The Wizard of Oz (1939)

 

Like most people of my generation, I grew up watching The Wizard of Oz on television each year. It was an event that so many people shared on an annual basis, and even though we all had become so very familiar with the story, we would still talk about it the next day at school. Having so many opportunities to share a common experience made a sense of connectedness over the film that very few other movies have. Perhaps The Sound of Music with its annual Thanksgiving screenings now or The Ten Commandments at Easter could be similar, but nothing can approach the sheer numbers of people who have seen The Wizard of Oz thanks to its repeated showings on TV from 1956-1991. That’s longer than most television programs last.

The story is justifiably familiar. A young girl, Dorothy Gale (played by Judy Garland), falls and hits her head during a Kansas tornado (very accurately depicted) and awakens to find herself transported to Oz. How or why the tornado went from Kansas to Oz doesn’t matter, but the contrast could not be starker. Kansas is all sepia tones and dust and darkness. Oz and Munchkinland, by contrast, are so bright and vivid and beautiful. Dorothy spends much of the film trying to follow the Yellow Brick Road to ask the Wizard of Oz for help in returning to Kansas. Why she wants to return to such a drab place remains a mystery to me after all these years. Who wouldn’t want to stay in Oz with all of its excitement and vibrance and brilliance? Just based on the cinematography alone, I’d never want to go back to Kansas, and I’ve actually been to Kansas in real life and know that it’s much more colorful than the film depicts.

Along the way to meet the Wizard, Dorothy (accompanied by her adorable dog Toto) meets a series of strangers who wind up joining her on the journey. Each person (well, “person” might be a stretch) wants to ask for something different from the Wizard. Each of the three companions gets their own introduction and backstory: the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion. Heck, the lion even gets two songs! Each member of the cast was spectacular, and many of them had to perform two different roles, yet none of them were nominated for acting honors. In fact, other than Garland, none of them would ever be nominated by the Academy Awards for acting. Garland, who wasn’t even the first choice for the role of Dorothy, received a special “Juvenile Award” for The Wizard of Oz and Babes in Arms, the two films she completed in 1939, but I have always wondered how she might have done in the race for a competitive Oscar that year. It would have been tough to deny Vivien Leigh’s legendary performance as Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind.

Garland’s co-stars were multitalented performers. The Scarecrow and the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion, as we learn later in the film, are manifestations of three farmhands from her home in Kansas. Ray Bolger plays Hunk and the Scarecrow, and his rendition of “If I Only Had a Brain” features some of the loosest, most acrobatic dancing in the film. Jack Haley (Sr., if I need to add that) is both Hickory and the Tin Man, a romantic trapped in a metallic body. The great Bert Lahr performs the roles of Zeke and the Cowardly Lion, and given how heavy that lion suit looks and how annoying that constantly moving tale must have been, he was astonishingly good at dancing and singing. It’s tough to imagine the movie being as successful as it is without these three.

Of course, those are not the only actors in the film to perform multiple roles. Frank Morgan seems to pop up everywhere you look. He’s Professor Marvel back in Kansas, he’s the Wizard (in disguise, hidden behind a curtain), and he’s a carriage driver and a doorman and… and… and…. It’s fun to watch the film to see just how often Morgan pops up. Margaret Hamilton makes the Wicked Witch of the Witch iconic, but her performance as Elmira Gulch back in the sepia world of Kansas is just as frightening. Almost every filmed version of a witch since 1939 has been measured against Hamilton’s performance and been found lacking. Her line reading of “I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little dog too” sends a shiver down the spines of viewers no matter how many times they’ve seen the film.

Speaking of being frightened, I was never really all that scared by the Wicked Witch or her flying monkeys, but a lot of other people were. Certainly, they are meant to be scary, and I can see why others felt that way, but what scared me more were sequences such as those grumpy trees that can talk and throw apples. They seemed much more likely to appear in the world I inhabited then, and I never quite recovered from those moments. The most emotionally frightening moment for me, however, was Dorothy seeing her Aunt Em in that crystal ball of the Wicked Witch’s and tearing up because she was afraid that she’d never see her aunt again.

The Wizard of Oz is filled with so many wonderful, joyous moments too. Billie Burke as Glinda with her high-pitched voice and that enormous pink gown and her wand and the bubble she travels in is just delightful. The costumes throughout the film are spectacular, especially the ones designed for the residents of Emerald City. Again, once you’ve seen what they were, why would you want to go back to overalls and gingham? Nevertheless, Dorothy is homesick and wants to return to Kansas, so Glinda gives her the ruby slippers and sets her off on the journey that takes up much of the film. I’ve seen one of the pairs of ruby slippers at the Academy Museum in Los Angeles, and I couldn’t help but sigh at the memories associated with them. How important costuming can be to the success of a film!

The film won two Oscars, one for its musical score and one for the stunning “Over the Rainbow.” The winning song is performed by Dorothy while she’s still in Kansas at the beginning of the film, and it’s such a simple, beautiful series of dreamy images. It’s no wonder that Oz had to live up to a lot just on the basis of the song’s lyrics, and it’s such a great song that it’s no wonder that it has become as beloved as it has. If you consider the imagery in “Over the Rainbow,” you can appreciate the work of the production design team even more. The Yellow Brick Road is very bright, and Oz simply sparkles and shines. Even when you know that the backdrops in Oz are painted, you still appreciate the achievement.

Those of us who were regular viewers in the past have memorized the songs and learned so many of the lines from the film and analyzed what we saw on the screen. So beloved and influential is The Wizard of Oz that it was among the first twenty-five films selected for preservation by the Library of Congress’s National Film Registry. What a rare and special honor that was, and, really, what a rare and special film this.

Oscar Wins: Best Song (“Over the Rainbow”) and Best Original Score

Other Oscar Nominations: Outstanding Production, Best Art Direction, and Best Special Effects

Gulliver's Travels (1939)

 

