April 1945. The Battle of Okinawa begins. President Franklin D. Roosevelt dies, and Harry S. Truman becomes President of the United States. Buchenwald and Bergen-Belsen are liberated. Mussolini and his intimates are publicly executed. Hitler privately commits suicide in his bunker. That's one month: April 1st, Battle of Okinawa; April 30th, Hitler's suicide.
And in this single month with all this history...here are the movies we got:
A Royal Scandal
release: April
dir: Otto Preminger
pr: Ernst Lubitsch
scr: Edwin Justus Mayer, adaptation by Bruno Frank, from the play Czarina by Lajos Biró and Melchior Lengyel
cin: Arthur C. Miller
A political sex farce starring Tallulah Bankhead as Catherine the Great. As appropriate for the genre, there are a thousand different overlapping plots and subplots and characters, not to mention the assemblage of names and titles typical of Russian aristocracy, so I won't get into all of it. Suffice it to say, it's ridiculous and irreverent and hilarious, able to shock without swearing, the implications of a dedicated soldier suddenly getting his own rooms at the palace enough for the audience to make the necessary conclusions. Bankhead, fresh off her screen comeback in the previous year's Lifeboat, is purrrring with sensuality and eccentricity - she also didn't make another movie in Hollywood after this. The Eve of St. Mark's William Eythe gives his most animated performance yet, while Vincent Price turns up the camp as the French ambassador. And Charles Coburn? A riot. Craftswise, period accuracy is ignored in favor of glamour, and we love it.
Earl Carroll Vanities
release: April 5
nominations: Best Original Song ("Endlessly")
dir: Joseph Santley
pr: Albert J. Cohen
scr: Frank Gill, Jr., from a short story by Cortland Fitzsimmons
cin: Jack A. Marta
A foreign princess joins a revue. Some real catchy, jazzy numbers. One such sequence, they make sure to specify, is a "dress rehearsal...without the blackface for now." Well! How generous! Eve Arden does her thing, but with a terrible hairdo.
G.I. Honeymoon
release: April 6
nominations: Best Score (Edward J. Kay)
dir: Phil Karlson
pr: Lindsley Parsons
scr: Richard Weil, additional dialogue by Tim Ryan, story by A.J. Rubien and Robert Chapin and Marion Page Johnson
cin: Harry Neumann
A soldier and his new wife keep getting interrupted. I seem to recall this feeling awfully sweaty in its strained attempts at "witty" repartee.
Brewster's Millions
release: April 7
nominations: Best Score (Louis Forbes)
dir: Allan Dwan
pr: Edward Small
scr: Siegfried Herzig and Charles Rodgers and Wilkie C. Mahoney, from the novel by George Barr McCutcheon and the stage play by Winchell Smith & Byron Ongley
cin: Charles Lawton, Jr.
A penniless soldier returns from the war to find that a dearly departed distant relative has left him a fortune of $8 million (I gather the equivalent of $148M today)...provided he can spend $1M in a month without revealing why. Always kind of hated this oft-remade premise, but at least it's an engaging enough cast, between Rochester, Helen Walker, and leading man Dennis O'Keefe, who keeps a good straight face throughout the madness.
Crime, Inc.
release: April 15
dir: Lew Landers
pr: Leon Fromkess
scr: Raymond L. Schrock, from the book Crime Incorporated by Martin Mooney
cin: James S. Brown, Jr.
Ripped from the headlines - a crime reporter is threatened with jailtime for not squealing on his gangland sources, but there's bigger fish to fry - like who runs the organized crime syndicate of the title??? A slight cut above similar gangster B-movies, thanks to its great cast (Leo Carrillo! Lionel Atwill! Grant Mitchell!), solid plotting, and memorable set pieces, with moments that I could swear were repeated beat for beat in 1990's Dick Tracy. It's clearly a little enamored of gangster character Bugsy, supposedly based on real-life gangster Bugsy Siegel, who had his own Hollywood connections. There's a not especially well-staged, but highly memorable, assassination at a wax museum, the thoughtfulness behind the setting endearing itself to me, even if it's too brightly-lit and thunkily cut. But it is a moment that lets me geek out for a moment, so bear with me on this next tangent.
One of the gangsters is the sole credited performance of longtime extra Jack Gordon, whom I first read about in my beloved Tough Jews, a witty history of the Jewish mafia written by Rich Cohen. Yes, Gordon was a stage name; his real name was Irving "Gangi" Cohen, and he was a hitman with Brooklyn's Murder, Inc., who went into hiding after stabbing his best friend Walter Sage (who said he "only stole to support his study of the Talmud"). He became an extra and "technical advisor" in Los Angeles, but hiding out in the movies didn't exactly work: all it took was for his enemies on both sides of the law to catch a matinee, and suddenly Cohen/Gordon found himself in handcuffs on the set of The Sea Hawk (lucky break: a hitman had also been dispatched). Tries for Sage's murder, Cohen/Gordon put on the performance of his life, weeping on the stand, and was acquitted. He returned to Hollywood, where he continued to work until 1974, just two years before he passed away. But this is his only credited performance, and he makes the least of it, though it is funny to hear him recite lines in a bizarre, breathless, uninflected rat-a-tat style - according to Rich Cohen this was his actual manner of speaking, "as though his words were connected by hyphens." Maybe he's better on stage. He's third from the left in the pic above.
Anyway. OK movie, if you've the gangster itch, this will scratch it.
