1940's Hall Of Fame Part I

And here we have another contender for the top of the list. I'm not quite sure how you guys have managed to only pick good movies so far. I mean, statistically, there should be at least one movie that I found to be rubish .

Great performances throughout. I don't think there was a bad acting job in the movie. The children in the background roles weren't much to write about, but since they got about a line each, I'm not arguing. McDowall, playing Huw, was the only kid to get a bigger role, and I found him to be a good actor. The boy he portrayed seemed a bit...what's the word...mature? Trying to act above his age? In swedish we use the word "lillgammal" about a child acting as if he's older than he is. It's not a put-down, it just felt a bit weird seeing a boy who, judging by that break in his voice, just hit puberty ask to be his sister-in-law's stand-in husband for want of a better term. That said, it's the only not overly postive thing I have to say about the acting.

I loved how the valley slowly transformed as the story progressed. It was a subtle change, but every time we cut back to the shot of the long hill with the mine at the top, it would've changed just a little towoards being in that black, smoggy state of the beginning, where our narrator prepares to leave the valley forever. It beautiful work done with an eye for detail which I appreciate very much.

The decline of the family was also something that was handled with a careful touch. Through the series of events, no one misfortune seemed to crowed into the next, but kept a perfect beat with giving the family breathing space and to get used to one thing before the next came a-knocking. And more important still, we got at least some good news between the punches, keeping the family from keeling over on the spot. Both writer and director should get major props for both set-up and orchestration of execution. This was my first Ford film (to my knowledge) and if he keeps this standard, I'm game for another.

Overall, a very good film about a kind of horrible story, which could've easely been too dark if not handled properly. Had there not been the thin rays of levity that was Mr. Gruffydd's walk among the daffodills or the boxer's lesson (best character in the movie btw), this would've been too dark for my taste. As is, I loved it. Spectacular nom, Dan! Many thumbs up!

__________________
Why not just kill them? I'll do it! I'll run up to Paris - bam, bam, bam, bam. I'm back before week's end. We spend the treasure. How is this a bad plan?

I have a huge problem, which is that I keep getting the names of older films mixed up, or I'll watch films and never remember their names period, particularly film noirs or films I watched on tv when I was younger. I have the same problem with Westerns, though I haven't seen too many Westerns anyway so it's not as big a deal.

The Verdict, Gilda, Double Indemnity,The Maltese Falcon, and D.O.A (1950, not the video game adaptation from 2006, obviously haha) I do remember the names of though.

Yea, I have the same problem remember movie titles, and sometimes I've popped in a DVD only to realize I had seen it before. Noirs are bad for having similar sounding names, same with westerns too.

I'm not sure if I seen The Verdict, but the rest of themI have (Gilda, Double Indemnity,The Maltese Falcon, and D.O.A) all good ones!...We had some really good ones in the film noir hof. I love noirs myself, I don't know if I ever seen one that I hated.

Peter Lorre is in The Verdict. If you like him you should give it a watch. It's not a film I see mentioned very often, so maybe it's not quite as good as I remember, but I recall liking it quite a bit and finding it rather amusing as well. But I also haven't seen it in a very long time so I might not even like it now.

I know how you feel. I've even watched entire tv series, forgot about it (or forgot the name), then go to watch it years later and suddenly I remember the entire thing.

Maybe I should just get my memory checked by a Doctor or something haha.

great review Clazor! I know what you mean, when I first started I had figured it would be between my two favorites; Laura and Arsenic & Old Lace and as I started watching I kept thinking: oh, *****, here's a contender. And another, and another!

__________________
What I actually said to win MovieGal's heart:
- I might not be a real King of Kinkiness, but I make good pancakes

~Mr Minio

Pursued

Speaking of contenders; ANOTHER ONE!

