Easy to Love: A Whole Bunch of Other Classic-Film Suggestions

The Siren rarely crowdsources anything; it feels like asking someone to do her homework. But she thought that this one time, it would be great to ask for recommendations on Facebook. So the Siren asked people for one (1) film that they’d suggest to a top-flight college student as a gateway to Hollywood movies made before about 1960. She had a vague notion that it would clarify her thinking, narrow her choices, maybe give her a couple of useful quotes.

And holy cats. 

What followed was a deluge, a cacophony, a landslide of recommendations ranging from Cat People to The Passion of Joan of Arc. Which, in retrospect, was entirely predictable. The Siren’s Facebook collective is what’s known as a self-selecting group, i.e., people willing to see day after day of old movies in their feed.

Most people were no more able to limit themselves to a single choice of film than they’d have been able to obey a sign over a bowl of french fries proclaiming “ONE PER PERSON, PLEASE.” The Siren had summoned up the conviction lurking in the hearts of cinephiles everywhere, that life without classic film is like that New Yorker cartoon above.

One cinephile Millennial posted gloomily, “I apologize for my generation,” but that isn’t the point of this exercise in any way, shape or form. First, Lance Mannion’s students are smarter than smart. Second, if it took the Siren until her 20s to get satisfaction from abstract art and until her 30s to appreciate classical music (and it did) that doesn’t mean she somehow enjoyed them less, or that she was dense for not having adored them from the time she could say “Mama.”

And the Siren has an oft-stated evangelical conviction, that the world of early-to-mid 20th century American film is vast and so brilliant that truly, there is something for everybody who isn’t the cinematic equivalent of tone-deaf.  

The conversation was incredible, but the Siren couldn’t possibly hit the honors students with a list so long it prompts the urge to close the browser and uncork a beer. So the Siren has appended a non-inclusive list of the suggestions she got from her film-mad (and highly film-knowledgeable) Facebook friends. The Siren’s also including two gentlemen she buttonholed at a party, a few who sent her emails and one gentleman whose opinion was solicited at the Nehme family dinner table. The writers and people whose work appears online are identified as much as possible. The others are nothing if not eclectic in their pursuits, including academics, medical people, museum curators, musicians, computer programmers, a couple of attorneys and a psychotherapist.

A rough tally of the films that got mentioned more than once, but that the Siren didn’t include in her own list:

Out of the Past

On the Waterfront

North by Northwest

Rebecca

The Maltese Falcon

The Searchers

Night of the Hunter

The Best Years of Our Lives

Sunset Boulevard

The Philadelphia Story

Bringing Up Baby

The Thin Man

The African Queen

Baby Face

Marked Woman

The Women

The Lady Eve

Samuel A. Adams, critic and editor of Criticwire: My kids, who were art-school students, really took to THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC. (I'd been cautioned by the department head not to try and show them the whole thing; but I ignored the advice.)

Miriam Bale, film writer and programmer, critic at The New York Times: I agree with Night of the Hunter and Out of the Past. But I'd add The Birds, and Red Headed Woman, a great introduction to the naughtiness pre-code!

Kendra Bean (author of Vivien Leigh: An Intimate Portrait): Gone with the Wind. It's easily available and you can break it up into two sittings. Bonus: watching it with me!

Christianne Benedict of Krell Laboratories: Harold Lloyd's Girl Shy, mainly because its last third is one of the most jaw-dropping action sequences ever filmed, but also because it's hilarious.

Karie Bible, film writer: Baby Face. “Always a great crowd pleaser! What better way to get them hooked on pre-code?”

Jill Blake, Sittin’ on a Backyard Fence: Right at 1960, but THE APARTMENT is a must. Honorable mention for ACE IN THE HOLE. Hell, let's throw in all of Billy Wilder's filmography. And I love that I'm seeing so much love for THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES. It should be mandatory viewing for sure.

Tom Block: “I've yet to meet the person that didn't respond to Scarface.” [That’s the 1932 version, of course!]

Wesley Blount: On the beaten path: It Happened One Night, The Maltese Falcon, Mildred Pierce (there oughtta be Joan too), Swing Time. Off the beaten path: June Bride (Davis that holds up well), A Letter to Three Wives, The Palm Beach Story.

Trudy Bolter: “Political films like The Mortal Storm and Gentleman's Agreement can fascinate students.”

Robert Cashill, film journalist:  “I showed parts of The Heiress to a college audience. Many said they planned to seek it out on their own. Compelling on so many levels.”

Philip Chambers:  “I have two movies from different periods that might work. For example if you want to give them an idea of the sordid realism of films of the early thirties, try Barbara Stanwyck in Baby Face. If they think early movies are full of the pleasures of Andy Hardy and lavish innocuous musicals, they're in for a surprise...My choice for the forties would be Nightmare Alley, primarily because Tyrone Power is a good looking stud and he'll rope them in, but they'll soon find out that looks, contrary to Hollywood iconography, are not all that important when your mind is full of ruthless greed and the need to claw your way to the top no matter how it affects you morally and psychologically.”

