Tiana (Anika Noni Rose) and her father, James (Terrence Howard) have a dream - to open a restaurant in their home town of New Orleans. After James' death in World War I, Tiana continues to work and save to finally open that restaurant. So, when Tiana's best friend Charlotte "Lottie" La Bouff (Jennifer Cody), hires Tiana to cater the desserts (Tiana's beignets - Lottie's father's (John Goodman) favorite treat) at a big society party, Tiana believes has enough money for the down payment on the restaurant. But there is a complication - the derelict sugar mill that Tiana has offered on has another, wealthier, bidder. Our film is The Princess and the Frog (2009). Summer in DC means free films, and The Shakespeare Theatre Company hosted a double feature as their new season is opening. The Princess and the Frog tells a tale of dreaming vs. reality, and the importance of knowing the difference. Tiana has become so wrapped up in working towards her dream - she knows that dreams don't come true by magic - that she never has time for anything BUT work. Her mother, Eudora (Oprah Winfrey) worries that she's become so obsessed with the restaurant that she will never have a private life or find love.
Tiana's progress is interrupted by the entrance of a frog - and a frog that talks, no less. He is Prince Naveen (Bruno Campos), a young man who is the exact opposite of Tiana. Raised in a wealthy royal family of Maldonia, he's been thrown out of his home and left to fend for himself. His irresponsibility forced his parents to try and make him grow up. But all they've succeeded in doing is pushing Naveen into finding a wealthy wife or a get-rich-quick scheme. It's one of the latter that puts him in the hands of Dr. Facilier (Keith David) a local practitioner of dark magic who convinces Naveen's valet Lawrence (Peter Bartlett) to take on the appearance of Naveen, and marry Naveen's prey himself - Lottie La Bouff.
Anika Noni Rose is excellent as the voice of Tiana. She has just the right amount of strength and sass that you admire this young woman, but also would like to see her find some happiness and ease in her life. She also has an exquisite singing voice. As an actress, she's taken on a variety of roles - she had an ongoing role as assertive lawyer Wendy Scott-Carr in The Good Wife, got to show off her acting and singing chops in Dreamgirls (2006), won the Tony for Caroline, or Change (2004), and was nominated again for her work in A Raisin in the Sun (2014). In 2019, she received the Lucille Lortel Award for Carmen Jones.
The movie has a lot of surprises, not the least of which is that 'Big Daddy' and Lottie are actually nice people. John Goodman gives 'Big Daddy' a bit of pomposity, but he's also loving and generous, not just to his daughter - it's clear he has a deep affection for Tiana and Eudora. And while he certainly loves Tiana's beignets, there is a hint that he is also tipping her a lot to help her start her restaurant.
The trumpet playing alligator, Louis (Michael-Leon Wooley) is a tad silly, but works in the context of our frog-cursed humans. Likewise, Ray the Cajun firefly (Jim Cummings) is amusing, though the accent is sometimes difficult to understand. Both actors do give us sympathetic characters which are worked seamlessly into the story.
All in all, this film is an enjoyable modern fairy tale, with an exemplary cast. We'll leave you with a trailer from the film:
In a series of four vignettes, the purchase of the latest Paris Model (1953) effects the lives of five women in France, in New York and in Los Angeles. We picked this film because it had some excellent actors in the cast, but having them there didn't help. This is an AWFUL movie. Even at a mere 80 minute running time, it felt like we were watching the movie forever. The script is bad, the sets are cheap, even the dress that is the focus of the film looks like it came from the bargain-basement in Walmart. The picture consists of four stories; each focus on women who buy this particular dress design (unlike the 1942 Tales of Manhattan where a tailcoat's owners are the focus, it is NOT the same dress). Gogo Montaine (Eva Gabor) in the first vignette buys a Paris original (and charges it to one of her lovers). Gogo is in the boyfriend business - she gives them the look, and they melt at her feet. Except, while Ms. Gabor can be really funny, and she is quite pretty, giving the sultry "look" is not really in her acting ballpark. She looks remarkably silly and unconvincing as she tries to seduce a variety of men into doing what she wants them to do. It's not all her fault - the camerawork also succeeds in making her look idiotic rather than alluring. In the next story line, the usually wonderful Paulette Goddard plays Betty Barnes, an avaricious secretary in New York City on the make for her married boss Edgar Blevins (Leif Erickson). She purchases her dress (a knock-off of the Paris model - in the first story we see a woman sketching and taking notes at the Paris showroom) in order to seduce Blevins. She's such a despicable woman, you can't possibly root for her, and you surely don't like her. Leif Erickson's characterization is of a unattractive, henpecked husband who is also unattractive. When you see his wife Cora (Gloria Christian) during a phone conversation, you don't think too much of her either. With no-one with whom to sympathize, what's the point?
In the next tale, the dress has become even cheaper (it's now "a copy of a copy of a Paris original"). Marion Parmalee (Marilyn Maxwell) is attending a retirement party for her husband's boss, and she wants to make sure that Patrick James Sullivan (Cecil Kellaway) names her husband as his successor. How better to do it than to wear a sexy dress and tease P.J. into naming Jack (Robert Bice). She needs to get P.J. away from his wife Nora (Florence Bates), but that, she reasons will be easy with this marvelous dress. As with the prior tale, we have a thoroughly unpleasant, greedy woman, and a horribly lecherous man that you can't wait to get their comeuppance. Cecil Kellaway is ill-served in the part - he's usually an appealing actor; here, he is just creepy.
This particular segment has the benefit of Florence Bates as Nora (one of the only nice people in the film). Ms. Bates, who is best remembered as the odious Mrs. Van Hopper in Rebecca (1940) was equally adept at comedy and drama - my favorite of her roles was as Florence Dana Moorehead, the author who likes to "eat good" in I Remember Mama (1948). Ms. Bates started out to be a pianist, but had to change careers due to a hand injury. Then, she got a degree in mathematics, and taught math; after her 1909 marriage, she stayed home to raise their daughter. A divorce led her to study law and become the first female lawyer in Texas. Her father's death resulted in her working with her sister in their father's antique store, which Ms. Bates sold after her sister's death. When her second husband (to whom she was married from 1929 until his death in 1951) lost all his money, the family moved to Los Angeles and opened a successful bakery. She went onto the stage after she arrive in LA (she'd done some bilingual radio work in Texas); an introduction to Alfred Hitchcock led to her role in Rebecca and her film career. This film was her last one; she died the following year of a heart attack at the age of 65.
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The final yarn has Marta Jensen (Barbara Lawrence) buying the dress from a thrift shop. She's eager to convince her boyfriend, Charlie Johnson (Robert Hutton) to propose marriage. Charlie, however, is a cheapskate and a bore. While Marta seems a nice enough girl, her eagerness to marry this louse is distasteful. Ms. Lawrence gives the part as much as she can, but she's working opposite Mr. Hutton who is about as engaging as a piece of white bread. Tom Conway, totally miscast as he Maharajah of Kim-Kepore, repeats his role from the Paris story; he might as well be sleepwalking for the energy he brings to it. The whole episode is set in Romanoff's - except it's an obviously cheap imitation (TCM article). We do have a guest shot by "Prince" Michael Romanoff - he's the only personable character in this segment.
The original title of the film was Nude at Midnight (AFI Catalog), the name of the dress all the women purchase (AFI Catalog). You can see the dress in the lobby card below. The movie really has nothing to offer, and we strongly suggest you pass this one by should it ever show up on your TV screen.
Lila Thorne (Ida Lupino) has just become engaged to Fred Leonard (Lee Bowman); Fred is eager for Lila to meet his mother, Hattie (Fay Bainter). So off Lila goes to Maclin City, where she tries to get in Hattie's good graces - not an easy task. Turns out, Hattie's already chased away at least one of Fred's girlfriends. In the midst of this, Hattie discovers that the local dry cleaner, Mr. Zambrogio (Henry Armetta) has been forced to raise his prices - a protection racket is bleeding him for large amounts of money. Incensed when she discovers the mayor will do nothing about about it, Hattie decides to hire her own mob to deal with the gangsters. This week, we'll discuss The Lady and the Mob (1939) and its star. As part of the What a Character! blogathon, we're focusing our attention on the wonderful character actress Fay BainterIt's not often that Ms. Bainter gets to lead a film, but when she does, it's always a pleasure. She takes an okay script and an average part, and gives the audience a decidedly better experience. Sure, this film is a B movie, but in Ms. Bainter's hands, you really don't care - she's that good. She's funny and wry - even when she is being tyrannical towards Ida Lupino, you are amused by her. And when she decides that it is up to her to solve the crime problem in Maclin City because the authorities won't, watch out! She's a force to be reckoned with. Ms. Bainter was not the first choice for the role - the studio originally wanted Edna May Oliver (AFI catalog) - interesting choices that would have given two very distinct performances. Fay Bainter started her stage career on the West Coast, working in traveling companies. By 1912, however, she'd come to Broadway - between 1912 and 1949, she appeared in 26 plays including Dodsworth (1934) (as Fran - the part would go to Ruth Chatterton on screen), She Stoops to Conquer (1928), and The Way of the World (1931). She started working in films in 1934. In 1938 she won a Supporting Actress Oscar (for her role as Bette Davis' aunt in Jezebel), and was nominated that same year for Best Actress (for White Banners), the first of only 9 people who have been given two nominations in the same year. She was also nominated for her role in The Children's Hour (1961). She segued into television in 1949, and worked in both mediums until her retirement in 1965. Her husband of 43 years died had died in 1964 (they had one son); Ms. Bainter died in 1968, at the age of 74.
Ida Lupino is very good in what is an extremely small part (Wendy Barrie was the first choice for the part). Ms. Lupino was still, at this point in her career, relatively unknown and relegated to secondary roles. But in December of 1939 (The Lady and the Mob was released in April), Ms. Lupino would finally get noticed, when she appears as the Cockney prostitute in The Light That Failed (TCM article). Ms. Lupino gives Lila gumption, which she needs when faced with the whirlwind that is Hattie. If there is a problem with the character, it is that one can't imagine Lila staying with a bore like Fred. Lee Bowman has very little to do, and his character is a bit of a dolt. He's obviously dominated by his mother - when Lila says "I hope you realize I'm not marrying your mother," Fred's response is "That's what you think". Mr. Bowman isn't present for over half of the movie, and when he does appear, he's pushed aside by Lila and Hattie. They have bigger fish to fry, and he is not part of the solution. Part of the fun of the film is watching the two women bond over Hattie's preoccupation with the crime wave.
The supporting characters are lots of fun, with Henry Armetta as a stereotyped Italian dry-cleaner; Warren Hymer (Frankie O'Fallon) stands out as the chief of Hattie's mob, but they are all amusing; their interplay with Ms. Bainter is excellent. George Meeker (playing George Watson) is the head gangster on the other side of the fence, and makes a nice contrast to Mr. Hymer.
The film had several working titles: Mrs. Leonard Misbehaves; Old Mrs. Leonard and the Machine Guns; Old Mrs. Leonard and Her Machine Guns. Because of the gangster theme, they had issues with the Production Office. While this movie is not great literature, it's amusing and tidy (one fight scene goes on a bit too long, but otherwise it's a fairly neat presentation). It is certainly worth a viewing.
This post is part of the What a Character! blogathon, hosted by Once Upon a Screen. Please visit the other posts to learn about a variety of amazing character actors.
Louise Fuller (Grace Moore), an opera star of some note, is deported from the United States after she overstays her visa limits. Louise is eager to get back to the States - she has promised to assist her beloved tutor and uncle, Walter Mitchell (Henry Stephenson) by appearing in a music festival being held in his honor. The list for a visa is long - she'll have to wait for a year, unless she can find an American to marry. Enter artist Jimmy Hudson (Cary Grant), a foot-loose and fancy free young man, who initially disdains her snobbish demeanor. Our film this week is When You're in Love (1937). With Cary Grant in a film, what's not to love? Well, this film, quite frankly. It's not that it is bad; it's that it is banal, and above-the-title Grace Moore really is no actress; she was an opera singer that the studio was trying to make a star. While she is an wonderful singer, with a very expressive voice and demeanor WHEN she is singing, as an actress, she's a dud. Her lines are delivered with an almost flat tone; she never really seems interested in the action. As a result, she and Mr. Grant don't click.
Ms. Moore appeared in nine films between 1930 and 1939. Born in Tennessee (she was called "The Tennessee Nightingale"), she started her career on Broadway in 1913 (she would appear in 9 plays between 1913 and 1932); working her way from the chorus to featured performer in a number of musical reviews (like the Ziegeld Follies of 1931). After a couple of films in 1930, she signed a contract with Columbia in 1934. She was nominated for an Oscar for best actress for her work in One Night of Love (1934). By 1939, she was through with films, and working more steadily in opera companies. Married once to Spanish actor ValentÃn Parera, she died in a plane crash near Copenhagen (Prince Gustaf Adolf of Sweden was also killed in the crash). A scholarship is named for her at the University of Tennessee School of Voice.
Cary Grant had just begun a new contract with Columbia (TCM article), which may account for him being billed below Ms. Moore and below the title (in his next films, TopperThe Toast of New York, and The Awful Truth, he was still billed under his co-stars, but above the title). He really does his best to bring some exuberance to the film, and mostly he succeeds. But it's impossible to work around that fact that he's acting against someone who just doesn't project emotion very well. It is amusing that he is playing the American (with his delightful English-ish accent) while Ms. Moore is supposed to be Australian - with an American accent). One of his most delightful scenes is with the couple who raised him after his parents' deaths. His affection for them is transmitted right through the screen.
Also in the cast is Aline MacMahon. She's wasted in this film; while she gets some good lines, she just doesn't get enough screen time. Similarly, Thomas Mitchell and Henry Stephenson are given very little to do. It's a shame when you have actors of their caliber who are not permitted to perform up to their abilities.
This was Robert Riskin's first directing gig; he'd written the screenplay for the film as well. Producer Harry Cohn was hoping that Riskin would break out Cary Grant in the way his scripts for It Happened One Night and Mr. Deeds Goes to Town had for Clark Gable and Gary Cooper. Perhaps it was the loss of his collaborator, Frank Capra, but the magic didn't work for this picture, and it ended up losing money (Cary Grant: A Biography by Marc Eliot).
The costumes by Bernard Newman are very lovely.The music includes several opera pieces, two songs by Jerome Kerns and Dorothy Fields, and a really terrific version of Ms. Moore singing (and Cary Grant playing the piano) of Cab Calloway's "Minnie the Moocher" (a preview of the film did not, in fact, include that number (AFI catalog).
The film opened at Radio City Music Hall in New York City. The New York Timesreview by Frank S. Nugent called it "a glib reworking of an ancient operatic formula." The Hollywood Reporter, however, enjoyed it, calling it "a signal triumph for the foremost diva of the screen..."
For opera lovers, this film is worth a look - you can fast forward to the musical numbers (which mostly have nothing to do with the plot) and watch Ms. Moore sing, which is certainly worth doing. You can watch her doing "Minnie the Moocher" - she is really good! We'll leave you with a snippet from When You're in Love's premier on GET-TV, which was able to show a restored copy of the film:
On the New England shore is a cottage which the locals believe is haunted. To Laura Pennington (Dorothy McGuire), a pennyless waif who is described by young Danny Hillgrove (Alec Englander) as homely, it is The Enchanted Cottage (1945). Laura is thrilled when she is asked to work there as a maid by the owner, Abigail Minnett (Mildred Natwick), a reclusive widow. Before Mrs. Minnett settled in the house, it was rented to honeymoon couples; Oliver Bradford (Robert Young) discovers the house and convinces Mrs. Minnett to allow him and his bride-to-be, Beatrice Alexander (Hillary Brooke), to honeymoon there. But their visit is delayed by the start of World War II, and when he does arrive, Oliver comes alone - a shell of a man, disfigured in a wartime accident. Told in flashback by Laura and Oliver's mutual friend, composer John Hillgrove (Herbert Marshall), we know from the beginning that Oliver and Laura are a couple. We also know that they are well-liked in their community. What the story brings is the long road they must travel to feel themselves worthy to be with other people. One particularly telling scene in the story of Laura's yearning for love occurs at a Canteen dance. Filled with airmen, Laura is ignored by everyone; men start to approach her, but when they see her, they turn back or avert their gaze. It's a heartbreaking moment, and one with which every young woman can identify. Because of this, Laura retreats back to the cottage where she hides with Mrs. Minnett, who herself bears scars that have caused her to secrete herself within the safe precepts of the house.
What the film is NOT is sensational (one wonders what film the designer of the poster above was watching when he created the tag line!) This is a sensitive and moving film, based on a play by Sir Arthur Wing Pinero. The play was written in 1922 as a morale booster for soldiers who were disfigured during the First World War (TCM article). That it would be redone as the Second World War ended is not surprising - sadly, it still had a tale to tell to GIs returning from Europe and the Pacific (a similar story is told by Homer Price in The Best Years of Our Lives (1946).
Robert Young is excellent as an exuberant young man plunged into depression by his family's reactions to his injuries. The revulsion displayed by Violet Price (Spring Byington), Frederick Price (Richard Gaines) - Oliver's mother and stepfather - and Beatrice all combine to drive Oliver to consider suicide. Mr. Young shows us the hatred that he has for his family, for himself, and for the world that robbed him of his secure vision of the future. Joseph Cotton was briefly considered for the part of Oliver (he'd previously played battle-scarred vets in I'll Be Seeing You (1944) and Love Letters (1945)) (AFI catalog). Mr. Cotton would surely have been excellent, but it is hard to imagine anyone but Mr. Young in the part.
It's hard to make Dorothy McGuire plain. She is an exquisite woman, with a radiance that make her pretty face even more beautiful. In prior productions of the piece, Laura was given a real physical defect - buck teeth, a crooked nose, a limp - but this film makes Laura homely with a bad hairdo, no makeup, and dull lighting. As Bosley Crowther points out in his (unfavorable) New York Times review, "a girl of moderate features (and fair intelligence) can make herself look very sweet." But herein Mr. Crowther misses the point that Ms. McGuire fully understands. Laura is homely because she feels that she is homely and undeserving of love. Ms. McGuire enacts a woman who has grown to fear the world; she's been told so many times that she is plain that she feels it is hopeless to even try to be appealing. It's a masterful stroke - one that makes the viewer identify with Laura even more. Like Mr. Young, Ms. McGuire was not the first choice for the part - both Ginger Rogers and Teresa Wright were considered.
Herbert Marshall as the pianist blinded in the last war is superb as the man who slowly leads Oliver back to the land of the living. And Mildred Natwick - it's impossible for her to ever make a wrong turn. Her love for Laura, her sympathy for Oliver, and her belief that they can have for each other the love that she lost when her husband died is moving beyond imagining. Hillary Brooke is also convincing in her major scene - asked by Oliver's mother to try to get him to come home, she does so reluctantly. Her horror at the changes in him are matched only by her disgust with herself for this reaction to the man that she believed she loved. Also worth noting is the brief appearance by Josephine Whittell as the thoughtless Canteen manager who forces the delicate Laura onto the dance floor with the cruel and uncaring soldiers. Ms. Whittell's career extended from 1917 to 1948. Many of her appearances were uncredited and unnamed (like this part). She also appeared in several Broadway plays between 1911 and 1926 (including No, No Nanette). She died in 1961, three years after her final film appearance in The Buccaneer.
As we mentioned before, The New York Times was dismissive of the film (Mr. Crowther also thought that simple plastic surgery could heal what is obviously severe neurological damage that causes Oliver's face to droop on one side, and his arm to be unusable); Variety, however was complimentary. In 2014, this film was Robert Osborne's pick for his evening of films, and was one of Whoopi Goldberg's picks when she was guest programmer in 2007. The film did get one Academy Award nomination - the score by Roy Webb was nominated (but lost to Miklos Rozsa's Spellbound). This is the second film version of the play - the first was in 1924, with Richard Barthelmess and May McAvoy as Oliver and Laura; in 2016, it was filmed again, this time Paul D. Masterson and Sarah Navratil in the leads (the war in this case is in Iraq). Robert Young and Dorothy McGuire reprised their roles in the Lux Radio Theatre edition of the story in September of 1945. Academy Award Theatre did a radioplay in December 1946, with Peter Lawford, Joan Loring, and Herbert Marshall. September of 1953 saw a General Electric Theatre version with Joan Fontaine and Dan O'Herlihy; and in September of 1955, Lux Video Theatre presented the story, with Teresa Wright, Dan O'Herlihy, and Sara Haden. It was even spoofed by Carol Burnett in her version entitled The Enchanted Hovel. We'll leave you with the film's trailer and a hearty recommendation to view this lovely movie:
