Noir City DC was held in October 2018, and featured a number of fascinating films. Though I would have loved to have seen them all, having a job and other responsibilities precluded that. We were, however, able to see a double feature of two rarely shown films. The first was Destiny (1944), the story of Cliff Banks (Alan Curtis), an ex-con who has a penchant for getting himself involved with the wrong women. The second film was Flesh and Fantasy (1943), an anthology film - three stories that looked at superstition, dreams, and destiny. But more interesting than the films themselves was that fact that, at one point, they were to be one film. Eddie Muller, founder of the Film Noir Foundation (and the host of Noir Alley on TCM) introduced the films, and also hosted an impromptu discussion in the lobby of the AFI Silver Theatre on the intermission. He provided a fascinating look at the history of these two films, originally intended to be only one movie, with four separate, interrelated vignettes. Julien Duvivier had already been acknowledged as a great director, thanks to films like Pépé le Moko (1937), when World War II broke out. Like many of his compatriots, he left France to work in Hollywood, where he felt he would have more creative freedom (EuroChannel article). Mr. Duvivier was friendly with Charles Boyer and the two formed a production company. The result was Flesh and Fantasy, which would be distributed by Universal Studios. Only there was a problem. Universal executives thought the first vignette was too odd for their audience, and yanked it out of the film. Then, the following year, Universal decided release it with a frame built around the short (to make it feature length and "clarify" it). They called back actors Gloria Jean (Jane Broderick) and Alan Curtis, and over their protests, forced them to film this new, odd sequence. Mr. Duvivier refused to participate (ordering his name be removed from the picture), and Reginald Le Borg reluctantly assumed direction of the new section. The new film was Destiny (1944)
The difference in tone and texture between the two episodes is glaring. As Mr. Muller pointed out in his introduction, you know when Mr. Duvivier's sequence begins (and ends) without being told. His portion is dreamlike, but at the same time, intense and moody. Mr. Le Borg's portion is more matter-of-fact (it also doesn't help that the script he was given makes little-to-no sense. Cliff Banks is turned into an idiot in the frame story. I found the character more interesting as a monster). John Garfield had been the first choice for Cliff (when it was still part of Flesh and Fantasy).
Both Teresa Wright and Bonita Granville were considered for Ms. Jean's role (AFI Catalog).Gloria Jean was brought to Universal as a singing star in the mold of Deanna Durbin. She saw Flesh and Fantasy as a turning point in her career. Finally, she would be in a dramatic role (with almost no singing) with fine performers Like Edward G. Robinson and Barbara Stanwyck. But, when the studio pulled her segment from the film, she was devastated, and felt that this action prevented her from advancing in the film industry (The Hollywood Reporter, 2018). By then end of the 1940's, her film career was pretty much over. She did some television, but eventually worked as an executive secretary at Redken Laboratories; she retired from that job after 30 years with the company. She moved to Hawaii to live with her son, Angelo and daugher-in-law (Angelo died in 2017). A biography was published in 2005 (Gloria Jean: A Little Bit of Heaven by Scott and Jan MacGillivray). Ms. Jean died in August 2018 of heart failure and pneumonia. She was 92.
The three stories that make up Flesh and Fantasy were supposed to flow, one into the other. Despite the unnecessary interruptions of Robert Benchley (I'm not really a fan. He frequently just goes a bit too far in silliness for my taste), the vignettes do still waft from story to story. The first (sometimes called "Mardi Gras"), stars Betty Field as Henrietta, an embittered seamstress, who yearns for Michael (played by Robert Cummings), a law student who is unaware of the homely woman. It has a romantic tinge, and is reminiscent of The Enchanted Cottage (1945). Ms. Field does a good job with the part, and provides just the right touch of hope to a woman who has all but surrendered her life. Story two (often called "The Palmist") concerns Marshall Tyler (Edward G. Robinson), a businessman who is told by palm reader Septimus Podgers (Thomas Mitchell) that he will kill someone. Tyler becomes obsessed by the prophecy, and is plagued by voices encouraging to control the prediction by picking a victim now, so that he will not be accused of a crime. Mr. Robinson is a deft actor who portrays mania well (if you've never seen him in Scarlet Street (1945), give yourself a treat). He's ably supported by Mr. Mitchell (a superb character actor), along with Dame May Whitty (Lady Pamela Hardwick) and Anna Lee (Rowena). The final story features Charles Boyer as Paul Gaspar, a world-renowned high-wire performer who is having nightmares that see him falling from the wire as a lovely woman gasps in horror. While traveling back to America (and considering the future of his act), he meets Joan Stanley (Barbara Stanwyck), the woman whom he has seen in the dream. Romantic elements also infuse this story, and both Mr. Boyer and Ms. Stanwyck are excellent (and are excellent together). We also have Charles Winninger as King Lamarr, the sympathetic owner of the Paul's circus.
Originally titled For All We Know, Flesh and Fantasy also looked at actors Charles Laughton, Adolphe Menjou, Deanna Durbin and Greta Garbo as potential actors in the piece. (AFI catalog) All three stories in Flesh and Fantasy made it to radio: a Screen Guild Theatre radio broadcast on April 1945 starred Ella Rains and Charles Boyer in "The High-Wire Performer" episode; a July 1945 broadcast featured Edward G. Robinson and Vincent Price in "The Palmist" episode; and in September 1945 John Hodiak and Claire Trevor enacted the "Mardi Gras" Episode. Mr. Muller is hoping that one day, these films can be reassemble to finally show us the film Mr. Duvivier intended to release. In the meantime, I heartily suggest watching both films together, and let you mind wander over the possibilities. Here are trailers from both of the films:
We return to the films of Ronald Colman with the romantic comedy, My Life with Caroline (1941). Caroline Bliss Mason (Anna Lee) is very much a woman who, when she is not near the man she loves, loves the man she is near (with apologies to E.Y. Harburg). So, while she is on a trip to an Idaho ski lodge with her father (Charles Winninger), she announces that she has discovered her "true love" in Paco Del Valle (Gilbert Roland), a South American millionaire. Mr. Bliss, being no fool, cables Caroline's husband, publisher Anthony Mason (Ronald Colman), who immediately flies to meet his straying spouse in Idaho. Anthony been through this before - and as he waits to clear up Caroline's latest mess, he recalls the last time she found her "true love", and her relationship with artist Paul Martindale (Reginald Gardiner). Told in flashback, the film is primarily the story of Paul and Caroline and Anthony, as Caroline holds her lover off temporarily while she attempts to tell her husband that she loves another. Perhaps Caroline's one saving grace as a character is that it doesn't appear that she has cheated on her husband in the physical sense (though there is obviously an awful lot of cheating going on in her head). Normally, I wouldn't just refer immediately to a film review, but upon reading New York Times review. we were all struck by how on the mark it is:
"Things have come to a pretty pass, certainly, when Ronald Colman, that
old debonair dog, has to work to hold onto his lady as laboriously as he
does in RKO's My Life With Caroline. . . And such an unimportant fluff the lady is, too—such an
obvious nincompoop! Time was when Mr. Colman wouldn't have given her a
"how'dya do," let alone make himself silly for an hour and a quarter
chasing after her. Well, that only leads to this conclusion: either Mr.
Colman is slipping or his writers are".
Nincompoop is the perfect word for Caroline, and it is hard to envision why any man would put up with her nonsense. And WHY would one want to give up Ronald Colman for Reginald Gardiner, who is probably one of the prissiest human beings in film?
We can't really blame Ronald Colman, except for picking the film, as he is good as Anthony, with just the right amount of humor and tolerance for the part. Though not entirely a comedy, his talents in the arena were better served in Talk of the Town later that same year. That, far more than this, demonstrated his light touch. Here, he seems miscast; a better script would have helped. As discussed in this TCM article, Colman is just too sophisticated and too mature to be interested in such a flibbertigibbet as Caroline. Regardless, it was a film Colman and director Lewis Milestone very much wanted to do. Which brings us to Anna Lee. Though listed in the credits as being introduced to film, Ms. Lee had actually already appeared in 10 films (beginning her film career in 1932), though the roles were either minor or supporting parts. Later that same year, she would return to a second lead status, but this time in a film that would better utilize her talents - How Green Was My Valley, in which she played Bronwyn, the bride of oldest Morgan son. Lee, who was born Joan Boniface Winnifrith in Kent, England, had a long and successful career, segueing almost seamlessly from film to television, and ending her career playing Lila Quartermaine, first on the soap opera Port Charles, then playing the same character on General Hospital (performing from a wheelchair after an automobile accident paralyzed her from the waist down). She died in 2004, aged 91, the year after her a new production staff at General Hospital refused to renew her contract.
Which brings us to Reginald Gardiner - we wondered if, unlike Paco, Paul was under the delusion that Caroline was wealthy (or would get some kind of alimony from her husband. Fat chance, since she is this close to cheating on Anthony). We know from her father that any money that Caroline has is from her quite generous husband. It's rather hard to like Paul, and Gardiner, who really is a rather stuffy actor, doesn't make it any easier. In a sense, he is playing the same part he played in Christmas in Connecticut. He wasn't all that likable there either. Both Eva Gabor and Miriam Hopkins were considered for Caroline (see this article from the AFI Catalog); after Anna Lee was cast, she also received a long-term contract. The film, written by Milestone as Palm Beach Limited and based on a French farce, was the first outing for Colman's production company with Milestone and William Hawks, United Producers Corp.
While this isn't a film we would recommend, it has some interesting moments. And it does have Ronald Colman. We'll leave you with this scene from the beginning of the film.