Jason Chervokas: “I second Sunset Boulevard for the mission at hand. Classic noir with a modernist trick of sorts -- narration from beyond the grave -- and an old movie about old movies, that, if it doesn't suck you in with both the romance and the hustle that is old Hollywood, well, you'll never care about old movies.”

Elizabeth Cody, author of the Lily B. series, which happen to be my daughter’s favorites: All About Eve. The African Queen.

Tony Dayoub, Cinema Viewfinder: Kiss Me Deadly, Night of the Hunter, and The Searchers. I guess the reason would be the same for all three. For any newbies who believe that pre-1960 films are too naïve or light for contemporary sensibilities, each of these will prove them wrong in their own unique way.

Brian Doan, Bubblegum Aesthetics: One of my happiest moments teaching film was the loud, sustained-through-the-film laughter My Man Godfrey got when I showed it in an intro class. They loved the film, and it was really great to see them connect with its blend of slapstick and dizzy romance.

David Edelstein, chief film critic, New York Magazine: “I don’t know if it’s the perfect intro, but Night and the City showed me that noir can be not just cynical, but tragic.”

Roy Edroso, political writer and possessor of great film taste, proprietor of Alicublog: “They haven't seen Citizen Kane. I know they haven't. So you can show that to them, and then go back to Biograph and begin the long story.”

Chris Edwards, Silent Volume: “I'm tempted to say The Best Years of Our Lives, which is a top-five favourite film of mine. But my suggestion is The Pride of the Yankees--not because it's the best pre-60s film I've seen, but because, as a biography made in a style totally different from biographies today, made a year after the man died, and co-starring his colleagues, I think it's both a fine film and a real teachable moment. Seeing that film is good for you.”

Steve Elworth: “Detour, because it is great and it was made for $1.75.”

Paul F. Etcheverry: “I just want to see the expressions on the students' faces when they watch Three On A Match and see that Ann Dvorak has been snorting cocaine with Lyle Talbot.”

Marilyn Ferdinand, Ferdy on Films: “My 12-year-old grandson responded extremely well to Went the Day Well? I think it's got a lot to recommend it because it is British, so therefore not American but also not subtitled, it is action-packed, deals with a subject that could seem contemporary (internal terrorism), and it has some really great roles for women. It shows the costs of war and the importance of bravery and sticking together.”

David Ferguson: “For the girls and gay boys I'd try The Women and Old Acquaintance since they're kind of like Real Housewives. Imitation of Life (either 1934 or 1959) is always a grabber and can stimulate very interesting discussion of race.”

David Fiore: “I don’t see how The Lady Eve could fail to delight anyone.” [He also suggests a field trip to the Toronto Cinematheque for the Bette Davis retrospective playing there.]

Stephanie Fowler: “Now Voyager for Bette Davis would win hands down for me, such a stylish and well acted movie classic; and Laura, a great mystery movie that still doesn't feel dated to me. It's only the being in black and white that dates it I reckon.”

Larry Frascella, co-author of Live Fast, Die Young: The Wild Ride of Making Rebel Without a Cause: “When I was going around showing Rebel Without a Cause at colleges some years ago, I often heard a variation of the comment: ‘I didn't know a movie could get you so emotionally stirred up.’”

Beth Ann Gallagher: “What about the classic film silent comedy Safety Last? When a restored print showed at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival the audience was so vocal and appreciative of all the jokes and stunts, and they are all hardcore silent film viewers likely to have seen that movie before. I can imagine it playing well for the class and getting them to love a silent film classic!”

Klara Tavakoli Goesche, Retro ACTIVE Critiques: “Can I also suggest Rear Window? Only because those of us who've seen it countless times can take it for granted that the young'uns might not have seen it even once.”

William Goss: The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) “The comfort of a familiar tale, the sprightliness of a legendary lead and...it's in color. DVD/Blu.”

Annie Gugliotti, Blogdorf Goodman: “Did anyone suggest Now, Voyager....because that tears me up ever time.”

Mark Harris, author of Pictures at a Revolution and Five Came Back (the story of directors John Ford, Frank Capra, John Huston, William Wyler and George Stevens during World War II, due in March 2014):  “This is going to sound like exactly the kind of movie at which they might roll their eyes, but have you seen Shane lately? It's really simply made but so adult, so controlled, so emotionally powerful and disturbing about families. Every scene, every shot, every line means something. I think it might fit your criteria.”

Lokke Heiss: “I lived in Columbia, Missouri the last seven years before coming to NYC, and my friends who taught the intro film classes at the university there talked to me about this constantly. The film that pops up on most people's lists, a great 'gateway drug' film for pre-60 newbies, is It Happened One Night. A film I also recommend strongly is Cat People, because besides being a great movie, it shows that you can make a really scary movie in ways other than using special effects.”

