Only Angels Have Wings (1939)

A cabaret singer (Jean Arthur) steps off her ship at a South American port and meets a couple American fly boys who deliver mail under dangerous conditions. After one of the pilots has an accident, she gets to know their boss (Cary Grant).

There are elements of Rom and there are elements of Com, but make no mistake. This is no Rom-Com. This is the most dramatic role I’ve seen Grant in up to and including North by Northwest (1959). The stakes are high and the outcome is not guaranteed.

Here is an early appearance of Rita Hayworth. The twenty one year old had already appeared in a ton of films. She wasn’t far from Hollywood immortality. Also Thomas Mitchell, who was having a spectacular year. His five films that year were nominated for thirty six Oscars, winning thirteen. One of them was for his performance in Stagecoach.

Only Angels Have Wings is a solid drama. It's refreshing to see Grant play a character not exactly the Cary Grant type. It's perhaps a bit clunky at times, but it's very effective. AMRU 3.5.

A Foreign Affair (1948)

A Senate committee travels to post-war Berlin to investigate stories of lax attitudes and inappropriate behavior by US servicemen. Among them is the young Congresswoman Frost (Jean Arthur). She sees our boys buying goods on the black market and chasing German women, but when she learns that someone has been covering for a cabaret singer (Marlene Dietrich) with a Nazi link, she is determined to uncover the truth. She enlists the help of fellow Iowan Captain Pringle (John Lund). Will love bloom?

It’s not a spoiler to reveal that it’s Cap Pringle who’s been covering for singer Von Schluetow. And Cap makes for a pretty poor romantic lead. Our introduction to him is pretty rough and it doesn’t get better. But this is Billy Wilder and he knows how to spin a tale.

Squeaky little Jean Arthur took four years off from filmmaking, and would wait another five for her last film, Shane. She was very charming as the naive and uptight Senator. She and rival Dietrich were both pushing fifty, very unusual for a film of this time. Dietrich, true to form, didn’t think much of her co-stars. She referred to Lund as a piece of petrified wood and Arthur as “that ugly, ugly woman with that terrible American twang". She never did play nice.

So, did A Foreign Affair stick the landing? More or less, I would say. From a story and dialog perspective, it’s not top Wilder. But it’s not too bad either. Good performances (particularly if you like Dietrich’s singing) and the footage of bombed out Berlin were quite striking. AMRU 3.

Shane (1953)

An ex-gunfighter (Alan Ladd) crosses paths with a homesteading family that is being bullied by a wealthy rancher. He decides to hang around to help.

Shane leans hard into the myth of the old west, while getting a surprising amount right. Conflict between ranchers and farmers was a real thing. Despite the vastness of the landscape, resources (grazing pastures and water in particular) were scarce. Gone is the quaint and clean old west town. Life was harsh. The trope of the good gunfighter against the evil gunslinger, however, is readily apparent. The “Man’s gotta do” philosophy is a prevalent theme.

Jean Arthur came out of retirement as a favor to friend director George Stevens to play the homesteader’s trusty wife. The unspoken sexual tension between her and Ladd’s Shane was palpable. It was borderline scandalous, this being a very kid friendly picture. Eliza Cook Jr. is a pint-sized blow-hard and Ellen Corby (Grandma Walton) is his wife. Jack Palance is wonderfully evil as the gunslinger.

Ten year old Brandon De Wilde played Joey, the boy that idolizes Shane. He was nominated for an Academy Award for his performance. Brandon embarked on a productive, if not stellar Hollywood career, also appearing in Hud. That career, however, was tragically cut short when he crashed his camper van on his way to visit his wife in the hospital. He was just thirty.

Shane was an iconic novel and is also an iconic film. The tension felt by the characters contrasts greatly from the optimistic and somewhat comedic tone of the John Wayne western. Something of a slow burn, it is a well paced and a very well made film. AMRU 4.

“A man has to be what he is, Joey. Can't break the mould. I tried it and it didn't work for me.”

Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)

A wealthy man dies and the search for an heir turns up eccentric small town man, Longfellow Deeds (Gary Cooper). Unfamiliar to big city ways, he is taken in by reporter Babe Bennett (Jean Arthur), wise in the ways of city life, and becomes the target of the popular press and those who get rich handling rich people’s money. When his folksy home-spun wisdom interferes with their plans, they use the bad press to question his sanity.

Jean Arthur could have been a bigger star. She was the female lead in plenty of pictures, some of them good, and was liked by her directors, but she never rose to A level stardom. Maybe because she was slightly older than her female contemporaries, hitting the big 3-0 when talkies became standard. Maybe she just managed to miss that one big roll. She turned down the Donna Reed roll in It’s a Wonderful Life because she didn’t want to work with Jimmy Stewart again. She retired fairly young. Her Columbia contract ended when she was 44 and she appeared in only two more films. Whatever the reason, she was always charming in the films I’ve seen, even the one I don’t care for much.

