KH Film #2: Christopher Strong (1933)

Director: Dorothy Arzner
Screenplay: Zoe Akins, based on the novel by Gilbert Frankau
Producer: David O. Selznick
Studio: RKO
Cinematographer: Bert Glennon
Costume Designer: Walter Plunkett & Howard Greer (both uncredited)

Cast: Katharine Hepburn (solo billing above title), Colin Clive, Billie Burke, Helen Chandler

US Premiere: March 31, 1933

KH Firsts:

• First film with solo billing above the title
• First film with costumes by Walter Plunkett, who would work with KH on nine more movies, through the late 1940s

Christopher Strong (Lady Cynthia Darrington)

I'll confess that I had to watch Christopher Strong twice. Why? Because the first time I tried to write this entry, I couldn't remember half of the movie. I remembered the cast, a few of the themes and the basic plot elements, but none of the particulars stuck around long enough to take root in the vast wasteland of my mind where I store all the other cultural minutiae. What's so strange is that I like Christopher Strong. I liked it the first time I saw it, several years ago. I liked it last Sunday and I liked it tonight.

We begin at a treasure (scavenger) hunt party, hosted by Irene Browne. In order to win, one must produce a man who has been married more than five years, is still in love with his wife, has never had an affair, and is willing to say so in public; and a woman over 20 who has never had a love affair and isn't afraid to admit it. Helen Chandler and her unhappily married lover Ralph Forbes are determined to come out on top and go prude hunting.

Oh, the 30s. When the spoiled children of the upper class had nothing better to do than drink all night and look down on the unsophisticated.

Oh, the pre-Code era. Where men and women acted like Men and Women, without the need for third act repentance.

Chandler drives home to grab the most loyal husband she know, her father (and title character) Colin Clive. Forbes borrows a motorcycle and goes after Chandler, only to end up in a drag race with Katharine Hepburn, a well-known twenty-something aviatrix who - what luck! - has never had a love affair. Chandler talks Clive into coming to the party (he is Browne's brother) and Hepburn agrees to go back to join Forbes - it's the least she can do after running him off the road when their drag race is interrupted by a cement mixer.

I just love Hollywood.

All of the above takes place in the first ten or so minutes. What happens next is pretty obvious since the man who has never cheated meets the virgin and they're played by the two top-billed actors (third billed Billie Burke plays Clive's wife.) Clive and Hepburn are introduced and take an immediate liking to each other, and Hepburn becomes a big sister of sorts to only child Chandler. Their friendship (Hepburn and Chandler) make it all the more difficult for Hepburn and Clive to fight their feelings for each other. But when they unwittingly end up alone in a motorboat together on moonlit night (don't ask), complications, as they say, ensue.

KH is very good in this picture. We're first introduced to Lady Cynthia through a year-old newspaper trumpeting her latest achievements as a pilot and featuring several photos. She has made a success of herself in a man's world, but has it been at the expense of living?

Perhaps I've played the fool myself in choosing to live such a lonely life.

What makes the line so effective is that she utters it without a trace of self pity; she's simply wondering aloud. When she and Clive first begin their affair, she's troubled by the effect it will have on his family, and at the same time enthralled in the throes of her first love affair. One scene in particular has her waiting for Clive's arrival at her home. She paces around the room, nervously smoking cigarettes, without saying a thing. She doesn't need to tell us about her anguish because we can feel it. It's a marvelous moment, a lesson in screen acting.

As I mentioned above, KH has solo billing above the title. For her second film. Granted, a large part of that is the way the studio system worked. KH's role in A Bill of Divorcement - a lovely young woman supporting the older established Star - is the type that exists in countless scripts designed to get an actress noticed. It worked and the RKO machine went into overdrive to sell their new glamour queen, beginning with Christopher Strong. And what's the best way to sell a new face? Copy someone else's look, of course! Repeatedly, but not throughout, KH is lit with what was called a "north light effect:" one light is placed high above the actress, causing her cheek bones to cast shadows down on her face.

Look familiar? It's the same technique Josef von Sternberg used to show off Dietrich, who had taken Hollywood by storm just three years earlier (though, like everything else, the effect was more dramatic on Dietrich.)

I think it's also significant that KH wasn't cast in another ingenue role or two before achieving star billing. Most of the actresses we now think of as legends (Bette Davis, John Crawford, Norma Shearer, Myrna Loy) started out as extras, but not KH. While she paid her dues in the theatre - she was fired from her first several plays - she was a star in Hollywood virtually from day one.

(Add that to her wealthy New England breeding (not to mention that accent) and it's easy to see why she may not have been the most well-liked person on the RKO lot, earning the nickname "Katharine of Arrogance.")