Gulliver’s Travels is a charming animated adaptation of Jonathan Swift’s famed novel. Well, actually it’s an adaptation of a portion of Swift’s book, the section where Lemuel Gulliver’s ship crashes near Lilliput, an island of tiny people. This film version was the first feature-length film released by the Fleischer Studios, who were best known for such cartoon characters as Popeye the Sailor and Betty Boop and who were clearly trying to compete with the Disney studio’s just-released Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The Fleischer film begins in 1699 with a spectacular sequence involving the wrecking of Gulliver’s ship. The rolling sea and the crashing waves and the other elements of the storm are rendered beautifully. In fact, the entire film is drawn in such rich colors and with such careful attention to detail. For example, when the very small denizens of Lilliput are crossing a covered bridge, the light shines through the cracks between the boards. The film also features some nice comic moments, such as when the Lilliputians attempt to tie up Gulliver while he is unconscious on the beach after the shipwreck. How does he not wake up during all of the random activity that’s taking place on his actual body? The main or central plot involves a struggle between the kings of Lilliput and Blefuscu. They’re trying to arrange a marriage between Princess Glory of Lilliput and Prince David of Blefuscu, two impossibly good-looking young people who can’t help but be in love with each other (or seem to keep their hands off of each other), and everything is going well until they fight over which traditional song will be sung at the wedding. King Little of Lilliput prefers “Faithful,” the song that his people sing, and King Bombo of Blefuscu wants “Forever,” the song of his people. Inexplicably, this dispute leads to Bombo declaring war on Lilliput. I guess music is a big deal to the people on these small islands. Gulliver winds up being the savior here, as expected, interceding when Bombo’s ships attempt an assault on Lilliput. He also saves the princess and prince even though the prince is almost killed from the attempted use of Gulliver’s “Thunder Machine” (a pistol). You expect a happy ending in an animated film from this era, and so it’s comforting to see Gulliver sailing off into the sunset at the movie’s end in a boat that the Lilliputians have built for him. Perhaps there could have been a sequel involving the other sections of the novel that weren’t included in this film version. Gulliver’s Travels is also quite the musical film, featuring a series of fun songs, my favorite being “All’s Well,” sung by the town crier who discovers the “giant” on the beach. Another favorite is “It’s a Hap-Hap Happy Day,” performed by the residents of Lilliput while they are, um, grooming (?) Gulliver, making him more presentable after the shipwreck. It seems like the film skipped over quite a few elements involved in getting a man dressed and ready for meeting a king, but that’s probably best given the intended audience. The merging of “Faithful” and “Forever” into one song called, unsurprisingly, “Faithful Forever” – is not a particularly inspired choice even if it was nominated for the Oscar, but if it keeps the peace and everyone can be reunited as a result, so be it.

Oscar Nominations: Best Original Score and Best Original Song

Gone with the Wind (1939)

 

Writing about Gone with the Wind poses an interesting dilemma. On the one hand, it’s one of the most accomplished epics in film history, with great performances and astonishing visuals that keep audiences returning to the movie again and again. On the other hand, it is clearly sympathetic to the Southern side of the Civil War, and its depictions of African Americans and Yankees and (at times) even Southerners are remarkably stereotypical and offensive. It’s like watching The Birth of a Nation. While you might admire the technical accomplishments of the film, it’s very tough to sit through some of the more objectionable material.

So how do you tackle an examination of such a film? I’d start by noting that I’ve always felt that the focus is less upon the Civil War and Reconstruction – although those pivotal historical periods are certainly important to the plot and provide its central context – and more upon the story of a remarkable woman, Scarlett O’Hara. It’s one of the greatest roles an actress could have, and Vivien Leigh is just perfection as one of the most complex and complicated and contradictory heroines in film. We watch as Scarlett marries two men she doesn’t love, the first as a means to make her purported lover jealous and the second to secure a safe financial future for herself and her family. When she finally does marry someone she should love (and ultimately does), she takes so many opportunities to sabotage her happiness by continuing to pine for Ashley Wilkes (a rather wan Leslie Howard) instead of just loving the man who loves her, Rhett Butler (Clark Gable, never better).

Everything in the movie indicates that Scarlett should be with Rhett, yet she keeps missing the cues that the universe seems to be sending to her. When her first husband, Charles Hamilton, dies from measles before he can even join a battle, her only fun as a very unrepentant widow is when Rhett shows up and “bids” to dance with her. Her second husband, Frank Kennedy, gets shot in the head when he and some of the other men are trying to scare the residents of a “shantytown” where Scarlett was attacked. (It seems pretty clear to me that Frank and the other men are a part of the Ku Klux Klan, but the film doesn’t directly state their affiliation.) Her way of mourning Frank’s death involves drinking heavily, not out of sadness over his death but more over the fact that she’s still young and already twice widowed.

Even the man Scarlett longs for throughout the movie is rather a disappointment. What, exactly, does she see in Ashley? He’s honorable and stoic and, well, boring. He’s not even especially handsome or dapper. I don’t get what his cousin-wife Melanie sees in him either. Howard is not the most expressive actor, which perhaps explains why he was one of few major performers in the cast not to be nominated for an Oscar. Gable’s Butler, by contrast, is fun and exciting and just enough of a “bad guy” to make him immensely more attractive. He certainly makes his intentions clear from almost the first time we see him on screen, and his roguishness is just the kind of spark that someone like Scarlett needs in her life.

The film’s Oscar-winning screenplay is filled with great lines throughout the story. “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn” is justifiably famous, and “As God is my witness, I’ll never go hungry again” serves as a great finish to the first half of the film. Gable gets most of the best lines, honestly, and he knows just how to deliver them with the correct dose of smirk and slyness. If there’s a second place for best line delivery, it would have to go to Hattie McDaniel, who takes the stock character of Mammy and infuses it with knowing facial expressions and sharpness. She and Gable, Leigh, and Olivia de Havilland as Melanie Hamilton Wilkes were all nominated for their performances, and McDaniel and Leigh richly deserved their Oscar wins.

Given the film’s length – almost four hours if you watch the version with the entrance and exit music and the intermission and entr’acte music – there’s time to showcase some great visuals. The siege of Atlanta (and Rhett and Scarlett’s escape with Melanie and her baby and Prissy through the burning of much of it) is quite spectacular. Similarly, when Scarlett arrives at a makeshift hospital to get the doctor’s help in delivering Melanie’s baby, the reverse zoom that keeps expanding our view of the dying and the dead is an impressive accomplishment. We sometimes forget that CGI has not always been available, so the ability to wrangle huge numbers of actual people on screen is a skill that many directors could not manage, but Victor Fleming (plus George Cukor and Sam Wood, the other directors credited with working on the film for a time) works wonders with his crowds. There’s an energy and an excitement to those big moments.

The scale of the production was massive, and the production design must have been a monumental undertaking. The filmmakers needed the interiors and exteriors of several Southern mansions, and they needed to make the town of Atlanta just so they could burn much of it down. Even the little touches that help to create a clear sense of what the interiors of the homes would look like are carefully done. I’ve always marveled at the sequence involving the women having to take a nap in the middle of the afternoon just so they won’t be too tired for the barbecue later that evening. The number of beds and large fans alone is mind-boggling. I’d also like to mention the costumes by Walter Plunkett. Even though Costume Design wasn’t an Academy Award category when Gone with the Wind was made, he surely would have been a contender for the range of dresses that Scarlett alone has to wear.