Meredith Hindley, writer and historian: Rear Window. “Who hasn't spied on their neighbors and wondered what was going on? Young women will also be enchanted by Grace Kelly's forwardness and wardrobe. (We're talking haute couture, not yoga pants and a hoodie.) Plus, the unpacking of the Mark Cross bag is seduction itself. Kelly's character (Lisa Fremont) also uses her brains and takes a huge risk, so she's not a passive participant in solving the mystery. There's also Hitchcock's lush visuals and slow cranking tension.”

Jordan Hoffman: “A nice entry level screwball comedy. Everybody loves ’em. The Thin Man or Bringing Up Baby . . hell, I don't need to tell you . . .one of the big honkin' fat screwballs.”

Hannah Huckaby: “Modern Times speaks to today's economic troubles and is soooooooo funny.”

Ed Hulse, author of Lone Pine in the Movies: Where the Real West Becomes the Reel West: “I don't pretend to have any great insight on this subject, but I'll pass along something that gave me hope. Back in the early Eighties, when the most popular revival house in NYC was the Regency, I attended a screening of the then-recently-restored The Adventures of Robin Hood, which is my all-time favorite film. Upon entering the theater I was startled to see many young people, including baby-boomer parents with children. To be frank, I was afraid the film would be treated as a campy artifact and girded my loins to be annoyed by snarky comments and inappropriate laughter. But to my amazement and delight, the audience got caught up in the film and even the kids -- weaned on smarmy sitcoms and brain-dead video games -- whooped and hollered in all the right places. After the screening, trudging up the aisle behind two young families, I overheard one dad telling the other, ‘Boy, that's one old movie that still works.’ The reply: ‘You know, I saw it on TV when I was a kid but I didn't remember how good it is.’ Maybe it was the gorgeous new 35mm print and the theatrical venue that made the difference, but that particular screening of Robin Hood--a film I've seen at least two dozen times--still ranks among my most enjoyable moviegoing experiences.”

Andrew O’Hehir, film critic, Salon.com: One shouldn't pick these things for defensive reasons, but The Searchers will blow their minds if they believe westerns are stodgy, antique and easy to laugh at. It's also a key text in American cinema, Echo the thoughts on noir, a lot of which pre-echoes contemporary issues. Also, if I may invoke the Hammer of Obviousness -- Casablanca. Bizarre as this may seem to those of us above the dividing line, many younger people haven't seen it. If it doesn't exactly help them understand WWII, at least it begins teaching them about the cultural importance of that war.

Peter Labuza, The Cinephiliacs: “It's a Wonderful Life seems to do it for a lot of my peers; I wonder (this is untested) if something with a little more "naturalism" like On The Waterfront would play well.”

Lou Lumenick, film critic at the New York Post (and the Siren’s boss there): Sweet Smell of Success worked on my daughter. Also The Manchurian Candidate. [Slightly out of time range, but truly great so the Siren’s leaving it in.]

Daniel Lunsford: On the Waterfront. It's only a few years before 1960 and proto-modern in many ways, yet it has many of the charms of 1940s films. I bet it could be a decent gateway drug to earlier movies.

Cyndi Mortenson: I run a repertory cinema that shows exclusively classic films. We have a large young audience, but I've had to convince some of them to try a black-and-white film (they aren't interested if it's BW)--I'll tell them they can go in free and if they don't like it, they don't have to pay. It's so rewarding to see them excited after seeing Rebecca or The Philadelphia Story or It Happened One Night for the first time.

Jad Nehme: Hard to Handle or Picture Snatcher. “All the pre-Codes we’ve watched were great; James Cagney is wonderful. Also, I saw East of Eden in class at lycee and we all liked it very much. It spoke to young people and their emotions, at least at the time. Maybe 20 years later it won’t. But it’s a great movie.”

Sheila O’Malley, The Sheila Variations: Only Angels Have Wings. “A perfect movie, something for everyone, looks great, sexy, adventurous, etc. Amazing action sequences, fantastic dialogue and atmosphere.”

Doris Palmieri:  Rear Window. “But, for introducing a younger audience to Bette Davis, Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? will shake things up.”

Vincent Paterno, Carole & Co. (a blog about Carole Lombard): “One more vote for My Man Godfrey (an ideal film for the Occupy crowd) and one more against Bringing Up Baby. (I admit a Lombard bias, but there are many other films that feature Katharine Hepburn, while many younger audiences aren't aware of Carole's timelessness.) Several other candidates: Libeled Lady, Ninotchka, Gold Diggers Of 1933, The Miracle Of Morgan's Creek, plus as a twin bill, Remember The Night and Double Indemnity, if only to show the versatility of actors under the studio system. Oh, and how I could forget Stagecoach, still the greatest western of them all?”

Barton Plunkett: Rear Window. “Still plays. Great intro to Hitch, Jimmy and, hubba hubba, Grace Kelly (plus a scary Raymond Burr for good measure).”

Gloria Porta, Rooting for Laughton: “I think that Night Of The Hunter and Witness For The Prosecution are fairly approachable by the general public.”

