John Ford Retrospective - Doctor Bull (1933)

DOCTOR BULL (1933)

Starring:  Will Rogers, Rochelle Hudson, Louise Dresser, Vera Allen, Ralph Morgan, Marian Nixon, Howard Lally, Andy Devine, Berton Churchill

Writer:  Paul Green (based on the book "The Last Adam" by James Gould Cozzens

Cinematography:  George Schneiderman

Editor:  Louis R. Loeffler

Music:  Samuel Kaylin

B&W, 1h 17m.  1.37:1 presentation.

Released on:  September 1, 1933 by Fox Film Corporation.

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set.

Doctor Bull is very representative of John Ford himself, in that it revels in the simplicity of small town American values, while at the same time mocking its faults fairly mercilessly.  He is aided in this approach by Will Rogers, an old hand at acting (having been in the theatah since the vaudeville days) turned political and social pundit.  While less remembered today, he was famous throughout the United States in the 1920s and 1930s, lovingly referred to as "Ambassador at Large of the United States." He had a folksy yet subtly intellectual charm, with humor that could "bridge the gap" as they say in today's parlance.  He died in a plane crash in 1935 at the top of his game, and Doctor Bull marks the first of three films he made with John Ford before he died.

Here he plays George Bull, a former animal doctor turned small town physician in the fictional town of New Winton, Connecticut.  George looks after the health of all the town's adults and children, but his pet case seems to be that of Joe Tupping (Howard Lally), a young man who broke his leg falling of the top of a house.  Both the townspeople and George's colleagues insist that Joe is a hopeless case and will be paralyzed for life, but George and Joe's wife May (Marian Nixon) have hope that he will pull through and regain his mobility.  George has a romantic interest in one Janet Cardmaker (Vera Allen), a widow who lives on a hillside farm just outside of town.  

Janet is what some might call "well off," especially in the parlance of 1930s Depression-era America.  While she is a paragon of goodness (no matter what the town gossips, played by Louise Carter, Tempe Pigott, Nora Cecil and Elizabeth Patterson, say), her powerful family is, for the most part, quite the opposite.  Her brother, Herbert Banning (Berton Churchill), is a businessman and real estate mogul whose wife (Louise Dresser) is far more concerned with optics and social niceties than her own daughter Virginia (Rochelle Hudson)'s well-being.  Over Virginia's objections, her parents are trying to marry her off in a social matchup, and Doctor Bull seems to be the only one Virginia can count on to be her friend.  

In fact Bull is there to support everybody in the town, existing on hardly any sleep while getting midnight phone calls from hypochondriacs like town soda jerk Larry Ward (Andy Devine, doing his patented Andy Devine schtick).  When he realizes that an outbreak of typhoid has been brought on by Herbert's water works project not following codes, he gets confirmation from his big city colleague Dr. Verney (Ralph Morgan), while getting backlash from his own community.  Soon he's brought in front of a local mob and castigated by people who should know better.  Ah, but Doctor Bull is a better man than me; instead of washing his hands of the judgemental own hypocrites, he doubles down on trying to get the town children vaccinated (it doesn't seem as if things have changed much in the past 90 years).  Being a classic Hollywood studio film, all's well that ends well.

Doctor Bull is a decently entertaining piece of small town Americana.  At an hour and seventeen minutes, it doesn't overstay its welcome, and the pace is brisk.  It packs a lot of plot into its short runtime.  Ford always has an eye for detail, and the townspeople, as in so many of his films, are scene stealers.  Louise Carter, who plays Mrs. Ely, veers close to caricature but never reaches it; rather, her obvious joy in being the town gossip hits home; we all know somebody like that!

This is the first film I've seen with Will Rogers.  For someone who considers himself a student of classic cinema, it's surprising that I hadn't come across him sooner.  However, it took me until my late 20s to discover the genius of Harold Lloyd, so I guess some things you just have to discover on your own time.  Rogers' humour, while served up in a nearly-obsolete folksy manner, packs a bit of a punch for all its understated delivery.  His acting as well impressed me; for some reason I think I was expecting a "local yokel" type performance, but his subtlety of style wouldn't look out of place in today's world.

While not John Ford's best movie, Doctor Bull is a decently entertaining film with a short running time that will easily kill 80 minutes.  It praises small town pleasures while pointedly taking on the pitfalls of some of its people; it salutes scientific achievement while saving a soft spot for community-oriented servitude.  It's balanced without being frustrating.  Beware, however, if you have high blood pressure; the behaviour of the pick-a-little, talk-a-little townspeople might get you a little riled up!  Worth a watch on a rainy day.

Six pragmatic physicians out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Pilgrimage (1933)

PILGRIMAGE (1933)

Starring:  Henrietta Crosman, Heather Angel, Norman Foster, Marian Nixon, Maurice Murphy, Lucille La Verne, Charley Grapewin, Hedda Hopper, Robert Warwick, Louise Carter, Betty Blythe, Francis Ford, Jay Ward, Frances Rich

Writers:  Philip Klein, Barry Conners (based on a story by I.A.R. Wylie)

Cinematography:  George Schneiderman

Editor:  Louis R. Loeffler

Music:  R.H. Bassett, director Samuel Kaylin

B&W, 1h 36m.  1.37:1 presentation.

Released on:  July 12, 1933 by Fox Film Corporation.

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set

Pilgrimage is one of those films that comes to mind when you think of an unsung classic film.  Though it was directed by John Ford, it seems to be practically unknown, even to classic movie buffs such as myself.  I had heard of the film by name but other than that I was unaware as to its contents, or even whether it was any good.  After seeing the film, the latter worry can be put to rest.  This is a beautifully artistic yet restrained film by a master filmmaker entering his prime, and the only reason I can see it not being more well known is that it deviates somewhat from Ford's filmography in that its protagonist is a woman.  It wasn't the only one of that ilk that he directed, either; but far be it for me to cast speculation on the vagaries of cinema history, and the perhaps sexist views of the Cahiers de Cinema clique.  That would require a whole other essay to unpack.

The film opens in 1915 in fictitious Three Cedars, Arkansas, where Mrs. Hannah Jessop (Henrietta Crosman) is a widowed farmsteader.  Her son Jimmy (Norman Foster) feels stifled by his unappreciative mother, and wishes to break out on his own.  She guilt trips him into staying, but forbids him from seeing local lass Mary Saunders (Marian Nixon), whom she looks down upon because Mary's father (Charley Grapewin) is an alcoholic.  

A couple of years later, love and nature have taken their course, and Mary is pregnant with Jimmy's child.  At this point, Hannah vindictively signs Jimmy up for the Army.  The lad had previously expressed his desire to help his country, but she had used her local power and his position as her only child to block him from being drafted.  Now, however, she essentially signs his death warrant ... and slightly before the armistice is signed, Jimmy becomes fodder for the soon-to-be-silent cannons.

