Princess O'Rourke (1943)

“Boy, are you lucky I was raised right. Or was I? Yeah, I guess I was.”

            Princess O’Rourke is a Cinderella tale told in reverse- instead of the girl being poor and marrying a prince it is a common American man with a good job marrying a princess. This a modern Cinderella story told during World War II. The film has its charms but for the most part it is slow with so-so performances from the leads.

            Maria (Olivia de Havilland) is an exiled foreign princess whose family has been thrown out of their country during WWII. Her father the king is currently living in England while she is living in New York City with her uncle Holman (Charles Coburn). Maria lives a very sheltered life she cannot go anywhere without being followed and she is bored always being in the apartment. Holman suggests to his niece to take a trip out to some friends in San Francisco for a few days. She agrees and takes the flight under the name of Mary Williams. Before she gets on the plane her secretary gives her a sleeping pill so she will sleep on the night flight. As Maria tries to get comfortable she cannot fall asleep so she asks for another pill. Three more times she asks for a pill the last time she happens to ask Eddie O’Rourke (Robert Cummings) one of the pilots.

            Maria finally falls into a deep sleep when Eddie and his co-pilot and best friend Dave (Jack Carson) have to turn the plane around due to heavy fog. No one can get Maria up she is so out of it. Eddie does not know who to contact to come pick Maria up since no address was left so he has to take her to his apartment for the night. Before he takes her to his place he takes Maria to a diner for some coffee. She says in front of the owner that all she wants is to sleep so he puts a sleeping pill her coffee!! Eddie finally manages to get her back to his place but calls Dave to send his wife Jean (Jane Wyman) to get Maria out of her clothes.

            When Maria wakes up the next morning she sees notes that Eddie has left for her with one of them telling her that they should meet the next day. Maria goes back to her uncle who has been in a fury looking for her. She tells her uncle that she spent the night in the lady’s lounge at the airport. Maria meets up with Eddie and he takes her Dave and Jean’s house before they go out for dinner that night. Jean is part of a women’s group for the War effort so she takes Maria along with her. Maria is moved by these women doing their part to help their country in a time of need she decides to enlist as well but is turned away because she does not have any common skills. So instead she is turned into a dummy for the nurses. That night the two couples go out for dinner. Eddie and Dave have enlisted with the Air Force and have to head out for a day or two the next day. Eddie asks Maria as Mary the refugee who was heading out to San Francisco to be an attic maid for an old lady (the story she told them). She tells him she cannot but does not give him a reason why. He keeps insisting and reluctantly in so many words says yes to his proposal.

            The next day Maria keeps trying to call Eddie to say she will never forget his proposal and him but he cannot talk to her for more than a few seconds so he does not get what she is trying to say. Holman finds out some more information about Eddie from an informant. He finds that Eddie is one of nine boys and his father is one of eleven boys (*dear God I have three younger brothers I cannot even imagine living in a house full of boys like that!*). With this information Holman calls the King to tell him about Eddie and his large family of boys and how the King has always wanted his country to be more friendly with America. The King allows his daughter to marry the commoner. Eddie meanwhile has had Jean track down the check that Maria’s secretary had written and that it came from an older man. Maria meets Eddie at Dave and Jean’s. Eddie is not happy with Maria thinking she was living with an older man who paid for everything for her. In order to explain everything she takes him to her place.

            The new couple is invited to stay at the White House. The more Eddie is told about what his duties are and how his children are to be raised the more he feels the pressure. The final straw for him is when he has to sign a paper that he has to give up his American citizenship. Eddie tries to talk to Maria telling her that he is in love with Mary the poor refugee girl who was going to San Francisco to be an attic maid. But Holman takes control of her like a slave as Eddie says she is and sends her to her room. Eddie leaves but then comes back because he has no other place to stay. When he comes back he sees Maria again but Holman shoos her back to her room and locks her door so they cannot see each other.

            Maria writes a letter and gives it to the President’s dog Fala (which is really Roosevelt’s dog) to give to his master. The next thing some people come, get Maria out of her room, and a Supreme Court judge marries Eddie and Maria and they sneak out of the White House happily married.

            The performances were good but I found them boring especially from Olivia de Havilland. Now I do not know if her performance was how she was directed or if she was pissed off with Warner Bros. and decided to botch the film somehow but whatever it was her performance was boring. I say boring but she was not bad. De Havilland’s performance was very calm for a comedy I felt she could have put more emphasis into the lines and the character in some scenes. But as I said I do not know if de Havilland’s boring performance was done on her own or if it was directed that way. Robert Cummings was a bit too much for me here. He is a good actor but after a while I could not take him. Jack Carson gave a good performance. Sometimes whenever I see Carson in a film he is too much and he just becomes annoying. Jan Wyman plays Jean in the film. I have never seen her before in a film and I liked her I would not mind seeing her again in another film. Charles Coburn always plays the characters that seem like they have good intentions at first and then turn out to be bastards. I really did not like him at the end of the film which was the point.