Scott K. Ratner, actor: “I've never personally known anyone to dislike or be totally bored with Rebecca (surprising, as it kind of rolls into low gear in its final quarter), and two dark horse favorites that have always worked for me are And Then There Were None and A Matter Of Life And Death. North By Northwest always does well and, cliche as it may seem, Casablanca I've found pretty safe.”

Christina Rice, author of Ann Dvorak: Hollywood’s Forgotten Rebel: “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and It Happened One Night are two films I showed to my kid sisters when they were in grade school and they loved them. Light and fun but still classic. Most have certainly heard of Marilyn but maybe have not seen her in action; and everyone deserves an introduction to Gable.”

Carrie Rickey, critic: His Girl Friday. “I find that Howard Hawks almost always works for college students.”

Gabrielle Roh: “Private Lives with Norma Shearer...if only the sound quality was better.”

Graham Russell, Bitterness Personified: Angel Face. “I can't see how they couldn't respond to Robert Mitchum--his sexy insolent tough guy persona is timeless!”

Mark Schoeneker: “Can't believe no one's mentioned Treasure of the Sierra Madre. It's the ideal gateway movie, every bit as fresh & exciting today as it must have been on the day it came out, & 100% capable of converting ALL nonbelievers. Also, plays really well alongside Double Indemnity.”

Daniel Shaw: “The More the Merrier (because Jean Arthur, and Joel McCrea); Notorious (because Hitchcock, Ingrid, Cary and Ben Hecht).”

Ceil Shissler: “I am the person you are trying to educate….I liked The African Queen.”

Tom Shone, film writer and critic for the Economist’s Intelligent Life and the Guardian Online: “Any of the great Hitchcocks--Rear Window, Strangers on a Train...But if it’s just one, North by Northwest. All the Bond films come straight from that one.”

Michael Simmons, writer: “A couple of years ago we had a couple of English girls staying with us. They were in their gap year and getting ready to attend University back home. Anyway, we took them to see Breakfast at Tiffany's and Roman Holiday. They were looking forward to Breakfast because they had heard so much about it over the years but it just bombed with them...Roman Holiday, on the other hand, just won them over, and came off as timeless rather than old. They were predisposed to hate it (black and white, a princess, the bad aftertaste of Breakfast) but it completely slipped under their defenses. Because Roman Holiday is not really part of mainstream pop culture, they had no idea how it was going to end. They were just weeping when it was over. The best part was that it made other movie suggestions easy. Like Audrey? Try Sabrina. Like the European romance? Try Jules and Jim. Like the unscrupulous newsman? Try His Girl Friday. Like pretty women riding on motor scooters wearing iconic clothing? Try The Singing Nun. Well, maybe not that one…”

Ellen Smith (no relation but the Siren’s good, good friend since the third grade, so she’s used to me): Sunset Boulevard.

Lauren Stieber: The Thin Man and The Philadelphia Story. “Bringing Up Baby for extra credit.”

Cassandra Sophia B: The Third Man, without question.

Philip Tatler IV, Diary of a Country Pickpocket: Out of the Past.

Charles Taylor, critic and NYU faculty member: It might be cheating but what about some Method stuff? I can't imagine On the Waterfront won't hold them.

Ella Taylor, critic, NPR: All About Eve, of course. But also Now, Voyager, a not-great movie with some really great Bette moments: Emerging from frump to glamor-babe; saying no to monster mom, but nicely; not asking for the marital moon because she already has the stars; and so on.

Rachel Thibault: Gold Diggers Of 1933 and some Sam Fuller--I'm partial to Pickup On South Street (1953). Don't think i have to explain the need to watch Busby Berkeley (fun musical numbers, sexual innuendo) and Pickup is great Cold War hysteria noir. Funny, too.

Steve Timberlake, Linkmeister: The Best Years of Our Lives. It's easily relatable to current war vets.

Melodie Warner: The Women, Carmen Jones, Notorious, The Letter and Little Foxes. “I love films in which women are more than just a pretty face.”

Tinky Weisblat, author of Pulling Taffy: A Year with Dementia and Other Adventures:  It. Young people are amazed that something in black and white (and silent!) can be so lively. Or maybe someone.

Marisa Young, The Timothy Carey Experience: Sunset Boulevard. Perfect Hollywood Gothic. All About Eve is my absolute go-to; it's perfect in every way. If they dig horror, The Black Cat and The Bride of Frankenstein never fail to impress.

Robert Ward, author of Renegades: My Wild Trip from Professor to New Journalist: I had a noir seminar at Claremont College. Seven students to it and I picked movies which came from novels: The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), Out of the Past, The Killing (short story), Double Indemnity, The Big Sleep, The Letter...and a few others. No one had ever seen Robert Mitchum or Jane Greer but everyone thought Out of the Past was great. They loved Postman and Double Indemnity.

Noel Vera, Critic After Dark: Stalag 17. [Billy Wilder is] not my favorite filmmaker, not even the best of his works, but the kids simply love that film. Just can't get enough of it.

Bart Verbanck: The Crimson Pirate.

