There's something so satisfying about a no-nonsense, beautifully-filmed western. A couple of likeable stars, good supporting players, stunning locations. The Hired Hand (1957) is that kind of movie: a briskly paced, efficiently filmed story that speeds lightly through its one hour running time. It's now available on DVD from Warner Archive.
Anne Francis steps into the saddle as Ellen Beldon, a widow who is about to be the first woman to be hung in Texas history, for the murder of her husband. He claims of innocence have been ignored..
She's rescued from jail by her uncle and his ranch hands and races across the border to her old ranch home in New Mexico. There she is safe, because the governor has decreed that she was unfairly tried and he will not allow extradition.
Beldon's father-in-law isn't willing to let her go though. He hires gunslinger Gil McCord (Rory Calhoun, who also produced the film) to kidnap her and bring her back over the Texas border where he can legally make an arrest. The mercenary McCord goes undercover as a ranch hand to get close to Beldon and quickly captures her. She strikes him as decent though, and once he hears her story, he knows he must try to save her life.
It's a simple story and not bound to provide any real surprises. That can be easy to forget though, because the Lone Pines, California locations make the production seem grander than it is. I've been watching a lot of films made there lately, and the purity and fresh feel of the expansive vistas and snowy mountain peaks always thrill me. Here director Ray Nazarro tends to humble his players, by showing how small they are in the face of all that natural grandeur.
Rory Calhoun and Anne Francis are remarkably appealing actors. I've often felt they both deserved greater fame and acclaim, but in enjoying their performances here, I've decided that they weren't meant to achieve that level of stardom. They have acting chops and charisma, but no matter how lost these stars may become in their roles, they always seem like the most gorgeous couple in a small town high school.
They're the prom king and queen, who decide they're going to go to Hollywood to break into the movies. That aura makes them all the more endearing, if not larger than life. I think there are a lot of stars like that: beautiful, charming people who appear more accessible because they are closer to the earth than the greats.
I found it interesting that three of the leading men would soon move on to television, because the production could easily have been a one-hour drama on the tube if a few corners were cut. Calhoun stayed with the western genre for two seasons on The Texan. Ranch hand Chuck Connors would embark on a legendary run as The Rifleman and Vince Edwards, who plays Ellen's shifty brother-in-law, would find his greatest fame starring in the medical drama Ben Casey.
For another take on The Hired Gun (1957), check out Laura's great review at Laura's Miscellaneous Musings.
Many thanks to Warner Archive for providing a copy of the film for review. This is a Manufacture on Demand (MOD) DVD. To order, visit The Warner Archive Collection.
There is an inherent beauty—a true "aura"—in moving images made on nitrate stock.
-Paolo Cherchi Usai, George Eastman House Senior Curator of Moving Image
Quote Source
Ginger Rogers in Carefree (1938)
Madonna, 2015
Here are some lovely additions courtesy of Dsata:
Richard Egan and Jane Russell in The Revolt of Mamie Stover (1956)
Model photographed by Nina Leen, 1947
Hans Makart, Detail from The Dream after the Ball, 19th Century
The Warner Archive Blu-ray edition of 42nd Street glimmers from the first frame. Even the title card looks magnificent. The credit "Silks by the Cheney Brothers" never looked more glamorous. To see the film that I watched dozens of times as a teenager on a VHS copy recorded from TV this way is almost like seeing an entirely new production.
42nd Street revived the screen musical after a brief period where audiences, tired of the glut of early sound productions, were unwilling to endure another awkward kickline or ungainly dance specialty. It had polished dialogue, full of snap and cynicism, sleek, sharp-witted showgirls and it wasn't afraid to show the unglamorous exhaustion and heartbreak at the center of it all.
It's easy to forget that Warner Baxter, Bebe Daniels and George Brent were the headliners of this influential musical. While they are sympathetic and effective in their roles, they always seem to be playing support to the supporting players.
Full of youthful confidence and energy, Dick Powell and Ruby Keeler steal the movie--they're the first thing you think of when you hear the title. Not far behind them are the now familiar cast of Warner Bros players: the sleazy boob Guy Kibbee, flat-voiced Ned Sparks, the simultaneously delightful and irritating Una Merkel. And then there's Ginger Rogers, already something special and ready to grab the spotlight.
As much as Ruby Keeler grates on me, with her slow-witted line readings and the anxious way she glances at her clomping feet, she is the only star who could have played the ingénue who becomes a star overnight. Everyone else knows where the bodies are buried, only Keeler can portray a woman who doesn't know enough to realize the full risk of her situation, but is wise enough to raise an eyebrow when a man closes a door behind her. She's equal parts clod and sparkling and perhaps that's the magical combination: she's both girl-next-door and fast-tapping superstar.
Keeler is the only female cast member to get to the top with her taps. Daniels, Merkel, Rogers and the mysterious chorine with a Park Avenue address ("is her homework rough!") all lean on men to get ahead. It's a dark message, barely glossed over by the sprinkling of musical numbers at the end. Even there, the dominance of men is reinforced, with a dancer being stabbed to death in a vignette.