            Princess O’Rourke is a good comedy, not that great just good. I would only suggest watching the film if you are a fan of Olivia de Havilland or Robert Cummings, or Jane Wyman but other than that take your time looking for it.

 

Wells Fargo (1937)

I do not particularly care for western but yet again like I did with Four Faces West I had to make an exception for Wells Fargo because Joel McCrea and Francis Dee were the stars. I waited a long to see this film and finally had the chance when TCM aired it as part of their Star of Month series for Joel McCrea.

            Ramsay MacKay (McCrea) works for a mail express called Wells and Fargo. Their service gets mail to post offices quicker that US Postal Service. On his way to Buffalo he meets Justine Pryor (Dee) and her family after their carriage broke down. Ramsay brings Justine and her mother while the father stays with the carriage. He tells them he is riding fast and by the time they get to Buffalo mother and daughter are both winded. While in Buffalo Justine and Ramsay come to like each other.

            Justine and her family are from St. Louis. Her father is a builder and he is waiting for draughts to arrive so he can have a loan approved for a new project. Ramsay personally takes the draughts to Missouri to Mr. Pryor. Justine is surprised to see him and kisses him unexpectedly. She surprises even herself with the kiss and makes up that she is happy that her father got his draughts.

            Ramsay sets up an office for Wells and Fargo in St. Louis. The business is doing well in the city. He and Justine have fallen in love and plan to be married but just as they are about to Ramsay gets an assignment to set up a route and office in San Francisco. Ramsay leaves Justine behind since California is still a rough place and promises they will be married when he returns.

            Out in California Ramsay sets up a mail express as well as banking express. While telling a young prospector named Dan (Robert Cummings) that he can personally get his money to his fiancé in St. Louis two men who have not had any luck finding gold overhear. They shoot and rob Ramsay. Thankfully Ramsay is ok but the men who had given him the money do not believe that he was robbed and they go looking for their money. Ramsay pulls out a check from the company that will pay the men back their money that was stolen.

            One day a ship comes in. On the ship is Dan’s fiancé as well as Justine who has surprised Ramsay. They marry right away. Over the next few years Ramsay helps the company become very successful. The head of the company wants Ramsay to lay down a few stations to St. Louis from California which will take a whole year. Ramsay says he cannot he promised Justine that he would not travel for so long again. Justine seeing how her husband wants to go lets him go.

            In the midst of the route planning the Civil War breaks out. The family is for the Confederates. Justine’s younger brother died while fighting and the mother is devastated. She goes out to California to help her daughter. Justine is truly fed up with Ramsay being away for so long and his new plans to go out to Washington on orders from the president. She writes a letter to her friend who is a soldier for the Confederates telling him of Ramsay’s plan with the money. But she cannot do that to her husband and thinking she threw the letter in the fire runs out of the room. The mother picks up the letter and sends it. In the open plains of desert Ramsay comes across the friend and some soldiers. Ramsay is traveling with his own small army to protect the money. A battle ensues and the friend is killed. Ramsay is given Justine’s letter. He is deeply upset and for the next few years the couple does not speak to each other.

            Eventually Ramsay and Justine make up when he goes to their daughter’s seventeenth birthday party. He shows her the letter telling her to get rid of it when the truth is revealed who sent it.

            Joel McCrea and Frances Dee were wonderful together. They were both such good actors themselves that they worked so well on screen with one another. As I always say about Dee in my reviews of her films I have seen she as so gorgeous and so ridiculously talented. And I will say the same as always about McCrea that he was handsome and talented. I cannot help it I just adore these two as actors and love seeing them as a pair in films. Since they were married in real life you can believe them as a married couple in the film, you can believe their characters really love each other. Knowing they were real life husband and wife adds a little bit more to the film it is sweet to watch their scenes together. (Am I weird for always thinking when I see McCrea and Dee in their films that their sons must have been incredibly good looking when they were younger? Haha)

            Robert Cummings only has like three scenes in the whole film but I feel I must mention him because he was adorable. Also he was a good actor and this is one of his first films he made.

            The story to Wells Fargo has its boring moments but for the most part it is a good film. Wells Fargo is a hard film to find it is not available on DVD nor is it available to view on Youtube. If TCM ever airs the film again (this was the first time the channel ever aired it) definitely catch it. 