Bob Westal, Forward to Yesterday: “For college age and older people, film noir seems to have a special status and might feel more contemporary than other films, so starting with Double Indemnity or The Killing (Stanley Kubrick has a lot of younger fans, and can tie in the structure to early Tarantino) might make sense.”

Angie Wojak: Rear Window, Safe in Hell, The General, Double Indemnity, Out of the Past, The Women, Dinner at Eight, Female.

James Wolcott, author of Critical Mass and a visitor to the Public Intellectuals class himself: “The first title that popped in my head was The Maltese Falcon because it has a great cast, moves fast, is quite funny and atmospheric.”

Jeff Zak: Out of the Past. I was a student in Glasgow, around 1996. I remember they were showing a series of film noir films every friday night. I have to say, after watching Out of the Past, I just fell in love with Robert Mitchum...the coolest film I’d seen at that time. I love it! Kids will love it! Smokers will love it! Err...

Adam Zanzie, Icebox Movies: High Noon. "It’s short, innovative and easy to relate to."

The Uninvited (1944) at The Criterion Collection

Just in time for Halloween, the Criterion Collection has done us all an enormous favor by releasing one of the screen's great ghost stories, Lewis Allen's remarkable The Uninvited, starring Ray Milland, Ruth Hussey, Gail Russell, Cornelia Otis Skinner and Donald Crisp. It's a supreme example of how black-and-white conjures danger, romance and the supernatural. The film is an object of veneration for its fans, which include Martin Scorsese and Guillermo del Toro. But for a long while it's also been condemned to a shadow world of bad copies made from questionable sources. Criterion has, as always, come up with a version that's worthy of the way it must have looked in 1944.

The author of the source novel for The Uninvited, Dorothy Macardle, was a most interesting person, born in Ireland to a rich Catholic family and growing up to teach English in a predominantly Protestant college until her Irish republican activities got her fired in 1923. Thereafter she did some time in prison during the Civil War, where she wrote some of her first ghost stories. Eamon de Valera was her friend and mentor, although they had a rough patch when Macardle objected to part of the 1937 Irish constitution pertaining to women. Macardle's fervent anti-Nazism led her to move to London during the war to work with refugees and with the BBC to help the war effort. When The Uninvited was released, according to the Irish Times, "among those who went to see it at the Savoy in Dublin was de Valera himself who, however, was not amused by the twist in the story"--one that doesn't exactly support a traditional view of pious womanhood. "Typical Dorothy," de Valera remarked. Macardle also wrote a famed history called The Irish Republic.

Meanwhile, rejoice at just how good The Uninvited is looking. Here's an excerpt from the Siren's essay.

The character of Stella is twenty; Russell was nineteen and looks younger. It was her first starring role, and she brings febrile intensity to it, moving from flirtatious humor to an orphan’s yearning for her mother to the desperation of a possessed woman. In real life, Russell wasn’t able to pull back. By all accounts an introverted and jittery person ill-suited to the Hollywood racket, she is said to have started drinking on the set of this movie in an attempt to calm herself between takes. Her very next film found her playing none other than Cornelia Otis Skinner, in the 1944 screen adaptation of Our Hearts Were Young and Gay, the autobiographical best seller that Skinner had cowritten with a college chum of hers a couple of years earlier—also directed by Allen, and another hit. For a short while in the 1940s, Russell’s ethereal style gained her roles in films like Frank Borzage’s Moonrise (1948). But by 1956, when she appeared in Budd Boetticher’s Seven Men from Now, alcoholism had coarsened her wondrous looks, and her career was nearly over. She died in 1961, of drinking-related causes, age thirty-six. The Uninvited, then, also offers a glimpse of Russell at her hopeful start, photographed in a way that justifies the fan magazines’ compari­sons to Hedy Lamarr.

Indeed, Allen’s most indispensable ally on The Uninvited was the great cinematographer Charles Lang Jr., whose work on the film was nominated for an Oscar. Windward House has no electricity; whether that’s because of its remote location or its having stood empty for years is never explained. In the event, this gives Lang an excuse for some of the eeriest lighting of the 1940s. Flashlights pierce the gloom, candles and oil lamps flicker, and the sea casts patterns of light on the ceiling.

Get Thee to MOMA's To Save and Project Festival

It’s that time of year again, when the Museum of Modern Art in New York offers a unique opportunity to see rare old movies, restored to their former luster and projected on film, the way the Goddess and Eastman Kodak intended.

Yes, it’s To Save and Project, what MOMA calls “an annual festival of newly preserved and restored films from archives, studios, distributors, and independent filmmakers around the world, from October 9 through November 12.” You may glance at the calendar and notice the Siren is a wee bit fashionably late, but don’t let that deter you. There are screenings left for many of the most choice selections.

