John Ford Retrospective - Stagecoach (1939)

STAGECOACH (1939)

Starring:  Claire Trevor, John Wayne, Andy Devine, John Carradine, Thomas Mitchell, Louise Platt, George Bancroft, Donald Meek, Berton Churchill, Tim Holt, Tom Tyler

Writer:  Dudley Nichols (based on the story "Stage to Lordsburg" by Ernest Haycox)

Cinematography:  Bert Glennon

Music:  Gerard Carbonara

Editors:  Otho Lovering, Dorothy Spencer

B&W, 1h 36m.  1.37:1 perspective.

Released on: March 2, 1939 by United Artists

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set

1939.  Generally considered one of the greatest years in film history.  Films such as Dark Victory, Gone With the Wind, Goodbye, Mr. Chips, Love Affair, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Ninotchka, Of Mice and Men, Stagecoach, The Wizard of Oz, Wuthering Heights, were released that year, and those are just the best picture nominees.  Other hits included Babes in Arms, Dodge City, The Women, Drums Along the Mohawk, Gunga Din, The Little Princess, The Story of Alexander Graham Bell, Confessions of a Nazi Spy, Only Angels Have Wings, Young Mr. Lincoln, Beau Geste, The Four Feathers, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, The Rains Came, Jamaica Inn, The Roaring Twenties, The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex, Destry Rides Again, and The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

It would surprise absolutely nobody, then, that John Ford released three fantastic movies during that calendar year.  He led off with what many consider his finest film, Stagecoach.  This is a film that revolutionized the western genre.  Until then westerns were for the most part simple shoot-em-ups, almost always made on a low budget from one of the poverty row studios (Monogram, Republic, etc), with simple plot structures (cowboys vs. Indians, or a love triangle with two men and a girl), short run times (often around an hour or less), and lots of horse and gun action.  White hat good, black hat bad, that sort of thing.  When Ford was approached to do Stagecoach, he was hesitant at first, believing he had grown out of making oaters, but agreed to do the film if he could approach it as a work of art as well as a piece of entertainment.  He obviously saw something in Ernest Haycox's story that he could work with.

Story-wise, the plot is extremely simple.  A stagecoach travels with its passengers from Tonto, Arizona through Monument Valley to Lordsburg, New Mexico, only stopping to change horses and eat.  The coach's driver, Buck (Andy Devine), is hesitant to go, as the Apaches led by Geronimo have cut all the telegraph lines and made fatal attacks on those who trespass on their territory.  He is convinced to go on by Marshal Curley Wilcox (George Bancroft), who knows the Ringo Kid (John Wayne) is in the territory and wants to arrest him before they get to Lordsburg, where Ringo plans on engaging in a little eye for an eye with Luke Plummer (Tom Tyler), who shot his father and brother.  Others on the carriage include:  Dallas (Claire Trevor), a hooker with a heart of gold; Hatfield (John Carradine), an inveterate Southern gambler with a shady past; Doc Boone (Thomas Mitchell), a once-respectable medical professional turned to drink; Mrs. Lucy Mallory (Louise Platt), a late-term mother to be who wishes to be with her husband, who's a member of the cavalry; Samuel Peacock (Donald Meek), a travelling whiskey peddler who Doc Boone takes a liking to; and Ellsworth Henry Gatewood (Berton Churchill), an insufferable, overbearing banker.  Accompanying them, at least part of the way, is Lt. Blanchard (Tim Holt).  It's also nice to see, albeit uncredited, Chris-Pin Martin, Jack Pennick, and Francis Ford (the director's brother) at various stations along the way.

One thing you'll notice is that these characters are all archetypes.  Ford takes these archetypes and in some cases subverts them, in others emphasizes them.  Almost all the characters exist in shades of grey.  The Ringo Kid is an escaped prisoner whose stated goal is murder, yet he is the most gallant and sensitive male character in the piece.  Dallas has taken to selling her body in order to make a living, but her motherly instinct is second to none.  Peacock, the travelling salesman (usually the most gregarious person in the room), is timid and almost invisible; the others get his name wrong and keep thinking he's a man of the Lord.  And so on, and so forth.  The pregnant woman may be a "lady" unlike Dallas, but she is full of prejudices.  Ford in fact saves his most damning ire for the only one-note characters in the show, the prim and proper ladies and men who make up "proper" society.  Small town society was always a bugbear of Ford's, and the portrayal of these types in Stagecoach is a good, often humorous, representation of it.  The penultimate line of dialogue in the film sums it up best.  As Ringo and Dallas head to his ranch to begin their life together, Doc Boone remarks to Marshal Wilcox that they are "saved from the blessings of civilization".

Ford has fun contrasting the archetypes of the good girl and the bad girl.  Mrs. Mallory is dressed in subtle colours, and has brown hair, and generally looks like the Melanie Wilkes type.  Dallas' getup, even in this black-and-white movie, is garish, and her blond hair is 1930s subtext for "bad girl".  And yet, Lucy Mallory is a bit of a snob, and Ford lets us know it, while he takes pains to portray Dallas as simply a person who gets the shit end of the stick because of her current situation.  Very relatable.  She takes control of the situation and proves her mettle when Lucy gives birth, springing into action while the men (aside from Doc and Ringo) are completely useless.  

I can't go on without talking about John Wayne.  This is the film that made him a star, and Ford took full advantage of his movie star qualities over the next quarter century.  The director abused the actor verbally and physically behind the scenes, and yet onscreen the Ringo Kid is photographed lovingly.  His entrance is simply one of the best "movie star" entrances ever.  Watch as the camera tracks towards him, slightly losing focus in a moment of breathless anticipation, before settling on a stunning close-up of the still-youthful Wayne and his matinee-idol visage, the Duke not yet grown grizzled and aged.  Even in scenes set on the stagecoach, Ringo (who as the last passenger must take his place on the floor) is never shown to be lower than the others, occupying the same space in the frame as do they.  He's the last main character onscreen, and through sheer force of charisma he pretty much takes over from there.

