What a darling ensemble!

I'm pretty confused about female friendships after watching Jane Austen Book Club and The Women (1939) in the same day. Are my female friends horrified by my personal calamities or secretly thrilled by them? Are they the wind beneath my wings or the knife in my back? The classic 1939 film maintains that most women are a pack of gossiping, shrewish harpies whose main pleasure is to shop and send the bills to their husbands who are so busy having affairs with perfume counter girls that they don't notice another $250 nightgown (in 1939 money!) more or less. The 2007 film maintains that women become instantly bonded over the smallest triviality (a favorite author) and spend the rest of their lives bucking each other up with a steady diet of reading Jane Austen, wine-drinking and Ugg-wearing. That I have female friends that remind me of characters from both movies only adds to the confusion.

Here's the thing about these staggeringly different "chick flicks:" I really loved both of them because of all of the amazing ensemble acting. I'm a total sucker for ensemble acting. The Big Chill is one of my favorite movies of all time though I have little interest in the 1960s or the lives of self-obsessed yuppies who went to college in the sixties. Give me a movie where a bunch of actors get enough room to really create characters and even if their interactions are hopelessly contrived (as in both The Women and The Jane Austen Book Club) and I'm all over it.

Here are a few of the highlights:

Rosalind Russell in the Women is a revelation even for this Ros Russell fan. She's over the top loathsome and catty and though she was a gorgeous glamorous woman she was completely willing to lookunattractive in this film. The ingenious costuming always includes extra tall ugly hats and fussy ruffles is designed to make Russell looks as awkward as possible. Compare her to star Norma Shearer who was actually a little bit frumpy in this movie until the final scenes and to Joan Crawford who benefits from the femme fatale wardrobe she's given. Speaking of wardrobe, The Women has about 15 minutes of amazing filler in the form of a technicolor fashion show. These are some of the most hilriously odd clothes I've ever seen in my life. The recent remake of the film has the main character, Mary Haines, as a fashion designer. I like how the original film skewers the world of fashion, the absurdity, the expense and the snobbishness. And then of course it turns around and gives you fifteen minutes of clothing eye candy.

Emily Blunt in Jane Austen book Club is excellent as the tightly wound "time bomb" Prudie who has serious mommy issues and a thing for one of her high school students. She also has the most amazing clothes, which stand in stark contrast to the other "hippy handcraft" wearing members of the club.

Paulette Goddard stands out in a critical but small part in The Women. I love her advice to Mary Haines, "You forgot to lick her in the one place it counts. In his arms. And if I know men that's still Custer's last stand." And then she goes on to have the film's one genuine cat fight, with Rosalind Russell. Awesome.

Hugh Dancy plays the lone male member of the book club. He's a sci fi nerd who is attracted to one of the members and so ends up reading all of Jane Austen as well as the Mysteries of Udolpho just to get her attention. Stunt reading. Look ma, no cliff's notes. I love his take on "Mansfield Park," that it's a reverse Empire Strikes Back, because the brother and sister get together at the end.

It would take a much longer blog post than I really feeling like doing right now to go into depth about either of these movies. They are both vacuous, enjoyable and have a way of distracting and soothing the way a good chic flic should.

Mary of Scotland: a partial, imperfect and ignorant history

No, it's not another leg tribute (but it could be.) Frederich March as the James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, traditionally historic villain and hero of Mary of Scotland. Hepburn was an ancestor of actress Katharine Hepburn who starred in the film and as such the treatment of Bothwell in the film was softened so as to not offend her. Bothwell is always referred to as "Bothwell" in the movie, perhaps to avoid confusion with the actress and the Earl.

I watch a lot of costume dramas. You might say that everything I know about history has been at least supplemented or more likely warped by their influence. It's been more than a decade since my last proper class in history and I've never been much for reading it for fun. To paraphrase Jane Austen, I am a partial, prejudiced and ignorant historian. Such poor qualifications didn't stop Jane and they won't stop me from expounding on the topic. In her hilarious youthful satire, The History of England, Austen paid comically little attention to wars and most of her comments in the Tudor era are directed at praising Mary Queen of Scots and castigating Queen Elizabeth the Ist for her treatment of the Stuart queen. Jane came down firmly on the side of Mary of Scotland and so did the makers of the film by the same name, director John Ford, and writers John Dudley and Maxwell Anderson.