First and foremost, for all those who worked so hard on the second For the Love of Film blogathon, there is Try and Get Me! (aka The Sound of Fury), newly restored and ready to shine. The Siren has a screener for this one which she is stubbornly refusing to watch, because she wants to see it in the shiny new version for which we bloggers and readers and donors raised all that lolly. Instead, the Siren plans to attend on Nov. 2, when Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation will be presenting this noir along with Crashout (co-written by the blacklisted Cy Endfield, Try and Get Me’s director, and also so far unseen by the Siren) and Alias Nick Beal. (If you want to read up on Try and Get Me!, check out blogathon partner Marilyn Ferdinand’s take.) The screenings start at 2 pm; anyone in the New York City area who can make it definitely should.

Here are some other entries that the Siren finds of particular interest, and hopes her patient readers will, as well.

First up, this Saturday at 7 pm, is the deliriously insane I Am Suzanne!, directed by Rowland V. Lee in 1933. The Siren has a son who is turning seven this weekend and has expressed a desire for Mommy’s presence at his festivities, so she won’t be at MOMA, but if you can make this one, you absolutely should. William McKinley on Twitter described this as “The Red Shoes with puppets,” which is surprisingly accurate; the Siren would call it “Coppelia plus guns,” but feel free to take your pick. Both Will and I, as well as Lou Lumenick, urge you to see for yourself. The title role is filled by gorgeous Lilian Harvey, who had a thrillingly varied career but whose Stateside stardom never took off. Judging by this, the camera was, if not Harvey’s lover, then a very good friend. She’s a pensive, delicate presence with a killer body that the movie gives you ample time to ogle. That’s partly because puppeteer Gene Raymond (whose callowness is just right here) is making a marionette based not on her face, but her figure. There’s also Leslie Banks (about to do The Man Who Knew Too Much for Hitchcock the very next year) stealing everything but the dressing-room door in a very Boris Lermontov role. It soon becomes clear, though, that Banks’ character is much more about padding his pockets than art. What makes the movie so deliciously oddball, apart from little touches like an anthropomorphic dancing snowman, is the way I Am Suzanne! melds childish glee and way-out-there perversion. Watch Harvey’s expression when she’s in the hospital with Raymond adjusting her traction, and maybe you’ll see what the Siren means.  

Stark Love (1927) is a Karl Brown silent screening this Sunday, Oct. 20, at 5:30 pm; the Siren has been unable to see it so far, although she plans to at a later date. Richard Brody, the Siren’s friendly sometime Twitter-debater and a man of highly discerning tastes, was hugely impressed with this unusual silent, filmed in the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina with nonprofessionals in the cast. Another silent-film aficionado wrote the Siren saying it’s “astonishing and beautiful,” so clearly this is a must for all the fans of the era. The film also gets a brief, delightful mention in John McElwee’s Showmen, Sell It Hot!. (The Siren plans to write up this book later, but the spoiler version is, just buy it, it’s wonderful.) In his discussion of Jesse James (1939), shot partly near Pineville, Missouri, John writes:

Pineville residents since may have forgotten Ty Power and Henry Fonda, but what fun to have had a major feature shot in your backyard, even if it’s one folks way back thrilled to. The closest my locality came was Thunder Road, several counties away, but it seemed like home, and a silent called Stark Love, directed by Griffith disciple Karl Brown and shot amidst North Carolina hills in 1927. I attended a screening at Appalachian State University in the early 1990s, where many in the audience yelled out  names of locals they recognized upon that flickering, voiceless screen. Good thing Stark Love was run mute, for any mood accompaniment would surely have been drowned by who’s who-ing from the audience along the lines of, “There’s Great-Grandma!”

Hitler’s Reign of Terror and I Was a Captive of Nazi Germany pretty much had the field of explicit anti-Nazi filmmaking to themselves when they were released. On Saturday, Oct. 26 at 7 pm, both films will be introduced by Prof. Thomas Doherty of Brandeis University, who discusses them extensively in Hitler and Hollywood: 1933-1939.

Hitler’s Reign was made by Cornelius Vanderbilt Jr., who didn’t think much of his gilded relations (“dull, uninteresting, hopelessly mediocre people,” was his unfilial summary). Still, once Vanderbilt opted for the life of an intrepid filmmaker-cum-journalist, Doherty says that background came in handy in two ways. Vanderbilt could afford Bell & Howell’s expensive, handheld 35-mm Eyemo camera (although getting real financing and distribution proved hard). And he could use his celebrated name to gain access to people like Pope Pius XI and the Hohenzollerns of Germany who would ordinarily avoid grubby reporter types. In 1933 came the biggest “get” of all, an interview with Adolf Hitler in which Vanderbilt had the courage to ask point-blank about the Jews.

Watching Hitler’s Reign now, there’s a sense that Vanderbilt’s aristocratic background may have been part of what gave him the nerve to ambush-interview a dictator. It’s a terrible loss that there were no cameras turning on the moment, but this film does contain a re-enactment of the encounter, and it still gives a shudder. Vanderbilt himself is a soigne chap with an East Coast lockjaw accent, and he sits in his chair with the air of a man who expects to be listened to. He wasn’t, though; his film played well in a few places, but what few bookings Hitler’s Reign could get were often shut down by state and local censors even though it was (just barely) pre-Code.

