Monologue: Kate's Heavy Dinner

It's actually difficult to find items for the monologue series. Screenwriters generally favor single sentence utterances and the ole trusty shot / reverse shot conversations, leaving the bulk of monologue-writing to the playwrights. But watching Alice Adams (1935), now celebrating its 75th birthday, it's easy to think of virtually every scene as a Katharine Hepburn monologue. Occasionally her co-stars will start a sentence in response but Kate as Alice rarely lets them finish a thought. She spends the whole movie jabbering away as if she's the only character.

Hepburn and MacMurray in Best Picture nominee Alice Adams (1935)

In her defence, this is generally because she's nervous, not from lack of interest in her partners. This is never more true than in her romantic scenes with Fred MacMurray. He's Arthur Russell, a young man of some bank whom Alice is desperate to win. (In the emotional logic of the movies, this is not heartless social climbing or gold digging so much as a girl who just wants to be happy. And therefore deserves the man above her social station.) One of the peculiar charms of the movie and of Kate & Fred's scenes together is that Alice is so busy trying to impress him that she never notices her own success; He's besotted from the start.

In their first lengthy scene together, he walks her home and she lies embellishes all of her truths to prove her social worth. She assumes he's already spoken for... but she can't help but try.

It eventually becomes clear, even to Alice, that this eligible bachelor is interested. Her parents finally talk her into having the prime catch over for dinner in a lengthy sequence that basically functions as the third act of the movie. I'm only excerpting a small piece of it here. Alice Adams was a big break for the young George Stevens in the director's chair and though the movie and central star turn are uneven this particular scene is truly a gem. Stevens is performing a difficult juggling act keeping socioeconomic satire, character arc drama, plot convergences and physical comedy all in the air simultaneously.

The unfortunate dinner is the sort where virtually everything goes wrong. The Adams have planned an elaborate meal made to impress but it's all wrong for the stifling heat, most of them don't understand what they're eating, everyone is sweating and the father can't remember the cook's name though they're pretending that she's their regular help. Alice even blames her in pretentious French though this isn't lost on the cook (Hattie McDaniel in fine comic form) who is struggling through the multi-course dinner herself.

While Hepburn sells nervous and rude chatter about the working classes (to which her character and family belongs) Stevens camera drifts away from her slyly following McDaniel around the table as she loses control of the service (the heat is getting to her, too).

Alice Adams: Father simply has to have a heavy meal at the end of the day. He works so hard in his terrible old factory -- terrible new factory I should say -- that he simply must have lots of food to keep his strength up. I don't see why most businessmen can't leave most of their details to their employees. But then I suppose some of them are like that. They just allow the help to sit around idle while they do all the work. Then of course there's the other type of businessman who simply drives his employees all the time and invents things for them to do if there's nothing else because he hates to see people idle.

Which category do you fall into Arthur? [She doesn't let him answer] I'm sure not the last. You're probably the idol of your office boys and secretaries.

The screenplay's use of homonyms there is delightful since any linguistic play delivered with Hepburn's vocals is welcome and it's also such a terrific point about the unspoken Alice Adams predicament; the Adams family is quite idle, really, and they spend the running time idolizing the wealthy.

Alice's father interjects, clearly excited about the notion of even having a secretary at all. Then Walter, the brother, enters and exits with some urgency (things are going very wrong offscreen as well) and takes the father with him.


At this point Hepburn lays on the charm offensive. Alice is flailing, searching for a way to salvage the already ruined evening, knowing that the ruse is broken.

Walter's such a funny boy -- so abrupt and unexpected. He-- oh, but then of course you know that about him. I guess all talented people are a bit peculiar. It's part of their charm, really. What are your talents Arthur? [She doesn't let him answer] Can you play any instrument or sing or paint? Or perhaps you have some secret hobby that derives its chief charm by just being secret, something you keep all to yourself and don't like to talk about.

Russell must know what Alice doesn't like to talk about by now, what she's kept all to herself in their conversations. There are more interruptions and the mother also leaves. We hear the family arguing from another room. It's now just the young would be lovers at the table. Alice eyes the man she loves and believes lost, tears welling in her eyes.

Penny for your thoughts? No, I'll bid more. A rose... a poor little dead rose for your thoughts, Russell.

Will you ever forgive us for making you eat such a heavy dinner? I mean look at such a heavy dinner because you certainly couldn't have more than looked at it on a night like this.

Adams rises to escort her sweating suitor out. Hepburn in an inspired decision, drops the fawning for something like subtextual anger at her own inferior standing that's gotten them both into this mess. There's something about the body language and the line readings that momentarily turns a little condescending... even through the heartbroken defeat. It'll shift to self pity in the next scene.

Cheer up. Your fearful duty is almost done and you can run on home as soon as you like. That's what you're dying to do isn't it?

Though it's never quite clear what this young heir believes or doesn't believe about the delusional information that's been constantly flowing from this eager girl's lips (the movie is always lacking for clarity when it comes to the idol classes) it's always clear that he'd like to kiss them. Running on home is not what he's dying to do at all. But Alice is always charging through these onesided conversations in unreality like an incongruously delicate bull in her own china shop.

How to stop her from breaking her own heart?
*

She Who Must Be Obeyed!

Have you ever seen SHE (1935)? The brief title is appropriate even though the film is ostensibly a voyage film about a youngish man Leo Vincey (Randolph Scott) who sets out to find the Fountain of Youth. That fabled myth switches elements here to become the Flame of Life. Stepping into it will grant you immortality, see. But what SHE is really about is what men want and fear in women.

The film is available on Instant Watch at Netflix and today being its 75th anniversary, why not give it a look? It's an interesting snapshot of both cinema's male gaze (more on that later) and the 1930s. Genre films, even ones that take place in realms of the fantastical are often great snapshots of the time they sprang from. Luke Skywalker screams 1970s does he not? They only made faces and hair like that in the 1970s. And I think they only made square jawed men like Randolph Scott and his "roommate" Cary Grant back in the 1930s.

Mmmm. Randoph & Cary...

Scott ♥ Grant at their '30s beach home. (They lived together for 12 years.)
Every photo they took together -- and there are quite a few --amazes.

Sorry to distract!

Try not to think about Randolph & Cary while watching SHE. The film isn't about whether or not Randolph loved Cary but what kind of woman his character Vincey will choose to love. But we're jumping too far ahead.

First comes exposition.

And quite a lot of it at that. I'm working on a theory that older films feel slow to modern viewers because they put all their exposition and backstory in at the very beginning instead of bogging the narrative down with it intermittently as modern movies do. It takes SHE forever to get going.

