Silent Sundays: Easy Virtue (1928)

“‘Virtue is its own reward’ they say - - but ‘easy virtue’ is society’s reward for a slandered reputation.”

            It is interesting to look back at novels and films to see how much a person’s reputation and character mattered in high society and even regular society. One of the things that kind of makes me laugh and also makes me angry was how society saw divorce as something scandalous almost like a plague when today we really do not see divorce as a problem. The topic of divorce in old novels and films makes me laugh because looking at how they though it was so wrong when today we just feel bad is crazy. It makes me angry because it always seems to be the woman who is scandalized and become a plague in society that men should not marry. The Alfred Hitchcock silent film Easy Virtue deals a scandalous divorcée and the next man she marries.

            Larita Filton is on trial for divorce. Her abusive drunk husband is filing for divorce against her citing adultery. In flashbacks we see the story. Larita was having her portrait painted by an artist named Claude. Her husband Aubrey stumbled into a session completely drunk leaving Larita unable to sit for her portrait for a while. When Larita comes back to have her portrait finished Claude confesses his love for her and wants to kiss her. Larita rejects his advances but it is too late for her husband to see she is rejecting Claude. He believes that his wife and the artist are intimate together. Claude tries to shoot the husband but misses. The husband then comes over and starts beating Claude. Claude in self-defense shoots the husband but does not mortally wound him. In desperation that he will be arrested Claude kills himself. The court will not listen to Larita that even though her husband is an awful human she was still there for him when he was wounded and she rejected Claude. All the court sees is that she is beautiful and that Claude changed his will that everything be left to her, a married woman. The court rules in the husband’s favor and she is branded a woman of “easy virtue.”

            To get away from all the press, Larita goes to the south of France. Even though she does not want any attention she soon gets it because she is flirty and pretty. All the men at the hotel crowd around her. One young man named John Whittaker catches her fancy. John is very sweet to her and soon proposes marriage. Larita is unsure because they know nothing about each other. John assures that all he needs to know is that he loves her and she finally agrees to marry him.

            John takes Larita back to his family estate in London. Right away his mother does not like Larita. John was supposed to marry another girl named Sarah. At dinner his mother places Sarah between John and Larita but that does not stop the couple from talking around Sarah. The mother feels she has seen Larita somewhere and finally finds a newspaper article about her divorce. Soon the mother starts to make John hate Larita.

            The situation gets so bad that Larita decides to leave John so he can divorce her and she will make it uncontested. Once again Larita is back in a divorce court at the end of the film.

            Easy Virtue was an interesting Hitchcock film to watch because it was not a film you would think when his name comes to mind. There is nothing suspenseful about Easy Virtue it is a straight up drama. But if you are familiar with Hitchcock’s films you will know there is usually an overbearing, evil mother in them which is what Easy Virtue had with John’s mother. I have to say in terms of direction this was one of my favorite Hitchcock films. His direction was so different when compared to his later films. There was a surrealistic quality to it. Some of the camera angles and shots were fantastic. Easy Virtue as a story was alright. I was not too crazy about it; it is a story that has been told countless times and it is one that gets on my nerves so bad. Besides the story I definitely recommend seeing Easy Virtue especially if you are into film-making and if you are a fan of Hitchcock’s films. 

Silent Sundays: The Pleasure Garden (1925)

There are so many aspects of early 20^th century history I would have liked to have witnessed. If someone can invent a time machine I would love to travel back to when my favorite classic films were released in theaters including silent films. That would be incredible to go back and actually see these films for the first time on the big screen. I would also love to be able to go back and visit some of the beer halls and vaudeville and Broadway shows. The beer halls or music halls and vaudeville seem to have been seedy yet interesting places. One silent film in particular that makes me wish I could go back and visit a music/beer hall is The Pleasure Garden from 1925.