I really enjoyed this movie from the get-go. Having wanting very much to see it some weeks back when I first tried watching it with bad audio. Now, with a version from the local library I had a bonus with a short intro by Martin Scorsese who likened it to a Shakespearean tragedy. And as I watched it unfold I completely agree. There is a certain undeniable doom that refuses to give way as it circles and drags everyone into its whirlwind.
Scorsese also spoke of how this was rather new in the more darker tone of westerns of its time. Nothing and no one is strictly good or evil. On the side of Light or on the side of Dark. What there is, is a long standing hatred that simply overwhelms and eventually consumes those who allow it to rule them. Which is handled very well.
What is also handled, and can be misconstrued, when it comes to people's feelings is that this movie covers up to 20 years of life. From the time of Jeb, Thur and Adam being around 5, to grown adults. And then, two years with Jeb in the army, some six months after his return home, then another year, maybe more, after the first death.
In such an amount of time, feelings and emotions change, as do people, and this was addressed and, while it was not "explained" to the viewer; I do get it and appreciate it.
What I also appreciated was the camera work. It was incredible. One in particular I loved was at the end of Jeb and Adam's many fist fights.



The angling was powerful and raw. There so many great shots along with this, including the scene in the alleyway as well.

And, as with any good western, the outside shots of New Mexico and the cloudy skies were simply brilliant. In regards to camera work, the film was painted with a masterfully creative hand.

What was also masterful was the sound track. Which, at times was like a cataclysmic storm. Pelting you without mercy. Much like the unrelenting doom that hounds the story's characters. The music is epic and at many times - intense. It's ebb and flow and crashing crescendos were entities unto themselves. F@cking magnificent.

Pursued is a solid western with - echoing Scorsese - Shakespearean under tones.

Bravo Camo for nominating this.

It's a solid movie, with a nice and tight script, decent soundtrack and some interesting bits of cinematography, but the main attraction here is Charles Laughton. It's always a delight to see him on the screen! He's one of the most charismatic actors I've ever seen and every scene he's in just gains a special kind of lightness! The rest of the cast is ok, I guess, though it's kind of unfair to judge them when they're standing next to a man like Laughton. It's like his acting his 30 years ahead of his time, a bit like John Stewart.
I really liked the open ending and how the internal struggle of Mr. Marshall was portrayed on that last scene! A very nice nomination!

THANKS neiba! Laughton IS a joy to watch!

Just sent my voting list in, whoo! that was hard to place them in order. All of the films are fine nominations, good choices everyone

Great review, Ed. So glad you liked it

Man, Scorsese has opened tonnes of movies, really shows how much he loves movies. Just yesterday i read that he opens the dvd or bluray can't remember for Jean Renoir's The River and he says that and The Red Shoes (which i'm watching shortly) are the most beautiful colour films in his opinion.

I would LOVE to see him host a night of movies on TMC with Mankiewicz or Osbourne, that would be so cool

and THANK YOU for nominating it!

Just finished watching this.
I had seen some parts of this when I was a kid but I never had the chance to watch it all in one seating. It's almost like going to a concert, and that's lovely.

That being said, I'd love to watch this without an analytical mind which kind of ruined some parts for me!
I hated the interpretation of Toccata and Fugue, and as much as the animation was interesting I couldn't stop insulting the conductor. It looked like a Wagner ouverture instead of Bach!!

I don't particularly like The Nutcracker so that was kind of boring too.

Then it started being really interesting: The Mickey and the Broomstick part is really nice and The Rite of Spring is absolutely amazing! The concept, the animation and of course: Stravinsky!

Then there's the Waltz of the Hours that I didn't think it was well animated and it ends beautifully with Mussorgsky and Schubert, a combination I never thought it would work so well!

Overall, this is a really educacional tool mixing science, art, myths and some of the greatest masterpieces of classical music and something I think every kid should be shown at least once!

I don't think I had heard of Little Foxes before this HoF, and I am really glad it was nominated, because I rather loved this. At the very start I wasn't quite sure where the film was going, but I grew more and more enamoured with it as the film progressed. I really enjoyed the extensive use of deep focus, and particularly any shots involving the stairs.

Richard Carlson as David was great. He was very entertaining and made me burst out laughing on numerous occasions. While I found Birdie a little annoying at first, I quickly gained quite a bit of sympathy for her as well. And of course, Bette Davis was fantastically cruel with her performance as Regina. Unfortunately I don't have much else to say other than the fact that this was a thoroughly enjoyable film.