The film does spend too much of its time discussing the “Southern way of life,” which is really just code for slavery. Before the Civil War begins, the white Southern characters (well, the men, primarily) discuss the possibility of their way of life disappearing. During the war and the Reconstruction period that followed, Ashley, in particular, expresses a sense of loss for the way things used to be. Gone with the Wind really does take that silly myth about “moonlight and magnolias” before the war and devotes far too much energy to trying to make us care that slavery has ended. Having read the Margaret Mitchell novel upon which the film was based – and which is even longer than the film, if you can believe that – I know that the filmmakers were being dutifully respectful to the text, but they ended up making a film that doesn’t particularly age well in those moments.

Likewise, most of the depictions of the people who were enslaved are very limited and resort too easily to stereotypes. It’s only through the talent of actors like McDaniel that some dignity emerges. Otherwise, we’re left with characters like Pork (Albert Polk) and Prissy (Butterfly McQueen), who have very little to work with in terms of the story to make much of an impression. The actor who plays Big Sam (Everett Brown) seems only to appear when Scarlett (the film’s primary white woman) needs rescuing. I’ve often wondered why Mammy, Pork, and Prissy continue to stay with their white former “owners” after the war ends. When Prissy sees the new mansion that Rhett builds for Scarlett in Atlanta, she says, “We’s rich now.” No, they’re not. They’re still basically enslaved, but their loyalty to their former masters is meant to suggest something (ridiculous) about how they were treated in slavery. Watching the film now is tough when you see how what the movie often does to its African American characters, but I have a feeling that even in 1939, it was tough to watch some of these particularly offensive moments. It is/was certainly a product of its time.

The film does a better job with some of its minor white characters. I’d single out Ona Munson’s performance as Belle Watling. Of course, the filmmakers couldn’t directly state that Belle is a prostitute in 1939, but it’s clear from the way that she’s dressed in red and heavily made up that she’s not a “nurse” in the traditional sense. Munson is so direct and fresh, though, that we start to sympathize with her. In her few moments on screen, we learn so much about her character’s life and what she’s endured. She’s a tough woman who manages to convey just how difficult it was for a woman during the time period Gone with the Wind covers.

And that’s a good point at which to return to Scarlett O’Hara. She has the instincts of a solid business owner. She, unlike her second husband, knows that the lumber business is where the money will be as the South starts to rebuild. She also manages to meet whatever difficulties she faces with a straightforward sense of purpose. She delivers a baby without a doctor’s assistance, she turns around the fate of Tara by making a shrewd business decision even at great personal cost, and she even kills a Yankee soldier who tries to steal from her. She also faces the loss of her beloved mother, the death of two husbands, and the accidental death of her only child. The film’s focus on the remarkable life of this central character is perhaps the key to its lingering impact.

Oscar Wins: Outstanding Production, Best Actress (Vivian Leigh), Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Hattie McDaniel), Best Directing, Best Screenplay, Best Color Cinematography, Best Art Direction, and Best Film Editing

Special Award: John Cameron Menzies for “outstanding achievement in the use of color for the enhancement of dramatic mood in the production of Gone with the Wind”

Technical Achievement Award: R.D. Musgrave for “pioneering in the use of coordinated equipment in the production Gone with the Wind”

Other Oscar Nominations: Best Actor (Clark Gable), Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Olivia de Havilland), Best Sound Recording, Best Special Effects, and Best Original Score

Union Pacific (1939)

 

One of the primary plot threads of Union Pacific is the behind-the-scenes attempts to sabotage the historic attempt to connect the eastern and western parts of the United States with railroad tracks, and the end of the film takes place at Promontory Point, the place where the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads were connected with a golden spike driven into the last rail. Throughout the film, we get to see some intriguing aspects of the building of a railroad: the laying of the wooden rails, the laying of the rails themselves, and the driving of the spikes to hold the two together. We even learn that many of the buildings that sprang up near the railroad construction sites were dismantled and moved by the railroad to the next location, allowing for saloons and other structures to be always available. Those moments are fascinating to watch. However, the film keeps returning to the machinations of Asa M. Barrows (played by Henry Kolker), one of the financiers of the railroad, and his hired hand, Sid Campeau (Brian Donlevy), to keep the construction from progressing. Barrows, for example, promises $200,000 in cash to pay back wages but asks Campeau to have the money stolen before it reaches its destination. More than two hours of subterfuge regarding railroads might be a bit much, so Union Pacific devotes much of its time to a love triangle. Robert Preston, in one of his earlier film roles, plays Dick Allen, a gambler who works with Campeau. He even calls himself Campeau’s “partner” (more on that later), and they ensure that there’s lots of alcohol and gambling and prostitution at each stop in order to keep the workers distracted from their work. Barbara Stanwyck plays Mollie Monahan, the train’s “postmistress” (the diminutive term used at the time for a woman who was doing what was considered a “man’s job”) and the daughter of the train’s engineer. Dick has been trying to get Mollie’s attention for years, but she resists his attempts to propose to her. And then Joel McCrea shows up. He’s Jeff Butler (or “Captain Butler,” the second character so named in 1939, the other being the more famous Rhett Butler in Gone With the Wind). He’s taken on the job of “troubleshooter,” the person whose job is to keep law and order for the railroad, and that’s going to put him at odds with Campeau and his old friend Dick. Yes, McCrea’s Jeff and Preston’s Dick are Army buddies from the Civil War. When they reunite on the train—with Mollie between them—we learn that they “slept under the same blanket” and have “eaten off the same place.” Very close indeed. It’s not long after meeting Jeff that Mollie decides that she’d much rather spend time with him than with Dick. After observing him beat up one of Campeau’s men (a really big guy) using just a shovel, all she can say is “Glory, what a man!” Watching the two men maneuver for Mollie’s attention takes up quite a bit of the film, even when other events are taking place. For instance, they play an interesting game of cat-and-mouse in the car that serves as Mollie’s railroad car/post office/tea shop after the theft of the payroll. The men like each other—well, “like” might be the wrong word—but they also compete with each other. Watching such homosocial moments in older films has been a fascinating experience; there are far more than you might initially expect (and, obviously, far more than the Production Code folks were able to discern—thankfully). Stanwyck, Preston, and McCrea are all good here, but they were always reliable performers and would give greater performances in other films. Overall, Union Pacific features some pretty typical stuff for a western: buffalo herds, an “Indian” “attack” on a train, a train robbery, the atmosphere of the saloon, and several shootouts. It also includes a few moments of humor, such as when the Native Americans discover one of those carved wooden cigar store “Indians” on the train. Anthony Quinn makes a brief appearance, one of the earliest in his career, as one of Campeau’s men who shoots someone whose about to beat him at gambling. However, other than the love triangle plot, the most interesting aspects of the film are the two train wrecks. The first occurs when the Native Americans use a water tank tower to knock a train off the rails, and the second happens as the railroad workers try to lay tracks on top of the snow in order to get around a mountain. Both are amazing to watch, and when you remember that the director of Union Pacific, Cecil DeMille, staged another spectacular train wreck in his Oscar-winning The Greatest Show on Earth thirteen years later (boy, he really enjoyed staging train wrecks), you can appreciate the nomination for Best Special Effects that Union Pacific garnered. Unfortunately, like many films of its time, it’s marred by its attitude toward Native Americans. After Jeff beats up half of Campeau’s men for killing a Native American who was harmlessly waving to the passengers on the train, Campeau says, “What’s a dead Indian, more or less? The Army’s been killing them for years.” Jeff’s horrible response? “The Army doesn’t kill Indians for fun, Campeau. And I don’t think you do either.” It’s quite obvious that Campeau’s men do, indeed, kill for fun, an action better described as genocide, and Jeff’s rationalization for the Army’s behavior hardly improves the image of the Army.

