Classic Movie Picks: August 2015

by Lani

Each month, I scour the Turner Classic Movies schedule for upcoming films that I can't miss. The highlights are posted here for your reading and viewing pleasure! (All listed times are Eastern Standard, check your local listings or TCM.com for actual air times in your area. Each day's schedule begins at 6:00 a.m.; if a film airs between midnight and 6 a.m. it is listed on the previous day's programming schedule.)

After a summer vacation from blogging, I'm back with monthly classic movie picks -- and just in time! August is "Summer Under the Stars" on TCM with each day's programming devoted to a single star. It's a favorite time of the year to discover new-to-me films featuring stars that I enjoy, get a new appreciation for an actor or actress I'm not familiar with, or just catch up with favorite classics. 

Since I'm feeling refreshed, I've picked a film for every day of the month and every star.  Some of these picks are films which I've seen and possibly even recommended before; these picks are marked with a "*". The rest of the films are ones that I'm looking forward to seeing for the first time (so if it turns out to be a stinker, please know that I'm suffering along with you!).

8/1: Gene Tierney
8 PM - The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947)*
In this supernatural love story Tierney is luminous as the young widow Lucy Muir who takes a cottage on the English coast which happens to be haunted by the ghost of a sea captain.

8/2: Olivia De Havilland
8 PM - The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)*
De Havilland stars opposite frequent screen partner Errol Flynn as Maid Marian to his Robin Hood in this classic adventure.

8/3: Adolphe Menjou
7:30 AM - A Woman of Paris (1923)
In this silent melodrama directed by Charlie Chaplin, leading lady Edna Purviance is jilted by her lover and runs off to a life of sin in Paris, including becoming the mistress to a dashing rake played by Menjou.

8/4: Teresa Wright
9:15 AM - The Steel Trap (1952)*
An underseen gem! Joseph Cotten stars as a frustrated bank manager who attempts a clever robbery, yet finds his plan thwarted by circumstance every step of the way. His wife, played by Wright with her usual wholesome strength, serves as his conscience...but is it too late to turn back?

8/5: Fred Astaire
11 AM - Top Hat (1935)*
My favorite of the Astaire and Ginger Rogers musicals, this film has all the hallmarks of that series - a farcical plot involving mistaken identity, toe-tapping music, exuberant dancing, and glamorous settings and costumes from start to finish.

8/6: Michael Caine
3:30 PM - The Man Who Would Be King (1975)*
Caine and Sean Connery star in this epic adventure as swindlers who install themselves as rulers of a remote Asian land. The lead characters are not the heroic types we're used to seeing in adventure tales, but rather roguish opportunists who serve as prime examples of the corrosive effects of absolute power.

8/7: Katharine Hepburn
3 PM - Adam's Rib (1949)*
My favorite Hepburn-Tracy pairing has the two stars facing off as married lawyers on opposite sides of an attempted murder case. The scene-stealing supporting cast includes Judy Holliday, Jean Hagen, and David Wayne.

8/8: Raymond Massey
9:45 AM - The Scarlet Pimpernel (1935)
In this costumed adventure set amid the French Revolution, Leslie Howard plays the titular British vigilante and Massey is the crafty Frenchman on his trail. Often cast in colorful villain roles, Massey cited this film as a favorite.

8/9: Robert Walker
6:15 PM - The Clock (1945)*
This understated romance provides strong roles for both Walker and leading lady Judy Garland as a young G.I. on leave and the young woman who catches his eye. There is a magical quality to this film which is not only a love story, but a love letter to New York City (though it was shot almost entirely in Hollywood).

8/10: Joan Crawford
3:30 PM - The Women (1939)*
Crawford has a leading role among this cast of over 130 women (they say even the animals were female). In a perfect bit of casting, she's the scheming mistress who has enticed away poor Norma Shearer's dumb husband. Her final line is one of the movie's best!

8/11: Rex Ingram
10 PM - Cabin in the Sky (1943)
Ingram plays Lucius Jr., aka Lucifer, in this musical about the battle for a gambler's soul. The cast includes Eddie "Rochester" Anderson as the gambler, Ethel Waters as his faithful wife, and Lena Horne as a vampy temptress.

8/12: Robert Mitchum
10:45 PM - Thunder Road (1958)
Mitchum starred, produced, and wrote the original story for this drive-in classic about a Tennessee bootlegger who clashes with gangsters and the Feds. Look for Mitchum's son Jim, cast as the elder Mitchum's brother, and jazz singer Keely Smith.