A Medal for Benny
release: April 16
nominations: Best Supporting Actor (J. Carrol Naish), Best Original Story
dir: Irving Pichel
pr: Paul Jones
scr: Frank Butler, additional dialogue by Jack Wagner, story by John Steinbeck and Jack Wagner
cin: Lionel Lindon
A community finds itself in an uproar when a local ne'erdowell is killed in action overseas and awarded a posthumous medal of honor. Would make an interesting companion piece with Hail the Conquering Hero, these are both films about communities whose perceptions change based on what's best for patriotism and local PR. This one has just a bit more meat on it: the community in question is made up of, to quote the introductory scroll, "Paisanos - Americans of mixed Indian and Spanish Blood," and when the dead Benny of the title joined the action, he left behind not only a loyal but long-disappointed fiancee, not only a dedicated if poor father, but a police warrant. Classified as a drama, despite being an often-amusing poke-in-the-eye about who is allowed to become heroes, how we see their families, and what we owe the dead, even if they're assholes. The white elite of the city gathering together to stage a temporary luxurious home for Benny's family to receive government officials and the press in is still funny; indeed, I think you could make this movie right now and it would be just as effective, funny, truthful. Great performances from Dorothy Lamour (as Benny's fiancee, of Spanish descent), Arturo de Córdova (as the man who loves her, Mexican), and J. Carrol Naish (as Benny's father, of Black Irish descent).
Dillinger
release: April 25
nominations: Best Original Screenplay
dir: Max Nosseck
pr: Frank King / Maurice King
scr: Philip Yordan
cin: Jackson Rose
A bio of the bank-robbing thug. It's no Public Enemies, but what is? It's barely over 60 minutes but it still takes time for the important stuff: there's a scene where a penniless Dillinger gets snubbed and insulted by a waiter, then he returns some time later with money, his girlfriend, and an order of three beers...and you know he's up to no good, you're waiting for something horrible, but he's so still, so coiled, and the waiter, of course, doesn't remember, but you know the six seconds that weren't even a footnote are about to define the rest of his life - and how we think of Dillinger. I love that scene. I also love the climax. It feels a little shortchanged due to budget constraints and general lack of aspiration, but what it offers is brutal. Lawrence Tierney, for God's sake, isn't that enough?!
Salty O'Rourke
release: April 25
nominations: Best Original Screenplay
dir: Raoul Walsh
pr: E.D. Leshin
scr: Milton Holmes
cin: Theodor Sparkuhl
This makes three gangland flicks in April 1945; as War waned, America yearned for a return to old values, I guess. Alan Ladd is a professional gambler who recruits a jockey to ride a horse he needs to win if he's going to live past Christmas; said jockey is required to get an education in order to ride, I forget if he's a juvenile delinquent or needs a GED or what the deal is there; and The Uninvited's Gail Russell is the teacher both jockey and gambler fall for. Now, I've said this before, but the bad side of reviewing movies I watched months ago is that I've watched 100 movies since and can't remember every detail; the interesting side is the feeling, and I felt warmth on seeing that title. I need to rewatch it, but if you see that plot, you can probably guess at the mix of violence (they're gangsters!) and genuine Heart (education! sponsoring a youth! Gail Russell!) that the movie is built around.
Counter-Attack
release: April 26
dir/pr: Zoltan Korda
scr: John Howard Lawson, from the play by Ilya Vershinin & Mikhail Ruderman as translated by Janet Stevenson & Philip Stevenson
cin: James Wong Howe
A Russian takes a group of Nazi soldiers prisoner, but time, exhaustion, and the cleverness of one of his prisoners begin to take their toll. Paul Muni is the star, which means he's doing the craziest accent you've ever heard in your life - what is Muni's real accent, is The Last Angry Man the closest we ever got to hearing it, is he Daniel Day-Lewis's idol? But also, Paul Muni is the star, which means you're getting a masterclass on how to own an environment even while falling asleep. I love the way it's lit and sound designed, because it's one man against several in a basement, so there's a lot to play with in the shadows and in the unknown within those shadows. That setting makes the stage origins obvious, to an extent, yet Korda's skill as a filmmaker is such that you cannot imagine how this specific claustrophobic effect could read the same outside the cinema. Odd comparison, I know, but in that sense, I was reminded of The Humans.
The Enchanted Cottage
release: April 28
nominations: Best Score (Roy Webb)
dir: John Cromwell
pr: Harriet Parsons
scr: DeWitt Bodeen / Herman J. Mankiewicz, from the play by Sir Arthur Wing Pinero
cin: Ted Tetzlaff
Th incredible story of a plain woman and a scarred soldier who are, believe it or not, prepare yourself, attracted to each other and become even more beautiful to each other despite no one else thinking so. Wow. So deep. An oft-adapted play in its time, for some reason, perhaps because the conceit of making the players more attractive as the film and its protagonists develop is basic visual storytelling. Here's the thing. In this adaptation, the soldier is a scarred Robert Young, I understand the self-consciousness; the "plain" woman is just...Dorothy McGuire. I understand that it's a whole thing about inner beauty, not outer beauty, and someone you love becoming more attractive because of love, despite their looks, but such stories, when it comes to Hollywood, are best for fantasy or animation, because Hollywood thrives on Hot People. Dorothy McGuire with slightly thicker eyebrows is like Alex Pettyfer with a shaved head and tats: you're only highlighting how weirdly attractive they are, nothing can stop them!
Sunday: Hollywood and the War play catch-up!
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