Babes in Arms (1939) **

As a fan of the larger than life production numbers that Busby Berkeley choreographed for such films as 42nd Street (1933), Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933), and Footlight Parade (1933), I must admit that I found his Babes in Arms (1939) to be rather pedestrian. Furthermore, if the last scene, “God’s Country”, were cut, I wouldn’t believe Berkley had anything to do with it, sans the fact that he’s credited as the director in the beginning of the movie.  And, how in the world was MGM allowed to say this was based on a Rodgers & Hammerstein musical when almost all of the original Broadway songs were cut and replaced by mediocre melodies?  The only thing that saves Babes in Arms for me is Judy Garland’s beautiful voice—and even that is somewhat tainted when she has to sing with Mickey Rooney and/or Betty Jaynes. 

Tough times hit the vaudeville world when the talkies take over at the box office and old troopers like Joe Moran (Charles Winninger) and his wife Florrie (Grace Hayes) find they can’t make a living anymore.  When Joe gets the old-timers together for a revival tour he says they can’t take any excess baggage along—this means no kids, even if they are more talented than their “has-been” parents. Foreseeing that things aren’t going to go well for their out-of-touch parents and with the threat of being sent away to a trade school, Mickey (Mickey Rooney) decides that he and the other kids should put on their own show in their hometown.  And, so he writes and produces his own musical—which we never actually get to see, sans one unfortunate number, “Daddy Was a Minstrel Man” in which almost the entire cast performs in blackface.  I won’t spoil the ending, but needless to say it ends like most 1930s musicals—happily, at least for those in the film, perhaps not so much for musical lovers.

While I didn’t really like Babes in Arms, I can’t say that it was a bad film—it just wasn’t very good.  I don’t know if MGM was in a hurry to cash in on how well Judy Garland’s The Wizard of Oz (1939) did at the box office and decided to rush it through post-production or what, but there is a lack of substance to it that just irks me.  I don’t care if it earned two Academy Award nominations (Best Actor, Rooney—really?--and Best Music) and made a boat load of cash—even more than The Wizard of Oz—oh, the inhumanity!—it’s not what I think a top-notch musical should be.  It doesn’t help either that I dislike every musical number except “Good Morning” and “I Cried for You”, both of which Garland primarily performs alone.  Another pet peeve is that I have to listen to Jaynes and Douglas McPhail sing the same song twice, “Where or When”, in the span of five minutes. I could have done without the first rendition, let alone a back-to-back rehashing of the song, which sounded exactly the same as it did the first time I heard it two minutes earlier!  And, finally, suffice to say, I was not happy to see Garland sing in blackface—even if the song was paying homage to that old vaudeville standard, it still doesn’t leave a pleasant image in my mind—which is how I also feel about seeing Bing Crosby perform“Abraham” in blackface in Holiday Inn (1942). Yes,I know Garland had done this in a previous film, Everybody Sing (1938), but fortunately I’ve never seen that. 

Oddly enough, other than the two memorable songs sung by Garland, the most interesting thing about Babes in Arms are the ancillary performances of Guy Kibbee and Margaret Hamilton. Kibbee’s Judge Black’s conversation with Hamilton’s Martha Steele, who’s the head of the Welfare Board, about what is best for the vaudeville children is probably the most interesting dialogue exchange in the entire film. More of them and less of Baby Rosalie (June Preisser) would have done wonders for the movie, I’m sure.

Overall, Babes in Arms is probably the least interesting musical I have watched that appears in the 1001 Movies book. Thankfully, Judy Garland’s voice got me through it. 

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Ninotchka (1939) ****

When MGM marketed director Ernst Lubitsch’s political satirical 1939 comedy, Ninotchka, they used the catchphrase, “Garbo laughs”. While Greta Garbo had most assuredly laughed in her previous films, this was her first comedy film and she played her part perfectly.  It helped that screenwriters Billy Wilder, Walter Reisch, Charles Brackett, and Melchior Lengyel’s Oscar-nominated script was tailored made to fit Garbo’s serious on and off-screen persona.  As a result, Ninotchka benefitted immensely from having the perfect script for just the right actress who was supported by an eccentric cast, and who was directed by the only man who could pull it all together. 

