Strike!: 1945, Part Eight

October 1945. Now that the war's officially over, there's some tidying up to do. Remaining Japanese troops in Taiwan surrender, the Nazi Party is officially dissolved, and 29 countries come together to establish the United Nations, making Woodrow Wilson's dream a reality; throughout the year, more will join. 

In Hollywood, a six-month strike by the Set Decorators' union came to a head as a fight broke out between scabs, police, Warner Bros. security, and 300 strikers. The fallout contributed to the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act in 1946, limiting the power of labor unions, and the slow dissolution of the Conference of Studio Unions, which spearheaded the strike.

Though the strike caused delays on films like Duel in the Sun, for the most part, studios had a backlog of films to release. The month Hollywood Black Friday occurred, here's what the output looked like:

Wives and Lovers: 1945, Part Six

July 1945. Berlin is divided between East and West, a situation that will remain in place until 1990. The Philippines are officially liberated. The Japanese begin peace negotiations, and the Potsdam Conference avers that there will be no negotiations, but rather unconditional surrender. And the first atomic bomb is successfully tested in New Mexico, ushering in the atomic age.

And at the cinemas, we were celebrating Christmas in July:

A Director's Debut: 1945, Part Three

February and March 1945. Overseas, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin meet for the Yalta Conference, where they plot not just peace but how to carve up the world to best satisfy their respective empires once the war ends. On his return, Roosevelt addresses Congress for what will be his last time. The Battle of Iwo Jima rages across five weeks, while the Battle of Manila lasts exactly one month and ends in liberation for the Philippines' capital. Secret negotiations between the SS and the CIA for the surrender of Axis areas begin. Tokyo is devastated in a two-day bombing raid that kills 100,000 citizens, the most destructive air attack of the War.

And back in Hollywood? Well, in March, the 17th Academy Awards are held, resulting in Going My Way winning Best Picture (and more, as you know). March also saw the feature film debut of Elia Kazan.

Kazan was no stranger to Hollywood, he already had at least two films under his belt, including Blues in the Night...but as an actor. That's what he studied at Yale, and that's what he pursued when he joined the Group Theatre in 1932 - he continued in that vocation even as he began his career as a stage director. After appearing in the film Blues in the Night in 1941, he directed the legendary original production of Thornton Wilder's The Skin of Our Teeth, starring Tallulah Bankhead and Fredric March. So, he becomes a greater director than actor, and takes the Hollywood job that still keeps him close to the spirit of New York, even if it's filmed on the Fox soundstages: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. His first film, and it wins an Oscar. But we'll get into that later this month.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn came out amid a Disney anthology, a "prestige horror" production, and Universal programmers for Abbott & Costello and Holmes & Watson. See for yourself:

How You Like Me Now?: 1944, Part Eight

We're coming to an interesting point of 1944. The most famous film of today's collection was made three years before its release, did OK at the box office, and received no Academy Award nominations. And yet! It has endured! That and more, just below...

First of the Best: 1944, Part Four

January saw our first Best Director nominee, and now May has our first Best Picture nominee!

The Imitation and the Real Thing: 1944, Part One

Of our first eleven films that qualified for the Academy Awards honoring the films of 1944, five were released in late 1943. Of the six released in 1944, one of them is the reason we're here - Lifeboat, the second film for which Alfred Hitchcock was nominated for Best Director. We'll get more into the specifics of Lifeboat's production and Hitchcock's nomination when we discuss the Best Director category in a couple of weeks. For now, let us just take in these eleven releases, from November 1943 through January 1944, running the gamut from musical to thriller, original to remake, Hitchcock himself to Hitchcock proteges. 

One thing you'll see, as I mentioned yesterday, is how some films referenced the War even when they didn't have to. Sure, The Fighting Seabees is specifically about a military unit, and Lifeboat is a tale of survival on the Atlantic - but Sherlock Holmes and the Spider Woman includes a visual joke, The Desert Song rewrites its plot to accommodate the times, and our first flick even gives a tongue-in-cheek apology for being a fantasy:

1946: Some Spring, Some Summer

It's Spring now in 1946, and with the new season came the first nominee for Best Picture - Henry V.

Produced in Britain in 1944 as a way to rally the fighting spirit of the UK, Henry V is Laurence Olivier's directorial debut, adapted from the Shakespeare play of the same name. For the uninitiated, it's the story of a once-frivolous prince who's now King of England and finds himself in conflict with France over that country's throne. The nations go to war, though the invading English are ridiculously, hilariously outnumbered, and don't stand a chance. Oh, ho-ho, so you think! This is the play from which come the lines "Once more unto the breach" and "We band of brothers" and "O God, thy arm was here," so it's a compelling drama about war, about overcoming odds, about the uncertainty of leadership. 

Olivier's approach is a true adaptation. He opens at the Globe Theatre, with audience members laughing and talking throughout, actors going in late for cues, a thunderstorm interrupting proceedings, performers in obvious wigs and wardrobe acting on a bare stage. But as the narrative unfolds, the setting changes, becomes more cinematic - we see them land at the beach, we see the battle play out with horses thundering and spears impaling, we see Henry wander a campsite lit only by fires and the moon. This is not just a practical choice to give us spectacle where cinema demands, but an illustration of the transportive power of the Theatre, and that is a timeless thing.

