More Like Weepin' Through

Film: Smilin’ Through
Format: Turner Classic Movies on rockin’ flatscreen.

I like Norma Shearer and I make no apologies for it. When I think about the classic actresses I love, I often forget her, though, because her career was voluntarily cut short. Any actor, actress, or director can swing a nomination with a good performance, but you don’t get six of them without having something on the ball. What impresses me the most about Norma Shearer is that she looks modern, like she could be plucked out of many of her films and dropped into something just going into production. With Smilin’ Through, that’s especially the case. Everyone else looks like he or she is in a film made in 1932. Shearer looks like a modern actress doing a period piece.

Smilin’ Through is a classic weepy romance of the early talkie years. Aging bachelor Sir John Carteret (Leslie Howard) sits by the grave of a woman who died at 19. Here he communes with her spirit, and we learn that the improbably named spirit, Moonyeen (Norma Shearer) is his lost love. Shortly after this introduction, we learn that the late Moonyeen has a niece named Kathleen (Cora Sue Collins as a child, Norma Shearer as an adult) who has been recently orphaned because of a shipwreck. Sir John’s friend Dr. Owen (O.P. Heggie) suggest that John take her in, which he eventually agrees to.

Darkness Promised, not Delivered

Film: The Dark Angel
Format: DVD from NetFlix on laptop.

This quest to watch all of the Oscar nominated films in the categories I’m looking at takes me to some odd places now and then. It’s led me to a number of movies I’d never have seen and am happy to have watched, but it also leads me to many films where I find the nomination and even the film completely ridiculous. Such is the case with The Dark Angel. This is a film that makes me question pretty much everyone involved with it. Couldn’t they tell this was syrupy garbage? Was there so little self-awareness that the plot headed directly into the silliest of melodramas?

We start with our three principle characters as children. Kitty Vane (Cora Sue Collins), while about six, has already decided that she will marry one of the two boys who live next door. True to Hollywood standards, the boys who live next door are not Kitty’s age but are closer to 12. They are Gerald Shannon (Jimmy Butler) and Alan Trent (James C. Baxter). Kitty is already leaning toward Alan being her eventual husband. We get a little bit of hijinks with the kids and then we flash forward to the film’s present when marriage between Kitty (now played by Merle Oberon) and one of the two boys is much more reasonable.

Lust in the Dust

Film: Duel in the Sun
Format: DVD from Mt. Morris Public Library through interlibrary loan on laptop.

Anyone who has worked on a group project knows that there’s often a benefit to having the suggestions of other people. Sometimes, though, other people turn out to be much more of a hindrance than a help. In the case of Duel in the Sun, King Vidor is give the sole directorial credit, but there are six uncredited directors on this film. Six. I can only imagine that at some level, this led to a “too many cooks” situation.

This is exacerbated, at least for me, by the fact that this film stars Jennifer Jones, who tends to leave me cold. This is balanced by it also featuring Joseph Cotten, Gregory Peck, Lillian Gish, and Lionel Barrymore. Still, I specifically watched this because Jones was nominated for Best Actress for this film, so she was the main reason I spent time with Duel in the Sun in the first place.

Fine China

Film: The Good Earth
Format: DVD from Rockford Public Library on laptop.

I’ve spoken of the acting prowess of the great Paul Muni before. He’s a forgotten actor these days, and it’s a damn shame. The man was, in addition to being a commensurate actor, a chameleon. This quality worked against him during his career because he was difficult to market. It works against him now, because he is frequently unrecognizable. In 1937, Muni had three movies released. One, The Life of Emile Zola, won Best Picture. Another, The Good Earth (the subject of this review), was nominated. It was a good year for Muni.

The Good Earth is an oddball of a film for 1937. It’s an epic, but it takes place in China, a world that would be completely alien to the majority of Americans. Once Muni was tagged to play Wang, the lead character of the film, the Hays Code required that any actress playing opposite him in the role of O-Lan, his wife, would need to be white as well. The role was filled by Luise Rainer, who became the first person to win back-to-back acting Oscars thanks to this role. It does feel like an odd film, though, especially these days with white actors in, for lack of a better word, yellowface. Some Chinese actors were used in other roles, but having white actors play foreign roles was hardly unusual for the time.

And Hello, Guacamole

Film: Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939)
Format: DVD from Mount Carroll Township Public Library on laptop.

I tend to pick movies more or less at random and according to availability these days. I did the same thing with the 1001 Movies list, not wanting to spend too much time in any one era or year. When I switched over to Oscar films, I was left with a number of years in which I had seen most of the relevant films and other years where I had seen only a couple. One of those years where I’ve seen most of the films on my Oscar lists is 1939, widely considered one of the greatest years in Hollywood history. It’s hard to argue that point, and Goodbye, Mr. Chips only adds to that year’s luster.

I seem to say the following a lot: this is actually a pretty simple story, a plot that isn’t really much of a plot. Goodbye, Mr. Chips is much more a character study and the story of a man’s life than it is an actual plotted tale. And really, that’s all it is. Mr. Chipping (Robert Donat) begins the film as a newly hired Latin teacher at a British boarding school called Brookfield. We learn that Brookfield has a long and storied history, having been established at the end of the 15th century.

The Barretts of Wimpole Street

Format: Turner Classic Movies on rockin’ flatscreen.

I have a B.A. in literature (I promise this is relevant), so I’ve studied more than my share of the classics. When it comes to poetry, I’m not sure that Robert Browning would land anywhere near my list of favorites. So much of his work is so obtuse; it almost always left (and still leaves) me confused. I much preferred his wife’s work. Elizabeth Barrett’s work was simple without being simplistic. It’s understandable and powerful because it is so understandable. So it came as something of a happy moment for me when, on their first meeting in The Barretts of Wimpole Street, Robert Browning (Fredric March) laments that almost everyone who reads his poetry finds it impenetrable. Damn right.

The Barretts of Wimpole Street is a sort of biopic but is more of a drama than anything else. Much of the film seems based at least vaguely on reality, although the darker moments that come near the end may not have been. I have no way to tell without doing more than the cursory research I’ve done. It’s an interesting extrapolation from what I could find about Elizabeth Barrett and her life before meeting Browning and their subsequent marriage.