Oscar Nomination: Best Special Effects

Captain Fury (1939)

 

Captain Fury is, essentially, a traditional western that happens to be set in Australia. However, other than a few shots of emus and kangaroos, the film doesn’t really depend very much on its alleged setting. You can tell that most of it was shot on a studio lot; the images of emus and kangaroos seem to be stock footage. Brian Aherne plays Michael Fury, the title character, who fought for Irish independence but is now a convict sentenced to hard labor in Australia. After they arrive in New South Wales, the convicts are distributed among the rich landowners, and Fury winds up under the oppressive rule of Arnold Trist (George Zucco, frequently guilty of scenery chewing). Trist has his men abuse the convicts, and he also wants to get rid of the neighboring settlers so that he can consolidate what he calls “an empire within an empire.” Fury is about to be beaten for his inept shearing of sheep when he escapes with the help of another convict, Coughy (John Carradine, perfectly suited for playing a consumptive). However, he isn’t free for long, as June Lang’s Jeanette Dupre, a settler’s daughter, takes him prisoner with plans to collect the $100 reward for returning escaped convicts. When he realizes that Trist is trying to frighten away the settlers so that he can take the land (much like he has already taken their money in taxes), Fury takes up their cause and even rescues some fellow prisoners from Trist’s control. They begin retaliating against Trist’s men, who are systematically destroying the settlers’ farms. Jeanette’s father, Francois Dupre (Paul Lukas, speaking with an accent that inexplicably sounds like no one else in the film), a very religious man, doesn’t approve of Fury or his friends or their tactics, even when they help to save his own farm. He certainly doesn’t want his daughter to fall in love with Fury, of all people, so you know how that’s going to turn out if you’re familiar with classical Hollywood plotting. Captain Fury has a few aspects worthy of attention. Victor McLaglen plays Blackie, a convict who knew of Fury’s escapades back in Ireland, gets to have a series of humorous moments in the film. Despite his large size—he’s a bit of a brute visually—McLaglen was able to demonstrate more than just strength here. Carradine is also quite good in the role of the dying romantic who’s always rhapsodizing about the beauty of the clouds and stars, often at the oddest times. Frankly, they’re more intriguing that the bland leads of Aherne and Lang. Speaking of odd, there’s a scene where the convicts and settlers (minus Papa Dupre, of course) have a dance even though all of them are under constant threat of attack by Trist’s men. While I don’t think that the art direction for Captain Fury is particularly award-worthy—its sole nomination was for its art direction—some of the details are nicely done: the scars from the ankle chains, for example, or the rats near the bowls and spoons that the exploited convicts use for meals. Its message is certainly a solid one: how once you’ve been convicted of a crime, it’s almost impossible to have people see you as anything other than the worst that you might have done, no matter how much good you might have done since. What might be most surprising is that the film was directed by Hal Roach, more noted for his work on the Our Gang comedy shorts. This is quite a departure from those films, but Captain Fury is a competent film overall.

Oscar Nomination: Best Art Direction

Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939)

Goodbye, Mr. Chips takes place at the Brookfield School where the 83-year-old Mr. Chipping (played by Robert Donat, the winner for Best Actor), nicknamed "Chips" by his wife Katherine (Greer Garson in her first major film role), has not missed a first day assembly in 58 years (even though he has been retired for the past 15 years). The start of a new school year has always been exciting for Mr. Chips, and despite being sick, he makes his way to the assembly hall only to find the doors already locked. After he meets the new history master and prepares some tea and cakes in case any of the boys should stop by his home, he falls asleep in a chair by the fireplace.

Presumably, what follows would be the dream that he has. It covers much of his career at the school starting with his first day in 1870 when a clean-shaven Mr. Chippings arrives with no previous teaching experience. His first time in the classroom is disastrous as he lets the boys get out of hand with their disruptive questions and continual interruptions. They physically attack him just as the headmaster arrives, prompting a stern warning to Mr. Chips to enforce discipline if he plans to maintain control of his classroom. He does so in a rather harsh fashion, punishing the entire class by making them miss a crucial soccer match. For years afterward, he remains relatively isolated from the friendly banter that often accompanies teacher-student relations at the school.

It's at the insistence of fellow teacher Staefel (Paul Henreid, a few years before Casablanca) that Mr. Chips agrees to go on a walking tour of the Alps. He meets Katherine in the mountains, and they begin an awkward if charming relationship. He is, admittedly, terrified of women, but she is such a calming presence that he cannot resist wanting to spend more time with her. She is the first person who seems to understand him. She too is touring the continent, but she and her friend are on bicycles. By accident, Chips and Katherine meet again as they depart from a boat that has been floating down the Danube, and she convinces him to waltz with her that night at a party in an enormous ballroom. The next morning, she has to depart by train, and he goes to the station with her, running after the train once she kisses him goodbye. It's a cliched moment nowadays, but placed within the context of this sentimental drama, it still manages to elicit an emotional response from viewers.

After they marry, he and Katherine move into one of the houses at the school, and she slowly begins working on making him more popular among the boys. She begins inviting them to have tea and cakes on Sunday afternoon, and she's also the one who suggests that he try telling a few jokes as a part of his lessons. It works, and he begins to believe in himself as both a good teacher and a potential headmaster. Sadly, Katherine dies in childbirth, as does the baby she's carrying. Mr. Chips goes to his class that night—ironically, it's April Fool's Day—but he cannot carry on with his lesson. After one of the boys arrives late and begins to spread the word about the death of Mrs. Chips, you see just how much they care about Mr. Chips, how much loved he and his wife are. The closeups of the tearful faces of the boys make for a tender scene, to be sure, and one of the few that made me almost tear up. That probably has more to do with Garson’s portion of the movie being over, though, rather than any natural sympathy that Donat has earned in his performance.