Souls at Sea (1937)

“The floor of the ocean is paved with the bones of slaves.”

            Souls at Sea is not a very well known Gary Cooper film unless you are a big fan of his. The only reason I even found this film was because I was on a hunt for Frances Dee films. If you read my blog enough or click her name at the bottom of this post you will see that I have nothing but complete adoration and love for Frances Dee and that I occasionally go on and on about how hard her films are to find. I was so happy to have found this and it was a real bonus seeing Gary Cooper and George Raft in the film as well. The three of them made very good leads along with the story.

            Michael “Nuggin” Taylor (Cooper) is standing trial for being a slaver and for the deaths of several people on board what is thought to be a slave ship called the William Brown. Several of the survivors defend him saying that he saved any lives he could, including theirs. Only one person, Margaret Tarryton (Dee), is upset with Nuggin. Towards the end of the trial a man comes forward telling the judge and the lawyers that he has evidence to prove that Nuggin is not a slaver. Through flashbacks we learn about Nuggin and how he came to be on the William Brown.

            Nuggin was sailing on a different slave ship with his friend Powdah (Raft) when the captain was killed. Nuggin let the ship be caught by British patrol ships and brought to port. One of the patrolmen, Tarryton, does not like Nuggin or Powdah, he along with his superior had the two men handing by their thumbs on the ship. Later on land Nuggin is given a proposal by a British intelligence officer to help cripple the slave trade since the man Nuggin has done his own work to stop slaves from being traded. The man gives the sailor the job of journeying on the William Brown to gain information and bring the ship under British patrol.

            At port in the city Nuggin sees Margaret and from the moment they lay eyes on each other there is an attraction. Unfortunately her brother is Tarryton the man who had Nuggin and Powdah by their thumbs. Tarryton is not a good man he plans along with another man to take over the slave trade in Havana. Margaret goes to her brother on the William Brown to plead with him to stay but because he had to tell her some of his plans she now has to go with him.

            On board Margaret and Nuggin get to know each other and they do like each other but then her brother tells her that Nuggin is a slaver and she turns away from him for a while. But of course since she is the lead female and he the lead male they fall in love.

            Tarryton plans to kill Nuggin the attempt falls apart when the ship catches fire and gun powder ignites blowing gaping holes into the ship. The ship going down does not stop Tarryton from trying to kill Nuggin. The two men get into a fight and Tarryton ends up dying. Margaret is furious with Nuggin she does not want to even look at him. He gets as many of the survivors on to the life boat. He tells Powdah to get in the boat but Powdah is beyond distraught when the girl he fell in love with dies from wounds from being crushed. He punches Nuggin knocking him back into the boat as he stays on board to stay with the body of the only girl he ever loved.

            In the end Nuggin is cleared of being a slaver by the intelligence officer’s evidence.

            The film is a lot better than I have described it. It is a period melodrama but one that is very bearable to sit through with a lot of action and great chemistry between the cast members.

            Gary Cooper in the lead was perfect you can definitely see him as the courageous man his character was but with a sweet side. Frances Dee was nothing but wonderful. The films I have seen with her so far she was very natural it always seems as if she is the character not just an actress playing the part. She and Cooper had a very cute scene together: Margaret does not have very strong sea legs and gets seasick. Nuggin sees her running for the deck to be sick and he nicely says that he can help her to which she says “you cannot help me with what I am about to do.” He says he can with some powder he got in Africa, it really works but it will give her the hiccups. He forces it in her face when she is being stubborn about taking some. Her brother sees it and thinks he is harassing her. Margaret feels better but of course has the hiccups. Her brother comes over and knocks some of the powder about and gives both he and Nuggin the hiccups. The scene was my favorite it was adorable.

            I have only ever seen George Raft in The Black Widow and by the time he made that he was older. I really liked Raft he was a good actor. He was so sweet and adorable as Powdah that at the end when the girl he likes dies you feel terrible for him. Raft had great chemistry with Cooper apparently they had a good time making the film and stayed friends when the film was done, you can definitely see their real friendship come through. I look forward to seeing Raft in more films now.

            The direction by Henry Hathaway was excellent. He did a great job of capturing the feeling of being on a ship with the up and down movement and it being tilted to one side. I felt like I was a little queasy right along with Frances Dee haha. The actions scenes at the end were excellently filmed.

            Robert Cummings has a small part in the film. The most he says is at the beginning but we see that he really admires Nuggin and helped him out a bit when the ship was going down.