Christopher Strong also marks the first time KH played a lady of society. Contrary to popular belief, she was an actress of remarkable range - a topic I'll delve into in another post at another time - and her most heartbreaking performance is as the decidedly middle class Alice Adams. But her persona as an actress and as a star was built around roles like Lady Cynthia Darrington: Terry Randall Sims (Stage Door), Susan Vance (Bringing Up Baby), Linda Seton (Holiday), Tracy Samantha Lord (The Philadelphia Story), Tess Harding (Woman of the Year), Amanda Bonner (Adam's Rib), Violet Venable (Suddenly Last Summer), Christina Drayton (Guess Who's Coming to Dinner), and let's not forget Eleanor of Aquitaine (The Lion in Winter) were all, if not born to their respective manors, moved into them soon enough. After being declared box office poison in 1937, she had a major comeback with The Philadelphia Story in 1940, having learned the lesson that audiences liked seeing her taken down a peg - a lesson that became the formula for her most successful pairings with Spencer Tracy.

While the society role doesn't exactly mark a turning point in her career, it does make Christopher Strong a significant part of the KH canon. And as far as film history goes, it is the only time KH worked with Dorothy Arzner, the only female director in Hollywood at the time.

And where else are you going to see KH dressed as a moth in silver lamé?

Availability: VHS is out of print, used copies are somewhat scarce and run pretty high (the cheapest copy available through an amazon seller as I write this $36.94); it is in the TCM library and shows up from time to time.

KH Film #1: A Bill of Divorcement (1932)

Director: George Cukor
Screenplay: Howard Estabrook & Harry Wagstaff Gribble, based on the play by Clemence Dane
Producer: David O. Selznick
Studio: RKO
Cinematographer: Sidney Hickox
Costume Designer: Josette de Lima

Cast: John Barrymore (solo billing above title), Billie Burke, Katharine Hepburn, David Manners

US Premiere: September 30, 1932

KH Firsts:

• First film
• First film at RKO
• First film directed by George Cukor
• First film produced by David O. Selznick film

A Bill of Divorcement (Sydney Fairfield)

It's Christmas Eve, the Fairfields are giving a party and love is in the air. Mother Billie Burke has just obtained [film title] from father John Barrymore, who has spent the past 15-odd years in an insane asylum. She is planning to marry Paul Cavanagh, the lawyer who *ahem* helped her get her divorce, in January. And before night's end, daughter Katharine Hepburn will be engaged to David Manners. Come Christmas Day and everyone is thrown for a loop when Barrymore is released from the hospital (he is billed above the title after all) and returns home to try and pick up the pieces of his life. Hepburn is in for the biggest shock of them all, as she has been led to believe that her father's mental illness is entirely the result of shell shock from the Great War, when in fact, it is a hereditary condition. Or, in her words, "So... in our family there's insanity."

Really, the biggest obstacle in enjoying the film is its treatment of mental illness. The words "mental illness" aren't ever even used. Whatever is wrong with Barrymore, it's simply referred to as "insanity." Either they didn't know any better or they assumed the audience didn't know any better - it doesn't really matter, as the film's treatment of the issue was handled with sensitivity for its time.

What does matter is that both Barrymore and Hepburn give strong performances. Nowadays, a popular actor playing a mentally ill character may as well be costumed in a "Nominate Me for an Oscar" sandwich board. It's clear that in this case, Barrymore is only concerned with giving a sensitive and genuinely moving performance. Which he does.

But this is a Katharine Hepburn blog, isn't it? in Me: Stories of My Life, KH describes her entrance in the film:

"The first shot was at a party my mother [Burke] was giving. In a long white dress, I floated down the stairs into the arms of David Manners." (p.141)

"Floated" is the exact right word to describe the moment. George Cukor was the perfect director for KH's first film - and just because we now know how well their films always turned out (they made ten in all, spanning five decades.) Cukor was a marvelous director (check out his filmography) with a keen eye for presenting an actress to her best advantage. From Me:

He was primarily an actor's director. He was primarily interested in making the actor shine. He saw the story through the eyes of the leading characters.

When I made A Bill of Divorcement, he set out to sell me to the audience: running down the stairs into the arms of David Manners - throwing myself on the floor - in Barrymore's arms. A sort of isn't-she-fascinating approach.

I'm sure it helped that she was as fascinating as he made her seem. She's good, especially for the first time out. What's remarkable is seeing a young actress with so much promise, already knowing that her career would exceed all imaginable expectations. Everything she had that made her a great actress and a great star is apparent, even if she hasn't quite learned how to use it all just yet.

This next part covers a major spoiler and I just hate it when a reviewer tells you a movie is worth seeing and then tells you how it ends. Highlight the big blank part to read it.