            The Pleasure Garden is a music hall in London where Oscar Hamilton has gained great notoriety for his chorus line. His lead chorus girl is Patsy Brand. After a show an old man is introduced to her and comments that he likes the curl in her hair. The curl is part of the blond wig all the girls wear so she pulls it out to give to the man much to his horror.

            By the stage door is a young girl named Jill Cheyne. She is looking to speak to Hamilton about getting a part in the show. She had a letter of introduction but something happened to it. When she returns outdoors her money is taken by some men. Patsy walks out just as Jill’s money is taken. As a gesture of good will Patsy lets Jill stay at her place and tells Jill she can talk to Hamilton the following day about auditioning.

            Jill does so well at her audition that Hamilton gives her a part in the show. She eventually becomes very popular and her picture is all over the paper. Her fiancé Hugh comes to town to see her before he leaves for two years to work on a plantation. Hugh is a nice man who wants to work hard and come back and marry Jill. He brings his friend Levet to the apartment. Patsy is immediately taken with Levet.

            Down the road Jill becomes diva and forgets all about Hugh and begins seeing a Prince Ivan. Patsy has been seeing Levet and they are soon engaged and married. Levet has to go down to the same plantation to work with Hugh. One day Patsy gets a letter that Levet is sick and she has to somehow get down to where he is to be with him. She goes to Jill for the fare but Jill has become a snob and will not lend her some money. Fortunately Patsy’s landlords like her and loan her the money.

            When Patsy gets down to the plantation Levet is not really sick he is just a drunken idiot who has been messing around with a native woman. Patsy of course becomes very upset with Levet and tells him she never wants to see him again. Levet in a fit of anger begins to beat Patsy. His boss sees what is going on and shoots Levet dead to get him off of Patsy.

            Big shock, Patsy and Hugh wind up getting together in the end.

            The Pleasure Garden was alright. There really was no focus on the music hall throughout the film it was just in the first few minutes. Maybe it is a metaphor for other things, I don’t know. But for some reason this film made me wish I could go back in time and go to a music hall for a show (go figure). The only reason I watched it and the only reason it is not obscure is because it was the first film to be directed by Alfred Hitchcock. His direction is not what we know it to be. He had yet to master direction plus the story is typical melodrama and the acting is atrocious. The Pleasure Garden is only worth watching just because it is Alfred Hitchcock’s first film.

Notorious (1946)

“There's nothing like a love song to give you a good laugh.”

            Today is Ingrid Bergman’s 100^th birthday. Bergman is one of my all time favorite classic film actresses. Without her I would not be as into classic films and Hollywood as I am now. I remember picking up a few of her films when I worked at Best Buy many moons ago. It was at a time when classic films were starting to come out on DVD. The first of her films I bought were Spellbound, Casablanca, and Notorious. I bought Notorious because I love Cary Grant and so did my great-grandmother who told me about the film. From the moment I first saw Bergman in Notorious I was hooked. In honor of Bergman’s 100^th birthday I have decided to review the first ever film I saw her in.

            A German man is convicted of being a Nazi spy in America. The press is abuzz outside the courtroom not so much for the German man but for his beautiful young daughter Alicia Huberman (Bergman). That night she has a wild party at her place and gets tossed. At the party is a man she has never seen before. Apparently a friend of hers brought the man along. The mysterious man’s name is Devlin (Grant) and he is the last one left among the guests at her party. In her drunken stupor Alicia wants to go for a drive and she will be the driver. On the road she gets pulled over but Devlin shows the officer a card and they are free to go. This angers Alicia because she realizes that Devlin is some kind of government worker sent to watch over her.

            The next morning Alicia wakes up severely hung over to see Devlin standing in her doorway. He has an assignment for her. She refuses to do so until Devlin plays her a record of a bugged conversation between her and her father where she professes her love for America. Alicia’s assignment is to get close to a man named Alexander Sebastian (Claude Rains) who was an associate of her father’s. Sebastian lives down in Rio De Janeiro where other ex-Nazis also live.