I must also mention Thomas Mitchell, who played Doc Boone.  Mitchell won the Academy Award for his performance here, which was probably also a combined award for his performances in Gone With the Wind, Only Angels Have Wings, The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington the same year.  A most wonderful year, to be sure!  Although his character is inebriated for the majority of the runtime, it's crystal clear that Doc Boone is the moral conscience of the film.  The audience's view of the world Stagecoach portrays is very much through his sensibilities  When push comes to shove, he sobers up of his own accord and gets the job done, then returns to his favourite pastime without batting an eye.  We never do find out what has driven him to drink, but Mitchell's performance treads a fine tightrope between comedic and tragic brilliantly.

Stagecoach was the first film in which John Ford utilized the majestic landscapes of Monument Valley.  He would go on to do so another seven times throughout his career, returning to the setting that made him famous.  Aside from the epic vistas of the Colorado Plateau, Ford's camera finds itself riding atop a stagecoach ferrying a river, being leaped over by a bunch of wild horses, and gliding up to the Ringo Kid's aforementioned dramatic entrance.  When not being used in these (for the time) out of the ordinary ways, the camera remains for the most part stationary.  It is at these moments that editing is used, helping to set up the spaces in the coach and the various buildings the characters occupy.  The editing also helps Ford tell the tale concisely.  Take the end of act two.  Ringo proposes to Dallas, and she runs off.  Then the Marshal appears, advising him to stay close.  This serves multiple purposes.  It keeps us in temporary suspense as to how Dallas will reply; it reminds up that Ringo is still under arrest, and also reminds us of the threat the natives pose to the passengers.  It's also a great way to end the scene quickly.  More films today could take a cue from this style of editing.

Stagecoach cemented John Ford's place in the cinematic pantheon of greatness.  With fantastic visuals, great character work and a taut, gripping tale, Stagecoach is one of the best films from one of the best years of film, and yet is only one of his best films.  That shows how great a director Ford was.  Unmissable.

Ten petrified passengers out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Submarine Patrol (1938)

SUBMARINE PATROL (1938)

Starring:  Richard Greene, Nancy Kelly, Preston Foster, George Bancroft, Slim Summerville, John Carradine, Joan Valerie, Henry Armetta, Warren Hymer, Douglas Fowley, J. Farrell MacDonald, Maxie Rosenbloom

Writers:  Rian James, Darrell Ware, Jack Yellen (based on the novel "The Splinter Fleet of the Otranto Barrage" by Ray Millholland)

Cinematogaphy:  Arthur C. Miller

Music:  Arthur Lange

Film Editor:  Robert L. Simpson

B&W, 1h 31m.  1.37:1 perspective.

Released on:  November 9, 1938 by Twentieth Century Fox.

My experience:  YouTube

Submarine Patrol was apparently one of John Ford's favourite films that he made, and knowing what we do of him, that checks out.  It's a film full of men being men, women (except for Nancy Kelly's character) being practially non-existent, and a storyline both nautical and military in nature.  While I can't say I felt anything close to the same love for it, it's one that grew on me as the runtime went on.

Our protagonist is Perry Townsend III, (Richard Greene), a rich nepo baby with a bit of a superiority complex, who wants to do his part for his country in the first world war, but at the same time is not afraid to take advantage of his position in life.  He is assigned to SC 599, a splinter vessel (a hastily built wooden boat not meant for longevity), captained by Lieutenant (j.g.) John C. Drake (Preston Foster), who has been assigned to the vessel as punishment for running his previous command aground due to negligence.  Drake is therefore being extra hard in trying to prove his mettle, and his sights quickly set on Townsend, who thinks nothing of jumping ship in order to hook up with his new flame, Susan Leeds (Nancy Kelly), and meandering back at his own pace when called.

From this description, you might presume that Submarine Patrol is about two people in conflict until either one of them blows a gasket or they begin to come together.  Not so.  Rather than two ships heading full speed towards each other, think of this as two trains running on parallel tracks to the same destination.  Both men have something to prove; Drake to his military superiors, and Townsend to Captain Leeds (George Bancroft), Susan's father who thinks he's a playboy ne'er do well who will only hurt his daughter.  Things come to a head when Captain Leeds finds himself stuck in the engine room with Townsend during an assault on a notoriously difficult submarine in Otranto, Italy.  It's a nice inversion of the usual conflict driven storyline in favour of a team-oriented one.

The cast is filled out by a who's who of successful character actors from the past, present (late 1930s) and future.  Appearing as crew members from SC 599 are J. Farrell MacDonald as Chief Warrant Officer Sails Quincannon; Slim Summerville as Spuds, the ship's cook; George E. Stone as Seaman Irving Goldfarb; Elisha Cook Jr. as Seaman Rutherford Davis Pratt, aka "The Professor"; Warren Hymer as Seaman Rocky Haggerty; Douglas Fowley as Seaman Pinky Brett; Dick Hogan as Seaman Johnny Miller; Robert Lowery as Radioman Sparks; and of course regulars Ward Bond as Seaman Olaf Swanson and Jack Pennick as Boatswain "Guns" McPeek.  