Burke goes off to marry Cavanagh as originally planned. Barrymore accepts that her life has moved on without him and he loves her enough to not deny her her happiness. He is content to live with his daughter and finally enjoy the company of the child he never knew. She hasn't told him that she's engaged and she forbids anyone else from revealing same, ultimately giving up her fiancee for her father, the man who needs her more. All of this is beautifully depicted in one gesture. Hepburn and Barrymore are sitting together after Burke and Cavanagh have gone and she hears Manners calling to her (they whistle to each other, it's cute) from outside. She gets up, walks to the window, closes the drapes and goes back to her father. No tears. No speeches. It's heartbreaking and devastating.

End spoiler.

Rating: 7/10

Availability: VHS is out of print, but used copies are readily available and reasonably priced; shows up on Turner Classic Movies from time to time.

Inland Empire

The movie: Inland Empire

The director: David Lynch

The year: 2006

The cast: Laura Dern, Jeremy Irons, Justin Theroux

The confession I made to my friend Paul afterwards: "I think I lasted about an hour. After that, I didn't know who anybody was, what was going on, or why it took three hours to get there. Actually, I think it was more like 45 minutes. I only said 'an hour' to give myself more credit."

The first 45 minutes of the plot: Dern and Theroux are making a movie directed by Irons. It's a remake of something that never was finished because the leads were both murdered. And a strange German woman just moved into Dern's neighborhood. Julia Ormand watches human-sized rabbits dressed in people clothes on TV. Harry Dean Stanton, the AD, is broke and shamelessly borrows money from everyone in the cast. That covers the first 45 minutes.

The Point: um...it had Laura Dern? Does that count? And Justin Theroux and Jeremy Irons are both pretty hot. And it looked cool. But what the hell was up with those rabbits?

The score: 5.5/10

Why a 5.5 for something so baffling? I want to give Lynch the benefit of the doubt. I'm sure he thinks the movie makes sense. And maybe I will, too, someday. And it had Laura Dern. And Justin Theroux and Jeremy Irons are both pretty hot. And it looked cool. And I'd rather sit through Inland Empire two or three more times before a Date Movie/Epic Movie double feature.

Review: The Cincinnati Kid

The Movie: The Cincinnati Kid

The Director: Norman Jewison

The Screenplay: Ring Lardner, Jr. & Terry Southern.

The Cast: Steve McQueen, Eddie G, Karl Malden, Joan Blondell, Ann-Margret, Tuesday Weld, Cab Calloway and a surpringly hot young Rip Torn.

The Year: 1965

The connections: Jewison would direct McQueen in The Thomas Crown Affair three years later.
McQueen and Weld played opposite each other two years earlier in Soldier in the Rain.
Robinson and Blondell co-starred in Bullets or Ballots 29 years earlier.

Let’s pause a moment to consider: Only someone as cool as Steve McQueen could pull off the name Steve McQueen.

The plot: Everyone gathers in New Orleans to play poker. More to the point, to pit McQueen, the Kid, against Robinson, the Man, to see who comes out on top. Malden sets it all up and acts as dealer. He’s married to a very unfaithful and expensive Ann-Margret. Torn tries to fix the game by promising Malden a cut. Weld is McQueen’s fresh-off-the-farm girlfriend. Calloway sits in on the game. Joan Blondell is called in to spell Malden and needle the hell out of Robinson.

The point: Death before dishonor. What’s the point of honor if your dead? What’s the point of a life without honor?
Also intergenerational warfare and a good old-fashioned virgin/tramp showdown.

Double Feature Fun: The Sting.

Rating: 9/10. The cast, director and authors raise expectations before the opening titles are over and they all deliver. What makes the film great is that the whole adds up to more than the sum of its parts. Credit Jewison, cinematographer Philip H. Lathrop, editor Hal Ashby and especially producer Martin Ransohoff for bringing them all together.

Very Short Reviews: United 93 and Babel

United 93 (2006, Paul Greengrass): 7.5/10
Everything that takes place on the ground works, effectively conveying the confusion, disbelief and horror of the events of that day. The scenes on the plane are less effective. It turns out Greengrass's version of what probably happened is what everyone else assumes probably happened.

Babel (2006, Alejandro González Iñárritu): 8/10
Babel has a lesson: Even though we may speak different languages, we're all still human beings. Also, don't shoot at cars. Cate Blanchett is as good as ever, but the film belongs to Adriana Barraza and Rinko Kikuchi. Brad Pitt plays the same Average-Joe-stuck-in-an-extraordinary-situation character he played in Se7en. He's better this time, but that's not saying a whole heckuva lot.