The unfortunate side effect of too much exposition and that still regularly employed device of the protagonist as audience proxy, the character that needs everything explained to them, is that the protagonist often comes across as quite dimwitted. In the first thirteen minute scene (all exposition) we hear the story of Vincey's great great great great grandfather or some such -- they look exactly alike --and the legend of the Flame of Life. Vincey is shown an artifact with the inscription "Here burns the flame of life". He actually thinks they mean that that object is the immortality device. "But this is gold, a known element!" Dumb-dee-dumb-dumb... DUMB.

Apparently Vincey is unfamiliar with the concept of symbols.

The Flame of Life | Tanya the Young & Beautiful

Scientist: Don't you understand?
Vincey: I'm afraid I don't.

Once Vincey is on his journey, he travels in the blink of a title card to the utmost part of the world where he meets Tanya (Helen Mack), the young beautiful daughter of his guide through the treacherous arctic. Somehow the arctic guide is the only character who doesn't understand the basic principles of snow and avalanches but let's not nitpick. (It's not real snow anyway. The tracks suggest they poured sand on the studio floor.) Tanya tells him Vincey more about this legend. It involves a woman.

"What kind of woman?" he asks. It's the smartest question he'll ask in the entire movie, since the movie is about just that. Which kind of woman will a good man choose?

The adventurers discover a secret tropical world inside the snowy mountains they've been climbing. Beset upon by savages, Vincey is injured whilst performing heroics. Just when things look incredibly dire, they're suddenly rescued by the command of SHE (Helen Galaghan in her only film appearance) who rules this hidden world inside the mountains.

Her kingdom is a Lost Horizon/Brigadoon/Shangri-La sort of deal. Her interior decorator has a fondness for mixing up German expressionism, Roman and Greek influences and then tossing it all in an Art Deco blender. In other words, it's very 1930s... on steroids to make it seem otherworldly. The queen's full name is actually "She Who Must Be Obeyed" and/or "She Who Must Immediately Serve As Character Design For Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarves".

SHE seems quite benevolent but for the troubling dictatorial implications of her full name. Soon it becomes apparent that Vincey's dead relative was her lover 500 years ago. She'd like to repeat that carnal experience with Randolph Scott if she can pry him away from Tanya and Cary Grant.

Who can blame her?

Her plan to do so is mucho theatrical and involves a huge human sacrifice ceremony, expensive costume parade and elaborate modern dance that won the movie its sole Oscar nomination for Best Dance Direction (in the first of only three years that AMPAS had such a category). Benjamin Zemach is the choreographer but I hope he dedicated the honor to Martha Graham because that legendary dance icon's influence is ALL over the number. It's rather as bald a steal as Beyoncé's "Single Ladies" was with Bob Fosse's work.

The most fascinating thing about SHE is how baldly it reveals all the screwy dichotomies of both cinema's male gaze and Hollywood's youth worship. Movies always want to eroticize women and then punish them for being erotic. And the movies are also always reinforcing America's youth worship while simultaneously reinforcing heteronormative ideals "Let's grow old together!"

In two consecutive scenes Tanya works both sides of this schizo view. She offers up her love to Vincey and talks about what she has to offer. Her words are flowery but they amount to 'Let's grow old together.' He rejects her. "You're not tempted as I am." In the next scene (catfight!) Tanya, having been rejected, storms into SHE's royal suite and wields "old" like an insult.

Tanya believes that this evil queen's magical age is a weakness.

Tanya: Why are you afraid of me?
SHE: (Incredulous) Afraid?
Tanya: You are afraid of me and now I see why. Because I'm young and you know love belongs to the young. Your magic makes you seem young but in your heart you're old, OLD. You were young once like me but now you're old and it's too late for love ever.

Oh, Tanya. If being old means you can't love then you'll lose Vincey anyway. You can't grow old together and stay young. Duh!

<-- evil spooky unnatural youth ritual

Aren't both women making the same argument?

SHE: 'I'm better because I'm young... forever.'
TANYA: 'I'm better because I'm younger... at the moment.'
BOTH LADIES: 'Being old is gross!'

It's no spoiler to tell you that Vincey is going to choose Tanya's helplessness and her home cooking. Literally. He's continually rescuing her and she cooks for him throughout the movie! The hero is never going to choose the alpha female because that's how movies do. But the Quest for Youth story blankets this traditional fear of powerful women with a hypocritical ageism. Randolph Scott was 37 and Helen Galaghan 35 when the film was released but Helen Mack, playing Tanya, was 21. In the scene where Vincey and Tanya first meet, the romantic kindling for her fire is when this older man tells her how he'd treat her if she were his... daughter. Ewww.

Vincey will reject that Flame of Life but isn't he still chasing that fountain of youth by choosing a young bride?

Note the positioning: Scott, submissive, in the traditional "slave girl"
pose. Can't have that! Later, the reverse corrective: Scott throned in
his own home. The woman dethroned and in submissive position.

Maybe not that much has changed at the movies in the past 75 years. We've still got big special effects extravaganzas (which this is... and fairly impressive for its time, too) praised for their sheer spectacle and imagination, their other flaws (stilted acting, massive plotholes) ignored. And we've still got plentiful storylines wherein powerful women are vilified and damsels in distress are placed on pedestals. Now, today's damsels do have a little more fire in them than quivery crying Tanya... but if they get too fiery, watch out! They'll end up as terrifying as emasculating as dangerous as SHE!
*

Gloria Stuart Centennial (And The 25 Oldest Living Oscar Nominees!)

One hundred years ago on this very day 30s actress Gloria Stuart was born in Santa Monica. Happy birthday Gloria! Stuart made her name on James Whale's pictures like The Old Dark House (fun movie) and The Invisible Man before her screen career petered out in the 1940s. Then, über famously, James Cameron resurrected her to play the 100 year old survivor of Titanic. And the best part... she's still with us today!


Were you confused like Britney Spears when she tossed the Heart of the Ocean back into it in Titanic? Do you think Kate Winslet hopes to grow up to look just like her?

"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it through not dying."
-Woody Allen

Since Gloria is not the oldest living Oscar nominee, it's list time. Who's still with us? (If I forgot anyone, do let me know in the comments.)

The Oldest Living Oscar Nominees

1. Robert F Boyle (Honorary Winner and 4 time nominee as Art Director Fiddler on the Roof) is nearing 101.
   Update: August 1st, 2010 (RIP). What a career he had.
   
2. Luise Rainer (2 time winner The Good Earth & The Great Ziegfield) is 100½.
3. Gloria Stuart (nominee Titanic) is 100 exactly.Update Sept 26, 2010: (RIP). a long life well -travelled.
   
4. Douglas Slocombe (3 time nominee) cinematographer of Raiders of the Lost Ark among other classics.
5. Kevin McCarthy (nominee Death of a Salesman) is 96.
   Update: Sept 11, 2010: RIP
6. Olivia de Havilland (2 time winner The Heiress & To Each His Own) is 94. Yes, she still hopes to publish memoirs and no, she's not the only surviving Gone With the Wind cast member.
   
7. Kirk Douglas (Honorary Oscar and 3 time nominee), Spartacus himself, is 93.

8. Ernest Borgnine (winner Marty) is 93.
9. Celeste Holm (winner Gentleman's Agreement) is 93.
10. Joan Fontaine (winner Suspicion) is 92. Yes, it's true. She and sister Olivia de Havilland are still not speaking.
11. Tom Daly (5 time nominee) this Canadian producer nominated in short film and documentary categories just turned 92.
    
12. Joyce Redman (2 time nominee Tom Jones) is 91. [Trivia note: Tom Jones is the only film to have ever won three nominations in Supporting Actress. Pity that Robert Altman's Nashville didn't repeat the trick.]
    
13. Dino de Laurentiis (Thalberg winner and a producing winner for La Strada) is almost 91.
14. Michael Anderson (nominee, directed Around the World in 80 Days) is 90.
    
15. Ravi Shankar (nominee, the co-composer for Gandhi) is 90.
16. Ray Harryhausen (Gordon Sawyer Award recipient), the f/x legend, just turned 90.
17. Mickey Rooney (Honorary Oscar and 4 time nominee) is 89.
18. Joe Mantell (nominee Marty) is 89.
    
19. Carol Channing (nominee Thoroughly Modern Millie) is 89. "Razzzzzbbberrries!"
    

20. Hal David (winner "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head" from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid) is 89.
21. Deanna Durbin (Juvenile Award winner) is 88. She was only 18 when she won her Juvenile statue (shared with Mickey Rooney) but she retired from the screen just nine years later.
    
22. Doris Day (nominee Pillow Talk) is 88. There's a few Facebook groups trying to get her an honorary Oscar. Filmmaker Douglas McGrath pushed for it, too. [Trivia note: There is some controversy about Doris Day's exact age. But most sources now claim she was born in 1922 so she would have turned 88 this past April.
    
23. Mihalis Kakogiannis (3 time nominee, all nominations from Zorba the Greek) just turned 88.
    
24. Eleanor Parker (3 time nominee Caged) just turned 88. She's best remembered today as the (not totally) wicked would be stepmother in The Sound of Music but that doesn't paint the whole picture at all. Isn't it time for renewed interest in her career? Smart cinephiles think so.
    
25. Blake Edwards (Honorary Oscar and nominee for Victor/Victoria), aka Mr Julie Andrews, is almost 88.
26. Norman Lear (television giant who was Oscar nominated for writing Divorce, American Style), one day younger than Blake Edwards, is also almost 88
27. Jackie Cooper (nominee Skippy) is 87. Trivia note: He is the youngest Best Actor nominee of all time, having been up for the prize when he was but 9 years old. He's likely to keep that Oscar record. The closest anyone ever got was Mickey Rooney -- also on this list -- at the age of 19.
    
    but I couldn't stop there. Partially because I missed a handful of people. Partially because I definitely have undiagnosed untreated OCD. Carpal tunnel syndrome here I come. It's a top 40!
    
    
28. Arthur Penn (3 time nominee, directed Bonnie & Clyde) is 87. I know I've given this book a million plugs but you must read "Pictures at a Revolution" for a detailed fascinating account of how that landmark movie was constructed. Choosing a director wasn't the least bit simple. And directing Warren Beatty isn't so simple either. Penn did it twice.
    
29. Juanita Moore (nominee Imitation of Life *see it* It's a beauty) is 87.
30. Valentina Cortese (nominee Day for Night) is 87. She holds the extremely rare honor of a supporting acting nomination from a foreign language film. Those are so very infrequent.
    
31. Franco Zeffirelli (2 time nominee, director of Romeo and Juliet), another Italian (!), is 87.
    
32. Charles Durning (2 time nominee, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas) is 87.
33. Richard Attenborough (2 time winner, director of Gandhi) is 86.
34. Cliff Robertson (winner Charly) is 86.
35. Glynis Johns (nominee The Sundowners) is 86
    We're glad she got that one last burst of mid 90s comedy gold in While You Were Sleeping and especially The Ref. Well done, Sister Suffragrette ♪ ! Unfortunately, she's been little seen since.
36. Arthur Hiller (Hersholt Huminatarian winner, nominee for Love Story) is 86.
37. Ron Moody (nominee Oliver!) is 86. For a recent article on this underappreciated sixties musical, click here.
38. Stanley Donen (Honorary Oscar) is 86. He's one of the best musicals director, most famous for that thrilling barn sequence in Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and the entirety of Singin' in the Rain.
39. Sidney Lumet (Honorary Oscar, plus 5 time nominee) just turned 86 last week. His classics include 12 Angry Men, Network, The Verdict and Dog Day Afternoon and he's also the man behind the extremely undervalued Running on Empty (1988). The best part is that he's still active. He recently made Before the Devil Knows You're Dead.
    
40. Eva Marie Saint (winner On the Waterfront) turned 86 today, so we'll bookend with this other birthday girl. Happy birthday, Eva! Don't forget your gloves when you leave the party tonight.
    

Big screen actress icons I had to pass up for this list included Jane Russell, Maureen O'Hara, and Esther Williams. All are still among the living but none were ever Oscar nominated and haven't been given Honorary Awards. What a world, what a world. Christopher Lee, is another biggie that's never been nominated. He still works so consistently at 88 that it's possible they'll yet find a way to nominate him. Next up for Lee is Martin Scorsese's The Invention of Hugo Cabret.

Carol Channing for Exit Music!

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Further Reading? Try this substantial Gloria Stuart tribute at Ehrensteinland and if you're in LA, please note that AMPAS will be honoring Stuart's centennial at the Samuel Goldwyn theater on July 22nd.
*

Do You Love Luise?

Though life expectancy has been increasing for decades, it still feels like a particularly incomparable achievement when someone lives to be the big 1-0-0. Today is the centennial of Oscar's first double acting winner, Luise Rainer. And she's still alive to celebrate it!