They are joined on this filmic expedition by 1930s Ford regular John Carradine as McAllison, the supercilious first mate of Captain Leeds' ship the Ana Maria; Henry Armetta as an Italian hotelier; Maxie Rosenbloom as Marine Sentry Sergeant Joe Duffy, who delivers one of the film's funniest lines; Charles Trowbridge as Rear Admiral Joseph Maitland, a friend of Townsend's father; Moroni Olsen as the fleet captain; and Victor Varconi as an Italian chaplain.

Submarine Patrol has some nice work by said performers, and there's nothing particularly wrong with it, but it never quite clicked for me.  It came close once the ship put out to sea, and there's a nice somber moment when they torpedo their first submarine and the reality of war begins to hit home for a few of the boisterous young men.  The second half was superior to the first half, with a nice sojourn with Townsend and Susan in Italy cushioned between a couple of battle scenes that seem to have been nicely filmed.  I say seem to have been because the print I saw was very dark but it sounded nice.  I'm only being slightly facetious here.

Apparently William Faulkner was one of the ten people who took a shot at adapting Ray Millholland's novel, and that may be part of the problem.  While we have a distinct protagonist and follow him on his journey, it seems to be a case of too many cooks.  I know there are some people who love this film, and while I tend to worship the cinematic Fordian universe, I have to say that despite the fact it has some good moments and themes, I would put this on the lower end of the tier.

Six scuttled ships out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Four Men and a Prayer (1938)

FOUR MEN AND A PRAYER (1938)

Starring:  Loretta Young, Richard Greene, George Sanders, David Niven, C. Aubrey Smith, J. Edward Bromberg, William Henry, John Carradine, Alan Hale, Reginald Denny, Berton Churchill, Barry Fitzgerald

Writers:  Richard Sherman, Sonya Levien & Walter Ferris (based on the novel by David Garth)

Cinematography:  Ernest Palmer

Editor:  Louis R. Loeffler

B&W, 1h 25m.  1.37:1 presentation.

Released on:  April 29, 1938 by Twentieth Century Fox.

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set

I really had a lot of fun with this one, but tonally the film is all over the place.  It's got suspense, intrigue, adventure, and it can be a barrel of laughs at times.  All great assets to have, no doubt.  But when a scene where a group of revolutionaries being gunned down in cold blood is sandwiched between David Niven doing a Donald Duck impression and a scene taken from straight from the screwball comedy playbook, one can be forgiven for lifting a critical eyebrow and looking a little askance!

The four men referred to in the film's title are the sons of disgraced British colonel Loring Leigh (C. Aubrey Smith), who has been cashiered out of the military for supposedly wilfully leading his troops into a slaughter.  Wyatt (George Sanders) is a barrister in London; Geoffrey (Richard Greene) is a diplomat in the British embassy in Washington D.C.; Christopher (David Niven) is a playboy aviator; and the youngest, Rodney (William Henry), is a college student at Oxford.  Colonel Leigh calls them all home to their residence at St. John-Cum-Leigh to ponder how to proceed.  Before they can get very far, he is found dead in his study.  Officially ruled a suicide, the boys know the truth that he was murdered, and they set about following any and all leads to prove it.

Geoffrey's somewhat ignored main squeeze, Lynn Cherrington (Loretta Young), has a habit of popping up wherever he is, if only to get him to pay her some attention, and finds herself getting mixed up in all of this.  But does she have her own agenda?  Her father, Martin Cherrington (Berton Churchill) is one of the owners of Atlas Arms, a company responsible for manufacturing the weaponry which led to the slaughter of the late colonel's troops.  While Wyatt and Rodney search India for clues by interviewing people like trooper Mulcahay (Barry Fitzgerald) who might have known their father, Geoffrey and Christopher follow their leads to South America, where they meet Captain Loveland (Reginald Denny), who came into a bit of money and moved to Buenos Aires, leading industrialist Furnoy (Alan Hale), and General Torres (J. Edward Bromberg), a bandit turned revolutionary who is involved in purchasing weapons from Atlas Arms.  A counter-revolution appears to be taking place, led by General Adolfo Arturios Gregario Sebastian (John Carradine).  All road lead not to Rome but Egypt in this story, before the curtain falls on our tale.

This film is quickly paced and packs a lot of story into its less than 90 minute running time, thanks to some judicious editing by Ford and his cutter Louis Loeffler.  The entire tribunal that sets off the plot AND the introduction of Leigh's four sons happens within the first ten minutes, and this pace continues consistently.  A man falls out of a car dead in the driveway of the Leigh residence, and that's all we need to take us to the next scene; no fat on the bone here.  This helps uphold the jaunty feeling the film has, as we travel from London to India to islands off the coast of South America, to Egypt with no problem whatsoever.  For filmgoers in 1938, this must have been like watching a James Bond movie 25 years before the 007 films became synonymous with globetrotting adventure.

And while the lighthearted, adventuresome spirit persists throughout the film, there are a couple of detours that stand out as perhaps not inessential story-wise, but tonally off.  The first is a scene with Barry Fitzgerald which instigates a barroom brawl by taking offence to being called British by a native.  While funny and amusing, this excursion into Three Stooges style chair-throwing comedy is plainly an excuse for Ford to indulge spending time with one of his favourite actors, throwing some barbs at the British in favour of his beloved Irish, and getting some "manly man" action into the scene.  It's a quick distillation of everything I didn't like about The Quiet Man.  

The other scene that bothered me a little bit is the aforementioned scene involving the revolutionaries.  I very nearly got whiplash from the maddening inconsistencies in tonality.  Ford and DP Ernest Palmer, who until then had kept their sets lit fairly brightly, all of a sudden indulge themselves in foreboding chiaroscuro lighting, threatening camera angles, and menacing low-angle shots of certain characters.  Intentionally, it seems, as one scene on the island has Generals Torres and Sebastian engaging in some morbidly funny dialogue against a wall before the camera pans to a firing squad.  Again, nothing wrong with it as a scene, it just feels like it's in the wrong film.