Nor were critics especially kind, laudable message or no laudable message. The film is in fact a jarring collection of on-the-scene footage (some of which Vanderbilt claimed to have smuggled out of Germany by strapping the reels to the underside of his car) and obvious re-enactments by actors whom one hopes never quit their day jobs. But the street moments that Vanderbilt captured are chilling, and as an early example of polemical documentary, it absolutely should not be missed. The version that the Siren saw is clearly one that was revised at a later date. Dave Kehr has the scoop on how we have a copy of this movie; the Siren hopes Doherty can shed further light on the revisions, only lightly discussed in the book.

Screening as a highly appropriate double feature with Hitler’s Reign is I Was a Captive of Nazi Germany, an independent feature released in 1936 (with a PCA seal, to the annoyance of Nazi consul Georg Gyssling). Isobel Lillian Steele was a Canadian-born, naturalized American citizen who had lived in Germany since 1931, writing daintily apolitical magazine features and enjoying the last gasps of Weimar nightlife. According to Doherty, Steele got caught up in a liaison with one Baron Ulrich von Sosnosky, a Polish military officer and ladykiller-about-town. Steele later said she had no idea (she would say that, wouldn’t she?) that Sosnosky was enjoying the favors of two beautiful secretaries in Germany’s military bureaucracy, much less that those ladies were passing documents to the Baron. When the situation was uncovered, Steele was caught up in the arrests, and sent to prison for several months. She was eventually released through the intervention of Senator William E. Borah of Idaho, the “lion of the Senate,” and Sosnosky’s neck was eventually saved by an exchange of spies (though his later fate is a mystery; Wikipedia, for what it's worth, lists no fewer than four possible ends for the Baron). The two secretaries met a horrible fate.

It’s a thrilling, ultimately tragic story with a strong undercurrent of heedless sex, and the Siren wishes she could tell you it makes for a movie with those qualities. It doesn’t, only partly because it insists, rather implausibly, that Isobel is a simple American girl who went to the wrong parties. More importantly, Kehr is right when he calls I Was a Captive “rhetorically crude and stylistically nonexistent.” (Although there are a few rather haunting shots inside the prison, possibly illustrating Ivan G. Shreve’s Blind Squirrel Theory of Cinema.) And yet the film is undeniably mesmerizing, with its portrait of Germany on the brink, the occasional bits of interpolated documentary footage (including the 1933 book-burning shown in Hitler’s Reign), narration that refers bluntly to concentration camps, and characters such as a brownshirt suitor, tired of persecuting Jews and Communists and looking forward to his promotion--to informer.

Watch out for Steele's “out of character” appearance at the start, wearing an impeccably chic ensemble and toying with what’s either a pom-pom trimming or a powder puff, although on a DVD screener at first it suggested a poodle scalp. Steele says, with a flat delivery that’s pretty characteristic of the whole movie, “The prison scenes depressed me. Hollywood has a way of making things realistic.” That line will probably get a laugh at MOMA, but in a strange way she’s right. The movie may think it’s about an innocent abroad whose heart was always in the right place. But what this movie actually shows is a woman who didn’t want to know about what was swirling around her, until the knock came at her own door. In that sense, Steele was indeed very American.

The movies are also screening Monday, Oct. 28 at 3 pm.

On Wednesday, Oct. 23, at 7 pm, we have Death of a Salesman, the 1951 version directed by Lazslo Benedek and starring Fredric March. The Siren plans to be there, but she can’t tell you a thing about this one. That’s because it’s been hard to see for decades. MOMA says this version has been fully restored. Bone up on your Fredric March fandom by checking out director Guy Maddin’s essay on the Criterion edition of I Married a Witch.

The only Nov. 2 noir offering that the Siren has previewed is the long-unavailable Alias Nick Beal, and it’s a pip, a retelling of the Faust legend with Thomas Mitchell’s well-meaning district attorney standing in for Goethe’s scholar, and Ray Milland as Nick Beal--probably a play on Beelzebub, though few screen demons are handsome as this one. The Siren has long been an admirer of Milland, and this is one of his best. Milland is not simply seductive--something he could accomplish by standing in good light and breathing--he’s genuinely frightening, slowly revealing the vicious amorality under his smooth-talking exterior. Mitchell is excellent at keeping his character’s cluelessness plausible; he’s insisting the devil doesn’t come to life far past the point when everyone else has caught on. With George Macready, on the side of the angels for once; and Audrey Totter, playing her pop-eyed, high-strung sex appeal for all it’s worth as Satan’s reluctant handmaiden. She has a late-movie scene that must be one of the best she ever did; no description of any kind, believe me, it will be obvious when it happens. Directed by John Farrow, with fog-shrouded cinematography by Lionel Lindon, Alias Nick Beal will be screening in a fresh archival print. It’s also showing Thursday, Nov. 7 at 4 pm.

Try and Get Me!, in addition to the Nov. 2 screening, also plays Wednesday, Nov. 6 at 4 pm.