Depending on where you read the information Luise was born in either Vienna, Austria or Düsseldorf, Germany* to a prosperous Jewish family. She was a popular stage actress by her early 20s. She had the good sense (and good fortune) to get a Hollywood offer and hightail it out of Germany by 1935 when Hitler was consolidating power. Within her first three years in Hollywood she had already won two Oscars. In the grand scheme of cinema, she may appear now to be something like a flash in the pan, but the flash was obviously of supernova proportions. When I finally saw The Great Ziegfeld (1936) for the Best Pictures From The Outside In series I fell for her flighty emotional French diva. Here's a taste.



Luise currently lives in London and she's still giving interviews. How about that! I love this bit from her on acting

I don’t believe in acting. I think that people in life act, but when you are on the stage, or in my case also on screen, you have to be true. You must feel it, and give birth to it, like to a child, Do you understand? I was asked long ago, by Columbia University in New York, would I teach I said: 'Teach? I would wring everyone’s neck!’ I wouldn’t dream of it, because life has to teach you.

Have you seen both her Oscared turns, the other being The Good Earth (1937)? Did you want to sing Luise a rousing round of Happy Birthday in English and/or German today?

*According to some reports this confusion is purposeful, Hollywood sold her as 'Austrian' nicknaming her "The Viennese Teardrop" because Germany wasn't exactly popular in the States in the 1930s.
*

As God Is My Witness.

Jose here with a post seventy years in the making.



On December 15th, 1939 the city of Atlanta celebrated what President Jimmy Carter would later call "the biggest event to happen in the South in my lifetime." The entire city had been holding a celebration for the previous three days which had them decorate their houses in Civil War era style, lined their streets with Confederate flags and hold the largest costume ball seen to the date.

The worldwide premiere of Gone With the Wind would become an event of such magnitude that even a recent bestseller dedicated an entire chapter to the effect it had on its characters.
If that was only the premiere, can you imagine the effect the movie had on the world?

Unrivaled to this day in scope, box office and critical acclaim (although that has come with its share of controversy...) the film remains the epitome of Hollywood's Golden Age. Unlike revered classics of the era though, it has been able to remain timeless and thoroughly enjoyable (I dare you to mention any other four hour long movie which you can sit through without taking a look at your watch).

Most of the film's success is owed to what I consider to be the greatest Oscar winning performance of all time: Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara. The search for the perfect actress to play the iconic role is legendary and as such also remains a fascinating part of Hollywood lore. Watching the result is obvious that David O. Selznick made the right choice.

Few actresses have been as volatile, fearless and relentless as Leigh, who in Scarlett found a perfect outlet to channel a continent's entire view of upcoming disaster. Gone With the Wind was made during the time leading to WWII and while its American Civil War plot had little to do with the conflict involving the Nazis, the irreparable changes Scarlett will go through represent problems humanity has faced for as long as it has existed.

Even if Scarlett spends most of the film acting like what some would call a spoiled bitch, she has a surprising side filled with the kind of strength that would even lead to murder.
In the film's centerpiece she delivers the greatest speech captured on film.



The scene not only marks the ending of the movie's first part, it also establishes a point of no return after which none of the characters are the same they were in the two previous hours.
The scene, which was beautifully shot by Ray Haller and Ray Rennahan, also marked a landmark for Hollywood aesthetics.

Notice how we can't really see Scarlett as she addresses the heavens. Shot against light in what has to be one of the most beautiful use of matte paintings, it's as if not even Scarlett recognizes who she's become. As she raises her body she remains in the dark, but the second when she starts talking there's a timid light that illuminates her face (metaphor for inner enlightenment perhaps?).

As God is my witness, as God is my witness they're not going to lick me. I'm going to live through this and when it's all over, I'll never be hungry again. No, nor any of my folk. If I have to lie, steal, cheat or kill.

Then the camera moves one more time and once again we only see her silhouette as she repeats

As God is my witness, I'll never be hungry again.

She's once again in the darkness, ignorant of what the future will bring. But this time she'll be prepared to face it.



If you have seen it, you know what I'm talking about and should put your DVD or Blu-ray in the player tonight and commemorate its anniversary. If you haven't seen it what are you waiting for? Tonight's a perfect chance for you to do so.

*

Birthday Suits: Nov 9th

Today's Birthdays 11/09
<--- 1869 Marie Dressler is awesome. She gave one of the most aggressive Best Actress winning performances evah. If you haven't seen Min & Bill (1933), you must. You must, you must, you must.
1883 Edna May Oliver feisty character actress
1886 Ed Wynn Uncle Albert from Mary Poppins. He loves to laugh... long and loud and clear. Audiences were always ready to laugh along with him
1922 Dorothy Dandridge first black woman to be nominated for Best Actress at the Oscars (Carmen Jones) and what a neat coincidence that she was portrayed by the first black actress to eventually win the Best Actress Oscar (Halle Berry) in the bio Introducing Dorothy Dandridge
1948 Bille August Danish director of The Best Intentions and Pelle the Conqueror fame
1955 Fernando Meirelles director of declining films: City of God, The Constant Gardner, Blindness. I'm not trying to be mean. But... um... do you have faith he'll pull out of it? Discuss.
1974 Giovanna Mezzogiorno of Vincere (2009) hoopla
1988 Nikki Blonsky I don't know about you but I could hear the bells when she sang in Hairspray

And finally let's hear some love in the comments for Hedy Lamarr, one of the most beautiful actresses of the 40s and one of the first to go nude on film in Ekstase (1933)


Where's her biopic? Or miniseries even. Seriously... you can practically see the scenes spanning the genres: (war drama) Austrian-Jewess Hedy drugs her own maid to escape her husband and Vienna in the 30s, then helps invent frequency hopping. I mean, how many actresses can claim the origins of modern ubiquitous technology? (romance) Hedy marries and divorces six men. (movies about movies) Hedy films one of the cinema's first sex scenes, Hedy's movie banned in Hollywood but they recruit her anyway, Hedy loses the "Ilsa" role to Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca, Hedy stars in Samson and Delilah! This is a biopic I would gladly watch... even if they framed it in that stupid end of her life looking back way.

First Hand Rose.

Jose here to commemorate Fanny Brice's birthday. The extravagant comedienne would've turned 118 today. Yes, seriously, watching her energy in films like The Great Ziegfeld (where she played herself) or listening to her vibrant musical performances it's easy to think that this woman could've lived forever.

A New Yorker born from Hungarian parents, she made a way for herself in the burlesque world and later by her association with Florenz Ziegfeld. She became a huge musical star and a popular radio personality with her Baby Snooks character.

But what remains fascinating about Brice is that she pulled off an enviable career using raw talent. Would someone like her fit in our current notions of what makes an entertainer appealing?