All that being said, I very much liked Four Men and a Prayer.  While Indiana Jones probably wouldn't be the first connection one would make to this film, I believe it makes sense -- not for plot reasons, but for the lighthearted tone the film has.  There is plenty of humour to be found here, and although referring to it as an out and out comedy would be a stretch, there are long swathes of the picture that are chock full of delicious performances and lines.  The actors must have had a grand old time.

A baby-faced David Niven damn near steals the show in this one, with so many priceless gestures and facial tics I was damn near in stitches half the time.  The distasteful face he makes when he asks his brother, who has been residing in America, to say, "okay, toots"; the conversations he has in the hybrid voice of "Donald Mouse"; his reactions to Lynn and Geoffrey's PDAs; and physical comedy involving a rather on the nose rubber rat squeak toy.  All of them made me snicker to no end.  Loretta Young also impresses with her comic timing, from the adorable way she sticks out her tongue after pronouncing St. John-Cum-Leigh ("sinjun cumley") to her flirtatious ways wrapping various men around her finger, to the bewildered way she yelps, "Hey, don't mind me!" when Geoffrey and Christopher walk off without her to follow a lead.  Honestly, I have to say I'm a little bit in love with her in this film.  The piece is also classed up with the creme de la creme of Hollywood's British acting royalty, all turning in solid performances, especially George Sanders, who handles scenes both light and "actorly" with equal aplomb; his final scene at the end of the film is especially stirring.  And I must say I got a kick out of seeing Alan Hale wearing the skipper's hat while on his yacht, especially considering what his son would be getting up to a quarter century later!

With the exception of the aforementioned scenes involving the revolutionaries, John Ford keeps his directorial toolkit pretty empty in this one.  It was probably just a film for him to do, and while there are scenes that he subtly augmented (check the key lighting on Niven, Greene and Henry's faces while Sanders toasts their late parents -- the effect is very angelic), for the most part he seems to have been a director for hire here.  

I may be going against my better judgment here, but although I recognize Four Men and a Prayer has many flaws, I have to say I really enjoyed it.  Dated, to be sure, but sometimes you just need to set aside an hour and a half and have some mindless fun.  And this does the job as good as any.

Eight barnstorming brothers out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - The Hurricane (1937)

THE HURRICANE (1937)

Starring:  Dorothy Lamour, Jon Hall, Mary Astor, C. Aubrey Smith, Thomas Mitchell, Raymond Massey, John Carradine, Jerome Cowan, Al Kikume, Kuulei De Clercq, Layne Tom Jr.

Writers:  Dudley Nichols, Oliver H.P. Garrett (from the novel by Charles Nordhoff & James Norman Hall

Cinematography:  Bert Glennon

Music:  Alfred Newman

Editor:  Lloyd Nosler

B&W, 1h 44m.  1.37:1 presentation.

Released on:  November 5, 1937 by United Artists

My experience:  Kino Lorber Blu-Ray

The Hurricane is one I've been looking forward to for quite a while.  I'd heard a lot about it, but it's not one of Ford's more revered films.  The special effects have been praised, and for good reason; the at that time jaw dropping natural disaster-based visuals of 1936's San Francisco, and In Old Chicago and The Hurricane from '37, were enough to persuade the Academy to create a best visual effects Oscar starting in 1939 (which was won by the monsoon effects for The Rains Came, naturally). 

Dorothy Lamour is top-billed and plays Marama, but our protagonist is Terangi (Jon Hall), a free spirited South Seas native of the island of Manakoora who works as first mate on a boat run by Captain Nagle (Jerome Cowan), and is loved and respected by everybody on the island:  the colonisers, including Father Paul (C. Aubrey Smith) and Dr. Kersaint (Thomas Mitchell), as well as the colonised, including Chief Mehevi (Al Kikume), Mako (Layne Tom, Jr.), Hitia (Mamo Clark), and Arai (Movita Castaneda).  Everyone, that is, except DeLaage (Raymond Massey), the governor of the island, whose entire existence depends on the upholding of law and order.  His wife (Mary Astor) is more open-minded, and befriends Marama when Terangi is jailed in Tahiti for breaking a racist man's jaw.  

Terangi is not a man to be held captive, and continually tries to escape imprisonment from his sadistic warden, played by John Carradine.  He finally escapes, and is rescued by Father Paul, and after reuniting with Marama and meeting his now eight year old daughter Tita (Kuulei De Clercq), he's forced to go into hiding after the relentless governor learns of his escape.  He's helped in this pursuit by Chief Mehevi and the plucky Mako ... and then the titular hurricane comes and unleashes hell on everybody, friend and foe alike.

I quite enjoyed The Hurricane.  The special effects held up well, the acting is for the most part quite strong, it has nice visuals, and it moves at a nice pace.  Jon Hall isn't much of an actor, but he makes up for it with his physical presence.  Originally I thought he was too Caucasian looking, but apparently he was half Tahitian, which is more than I can say for New Orleans-born Latina Dorothy Lamour, who nevertheless fills out her sarong quite nicely indeed.  John Carradine always seemed to find himself cast as the baddest people around, and here he plays the warden with all scowls and evil grins permeating his long, gaunt face.  Mary Astor fails to make much of an impression, but Massey pretty much carries this film in a supporting role as the conflicted governor.  He's basically playing Javert from "Les Miserables", as he ignores his moral compass in favour of upholding the law to the letter.  Thomas Mitchell, who was nominated for an Oscar for his role, bookends the film as the narrator, and plays basically the same jolly alcoholic he would play two years later for Ford in Stagecoach.

The casting of the two romantic leads aside, the film seems quite novel for its time as most (although not all) of the islanders seem to have been played by people of Asian-American or Pan-Pacific descent.  In fact the film goes out of its way -- sometimes in an overly heavy-handed way -- to condemn racism and profiling.  It's made clear that the film strongly disapproves of DeLaage's stance, the warden is a caricature of evil, and Tarangi is held up almost as a Christ-like figure at times.  There's one scene where Father Paul proclaims his belief in the virtues of Tarangi, and then the camera pans upwards to the clouds as heavenly music swells.  A bit on the nose, Mr. Ford!  When I was watching The Hurricane I couldn't help but think of it as a precursor of sorts to the type of films Stanley Kramer would make his name producing some twenty years later.  

If you want more proof as to the progressive views of the filmmakers, Tarangi and Marama get married twice, once by Father Paul and once in a native ceremony.  We don't see anything of the Christian wedding, only the newlyweds leaving the church as the colonisers and a few natives stand on the steps looking after them.  More attention is given to the native ceremony directly following, as the islanders disrobe the lovers' European attire and proceed to host a joyous celebration led by Chief Mehevi.  This is followed, cheekily enough, by the couple running away to a clearing by the beach, where it is not so subtly insinuated that they are running off to fuuuuuuuuccckkkk.  Indeed the scene ends on a medium close up of just their legs intertwined with each other, the rest of their bodies hidden from the reeds.  By 1937 standards, it's kinda hot!

The climactic hurricane sequences, justly heralded, were created by James Basevi, who would later transition into being an art director, winning an Oscar for 1943's The Song of Bernadette.  Here he created the entire island on a soundstage, spending $150,000 to build the sets, and $250,000 including use of the largest water tank in Hollywood to destroy them for posterity.  The fourteen minute sequence is phenomenal, with quick cutting and Oscar-winning sound design combining with the visuals to create an intense spectacle.

Natural disaster aside, there are some great moments that stand out in The Hurricane.  The montage of escape attempts as Tarangi tries to get away from his Tahitian jail and rejoin his family, is really great, mixing a little bit of expressionistic visuals with intense close-ups of the many members of the cast.  While not quite The Godfather in terms of storytelling, it's right up there with The Roaring Twenties in terms of virtuoso editing.  There's also a scene (again involving the jail) in which we get a shot from Tarangi's point of view, of John Carradine glowering at him and telling him he'll ensure Tarangi never escapes, in which Carradine's face is filmed through a spider's web.  Pretty sure I don't need to explain the symbolism to you, but suffice it to say it makes for a fantastic visual.

I was waiting for this to come up in my chronological journey through John Ford's filmography, and it was worth the wait.  Aside from some fairly prevalent focus issues in certain scenes, the film looks fantastic, and sounds just as great.  While it probably only rates in the middle tier (maybe upper-middle) of his resume when all is said and done, I quite enjoyed it.  Outside the box Ford is still worth checking out.

Eight galvanised gales out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Wee Willie Winkie (1937)

WEE WILLIE WINKIE (1937)

Starring:  Shirley Temple, Victor McLaglen, C. Aubrey Smith, June Lang, Michael Whalen, Cesar Romero, Constance Collier, Douglas Scott

Writers:  Ernest Pascal, Julien Josephson (based on the story by Rudyard Kipling)

Cinematography:  Arthur C. Miller

Music:  Alfred Newman

Editor:  Walter Thompson

Sepiatone with blue tinted sequences; 1h 40m.  1.37:1 presentation.

Released on:  June 25, 1937 by 20th Century Fox.

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set.

There are some things that achieve mass popularity that years later one looks back on and wonders what everybody was thinking.  Pet rocks, 1980s hairstyles, Tamagotchis, that kind of thing.  Same thing goes for celebrities.  

The celebrity whose popularity I never quite understood was Shirley Temple.  Nowadays her fame has for the most part passed on; apart from Heidi or The Little Princess, or her later post-pubescent films with name directors and actors (The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer, Fort Apache), they go mostly unwatched in this day and age.  

In part her popularity was due to the Depression; in those dark days of misery and hardship people went to the movies to escape, and an effervescent smiling child full of positivity and good cheer who also looked cute (but not too professional) singing and dancing was just what the country needed.  And 20th Century Fox capitalized on that, putting her to work in as many movies as possible before she grew too old, with Shirley appearing in roughly four movies a year for the greater part of the 1930s.  In 1934 at the height of her popularity, she appeared in a total of ten films, although "only" six of them were anything more than a cameo!

They also capitalized on her popularity by putting her in movies directed by studio hands like David Butler and William Seiter, who put her front and center and would cut away to the star for every cute little reaction possible, and give her as many big musical numbers as she could carry, even if her voice (at least to modern ears) was quite grating.  But when Fox contract director John Ford returned to the studio after two pictures at RKO, somebody -- perhaps Darryl F. Zanuck -- had the idea to team their top star with their top director.  Aside from a role in Henry Hathaway's Now and Forever, it would be Shirley's first film with a name helmsman.  

What 20th Century Fox didn't realize -- or, perhaps they did? -- is that John Ford marches to the beat of his own drum.  Far be it for him to treat the star of his film with the kid gloves others had, or follow the same unofficial directorial working rules; in Wee Willie Winkie Ford treats Temple as just another actor, which works marvellously well for both her performance and the film.  We still get a few cutesy antics to keep the crowd happy, but otherwise she's just another actor in the frame, albeit the lead character.  No songs to be sung here, with the exception of a tremulous version of "Auld Lang Syne" that, perhaps because of the lack of schmaltzy musical numbers, works quite well.  The cutaways to Temple's reaction shots are few and far between, and always tastefully done.  In short, he made an actor with a very time-specific style turn in a performance that would be watchable in any era.