Ten years later, an embittered Hannah, who has turned even more inward and hateful, denies herself any association with Mary or her grandson Jimmy Jr (Jay Ward).  One day she is approached by Mayor Briggs (Francis Ford) and her neighbour Mrs. Simms (Adele Watson, in her final film role) as a potential candidate to go overseas and represent America as a Gold Star Mother (American women who lost sons in the Great War) at a dedication of a monument to slain American soldiers in France.  She is virulently against it at first, but allows herself to be persuaded, if only to escape the sight of Mary and Jimmy Jr.

She is brought on board by Major Albertson (Robert Warwick) and introduced to her fellow passengers by the Gold Star organizer Janet Prescot (Betty Blythe).  She rooms with Mrs. Rogers (Louis Carter), but finds a certain kinship with one Mrs. Kelly Hatfield (Lucille La Verne).  She finds herself loosening up and enjoying herself, but after a breakdown on board by Mrs. Rogers, she realizes she doesn't belong amongst the group, concluding that while they loved their children wholly and unconditionally, she was never able to show her feelings in a similar fashion.

While walking the streets of Paris one evening, she comes across a young man (American, natch) who appears to be pondering suicide upon a bridge.  Upon discovering that the young man, a Park Avenue heir named Gary Worth (Maurice Murphy), is despondent over the fact that his mother (Hedda Hopper) won't let him marry his sweetheart Suzanne (Heather Angel), she takes it upon herself to be his guardian angel (I got vibes of It's a Wonderful Life while watching this), and takes him home to sleep it off.  Upon meeting the girl and realizing she is pregnant with Gary's son, Hannah realizes they are in the same situation as Jimmy was, and makes it her mission to convert Mrs. Worth to acceptance of her son's relationship, wanting to make up for her mistakes and also to prevent Mrs. Worth from making one of her own.  She then heads to her late son's grave and prays for his forgiveness, eventually making her way back to Three Cedars and opening her heart to Mary and her grandson.

The film is titled Pilgrimage, ostensibly for the journey Mrs. Jessop makes to France, but it can also be argued that the title refers to the personal and spiritual journey Hannah goes on.  It is a genuinely moving and believeable journey, told as only the golden oldies could in those days of unironic sentiment.  Henrietta Crosman is phenomenal in the role of Hannah Jessop, and for the life of me I can't see why she didn't have a bigger career in film.  She nails the hardness that a widowed farmer would have felt she needed to survive, and presents her slow thaw (and before that, her conflicted feelings) beautifully.  Even when her journey has come full circle, Crosman is careful to make sure her character is like a bull in a china shop with her love, bursting through Mary's door and announcing her presence and her recalcitrance as if their forgiveness was a given.

There are some subtle moments of humour, as when Crosman and Foster are sawing a giant log in the farmyard, and later when she breaks a baguette violently over her knee in France.  These visual representations of male castration are quite obvious, but I got a kick out of them.  The film is very nicely directed by John Ford, who focuses on character moments and faces above his usual painterly vistas.  Even so, he uses the frame in such a way that Jimmy often appears framed by walls and doors, as if he's trapped, suffocated in his mother's presence.  Even at his death, Jimmy isn't just shot; rather, a trench collapses upon his platoon, and his final moments are most likely the physical embodiment of how he's felt his whole life.

It probably sounds from what I've written that Pilgrimage is a dark, morose tale.  While it isn't always a barrel of laughs, it is a sharp, insightful look into the human character, and how different people react to tragedy and trauma (Harriet forcefully tries to control everything around her; Mary finds enjoyment in what small pleasures she can).  Not the first film that pops into your head when thinking about John Ford, but maybe it should be.  It's right up there, sneakily among his finest.

Nine possessive parents out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Flesh (1932)

FLESH (1932)

Starring:  Wallace Beery, Ricardo Cortez, Karen Morley, Jean Hersholt, John Miljan, Herman Bing, Vince Barnett, Greta Meyer, Edward Brophy

Writers:  Leonard Praskins & Edgar Allan Woolf, based on a story by Edmund Goulding; dialogue by Moss Hart

Cinematography:  Arthur Edeson

Editing:  William S. Gray

Music:  Alfred Newman

B&W, 1h 36m.  1.37:1 presentation.

Released on:  December 8, 1932 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

My experience:  Warner Archive Collection DVD-Rom

Against expectations, I found myself captivated by Flesh.  I knew it was a lesser John Ford release, and was thus not expecting too much from it; it is quite stage-set, but the actors and story were quite compelling.

We begin our tale in Germany, where American Laura Nash (Karen Morley) has just gotten released from prison, due to her being pregnant.  It appears she and her man, Nicky Grant (Ricardo Cortez), were left holding the bag after a theft gone wrong.  She agrees to wait in Germany until Nicky gets his walking papers.  Problem is, she knows nobody and has nowhere to go.  In desperation and hunger, she goes to a biergarten where she is unable to pay for her meal, where the waiter (Vince Barnett) and maitre d' (Herman Bing) threaten her with calling the cops.  This is overheard by Polakai (Wallace Beery), who both wrestles in the place for entertainment purposes and brings kegs of beer to the patrons of the establishment.  He pays for Laura's dinner and offers her a place to stay for the evening.  

Laura engages in a little subterfuge, claiming Nicky is her brother and that she is waiting for him to be released from prison.  Polakai decides to spring the guy himself, using a stash of money he has hidden in order to bribe the officials to look the other way.  Once released, Nicky convinces Laura to cozy up to Polakai and marry him, convincing the sucker the baby is his until she can get all his money and abscond with the funds.  By this point in the story it is obvious the beefy wrestler is besotted with the willowy American, as shown by his enlisting landlord Mr. & Mrs. Herman (Jean Hersholt & Greta Meyer) in trying to capture the young lady's affections.

A year later, Polakai and Laura are married and on their way to America, where he believes he can earn more money for his family.  Trouble is, not only is Nicky in America and quickly comes back into their lives, the world of wrestling is completely different than it is in Germany, and Polakai's honour and pride are quickly slapped down by an industry that prefers matches to be rigged.  Laura has developed respect for her husband by this point, and is not totally at ease with Nicky's re-entry into their lives, especially when he takes it upon himself to become Polakai's manager, bringing him into the stable of Joe Willard (John Miljan), a thinly-veiled gangster and bookie who, with the help of henchman/referee Dolan (Edward Brophy), attempt to put Polakai in his place.  Things come to a head when the gentle German realizes he's been cuckolded on both fronts.