Dance director Busby Berkeley's staging of the thrilling 42nd Street finale is a chills-inducing production, because you know how much passion went into it. All the sore feet, shouting and exhaustion have come to this giddy moment and you can see the joy in the performers. Their feeling of accomplishment and delight in performing is palpable. The number brought the fun of musicals back to the silver screen, by showing how much heart they had. After that, a revival of the genre was inevitable.
Special features on the disc include a fascinating featurette on the history of the 42nd Street book and musical, brought over from the DVD release. There are also a couple of cartoons, a newsreel and a short film paying tribute to composer Harry Warren, whose significant contribution to the film and musicals in general is often overshadowed by the flash of Busby Berkeley's dance direction.
Many thanks to Warner Archive for providing a copy of the Blu-ray for review. To order, visit The Warner Archive Collection.
Bandit: How tall are you?
Stranger: About six feet…six with the hat.
In the midst of the 1960s craze for spaghetti Westerns, a scrawny, scrappy Man With No Name made his way to the top of the heap.
With a series of films in which his character was simply known as The Stranger, actor and producer Tony Anthony may have looked like the 90-pound-weakling of spaghetti Westerns, but he was a lot more like a fox in a folk tale conning a farmer out of his chickens. Three of the films in this unusual series: A Stranger in Town (1967), The Stranger Returns (1968) and The Silent Stranger (1975) are now available in a two-disc set from Warner Archive.
The films in the set (there are four total Stranger films) all follow the same basic plot. The Stranger thinks he has come upon an easy get-rich scheme; he is initially successful; a gang of men stronger and more violent than him strip him of his booty, and beat and humiliate him in the process; The Stranger gets his revenge and some reward in the end, if not the riches he had expected. This simple, and familiar plot is the framework for an increasingly bizarre series of films.
Anthony's Stranger doesn't walk tall. His shoulders are in a perpetual slump, and he always slinks around in the shadows, feeling out the situation before he makes an appearance. It isn't that he lacks confidence, he simply knows his limitations and how to overcome them in a canny way. He's mercenary, but only to a degree. He doesn't let the innocent suffer if he can help it.
The sixties were the perfect time for Tony Anthony's awkward anti-hero. If he'd come along a couple of decades earlier, he probably would have found himself firmly on the Elisha Cook Jr. supporting hood career track. But it was a decade of rebellion and subversion, and it's possible this is why the series enjoyed the success it did.
It took me a while to warm up to the Stranger. The first film struck me as unnecessarily bleak, too heavy on the violence and with insufficient humor, action or wit to balance out the blows. In fact, for a while I felt disappointed that these films I'd heard so much about appeared to not be living up to the praise.
Something shifts though as A Stranger in Town rolls into its final act. Anthony gets wittier, more charismatic. You can almost see the sparkle jumping into his eyes. Though I don't know in what order the scenes were filmed, in those final moments he seems to be hitting his stride and I regained some enthusiasm.
The series gets dramatically better, and more strange, as it progresses. You get the impression that no one expected the first entry to do as well as it did and everyone upped their game when that film was a hit. The Stranger Returns is a superior film in every way, even the music is catchier. While it still has the expected violence and brutality of the genre, it's much funnier and the action has a lot more pop.
Anthony seems to settle into his role, creating a surprisingly complex character. He trots into the film on his horse Pussy, carrying a tattered pink parasol. As he leans back to roll a cigarette, he finds it is unsmokable and tosses it away in disgust. After setting up this pathetic persona though, he suddenly shoots a rabbit with ease, easily procuring a meal for himself, while he comforts his frightened horse. This is really all you need to know about The Stranger.
His motto: "I don’t want any trouble." Instead, he is always in search of his next big score, the riches that are always just out of his reach. He's smart, but not quite smart enough. He's tough, but he must rely on his wits to overcome the truly bad guys whose amorality is a world away from his petty thievery. He never passes a plate of food without taking a bite. There's even a scene where he seems to hold off on offing an adversary because he wants to get a meal in first.
With that persona established, Anthony takes his Stranger to the far east in The Silent Stranger. This may be the first time the Western was mixed with a samurai flick.
It's a little goofier than the first two entries, with Anthony traveling to Japan in order to deliver a scroll given to him by an emissary who has promised he will be amply rewarded. As expected, things don't go as planned, and he finds himself playing two sides against each other in a samurai war reminiscent of Yojimbo (1961). There's lots of fish-out-of-water humor, and a few racist jokes at the expense of the Japanese, but it doesn't get too tedious.
With The Silent Stranger, you can see the series heading into more unusual territory. Anthony becomes increasingly eccentric and the situations he finds himself in more bizarre. For several scenes, he trots around offing attackers with a huge, ancient gun that's held together with a long piece of rope, and one of the villains is so near-sighted he has to stop for moment to put on his glasses before committing his next evil deed.