Attachments

 

Being the only animated Disney movie to pass the two hour mark, one could understand the feeling of apperhencion at sitting down to watch this; a series of animation shorts set to classical music. "Animated movie" isn't even an apt description, really, as it lacks a central narrative. I'd like it more to a concert wherein they've added a visual component as to engage the eye as well as the ear.

As such, it's an impressive acheivement. Thought to be only the beginning of an annual prodject by Disney, a cool reseption from audiences made this finacially impossibility. As such, we got only this (until Fantasia 2000 came out) and I think that if we only ever got just one, I'm glad it's this one. The musical pieces were selected with care and well orchestrated, as well as complimenting each other. As one piece leaves off, we get a breif monolouge, and then we're off again into a different region of classical music.

The animators also deserves a heap of praise. It may very well be their best work, only rivaled by the beautiful back drops to Sleeping Beauty, another movie I only watch for the animation and the soundtrack...well, the Tchaikovsky piece at least.

A tangent, and tell me if I'm wrong, but I think Sleeping Beauty's the last time the animators used the traditional cell animation, where they'd paint different parts of a given shot (background, characters, animals etc.) on pains of glass or plastic cells, place them under a camera in different layers and then shoot. Thats one frame of animation. Rinse and repeate. Handpainted with watercolors, it gives a certain shine to the animation, especially the yellow and red tones.

Anyway, back to the matter at hand.

Although I do like both music and animation, others who have seen it an talk about it here have mentioned it's length, something I have to agree with. This is a bit too long for what it is. As a one time experience at a consert house, this is fine, but to stand up to repeated viewing in one sitting, it could/should be shorter. If I were to cut some things, it would go as follows:

Lose "The Rite of Spring" entirely, cutting 23 min.

The piece that, while stil interesting, was the least interesting to me. Also, the animation was more...realistic..than the others, so it made it stand out for me, almost going to "land before time" territory rather than Disney.

Lose "Dance of the Hours" entirely, cutting 13 min.

While the animation was fun, the music, I felt, was very repetetive, cycling the same main theme over and over.

Lose 5-10 min on "The Pastoral Symphony", cutting dead weight.

Mainly, just cut the section with the Centaurs. It's superfluous, we meet them at the Bacanal and it's just not needed.

Thus, we've cut the movie down by about 40 min, leaving a more manageable 1 h 15 - 1h 25, making the experience more digestible
and less unwieldy.

Despite these points, I whole heartedly like this, and it too is in the runnings for my top spots (even if I get the feeling it's not with anyone else).

It sounds like you guys would rather have Fantasia 2000 and its 74 minutes. It does keep Mickey and "The Sorcerer's Apprentice".

__________________
It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
My IMDb page

When I sat down to watch Waterloo Bridge, I'd forgotten about the warnings I'd seen in this thread about it being a rather sad film. So until nearer to the end, I was still half expecting a sappy ending. I was pleasantly surprised to see a more tragic finale, since usually I'm the lone person rooting for a bittersweet ending, rather than a happy one.

I always find it odd how quickly people fall in love in these types of films, so at the start I didn't quite buy Roy and Myra's romance since it was even speedier than usual. I guess I found their bad timing and running about rather charming though, because a little way into the movie I realized that I did like them as a couple and cared about what happened, even if I can't pinpoint when exactly the transition took place.

I liked the tragic elements of the story almost as much as I enjoyed Vivien Leigh's performance, which was simply captivating. I can certainly see why she named this film as her favourite, even over her more iconic roles.

Attachments

 

Glad you liked Waterloo Bridge, Cosmic. Have you seen Vivian Leigh in anything else?

You're not the first one I've seen say something about how quickly people fall in love in some movies, but I think it happens in real life all the time.

Just Gone with the Wind, Streetcar Named Desire (though I don't remember much about that movie and have been meaning to watch it again), and Caesar and Cleopatra.

I guess your reaction to seeing it probably depends on whether or not you believe in love at first sight. The whole thing seems rash and ridiculous to me, but I'm a bit cynical and not the least bit romantic haha.

Did you like Caesar and Cleopatra? I tried watching it but didn't finish it. Though I should give it a go again.