OVP: So Proudly We Hail! (1943)

Film: So Proudly We Hail! (1943)

Stars: Claudette Colbert, Paulette Goddard, Veronica Lake, George Reeves, Sonny Tufts

Director: Mark Sandrich

Oscar History: 4 nominations (Best Supporting Actress-Paulette Goddard, Visual Effects, Original Screenplay, Cinematography)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Watching films made during World War II about World War II is such a strange situation.  This isn't a unique reality-films have been made during wartime about those wartimes in years since, particularly the wars in Afghanistan & Iraq (from an American perspective), but World War II has such finite dates & involves so many global players that watching those films during the war, about a war that the actors & filmmakers don't know the ending to is a bit surreal.  This is the case for So Proudly We Hail, a movie about American nurses who serve in the Philippines at the commencement of the war, leading up to the eventual surrender in the islands (and the Bataan Death March).

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie is told largely in flashback, as the women, including Joan (Goddard), try to instruct the captain of the ship they've been rescued from why Janet (Colbert) is unable to speak & is basically catatonic.  In the flashback, the women talk about the harshness of wartime life, but also about their friendships and romances.  Both Joan & Janet fall in love, the former with a lug of a soldier nicknamed Kansas (Tufts), and the latter with Lt. John Summers (Reeves), a romance that threatens her being courtmartialed.  Along the way they meet another lieutenant, Olivia (Lake) who is scarred from the war & the death of her fiancé, which eventually bonds her to the other girls once she admits the pain she's been going through.  We eventually learn that Janet is haunted by how she left behind John, whom she marries in a rush as they are evacuating, but gets some assurance that he could be alive, and they'll have the farm they always dreamed of in America, thus making her speak again.

So Proudly We Hail is not a good movie (though it's not horrendous-two stars seems more than fitting).  The film is overlong, and it's pretty sappy.  I am a relatively consistent Claudette Colbert fan, but this isn't much for me.  Colbert is melodramatic & weirdly bad in this film.  Her breakdown on the dock is cringe-y, and her relationship with Reeves makes grounding her character difficult to do.  She plays her role as a boring saint (critics of her may claim she does this too often which I don't agree with), and the anchor of having a lead that doesn't fit the film makes the  movie kind of a drag.

Strangely, it's Veronica Lake, an actress I find fascinating (but is nowhere near the talent of Colbert) that totally nails her small part, and probably would've made the worthiest nomination of the bunch.  Her racist soldier suffering from PTSD after the death of her fiancé during the Pearl Harbor attacks ultimately cannot kill Japanese patients like she wants, and has to (in a gorgeous scene where she lets her down for the only time in the film, suddenly becoming VERONICA LAKE) sacrifice herself in order to save the rest of the nurses.

Instead it was Paulette Goddard who won the Oscar nomination for this film, the only one in her career and though Lake's the better of the two (for my money), it's easy to see why they went with Goddard as she breathes some oxygen into an otherwise dour movie.  She's terrific, flirting with Tufts repeatedly (they have a great rapport), and toes the line between man-hungry & dismissive of men (since they always pay attention to her).  She doesn't get any of the big scenes like Lake does, but she's energy & that's more than welcome.

Before we go, the film received two more nominations I should note.  The Cinematography is big, but not all that outstanding.  The Visual Effects are also big (the giant shots of the boats is gorgeous, and the one cinematography moment that feels fitting of the nomination), but I don't know that they're all that noteworthy compared to other things that we had seen before.  All-in-all, other than Goddard none of these nominations feel all-that-earned, and like they were rewarding the concept of these brave women more than the movie that housed them.

OVP: The Blue Dahlia (1946)

Film: The Blue Dahlia (1946)
Stars: Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, William Bendix, Howard da Silva, Doris Dowling
Director: George Marshall
Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Original Screenplay)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

There's no genre in probably all of filmdom that I love more than film noir.  I have a penchant for "women who lie to themselves," romantic epics, and cerebral dramas, but at the end of the day you put me in front of a detective film with a jaded lead and a beautiful but dangerous woman in his romantic sights and I'm truly set.  This is why I picked The Blue Dahlia off of my DVR (again-trying to clean that thing out a bit over the next month), hoping that some interactions with the likes of Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake would be a great start to the week.  Unfortunately, the film doesn't have enough of a vested interest in its supporting cast and can't hold together its mystique (likely due to some famed offscreen issues with writer Raymond Chandler) to really graduate to a classic film noir.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film follows Johnny Morrison (Ladd), a discharged US Naval officer who is coming home to see his wife Helen (Dowling), only to find that she's clearly having an affair and throwing a gigantic party and killed their son in a drunk driving accident (it's a lot to take in in the first ten minutes of the movie).  Johnny threatens to kill his wife, but doesn't, and leaves, eventually meeting a woman on the street named Joyce (Lake), while Helen manages to get into all sorts of mischief, eventually blackmailing her lover and going home (unknowingly) with one of her husband's best friends.  Helen is found killed, and naturally Johnny is suspected, but while on the run-from-the-law he pursues the truth and eventually discovers the real killer.

