Yes, but William Powell brings off the noble stuff so well, doesn't he?
I liked
The Key, though, yes, it was stagey and oh too easy to figure out. Hey, could anyone but Powell bring off that full skirted army coat? He made it look stylish. On anyone else it would be a laugh riot.
The Road to Singapore was just great, I loved the drums drums drums, and the rain rain rain and Powell's elegant, open-minded cad, ostracized because he is living a life that the stuffy colonists all wish they were. The colonists were so prejudiced in this film I'm surprised that the native population didn't do a little knife throwing through those nice starched whites.
Marian Marsh is an actress I always like, she never does wrong. I don't know why she didn't have a bigger career. She's amazing in
Five Star Final and
Crime and Punishment. I had no idea till this film what a fine figure she had, too.
Louis Calhern just sucked the air out of the room when he was in it! I've never seen him so lifeless and boring before. He's very interesting - an actor who does a very good if stagey job in pre-codes like this one,
Frisco Jenny and
The Man with Two Faces, but really doesn't hit his stride till later on. Maybe the movies were not complex enough at this point to showcase his talent for playing quiet cunning or maybe it took years to perfect his film acting style.
Doris Kenyon had a great career in silents for many years. I honestly didn't realize who she was, but thought she showed the sexual frustration of living with Louis Calhern's dullard quite well.
Jezebel38 - I have no idea who the woman is in the portrait behind Powell - It does look like Pickford. The still was labeled as being taken during The Thin Man, though I have no idea if that is true or not. I found it interesting that the first photo I posted also had a blonde in the background. You're right, he's lifted Roy D'Arcy's moustache right down to the way it curls upwards at the ends!
Miss G - I find those pics of Powell as a young man hilarious - he does look like Clarence Day Jr. all dressed up in his father's pants!
I only watched the first 30 minutes of
The Girl Who Had Everything, and was too busy noting the similarities and differences to
A Free Soul to really look at the acting. Powell did seem as if he were in a different movie from the rest of the cast, he was very good at keeping your attention even when all by himself in his study. I'll see the rest of the film sometime this week - Liz looked beautiful and the clothes were great.
Alison -
I think Powell was considered the A number one bad guy in silent pictures, working as a villain with Lillian Gish in
Romola, and also as the rat Boldini in the 1926
Beau Geste. There were many other nasty roles throughout the late twenties. He probably never thought he would have a career as anything but a bad guy when talkies came in.
Manhattan Melodrama is great, I think Powell works so well with double casts like this one and
Libeled Lady. He's a great partner for men as well as women.