Sure her life was plagued with scandal (her marriage to Nicky Arnstein wasn't as tragically romantic as pop culture has us think) and that would've fit wonderfully in our tabloid loving society. But in an industry that has shifted towards the shallow, what do you think Brice would be doing if she had appeared this decade? She would've probably been relegated to supporting performances and deemed a "character actor" and her musical career would've been stalled because she wouldn't have looked good in a thong.

Casting the brilliant Barbra Streisand as Brice in Funny Girl (which brought her a much deserved Oscar for best Actress) and Funny Lady, was one of those rare moments of Hollywood genius where you can argue everything works for the best. Sure the movies are plagued with romantic fiction and invented plot twists, but as far as star charisma and talent go, Brice, and Streisand now, are in a league of their own.

Streep Noms #4-5 and Oscar Trivia

Streep at 60: More movie discussions to follow but today we're discussing Oscar competitive fields again
(the winner links take you to their acceptance speech)

The Best Actress races of 1982 and 1983 hold special meaning for me as they were my inaugural Oscar years. On April 11th of 1983 I saw my first Oscar ceremony. My only point of reference for the glitzy tradition was that my parents and my older siblings didn't like it -- something about Star Wars being way better than Woody Allen??? --and even though my parents didn't take me to that many movies, I had somehow seen and liked 3 of the 5 Best Picture nominees (Gandhi and the two blockbusters Tootsie & E.T.) For the first two years of my Oscar watching I saw a total of ZERO Best Actress nominees. My how life has changed.

1982...

• Julie Andrews, Victor/Victoria -this is the one I desperately wanted to see, being in love with both Mary Poppins and Maria Von Trapp. My parents refused to take me, muttering something about Julie Andrews appearing in a porno ... I was very confused.
  
• Jessica Lange, Frances
• Sissy Spacek, Missing
  
• Meryl Streep, Sophie's Choice
• Debra Winger, An Officer and a Gentleman
  

Other '82 female leads for context: Diane Keaton in Shoot the Moon, Teri Garr in One From the Heart, Carol Burnett in Annie, Dolly Parton in The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Nathalie Baye in The Return of Martin Guerre and Michelle Pfeiffer in Grease 2

Streep Stats: With this win Meryl became the 4th actress to win an Oscar for a Nazi/Holocaust related drama. It didn't happen again until Winslet won this past February for The Reader. Meryl was not, at 33 then, the youngest actress to win a second Oscar. Luise Rainer still holds that title winning her second Oscar in 1938 when she was only 28. Even Jodie Foster couldn't top that (her Silence of the Lambs win came at 29 years of age).

1983...

• Jane Alexander, Testament
• Shirley Maclaine, Terms of Endearment
  
• Meryl Streep, Silkwood
• Julie Walters, Educating Rita
  
• Debra Winger, Terms of Endearment

Other '83 female leads for context: Arielle Dombasle in Pauline at the Beach, Mariel Hemingway in Star 80, Bonnie Bedelia in Heart Like a Wheel, Sigweavy in The Year of Living Dangerously, Susan Sarandon & Catherine Deneuve in The Hunger and Babs in Yentl.

Streep Stats: Despite being only 34 years old when her 5th nomination rolled around, Meryl doesn't hold the record for fastest to get there: Bette Davis held the record for 65 years (accomplishing it by the age of 33) until Kate Winslet took over earning her fifth nomination (Little Children) at 31. I'm guessing that record holds for as long as Bette's did.

Give or take Norma Shearer who is either tied for 3rd place or in 5th
place depending on how you count her nominations

What are your ideal Oscar shortlists / wins in 1982 and 1983?
If you haven't seen very many early 80s movies, which are you most eager to finally get to?

Victor Fleming: Did the Auteurist Theory Do Him Wrong?

You must... you simply must set aside ten minutes today to read this terrific piece at The New Yorker on Victor Fleming and 1930s Hollywood. It digs into Fleming's heavily debated contributions to the twin immortals of 1939 (Gone With the Wind and The Wizard of Oz -- he was a replacement director on both) and what it unearths is fascinating, indeed. Frankly my dears, I gave a damn... several damns if you're counting.

<-- Clara Bow on Fleming: "Of all the men I've known, there was a man."

For instance, I knew that Vivien Leigh didn't like Fleming and was angry that George Cukor who worked with her closely on her performance was fired. But I had no idea how complex and influential Fleming's relationships to Hollywood's top actors (Gable prominent among them) and actresses actually were (nor what an actressexual -- ok womanizer but we're splitting hairs here -- Fleming was. He had affairs with Clara Bow, Norma Shearer, Lupe Velez and Ingrid Bergman among others). This is but one of many quotes worth sharing.

"Despite his later reputation as a ‘man’s director,’ ” Sragow says, “Fleming launched or cannily revamped a host of female stars from the 1920s on.” The hot-wired Bow did her sexiest, best work for him, in “Mantrap” (1926), and he got sensationally funny performances out of Jean Harlow in “Red Dust,” “Bombshell” (1933), and “Reckless” (1935). The sacred male companionships of seventy years ago did not have the effect of downgrading women—anything but. Fleming, along with his friend Hawks, created women onscreen who were resourceful, strong-willed, and sexual—the kind of women they wanted to hang out with, partners and equals who gave as good as they got. For a while, they, too, were an American ideal.

Selznick, Fleming, Leigh & Gable on the contentious Gone With the Wind set

Gone With the Wind gets the most time in the article. It's a great read and now I think I'll have to look into Victor Fleming: An American Movie Master as well since this essay references that work frequently.

20:08 (Best Pictures From the Outside In)

screenshots from the 20th minute and 8th second of movies.
I use a VLC but different DVDs do come up with slightly different screenshots. It's an inexact exercize.

It's a very plum... plum

Even Pee Wee Herman would love this redundant statement from The English Patient. 'Mmm, plummy!' But it gets at one of the best things about the movie, the feast it offers the senses.


In this first frame from Gone With the Wind, "Good Morning Scarlett", our heroine is all ablur ready to wreak havoc at the Wilkes Plantation. In the second frame (20:08 if you remove the overture) she's transferring her affections to Charles when she can't find a wedge inbetween Ashley & Melanie, newly betrothed.

Charles Hamilton, I want to eat barbecue with you! And mind you don't go philandering with any other girls because I might be jealous.

Such a troublemaker, that one! Or as her husband hunting rivals call her, "a hornet".

Visit Nick's Flick Picks for the new episode of Best Pictures From the Outside In as Mike, Nick and I tackle these two film giants, two of the longest best picture winners evah. "Fiddle Dee Dee"

And here's a chart of all episodes as per requests
*

Diving Back In to 'Best Pictures From...'