Temple plays Priscilla Williams, who travels from America to Northern India in 1897 with her mother Joyce (June Lang) after being left destitute by the death of her father.  They aim to meet up with her grandfather, Colonel Williams (C. Aubrey Smith).  There she makes friends with her grandfather's subordinates, such as Sgt. Donald MacDuff (Victor McLaglen), Capt. Bibberbeigh (Gavin Muir), Pipe Major Sneath (Clyde Cook), and Lt. Coppy Brandes (Michael Whalen), who takes a fancy to Priscilla's mother.  Trouble arises when Khoda Khan (Cesar Romero) escapes from jail, putting the family and the company in danger.  Constance Collier shows up as nosy busybody Mrs. Allardyce, and Douglas Scott plays a young boy called Mott.  

The film starts off quite interestingly.  From what I knew about it, and the writer of its original story, Rudyard Kipling, I figured we were in for a rah-rah, Anglophilic military adventure along the lines of The Four Feathers or Gunga Din.  In the opening conversation between Shirley and her mother, the question of expansionism and, to that effect, imperialism is brought up.  This being a 1930s film, it doesn't delve into the matter too deeply, but the fact that it is questioned, even if by a little girl, is quite interesting.  Priscilla continues to question the necessity of war throughout the film, accosting her grandfather and even, in an interesting turn of events, Khoda Khan, about why they feel the need to keep fighting.  Ford's early idealism -- which would largely disappear from his work in the post-war years -- is on full display as the film marches towards its climax.

That's not to say that the film is free from the racist tendencies of its time.  The character of Mohammet Dihn, played by Chinese-American actor Willie Fung (who, by the way, is billed tenth in the credits behind Collier -- even though his character is an important character and hers is basically a cameo -- and child actor Douglas Scott) is grating in its widely smiling, bowing and scraping, broken English insensitivity.  The way his character is disposed of needs to be seen to be believed.  And of course most of the hill tribesmen are played either by white actors or Latinos like Cesar Romero (who, to his credit, plays his role brilliantly).  But all this is to be expected, and only slightly took me out of the movie.

Wee Willie Winkie was shot in sepiatone, with blue-tinted sequences for the nighttime scenes, and it works wonderfully well in a Traffic sort of way, as the sepia really brings out the feel of the scorching Indian sun, and of course the blue helps the nighttime feel.  There is a straight silver nitrate version on the flipside of the DVD, which I sampled, and it didn't work as well for me.  The film has solid direction by Ford, with some nicely composed images, and strong acting by Temple, McLaglen, and especially C. Aubrey Smith, who by this point in his career was cinematic shorthand for the Old Guard British military establishment.  

Ford has always been a master when it comes to comedy and sentiment, and this film has both of these, from McLaglen teaching his troops how to box to the bedside death of a main character.  While I don't know if I'd rush to watch it again in the near future, I found it quite entertaining, and am pleased to finally say I have thoroughly enjoyed a Shirley Temple film.

Seven precocious prodigies out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - The Plough and the Stars (1936)

THE PLOUGH AND THE STARS (1936)

Starring:  Barbara Stanwyck, Preston Foster, Una O'Connor, Barry Fitzgerald, Denis O'Dea, Eileen Crowe, F.J. McCormick, Arthur Shields, Moroni Olsen, J.M. Kerrigan, Bonita Granville, Erin O'Brien-Moore, Neil Fitzgerald, Robert Homans

Writer:  Dudley Nichols (based on the play by Sean O'Casey)

Cinematography:  Joseph H. August

Music:  Roy Webb

Editor:  George Hively

B&W, 1h 07m.  1.37:1 presentation.

Released on:  December 26, 1936 by RKO Radio Pictures

My experience:  Criterion Channel

The Plough and the Stars is one of the least seen of John Ford's oeuvre.  Not sure why, because it's an RKO film and that studio's films have regularly appeared on physical media thanks to Warner Bros. buying out their library years ago and releasing plenty of box sets back in the early 2000s.  Perhaps it's the subject matter.  An anti-violence, pro-Irish freedom film lasting slightly over an hour is not a huge sell, even if it is from one of the greatest directors ever, and features one of the greatest classic Hollywood actresses in Barbara Stanwyck.  Still, you'd think it would be available somewhere, but that doesn't seem to be the case.  Perhaps because it completely bowdlerizes anything slightly controversial that the Sean O'Casey play it is based on would have presented to audiences at the time.

American actors Stanwyck and Preston Foster are Nora and Jack Clitheroe, a Dublin couple in 1916 whom we meet in the midst of an argument.  Jack is a commandant in the Irish Republican Army, and is waiting for a summons to arms, and Nora is firmly against his going, wishing he would choose her over his country.  The rest of the cast is filled out by a mix of character actors and also original cast members from the 1926 Abbey Theatre production, including F.J. McCormick as Captain Brennan, who comes to Jack with his orders to move out.  We then witness all the IRA soldiers, led by Lieutenant Langon (Neil Fitzgerald), gathering together to march towards the Post Office to commence the Easter Rising.