            Souls at Sea is a very well made drama. I very much liked how it was not ridiculously over dramatic as almost all period dramas tend to be. I think that comes down to the story the story was not a love story although there  was some romance thrown in there but it was not the central theme. And also it comes down to the actors who were some of the best and did not over act at all. Even the bit actors were excellent. Souls at Sea is one of the best period films I have seen I enjoyed sitting through it. 

Dial M For Murder (1954)

“Smart, aren't you?”
“No, not really. I've just had time to think things out. Put myself in your position. That's why I know you're going to agree.”

            One of the many reasons I like Hitchcock’s films is because he always knew how to put together a great cast and he always had characters good or bad or sometimes both that the audience could sympathize with. Dial M For Murder is one of Hitchcock’s perfect films from the story and direction to lighting and casting.

            Tony Wendice (Ray Milland) is an ex-pro tennis player. He and his wife Margot (Grace Kelly) live in a small apartment in London. When we are first introduced to the couple they are happily sitting down to breakfast seeming to be the 1950s example of the perfect couple. Later that night we see all is not perfect with the couple as Margot is now in the arms of another man named Mark Halliday (Robert Cummings).

            Margot had met Mark the previous year when their affair first started. Mark is a mystery writer living in America so he and Margot correspond through letters. Margot is upset her purse had been stolen at a train station a few months previously along with a letter from Mark. The purse was recovered at a lost and found but the letter was gone. Ever since then she has received two blackmail letters to pay her otherwise they will show her husband the letter. Margot paid them but nothing has happened she has not gotten the letter back. Tony comes home and decides not to go out to the theater with them saying he has a lot of work to do.

            After Mark and Margot leave Tony phones a garage owner saying that he wants to speak to him in person about a car that is for sale. Before the man comes over Tony sets things up around the apartment suspiciously. Now as the audience we know that something hinky is going on. When the man named C.A. Swan comes over Tony sweet talks him a little and after a few minutes he lets Swan know that he has been following him and knows all his shady dealings. Tony’s explains that he followed Swan to blackmail him into killing his wife. Tony has found out about Margot cheating on him with Mark and now wants to kill her and he plans the perfect murder.

            The plan is set for the next night. While Tony is out with Mark at a party Swan is to come in and kill Margot when he hears the phone ring to bring his wife out of the bedroom. That night things do not go smoothly: Margot almost goes out, Tony’s watch stops, but the one thing that should have happened does not. When Swan attacks Margot she fights back and stabs Swan in the back killing him.

            Now Tony is all nervous and he frames the whole accident to make it look like Margot purposely killed Swan.

            The cast of Ray Milland, Grace Kelly, Robert Cummings, and John Williams as the police detective was perfection. Milland was one of the best villains/antagonists in Hitchcock’s films. He just had that evil, malicious, jealous, slick look about him that made him such a great bad guy. I am not a huge Grace Kelly fan I find her to be more of an icon and a cliché more than a great classic actress. But I did find her to be very good as Margot. This was her first film for Hitchcock and she was one of the director’s favorite leading ladies. There is one scene of her when she is being prosecuted (in a sense of the word) and put on trial where she looks, to me, so unbelievably pretty. She really is not the heroine of the film the main heroes, if they can be called that, are Mark and the Inspector who save her. She definitely pays for her sins of cheating. Robert Cummings is very good as the other man who accidentally stumbles into the real happenings of the crime. John Williams adds a little comic/suspense relief as the sympathetic Inspector Hubbard.

            With the characters of Tony, Margot, and Mark we feel sympathetic towards them even though they are all in the morally wrong. Tony is upset that his gorgeous young wife is cheating on him. Margot is cheating but she is the victim who was almost killed and then arrested for a murder she is supposed to have planned. Mark loves Margot and does anything he can to get her out even going to Tony to confess his love for her. I love how in pretty much all of Hitchcock’s films we are made to feel sympathetic to characters no matter how much they do not deserve it.

            Dial M For Murder is based off a stage play. Hitchcock excellently stayed true to the stage formula only moving out of the apartment set three times. He knew that the dialogue was the most important aspect of the story so he focuses more on the actors and the telling of their stories and ideas. His amazing camera work and use of colors and visual imagery keeps the one roomed setting from getting boring. To me the one roomed set and the claustrophobia it creates is what makes the film so suspenseful and tense.

            My favorite scene of the whole film is one that everyone has either seen a picture of or has seen it somewhere: as Margot is being attacked by Swan she reaches back for some sort of help. It is one of my favorite shots from a film. There is so much desperation on both of the characters and Hitchcock excellently filmed that.  Just the entire scene where Margot is being attacked was filmed and acted perfection .