We've finally completed the new episode of Best Pictures From the Outside In. Each week (As if!) we pull two Oscar winners off the shelf from either end of the Academy's 80 year timeline. Your wait for this 1938 vs. 1997 match was as long as Titanic's running time. But you survived it. Congratulations: You're not Leo, you're Kate!


Mike: The 11th episode of "Best Pictures from the Outside In" takes us sailing through treacherous waters, filled with icebergs and taxmen, animated eyebrows and accidental explosions, and (I'm guessing) finally some serious disagreement among our panel members. In 1938, four years after It Happened One Night, Best Picture went to another Frank Capra film, You Can't Take It With You, the overly madcap tale of love in the midst of Capra's traditional battle between free spirits and hidebound plutocrats. In 1997, maritime disaster struck when Titanic, the fraught tale of love aboard the world's largest metaphor raked in a kadillion dollars and won a kadillion Oscars, including Best Picture.

Both films are focused on inter-class love stories, in each case threatened by interference from one-dimensional rich people who treat the poor like dirt...

"All Aboard" for the full conversation...
*

NYFF 2: Changeling

reporting from the New York Film Festival

I really wanted to love Changeling, the latest Oscar-Bait pic from Clint Eastwood. I find the period of the 20s/30s a fascinating time in American history. I love Angelina Jolie. And yet... Goddamnit. I can't say that I loved the picture or even liked it, really. Clint loyalists might think I had it in for the picture, what with my history of finding Eastwood films indulgently reviewed/awarded in the past, but I was rooting for it early on, even trying to ignore the pleasant but awkward score (That's Clint's doing again, you know how he likes to tinker with themes). Yet once the picture got going I just couldn't find much to root for.

A couple of early scenes at home and at the workplace provide Changeling with interesting period detail and establish Mrs. Christine Collins (Angelina Jolie) as a self sufficient woman and capable single mother. We learn that her husband fled many years ago leaving her to raise the child alone. She's also a supervisor at work with possible management in her future. All of this, the screenplay (by J Michael Straczynski) reminds us, is taking place in a time in which women were expected to be meek and dependent. Women were supposed to obey the patriarchy without question. This friction between nature (Christine Collins inner character) and nurture (time period specific sexism) is both an ideal setup for and an obstacle to the drama to come. After Christine's son Walter (Gattlin Griffith) goes missing she must fight an uphill battle with the patriarchy, excuse me, the LAPD. They're at best incompetent and at worst purely evil in their disregard for her son's well being. They even return to her a boy who is not her son at all. The evil LAPD (they should all be twirling mustaches) even throw poor Christine in an asylum when she won't accept the strange child as her own flesh and blood.

Somewhere buried in the heavily detailed procedural crime drama that Changeling becomes after Christine is locked up, is an interesting story about a woman finding her strength against significant odds in a time long before women's liberation and only a decade after women were granted the right to vote. Unfortunately the movie as directed and scripted works against this potentially thrilling internal drama. The plotting and direction can't decide which kind of movie this is: melodrama, courtroom, serial killer picture, procedural, period epic?

Unfortunately, the casting also gets in the way. Angelina Jolie's screen presence is, as everyone knowns, competent and forceful which is usually a good thing. Unfortunately her largeness somewhat robs Mrs. Collins of the journey from socially conditioned feminine weakness to lioness strength that we need to watch her stumble through. Jolie is technically proficient enough in these "womanly confusion" scenes but they don't feel organic to the actress and there's no surprise or reveal once she starts fighting back. Changeling might have been a better film with a less formidable icon at its center; an actress like, say, Amy Adams, might have had more success forced as she would have been to fight against her own girlishness to find the strength for the character transformation. What's missing in the role is the trained humility and period-specific weakness that Mia Farrow sold so superbly in Changeling's time frame contemporary A Purple Rose of Cairo. We can never doubt that ANGELINA JOLIE (capitals intended) is a woman of fortitude and perseverance. As an actress she's practically a modern superhero.

That said, I've little doubt that Jolie will receive her second Oscar nomination for the role as pundits have been predicting, even in a crowded Best Actress race. Eastwood even throws the Academy a shout out (within the movie's period context of course). Jolie's performance will play exceedingly well in short form, bursting to the seams with "Oscar clip" moments it is: shouting, crying, proclamations for justice --she's especially good in an interview sequence in the insane asylum when you can see her strategizing emotional responses and doubting herself. Clips might be the best way to experience this handsome looking but overlong, overwrought film. The plot is complicated -- it even loses focus on Christine for a surprisingly length of time -- but the picture is not.


In its opening frames Changeling takes us on a welcome trip back in time to the ancient Universal logo and then a black and white shot of Los Angeles. As it nears its subject, mother and son, it gradually imperceptibly turns to color. That's often a neat trick in the movies but with Tom Stern (Clint Eastwood's favored DP) behind the camera it's also not all that much of a transition. Inky blacks and subdued color are favored to such a degree that one wonders why this team, also responsible for the shadowy Million Dollar Baby and the nearly colorless Letters From Iwo Jima haven't just succumbed to their urges and made a true black & white picture. Black and white describes the film's characterizations, too. The film sparks colorfully a bit in the presence of a vivid supporting cast but mostly, like Jolie, they're trading on their screen presence and not the demands of their respective roles. Jason Butler Harner, who understands how to sell both time period and grinning pathology, will impress many in the breakout role of the infamous Gordon Northcott but the only character that isn't instantly easy to pin down as simply Good or Evil is the policeman (played by Michael Kelly) who serves as the bridge between Changeling's two halves. Changeling's title accurately reflects its early creepy child switch and its relentlessly mediocre shift from melodrama to true crime story. A better more disciplined film would have earned that title in a more ambitious way. It's a shame that there's so little real fluidity, few emotional surprises and no transformative character arcs within the sprawling story. C
*

p.s. Since you want to know about its Oscar chances as much as Clint does --what? He even references to the Oscars in his movie and in an endearing affectionate way -- I'll say this: It's a good bet for Angie, costumes and art direction. The rest will be tougher going. Of the supporting cast only John Malkovich and Jason Butler Harner are feasible and they're longshots at best and only in the race if voters go wild for the picture as a whole. The rest Director, Screenplay, technicals, depends on how well Gran Turino is received. If that other Clint pic is Oscarable it'll give voters a reason to pass here and still honor their favorite actor turned director/composer/producer. Which they like to. Current Oscar Predictions -they'll be updated on October 11th.

Big Willie (Shakespeare) Style

Nathaniel: In each episode of the mammoth "Best Pictures From the Outside In" project, Mike (Goatdog's Movies), Nick (Nick's Flick Picks) and I have been viewing two Oscar winners, one from either end of the Academy's 80 years timeline, moving forwards and backwards simultaneously. Today's double feature happens to star two very famous and prolific writers.

Emile & 'Will' co-star in one close-up in The Life of Emile Zola (1937)

On our trip forward we hit 1937's The Life of Emile Zola, a biopic cum courtroom drama set in France where Zola continually rocked the boat with controversial novels and politically crusading letters. On our trip backwards in Oscar time we've reached 1998's Shakespeare in Love, a romantic comedy cum theatrical love letter set in England when Shakespeare was making his name. Though we see very little of Zola in the act of writing (he's more of an orator on celluloid), we're treated to plentiful ink-stained close-ups of "Will" (Shakespeare) putting pen to paper even if he's more of a poetic lover on celluloid. Those particular shots made me wish that we were conversing with quill pens and sending each other exquisitely crafted letters rather than jotting out quickie e-mails like, well, this one.

If you were dipping your quill in the ink… what's the first sentence you'd scribble down about each film? Or would you just ignore The Life... altogether and start composing multiple sonnets to ...Love? That's what I'm tempted to do.

Nick: Nathaniel thinks I can limit myself to a SINGLE SENTENCE. Ha ha ha ha ha...

Here's a start: "Zola! Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Well, I absolutely f***ing won't. Not remotely the frame of reference that came to mind. But if I compare thee to a cold winter's night--that is, if I compare thee to Cimarron or Cavalcade--I find that I like thee so very much more. However stodgy and slow, you are a handsome little fellow."

Mike: My attempts to adapt the opening paragraphs of several Zola novels for our discussion having come to naught, I say this: Zola is both overstuffed and understaffed at the same time; the sets are lush and warm, but they're populated by so few people that it seemed like a high-school drama class was given free rein to use the Warner Bros. backlot but unfortunately limited to the dozen or so members of the class. And this: Shakespeare in Love moves with breathtaking exhilaration, its screenplay is a smart and funny exploration of the pain of artistic creation, it deserved almost all the Oscars it won (especially Best Picture), and I'm glad the film industry quickly got over its exploration of Joseph Fiennes as a leading man.

"J'Accuse... !" Paul Muni of being a ham and Joseph Fiennes of being a fox

Nick: Which leads me to a question. As clearly as Emile Zola would have hated Shakespeare in Love (too flouncy! not Real!), do you think the filmmakers of Life of Emile Zola would have hated Shakespeare in Love? Which is to say, does the Zola film express an aspiration toward the liveliness, momentum, and aplomb that I agree Shakespeare in Love possesses, or do we see a concerted drive toward the kind of sobriety, slowness, and superficiality of characterization we often get in Zola.

Another way to ask this would be whether bad films are even trying to be good ones, but I actually feel a little generous toward Zola. There's a severity to its compositions and its tone that I kind of appreciate, and symptoms like its very glancing look at Alfred Dreyfus (Supporting Actor winner Joseph Schildkraut, pictured right) who languishes in jail without developing much of a filmic "personality," COULD be a way of expressing what Dreyfus is losing (i.e., a three-dimensional life) by spending all those years in jail. Just as the film COULD be trying to show what a self-righteous stuffed shirt Emile Zola finally became even when he fought on the side of Right. Paul Cezanne certainly seems to think so. But there's also a nagging sense that Life of Emile Zola may just be failing to be the fuller, richer, more rousing and humane movie it would very much like to be. What do you guys think?

And I don't mean to keep avoiding Shakespeare in Love. I just haven't thought of enough puns yet.

Nathaniel: Is this one question or five? My mind's eye has glazed over and all I can see is that bizarre book cover pan that takes place, I think, between act one (Zola's generic lean years) and the other two acts (the interminable rest of the movie) showing us dozens of Zola's famous titles. I think the purpose of that bridge shot is to signify Great Accomplishment™ without having to actually dramatize it. After all, there's much speechifying to make room for.

If Zzzola is trying to be a rousing experience it's failing in a colossal way. To me it was a veritable anti-drama. I had the opposite reaction to the one named earlier: Cimarron and Cavalcade are solidly fun popcorn pictures in comparison. But I'm glad you mentioned them again, Cimarron in particular. To me the bulk of Zola is basically Cimarron's worst scene --that hysteric courtroom diversion-- only stretched out to feature length.

The one character I identified with was Dreyfus. It felt like a prison to me.

Mike: I don't think Zola wants to be anything but what it is: a Serious Biopic, a Film for the Educated, a Film for Grownups. Its stodginess defined a genre that was popular in the late 1930s and early 1940s and was certainly well-represented at the Oscars: look at The Story of Louis Pasteur, Madame Curie, One Foot in Heaven, Blossoms in the Dust, ad nauseam, ad hypniam. And I think there was definitely an idea that Hollywood could educate people with these movies--that's the only thing that can explain the seriously streamlined feel of a lot of the proceedings, like it's a lesson plan for fifth graders. It concentrates all the action into a ridiculously small number of characters, resulting in scenes like the one where the military brass are trying to figure out what to do about the Dreyfus letter--I had the feeling that if they pulled the camera back, it would reveal all five or six members of the military sitting in a row of offices, each waiting for his immediate underling to bring this event to his attention. Its weirdness results from these dual and conflicting goals: remind the educated how smart they are, and educate the uneducated. But I don't think it wants to be more rousing or entertaining than it is, because I think the genre forbids that.

Dear god I'm sick of Zola. Can we talk about Shakespeare now? Let's start with how happy we were to be reminded of how great -- passionate, funny, intelligent -- Gwyneth Paltrow can be when given the right role. Hell, we can even talk about Ben Affleck --I loved him in this movie, even though I'll back off my off-blog comment to Nick that I wish he had played Will Shakespeare. Imelda Staunton! Colin Firth! Tom Wilkinson! Anything but Zola!

Nick: Shakespeare in Love is seriously great. I know a lot of people find it overrated and think its Oscar win was bogus, but in a weird way, that whole scuttlebutt has also led to the film being underrated, don't you think? Having just watched so many 1930s comedies as part of this conversation series, it's all the more stunning to see the same swiftness of pace and succinct, delicious exaggeration of character in such a modern comedy. You can totally see Cary Grant (for Joseph), Irene Dunne or Katharine Hepburn (for Gwyneth), Alice Brady (for Imelda), and Walter Connolly (for Geoffrey) in this thing, right? Which means, for all the reasons Mike just mentioned, it would very likely have LOST Best Picture in the 1930s.