The film begins with Queen Elizabeth (Florence Eldridge) opining the return of Mary Stuart (Katharine Hepburn) from Scotland. Stuart was a rival to her throne and Elizabeth is warned by her advisers that she must not let Mary land safely in Scotland. Elizabeth's plan to intercept Mary fails and she is allowed to take her throne, in doing so she supplants her half brother the Earl of Moray who has been Regent in her absence. Mary quickly discovers that she can not trust Moray or the other Lords who've set themselves up as her counsel. They want her to renounce her religion and send her personal secretary, David Riccio, an ardent Catholic, back to France. Mary refuses and is backed up by the feisty Earl of Huntley (Donald Crisp, in a brave but wavering attempt at a Scottish accent). Huntley is out-numbered until the Earl of Bothwell shows up to keep the Lords in line.

In typical classic movie fashion their first meeting is flirtatious and full of innuendo. I said in a post earlier this week that Rossano Brazzi was the only man to look at Katharine Hepburn with naked lust on screen, but that was before I saw Frederick March as Bothwell. March is wonderful in love scenes as he has a very direct manner that is also tender and self-effacing without being studiously so.

Bothwell not only frightens the rebel Lords into submission he controls the border more effectively than it has been in years, an act which impresses both Mary and Queen Elizabeth who has been jealously hearing stories about Mary's court full of admirers. With suitors aplenty, Mary contends she will never marry again, though it is clear that she is in love with Bothwell. Riccio advises her to marry Lord Darnley who has the claim to the English throne as well as being Catholic. This leads to some unintentional comedy as Hepburn continually address Riccio as "David" in a voice and manner so similar to her pursuit of David Huxley (Cary Grant) in Bringing Up Baby that I couldn't help but make the occasional leopard joke.

Mary hesitates as long as possible but eventually consents to marry Darnley whom she loathes. In a great scene that could only happen in the movies, Bothwell kicks down Mary's door and demands to know whether she loves him and why she will marry Darnley. The film's portrayal of Darnley is a master stroke because Douglas Walton not only looks like pictures of the real-life lord, but he plays him with a combination of cowardly ambition and dissipation that is pretty close to the mark. The film substitutes alcoholism for Darnley's syphillis in a probable concession to the production code.

After their marriage Darnley's weaknesses grow more pronounced: he stays away from home, seeming not to care about the health of his newborn son and he is continually jealous of the influence of David Riccio, a jealousy which Moray and his lords encourage. Darnley agrees to have Riccio killed and in an intense scene which is close to the real-life incident, Darnley has his soldiers drag Riccio from the queen's apartment, where they stab him, within view of the queen and her ladies. Though in real life Darnley wasn't present at the murder, the film version makes him so, perhaps to remind the audience of his guilt in the crime. Darnley quickly realizes his mistake when the Lords talk next of removing Mary from power. Without Mary, he will have nothing, so the pair are reunited by a need for survival. Bothwell arrives and is disgusted by Darnley's cowardice and both he and Mary wish they could be rid of her husband. Bothwell pledges, somewhat ominously to serve Mary forever. Now this is the point in the movie, where I wondered if they were going to imply that Bothwell was responsible for Darnley's death which is the most common historical view of Bothwell. But the scenes that lead up to the explosion at Kirk o Fields (by the way Darnley didn't die in the explosion , he was found strangled outside the castle in his nightshirt after the dust cleared from the blast) imply that it was Queen Elizabeth working with Moray and his cronies who were responsible for Darnley's death. Whether or not this is true, it is unlikely that Bothwell was responsible as was the finding of several several modern reassessments published in the 1930s, which probably influenced playwright Maxwell Anderson.