When Lubitsch decided to make Ninotchka he wanted to cast Garbo in the lead but was worried that she might not be able to play the part as he wanted.  As such, he had an interview with her in which after several minutes of anxious, serious small talk he asked her, almost accusingly, “Can you laugh?” Garbo, for her part, was amused by the question and told him she believed she could.  But, Lubitsch pressed on and explained that he didn’t want a small, polite laugh but that he wanted a “wide-open and completely spontaneous laugh”. Garbo said she’d have to think about it for a day.  When she returned the following day she answered Lubitsch by saying, “Your question and the idea--can you laugh is silly. And I love it.”  She then proceeded to laugh quite heartily, as did Lubitsch, and they, of course, ended up making a Oscar-nominated film that showcased probably Garbo’s most rounded performance ever.  Oh, and the conversation also turned into one of the best film marketing campaigns ever.

Most of the story takes place in 1920s Paris, where three Soviet emissaries, Iranov (Sig Ruman), Buljanov (Felix Bressart) and Kopalsky (Alexander Granach) are trying to sell the crown jewels of the Grand Duchess Swana (Ina Claire). The jewelry sale is of great importance to the Soviet people, as it is expected that the year’s crop is going to be quite poor and the money will go toward feeding the nation.  However, the emissaries are beguiled by the luxuries of the Western world and end up being sidetracked by the Duchesses’ smooth-talking lover, Count Leon d’Algout (Melvyn Douglas).  When the pending jewelry sale ends up in the French courts, the Soviet government decides to send in reinforcements in the form of a no-nonsense hard-liner, Nina Ivanovna Yakushova, “Ninotchka” (Garbo). 

Of course, it is Ninotchka’s stolid, straight-talking, all-business nature that makes the story as funny as it is.  Her tone is set from the moment she steps off the train and refuses to allow a porter to carry her bags and asks him, “Why should you carry other people’s bags?” To which the porter answers, “Well, that’s by business, Madame.” Her retort, “That’s no business. That’s social injustice.”  His reply, “That depends on the tip.” The audience laughs, but not Ninotchka.  And the story continues on like this for quite some time, with Ninotchka matter-of-factly addressing the bumbling antics of her comrades and finding herself appalled by the consumerism of the Western world: two-thousand francs for a hotel room could buy a cow for the Soviet people; ordering raw beets and carrots in a French restaurant; and, inciting ladies’ room attendants to strike for better wages.  Through it all, Garbo plays her Oscar-nominated part to the hilt, never giving away that she is in on the jokes that the audience is laughing at. Her willingness to allow her true persona to be the butt of the joke is what makes the film so great. In one of her first scenes in the movie, her character is asked, “Do you want to be alone, comrade?”, a direct jab at her infamous line from Grand Hotel (1932) which became synonymous with her on-screen and off-screen personality. 

Yet, Ninotchka would have not been quite as good as it is if Garbo’s character didn’t transform a little, and that’s where Douglas’ character comes in.  Even a hard-line Russian girl can be sidetracked by a smooth-talking man—even if she constantly one-ups him with classic lines like, “Your general appearance is not distasteful,” and “We don't have men like you in my country. That is why I believe in the future of my country.”  And, yes, he is what finally makes her laugh a “wide-open and completely spontaneous laugh” with his complete ridiculousness.

Still, it’s not the love story that draws you in, it is the personal, though hilarious, transformation of Ninotchka. Through Ninotchka’s true education to the workings of the world and the true nature of communism, Lubitsch is able to show his main character’s growth as well as to expose the idiocy of the Soviet system.  No one did satirical social and/or political comedy better than Lubitsch, and Ninotchka was the perfect vehicle for him to attack Soviet propaganda.  Perhaps 1939 wasn’t the best time to tick off the Soviets, as less than three months prior to the film’s release the Soviets had signed the Non-Aggression Pact with Hitler.  In any case, Lubitsch’s cunning but polite ridicule of the Soviet system is perhaps the best film depiction of communism of its time.  He would, of course, follow this successful political satire up with perhaps his greatest satire, To Be or Not To Be (1942), when he took on the Nazis—you see, he was an equal-opportunity ridiculer.