It's the stuff of classic detective boilerplate, and with a writer like Chandler one should assume that it'd be better than it is, but the film lacks a few key elements that make for a truly interesting film noir.  For starters, the side characters, and really all of the characters, aren't that interesting.  Casting Ladd as the main character makes sense, but the rest of the cast isn't distinctive enough, and in particular the women don't stand out enough in the cast.  Chandler purportedly hated the film's leading lady, nicknaming her Moronica Lake, and while she was famously difficult to work with, he didn't give her a lot to do in the role other than occasionally seem mysterious and pretty.  It's hard not to think that a better actress like Rita Hayworth or Gene Tierney might have been able to find something stronger in the part, but Joyce is underwritten, and Helen is a bit of a cartoonish harpy-overall, his treatment of women isn't strong, and his work with men is hardly distinctive, not drawing the characters diversely enough, save for William Bendix' drunk-and-frightened Buzz, the highlight of the picture.

The ending also doesn't work.  Purportedly this was the studio's fault, as Chandler initially meant for Buzz, while in a blackout, to be the killer, and this made the most sense as it was disturbing and played into a number of the red herrings (as Buzz was arguably the only character who had no legitimate reason to want Helen dead), but the producers didn't want a naval officer to be portrayed as the killer so Chandler changed the ending and as a result sacrificed what was working in the film (the natural weirdness of a mystery where the killer was the only person who didn't want the victim dead).  By doing this, they might have appeased audiences but they hurt the film overall, and as a result it's a pretty lousy detective film.  There's moments to enjoy (I liked Lake's chemistry with Ladd better here than I did her films with Fredric March and Joel McCrea, and I get why they were paired together quite often), but overall this is pretty disappointing.

Those are my thoughts on this detective film.  It's relatively well-reviewed, so I'm likely in the minority here-anyone want to come to the picture's rescue?  Is it weird that this film essentially is remembered now for its connection to the entirely unrelated Black Dahlia murder?  If you haven't seen it, weigh in on your thoughts on Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, and Raymond Chandler in the comments!

Sullivan's Travels (1942)

Film: Sullivan's Travels (1942)
Stars: Joel McCrea, Veronica Lake
Director: Preston Sturges
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

I've currently been on a bit of a kick to see as many of the remaining "classics" that I haven't seen yet, finishing up both the original and the tenth anniversary AFI 100 Years...100 Movies lists, which brought Sullivan's Travels, arguably one of the least known films on the list, onto my radar.  The movie, directed by comic legend Preston Sturges, who also created the charming and wonderful The Lady Eve and so I was excited to see what was in store for me here, even if I haven't been wild about Veronica Lake in the past.  Thankfully, while I left this film with no greater opinion of Lake, my strong thoughts on Sturges remain intact, as this is a funny if dated comedy about the ravages of poverty during the Great Depression.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film follows John Sullivan (McCrea), who wants to make a truly great, serious picture about the hardships of the world (in a wonderful twist, the film he intends to be made is entitled O Brother Where Art Thou? which the Coen Brothers would eventually make into an Oscar-nominated film starring George Clooney some six decades later).  Sullivan, however, has lived most of his life with a silver spoon in his mouth, at least according to producers who want to trick him into continually making comedies, but this backfires when Sullivan insists that he must go out into the world and learn what the "average Joe" lives like so he can make an authentic picture.  The film follows a relatively traditional pattern after that, admittedly with loads of laughs, as Sullivan has troubles adapting to life on the road (frequently ending up right back at his giant mansion), but alongside a girl (simply billed as The Girl, and played by Lake), he eventually finds himself enduring the hardships and inequalities of the poor after being jailed in a labor camp for six years, before finally realizing that it's comedies that the poor need, not dramas, and goes back to live with the Girl in his mansion, a little bit wiser.

The film's physical comedy is the source of much of its joy, and it's actually quite amusing.  There are bits such as when Joel McCrea is trapped in a boarding house by a randy older woman who is trying to seduce him that had me uproarious with laughter, and it's extremely amusing to watch McCrea continually fail at being poor, as his money and stature just keep creeping back into the picture.  The supporting players are all regulars from Sturges' company, and they know how to mine a laugh, and Sturges is smart enough to fill them with occasionally powerful bite.  Frequently throughout the film we see that, in fact, the people who make pictures about the poor and downtrodden can't possibly imagine their lifestyles, and it's actually a pretty cheeky jab at the rich and their ivory towers.

