Diary of a Chambermaid, The (1946)

Diary of a Chambermaid, The (1946)

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“From now on I’m going to fight hard, and I don’t care who gets hurt, just so it’s not me.”

Synopsis:
A French chambermaid (Paulette Goddard) aspires to marry a wealthy man and become mistress of her own household. Meanwhile, she’s tasked with keeping the grown son (Hurd Hatfield) of her employers (Judith Anderson and Reginald Owen) happy during his visit home, and finds herself falling in love.

Genres:

  • Burgess Meredith Films
  • Hurd Hatfield Films
  • Jean Renoir Films
  • Judith Anderson Films
  • Paulette Goddard Films
  • Servants, Maids, and Housekeepers
  • Social Climbers

Review:
Burgess Meredith both co-starred in and wrote the screenplay for this unusual Hollywood comedy by Jean Renoir, starring Meredith’s then-wife Paulette Goddard in the title role. Loosely based on an epistolary novel by Octave Mirbeau, it tells the tale of a beautiful, feisty chambermaid who is quite rightly fed up with scrubbing floors, and determined to seduce a wealthy man, no matter his age. This leads to a dalliance with a wacky older captain (Meredith) living next door, but her pursuits are temporarily delayed by a sudden and inexplicable infatuation with dour Hurd Hatfield, who seems utterly mismatched for her spunky spirit. Meanwhile, the household’s equally ill-humored butler (Francis Lederer) begins to show hints of interest in Goddard, and plots to take advantage of his mistress’s long-earned trust in him. Unfortunately, none of this is particularly compelling or amusing, and the actors are so broadly directed that they emerge more as caricatures than sympathetic people. Goddard somehow manages to remain compelling throughout, but we can’t help wishing she had a better screenplay to work with. This film has numerous diehard fans — including Peary, who lists it as a Personal Recommendation — but I must say I’m not one of them.

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Paulette Goddard as Celestine

Must See?
No, though fans of Renoir will surely be curious to check it out. Listed as a film with Historical Importance (I’m not sure why) and a Personal Recommendation in the back of Peary’s book.

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Sin of Harold Diddlebock, The (1947)

Sin of Harold Diddlebock, The (1947)

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“Every man is the architect of his own fortune.”

Synopsis:
A recently fired accountant (Harold Lloyd) goes on a bender for the first time and becomes the owner of a circus, which he must then find a way to unload.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Carnivals and Circuses
  • Comedy
  • Harold Lloyd Films
  • Preston Sturges Films

Response to Peary’s Review:
Peary labels this creative collaboration of silent comedian Harold Lloyd and writer-director Preston Sturges “disappointing but mildly amusing”. He accurately points out that it contains strong elements of both men’s prior work, given that the film literally opens with an extended clip from Lloyd’s silent classic The Freshman (1925), and is based upon a similar premise as Sturges’ The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek (1944) (with an unseen alcoholic bender producing hilariously challenging consequences). In truth, I think Peary underestimates this controversial film, which was inexplicably pulled from circulation, drastically edited, and renamed Mad Wednesday; it’s actually a most enjoyable slapstick comedy, filled with healthy doses of satirical humor. In his final film, Lloyd (looking MUCH younger than his 54 years) is at the top of his game, and Sturges’ script provides nonstop enjoyment until about 2/3rds of the way through, when Lloyd’s nonsensical plan to try to rid himself of his circus by visiting the offices of prominent bankers in Manhattan temporarily derails the story. Fortunately, things get back on track during the “film’s highlight”, which “finds Lloyd dangling high above [the] city by a rope attached to the neck of a lion”. As Peary notes, the entire cast — most notably Jimmy Conlin as Lloyd’s partner in crime, and Frances Ramsden as his gorgeous workplace crush — is “sterling”. A minor quibble: it’s too bad the title’s first word was changed from “saga” to “sin”, since the latter makes little sense.

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Harold Lloyd as Harold Diddlebock
  • Fine supporting performances by Jimmy Conlin and others
  • Sturges’ zany screenplay

Must See?
Yes, as Harold Lloyd’s swan song.

Categories

  • Important Director

Links:

Streetwise (1984)

Streetwise (1984)

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“You wanna be downtown, you wanna be cool, you better learn the ways of the street.”