Overall, I adore Ninotchka.  While I love Garbo drama, I most admire this performance because it is her most-rounded role ever.  Additionally, I’m a sucker for well-done satire, and when it so deftly exposes the true nature of a political party or a historical mindset all the better.

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Gunga Din (1939) **

Director George Stevens’ Gunga Din (1939) is a product of its time.  Loosely based on the Rudyard Kipling poem of the same name, this 75-year old film celebrates British colonialism in a strangely uneven way.  At times, it is a buddy comedy and at other times it is a serious action/war picture—as such, it is difficult to pigeonhole it into a particular genre.  The film itself is not bad, but its plot has not aged well and can be off-putting to some.

Set in the Hindu Kush region of India, circa 1880, the British are dealing with a local murder cult known as the Thuggee who are also freedom fighters.  When the Thuggee murder an entire outpost and disable the telegraph line, three sergeants are asked to lead a small group of soldiers to investigate and repair the telegraph.  Sergeant Cutter (Cary Grant) is a cockney soldier always on the lookout for a get rich quick scheme, usually in the form of buried treasure. Sergeant MacChesney (Victor McLaglen) is the leader of the group, who has a fondness for elephants. And, Sergeant Ballantine (Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.) is counting the days until his discharge so he can get married (to Joan Fontaine) and go into the tea business. It’s obvious the three men are great friends, but the prospect of Sergeant Ballantine leaving the group to get married causes both friction and joviality in the story. 

There are many reasons why Gunga Din has not aged well. First, an American film celebrating British colonialism in a post-colonial world is very rarely viewed fondly. Second, most, if not all, of the Indians are played by white men wearing body paint.  You add this irritating detail to the fact that Gunga Din (Sam Jaffe) sacrifices himself for the British army at the cost of the lives of his countrymen and you can’t help but cringe.  Furthermore, after allowing the Guru (Eduardo Ciannelli) to give a rather impassioned speech about how old and accomplished India is compared to that of Britain, screenwriters Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur, Joel Sayre, and Fred Guiol then portray him as a complete madman.  Additionally, when one considers that the Indian people were, for the most part peacefully, trying to extricate themselves of British rule in 1939, led by Gandhi, a picture glorying the bravery and might of the British army seems a tad insensitive. 

The overall atmosphere of Gunga Din doesn’t abate the movie’s overall insensitivity, either. Had the film been a more focused, dramatic look at the conflict between the British and the Thuggee, it may have been more palatable.  Instead, Stevens jumps back and forth between seriousness and inanity.  While it was great to hear Grant’s natural cockney accent, his screwball antics throughout the film are grating to say the least.  And, while one can’t complain about anything that celebrates the bonds of soldiers, there is a fine line between showcasing and ridiculing such bonds. Gunga Din does not traverse this line well, and, as such, there is an uneven feel to the overall production.  Had the film been more focused, and the runtime cut by about 15 to 20 minutes, I think I would have enjoyed it, even with its insensitive message, a lot more than I did.

Gunga Din did earn one Academy Award nomination for Best Black and White Cinematography (Joseph H. August), which was probably the best thing about it.  Shooting massive battle scenes in the middle of the Sierra Nevada and Alabama Hills and then trying to pass them off as having taken place in the Khyber Pass was no small feat, but August and Stevens pulled it off.  Still, this is not enough to make this a must-see film, either.

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Daybreak (Le jour se lève) 1939 **

There are two important, though strange, reasons why director Marcel Carné’s Le jour se lève (Daybreak, 1939) is still considered an important element of French filmmaking. First, and probably most importantly, it is considered by many critics to be the greatest cinematic example of French poetic realism—I do not concur and will speak to that momentarily.  Second, it was suppressed not once but twice for two very extreme reasons.  With a resume like this, is it any wonder why Le jour se lève retains a place in some critics’ film Pantheon? Alas, for me, at least, it does not shine quite so brightly.