From here we follow the residents of the tenement house that the Clitheroes live in, including charwoman Maggie Gogan (Una O'Connor) and her daughter Mollser (Bonita Granville); Nora's uncle, Peter Flynn (J.M. Kerrigan) and cousin, the Young Covey (Denis O'Dea); alcoholic socialist Fluther Good (Barry Fitzgerald); and Protestant and British sympathiser Bessie Burgess (Eileen Crowe).  We also spend some time down in the pub, where we meet Timmy the Barman (Robert Homans) and prostitute Rosie Redmond (Erin O'Brien-Moore), then follow Nora as she heads to the barricades at the Post Office to try to persuade her husband to come home, and gets chastised by two of the women there (Mary Gordon & Doris Lloyd).

As we all know, the Easter Rising was unsuccessful, and we don't get to see too much of it, although Arthur Shields and Moroni Olsen appear briefly as Padraig Pearse and James Connolly, respectively.  Instead we are treated to the aftermath of the affair, as the family in the tenement house mourns a deceased tenant, while the British crack down on any remaining IRA soldiers they can find.  Still, some people are still fighting back, including a sniper (Wesley Barry) who takes potshots at the soldiers while Nick clambers over the rooftops searching the safety of home.  Just as he gets home, British Sergeant Tinley (Brandon Hurst) and Corporal Stoddard (Cyril McLaglen) pound down the door looking for him.  D'Arcy Corrigan also appears as a priest at a firing squad.

This is a well-shot film, and I enjoyed it, but it's not one hundred percent successful at what it sets out to achieve.  Firstly, O'Casey's play deals heavily with antiwar themes from a socialist point of view, and indeed most of its characters are such.  The film, however, takes away that POV entirely, and only a couple of characters are deemed socialists, and their views are pretty much shrugged off.  The play itself has four acts, and can run anywhere from three to its full six hours, depending on what edits the director chooses to make to the script.  Obviously, with a 67 minute film, there's not a lot of time to sift through what remains of a dialogue-heavy play, and even then there's at least ten minutes of montage in place of actual dialogue.   Not to mention the ending, in which Nora has delivered a stillborn child (she's not even pregnant in the film) and starts hallucinating that she and Jack (who by this point has been shot dead in the play - not so in the film) are walking in the woods (a scene which is transposed to an idyllic pre-Rising scene about a third of the way through the film).  Missing as well is the scene in which she deliriously goes to a window in the apartment, causing Bessie to pull her away and get shot by a sniper.  

So you see, the film is not the play at all.  But how does it hold up as a work of cinema?  Well, it's shot quite well.  Lots of shadowy lighting give the thing a sense of oppression which helps, and some of the action scenes are quite nicely filmed, adding a real sense of brutality and danger to the mix.  The acting is quite good.  Stanwyck is always good in everything she does, and is here too, even though her Irish accent is sometimes laughable.  Foster barely attempts one at all, which stands in sharp contrast with the rest of the cast, most of whom are Irish through and through.  The other American actors gamely attempt a go at the famous lilt, child actress Bonita Granville most successfully.  

The first roll call of the Irish Republic Army is shot backlit by torches, as the camera pans sideways past a couple of dozen soldiers, then cuts to a bunch of soldiers marching by at an angle.  My first thought was, "this is quite impressive!"  My second thought was, "Holy shit, Ford is cribbing from Triumph of the Will!"  For those unfamiliar, the aforementioned film is a Nazi propaganda film, and while I can't see Ford connecting his beloved Irish with Hitler's party in a derogatory sense (in fact he most probably chose to shoot the scene that way because he saw the film and was impressed with its cinematic iconography), with what we know now, it seems in very bad taste indeed.  

There is, however, an unexpectedly beautiful shot that says almost everything.  We look through a window to see a woman sitting in silence at what looks like a desk; we only realize the desk is actually a coffin when a man comes in with a hammer and starts to nail the top on.  This cinematic shorthand is something Ford was always very good at, and such is the case here.  

Ford was also good at silly comedic moments, and there's a fun one here which engages in the comedy rule of three, in which O'Connor, who's just been kicked out of a bar for fighting with Crowe, throws a rock through the window and storms off.  Crowe leaves the pub shortly thereafter and does the same with another window.  After about a minute, the barman sees one of the rocks on the floor, picks it up and absentmindedly tosses it aside -- through what I can only assume is the window of the door.

As a whole, though, the film is very scattered and episodic.  It's a decent enough piece of work, with some good performances and nice photography on the part of Ford's BFF Joseph H. August, and the performances are good (Barry Fitzgerald especially impressed me), but as a whole it never really gels.  Doing research on it makes me want to see the play, however, so there's that!

Five polemical poets out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Mary of Scotland (1936)

MARY OF SCOTLAND (1936)

Starring:  Katharine Hepburn, Fredric March, Florence Eldridge, Douglas Walton, John Carradine, Robert Barrat, Gavin Muir, Ian Keith, Moroni Olsen, William Stack, Ralph Forbes, Alan Mowbray, Frieda Inescort, Donald Crisp

Writer:  Dudley Nichols (based on the play by Maxwell Anderson)

Cinematography:  Joseph H. August

Music:  Nathaniel Shilkret

Editor:  Jane Loring (editorial associate)

B&W, 2h 03m.  1.37:1 presentation.

Released on:  July 28, 1936 by RKO Radio Pictures.

My experience:  John Ford Film Collection DVD box set.

Luminous.

That's the best word I can use to describe Katharine Hepburn in this movie, both in appearance and performance.  She is the heart and soul of the film, and it lives and dies by her.  In the 1930s, this picture's success (or rather, lack of it) led, for a short time, to Kate being declared box office poison, a moniker she wouldn't shake until The Philadelphia Story four years later.  Viewed today, however, I have to wonder what audiences back then were thinking.  She's magnificent.

This is not the sort of film you would expect to be made by John Ford, being more of the sort of picture George Cukor would take on.  Ford's insertion into the production, however, ensures a strong focus on the political machinations in lieu of the rather bland romance angle and makes it visually much more striking than Cukor would ever have done.  On which, more later.