I've never understood the popularity of Wallace Beery.  For most of the 1930s and even into the 1940s he was among the top moneymakers at the box office.  Perhaps this is because it was a different time, but I've just never been able to see it.  To me, in every movie I've seen him in, he's always been blustering, braggadocious and frankly unlikeable.  Perhaps I've been projecting what I've read and heard about him, which is that he was frankly not a very nice individual and would go out of his way to make his co-workers' lives more difficult.  In this movie, however, he was quite engaging.  I completely believed him as a gentle soul trapped in the body of a brute, and the little things he did while acting really helped sell this.  I may have to revisit some of his films at some point and see whether I've judged his acting too harshly.

Beery is ably assisted by his costar, Karen Morley, who delivers an incredibly realistic portrayal of a woman trapped in circumstances beyond her making; she makes you understand her thinking, and her changes of mind and points of view, and really lets the viewer into the mindset of her character.  A fantastic acting performance that frankly seems twenty years ahead of its time.  Ricardo Cortez is slightly less strong, but his brash attitude and charisma more than make up for it.  

For this film, John Ford reins in his broad strokes in favour of some subtler attention to detail.  For sure, we have the comic relief at the beginning of the film with the waiters and Laura arguing over the bill, but it only truly becomes hilarious if you're familiar with the German language, as much of the first fifteen or twenty minutes set in the biergarten is performed as if it were captured in situ.  

No, for this film Ford decided to focus on the little things that, due to his choices in direction and camerawork, say so much more than words ever could.  For instance, there is a scene right after Polakai springs Nicky from prison, and he sits them down at a table and starts to serve them some beer, gabbing all the time about how happy he is that they're reunited, and how much he loves Laura and by extension, her "brother".  All the while, the camera remains firmly focused on the gaze between the two lovers-cum-"siblings", with an oblivious Polakai behind them only seen from the chest down, just a pair of hands meeting their needs.  Another scene focuses on the nervous rubbing of hands -- Polakai's and Laura's -- as they discuss their future; his because he's completely smitten like a schoolboy, and hers because she's afraid of being found out.

Flesh really snuck up on me.  I wasn't expecting much from a film from whose credits John Ford removed his name, but I found it to be a thoroughly engaging character study of the type he didn't often indulge in.  Definitely worth seeking out.

Eight generous grapplers out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Air Mail (1932)

AIR MAIL (1932)

Starring:  Ralph Bellamy, Gloria Stuart, Pat O'Brien, Slim Summerville, Lilian Bond, Russell Hopton, David Landau, Leslie Fenton, Frank Albertson, Hans Fuerberg, Tom Carrigan, William Daly

Writers:  Frank Wead & Dale Van Every

Cinematography:  Karl Freund

Editor:  Harry W. Lieb

Music:  Gilbert Kurland

B&W, 1h 24m.  1.37:1 presentation.

Released on:  November 3, 1932 by Universal Pictures.

My experience:  YouTube

Following on the heels of the lofty but ultimately not wholly successful ambitions of Arrowsmith in the John Ford filmography comes Air Mail, a quintessential budget programmer from the early 1930s, with a solid cast, a couple of sets, some well done (for the time) visual effects sequences, and a generous dose of masculine camaraderie, infused throughout with a genuine lightheartedness by the staging and editing of John Ford, who no doubt was grateful to be free of the shackles of responsibility and stuffiness of the preceeding, more austere sensibilities of Arrowsmith.

A young-looking Ralph Bellamy, who was all of 28 years old at this time, plays Mike Miller, the manager and lead pilot of a US air mail waystation somewhere presumably in the Rockies, who is having problems renewing his pilots' licence as his sight is getting worse.  When Joe Barnes (an uncredited Ward Bond), one of his pilots, is killed in a crash, he's left not only without a pilot, but with a grieving girlfriend, Joe's sister Ruth (Gloria Stuart, 65 years before her Oscar-nominated role in James Cameron's Titanic).  Enter Duke Talbot (Pat O'Brien), a sarcastic ne'er do well with a glorious flying record and a not-too-comfy past with Mike, who only seems out for himself.  And out for the attentions of Irene Wilkins (Lilian Bond), the wife of Dizzy Wilkins (Russell Hopton), one of the other pilots at the waystation.  

The station is filled with other characters of the type you'll find in the typical John Ford male-dominated movie, such as the older, world-weary yet kindhearted Pop (David Landau), the man with a secret Tony Dressel (Leslie Fenton), the young buck who seems to be touched with luck until he isn't (Tommy Bogan, played by Frank Albertson), the sardonic comic relief of Slim McCune (Slim Summerville), and of course the ethnic -- if not stereotypes then at least, shall we say -- representations of German (Heinie Kramer, played by Hans Fuerberg), Irish-American (Sleepy Collins, played by silent film actor Tom Carrigan in his final credited role), and good ole boy from the American South (Tex Lane, played by William Daly).

The plot of the film is quite simple.  A massive storm is heading into the area, making it difficult for the pilots to do their job (as if their personal lives weren't already interfering in some cases), and rerouting some passenger planes with their often ungrateful clientele to the tiny airport to be switched to a plane.  After a couple of casualties, Mike decides it's up to him to make sure that the mail must go through.  After all, as the quote at the beginning AND the end of the film states:

"Neither snow, nor rain,

Nor heat, nor gloam 

of night stays these

carriers from the swift

completion of their

appointed rounds"

John Ford seems much at home with this film than he did with his previous endeavour.  He's always been an interesting study as he cherishes both individuality and the organization of men into a cohesive whole.  I think this is why his military films are done so well, because he is able to indulge his devotion of routine, order and rigidity while also making sure each individual in the films stand out.  Here he embraces the community of air mail pilots, a rather topical film as it would turn out to be, as the US Air Mail Service would only be around for two more years, being cancelled by President Franklin Roosevelt (who Bellamy would go on to portray the 32nd president of the US in the miniseries Winds of War and War and Remembrance, based on the books of the same name by Herman Wouk) ... but I digress.

It was interesting seeing Gloria Stuart in such an early role, although she didn't make much of an impression to be honest.  Lilian Bond did a good job of playing what ostensibly is a "bad girl" role, but she makes her character's behaviour believable and rational, given the circumstances she's put in.  Slim Summerville is amusing as always as the comic relief, with some nice sound effects work helping him along.  And Bellamy and O'Brien are strong as always, although these days you don't see too many Pat O'Brien star turns in which he's not acting alongside Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, or another of the Warner Bros. stable of 1930s gangsters.