Jean Gabin was the greatest French actor of his generation. He worked with the best French directors: Jean Renoir, Julien Duvivier, Jacques Becker, and René Clément, on some of the most important films to come out of France in the 1930s through the 1950s.  Still, he was a difficult man to work with and he had a notorious eye for the ladies—specifically one named Marlene Dietrich.  As such, when he did try to make it in Hollywood during the days of Vichy France, things went very poorly for him and he never became an international star like his fellow countrymen Maurice Chevalier or Charles Boyer. Still, he embodied the handsome, hard-working man with a strong conscience that appealed to French audiences—hence, his portrayal of François in Le jour se lève.

François is a simple foundry worker who falls in love with an innocent flower shop girl, Françoise (Jacqueline Laurent).  Sounds simple enough, doesn’t it?  Well, from the very first minute of the movie you know it’s not, because a man gets shot and proceeds to have one of the most over-the-top death scenes ever—falling down not one flight of steps, but several—and then is only pronounced dead by a blind man (Georges Douking) poking him with a stick. The police come and our hero and murderer, François, barricades himself in his room for a day so he can remember everything that led up to the moment that he pulled the trigger. Ah, but this isn’t your ordinary Hollywood flashback.  No, no one says, “It all began…” to us or an interrogating detective—just a simple dissolve and we are in the foundry with François when he first meets Françoise.  This was such a revolutionary film technique that it  was deemed too confusing for the audience and a title card had to be added at the beginning of the film to explain what was going on. 

The story itself is intriguing and allegorical at the same time.  Of course, François represents the recently defeated Popular Front and the police are viewed as pawns of Fascism, this is where the poetic realism comes into play, but at heart the film is nihilistic and depressing.  Think about it, François falls in love with an idealized woman (Laurent) who is distracted by womanizing dog trainer, Valentin (Jules Berry), who promises to take her to beautiful, European hotspots.  And while she refuses to engage in a sexual relationship with the hard-working François, she most assuredly begins such a relationship with a man who trains animals to do what he wants. Oh, and then there’s Clara (Arletty)—the woman smart enough to leave Valentin and to see what a good man François is.  Perhaps I’m biased here, but in a way, François got what he deserved in the end because Clara was obviously the best woman for him, but instead he throws her over for the idiotic, and dare I say it, boring, François. 

Okay, so yes, Le jour se lève is full of poetic realism.  François is a working class man with a fatalistic world view who destroys his one shot at happiness by killing someone (although, I would argue that he was on the wrong path in regard to which woman he should choose).  From start to finish there is a cloud of bitterness that hangs over the story that is irritatingly devastating.  Still, I cannot concur with those who believe this is the masterpiece of the genre—as Jean Renoir’s Grand Illusion (1937) is a far superior film, and while it does not have the quintessential tragic ending as does Le jour se lève, stylistically it is a better representation of poetic realism. 

Le jour se lève’s overt socialistic and fatalistic themes did not play well in Vichy France and it was banned in 1940.  Not willing to account for their own cowardice and connivance in the wake of the German invasion, Vichy leaders called the film demoralizing, and it was not shown in France again until after the war.  As if the Nazis and collaborators weren’t enough, RKO decided it wanted to make a remake of the film in 1947 and attempted to buy up all copies of the movie and destroy them.  Now, I like Henry Fonda, but RKO”s remake, The Long Night (1947), was a bastardized, horrible version of Le jour se lève. Thankfully, some people in France kept a few copies of the film out of the hands of RKO and it still lives on today. 

Overall, the story of Le jour se lève is intriguing. Still, while I enjoy both Gabin’s and Arletty’s performances (hers more so), I found Laurent and Berry unpleasant to watch.  She due to her vacuous personality and he due to his unending need to overact.  And, finally, when you begin a film with the ending there needs to be something in the main section of the movie that allows you to understand why someone would commit murder—and here, there is nothing. Instead, at the end you ask yourself, “Really?”—even if it was poetic realism.

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