Anthony went even further afield with Get Mean (1976), the exponentially less successful final entry in the series, in which he travels to Spain to save a princess and battle Moors and Vikings.
Though The Stranger series had a brief run, Anthony would continue in the entertainment industry, starring in a few more films and producing occasionally. He also embraced the technical side of filmmaking, running an optical equipment company that made him wealthy. In the early eighties, he had modest success briefly bringing back 3D as producer and star with Comin' At Ya (1981) (which I reviewed here) and Treasure of the Four Crowns (1983).
The prints for all three films in the set are in decent condition. There are moments where the picture gets a bit scratched and grimy, but that always seems appropriate to me in this genre; I had no complaints.
Many thanks to Warner Archive for providing a copies of the films for review. This is a Manufacture on Demand (MOD) DVD. To order, visit The Warner Archive Collection.
Barbara Stanwyck's bold button collar dress in Baby Face (1933) is worn again by an office worker in Housewife (1934):
George Brent is in both films too!
The Seattle International Film Festival announced its 2015 line-up today, and it is going to be a fantastic year for classic film fans. SIFF has long offered a bold and fascinating program of archival movies, but as I enter my third year of covering the festival, now in its 41st year, I have never been more giddy about the selections.
There will be a whopping 19 archival films at the festival. This will probably be more than I will be able to attend, but the selections are so amazing that it will be tough to miss anything. Among the highlights:
Celebrating 25 years: Martin Scorsese's The Film Foundation
I was most excited to hear that SIFF will be celebrating Martin Scorsese's The Film Foundation's quarter century by presenting eight movies at the festival. Four more films will be presented at Trader Joe's Silent Movie Mondays, which is a beloved Seattle tradition at the Paramount.
I'll have more details to share about when and where these films will be shown, but just look at this list, copied directly from SIFF press materials (note there's only seven titles in the SIFF section, I haven't determined yet if one is missing, or there are actually not eight films). It's an inspired mix of countries, time periods and genres (of course I'm thrilled to see a Mary Pickford movie in there):
Festival Selections--
Alyam, Alyam, d: Ahmed El Maanouni (Morocco 1978)
Black Girl, d: Ousmane Sembène (Senegal 1966)
Caught, d: Max Ophüls (USA 1949)
The Color of the Pomegranates, d: Sergei Parajanov (Armenia 1969)
The Dark Mirror, d: Robert Siodmak (USA 1946)
Rebel Without a Cause, d: Nicholas Ray (USA 1955)
The Red Shoes, d: Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger (United Kingdom, 1948)
The Silents (Paramount)--
The Mark of Zorro, d: Fred Niblo (USA, 1920)
My Best Girl, d: Sam Taylor (USA, 1927);
The Unholy Three, d: Tod Browning (USA, 1925)
Snow White, d: J. Searle Dawley (USA, 1916).
I'm sure it will be particularly stunning to see the vibrant colors of The Red Shoes on the big screen.
The Apu Trilogy
I was very young when I first saw Indian director Satyajit Ray's famous trilogy, and I don't think I fully appreciated what it had to offer. It centers on Bengali villager Apu, following him from childhood to fatherhood. I'm looking forward to seeing Song of the Little Road/Pather Panchali (1955), The Unvanquished/Aparajito (1957) and The World of Apu (1959) in a theater, where I can become fully immersed in the story.
Son of the Sheik
The Alloy Orchestra, which specializes in accompanying films, will be performing live with this 1926 film. I've always thought this Valentino flick was underrated and much more entertaining than The Sheik (1921). Early TCM Classic Film Festival attendees may remember the group's performance for a screening of Metropolis (1927) at the 2010 fest.
Spider Woman Double Feature
This program is sure to offer some interesting contrasts. The celebrated pianist Donald Sosin (who I enjoyed hearing at two SIFF 2014 presentations) will accompany Cave of the Spider Woman (1927). Then the Shaw Brothers version of the story, The Cave of Silken Web (1967) will be screened. How often do you see a double feature with a time gap like that?
A Tribute to Stewart Stern: Rebel Without a Cause Live Screenplay Reading
Seattle screenwriter and educator Stewart Stern passed on in 2014. He was a well-respected and generous member of the arts community. Giving his most famous screenplay the spotlight is a fitting tribute. The presentation also includes a screening of the film.
Saved From the Flames - A Trip to the Moon and Other Trips Through Time and Space
I have been a fan of Serge Bromberg ever since his Lobster Films led the ten-year restoration effort to save George Melies' A Trip to the Moon (1902). Since then, I've learned how much more he has done to preserve early film and make it available to the masses. I'm thrilled to have to chance to see him present this program at the festival.
The Astrologer
For the past year, this supposedly insane 1975 film has always seemed to pop up in festivalgoer favorites lists. I'm going crazy with curiosity. Even the trailer is wild:
Now I finally get to see what all the fuss is about.