Throughout the film, there are various montages to mark the passage of time. There’s nothing like a good montage in an older movie, is there? For the most part, it's always the roll call of students entering the school. They are always in alphabetical order, an astounding feat, and they call out their names as they pass by Mr. Chips or whichever person has the clipboard. We see them in various uniforms for athletics or academics as they pass, so we get a sense of the styles of clothing common to the period. We also get brief moments where the boys talk about current events so that we know the specific year or era in which some of the actions take place. It's during these scenes that we also get to see one of the running gags of the film: "There's always a Colley here." Indeed, there is always a Colley. Mr. Chips teaches four generations of them himself, and all of them are played by Terry Kilburn. It makes for some cute moments, but nothing laugh-out-loud funny.

The final portion of Mr. Chips' dream (or flashback, if you prefer) involves the war years. Despite having retired already, Chips is asked to serve as headmaster when all of the younger men enlist to serve in World War I. Several of the boys sign up as soon as they are old enough, and it's a sobering moment when Chips has to read out the names of the war dead, and we recognize several of the former students as being on the list. Among the first he has to read is that of Peter Colley, whose wife and child Mr. Chips has been visiting at Colley's request. The movie doesn't make a great deal of the depths of the loss to England of that generation of young men, but then that would take the focus off Mr. Chips and he is the center of attention for the film. It's really more about how the war and the deaths of all those boys he taught affect him rather than how it might have had an impact on the school or the other boys.

Donat isn’t necessarily bad in the title role. He does get to age several decades throughout the film, and I suppose he is having the most fun in the part when he's allowed to play an old man. He seems to get some of the best lines in those scenes, and he’s adapted his body movements to mimic an older man. I suspect it's that range of ages that won him the Oscar, and the make-up is pretty convincing. However, I still maintain that it's a far too theatrical style of acting that he's doing here. Compare him to, say, Garson in the same film. She is much more realistic and believable. When her character dies (far too quickly for my taste), the heart of the film is gone too, and Donat is allowed to overact without a strong naturalistic performer to balance him.

I've never been fond of movies about teachers. They always try to ennoble the profession and the people who practice it. Not everyone can be as beloved as Mr. Chips, certainly, and not everyone should be. Yet when people watch a film like Goodbye, Mr. Chips, they start to judge all teachers by the standards set by fictional characters like Mr. Chips. Live, flesh-and-blood teachers have good days and bad days. Some of us are strong when it comes to lecturing, and others are strong at garnering class participation. Some have effective classrooms because they are disciplinarians, and others create welcoming environments by being laxer about the rules. We never get to see the other teachers performing in Goodbye, Mr. Chips, and in truth, we don't even get to see Mr. Chips teach that often. However, I suppose everyone would want a teacher who could manage to get a class through a passage in Julius Caesar while outside the city of London is being bombed. I just don't think all teachers would be up to that task, nor would many of us even feel it is appropriate to endanger students during such a time. That's why no one should choose a fictional teacher to serve as a role model to actual people.

Oscar Win: Best Actor (Robert Donat)

Other Oscar Nominations: Outstanding Production, Best Actress (Greer Garson), Best Director (Sam Wood), Best Screenplay, Best Sound Recording, and Best Film Editing

Love Affair (1939)

Love Affair has been remade at least twice. The first time was as An Affair to Remember in 1957 with Deborah Kerr and Cary Grant, and almost everyone is familiar with that version thanks to Sleepless in Seattle (if someone didn't know about it before, that is). The most recent remake in 1994 starred Warren Beatty and his wife Annette Bening, and it's pretty much a disaster. When you return to the original, though, you realize that no one needed to tamper with what was already a charming, deeply romantic film. It certainly had no shot at beating Gone With the Wind that year, but Love Affair is a movie still worthy of our attention and our affection.

Charles Boyer plays Michel Marnay, a French playboy who is taking a steamship to America so that he can finally be wed. His bride-to-be, Lois Clarke (Astrid Allwyn), is the daughter of a wealthy industrialist. (Aren't all industrialists in the movies wealthy?) He gets a lot of attention on board the ship because everyone has heard of his reputation as a womanizer; his name appears frequently in the newspapers, usually in rather large headlines. He is a famous public figure who has never even had an occupation. The news media have, obviously, changed a great deal since 1939…. He meets Terry McKay when the letter he's reading blows through a porthole and she picks it up and starts reading it. They begin talking, and he invites himself back to her cabin. Terry, played by Irene Dunne, is pretty sharp, though, and doesn't fall for his advances, especially when she learns that the letter is not from his fiance but from the fiance's best friend with whom Marcel has shared an intimate trip to Lake Cuomo.

This portion of the film being set aboard a ship, they conveniently keep bumping into each other. After they begin dining together and having drinks together regularly, the other passengers start to become suspicious of a shipboard romance. People even try to eavesdrop on their conversations, and there is some very witty banter there, especially as delivered by Dunne. Michel and Terry don't help to squelch the rumors when they rip out film from a camera after their picture is snapped. They do try to split up, but they are seated side by side when they request individual tables. It's inevitable that they spend time together and start to learn more about each other.

During one of the ports of call, the last before they make their way to New York, Terry accompanies Michel to the top of a mountain in Medeira to visit his grandmother, played with Old World charm by Maria Ouspenskaya. The older woman knows a romance when she sees one, and she talks to Terry about her grandson in such a way that you know she's trying to set them up. Soon Terry knows that Michel is a talented artist who has never seriously considered a career as a painter, and she seems to forget that he is already engaged to another woman. It's when Terry sings, though, that Michel falls in love with her. Ouspenskaya's grandmother is playing the piano at his request, but it's Dunne's voice that makes him realize that Terry would be a better choice than Lois. One of Boyer's best moments in the film is his reaction to Dunn's charming performance; you can see the love develop in his eyes as he looks at her.

They quickly remember, however, that both of them have partners waiting at home. In fact, their partners will both be at the docks when they reach New York. They discuss how they might know if their circumstances change and they can be together. They make a plan to meet in six months at the Empire State Building. That would make it July 1, and before that day arrives, both of them deal with some significant changes in their lives. Michel breaks off his engagement to Lois, a story which is carried in the papers, and Terry moves to Philadelphia to resume her career as a singer. Her apartment in New York has a direct view of the Empire State Building, and the building's reflection shines in the open door. No wonder she has to leave; she has a constant reminder that she loves someone other than her fiancé, and it’s a rather… um… “predominant” reminder too.

Terry returns to the city on July 1 with only a few minutes to spare, but thanks to an interruption by her former fiance, she has to rush to get to the Empire State Building, and a car hits her when she tries to cross the street quickly without looking at the traffic. Michel has, of course, already gotten to the observation deck of the building, but he doesn't see what happened below. After waiting several more hours, he leaves thinking that she chose not to see him. He leaves the United States again, hoping to see his grandmother, but when he gets to Medeira, he discovers that she has already passed away. She has left behind a shawl that she promised to Terry, though; even after death, she has conspired to get the two of them together.