            Down in Rio, Devlin and Alicia fall in love. They share a passionate kiss on a hotel balcony and profess their love for one another. Before they can even have dinner Devlin receives news that Alicia is to get close to Sebastian. Devlin is not happy about this and begins to pull away from her as soon as he gets back to the hotel room. Devlin is told Sebastian will be out riding the following day and that is where Alicia is to catch his attention. Devlin moves their meeting along by kicking Alicia’s horse so Sebastian will ride after her.

            Soon Alicia is invited over Sebastian’s house where he lives with his domineering mother. Also invited to dinner that night are a few of Sebastian’s fellow Nazi sympathizers. While sitting down at the table one of the men nearly has a panic attack when he sees a bottle of wine on a sideboard. After dinner the men sit in the dining room  discussing what had happened before dinner. They decides that the man who saw the bottle must be gotten rid of because he has other slips in front of people before.

            Not long later Alicia announces to Devlin and his bosses that Sebastian has asked her to marry him. She did not answer him right away because she wanted to know what they thought she should do. The boss of the operation thinks Alicia should marry him and so she does. Devlin is still angry with her even though she was assigned to get close to Sebastian and she is angry and spiteful to him because he is the same way towards her. Sebastian and his mother throw a party for his friends to meet Alicia. She has told Devlin at one of their secret meetings that Sebastian is hiding something down in the wine cellar and he has key he keeps on his key ring. Before the party she takes the key off the ring so she and Devlin can find what he is hiding during the party. They do not have long before the champagne and wine run out and Sebastian will have to go down to the cellar. Devlin and Alicia find that Sebastian is hiding a chemical that looks like sand in the bottles. They get out of the cellar just in time but not before Sebastian catches them together. Devlin pulls Alicia close and kisses her and tells Sebastian the kiss was his fault. That night Sebastian comes to the realization from finding his key all the sudden back on his ring and the chemical on the floor that his wife is an American spy.

            Sebastian tells his mother about Alicia. Being the sweet caring mother she is tells her son that something must be done about her and she decides to have Alicia slowly poisoned. The mother’s plan works and soon Alicia is too ill to leave the house to see Devlin. Devlin and his boss become worried about her. He tries to go see her but he is told that Alicia is not to be disturbed. Devlin finally has enough and goes to the house, heads up to Alicia’s room and takes her away. As he is leaving with Alicia, Sebastian comes out of another room where he was meeting with his associates. Devlin know Sebastian cannot do anything. Some of the men come out from the other room and see what is happening. They realize that Sebastian has known that his wife is a spy and has not done anything about it sooner. Devlin is able to get away with Alicia without incident and Sebastian’s fate is left to the men in his house.

            Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant are complete perfection together. Both of them were so outrageously talented as actors that worked so well together. Their onscreen chemistry just oozes out of the film. The scene where they kiss on the balcony is incredible because of their chemistry and because of the fact that the Production Code only allowed for a couple to kiss for three seconds at a time so Alfred Hitchcock had Bergman and Grant kiss then pull away while still in each other’s arms and then kiss again multiple times. That kiss is my all time favorite onscreen kiss. Grant is the epitome of classic Hollywood leading man. He was always so handsome but I do not think he ever was more so than in Notorious. Ian Flemming based the look of his character James Bond off of Cary Grant and you can see why so clearly in this film (although Flemming said he based Bond off of Grant’s character in North By Northwest). Ingrid Bergman was beautiful in every film she made. She was a woman who never needed the flash of costumes or jewelry to help make her beautiful she just naturally was. Her acting in Notorious is fantastic especially at the beginning where she is this bitter drunken woman and also later on when she is spiteful and angry with Devlin. I believe in the hands of a lesser actress Alicia Huberman would not have been convincing or worked as well as she did.