The cinematography for this film was done by Karl Freund, who had previously wielded a camera on Fritz Lang's Metropolis, Paul Wegener's Der Golem, and F.W. Murnau's The Last Laugh -- in short, he has a strong background in the shadow and light expressionism of 1920s German cinema.  A couple of his more recent Hollywood efforts before Air Mail were Tod Browning's 1931 version of Dracula and Robert Florey's Murders In The Rue Morgue.  For his next film, Universal would hand him the director's keys for the original 1932 The Mummy, starring Boris Karloff.  As he was probably already in preparations for his directorial debut at the time of filming this, it's understandable if his work in Air Mail is slightly less memorable than his previously mentioned efforts; however, the camera work here is nothing if not solidly professional, and everything is lit well, almost like a slightly less chiaroscuro Casablanca ten years before the fact.

Another thing worth mentioning is this seems to be the first time Ford and his editor, in this case Harry W. Lieb, used graphic wipes as an editing technique.  It's not something he does often, usually preferring either slow dissolves, quick cuts, or fades to black.  He'll use this technique, although sparingly, in the future, yet another tool in his box.

I quite enjoyed Air Mail, a B-movie programmer made by A-list talent, for its heart, its humour, and its refusal to take itself seriously.  Consider it a prototype for Howard Hawks' 1939 masterpiece Only Angels Have Wings.  There would be greater things ahead in Ford's future (along with a few lesser efforts), but Air Mail finds both John Ford and his fans back on solid ground entertainment-wise.

Seven frolicking flyers out of ten.

Top 10 Ingrid Bergman performances (that I've seen)

10. The Bells of St. Mary's: She brings such forceful joie de vivre to her character, which is quite impressive when you realize that her first marriage was crumbling at that time. The movie as a whole I find rather mawkish and overly sentimental, so I have to be in the mood but ... the performance is good. 9. Spellbound: Here we go the other direction. Love love LOVE the movie, the dream sequences like you mentioned (and also shots such as the one at the end with Dr. Murchison in the office with the gun). Her performance, on the other hand, while very good (because let's face it, when is she not?), did grab much as much as the story did. 8. For Whom The Bell Tolls: An underrated classic. Nobody really talks about this one anymore. It's long, almost three hours if I remember correctly, and it's based on Hemingway's novel of the Spanish Civil War. Her character, for all intents and purposes, is "The Girl", but she takes a non-showy part and steals every scene she's in with layers of complexity. Even despite her and co-lead Gary Cooper not having much chemistry together, this is still one of her top ten performances for sure. 7. The Inn of the Sixth Happiness: Another less-known gem, and another epic set in a land and time that doesn't get touched on much. Bergman carries this film (along with some plucky children). I would venture a guess she's onscreen for 85-90% of the film's runtime. The film flubs the landing a bit, seemingly trying to shovel contemporary Western values into what had been a very open-minded framework, but her performance is, as usual, excellent. 6. Autumn Sonata: I love me some Ingmar Bergman almost as much as I love me some Ingrid Bergman (the fact that I have partially Swedish background no doubt is a reason), but oddly enough, this for me is almost mid-tier Bergman. Ingmar, that is. Ingrid's performance is wonderful; one moment you're furious at her, the next your heart breaks, and she makes you feel it all. The film, however, didn't engage me as much. 5. Anastasia: She won best actress in 1956 for this role, and while that was partially political as a "welcome back to Hollywood" type gesture, her performance itself is the stuff of greatness. She makes you live Anna Anderson's journey with her, from the traumatized anxiety in which we find her, to slowly becoming her own person. Is she really the Grand Duchess Anastasia? History has since proven she was not, and the film is ambivalent -- but I found it fascinating that Anna figured out who she was as a person, while trying to pretend to be somebody else. 4. Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde: This is the 1941 version with Ingrid, Lana Turner, and Spencer Tracy as the title characters. A delightful about face from the angelic characters she was usually cast as, Ingrid hams it up here playing a bawdy barmaid (read: prostitute in silver screen parlance) who falls in love with Tracy. It's frankly quite frightening to witness the sassy, flamboyant Ivy become confused and defeated by Jekyll's reign of terror. Not just an against-type performance but a multi-layered one as well. 3. Gaslight: Which leads us into the film that won Ingrid her first Oscar, in 1944. Over the past ten years or so this film has enjoyed quite the renaissance, as the term gaslighting has entered the lexicon. This is great because it has brought entire new legions of fans to classic cinema. The flip side is that because of this it seems to have been put into a box, with the focus being only on the actions of Boyer's character, and not enough attention given to Paula and her struggles to maintain her sanity. I don't like that they eventually turned to a Joseph Cotten-ex machina for the ending, but I do relish Paula's supreme enjoyment of the moment when the tables have turned. 2. Casablanca: This was a tough one for me, because like you I had this and Notorious as my one-two combination, natch. I'm putting this second for reasons I'll explain later. But this is the film that made me fall in love with Ingrid Bergman, as I think it did for us all. Knowing that she and her co-stars had no idea how the film would end as they were making it meant that they -- especially Ingrid -- had to shade their characters with nuance, and it made all the difference in the world. Here's looking at you, kid. 1. Notorious: The reason I chose this as my number one is that it has one of the greatest performances in cinema (Bergman's) in one of the greatest films ever. The nonchalant bravado that Alicia shows at the beginning is an act that masks her self-loathing and insecurity. She falls head over heels for Cary Grant and we feel it -- and then we feel her heartbreak when he throws her to the wolves in the name of duty. We feel her longing for Devlin even as she curses him. We feel her pity for Alex (Claude Rains in a supporting role for the ages) even as she despises him. As Alex and his mother siphon the life and energy out of her, we feel that too. It's an amazing performance, severely overlooked in my opinion. Funny how the Academy can reward performances in which an actor puts on a wig and a fake nose, but ignore an emotionally gutwrenching performance that carries you through the ringer with it.

John Ford Retrospective - Arrowsmith (1931)

ARROWSMITH (1931)

Starring:  Ronald Colman, Helen Hayes, Richard Bennett, A.E. Anson, Clarence Brooks, Alec B. Francis, Claude King, Bert Roach, Myrna Loy, Russell Hopton, David Landau, Lumsden Hare

Writer:  Sidney Howard (based on the novel by Sinclair Lewis)

Cinematography:  Ray June

Editor:  Hugh Bennett

Music:  Alfred Newman

B&W, 1h 39m.  1.20:1 presentation.

Released on:  December 7, 1931 by The Samuel Goldwyn Company through United Artists

My experience:  Warner Archive Collection DVD-Rom

Arrowsmith was a frustrating film to sit through, and I've been trying to figure out how best to write about the experience, and how I feel about the film.  I'm still not quite sure how, so I will simply engage in a bit of stream-of-consciousness and hope everything makes sense in the end, otherwise I'll never get to the next Ford movie in the filmography!