When he finally returns to New York after starting a career as an artist, Lois convinces him to join her at the theater on Christmas. He sees Terry with her fiancé as he leaves the theater, and he is shaken. The next day he tracks her down at the orphanage where she works teaching singing and confronts her as to why she never came. He does so by lying that he didn't show up and by speculating as to why that might have been the case. Slowly, he learns the truth of what happened that day and that she is still an invalid. They are reconciled, and she promises that both of them will achieve their dreams.

It's tough not to notice the repeated visual references to the Empire State Building. When Terry and Michel have their conversation on the ship about the plans for the July 1 meeting, it towers above the fog of New York City--something that might have been possible in 1939 but seems unlikely today given the number of subsequent skyscrapers that have been built. I've already mentioned the reflection of the building on Terry's door. What a testament to the cinematographers at RKO that they could pull off that shot. While he is waiting for July 1 to arrive, Michel takes a menial job as a billboard painter. One of his jobs has a clear view of the Empire State Building. Filmmakers in those days knew how to use a visual cue consistently throughout a movie.

This is not a perfect movie, however. For instance, the orphans are a bit too well-scrubbed, and all of them are talented singers. That must have been some very selective orphanage, but you need good child singers to make Terry seem more successful at her job. However, the bigger issue is what makes Terry so stubborn about getting word to Michel about her injury. Surely he would have understood and rushed to her side if he truly loved her. Yet she claims she doesn't want him to know. She seems to want to be her perfect self whenever she's with him. I guess that makes the ending even more touching and romantic, but it inflicts a great deal of pain on both of them in the meantime. I suppose that's why we've come to expect some pain and separation in most romantic films.

If you watch Love Affair, perhaps you too will develop a craving for pink champagne, Michel's and then Terry's favorite drink. You'll also witness two great actors, Dunne and Boyer, doing some of their best work. Dunne was adept at drama and comedy, and she has a lovely quasi-operatic voice that she displays here. Boyer was always charming and dashing in his roles, and here’s he’s at his most charming, smooth persona. He could play a villain well, as in the movie Gaslight, but he was so good at playing the romantic lead. Here he is given a chance to express with his face the growing depth of Michel's affection for Terry, and it's a masterful performance. Dunn was nominated for Best Actress of 1939, but Boyer was overlooked in the Best Actor category. That's a shame because both of them are outstanding.

Oscar Nominations: Outstanding Production, Best Actress (Irene Dunne), Best Supporting Actress (Maria Ouspenskaya), Best Original Story, Best Art Direction, and Best Original Song (“Wishing”)

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is an expose of the depths to which the government is influenced by the wrong men. You might say it's about how corrupt the government, the Congress, especially the Senate, had become in the 1930s, but that might imply that we've somehow gotten rid of the kind of backroom deals that the movie depicts. We all know that's not the case, of course, making Mr. Smith Goes to Washington in many ways just as insightful today as it was more than eighty years ago.

James Stewart plays Jefferson Smith, a naive young man chosen to fill the vacancy created by the death of one of the senators from his home state. Smith's choice as a replacement senator is a difficult one for the governor, given how much pressure he faces from newspaperman Jim Taylor (Edward Arnold) to choose someone who will help push through a shady land deal. Smith, the head of the Boy Rangers, a sort of Boy Scout organization, gets public support from the boys themselves, so Governor Hopper (Guy Kibbee, of all people) chooses Smith over Taylor's initial objections, particularly after his own children give him the idea to choose Smith. After all, what does Smith know about how the federal government works? So long as his powerful and influential fellow senator, Claude Rains' Joseph Paine, guides him, the deal should go through. Right?

No one expects Smith to be as naive as he is, though. For example, when he finally arrives in Washington, he disappears for hours just so that he can see all of the monuments and memorials in town. He stands in awe of the Capitol Dome itself, and I won't even mention how much attention the Lincoln Memorial gets in this film. Even we as viewers get a quick tour through a very delightful montage of the sights in our nation’s capital. Smith’s assistant, Miss Saunders (Jean Arthur, who's growing on me as an actress), tries to help Smith learn the ways of bill-making and other government operations. Unfortunately, she can't always control him, such as when he's questioned by the press. He makes bird calls and gives Indian signs in his first press conference, and his actions are used to ridicule him in the newspapers the next day. He even punches out one of the newspapermen in retaliation for the damage to his reputation. It’s not a particularly flattering portrait of the media, who seem to be complicit in the corruption in Washington.

Smith, you see, has a specific goal he hopes to achieve while in the Senate; he wants to build a national boys camp to teach morals to the young boys of America. He tells Saunders about the ideal location for this camp, oddly enough the same site that Jim Taylor wants to build a dam. Needless to say, when word gets out about the conflict, everyone tries to distract Smith so he won't know about the plans for the dam. Senator Paine even uses his daughter Susan (Astrid Allwyn) as a "distraction," let's call it, while the bill for the dam is presented. The state where the proposed camp and/or dam would be located is never mentioned. It doesn’t need to be, really, since it’s not like this kind of behavior is limited to only one of the states in our country.

There's a confrontation, naturally, between Smith and Taylor where their core beliefs are revealed. Is it any surprise that Taylor, the rich guy, thinks he "owns" everyone? There's also a confrontation between Smith and Paine where Paine tells the younger man that he has to compromise his principles. Taylor inevitably tries to smear Smith in the newspapers and other media outlets he controls, and Paine even goes so far as to accuse Smith of being unfit to be a Senator because, he claims, Smith is trying to profit from the sale of the land that is in dispute. They even attack the Boy Rangers trying to deliver their paper with the other side of the story that Taylor’s papers aren’t sharing. Paine lies at a meeting of a Senate committee, a moment so shocking to Smith that he packs his bags and tries to leave town. Saunders catches him at the Lincoln Memorial, and he agrees to return to the Senate and attempt the longest filibuster in the history of government.

It's tough to imagine that the writers of a film would decide to make such an arcane Senate rule as the one governing filibusters into a central piece of its narrative, but Mr. Smith Goes to Washington certainly does so to great effect. There's still quite a bit of dramatic license taken with the rules of the Senate, including the scene where bags of mail allegedly against Smith's filibuster arrive on the Senate floor, but you can't fault director Frank Capra for wanting to amp up the dramatic tension in scenes like these. Besides, who doesn’t love a good montage of newspapers being printed with the headlines that help to propel the narrative?

Stewart is reliably good here, as are Arthur and Arnold and Rains and Thomas Mitchell as Diz Moore, a newspaper reporter who is one of Saunders' closest friends. As much as you enjoy the performances, though, this is really a movie about the government itself. To a degree, it's an essentially conservative message that's being filtered through this narrative. After all, Smith's proposal for a boys camp couldn't be any more "traditional values" than much of the legislation passed these days. However, it's really more about the power the individual has in the face of government that you're supposed to realize at the film's end. If one man like Smith can come to that most corrupt of places, Washington, and retain his integrity, then why (you're supposed to ask) doesn't everyone else? It's an interesting question to which the film gives perhaps too pat of an answer. It is Hollywood's version of the government, after all (well, Capra’s version anyway), and that could account for all the idealistic, optimistic talk.