Synopsis:
Homeless teens survive on the streets of Seattle by panhandling, dumpster diving, selling drugs, and prostituting themselves.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Documentary
  • Homeless
  • Survival
  • Teenagers

Response to Peary’s Review:
As Peary notes, this Oscar-nominated documentary about “street kids living in Seattle’s tenderloin” — a “world of street brawls, drugs, perverts on the make, filth, hassles with the police, frequent busts” — is “bruising cinema verite“. While the kids may “seem happy to be free of their parents and enjoying life on their own”, this is simply because life at home with their irresponsible and/or abusive parents and stepparents was so much worse. Indeed, some of the film’s most haunting sequences involve the kids visiting their parents, who are astonishingly blase about the fact that their kids are making a living on the street: one (an alcoholic waitress) simply assumes it’s a “phase” her daughter is going through, while another (a father in jail for burglary and arson) appears to want the best for his son but simultaneously ridicules and belittles him. It’s truly impressive how much access filmmakers Martin Bell, Mary Ellen Mark, and Cheryl McCall (whose initial article for Life magazine inspired the documentary) gain into the private lives of the kids and their families, down to hearing young pimps openly soliciting girls to work for them (weren’t they afraid of exposure?). Despite the recent glut of “reality” T.V. and documentaries, this early glimpse into the lives of homeless teens rises a cut above, and is guaranteed to linger in your thoughts long after it’s over.

Note: A 23-minute follow-up film was made about the life of one of the teens showcased in the movie (“Tiny”), but I haven’t yet been able to locate a copy. Any hints are most welcome.

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Countless powerful sequences


Must See?
Yes; this one will haunt you long after it’s over.

Categories

  • Historical Relevance
  • Oscar Winner or Nominee

Links:

Outlaw Blues (1977)

Outlaw Blues (1977)

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“I’ve done more living in the past two weeks than I did in the last six years.”

Synopsis:
When an ex-convict (Peter Fonda) accidentally shoots a country-western star (James Callahan) who has stolen his song, he goes on the lam with a sympathetic singer (Susan Saint James) who hopes to make him a star.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Composers
  • Ex-Cons
  • Folk Heroes
  • Outlaws
  • Peter Fonda Films

Review:
Much like Alan Rudolph’s Songwriter (1984), this comedic sleeper exposes the surprisingly cut-throat underbelly of the country-western scene, in which hit songs are truly a hot commodity, and unscrupulous wolves are eager to take advantage of “naive” talent wherever they can find it. In Outlaw Blues, Peter Fonda’s renegade actions ultimately lead him to folk hero status in the eyes of Austin’s liberal-minded music lovers; we root for him as well, because he’s so clearly been wronged on every level. Unfortunately, the story itself is rather implausible — would Callahan really be so dumb as to steal someone else’s song when it was recorded in front of countless witnesses? — and Callahan (much like Richard Sarafian’s unscrupulous agent in Songwriter) is frustratingly one-note; in addition, the numerous chase scenes become rather tiresome (look for evidence of Roger Ebert’s ubiquitous Fruit Cart Rule). But Susan Saint James is charmingly feisty as Fonda’s partner-in-crime, and director Richard Heffron makes good use of diverse locales in Austin and surrounding areas. The film’s overall air of infectious lightheartedness makes it worth a look, once, if you’re interested.

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Susan Saint James as Tina
  • Fine use of authentic Texas locales

Must See?
No, but it’s a pleasant enough diversion. Listed as a Sleeper in the back of Peary’s book.

Links:

Private Affairs of Bel Ami, The (1947)

Private Affairs of Bel Ami, The (1947)

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“I do not think it is easy to be a successful scoundrel.”

Synopsis:
A caddish social climber (George Sanders) in 19th century England woos a series of women, then discards them — all while remaining in love with a penniless widow (Angela Lansbury).

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Angela Lansbury Films
  • Ann Dvorak Films
  • Frances Dee Films
  • George Sanders Films
  • Historical Drama
  • John Carradine Films
  • Warren William Films
  • Womanizers

Review:
George Sanders starred in all three of director Albert Lewin’s literary adaptations: W. Somerset Maugham’s The Moon and Sixpence (1942), Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), and this film (based on Guy de Maupassant’s novel Bel Ami). With his droll delivery and arrogant demeanor, Sanders at first seems perfectly cast in the title role as corrupt journalist George Duroy, whose monetary and social aspirations lead him to cruelly manipulate the countless women who fall for his charms. Yet we never fully understand why Sanders’ “Bel Ami” is so appealing to females: he’s handsome, but not irresistibly so, and is ultimately too icily self-contained to convince us of his persuasive powers as a lover. With that said, the women he woos — particularly Angela Lansbury as his one true love, and Ann Dvorak as the wealthy wife of his consumptive best friend (John Carradine) — give fine, empathetic performances, allowing us to vicariously experience the suffering he inflicts. The film is beautifully shot, with striking cinematography by Russell Metty and creative period detail.

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Angela Lansbury as Clotilde
  • Ann Dvorak as Madeleine
  • Atmospheric cinematography by Russell Metty
  • Creative set designs

Must See?
No, but it’s worth viewing once.

Links:

Slight Case of Murder, A (1938)

Slight Case of Murder, A (1938)

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“Sure, I’m legit. I’m in favor of law and order.”