Bothwell saves Mary who is under attack from the rebel Lords who want to imprison her for Darnley's death and put her son on the throne, while making Moray regent again. Bothwell and Mary flee, getting married along the way. The film makes it clear that the supposed abduction of Mary by Bothwell, was a transparent ploy to distance Mary from Darnley's murder, since Bothwell was the chief suspect in the crime. Huntley refuses to go along with abduction scheme and thinks their marriage is foolish and he breaks with the couple. After three weeks of marriage, Bothwell decides to leave to raise an army to defend Mary and take back the throne. In real-life the Lords confronted Bothwell and Mary in battle at Carbury Hill. Hopelessly outnumbered, Mary agreed to surrender on the condition they let Bothwell go. Mary is imprisoned, escapes and is tricked again into being imprisoned in England. Meanwhile Bothwell is imprisoned in Denmark where he dies of a fever. This collapses a series of jailings, escapes, battles and betrayals that ended with Mary's imprisonment in Tutbury Castle in 1589 and Bothwell's internment in a notorious dungeon in Denmark.

Jane Austen contended that Elizabeth I was entirely responsible for the imprisonment and execution of Mary and that all her ministers and advisers who are often pointed to as being to blame for giving her bad advice on the matter are not as guilty as the sovereign. This is undeniably sound reasoning, couched in elegantly ironic terms which would seem at first glance to praise Elizabeth, but in reality amounts to an extended spleen venting. And that is exactly what Mary of Scotland contends as well, that the plot against Elizabeth's life supposedly emminating from Mary was a frame-up designed to give Elizabeth an excuse to kill her rival to the throne. The movie combines the inquiry into Darnley's death that was conducted years earlier and her trial for treason in that principal evidence against her are forged letters. Mary is tried, found guilty and executed with her last moments on the scaffold, imagining that she hears Bothwell's pipers riding to her rescue.

Mary of Scotland had as one of its taglines, the phrase "One of histories great love stories" which may or may not be true. Accounts of the relationship between Bothwell and Mary vary from the seriously anti-Bothwell version which contends that Bothwell abducted and raped Mary to the "realist" view that Mary allowed the abduction in order to distance herself from Bothwell, who was the chief suspect in her husband's murder and that she married him because he was her closest ally and supporter. In real life Bothwell was married during the period that he and Mary fall in love in the film. His first wife divorced him after he impregnanted one of their servants. Bothwell also had two common law wives in Scandanavia before he was married to his Scottish wife. Since common law marriages weren't recognized in Scotland, he could never be charged with bigamy, but it still wasn't a very nice way to operate. And his double dealing caught up with him when he was arrested in Norway after he fled Scotland, since one of his common law wives had risen to prominence and was an eager witness against him at his hearing. No mention of Bothwell's wives or paramours is made in the movie. Nor is there any mention of Mary's pregnancy with twins and miscarraige of Bothwell's children while in captivity. I actually like the romantic view that the film takes of the couple and think that it fits in with many of the facts of their lives. Afterall Mary surrendered her throne on the condition that Bothwell be allowed to go free--not exactly the actions of a woman who'd been raped or coerced into marriage. Other minor incidents support the view of a real affection between the pair. Before Darnley's death, just days after the birth of her son, James, she made a difficult journey to visit Bothwell who'd been quite seriously injured in a riding accident. Though she was there under the guise of state business, it seems plausible to me that there was a romantic pull for her. Bothwell and Mary first crossed paths in France when she was girl and he was responsible in part for her safe conduct from France to Scotland. He had served her mother dutifully and given his reputation as a handsome and charming ladies man, it's not hard to imagine that the young Queen would fall for a man who offered her political security as well as the romance clearly lacking in her first two political marriages. While Mary of Scotland fails to capture all the details of their relationship, it captures the spirit of it.

The film also captures the spirit of the rivalry between Elizabeth and Mary, which was definitely one of history's great cat fights. In a wonderful scene before Mary's execution, Elizabeth comes to visit, offering Mary a chance to recant her claim to her throne in return for her life. Eldridge plays Elizabeth like an old school vamp, full of scorn, vanity and a falsely sweet varnish that fools no one. She is driven by fear, ambition, unnamed herat break, righteous anger and a tough intelligence. Interestingly she looks quite a bit like Bette Davis, and I think her performance here creates the "Elizabeth Template" that would be used up to the present day in Cate Blanchett's excellent performances. And indeed Betty Davis was cast to star in another adaptation of a Maxwell Anderson play The Private Lives of Elizabeth of Essex (1939). Mary is at first taken in by Elizabeth's softness and says that the sad thing is that they have so much in common and that they should have been friends. This may be a bit far-fetched or an an attempt to make Mary Queen of Scots into a saint, but in essence it is correct. Elizabeth and Mary were alike in that they were both Queens whose grasp on power was always slippery and who were forever under pressure to marry and produce an heir. They were compelled to be enemies and the film implies that at least part of Elizabeth's enmity is fueled by personal jealousy of her younger, more popular cousin. Elizabeth chose to remain single and consolidate her power through constant maneuvering. Mary chose to marry for her throne, and perhaps, for love. In the end Mary says she doesn't regret the decision she made a bit and she predicts that history will condemn Elizabeth for her treatment of her and that her son, James will one day become King. Both of these predictions came true and yet certainly, Elizabeth could not have regretted the decisions she made either, for they allowed her to rule half a century, save England from Spanish invasion and raise the country to a position of power in the world. Her reign gave us Shakespeare and an English presence in the New World. England and America would not be the countries they are today without her vision. Mary Queen of Scots is a rather sad, romantic sideshow in all other histories but those penned by Jane Austen and Maxwell Anderson.

I'm eating Branston Pickle out of a jar metaphorically

In Bridget Jones Diary, there's a point when Bridget (Renee Zellwiger) hits rock bottom. She's lost Daniel Cleaver, her parents have split and Mark Darcy whom she hated but was inexplicably chasing her, stops trying and goes off to America. Suddenly she realizes what she lost and her sadness is expressed in a predictable montage featuring 60s soul music and scenes of Bridget moping. In one telling shot she's wearing what looks like a duvet and is eating Branston Pickle out of a jar with a spoon. (For non-anglophiles, Branston Pickle a sandwich filling that tastes a bit like chutney and is definitely not meant to be eaten on it's own.)

That's me this week. Heading into week three of summer cold hell and I'm watching Bridget Jones Diary. Sure I've a load of interesting pre-codes to watch and then there's Gregory Peck day on Summer under the Stars, but I find myself rather enjoying this not very good film, which I've seen several times before. So cue the Supremes and allow me to wallow a little.

Colin Firth reprises his star-making role of Darcy, this time playing a supposedly modernized version of the character for this adaptation of Helen Fielding's updating of Pride and Prejudice. I say supposedly modernized because, everything else about the movie feels modern except for Firth's Darcy. He swears once and appears to be handy in the kitchen, but those concessions hardly make up for the fact that when he calls his nemesis Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) out in the street to fight, one does not even chuckle at Cleaver's suggestion of swords or pistols. Fielding's novel takes post-modern to glorious new heights by having a character who is at once infatuated with the screen Darcy as portrayed by Firth in the 1995 mini series adaptation of Pride and Prejudice in all his wet-shirted glory, and yet so dense as to not see the real life Darcy in her life for what he is. It works in the novel as Bridget's voice is so convincingly in control of the book that we go along with her ill-conceived prejudice against the reindeer jumper wearing barister, Mark Darcy. In the film though, it's impossible to mask the obvious charm of Colin Firth. Even in a reindeer jumper he looks at least as good he did in the famous wet shirt scene from Pride and Prejudice. He makes the words "turkey curry buffet" sound alarmingly appealing. That Bridget is blind and deaf to this and prefers instead to go off with obviously oily, (but sexy and funny) Daniel Cleaver, leads us to wonder if she isn't completely bonkers.

Firth in his star-making role as Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice, the famous wet shirt, (not in the novel, of course) made Firth a household name in England. The next year, Fielding helped immortalize the moment in pop culture by making it part of the backdrop of Bridget Jones Diary.

The book triumphs in bringing Bridget face to face with Colin Firth in an interview for a newspaper. In one of the funniest passages I've ever read in any novel, Fielding presents a supposed transcript of the interview, a meeting which had only one pre-cursor: don't mention the wet shirt. What follows is six pages of Bridget talking about the wet shirt interspersed with the confused and angered reactions of Firth. Since the producers of the movie had Colin Firth also play Mark Darcy, they couldn't very well have him play himself in an interview. Instead Bridget is made into a television presenter who interviews one of Mr. Darcy's client in a manner that's so refreshingly guileless that she wins the hearts (and perhaps pity of?) her viewers.

In Austen's novel Darcy and his nemesis have their conflict off-stage. Darcy catches up with the blackgaurd and forces him to do the right thing by the heroine's sister. The 1995 miniseries dramatized this famously absent scenario with lots of scenes of Firth as Darcy, looking decisive and riding round the country side. Fielding dramatizes the conflict between Darcy and Cleaver by the most hilariously awkward fight sequence in film history.(The follow-up in Bridget Jones II was a worthy successor and the only bright spot in an otherwise painful and miserable movie). Firth and Grant convincingly play two guys who’ve never been in a fight before, or at least not for a very long time.They pull at one another clothes ineffectually as if they are trying to get busy rather than beat each other to a pulp.At the height of the sequence, the action is interrupted by a birthday celebration in a Greek restaurant and Darcy and Cleaver pause to do the polite thing (they are English after all) and join in a chorus of “Happy Birthday.”

Bridget Jones wraps up predictably with Darcy returning on a perfectly romantic snowy evening. The pair kiss in the street- a fine, romantic, funny scene, somewhat ruined by cutting to a car full of Bridget's friends who look on, making rude comments. It seems that in modern movies viewers are expected to suspend disbelief for all manner of nonsense, except to believe that people could kiss in public without causing a near riot. In Bridget Jones we accept that an American movie star who is a few pounds over the broom handle requirements of Hollywood is a mince pie devouring Londoner. We do, because Zellwiger's accent is nearly perfect and because clever costume designers manage to put her in the Earth's most unflattering attire. We also buy that the kind, honest and attractive professional would go for Bridget the disaster on wheels. We do because Firth is so good at playing the repressed man who has gotten everything in life, but seems never to have had any fun, ever. Bridget's appeal is in her ability to let loose and enjoy herself.

There now. I feel a bit better. Cue Aretha's "R-E-S-P-E-C-T" and lets see what the Tivo grabbed of Gregory this morning.

I'm Obsessed Thank You Very Much

Quick 80's movie nerds, (aka Neoclasicists), what movie is the headline a quote from? Hint: a booga, booga, ah, ah ah!

I've been obsessed with movies since I was a kid. Star Wars was probably my first true obsession, but my disorder didn't fully kick into high gear until I hit puberty. The year was 1985 and I found myself working in a video store checking out three movies a night and watching HBO and WTBS whenever I had the chance. I fell in love with Cary Grant. I became obsessed with Bill Murray. I went completely bonkers for Laurence Olivier in Wuthering Heights, so much so that I recorded dialog from the movie onto a cassette which I played in my Walkman. (That was sorta like a big clunky iPod, kids. Ask your folks.)

I began to kick old school in a big way in college, taking film classes and occasionally ditching out of work and real-life to watch movies in the library basement. I built the first iteration of my Shrine to Cary Grant. After college I started working a desk job and began to play around building web pages. In 1995, I launched the first ever web site devoted to Cary Grant and a few years later I was contracted to write a book about him called "Cary Grant: A Life in Pictures." Two more books followed on Grace Kelly and Bob Hope and I became a founding member of the E-mail Warbrides, the first mailing list devoted to Cary Grant. Since then, I have attended Caryventions and even hosted one in Minneapolis.

In 2002 I got married and began a new obsession shortly thereafter: Jane Austen and more importantly, film adaptations of her books. Sci Fi was not forgotten and the Star Wars pre-quels loomed large in this time in my life. My love of Old Hollywood of the Turner Classics variety has never waned and new obsessions have been added almost yearly to now include: Michael Redgrave, Gary Cooper, Powell and Loy, Irene Dunne, Gregory Peck, Barbara Stanwyck, Jimmy Stewart, Alfred Hitchcock and the list goes on. I'm always on the look-out for the obscure from those stars that I follow, so if anyone hears of a showing of early and out of print films with these stars, I'd be much obliged if you'd let me know in the comments section.

I plan to post regularly on the films I'm currently watching and especially provide goodies, like "The Eye Candy of the Day" with awesome photos of pretty people in the movies.