I was quite looking forward to this one, as Arrowsmith was the first John Ford film to be nominated for best picture at the Academy Awards, and while that doesn't necessarily signify that it is a good movie (the Academy has made many, shall we say, questionable choices in its near century of existence), the very existence of said nomination for any film connotes a certain quality of product, or at least a contemporary admiration of such product, that directs attention towards any film that happens to get nominated for best picture.  The Oscars being much smaller in that era, it was tied for the most nominations in the ceremony for 1931-32 with four nominations (the qualifications ran between August 1, 1931 and July 31, 1932 for that year; the January through December period we are so familiar with today wouldn't occur for another few years (1934, to be precise).  The other awards it was in consideration for was best screenplay adaptation (Sidney Howard), best cinematography (Ray June) and best art direction (Richard Day).

I can see why the Academy liked it, as not much has changed in Academy tastes in the 92 years since Arrowsmith was released.  It's based on a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by acclaimed American author and social critic Sinclair Lewis (Main Street, Elmer Gantry and Dodsworth are among his other works).  It's also topical, dealing (albeit in this case very obliquely) with the inner workings (and conflicts and failures) of the medical system.  It's got a great cast led by Ronald Colman and Helen Hayes, and a pedigree of fantastic filmmakers behind the camera.

So why didn't Arrowsmith do much for me?  Was I expecting too much?  Perhaps.  The story focuses on Martin Arrowsmith (Ronald Colman), a young doctor from a fictional Midwestern city called Winnemac, who moves with his wife Leora (Helen Hayes) to the equally fictional Wheatsylvania, North Dakota, a tiny village in which he will be the only doctor in town, but will be set up in practice by Leora's father (Bert Roach).  Before leaving, his mentor, Dr. Gottlieb (A.E. Anson) tells him he's limiting himself, and it will only be a matter of time until he strives for bigger things, and to look him up when he gets to New York.  While in North Dakota, Martin meets and befriends the Swedish virologist Gustav Sondelius (Richard Bennett) over a beer or two dozen.  Experimenting during an outbreak that is killing all the local cattle, he comes up with a vaccine that saves the rest from perishing, much to the consternation of the state veterinarian (David Landau), who thinks Arrowsmith is trying to show him up.

A few years later, Arrowsmith has accepted Gottlieb's offer to join him in New York, at the McGurk Institute, run by Dr. Tubbs (Claude King).  He butts heads somewhat with a fellow scientist, Terry Wickett (Russell Hopton), but settles in to a comfortable life at the institute.  He discovers a serum that Sondelius believes will be helpful in fighting off a bubonic plague in the West Indies.  Arriving on the island, he finds the governor, Sir Robert Fairland (Lumsden Hare) having all but given up the ghost, and it is only with the help of local doctor Oliver Marchand (Clarence Brooks) that he is able to make headway with the local population.  They set up shop on the estate of Twyford (Alec B. Francis) and get to work trying to save the locals and others in the area, including society lady Joyce Lanyon (Myrna Loy), to whom Arrowsmith feels an attraction.  Some people live, some people die, and the censors left the backbone of the film on the cutting room floor.

Lewis' story would have worked much better as a four or five episode HBO miniseries (a la Todd Haynes' 2011 version of Mildred Pierce starring Kate Winslet), using the time to flesh out the characters and really dive deep into the themes.  As it is, I found Arrowsmith to be half a movie.  A good movie, with a wonderful cast and a true classic Hollywood sheen, but not a great one.  While it does touch obliquely on some of the issues in the medical system, it is more along the lines of "this doctor is BAD, that doctor is GOOD" rather than the reasons things are a certain way.  

Likewise, the film whitewashes its protagonist.  Arrowsmith is a drunkard and an adulterer, but while he drinks and shows interest in Loy here, everything is very much sanitized and thus the classic film star Myrna Loy (before her box office stardom, true, but still) is basically reduced to a walk-on part late in the film.  I was impressed with the casting of black actor Clarence Brooks in the substantial role of a well-spoken doctor, thirty years before Hollywood would regularly cast non-white actors in speaking roles that didn't require much more than pidgin talk.  

I did like the set design of the film, as it differentiated quite nicely between early 20th-century traditional midwestern decor, and the sleek art deco style that was prevalent in the late 1920s and early 1930s in New York City.  Upon arriving at the West Indies portion of the show, Ford is able to indulge in some chiaroscuro shadow and light, which works quite effectively at giving a till then somewhat sterile experience a little bit of atmosphere.

While I did not dislike Arrowsmith, I must concede that because of its literary and cinematic pedigree, I came away a bit disappointed overall, especially considering the talent involved.  I wouldn't guide you away from seeing it if you so chose, but there are definitely better John Ford films out there to be seen.

Six superficial scientists out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - The Brat (1931)

THE BRAT (1931)

Starring:  Sally O'Neil, Alan Dinehart, Frank Albertson, William Collier Sr., Virginia Cherrill, June Collyer, J. Farrell MacDonald, Mary Forbes, Albert Gran, Louise Mackintosh, Margaret Mann

Writers:  S.N. Behrman & Sonya Levien (based on the play by Maude Fulton)

Cinematography:  Joseph H. August

Editor:  Alex Troffey

B&W, 1h 02m.  1.20:1 presentation.

Released on:  August 23, 1931 by Fox Film Corporation.

My experience:  YouTube

I've always been quite partial to fish-out-of-water comedies, of which there were plenty in the 1930s.  In almost all of these, a poor or supposedly "lower class" person gains access to the world of socialites and high rollers, and by the end, through situations comic and otherwise, said person enriches the lives of the shallow folk among whom they've been spending their time, usually making them take off their sheltered goggles and "see the light" as it were.  I'm referring specifically to films like My Man Godfrey (1936), Mr. Deeds Goes To Town (1936), Bringing Up Baby (1938), The Philadelphia Story (1940), and Ball Of Fire (1941), to name just a few.  There are also some in which the hoity-toity are forced to spend time with the plebs and have their eyes opened, such as It Happened One Night (1934) and You Can't Take It With You (1938) -- both best picture Oscar winners directed by Frank Capra -- but the point I'm trying to make is that there's just something about the little guy standing up to the big guy and showing them a lesson that just resonates with me.

This being said, you would think that John Ford's career would consist of more class comedies than he has, what with his films being chock full of moments pointing out the hypocrisy of societal leaders, but other than the odd job he took in the late 1920s and early 1930s, there doesn't seem to be many that come to mind.  Perhaps as he got more clout as a director he wanted to go on location more and try new things, and films set largely in one location (or two, as The Brat) is, just didn't interest him.  Regardless, class-conscious comedy, while appearing in many of his movies to some extent, was for the most part relegated to side-stories and background observations.