            Another scene that I could not get over the way it was filmed was when Margot is alone with Mark in the apartment. They hear Tony coming in the door, they have been holding each other and we see them let go of each other and walk away in shadow. It is a bit difficult to explain you would have to see it but I loved it I thought it was awesome.

            Also as with all of Hitchcock’s films the score is top notch in helping to create suspense and drama. Famed composer and conductor Dimitri Tiomkin created a haunting, atmospheric score.

            Dial M For Murder is one of the Master of Suspense’s best films. Unfortunately this film often gets overlooked most likely due to the fact that Rear Window came out the same year and the actors besides Grace Kelly are not typical or recurring to Hitchcock films. I think this is one of his best casted films and one of his best all round films. It is one of the director’s most simple which is a nice break from all his chaotic films where the characters are all over the place.

            Dial M For Murder is a Hitchcock film not to be overlooked.

             

Saboteur (1942)

“Why is it that you sneer every time you refer to this country?”

            Rarely is there a Hitchcock film that is not perfect. Some of his films have their slight misses, too much going on at the same time, and confusion but unfortunately Saboteur is one Hitchcock’s flat out misses.

            Barry Kane (Robert Cummings) works in a plant manufacturing things for the government to be used in the war. There is a fire and Barry’s friend dies while trying to fight it. For some reason Barry is blamed for the fire and is now on the run across the country trying to clear his name. He has some clues and tries to piece those clues together. They lead him to a man named Tobin (Otto Krueger). Tobin is an evil man but he has a reputation as an upstanding citizen no one will ever realize or believe what illegal things he is up to.

            Barry manages to get away from the police after they have been called to Tobin’s house by jumping into a river and evading the police. He comes across the house of a blind man. The blind man knows that Barry has handcuffs on but believes him innocent. The man’s niece Patricia (Priscilla Lane) is not so convinced. When her uncle has her take Barry to the locksmith to take the cuffs off she intends to go to the police. Barry foils her plans and she winds up coming with him on his name clearing journey.

            Things begin to get pieced together and the danger becomes higher. By the time the two get to New York Barry and Patricia’s safety becomes uncertain.

            Basically the film screams American patriotism and “American values.” I was so completely bored by the film I kind of lost interest by a certain point. As Hitchcock put it the plot was confusing because the characters were confused. Normally I would not mind that idea but I did because the plot was boring. Hitchcock himself said the actors were boring they were not the kind of actors he wanted: Robert Cummings had too much of a happy, calm face and Priscilla Lane was too familiar. To top things off the director was not at RKO Selznick had him loaned out to an independent producer at Universal Pictures where the only actors on hand were Cummings and Lane and the script was written in two weeks. Not one of Hitchcock’s better ideas he set out to make Saboteur as an American version of The 39 Steps.

            Priscilla Lane and Robert Cummings were not bad actors. Hitchcock even said that Cummings was a very capable actor but he was just not suited for the film. He wanted Gary Cooper for Barry Kane but could not get him. If IMDB is true he also wanted Barbara Stanwyck… ugh what could have been with Cooper and Stanwyck in the leads!!! Lane is a good actress but like Cummings she just does not fit in a Hitchcock film. To make matters worse for me I just thought of her in Arsenic and Old Lace and I started to laugh. Even the villain was very miscast, I say he was miscast more than Cummings and Lane. Otto Krueger was a stock villain for Universal. He just looked silly in the role I laughed more than I was anxious with him.

         When I think of a cast for a Hitchcock film I have come to expect actresses like Ingrid Bergman, Joan Fontaine, Grace Kelly and actors like Cary Grant and Gregory Peck. They are brand name classic actresses and actors. These are the type of people the director wanted and he even said this is part of the reason the film felt flat as well. 

            The only really Hitchcock scene in the whole film is at the end which the climax of the story where the characters are at the Statue of Liberty and the real saboteur is found. If you have ever seen North By Northwest where Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint are on Mount Rushmore the Statue of Liberty scene is like that.

            Saboteur is definitely not one of Hitchcock’s best films acting, story, and even direction wise. The ending just ends I actually thought there was something wrong the DVD player for a few seconds. As one IMDB reviewer posted about Saboteur said the film feels like a product of second- tier directing by a director in the Hitchcockian style than by the master himself. I could not have described the direction any better. It is a shame because the story has potential but nothing really works out for it.

            Do not completely blow off seeing Saboteur as much as it does fall flat. The film does have its entertaining moments and it is a Hitchcock film and all his films should be seen.