I've been trying to figure out just how this film would have been received by those in Washington in 1939. It doesn't portray most of them in a very favorable light, of course. In fact, almost every Senator seems to be under the sway of some person or interest with deep pockets. The press is represented in a negative way as well, yet the film received good reviews at the time of its release. Perhaps in the midst of the Great Depression, people wanted to renew their faith in the integrity of the government. How ironic that it sometimes takes a movie like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington to make people consider that issue.

Oscar Win: Best Original Story

Other Oscar Nominations: Outstanding Production, Director (Frank Capra), Best Actor (Jimmy Stewart), Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Harry Carey and Claude Rains), Best Art Direction, Best Film Editing, Best Scoring, Best Sound Recording, and Best Screenplay

Ninotchka (1939)

Garbo laughs, and so does the audience. Ninotchka was nominated for Best Picture of 1939, one of the greatest years in Hollywood history. This is a fun romantic comedy set against the backdrop of Paris during the years of the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia. Not exactly what most people would consider fodder for a comedy, but Ninotchka uses the differences between the stereotypical Russian types and the more laidback Parisians to good effect here.

The title character, played by Greta Garbo in one of her best performances, is a special envoy sent to Paris to figure out why three earlier Russian agents have not yet managed to sell off the royal jewelry confiscated by the revolutionaries. The three men--Buljanoff, Iranoff, and Kopalski--have, it seems, become very enamored of the French way of life, which is so much more luxurious and, well, fun than the life they had to live back in Russia. As soon as Ninotchka arrives, she demonstrates that she will remain steadfast in achieving the goal of helping her fellow Russians. Unfortunately, she too soon falls victim to the charms of Paris and of one Parisian in particular, Count Leon, played with great charm by Melvyn Douglas.

One of the things that is striking about this movie is how Ninotchka and Leon begin to switch ideologies. She slowly becomes more cosmopolitan, even buying a new hat that she had earlier denounced as frivolous. He, on the other hand, becomes more inclined to goad his butler into starting a revolution among the workers. It's quite funny, really, to see them exchange roles in this way, and you don't need a deep knowledge of the inner workings of communism or capitalism to get the joke quickly.

There's a love triangle, naturally, that includes Ninotchka, Leon, and the Grand Duchess Swana, the original owner of the jewels who wants to see them returned to her. There's also some interesting moments set in Russia after all four of the envoys return home. Their night of sharing a four-egg omelet is quite funny, even if it does devolve into some of the most stereotypical Western views of what life under Communist rule must have been like. The ending is perhaps pure romantic fantasy, but that's always been one of the great contributions of film: allowing us to live in a world where fantasies like this can take place.

Stagecoach (1939)

Stagecoach is usually credited with making John Wayne a star, and he is certainly very good here as the Ringo Kid. However, this is truly an ensemble film, and every one of the performers is a joy to watch. Wayne doesn’t even appear until almost twenty minutes into the film’s 96-minute running time. In fact, he isn’t even the top-billed star of the movie; that honor went to Claire Trevor instead. What Stagecoach really offers, other than Wayne’s star-making performance, is a Western with lots of adventure and, more interestingly, a lot of character development. Nine people are sharing a small space for much of the film, and they get to know each other rather well… and so do we.

The threat of an attack from Apache chief Geronimo and his warriors hovers over the film from the very beginning, but despite the lack of a promised military escort, a band of travelers boards a stagecoach in a small town in Arizona. They're quite an assortment: Dallas, a woman whose reputation has led the “decent” ladies in town (the Law and Order League, an ominous-sounding group, to say the least) to exile her; a second woman who is later revealed to be pregnant although she demonstrates no obvious signs that she is near delivery; a whiskey manufacturer everyone mistakenly assumes is a preacher; an alcoholic doctor who quickly befriends the whiskey maker; a slick gambler type who seems a bit too sympathetic to the plight of the expectant mother; a banker who is trying to escape with a substantial amount of payroll funds; and the driver. They’re joined by a marshal searching for the Ringo Kid and, later, Ringo himself, who winds up being held captive to prevent him from going after the men who killed his brother.

Have I mentioned that these characters are played by some of the best actors in Hollywood at the time? Thomas Mitchell, who was having a very good year in 1939, won the Oscar for his portrayal of Doc Boone, the drunk who sobers himself up long enough to deliver a child. Trevor plays Dallas, the saloon girl who seems to have accepted that no one will ever look at her as human, only to be surprised by Ringo's tender demeanor toward her. John Carradine plays Hatfield, the gambler with a dubious past; he has just the right amount of oiliness for the part and is certainly appealing with all of his angles and style. Andy Devine plays Buck, the stagecoach driver who can never seem to get a full meal no matter where they stop; Devine was always a delight as the comic relief in a movie. And the list goes on.

Also along for the ride are Donald Meek as Peacock, the whiskey merchant who surprisingly manages to stand up for himself a couple of times; Louise Platt as Lucy Mallory, the wife of a cavalry officer who’s traveled from Virginia to reunite with a husband who seems to get farther and farther away from her the longer the coach travels; George Bancroft as the marshal inexplicably nicknamed Curley; and Berton Churchill as the banker Gatewood, who represents a privileged old white man who annoys almost every person he shares space with because he expects preferential treatment and deference from everyone else. Gatewood and Hatfield have an intriguing exchange about the Civil War and what it’s called that reveals a lot of unresolved tensions in the country at the time that the film takes place.

And then there’s Wayne, here in his 80th movie (already!) and truly at the top of his form. You'll probably be surprised by how youthful he looks; despite his rather lanky frame, he's also one of the prettiest men you'll see on film. Director John Ford certainly takes advantage of his leading actor's good looks from the time the camera zooms in on his face when he first appears on screen. That dolly zoom to a close-up is certainly designed to highlight an actor’s star quality. Wayne’s Ringo Kid has broken out of prison so that he can return to Lordsburg to kill the men who shot and killed his brother. Almost everyone, including the marshal, thinks he’s justified in doing so even if it’s against the law. Ringo is also quite a gentleman in many ways. For example, he treats Dallas like a lady, but she’s unaccustomed to this kind of reaction. He almost demands that the other passengers treat Dallas the same way they treat Mrs. Mallory. It’s a bit surprising that he asks Dallas to marry him and move to an isolated ranch so quickly after they meet, but Wayne and Trevor do have tremendous chemistry on screen.