            Alfred Hitchcock is one of my all time favorite directors because he knew who he wanted for his films and how he wanted his films to look and feel. The man had a knack for picking out the best talent for his films. Besides the kiss scene my other favorite scene is the push up from the upstairs of Sebastian’s home during the party to the key in Alicia’s hand in the foyer. There have been several scenes where it goes from wide angle to a detail within the frame but what makes this scene more interesting and awesome is that there were no camera cranes in 1946 when this film was made. A scaffold-like structure had to be made where the camera could be lowered and as the camera was lowered the lens zoomed out into Bergman’s hand.

            Notorious is one of my all time favorite films as a whole and for the actors and directors. The more I watch it the more I fall in love with it and with Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant. I do not think I could imagine a better film to become a fan of Ingrid Bergman’s she was amazing. If you have yet to see Notorious see it as soon as you can and any way you can.

 

Rope (1948)

“Murder is or should be an art.”

            Alfred Hitchcock through his film did make murder look like an art. His murders were like plays. They started off as perfect ideas, acted out as dramas, and unfolded like tragedies upon the murderer. Hitchcock’s 1948 film Rope is based off a play and feels like a play caught on camera.

            The film begins with two friends Brandon Shaw and Phillip Morgan (Farley Granger) strangling their friend David Kentley to death with a piece of rope. They place David’s body in a chest in the living room. Brandon feels excited about what they have done, killing someone just for the danger of committing the perfect crime. Phillip struggles with how he feels. It is very obvious that Brandon dominates Phillip into getting him to doing and thinking anything he wants him to.

            To make the crime even more of a perfection and even more dangerous and thrilling Brandon throws a party. He has invited David’s parents and girlfriend and even their old school house master Rupert Crandell (James Stewart). Brandon even has the food served on the chest where David’s body has been placed. When David’s father and aunt arrive at the party Phillip becomes so nervous he breaks a glass in his hand.

            Phillip’s nerves run to the extreme throughout the party. Brandon has to tell him to relax and put him in his place from time to time. Rupert takes notice of these exchanges. To get more out of the boys he talks about his philosophy of murder and how it should be an art and done by inferior people.

            Eventually everyone begins to worry about David not showing up. His mother calls the father and says she is frightfully worried David may have gotten hurt and wants him to call the police. Everyone leaves including Rupert. The maid hands him a hat but it is not his. The initials on the inside are DK. Brandon relaxes a little bit once the party has all left including the maid. Phillip just becomes more agitated and drinks more to try to calm his nerves. Rupert comes back citing a forgotten cigarette case. Now Brandon has cause for alarm. His perfect plan is coming apart.

            Whenever Rope is discussed one of the first bits of trivia you will no doubt read is how there are homosexual undertones between Brandon and Phillip. Maybe there is but I did not see their relationship that way. I see Brandon as always having been a manipulative person. When they were younger Brandon saw that Phillip was not as strong in character as he was and just how easily he could get Phillip to do whatever he wanted. Brandon has a dominant, superior personality. He tries to manipulate everyone and everything around him. He thinks he is clever which is why he killed David. When David is killed it is not Brandon who does the actual killing it is Phillip. There was probably no way Brandon was going to be the one to do the actual killing that is what Phillip the weaker one is for. I find Brandon Shaw to be one of the creepiest film characters. He knew exactly what he was doing the entire time, he was dominating and manipulative, and he was insane.

            I have had Rope on DVD for years. I remember watching the film on TCM a few years ago and absolutely loving it. Even when I rewatched it on DVD I thought it was great. Watching it now I think it is a good film but not one of Hitchcock’s best. To me there is no great tension like the director’s other films unless you count the tension between Brandon and Phillip or Phillip’s building nervous tension throughout the film. I liked how it was filmed in real time. There are no quick edits just close ups of the back of a jacket or an object where the film had to be changed out. The filming style was not bad I liked how it felt like a play but it just does not feel like a typical Alfred Hitchcock film. Sometimes I like it when a director or actor or actress does a film or role outside of their typical ones but with Hitchcock his typical formula and style never got old. Rope is not one of the first Alfred Hitchcock films I would recommend seeing. Only watch it if you are familiar with his other films.