8/13: Ann-Margret
8:30 AM - Viva Las Vegas (1964)*
This has to be the definitive Ann-Margret film; she gets to sing and dance with abandon, and she makes a perfect foil for the film's star, Elvis Presley. The first time I saw this as a kid, her dancing scared me a little -- she's like a wild animal! I wasn't used to Elvis having a screen partner who could match his raw energy and charisma, but that's really what makes the movie so fun!

8/14: Groucho Marx
8 PM - Monkey Business (1931)*
In this first Marx Brothers film made in Hollywood, Groucho plays..."Groucho." He, along with Harpo, Chico, and Zeppo also playing "themselves," is a stowaway on an ocean liner who gets mixed up with rival mobsters and their dames, all the while staying one step ahead the ship's crew. Love the gag where the brothers each pretend to be popular French crooner Maurice Chevalier (yes, even Harpo!). 

8/15: Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.
10 PM - The Corsican Brothers (1941)
You get double the "Young Doug" in this classic swashbuckler about conjoined twins who are separated at birth, both physically and geographically, but reunite as adults to avenge their parents' murder. 

8/16: Patricia Neal
8 PM - The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)*
In this sic-fi classic, the alien Klaatu arrives on earth with a message of peace, but finds that humans don't necessarily want to hear it. Neal plays a single mother whose son forms a bond with the strange visitor. 

8/17: Lee J. Cobb
9:45 PM - 12 Angry Men (1957)*
If you've ever been called to jury duty and imagined yourself as Henry Fonda's thoughtful and reasonable Juror 8, well, you're surely not alone. Cobb is a stand-out among this talented ensemble cast as Juror 3, so certain of the defendant's guilt due to his own prejudices, that he stubbornly resists any argument to the contrary.

8/18: Vivien Leigh
3:45 AM - A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)*
Can an actor have two signature roles? I think so; after all, Harrison Ford is Han Solo and Indiana Jones. If Scarlett O'Hara was Vivien Leigh's "Han," then perhaps Streetcar's Blanche DuBois -- a delicate, but troubled woman who clashes with her loutish brother-in-law -- is her "Indy." Of course, Leigh won an Oscar for both roles! 

8/19: John Wayne
8 PM - The Quiet Man (1952)*
Just a gorgeous movie -- for the Irish countryside in which it takes place, stars Wayne and Maureen O'Hara, and the lovely story of a quiet American newcomer who courts an independent Irish beauty. Wayne and O'Hara have an undeniable chemistry that gives the film a surprising amount of sex appeal.

8/20: Mae Clarke
8 PM - Waterloo Bridge (1931)*
I think I prefer this version of the tragic romance between a streetwalker and a soldier to the better-known 1940 film of the same name starring Vivien Leigh. Made in the pre-code era, the 1931 version is a bit grittier and features a memorable performance by Clarke.

8/21: Alan Arkin
1 PM - Wait Until Dark (1967)*
This tight thriller pits Audrey Hepburn, as a newly-blind woman, up against a trio of thugs led by a menacing Alan Arkin who invade her home to locate smuggled cargo. Both Hepburn and Arkin give first-class performances. 

8/22: Marlene Dietrich
8 PM - Witness for the Prosecution (1958)*
Dietrich is deliciously wicked in this courtroom drama adapted from an Agatha Christie play. Her other-worldly demeanor is used to great effect as a wife taking the stand when her husband is tried for murder.

8/23: Debbie Reynolds
8 PM - Singin' in the Rain (1952)*
Debbie is a "shining star in the cinema firmament" as a young actress who helps a silent-film actor transition to talkies. I guess this is my favorite Debbie Reynolds movie, since it is my favorite movie full-stop!

8/24: Warren Oates
6 PM - The Thief Who Came to Dinner (1973)
In this light caper, Oates plays an insurance investigator pursuing a jewel thief infiltrating Houston high society, played by Ryan O'Neal. Looking forward to seeing the Houston locations, including the Museum of Fine Arts.

8/25: Virginia Bruce
11 PM - Born to Dance (1936)*
This is a fun depression-era musical featuring the stellar dancing of Eleanor Powell and the not quite as impressive singing of Jimmy Stewart. These two youngsters get embroiled in a love triangle when sailor Jimmy rescues the pet pekingese of the famous actress Lucy James, played by Bruce, and her press agent manufactures a romance between Jimmy and Ms. James.

8/26: Greta Garbo
8 PM - A Woman of Affairs (1928)
This silent romantic drama stars Garbo and real-life boyfriend John Gilbert as lovers kept apart by prejudice and circumstance, triggering a series of tragedies.

8/27: Monty Woolley
8 PM - Holy Matrimony (1943)*
A frequent supporting player, Woolley takes the lead here as a famous, but reclusive artist who adopts the identity of his recently deceased valet to pursue a life outside the public eye. Complications arise, as they must in such comedies, as Woolley's ego gets in the way of his anonymity.