Since this is a Ford Western, there is a shootout between the men on the stagecoach and the Apache, of course. The cavalry always seems to leave the passengers just before they need protection, but they show up at the last minute to rescue the coach. That’s what happens in the most spectacular sequence in the film. Honestly, the stunt people certainly earned their salaries on Stagecoach, particularly in this part of the film. It’s fantastic work. The film is mostly shot in Monument Valley, which would become one of the director’s favorite places to make movies. He takes good advantage of the openness of the valley in the long shots that follow the stagecoach.

A lot does happen to these nine passengers during the course of the 96 minutes. The first cavalry troop leaves them alone in what’s termed Indian Territory. A group of vaqueros take the horses from the coach while everyone is waiting for Mrs. Mallory to recover from giving birth. The ferry that they were hoping to take has been burned to the ground. And all of this occurs before the shootout between the coach passengers and the Native Americans. We get to see just how rough the ride was from Tonto at the film’s start to Dry Fork to Apache Wells to, finally, Lordsburg. It makes you wonder how anyone managed to make such journeys.

While the shoot-outs are certainly interesting and the scenery is breathtaking, it's the interaction between these characters stuck in that tiny coach that make the film entertaining. It’s also a testament to the script that every character gets a resolution by the end of the movie. Trevor is my particular favorite in this film; she has a way of looking at the other passengers in such a way that you know exactly how she feels about them – it's  usually revulsion, by the way. Trevor gets one of the best lines in the film when she looks at the judgmental Law and Order League and comments, “There are worse things than Apaches.” Trevor would win an Oscar a few years later for Key Largo, but she livened up dozens of films in her career, including this one. Mitchell is a close second, and he's even better here than he is in that other movie for which he took a supporting role in 1939. Perhaps you have heard of it? He plays Scarlett's father in Gone with the Wind.

Stagecoach is one of the best movies from the Golden Age of Hollywood and one of the greatest years for film. It richly deserved its place on the list of films up for the Best Picture Oscar that year. Even if almost every character and plot line has since become something of a cliche (an Apache attack! a last-minute cavalry rescue!), you can still enjoy seeing this film. It certainly is a product of its time with its use of derogatory terms for Native Americans, but it also manages to seem fresh and entertaining many years after its initial release, and much of that is a testament to the great cast and to the people like Ford who brought them together for this ride.

Oscar Wins: Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Thomas Mitchell) and Best Scoring

Other Nominations: Outstanding Production, Best Director (John Ford), Best Black-and-White Cinematography, Best Art Direction, and Best Film Editing

Dark Victory (1939)

Dark Victory is a prime example of what they used to call, somewhat dismissively, "women's pictures" or even "weepies." However, despite its sad ending, this film owes its success to the ferocity of the lead performance by Bette Davis, one of the greatest actresses ever to appear on film. Here she plays Judith Traherne, a young socialite from Long Island who has spent much of her life partying and hunting and spending her family’s money. She drinks and smokes (a lot), and she’s very involved with her horses and dogs. Her life changes dramatically, however, when she’s diagnosed with a brain tumor.

This is one of Davis’ most sympathetic roles, but don’t kid yourself into thinking she’s playing some sort of passive victim. She’s still bringing a great deal of toughness to the role. At the start of the movie, Judith begins experiencing frequent headaches and bouts of double vision (which the film kindly replicates for us so that we can experience them too), but it’s a fall from one of her horses that really alerts everyone to an issue. A subsequent fall down the stairs leads to a meeting with a specialist, a surgeon who has been planning to leave his practice in order to conduct more research on brain tumors. Their first meeting is a tense one, but it showcases the range of which Davis was capable.

Davis’ Judith falls in love with the surgeon (played by George Brent, her frequent co-star, who was in a lot of movies but never seemed to break out and become a huge star) and she eventually marries him. The doctor and her best friend, played by a very young Geraldine Fitzgerald, attempt to keep secret the fact that the surgery has not been successful, but anyone who has ever watched a Bette Davis film knows that she is destined to find out. No one can outsmart Davis for long; you can always see the calculations of her mind.

Here's what has always puzzled me about this film, though. I understand that HIPAA (the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) was passed in 1996, but surely doctors in previous eras were expected to keep the health information of their patients private and to tell patients all of the information they needed to make informed decisions about their health. Brent’s Dr. Steele, however, decides – with the help of Judith’s family doctor played by the always reliable Henry Travers – to withhold the results of her brain surgery. She’s going to die within ten months, but no one is going to tell her? He also tells her best friend/secretary, Ann (Fitzgerald), about Judith’s prognosis, and she’s not even a relative!

It's only when Judith sees her own medical report lying on a desk in the doctor’s office that she learns the truth: “prognosis negative.” Again, shouldn’t patient records be kept in a more secure location? By this point, she’s married to Dr. Steele, but she shouldn’t have such easy access to medical information, should she? She even gets to read in her case study the opinions of other doctors who concur with Steele’s diagnosis (and there are many of them). Maybe it was this kind of behavior that led to the passage of HIPAA? It certainly seems like a potential issue of malpractice.

Dark Victory is almost a textbook example of classical Hollywood filmmaking. All of the elements are there for a successful film: the script, the performances, the sets and costumes, the great score by Max Steiner, even the editing (note how often the film fades to black to move us from scene to scene, quite a chilling choice). I have seen this film a few times, and I've always been a fan of Bette Davis (naturally, as any film lover should be). It's always a pleasure being reacquainted with it. Even though you can figure out pretty quickly what's going to happen, you still feel a measure of (misguided?) hope. However, when you get to the last sequence, where Davis is trying to get her husband packed for a trip and out of the house quickly, the suspense that the filmmakers are able to create is almost excruciating. Watching Fitzgerald's face or the reaction of one of the bit players in the role of the maid Martha (Virginia Brissac) only adds to the emotional impact.

Fitzgerald, acting in her first film in the United States, had a great chemistry with Davis. Their rapport seems genuine, and her feelings at the potential death of her friend are clear and evident. Humphrey Bogart has a relatively small role as a stable master named Michael, who confesses his love for Judith, as if we haven’t figured this out by his looks at her throughout the film. He’s from a lower class, of course, and gets a great speech about how manly he is compared to her rich male friends. You can see he had star quality, but this is quite a distance from Rick in Casablanca or Charlie Allnut in The African Queen.

I wonder how different the film might have been had Ronald Reagan, who has a supporting part as one of Davis's drinking buddies, played the part of the doctor instead of George Brent. Brent was always a capable actor, but aside from surgical prowess, his character needs a strong measure of charisma as well, I think. Reagan, whose politics I never admired, at least had the charm and looks to keep your attention whenever he's on the screen. Brent tends to fade into the background a bit too much. Of course, that was always one of the dangers of acting with Bette Davis.

Oscar Nominations: Outstanding Production, Best Actress (Bette Davis), and Best Original Score