It's also incredible to realize that this comedy, unlike almost any other recent comedy I can think of off the top of my head, has zero truck with nastiness (either meanness or grossness), and even when the double-entendres and insider references border on the smug, it isn't that lazy sarcasm that's all over modern movies. I love how generous the movie is, with character and story and tone, and how that doesn't make the movie bubble-headed, because it's also so interested in sadness and separation.

Nathaniel: It's not particularly strange that Shakespeare in Love acquired all that extraneous baggage -- that's to be expected with Oscar wins. But it is sad. For in this particular case of late breaking tide-turning enthusiasm, the Academy has very little to be ashamed of. I wasn't completely wild about it that year (I'm surprised to announce that I'm much crazier about it at this very moment) but this was and is a better picture than the expected champion it overthrew. The cherry on top? I wasn't rooting for her that year (I was leaning Montenegro then Blanchett from the nominees), but Paltrow's performance holds up. She's radiant. She doesn't get enough credit for the actor's command she has over her voice I think. It's quite an instrument and it has so many shadings in this movie, just as her face does in closeup ... storming over with dignified anger or romantic confusion or love of art. Within the context of the annual Best Actress crowning, I'm now willing to concede it's one of the freshest choices they've made in some time. It's both a character performance and a star turn and my god but they're too stingy with the latter these days, you know?

Gwyneth glows while reading her reviews. They also glow.

I enjoy almost every performance in this picture, with the exception of Geoffrey Rush (whom I'll just never really *get* I suppose. It's a mystery), and I'm glad that it took as long to get made as it did. Wasn't this supposed to star Daniel Day-Lewis and Julia Roberts originally some years earlier? Imagine what a different, and frankly lesser, film that would have made all burdened with star power too modern (Julia) or heavy (Daniel) for such a farce.

One quibble: what was with the terrible insert cutting in two different scenes to show us that Someone is Coming to spoil the party? It was like a parody of those countdown clock action movie flourishes where you swear they're stretching that last 10 seconds out into five minutes. That bomb is never going to go off in those action movies and by the time Someone Arrived in each case in Shakespeare in Love, I had forgotten that they were even on their way. Am I making any sense?

Nick: I completely get you, and it's a fair way to concede the flaws in this beautiful film. (I almost added "soulful," but is that too embarrassing an adjective?) I think the movie gets a little bogged down in the interlude when Viola thinks Will is dead and Will thinks Wessex killed Marlowe, and suddenly there is some lakeside moping under a tree. A good five or ten minutes of slightly misjudged tone and tempo. But that's only because the energy and elegance is so well-preserved everywhere else. For instance, in the merry score. And in the splendiferrific costumes by Sandy Powell, with whom Nathaniel and I have a sort of Design for Living three-way marriage thing. Someone should remember to make sure she knows.

Last bit from me: I'm thrilled to hear nice things said about Paltrow. I've maintained for years that despite the rumors, she was better in this than Blanchett was in Elizabeth. I know you guys aren't necessarily agreeing, but finding three people who admire her work in this movie is feat enough. And when I think that, in addition to Julia, this role was once earmarked for Winona effing Ryder... as earmarks go, that would literally have been a Bridge to Nowhere.

The weirdly incestuous '98 Best Actress Battle: Gwyneth & Cate
shared a leading man (Joseph Fiennes) a supporting actor (Geoffrey Rush)
and Queen Elizabeth even had a crucial role in Shakespeare in Love

Nathaniel: I actually was agreeing with you, which surprises me. But don't tell Blanchett's legion of admirers obsessors that I've switched sides ... or it'll be our sites shut down and not plague-ridden Elizabethan playhouses.

Mike: Paltrow gets my vote, although I have to admit that the only thing I remember clearly about Elizabeth is the scene where she gets the bishops to accept the Church of England by locking a few in the basement and then tossing her head coquettishly at the rest.

I don't think Shakespeare is perfect: even though I didn't dislike the constant insert cutting Nathaniel alluded to (it actually added to the comedy by the third or fourth time for me), the ending bothers me. Films about tormented (male) artistic geniuses often feature a fair maiden who inspires him, sleeps with him (sometimes the order is switched), and then gets the hell out of his way so he can go on being a tormented genius. That's a parallel between this film and Zola, although at least Zola's muse (Dreyfus) eventually got to leave his prison island, whereas poor Gwyneth is stuck with Virginia (but at least she doesn't die, which is often the fate of the muse). It would complicate matters too much if she stuck around: we don't really want to think of our geniuses as having small talk over coffee in the morning, squabbling about income taxes, or changing diapers--or being really happy.

But then again, that's one of the things that sets these two films apart: Shakespeare is bittersweet, but Zola gives us what feels like the crowning achievement of Zola's life. Sure, he dies, but he dies a hero, having accomplished everything he needs to do. The bulk of Will Shakespeare's writing life is ahead of him, and will always be tinged with melancholy, but most of Zola's biopic and his ultimate triumph are only peripherally related to what he's best remembered for--writing. As a film, as a biopic, and as an exploration of what it's like to be a writer, Shakespeare beats Zola.

Readers: Keep the conversation flowing in the comments...

vote: The Best Pic Tournament, our choices and yours so go and vote. Mike has mashed up the two films. Paltrow sure gets around.
next week's double feature: Titanic (1997) and You Can't Take it With You (1938)

Statistics: Shakespeare in Love was nominated for 13 Oscars (one shy of the all-time record) and won 7: Picture, Screenplay, Actress, Supporting Actress, Costume Design, Art Direction and Comedy Score (during the brief period when the Oscars momentarily thought they were the Golden Globes). The Life of Emile Zola was up for 10 statues and won 3: Picture, Screenplay and Supporting Actor.


Best Pictures From the Outside In (so far)
episode 1 No Country For Old Men (07) and Wings (27/28)
episode 2 The Departed (06) and Broadway Melody (28/29)
episode 3 Crash (05) and All Quiet on the Western Front (29/30)
episode 4 Million Dollar Baby (04) and Cimarron (30/31)
episode 5 LotR: The Return of the King (03) and Grand Hotel (31/32)
episode 6 Chicago (02) and Cavalcade (32/33)
episode 7 A Beautiful Mind (01) and It Happened One Night (34)
episode 8 Gladiator (00) and Mutiny on the Bounty (35)
episode 9 American Beauty (99) and The Great Ziegfeld (36)
episode 10 Shakespeare in Love (98) and The Life of Emile Zola (37)