affable, confident, sweet and talented Crosby, and romances a man she just met (Sinatra) on the eve of her wedding. This is the same stuff Hepburn pulled in the original, but for some reason it seemed less annoying when she was doing it. I guess Hepburn just has that X-factor that the otherwise talented and beautiful Kelly lacks – Hepburn projects intelligence and self-confidence, so even if you think she’s wrong, you feel for her.

What Kelly needs is a visit from the Bride Whisperer.