8/28: Ingrid Bergman
4:15 PM - From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler (1973)
A TCM premiere! Bergman plays a wealthy patron of the arts who helps two children hiding out in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I've heard mixed reviews of this one, but I've been waiting about 20 years to see it! I remember reading the children's book of the same name and wanting to watch the movie version so that I could see what the museum looked like. (I had never been to New York and this was before the internet was available.) 

8/29: George C. Scott
5 PM - Patton (1970)
Scott won an Oscar (and famously refused it!) for his performance as the larger than life General George S. Patton in this biopic which also earned Academy Awards for Best Picture, director Franklin Schaffner, and its screenplay by Francis Ford Coppola.

8/30: Gary Cooper
9:30 AM - Friendly Persuasion (1956)*
In this late-career role, Cooper plays the head of an Indiana Quaker family whose values of non-violence are tested when the Civil War reaches their doorstep.

8/31: Shelley Winters
12:45 AM - The Poseidon Adventure (1972)
Winters received her fourth Best Supporting Actress Academy Award nomination, having won twice, for her portrayal of a Holocaust survivor and former champion swimmer who is one of the surviving passengers aboard a capsized ocean liner. A classic of the disaster film genre!

Review: It Follows

by A.J.

It Follows

I must sound like a broken record (or corrupted mp3 file) when I say that quality horror films are few and far between. A good horror film can keep you on the edge of your seat, thrilling you with clever scares or unnerving imagery. But any horror fan knows that in searching for a good horror film, you’re going to see a lot of bad ones. Unfortunately, It Follows falls into the latter category. 

This film has a familiar beginning, though skillfully done: a teenage girl in red high heels bursts out of her house and runs out into the street then to her car. She runs, but doesn’t get away. There is definite skill in the staging, and it was clear from the outset that this was aiming to be a low-key, subtle horror film, but something was amiss with that opening scene. The random teen girl being menaced in the first scene is not just a horror movie cliché, she, and those red high heels even more so, are a signifier that It Follows is a film that will emphasize style over substance. That would be forgivable if It Follows was engaging and scary. However, It Follows also emphasizes style over scares.

The premise of this movie is intriguing and fresh. After having sex for the first time with her older boyfriend, young Jay (Maika Monroe) is attacked by him, drugged, and tied to a chair. He explains to her that he has passed to her a ghost that will follow her until it catches up with her and kills her. If it does, the presence will go back to following him. “It” can appear as anyone, even people she loves, and though it moves slowly it won’t ever stop following her. There is nothing she can do to get rid of it, only pass it along to someone else. Though clearly aware of the allegorical implications -- STDs/AIDS, or adulthood/maturity, both of which amount to decay and death to a teenager -- the film never fully embraces this subtext, insisting that the theme is open to a broad interpretation.

It Follows steers clear of some horror movie clichés (there is almost no violence or blood), but falls into others (Jay’s "nerdy" friend is characterized by big glasses and reading Dostoevsky's The Idiot). There are, of course, a few pop-up/startle scares. The climax is capped off with a creepy and memorable visual element. However, too many times I noted that while what I was seeing looked creepy, I wasn’t actually creeped out or scared. Is that figure in the distance behind Jay “It” or just a normal person? Speed walking or a light jog in the opposite direction is all it would take to diffuse the situation. 

At certain points It Follows moves too slowly, and the non-scary scenes fail to build dread and danger. The "scare" scenes, or potentially scary scenes, are separated by scenes of Jay and her friends talking like they are adults on True Detective. They wax poetic about the line between the suburbs and the bad parts of town, but those ideas are not explored any further. The one consistently effective element of It Follows is the haunting synth score by Disasterpeace.

I very much enjoy slow-burn horror films (Audition, John Carpenter’s Halloween,  and Val Lewton/Jacques Tourneur movies are some of my favorites). Because these films typically have low budgets, they avoid effects-heavy set pieces in favor of a grand, thrilling finale. The most successful examples make up for a lack of spectacle by building atmosphere and tension and creating full characters. It Follows clearly aims to be like the classic slow-burn horror films from the late 70s and early 80s, but ultimately it falls short in those crucial areas of mood and character and instead fills the time with dull teenagers talking to each other in rooms. 

Horror films can be flawed and still be successful. A good horror movie can have flimsy characters, plot holes, contrivances, it doesn’t even have to make sense (I’m looking at you Suspiria and Hausu), but it must spook, unsettle, creep, disturb, or unnerve. It absolutely must scare and, even more importantly, entertain. It Follows did not have me anywhere near the edge of my seat. Instead I was slumped back, my mind wandering to memories of other horror movies.