This sharpness, combined with the brilliant physical comedy, make up for the relatively eye-rolling ending, where McCrea's Sullivan decides the world needs laughter.  Today this wouldn't fly, and it shouldn't have really flown then as what the world actually needed was O Brother Where Art Thou, as people in power (like Sullivan) needed to realize that the poor were being treated horribly.  This ending was a bit of a downer and very high-minded (and considering Sturges worked almost exclusively in comedies, also back-scratching), but the film is too good in the preceding moments for this to derail the picture.  McCrea is also wonderfully hammy in his main role, while Veronica Lake is the little girl lost routine that she seems known for, which borders on the creepy in my opinion as she seems to have more of a father/daughter relationship with McCrea than the romantic one the script pushes.  Still, even with the ending and the questionable romance, this is a thumbs up from me, and I'm glad the AFI steered me in this direction.

Those are my thoughts on Sullivan's Travels, what are yours?  Is anyone a big fan of this, and where does it rank for you alongside Sturges other work?  If I don't love Veronica Lake here, is she a lost cause for me as an actress?  And what classic films are you hanging your head over never seeing?  Share in the comments!

OVP: I Married a Witch (1942)

Film: I Married a Witch (1942)
Stars: Fredric March, Veronica Lake, Cecil Kellaway, Susan Hayward
Director: Rene Clair
Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Score)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 1/5 stars

With the Oscar Viewing Project, I do find that I am slowly but steadily losing my "viewing virginity" with a number of classic film stars that I had apparently never gotten around to watching, and that includes Veronica Lake.  Lake was a movie star for Paramount in the 1940's and while her most famous role remains Sullivan's Travels (still need to see that) she's probably better known today for being Kim Basinger's doppelganger in LA Confidential and for being one of the movie stars that ended up inspiring Jessica Rabbit. Like several other actors of her era (Betty Hutton, for example) Lake ended up having a weirdly compelling real life story, becoming one of Marlon Brando's many lovers and like Hutton eventually became a waitress when she had burned through all of her money.  She eventually ended up dying at age 50 of hepatitis.  This is an (albeit sad) interesting story.  Unfortunately for me, I Married a Witch is not.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film follows Jennifer (Lake) and her father Daniel (Kellaway) who are burned alive during the Salem Witch Trials, but not before putting an evil curse on the Wooley men who accused the two, dooming the men to always end up marrying shrewish, cruel women.  We come back to the present (well, 1942) and the current Wallace Wooley (March) is about to get married and is on-track to become the next governor of Massachusetts.  His fiance Estelle (a young Susan Hayward) is constantly berating him and clearly only marrying him because her father is making her.

After lighting strikes the tree that Jennifer and Daniel have been hiding in, Jennifer plots to take revenge on the present Wooley by making him fall-in-love with her, ruining his life by showing him something that he can't have.  Unfortunately, she accidentally drinks the love potion and ends up falling in love with him.  The rest of the movie is a series of mishaps, with Wallace slowly falling for Jennifer but her father Daniel is constantly trying to keep them apart in a variety of ways (including a morbid suicide scene where he wants to send Wallace to the electric chair, and another scene where Jennifer fakes her own death).

The film courts macabre humor with more abandon than you would expect. I don't know if it's because I've been more sensitized to such things through the years, but you'd never be able to make a picture like this where a main character is so cavalier about ruining someone's life through sexual blackmail and murder (at least not and call it a comedy afterwards).  The film's side characters are all a bit stock for me.  I get that Hayward, for example, is playing a cartoon, but did she have to be such a harpy (the film's words, not mine)?  It gives little indication why Wallace, who is an affable enough chap, would have sold out so ferociously as to marry her just for a higher office he throws away rather cavalierly later in the picture.

That lack of reason may be the film's biggest problem.  The movie occasionally has Wallace falling in love with Jennifer through magic, but that's only fleeting.  The film relies heavily on Wallace actually falling in love with her, and there's really no reason he would outside of looks, which makes him a pretty horrible protagonist.  This is because Jennifer is a truly vapid and awful human being.  The film wants her desperately to be Susan Vance from Bringing Up Baby, or perhaps even an early incarnation Samantha Stephens, but Susan and Sam were both insanely likable.  Yes, they had their flaws, but you still wanted to love them.  Jennifer is constantly trying to ruin Wallace's life for her own selfish gains, and the school girl/naive aspect of her persona border on the creepy.  Lake is indeed beautiful in the role, but she adds nothing to it and if this is what she brings to a film, I can see why she never graduated into iconic status like Rita Hayworth or Lauren Bacall did as her peers.

The film received one nomination, one of those countless nominations for Best Score that emerged during this period.  I have to say that while it's cute, and would indeed eventually inspire Bewitched, there's nothing particularly excellent about it-it's just a playful little score.

Those are my thoughts-anyone want to disagree with me?  Has anyone out there seen I Married a Witch, and if so what did you think?  For those that haven't, is there a Veronica Lake performance I should look for to wash the stench off of this one?  Share your thoughts in the comments!