Here also is character actor Lionel Stander. His voice and looks are very distinctive and I remembered him as Max from Cheesy TV Hart to Hart four decades later. I noticed something Cooper would do. He’d make quirky facial expressions from time to time. I also Harrison Ford from Raiders doing something similar. I found it peculiar.

Here is Frank Capra at his Capriest. Pretty standard Rom Com format. I wasn’t charmed this time around. The principal reason was I didn’t find Deeds all that likeable. He was rude, quick to fight, and acted like a buffoon. Normally a Rom Com’s success relies solely on the chemistry of the two loves, and little else. Here, Deeds likability interferes. Overall not too bad, but (and I will say this again), it was too long. Fifteen minutes shorter would have been fifteen minutes better. AMRU 3.

“When the servant comes in, Mr. Hallor, I'm going to ask him to show you to the door. Many people don't know where it is.”

The Talk of the Town (1942)

A warehouse burns to the ground and a man dies. Professional rabble rouser Leopold Dilg (Cary Grant) is arrested. Realizing he doesn't have a chance in the world, he escapes before his trial. He takes refuge in the cottage of a lovely young schoolteacher, Nora Shelley (41 year old Jean Arthur). She helps Dreamy Leo but things get complicated when noted legal theorist Professor Lightcap (Ronald Coleman) arrives a day early to rent the cottage. Nora passes Leopold off as her gardener.

Every Christmas I get a daily desk calendar. I use them at work because it provides me with lots of paper for notes. This past Christmas I did not get one, so I went out and got myself a Leonard Maltin. Not really a Maltin guy. More a Siskel and Ebert type, but Maltin is what I found. I make two piles: one No the other Maybe. The Talk of the Town was in the Maybe pile.

There are two stories going at simultaneously. First is the legal drama unfolding. Malcontent Dilg has no tolerance for the abstract ideals of Lightcap's world and the fussy professor has no regard for Dilg's emotional notions of law. Reality, as it frequently is, is somewhere in between. Do you think these two could ever learn to compromise and someone become good friends, I mean real good friends? Do ya, huh?

The second story is of the love triangle. Nora is an unwed schoolteacher and therefore needs a man. Who does she choose to be with? That question is not answered until the very end, and don't be so sure. Interestingly, when the camera panned between the three actors, my eight year old said "triangle". The camera panned in the shape of a triangle. Huh.

He also asked when it was going to become funny. While sometimes amusing, it wasn't really a comedy. Talk of the Town is a very well crafted character study and (dare I say it) situation comedy. It didn't drag, it never seemed forced or trite. This is a well done movie. Sharp and focused. It was nominated for seven academy awards, winning ... um ... none.

An IMDb blogger cracked that this was a leftist propaganda movie. Bloggers, they can be so stupid, huh? Well anyways, I tried to fit his thesis into the reality on the screen. Did Cary Grant represent leftist ideals? Kinda, I would say. He name was Leopold Dilg, which sounds Ruskie to me! When posing at the gardener, they called him Joseph. Not Joe or Joey. Joseph. Hmmmm. When the man failed to realize, even if Dilg represented the left and Lightcap the right, both moved to the center. Plus Lightcap declared himself a political independent fairly early on.

Well written, well acted, and entertaining throughout. Jean Arthur is wonderful. I really did care about the characters and their stories. I wasn't totally charmed by this film, but I can see how others could be. I'm glad I watched it. AMRU 3.5.

You Can't Take it With You (1938)

The winner of Best Picture and Best Director, this offbeat comedy is about a family that chooses to do what they want over what they should do. How they have enough money to buy food is a mystery.

The story centers around young Alice (Jean Arthur) being the rebel of the family (she actually has a "job"!) and falling in love with owners son, Tony (James Stewart). The problem is that Tony's company is trying to evict Alice and her band of nuts from the family homestead. Drew's great-uncle Lionel Barrymore plays grandpa. 

Because of the sentimentality of Frank Capra's films, they were sometimes labeled "Capra-corn". Here is a great example. There were interesting scenes and clever dialog, but come on! I think they went a little bit over the top trying to show how eccentric they were. Characters wrestling, throwing darts, painting, doing ballet, while fireworks were being set off, all at the same time! Reminds me of my old dorm room days. And in the end, all problems are solved by singing "Polly Wolly Doodle". Maybe this makes sense during a depression. I hope I don't find out. 

One thing that struck me was the ages of the characters. Young Alice was played by 38 year old Jean Arthur. Her big sister was played by 15 year old Ann Miller. And Gramps was only 22 years Jean's senior. But it worked. Lionel looked to be 100, Jean Arthur could have easily passed for 24, and Ann Miller didn't look like any teen. 

Nice to watch once, but wholly unremarkable. Frank got a best picture, but not from me. AMRU 3.