Many European films did not receive a US release until after the War, for obvious reasons. And so Henry V came to our shores in 1946. IMDb puts its first American screening on April 3 in Boston, Variety's review ran April 24, the New York Times' June 16, and Manny Farber's review for The New Republic is dated July 8. Somewhere in there is its Oscar-qualifying date, surely. We'll discuss it more in two weeks' time, but we just wanted to note that it came out among these films:

1946: Winter Into Spring

Isn't this something? Yesterday, we talked about 1945 films that somehow qualified for the 1946 Oscars; today, we talk about the first three months of 1946 cinema. And I say "isn't this something" because, between the two, they give us nine of the 36 nominees eventually up for Academy Awards, a full 1/4 of the whole lineup. With few exceptions, these days we rarely discuss films released before October!

January through mid-March, here are a baker's dozen of 1946 flicks:

Oh Yay! Oh No!

Of S-Men and missed opportunities:

A SINGLE MAN

Glad I caught this for a second time (this time seeing the first fifteen minutes). A beautiful, moving film with Colin Firth's career-defining performance at the center of it. As George, the British college prof mourning the death of his life partner (Matthew Goode) in 1960s LA, Firth is sad, funny, hopeful, pathetic. His silence says more than his words, though these, too, are spoken beautifully. Goode is great in an affecting role seen only through flashbacks; for if we cannot like Jim, why should we care about, well, anything in the movie? Luckily, we love Jim, and Goode's portrayal, alongside the screenplay by director Tom Ford and David Scearce, are the source of such affection. Equally brilliant is Julianne Moore as George's nearest, dearest, and saddest friend, Charley. From her first scene, we see that she's never given up on the idea of a future with George -- maybe tonight's the night he comes to his senses! -- while her second scene allows us to see her precise and sad beauty regiment.

Tom Ford, the designer-turned-director, does a truly remarkable job with his first feature. Everybody and everything is beautiful, from the clothes to the art direction to the effective cinematography by Eduard Grau (the way little things brighten George's day: beauty worthy of tears). Some choices, though, are a little hard to follow and risk pulling the viewer out of the movie. Quick cuts to eyes and lips, for example. While I understand that we're getting everything from George's point of view, at times the cuts came so quick that I was startled out of the picture. I was quickly brought back, of course, by Firth and Grau and the score by Abel Korzeniowksi, but there were a few times when the style threatened to overcome the substance. Hopefully, Ford's next feature will dedicate itself completely to the latter. Hopefully, Ford will have a next feature.


SHERLOCK HOLMES

Well, I liked it. Like Monty Python and the Holy Grail, it takes a romp to fully realize the age it's portraying. Surely this muddy, steamy, dank Victorian London is closer to the truth than the polished period films of Merchant-Ivory (much as I love them). Hans Zimmer's score is one of his most engaging, taking an unexpected zither route that works much better than you'd think. Unless you'd think it was the perfect choice, in which case you're right, so go you. I like the end -- as with the stories, the question is always "how", and there is little opportunity for the audience to solve it themselves. Holmes has always been blessed with knowledge that no lay person could possibly understand, and always withheld clues until the end. That's how the books were, and that's how the movie is.

Sorry if I sound defensive. I just really liked the movie. Robert Downey Jr. was a great Holmes. He's not your mama's Holmes, nor was he the definitive one (Jeremy Brett, ladies and gents), but he had all the smug smarts of the character. Mark Strong's villain is deliciously foul, and the hints at a sequel featuring Moriarty thrill me. Rachel McAdams, however, is dreadfully miscast as master thief/love interest Irene Adler. I couldn't help but think how I would have preferred a Maria Bello or, even better, Kathleen Turner in 1980.

Making up for it: Jude Law as Watson. When I was a boy, I always wanted to be Watson. Imagine my disappointment when he was generally portrayed as a buffoon. Here, fortunately, he's the Watson I grew up with: smart, tough, and sharp (though not as sharp as Holmes). Law and Downey have great chemistry together. Watson is dashing and fun, and although a bit of a stuffed shirt, you totally get the affection between these two men. I loved it.


THE LOVELY BONES

What a disappointing movie. It starts out promisingly enough, but by the time it gets to the strangest Susan Sarandon montage I've ever seen, it's all too clear that someone -- Peter Jackson? His co-writers? The Studio? -- dropped the fucking ball. It's still an all right film, but over-indulgent and lacking in any real emotion. Some scenes are so inappropriately juxtaposed that it is neither poignant nor ironically hilarious, just confusing. Saoirse Ronan and Stanley Tucci are very good, great even, but they are adrift in a sea of monotony. Heaven is beautifully rendered, at least -- but to what avail? Maybe Jackson should have spent more time on Earth with the themes and FUCKING TITLE and less in Heaven, the land of who gives a fuck.


THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS

I'll just remember The Dark Knight as Heath Ledger's final film. Terry Gilliam went on about how Heath improvised most of his scenes, and everyone was thrilled at the results. Well, those "funny" improvs are some of the worst parts of the movie, along with an unevenly written protagonist (Christopher Plummer's trying, though) and an ending that drops the ball. Visually marvelous and with a fine performance by Andrew Garfield, Gilliam once again proves that he has a great imagination undone by an inability to know what to do with it. I liked Parnassus, but I also worked to do so. Mehhh....