The final movie the Siren wants to squeeze in: Caravan, a romance with Charles Boyer and Loretta Young and a screenplay co-written by Samson Raphaelson. The Siren has seen this one mocked from time to time for casting Boyer as a gypsy etc. That doesn’t much matter to her when Kehr calls Caravan a “genuinely great movie,” an endorsement that should make everyone pull out the calendars. Friday, Nov. 8 at 4:30 pm; and Sunday, Nov. 10 at 1 pm.

Please, take a look at the schedule and figure out what else you want to see; the Siren hasn’t come close to listing it all. This is a rich festival, and MOMA deserves every bit of support we can give.

Buster Keaton's Birthday, at The Baffler

Buster Keaton was born 118 years ago today. Earlier this year, the Siren was asked by The Baffler to write about the 14-disc Kino Blu-Ray set of Keaton's films. The Baffler is an excellent magazine of arts and criticism, published three times a year out of Cambridge, Mass., and the Siren is proud to be appearing in its pages. You can subscribe here. As of today, Keaton's birthday, the Siren's complete essay is online and can be read at The Baffler's website. What follows is an excerpt.

Spending so much time with Buster, getting reacquainted with his genius and spirit, has been an extraordinary thing. The Siren admits now that when she says she loves Buster Keaton, she doesn't really mean it metaphorically.

The most iconic Keaton stance, according to Walter Kerr in The Silent Clowns, shows Buster in thought: body tilted straight forward about forty-five degrees, one hand acting as a visor while he scopes out what’s ahead. True indeed, but there’s another essential posture, the head-scratch, also deployed when data must be assessed and decisions made.

That gesture reaches apotheosis in Seven Chances (1925), which has Buster as a financial hotshot whose firm’s in hot water. He discovers that if he marries by 7 p.m. that very day, he’ll inherit $7 million that will keep him out of prison. (Wall Street denizens who fear prison also appear in The Saphead. This plot point has dated more than anything else in the set.) Buster’s overhelpful friend has put an ad in the paper, resulting in hundreds of women in improvised veils showing up at the chapel. When Buster leaves in a panic, they gallop after him, their flying veils making them look uncannily like extras from DeMille’s silent version of The Ten Commandments. This vengeful Biblical horde chases Buster down a hill, where he dislodges some rocks, and then some more.

And so, faced with an army of would-be brides charging at him from one direction and a quarry’s worth of giant rocks rolling downhill from another, Buster stops for a moment, and his hand starts scratching his scalp. This sort of lady-or-the-boulder choice cannot be made on the fly.

Autumn Sonata at The Criterion Collection

The Siren has written another essay for the Criterion Collection, this one to be included in the booklet for the new Blu-Ray release of Ingmar Bergman's Autumn Sonata. This was one of the first times the Siren has written in any depth about the great Ingrid Bergman; and aside from a brief tribute upon his death, the Siren had never tackled writing about Ingmar Bergman at all.

The film concerns Charlotte, a concert pianist (Ingrid Bergman) who visits her adult daughter Eva (an exceptional Liv Ullmann) without realizing that Eva still carries years of pent-up resentment for the way she was shunted aside as a child. What follows is an excerpt from the essay. You can read the whole thing at the Criterion site. Better still, get the Blu-Ray. It's an extraordinary film that shows how the feelings of two women in a single house can be as vividly cinematic as an army roaming a vast battlefield location.

For Autumn Sonata, Bergman built his screenplay around exposition. Each revelation about Charlotte comes like another page of the indictment. She wasn’t just absent on tour for much of Eva’s childhood, leaving the girl to keep vigil with her father (Erland Josephson); Charlotte had an affair that resulted in her leaving both husband and children for eight months (the child Eva, shown in flashback, is played by Linn Bergman). She didn’t just leave Eva and her son-in-law alone; Charlotte didn’t show up for Eva’s pregnancy or her one grandchild’s birth (“I was recording all the Mozart sonatas. I hadn’t one day free,” she reminds Viktor). Evidently, Charlotte never came even after Erik died, although no one bothers to throw that at her. There’s so much else to choose from, like putting Helena in a home and never visiting.

The amount of harm that Charlotte has inflicted over one not-terribly-long lifetime could fill a miniseries. Indeed, this sort of story line recurs in classic Hollywood melodrama, where a selfish mother is the worst kind of villainess, like the parasitic Gladys Cooper in Now, Voyager, nagging Bette Davis into a wreck who winds up physically resembling Ullmann in Autumn Sonata, right down to the wire-rim glasses. Watch Autumn Sonata and other movie mothers may start to drift through your mind: Mary Astor, the pianist in The Great Lie, leaving her baby behind with Davis, then embarking on a world tour because (no other reason is plausibly suggested) she’s a heartless bitch; Davis—now the bad mom—in Mr. Skeffington, abandoning her lovelorn husband and daughter so she can pursue flirtations, lunches, and shopping; Lana Turner lighting up more for her show business pals than she does for her daughter in Imitation of Life (which Charlotte’s phone call to her agent echoes).