Synopsis:
At the end of Prohibition, a bootlegger (Edward G. Robinson) goes legit but struggles to sell his awful-tasting beer. As his business tanks, he goes more and more into debt, and soon owes nearly half a million dollars. Meanwhile, his daughter (Jane Bryan) becomes engaged to a state trooper (Willard Parker), and he must deal with four dead bodies that show up in his summer house after a local heist.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Black Comedy
  • Bootlegging
  • Edward G. Robinson Films
  • Gangsters
  • Play Adaptation
  • Social Climbers

Review:
Edward G. Robinson has great fun spoofing his infamous gangster persona in this light-hearted Warner Brothers satire, based on a play by Damon Runyon and Harold Lindsay. In an extended plot device that defies all logic, Robinson’s tee-totaling crime boss Remy Marco is so feared by his minions — and apparently by the world at large — that not a soul is willing to tell him how truly awful his bootleg beer is.

As a result, his post-Prohibition sales rapidly plummet over a period of several years, at which point Robinson — who has been eagerly embracing the opportunity to “go legit” and climb the social ladder — finds himself broke, but apparently not too broke to host a gala affair at his second house in the country, where all sorts of trouble ensues.

It’s silly, innocuous fun, with plenty of Damon Runyon’s distinctive dialogue thrown in to move things along at a zany clip. Ruth Donnelly is drolly amusing as Robinson’s wife, who struggles to affect an air of distinction befitting her new station, while Robinson is simply delightful. This one’s worth a look.

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Edward G. Robinson as Remy Marco
  • Ruth Donnelly as Mrs. Marco
  • Consistently clever dialogue

Must See?
Yes, for Robinson’s humorous performance

Categories

  • Noteworthy Performance(s)

Links:

Songwriter (1984)

Songwriter (1984)

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“I got cheated, and I wanna get even.”

Synopsis:
A country-western songwriter (Willie Nelson) tries to get out of a corrupt contract with his agent (Richard C. Sarafian) by having an aspiring singer (Lesley Ann Warren) put her name on his songs.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Alan Rudolph Films
  • Composers
  • Kris Kristofferson Films
  • Musicians
  • Revenge
  • Rip Torn Films
  • Willie Nelson Films

Review:
After directing Choose Me (1984), Alan Rudolph was called in at the last minute to helm this amiable, rambling tale about politics and survival in the country music industry, and his influence shows. More concerned with character than narrative, Songwriter introduces us to a host of quirky individuals — Willie Nelson’s “Doc” (essentially a variation on himself), Kris Kristofferson’s Blackie Buck, Rip Torn’s Dino McLeish, and Lesley Ann Warren’s Gilda — and then explores their interactions with one another as Doc attempts to get around the constraints of his binding contract with buffoonish bad-guy Rodeo Rocky (Richard Sarafian). Meanwhile, Doc rekindles a romance with his first wife (Melinda Dillon) and two young daughters, while Warren struggles to calm her stage fright by tippling hard liquor on the sly. Songwriter is the kind of movie that slowly grows on you, thanks in large part to Nelson’s sympathetic performance as Doc (he’s a genuinely nice guy) and Warren’s bold depiction of Gilda as a lost and nervous soul. (Strangely, Kristofferson’s character isn’t written very strongly, and he fails to make much of an impact.) The film is least effective when it’s explicitly aiming for broad laughs — whenever Sarafian and his henchmen are on-screen, for instance — but these moments are mercifully few.

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Lesley Ann Warren as Gilda
  • Willie Nelson as Doc Jenkins

Must See?
No, but it’s worth a look, particularly for fans of country-western music.

Links:

Experiment Perilous (1944)

Experiment Perilous (1944)

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“I’ve been living that diary tonight — living the strange, distorted lives of Nick and his sister.”

Synopsis:
A psychiatrist (George Brent) falls in love with a woman (Hedy Lamarr) whose husband (Paul Lukas) is possessively jealous of her.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Gaslighting
  • George Brent Films
  • Hedy Lamarr Films
  • Jacques Tourneur Films
  • Jealousy
  • Paul Lukas Films

Review:
Released the same year as George Cukor’s Gaslight (1944), this Victorian-era melodrama by Jacques Tourneur (his first A-level picture for RKO studios) is similarly concerned with the deadly ramifications of marital distrust and psychological manipulation. Its opening sequence, taking place on a train, is reminiscent of Hitchcock’s The Lady Vanishes (1938), as George Brent encounters and befriends a mysterious older woman (Olive Blakeney) who offers him her “special brand of tea”. Blakeney is superb in her all-too-brief supporting appearance, but her character is killed off in order to set in motion the chain of events that will eventually lead to Brent’s infatuation with Blakeney’s lovely sister-in-law, the equally mysterious Allida Bedereaux (Hedy Lamarr, giving a haunting performance). Unfortunately, despite plenty of atmosphere, the rest of the story remains disappointingly conventional: the mystery of who exactly is insane — Lamarr or her husband — is resolved fairly early on, so that the bulk of the narrative is simply concerned with Brent’s obsessive quest to rescue Lamarr from her controlling husband. Fans of Tourneur will want to check this film out, and it’s certainly worth viewing once — but it’s not a must-see title.

