WHAT FILMS HAVE YOU SEEN LATELY?

[charliechaplinfan]

I remember Claude's drunk mother, played by Eileen Heckart. A bit too drunk? I dunno. She walked a razor's edge of drunkenness, sarcasm and inconsolable grief...all at once, that it was a painful performance to watch. I wouldn't have wanted to be in her shoes.

Perhaps a performance like that is a personal one, she did a fine job of playing a drunk, I guess if I were Claude's mother I wouldn't think my reaction would be to hit the bottle, that perhaps is my problem with the performance not actually her but how it was written, yet her performance is a pivotal one and has to be played that way to illicit sympathy and also be a contrast to Christine. So I can see why she's played that way. The Bad Seed is a strange movie, a little discomforting and I think that's all down to the fact that such a pretty little girl can play someone who has such malevolence. I do hope the poor little girl didn't have anyone accosting her in the street who couldn't tell the difference between fiction and reality.

[MikeBSG]

While I like Frank Tashlin's cartoons a lot, I have to say that "The Girl Can't Help It" and "Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?" both leave me cold. I guess I prefer "Rock Hunter," but I wouldn't say that I like that film.

It's been years since I've seen "The Girl Can't Help It." I thought that apart from the opening scene, which makes fun of television, the rest of the movie was loud and unfunny.

[MikeBSG]

Today I watched "You'll Never Get Rich," a 1941 Fred Astaire-Rita Hayworth musical.

It was pretty enjoyable, even if it felt like Fred had wandered into "Buck Privates." I didn't like the comedian who played the GI named Swiveltongue. A little of his humor went a long way for me.

However, Robert Benchley was great. He stole the early part of the movie.

I loved Fred Astaire's dance in the guardhouse. It was very dynamic and energetic. And the Astaire-Hayworth dance to "So Near So Far" was just breathtaking. One of the great screen dances as far as I'm concerned.

[charliechaplinfan]

I'll have to watch the 2 Astaire/Hayworth films again, it's been too long since I've seen them.

[CineMaven]

I remember Claude's drunk mother, played by Eileen Heckart. A bit too drunk? I dunno. She walked a razor's edge of drunkenness, sarcasm and inconsolable grief...all at once, that it was a painful performance to watch. I wouldn't have wanted to be in her shoes.

Perhaps a performance like that is a personal one, she did a fine job of playing a drunk, I guess if I were Claude's mother I wouldn't think my reaction would be to hit the bottle, that perhaps is my problem with the performance not actually her but how it was written, yet her performance is a pivotal one and has to be played that way to illicit sympathy and also be a contrast to Christine. So I can see why she's played that way. The Bad Seed is a strange movie, a little discomforting and I think that's all down to the fact that such a pretty little girl can play someone who has such malevolence. I do hope the poor little girl didn't have anyone accosting her in the street who couldn't tell the difference between fiction and reality.

We don’t exactly know how grief will overtake us when we hear devastating news like Claude’s mother heard. It is a very showy and cinematic action to take so the audience can see the grief. And she was doing a little investigative reporting herself, trying to get answer’s about her son’s death from the last person who saw him alive.

The movie is discomforting Alison. It also touches on that ol’ Nature vs Nurture argument.


PATTY McCORMACK

As for little Patty McCormack being accosted on the street...she might’ve been accosted in casting directors’ offices. She might've been indelibly typecast as Rhoda...and the casting directors might not have been able to see her as anything else. Good, unsettling movie. I enjoyed it.

[MikeBSG]

Patty McCormack had the leading role in a very unsettling radio drama on "Suspense" in the mid-Fifties: "The Doll." She played a girl with a heart condition who believed that if the heart in the wind-up doll she got for her birthday stopped working she would die. One of the most powerful shows in the second decade of that show.

[charliechaplinfan]

What a shame such a promising beginning didn't lead to big roles as she became an adult, perhaps she was just too good as Rhoda Penmark that she couldn't break free. She was haunting though, it's not a performance I'll forget in a while.

[RedRiver]

How can you not like this one? The play is a little more mature; the ending creepier. But this film rolls right along, delivering shock after shock. You can't help but be enthralled. I like a good play on film. There are so many examples where it may not be one of the great movies, but Boy, is it fun!

It also touches on that ol’ Nature vs Nurture argument.

I assure you have no opinion on the subject. But I know a guy who was adopted by a stalwart conservative couple. And he's a ****ing lunatic!

[CineMaven]

What a shame such a promising beginning didn't lead to big roles as she became an adult, perhaps she was just too good as Rhoda Penmark that she couldn't break free. She was haunting though, it's not a performance I'll forget in a while.

Can you imagine (especially for her parents) not being able to parlay that into a bigger career for being typecast...and then there's that child star...teen star...young adult minefield that many child stars had to go through and very few succeeded. (Not even Shirley Temple did what young Elizabeth Taylor parlayed her career into).

Mike, that plotline sounds like something also shown in "The Twilight Zone" where Ed Wynn's life depended on a grandfather clock.

[charliechaplinfan]

Being typecast as the nastiest child I've ever seen on film, that's quite something.

I did like The Bad Seed, RedRiver, it perhaps doesn't come across because there have been a few posts left, I liked it but found its subject matter unnerving, having a child of that age, just makes you wonder, even though she's an angel at the moment

[RedRiver]

CCFan,

Right after I posted, I felt I had poorly phrased. You did make it clear that you like the movie. What I meant to say was, "Dude! How can ANYBODY not like this one?"

[charliechaplinfan]

Don't worry, I've felt the same myself when I've gone back and looked at something I've written, what I said in my mind and how it looks are different.

I've had a little relief after the demonic Rhoda by watching Sissi a series made in 1955 and starring Romy Schneider in her first role as Elizabeth, Empress of Austria. It's a trilogy, KarlHeinz Bohm plays Franz Josef that Austrian Emperor who spots her when he's on his way to be betrothed to Sissi's sister Nene. He fell in love with Sissi the younger sister whe she was 15 and married her shortly after, Sissi was young to become an Empress and her mother in law thought her too ill mannered and takes her in hand. Sissi herself is without guile and of generous spirit and beloved of all her subjects. The trilogy is a 'based on a true story' basically true, a couple of things changed around or have a slightly different spin on them and is told in the most romantic of terms, a true love that is disrupted by affairs of state and the mother in law. Romy Schneider is different from her later roles and so perfect for the role of Sissi, her costumes and hairstyles just get more lovely as the saga goes along, this really rivals GWTW for period costumes and KarlHeinz Bohm is romantic as Franz Josef without whiskers. Interestingly Romy's mother plays her own mother in saga. The colours on this restoration are jaw dropping, I'd heartedly recommend it to anyone.

[sandykaypax]

Just a postscript to the Patty McCormick conversation--she can be seen in Frost/Nixon as Pat Nixon.

Sandy K

[CineMaven]

Whoa!!!!

[MikeBSG]

Today I watched "Springfield Rifle" (1952) directed by Andre deToth and starring Gary Cooper.

It was an interesting movie that struck me as a little disjointed. There were great outdoors scenes with masses of horses galloping through the snow, a bitter hand to hand fight in the snow, and a fiery outdoor climax. But there were also a number of setbound scenes that struck me as stodgy if not tedious. The fact that the movie was basically a Cold War movie in Western dress, with an emphasis on espionage, didn't exactly help either.

With all the betrayals in the plot, I had to think of "The Man from Laramie." It isn't the best of the Mann-Stewart westerns, but it is better than "Springfield Rifle."

Cooper was good in this, and I really liked a scene with Fess Parker. I think this is even before Parker's scene as a cropduster pilot in "Them!"