Catholic Mary Stuart (Hepburn), more famously known today as Mary, Queen of Scots, lately wife to the deceased child king Francois II of France, makes her way to Scotland with her private secretary David Rizzio (John Carradine) and courtier Mary Beaton (Frieda Inescort) to start her life afresh.  Protestant Queen Elizabeth I of England (Florence Eldridge) considers Mary a threat due to her close proximity, both physical and familial, to Liz's throne.  She wishes her ambassador, the the Earl of Leicester Robert Dudley (Gavin Muir) to be around her, so sends Sir Francis Throckmorton (Alan Mowbray) up north to stir up the clan leaders against her.  These include Lords Ruthven (William Stack), Morton (Robert Barrat), Randolph (Ralph Forbes), and Scotland's regent, Mary's own brother James Stuart, the Earl of Moray (Ian Keith).  The only one who seems to support her is Lord Huntly (Donald Crisp).

Even Huntly has limits to his support of Mary, especially when he finds out that she prefers to marry James Hepburn, the Earl of Bothwell (Fredric March), a Protestant, over the clan leaders' choice, her own cousin Henry Stuart, aka Lord Darnley (Douglas Walton).  Her hard is forced, and she reluctantly accepts Darnley's proposal.  All this is a ruse by the clan leaders, who assassinate Darnley, who by this time is living apart from his wife, and blame Mary and her associates for it.  This, along with her hasty remarriage of Bothwell, prompts John Knox (Moroni Olsen), the leader of the Protestant reformation in Scotland, to rile up the citizens against her, causing her to escape to England.  All the while, Elizabeth plots from afar, until they meet in the penultimate scene of the film.

You probably read that last paragraph and thought - well, wait a minute.  That never happened!  You're right, dear reader.  Mary Stuart and Elizabeth I of England never did meet in person.  However, if you're looking to a classic Hollywood costume drama for precise historical accuracy, I'm afeared you'll be sorely disappointed.  From Queen Christina to The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex, from Clive of India to The Charge of the Light Brigade, these films were made for pure entertainment value, not lessons in history.  If it helped spur an interest in a certain subject, all the better.  But Mary of Scotland and its ilk are not to be mistaken for documentary works.

One thing all these films do have in common is a cast of thousands.  In this case, I'm not just talking about extras.  There are 42 -- count 'em, 42 -- credited speaking parts in the opening credits.  That's the most I've seen in any film from the classic studio era, at least at the beginning of a film.  Another thing they have in common is COSTUMES!!!  Honestly, I'm a bit of a slut for a costume drama, so I may be biased.  The Elizabethan-era finery here is by Walter Plunkett, who would go on to outdo himself with the outfits from Gone With The Wind just three years later.

John Ford shoots the hell out of this film, inserting expressionistic and proto-noir touches that enhance the staging.  Firstly, the way he stages the crowd scenes are stunning in their complex simplicity.  Like a modern day field general with a camera, he's able to move hundreds of soldiers from one aesthetically pleasing formation to the next, without seeming overly precious about it.

The things he does with lighting are also phenomenal.  He uses stage lighting to great effect here -- sensible, as the film is based off a Broadway play from three years prior.  In certain scenes the "house lights" as it were are dimmed or dampened completely, leaving only a key light or a spotlight to enhance the viewer's ability to feel the essence of the scene.  Take, for instance, the scene when Darnley proposes to Mary; the lighting adds a dark touch to the moment, allowing us a glimpse into Mary's feelings.  Ford's use of shadow is on point as well.  There is one scene in which Rizzio eavesdrops on a conspiracy, and all we see is his shadow projected on the wall as the plot is hatched.  Another scene has the weak Darnley cowering by a pillar in the midst of a melee, while the shadows of swords clanging appears on the wall over his shoulder.

Another scene has Mary ascend the scaffold from the viewpoint of said objet de mort, as if she were ascending to heaven.  Lightning strikes, the stage lighting dims, and we hear Bothwell's theme (sounding an awful lot like the music that plays when Titanic is sailing across the open seas in James Cameron's epic).

Performances are good across the board.  Hepburn, who along with Audrey Hepburn are distantly related to the actual Earl of Bothwell (thus playing the lover of her great-great-great-great-whatever?) is phenomenal in the role.  She brings fire and passion to her role, and lights up the screen whenever she's on.  Honestly, I don't think I've ever seen her so beautiful onscreen.  Fredric March plays to the balcony, as was his style in his early career.  Thankfully, this is effective, as his performance needed to be strong in order not to get overwhelmed by Hepburn's work.  It also contrasts well with Walton's portrayal of Darnley, which is, shall we say, foppish, effete -- even gay coded, perhaps.  

Now the film is not perfect.  There's a lot of mansplaining going on towards the Queen of Scots, a powerful woman who if portrayed today would no doubt have cut any sort of condescension off at the knees.  Not only that, at over two hours this film feels long.  Not sure what I would have cut out, as there aren't really any scenes that stick out as unnecessary.  Bothwell's scenes in jail, perhaps, as they are the only scenes with March in which Mary is not present.  Or perhaps we didn't need so many cutaways to Queen Elizabeth, but then again, to an Anglophilic American public in the 1930s, she would have been A Name To Put Butts In Seats.  It's like making a movie about Colonel Tom Parker and not putting Elvis in the film.

At any rate, these complaints notwithstanding, Mary of Scotland is a very good film, with strong direction and performances.  Although not a typical John Ford film, it is nonetheless a strong entry in his canon.

Eight quiescent queens out of ten.