Note: The film’s title is taken from the following provocative quote by Hippocrates (voiced by one of the characters): “Life is short, art is long, decision difficult, and experiment perilous.”

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Hedy Lamarr as Allida
  • Olive Blakeney as Cissie
  • Tony Gaudio’s cinematography

Must See?
No, but it’s worth viewing once.

Links:

Murder by Death (1976)

Murder by Death (1976)

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“If you ask me, anybody that offers a million bucks to solve a crime that ain’t been committed yet has lost a lot more upstairs than his hair.”

[Note: The following review is of a non-Peary title; click here to read more.]

Synopsis:
An eccentric millionaire (Truman Capote) invites a group of renowned detectives — including Sam Diamond (Peter Falk), Dick and Dora Charleston (David Niven and Maggie Smith), Sidney Wang (Peter Sellers), Jessica Marbles (Elsa Lanchester), and Milo Perrier (James Coco) — to his house on a stormy evening, challenging them to solve a murder mystery before it occurs.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Alec Guinness Films
  • David Niven Films
  • Detectives and Private Eyes
  • Elsa Lanchester Films
  • Ensemble Film
  • Maggie Smith Films
  • Murder Mystery
  • Neil Simon Films
  • Old Dark House
  • Peter Falk Films
  • Peter Sellers Films
  • Play Adaptation
  • Satires and Spoofs

Review:
Neil Simon’s all-star spoof of literary detectives and Old Dark House murder mysteries was an enormous hit the year it was released, and remained a popular re-run on television for years thereafter.

A host of big-name actors give boldly satirical performances playing humorous variations on Charlie Chan, Miss Marple, Hercules Poirot, Nick and Nora Charles, and Sam Spade/Philip Marlowe — with Peter Falk in the latter role given some of the best lines in the film:

Locked, from the inside. That can only mean one thing. And I don’t know what it is.

Alec Guinness, however, steals the show as an hysterically incompetent blind butler; his attempts to communicate with a deaf/mute maid (Nancy Walker) are priceless.

Meanwhile, in his first and (mercifully) final acting role, Truman Capote gives a distinctly underwhelming and snively performance as millionaire Lionel Twain:

Fortunately, he’s not on-screen for very long. While the script itself isn’t quite as consistently amusing or clever as fans may remember from earlier viewings, I’m nonetheless including Murder by Death here as a Missing Title, given its enduring cult status — film fanatics will want to watch it at least once.

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Peter Falk as Sam Diamond
  • Alec Guinness as Bensonmum
  • David Niven and Maggie Smith as Dick and Dora Charleston
  • Eileen Brennan as Tess Skeffington
  • Plenty of clever satirical dialogue:

    “Conversation like television set on honeymoon: unnecessary.”

Must See?
Yes, as an enduring cult favorite.

Categories

  • Cult Movie

Links:

Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe? (1978)

Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe? (1978)

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“I am precisely what I am because I have eaten my way to the top.”

Synopsis:
A renowned pastry chef (Jacqueline Bisset) invited to France by a portly food connoisseur (Robert Morley) fears for her life when the greatest chefs in Europe are mysteriously murdered, one by one; meanwhile, her insistent ex-husband (George Segal) pursues her aggressively, and is determined to keep her safe from harm.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Black Comedy
  • George Segal Films
  • Jacqueline Bisset Films
  • Murder Mystery
  • Robert Morley Films
  • Serial Killers

Review:
Canadian-born Ted Kotcheff directed this innocuously enjoyable culinary mystery (based on Nan and Ivan Lyons’ novel Someone is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe), which possesses plenty of mouthwatering sequences in which breathtaking dishes are meticulously prepared (my favorite is watching Bisset carefully sculpt her impressive Bombe Richelieu). There’s a generous serving of dark gore as well, given that each chef is killed according to his specialty (i.e., a lobster chef is drowned, and a chef renowned for his duck pate is ground up). While we’re fairly certain we know who the prime suspect is, and why, we’re nonetheless kept in suspense until the very end; meanwhile, the romantic subplot between Bisset and Segal gets somewhat tiresome, but at least helps propel the story forward. Robert Morley is delightful as a morbidly obese connoisseur whose love of fine food is putting his life at risk (he deservedly earned a Golden Globe nomination as best supporting actor for his performance here), and several noteworthy French actors (Philippe Noiret, Jean Rochefort) make welcome minor appearances.

Redeeming Qualities and Moments:

  • Robert Morley as Max
  • Several enjoyable sequences of culinary wizardry

Must See?
No, but it’s certainly recommended.

Links: