People We Like: Mary Astor

One of the pleasures of watching old movies is catching up with a Mary Astor performance one had missed – as recently with A STRANGER IN MY ARMS and RETURN TO PEYTON PLACE, or re-visiting a favourite like THE MALTESE FALCON or THE GREAT LIE.

Mary (1906-1987) began in the silents, doing two films with John Barrymore (with whom she had an affair) and then she successfully graduated to talkies with roles opposite Gable in RED DUST in ’32 (Grace Kelly played it in the ’53 remake) where she is tremendous as the wife falling for the hunter, other roles included DODSWORTH. In 1941 she won the best supporting actress award for THE GREAT LIE, and also starred in Huston’s MALTESE FALCON as the duplicitous Brigid O'Shaughnessy . Other hits included MIDNIGHT and THE PALM BEACH STORY. Soon though she was relegated to playing those saintly mothers in MEET ME IN ST LOUIS in ’44 and in the ’49 version of LITTLE WOMEN. I have already written about how wonderful the 1947 DESERT FURY is, that delirious noir in blazing colour, as per Mary Astor label, where she is Fritzi the casino owner and the mother of Lizabeth Scott.



The ‘50s saw a tougher series of mothers – Robert Wagner’s in A KISS BEFORE DYING, and Sandra Dee’s in A STRANGER IN MY ARMS where she is the queen bee determined everyone shall obey her. Then there was the chilling Robert Carter in RETURN TO PEYTON PLACE in 1961. 1964 provided a return match with Bette in the small but pivotal role of Jewel Mayhew in HUSH HUSH SWEET CHARLOTTE, her final role. Mary had a racy private life and kept a diary which featured in a sensational court case. Her two books “My Story” and “A Life in Film” were best-sellers in which she discussed her various marriages, lovers and screen work.

THE GREAT LIE - A superior ‘40s soap, as directed by Edmund Goulding. Bette’s Maggie and Mary’s Sandra Kovac are in love with the same man George Brent. Sandra is a talented but temperamental concert pianist. The convoluted plot sees Brent and Astor getting married but it is invalid as her previous divorce is not final, they separate and he marries Davis, and then goes missing when his plane goes down on a secret mission. Meanwhile, Sandra discovers she is pregnant but cannot let a baby get in the way of her career, so rich girl Bette convinces her to have the baby which she will then have so the infant can inherit Brent’s wealth. Some delicious scenes then follow with the women holed up out in the desert awaiting the birth, as Bette strides around in her jodhpurs and Sandra demands steaks and cigarettes …. THEN, Brent is found and comes back and thinks the baby is his and Bette's. Sandra soon decides she wants Brent back and the baby too and is determined to tell him the truth, so Bette invites her to stay … as the truth comes out. To add to the delirium there is also Hattie McDaniel looking after them down on the plantation. It remains a favourite Bette Davis film and Astor’s Sandra is a tremendous performance full of variety. Bette plays "nice" here while Astor is the bitch. Terrific stuff.



A STRANGER IN MY ARMS – a rather unknown Ross Hunter production from 1959, this widescreen black and white melodrama teams June Allyson and Jeff Chandler, with Hunter regular Sandra Dee (my crush at the time, in my early teens) but the real star here is Mary Astor firing on all cylinders as the queen bee who dominates them all. June is the widow of a supposed war hero living with his dominating mother (Astor) who is seeking the highest military award for her late son whom she ruthlessly dominated and kept close to her. Chandler is the air force pilot who knows how her son really died as the family (Charles Coburn is also involved) try to bend him to their will so he will falsify the truth – we get flashbacks to him and the son (Peter Graves) surviving at sea on their raft. Allyson had only been married to the son for all of 6 weeks but now Astor (who really hates her) steamrolls her every attempt at independence. Naturally June and Jeff are attracted, Astor will not stand for it, as daughter Sandra tries to help the lovers who finally manage to stand up to Mary in a rather good climax. Directed by one Helmut Kautner (a German, but no Sirk), its all rather turgid but fun, Allyson’s last of the ‘50s and she is her usual self here with those buttoned-up blouses, peter pan collars, gloves and little hats. This though is Mary Astor’s show all the way.

RETURN TO PEYTON PLACE – Jose Ferrer’s 1961 film for 20th Century Fox (his wife Rosemary Clooney sings the theme song over the nice credits depicting New England in all its seasonal glory) would seem a follow-up to the sensational PEYTON PLACE of 1957 – but the original seems to be set back in the 40s and this is a very early 60s looking movie. New cast all round too: Carol Lynley is Allyson who writes the sensational book, Tuesday Weld is now Selina Cross and Eleanor Parker steps in to Lana Turner’s shoes as Constance. We spend a lot of time though in New York as Alison meets her publisher (Jeff Chandler, again) and is groomed for literary stardom. Back in Peyton Place the real star of the show is Mary Astor (again) as Roberta Carter, whose son Brett Halsey is returning home – but he turns up with his new wife Rafaella (Luciana Paluzzi) but he is too spineless to stand up to his domineering mother so the stage is set for melodramatics. Then the book is published and Roberta is outraged and tries to get it removed from the library, bringing in conflict with Constance’s husband Mike Rossi, the school head. Meanwhile Selina gets involved with the new ski instructor … It is all movie-making by numbers but Fox did this kind of stuff well, and Astor again has the plum role. There must have been some changes though: in the trailer on the disk we see the bedroom of Halsey and Paluzzi going up in flames but this is not in the movie where we do not see Paluzzi after her ski accident, as the film climaxes at the town hall where Roberta is trying to get the book banned. All very odd – but a good trashy wallow nonetheless, with that nice early 60s cast.

People We Like: Maurice Ronet

I have already blogged a lot here on Alain Delon, Jean-Paul Belondo and Jean Sorel (as per labels), but Maurice Ronet (1927-1983) is another fascinating French actor, and certainly the equal of Delon and Belmondo, Sorel probably being the most lightweight.

I first encountered Ronet in 1960 as Dickie Greenleaf in one of the first European films I saw back then, Rene Clement's PLEIN SOLEIL, from Highsmith's book which is one of my favourites. Delon had the more showy role, but Ronet captured Greenleaf perfectly. He had already done Malle's LIFT TO THE SCAFFOLD in 1958 (see below) and appeared in other films like CARVE HER NAME WITH PRIDE being in films since the early '50s.

Ronet brought a complexity and depth to his roles, and an easy charm, even when featured as the lover in Chabrol's LA FEMME INFIDELE in 1968 - another one where he gets killed off, coming into close contact with a blunt object. Then there was that fatal re-union with Delon in LA PISCINE, Jacques Deray's glossy thriller from 1969, also with Romy Schneider, whom Ronet starred with in QUI? IN 1970 - a so-so thriller but with good roles for them. He was perfect with Jean Seberg in Chabrol's sunlit comedy thriller THE ROUTE TO CORINTH in 1967, and with Monica Vitti in THE SCARLET LADY in 1969 (as per my reviews on those, Vitti, Seberg, Schneider labels). He also featured in other international movies like Carl Foreman's THE VICTORS in 1963 and the all-star BLOODLINE (with Schneider again) in 1979, and part of Vadim's LA RONDE remake in 1964.



His best role though has to be in Malle's LE FEU FOLLET in 1963 as the recovering alcoholic Alain Leroy who is trying to find a reason to go on living. Its a profound, moving, complex masterwork - reviewed below. Ronet had quite a prolific career (as detailed on his profile at IMDB) and did a lot of routine films, as most actors do, but at his best he was supreme. He died in 1983 aged 55.

A Louis Malle double feature

Two of Louis Malle's early features, from that good box set [Vol 1] which also includes LES AMANTS and ZAZIE DANS LE METRO. Malle (who died in 1995 aged 63) began filming in the mid '50s with underwater explorer Jacques Cousteau, their first documentary being the well-received LE MONDE DU SILENCE in '56.

LIFT TO THE SCAFFOLD – (or ELEVATOR TO THE GALLOWS to give it it’s American title). Louis Malle’s 1958 thriller ASCENSEUR POUR L'ÉCHAFAUD is still a fascinating experience as the plot spirals off in different directions. We have Jeanne Moreau endlessly wandering around Paris by night and in the rain looking for her missing lover (Maurice Ronet) who was supposed to kill her wealthy industrialist husband and join her, but he get trapped in the lift/elevator when the power is turned off, after the murder which he fakes to look like suicide. Can he escape? Meanwhile, his car is stolen by a teenage delinquent and his girl, who speed off and get involved with a German couple. We wonder why we are spending so much time with them, but this too leads to murder as the stories converge …. The spare Miles Davis soundtrack is cool beyond belief and Paris in 1958 looks the place to be. For me Malle (like Demy) is the most interesting of the New Wave directors [he was just 25 when directing this] and it is still a fascinating movie with Moreau and Ronet in their early prime. Marvellous black and white photography too by Henri Decae.



LE FEU FOLLET (THE FIRE WITHIN). This made such a big impression on me when I saw it aged 18 in 1964 that I did not need to see it again until now. It is surely Malle's most outstanding work, adapted from the Drieu La Rochelle story, with an Erik Satie soundtrack (so appropriate) and those luminous images by Ghislain Cloquet and with an astounding performance by Maurice Ronet. This and Bogarde's role in THE SERVANT are surely the outstanding performances of 1963. Ronet captures every facet as Alain Leroy, a playboy drying out at a private clinic who really finds nothing to live for once he is "cured". His alcoholic playboy is also a terminally depressed and finds life hollow and meaningless. Even the visiting friend of his ex-wife, whom he sleeps with and who writes him a cheque, cannot rouse him. He likes the routine at the clinic as we observe him in his room - notice the picture of Marilyn Monroe (a supposed recent suicide) and other newspaper features on death clipped to the wall... and the date scrawled on the mirror - the next day's date.


He decides on a whim to return to his old haunts in Paris to see if any of his old friends can be of any help in giving him a reason to go on living. Paris again in the early 60s looks marvellous as we linger at the Cafe Flore and the Brasserie Lipp. But Alain seems a shadow of his former jolly self to the barman and hotel staff he used to know. His best friend has settled into domesticity with a wife and child and is writing a book, he meets Jeanne Moreau, and Alexandra Stewart and her high society friends, and he starts drinking again. There is also that group of homosexuals who notice Alain and comment on how he has changed as one comments that a friend of theirs had been in love with him. It sounds depressing but it isn't really, and is a mesmerising film about suicide as a rational way out for a hollow man who is all used up and cannot see any point in continuing.... it is inevitable when back at his room to see him pack up his belongings and his life.



Malle went on to lots more varied films from the jollity of VIVA MARIA and the dramatic LACOMBE LUCIEN to those American classics like ATLANTIC CITY - LIFT TO THE SCAFFOLD is a young man's film exploring what cinema can do, but LE FEU FOLLET remains a personal favourite that simply endures. A key '60s film too, comparable to THE SERVANT or BLOW-UP or BELLE DE JOUR.

R.I.P. to two more stalwarts...

Mary Murphy (1931-2011) One of the first ladies I got to know at the movies when I was a kid, in SITTING BULL and the Stanwyck western THE MAVERICK QUEEN - and THE WILD ONE of course! She was ideal as the spirited gal out west.


Terence Longdon (1922-2011) Another stalwart of the British cinema of the '50s onward has gone with the death on April 23 of Terence Longdon. Instantly recognisable, he had small parts in so many films, often playing army or military types, in films like APPOINTMENT IN LONDON, DANGEROUS EXILE, SIMON AND LAURA, THE MAN WHO NEVER WAS and others including the early CARRY ONs (DOCTOR and NURSE) and DOCTOR AT LARGE.
His best known cinema role probably being Drusus - Messala's sidekick (or more) in BEN HUR (above) in '59 - he was also Patroclus in the 1955 HELEN OF TROY. He later did a lot of theatre and television so kept being gainfully employed and had a good innings at 88.

Above: with Turner and Connery in ANOTHER TIME ANOTHER PLACE, and with Stanley Baker in HELEN OF TROY

Taxi Driver

It's back! A new re-issue of TAXI DRIVER for its 35th anniversary ... it would be good to see it properly again - it was probably one of the most viewed of the early video cassettes back in the 80s and 90s.

An essential 1976 movie - how we were gripped and enthralled by it, it is certainly a vividly expressionistic depiction of big city breakdown and one of the true masterpieces of American cinema. One had to read the extensive coverage on it in "Film Comment" as Scorsese, Paul Schrader and De Niro were the heroes of the hour. I had that album too with that pounding Herrmann score - and then those images: the taxi emerging from the steam, the reds and neon colours. Perfect, simply perfect. I also loved NEW YORK NEW YORK and in fact that is one to re-visit too now.

The other movie that excited me as much in 1976 was De Palma's brilliant OBSESSION where one fell totally in love with Genevieve Bujold, and it too had stunning images and another final Bernard Herrmann score. They were the top movies of the year for me, along with Visconti's last L'INNOCENTE (maybe the greatest costume period film ever) and Lester's ROBIN AND MARIAN. Some year ... (like 1975 was the year of Antonioni's THE PASSENGER and Kubrick's BARRY LYNDON

The Best of Everything

Rona Jaffe's bestseller THE BEST OF EVERYTHING is back in the bookshops - due to the success of MAD MEN on tv, where Don Draper is seen reading it. Perhaps the movie will be back too? It is one of those perfect '50s confections, exploring the lives of loves of office girls in New York in the oh-so glamorous world of paperback publishing. It is a well-crafted story following Hope Lange as she emerges from the subway (with that nice touch of the breeze blowing up her bolero jacket showing us the lining material) wearing her white gloves and hat. Then we get to meet the other girls including Diane Baker (falls for a cad [Robert Evans no less] who wants her to have an abortion and then she meets a nice doctor!), fashion icon Suzy Parker who was in a few movies at this time as Gregg the actress who is just not good enough and cannot handle rejection by cad Louis Jourdan ... there is also Martha Hyer having an affair with an office colleague but that story is practically snipped out as the film focuses on the three main girls, with Hope getting involved with Stephen Boyd, and then her old flame Brett Halsey re-appears and he wants her to be his mistress.

There's a few old timers too - Brian Aherne as the lecherous boss and "as Amanda Farrow" Joan Crawford in full fighting mode as the office dragon making life hell for the girls in the typing pool. Amanda leaves to be with her long time married lover, so Hope gets promoted to her place, but it seems Amanda has left it too late..

It has those lush 20th Century Fox production values including that Johnny Mathis theme tune as the credits unfold over New York in the 50s - and is a sterling addition to those '3 girls sharing an apartment and looking for love' movies they did so well - usually directed by Jean Negulesco, who helms again here. The book was a bestseller at the time, along with those other torrid tales like PEYTON PLACE by Grace Metalious, MARJORIE MORNINGSTAR (Natalie Wood in the '58 film) by Herman Wouk and A SUMMER PLACE by Sloan Wilson - all successful movies too, showing America in the late '50s before all that liberation stuff began! Then came the early '60s and titles like THE CHAPMAN REPORT (I have already reviewed this delirious Cukor classic) and Mary McCarty's THE GROUP [filmed by Lumet in 66] before we got to John Updike and RABBIT RUN! We move on to A SUMMER PLACE shortly ...

That day at the beach ...

I have always been fascinated by those photos by George Barris showing Marilyn at the beach that day in 1962 a couple of weeks before her death. He captures her enjoyment and she looks lovely here at 36. The photos at the house at 5th Helena Drive in Brentwood and those shots of her sipping champagne on the highway also capture her radiance at this time when she had slimmed down from that rather chubby period, when she was doing SOMETHING'S GOTTA GIVE. The "Last Session" pictures by Bert Stern (as per his book) show another darker side of Marilyn - but here on a sunny day she poses happily for the camera. They are surely among the best images of her.

Sophia in L.A. 4 May 2011

AN EVENING WITH SOPHIA LOREN - an evening it would have been great to attend was the occasion of the 50th (!) anniversary of her Oscar win for TWO WOMEN, as the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences paid tribute to Sophia Loren at the Samuel Goldwyn theater in Beverly Hills on 4th May. Pity it was not televised as the audience were treated to clips from her career, comments from co-stars and family and Sophia herself looking marvellous at 76. Maybe I can persuade our London National Film Theatre to do something similar with her .... There is now a segment of it on YouTube at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztUofaBuy6M&feature=feedu

As mentioned on my many other posts on Sophia here, at least I got to see her up close in 1979 ...