The Brat is based on a 1917 play by Maude Fulton, who also originated the title role on stage.  The film, is very much set in the 1930s, at first seems to be a bit of a take on Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw (perhaps better known today as the basis for the musical My Fair Lady by Lerner & Loewe, but I digress).  Sally O'Neil plays the titular waif, who we first meet in a night court where she has been brought before a judge (William Collier, Sr.) for eating and running from a diner (this being the Depression, we believe her when she says she hadn't eaten in two days, and hasn't had a job in two months).  One of the judge's friends, author MacMillan Forrester (Alan Dinehart), seemingly takes pity on the young lady, pays her fine and brings her back to his country home.  Mac has an agenda, however, as he is inspired to study the young lady and use his findings in a new novel he's writing.

Upon arriving at the mansion, the Brat is shocked to see the way the other half live, and develops a friendship with Timson, the Forrester butler and the local bishop (Albert Gran), who seems to come and go as he wishes.  She sees the callous way Mac's mother (Mary Forbes) treats his brother Stephen (Frank Albertson), who is obviously considered the black sheep of the family, having taken to alcoholism as his mother is withholding the deed to his late father's ranch.  Most troubling is the presence of Mac's two live-in girlfriends, Angela (Virginia Cherrill) and Jane (June Collyer), who have nothing nice to say about anybody at all and seem to exist just to leech off the family's money.  When the Brat realizes that Mac is just as callous as the rest of his family, her feelings of admiration for him are shattered.  After a knock-down, drag-out catfight between the Brat (whose name we never find out, as Mac never thinks to ask) and Angela, and after bearing witness to Mac's callous behaviour (influencing his mother to sell the ranch so he can buy a yacht), she and Stephen, who is much more suited to her personally, run away from the family to get married and move out west to start life anew.

The Brat, having been based on a Broadway play, is very stagebound, and aside from the opening few minutes Ford doesn't do too much to open it up cinematically, but as a filmed stage play, I did find it amusing in fits and starts.  I think my enjoyment of it was influenced by my love of the fairly specific subgenre it fits into; The Brat isn't quite a screwball comedy (with the exception of perhaps the WWE-style brawl between the two women in gowns), but it does have some very pointed satire and biting witticisms aimed at cutting off the wings of the snobbery of some folks and siding definitively with the hoi polloi.  

One thing I need to mention is that the print available on YouTube is, compared to most things available to stream online, visually quite murky.  This is due to it being a filmed copy of a screening at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York.  The only extant copy is a badly damaged nitrate print, hence the difficulty in restoring it for a transfer worthy of release.  What we have is unfortunately the best we will ever get.  Still, all of Ford's sound films are in circulation, and for a film that's over 90 years old, the fact that we still are able to watch it when so many films released in the early 1930s have been lost forever is nothing short of a miracle.

I enjoyed The Brat.  It had some nice comedic moments, and while nothing really stood out (with the exception of the performance of Sally O'Neil, who sadly didn't have a long career due to stage fright), it was a solidly performed stage play, albeit with perhaps too short a running time for all the action packed into it.  It's not much to look at, but if you're willing to sit through some murky visuals, you may get something out of it.  For Ford completists and fans of comedic social satire.

Five affluent a-holes out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Seas Beneath (1931)

SEAS BENEATH (1931)

Starring:  George O'Brien, Marion Lessing, Mona Maris, Walter C. Kelly, Warren Hymer, Steve Pendleton, Walter McGrail, Larry Kent, Henry Victor, John Loder

Writer:  Dudley Nichols (based on a story by Cmdr. James Parker, Jr., U.S.N. Ret'd)

Cinematography:  Joseph H. August

Editor:  Frank E. Hull

Music:  Peter Brunelli

B&W, 1h 30m.  1.20:1 presentation.

Released on:  January 30, 1931 by Fox Film Corporation.

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set.

In addition to having a very lengthy and acclaimed film career, John Ford was also a longtime Naval reservist in the United States who saw action in the Battle of Midway during World War II (directing a fantastic documentary about it, which we will get to in the future) and later on, to a lesser extent, in the Korean War.  

At this point in his career, he was not officially affiliated with the United States Navy (he entered the Reserve in October 1934, and entered active duty three months before Pearl Harbor).  Even at this time, his patriotism and interest in the men who sail the seas was well-documented, especially through some of his past films, three of which -- The Blue Eagle (1926), Salute (1929), and Men Without Women (1930) -- were focused on the trials and tribulations of Navy men.  

Two of those films featured George O'Brien, who Ford had discovered back in 1924 and cast in his epic Western The Iron Horse.  O'Brien returns to Ford and the ocean waves in this one, portraying Commander Bob Kingsley, who is in charge of a mystery ship, what we would now call a Q-ship.  These were ships sailing under the flag of a specific country (in this case the United States), who were dressed up to look like harmless merchant trading ships, while carrying hidden ammunition, with the intent of luring U-boats close enough to be blown to smithereens.

Sailing under Commander Kingsley are "Guns" Costello (Walter C. Kelly, the uncle of Grace Kelly), a big lug named Kaufman (Warren Hymer) -- both in comic relief roles -- Chief Joe Cobb (Walter McGrail), Lieutenant "Mac" McGregor (Larry Kent), and Ensign Dick Cabot (Steve Pendleton, credited as Gaylord Pendleton here), a fresh-faced newcomer to the ship.  

While pulling into port in the Canary Islands to load up on fuel and provisions, the men are given shore leave with the express order not to fraternise with women or indulge in alcoholic beverages.  So naturally, they head to the nearest bar to check out the local "wildlife."  Ensign Cabot develops a special fixation on the bar's entertainer, Lolita (Mona Maris), who unbeknownst to him happens to be an agent in the employ of the Germans who his ship is tracking.  Meanwhile, Commander Kingsley, while attempting to discreetly photograph a German ship in the port, comes across Anna Marie (Marion Lessing), who unbeknownst to him happens to be the sister of Baron Ernst von Steuben (Henry Victor), the commander of the U-boat he hopes to destroy.  She also happens to be dating her brother's first mate, Franz Schiller (John Loder), adding another layer of intrigue into the situation.  What will happen when shore leave is cancelled and the men have to return to the ship?

Seas Beneath does not have a great reputation among John Ford films, a rep the master had no inclination to change, as by all accounts he had issues with the leading lady, a starlet from Wisconsin who was apparently forced upon him by a suit at the studio who assumed because she had a German last name she would be able to speak the language.  Let's get this out of the way quickly:  Ford was right about Lessing's acting talents.  She's a horrible actress, and easily the worst thing about this movie.  

That being said, I enjoyed the rest of the film.  The opening ten minutes excel in acclimatising the audience to the cadences and rhythms of life at sea, especially the communications between the ship and the torpedo submarine it has in tow.  There is some great stuntwork, with men crawling all over the topsails, and one man even taking a plunge from atop the ship's full height.  Impressive stuff.  Later on in the film, we see some actors on top of a submarine stay in position as the submarine submerges, and the camera (roughly at chest level to the men) descends underwater.  

In fact, the photography in this film is top-notch.  There are no specifically showy shots that scream out "artistic genius".  Rather, the production was filmed out on the open seas, with the use of full scale ships and submarines.  We get a POV shot of a submarine rising slowly up out of the water, and another lengthy, uninterrupted shot from about a ship, in which the camera is behind a character who watches another ship sink into the ocean.  It brings a quite documentary-like feel to the story.  

Also adding to the realism is the abundant use of German (with very few intertitles).  It's not something I've seen in many Hollywood movies of the era; I'm almost inclined to state that Seas Beneath was 75 years ahead of its time in that regard.  Ford's years of being a silent film director work in his favour here, as he's able to tell a story without dialogue (or in this case, in a foreign tongue without subtitles).  In fact, it's when dialogue appears (specifically from the mouth of Lessing) that the film loses some of its magneticism.

The ending of the film left me a little perplexed; the film would have been better served stopping after the final logbook report.  Instead, we are treated to an unwanted, trite and forced romantic dialogue that could have been struck from the film without incident.  Still, I must say I was pleasantly surprised with Seas Beneath.  It's got comedy, action, suspense, doesn't try to overshoot its mark, and I found it an unexpected joy to watch.

Seven submersible sailors out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Up The River (1930)

UP THE RIVER (1930)

Starring:  Spencer Tracy, Claire Luce, Warren Hymer, Humphrey Bogart, William Collier Sr., Joan Lawes

Writers:  John Ford & William Collier Sr., based on the original story by Maurine Dallas Watkins

Cinematography:  Joseph H. August

Editor:  Frank E. Hull

Music:  James F. Hanley

B&W, 1h 25m (originally 1h 32m).  1.20:1 ratio.

Released on:  October 10, 1930 by Fox Film Corporation.

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set.

John Ford.  Humphrey Bogart.  Spencer Tracy.

Three icons of American cinema, together in one film.  A film made by an all star team like that should have masterpiece written all over it, or at the very least should be a well-known piece of cinema history.

Up The River, however, falls short on both accounts.  This was the feature film debut for both Bogart and Tracy, making them complete unknowns at the time, and this production -- though it had a name director attached -- quickly came and went from theatres and was forgotten.  The remaining extant print comes from a frustratingly choppily edited duplicate, and about eight minutes are missing from the finished product.  Tracy and Bogie, both looking incredibly young (being five and ten years from stardom, respectively) have decent chemistry, and sadly this was the only film they made together.

The film itself is a somewhat amusing character comedy that shows its age, both in the wear and tear visible in the print, and also in its archaic attitudes.  Tracy and Warren Hymer play St. Louis and Dannemora Dan, respectively, two cons whose specialty is escaping from prison -- escaping thanks to St. Louis' brains, and getting recaptured thanks to Dan's lack of wits.  After getting caught once again, they end up in back in prison, palling up to the warden (Robert Emmett O'Connor) and his daughter Jean (Joan Lawes, daughter of the actual warden of Sing Sing), playing tricks on a bully played by an uncredited Ward Bond, and making 40-year-inmate and manager of the prison baseball team Pop (William Collier Sr.) happy by agreeing to join the team.  

Sharing a cell with Pop, they also meet Steve Jordan (Humphrey Bogart), a young man who comes from a well-to-do family who was caught up in some violence while about to leave for a trip to China.  Steve has eyes for Judy Fields, played by Claire Luce -- a Broadway actor who specialized in Shakespearean roles later in her career (no relation to Clare Boothe Luce, the writer of The Women among other plays) -- and pledges his love and devotion to her, promising to wait until she is released before beginning a new life with her.  Problem is her old partner in crime Frosby (Morgan Wallace), who left her high and dry to take the rap, finds out about the situation and takes his business to Steve's hometown, where his mother (Edythe Chapman) and sister Cynthia (Althea Henry) think Jordan has actually been in China.  St. Louis plots another escape in conjunction with Dannemora Dan to thwart Frosby's efforts and make sure the two lovers are united.

For a movie directed by John Ford, starring Spencer Tracy and Humphrey Bogart, with some funny character work by Warren Hymer, and in which the climax of the show involves a game of baseball, I found myself somewhat uninvolved in the proceedings.  The comedy as mentioned can be quite amusing, although some of it falls flat.  It definitely comes from a time when movies, and society in general, were much more innocent, or at least put on the appearance of innocence (in order to lead the average person into a tranquil docility perhaps?  That's another essay for another day).  

From a modern vantage point, the prison seems like a boys club with walls and guards.  Everybody's always joking and yukking it up, having a good time, the warden seems to have no issues with befriending the inmates, and while I'm sure prisons back then had many murderers and generally unsavory characters mixed in amongst their populaces, there doesn't seem to be a Hans Beckert or a Leopold and Loeb anywhere in this film.  There is also a frankly unbelievable scene in which Judy basically gives the game away to Frosby about her plans with Steve.  You know the man is bad news, keep your mouth shut, child!  

There is also a cringingly depressing minstrel show, with two white inmates in blackface performing a routine for the benefit of the prison's wealthy patrons.  What makes watching this even more uncomfortable is that during this scene Ford constantly cuts to a black inmate and an oriental inmate sitting side by side in the front row, hooting and hollering and clapping as if this were the greatest thing since sliced bread.  These two audience members, of course, are never seen before or after said minstrel show.

The ending also left me unsatisfied as, with all the talk about St. Louis being the only one who can bring the baseball team to victory, the film ends before he even throws a pitch.  Maybe they ran out of time with Tracy's schedule (he had a two week filming period due to starring on Broadway concurrently).  Maybe Ford thought the ballgame wasn't that important, in which case why make such a big deal out of it to begin with.  Or perhaps, as sometimes happens in the lesser Ford films, he just didn't know how to end it.  

While I'm thankful that Up The River still exists on celluloid, and is available to find for those who expend the effort, I have to admit that despite its cinematic pedigree, for me it's a one and done.  It has its moments, but I don't think I'll be returning to this one anytime soon.  Too bad, as it's a small piece of film history featuring the only collaboration between two of the greatest actors of the silver screen.

Five personable prisoners out of ten.

John Ford Retrospective - Born Reckless (1930)

BORN RECKLESS (1930)

Starring:  Edmund Lowe, Catherine Dale Owen, Frank Albertson, Marguerite Churchill, William Harrigan, Lee Tracy, Warren Hymer, Ilka Chase, Ferike Boros, Paul Porcasi, Joe Brown, Ben Bard, Pat Somerset, Eddie Gribbon, Mike Donlin, Paul Page

Writer:  Dudley Nicholas (based on the novel "Louis Berretti" by Donald Henderson Clarke

Cinematography:  George Schneiderman

Editor:  Frank E Hull

B&W, 1h 22m.  1.20:1 ratio.

Released on:  May 11, 1930 by Fox Film Corporation

My experience:  Ford at Fox DVD box set

What a difference a year makes.  On May 8, 1929, John Ford's film The Black Watch was released, and while an entertaining film, the dialogue registers today as very stilted and slow.  Why?  Sound film was in its infancy, and studios were trying to figure out how listening to dialogue would affect an audience.  It was thought that actors needed to enunciate slowly and clearly, and often loudly -- playing to the back row, in theatre parlance -- in order for moviegoers to accept talking pictures.  What filmmakers hadn't counted on was the fact that when the faces were looming large on the screen above, audiences had no problem telling the emotions of characters.

A year later, on May 11, 1930, Born Reckless, also directed by Ford, was released into a world that, like the film industry, was very much in tumult.  America and the world had been plummeted into what would become known as the Great Depression, which would last the better part of ten years.  Hollywood was forging ahead with its new experiments in sound film, and even two-strip Technicolor.  All this is to say, that Born Reckless must have been seen as a new breed of cinema to those curious early 1930 cinema audiences.

The interesting thing for me is that Born Reckless was released in 1930, a year before Little Caesar and The Public Enemy -- which are universally acknowledged to have kicked off the gangster film -- came out.  It is the type of film that seems like it could have been written for James Cagney.  The dialogue is quick and snappy, and full of early 20th century slang.  The pace slows after that, but as in a Baz Luhrmann film, the energy of the first quarter of the film for the most part carries us through the slower parts.

Our protagonist is Luigi "Louis" Berretti (Edmund Lowe), a hoodlum in New York in the late 1910s, just before America entered the war.  He lives at home with his mother (Ferike Boros) and father (Paul Porcasi, an Italian-born actor whose use of the Sicilian dialect is used to comedic effect that probably would have gone over the heads of at least three quarters of US audiences back then), and his sister Rosa (Marguerite Churchill).  He and his gang, including Big Shot (Warren Hymer), Good News Brophy (William Harrigan), Joe Bergman (Ben Bard), Duke (Pat Somerset), and Bugs (Eddie Gribbon), get in trouble for trying to rob a bank, and are called before District Attorney Cardigan (Roy Stewart).  With the help of local reporter Bill O'Brien (Lee Tracy), Louis is able to swing a deal to get sent overseas and serve in the army.

While in training camp he meets Frank Sheldon (Frank Albertson), a rich young man whose uncle Jim (Edwards Davis) and sister Joan (Catherine Dale Owen) are able to visit before they go overseas.  Ward Bond and Jack Pennick appear as scowling sergeants here.  When they do get overseas, the movie gets very Fordian, as the director spends about fifteen minutes indulging in raucous masculine hijinks, including Louis' flirtation with a French waitress (Yola d'Avril).  Upon returning home, sans a few comrades thanks to the unseen Battle of the Argonne, he reconnects with his family, folks from his old neighborhood, and gives his respects to Joan, who is set to marry Dick Milburn (an uncredited Randolph Scott).  He starts a nightclub which soon becomes the hottest spot in town, but being in the same place, his past is never far behind him.  Can he keep his nose clean?

While Lowe is good in the role, Cagney would have been dynamite.  Lowe has charisma for sure, and nails the physical part of the role (could it be Cagney stole some of his Cagney-isms from Edmund Dantes Lowe?).  Like the Count of Monte Cristo he was named for, Lowe is just a little too well put-together and soft-spoken not to mention being a bigger, more lumbering person than the five foot five Cagney, whose movements were informed by both his scrappy childhood growing up in the Bowery and his training as a professional dancer.  It's unfair of me to compare Lowe to James Cagney, I know ... but one can't help but wonder what the Warner Bros. star would have done with such a role.  Warren Hymer is great as Big Shot, bringing a likeability to what is essentially a villainous role.  I was impressed by Marguerite Churchill, who brings a nice intensity to the role of Rosa, Louis' sister.  And Lee Tracy was just fine as the fast-talking, wisecracking reporter Bill O'Brien.  

The film itself gives a fine representation of a New York neighborhood, and very much captures the vibe of the period (in fact, one might say that the pre-World War I scenes are a little too modern from a historical point of view, but that was the norm in Hollywood at that time).  The backlot set is very much like that which would be seen in countless gangster films over the next decade or so, from The Public Enemy all the way through to 1939's The Roaring Twenties (my personal favourite gangster film of the era).  The scenes overseas in France run a little too long, however.  They don't add character, as we already know who these people are; the film would be little over an hour without these scenes, though, so perhaps they were added to prop up the runtime?

Regardless, when we return to America after the wartime interlude, the pace of the film quickens.  In a series of episodes we see a decade pass over the course of perhaps ten minutes.  The climax of the film involves the kidnapping of a child of the well-to-do, and I had assumed it was a take on the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, but upon researching it later I realized that the Lindbergh kidnapping didn't happen until 1932, two years later.  Ford, who while indulging his buffoonish tendencies during the sequences in France, has heretofore kept his cinematic prowess fairly restrained, lets out the stopper during the last reel of the film.  Louis' approach of the criminal compound on Long Island is blanketed with some great smoke machine work, which gives the film something of a film noirish tinge about fifteen years before the term was coined.  This mood continues when, upon returning to his nightclub for a showdown with Big Shot, the swinging doors are suddenly covered with his profile in shadow, seconds before he enters the frame.  There is also a shockingly abrupt dolly pullback between those same swinging doors after shots are fired, which serves the dual purpose of enhancing the shock caused by the loud gunshots and put the viewer on edge, while at the same time quickly pulling away from any actual violence being shown on film.  While the Hays Code wouldn't go into effect for another four years, censorship was still very much a thing in 1930, albeit left in the hands of government censors of the states and provinces.  The movement also makes us crane our necks in anticipation of who exactly won the duel.

Born Reckless is not a perfect film, but it is a surprisingly good early gangster film.  There had been others in the past (Fritz Lang's epic four and a half hour saga, Dr. Mabuse der Spieler, Von Sternberg's 1927 masterpiece Underworld) and would be countless more going forward, but in terms of sound films out of Hollywood, I was surprised, pleasantly so, to discover that this early prototype of a soon to be ubiquitous genre can still very much hold its own.

Seven and a half generous gangsters out of ten.