We figured it was time to have a place to talk about Steve’s latest video subjects that do not have an UMR page.
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We figured it was time to have a place to talk about Steve’s latest video subjects that do not have an UMR page.
Added Steve’s Jack Conway You Tube Video To This Page. Our thoughts on the video and Conway’s movies.
I liked the video, though I have not seen many of his movies. My tally is a lowly 5. First match is #14 A Yank In Oxford….barely remember it. #6 The Hucksters….not one of my favorite Gable movies. #5 Love Crazy…just re-watched this one a few nights ago…it is ok. #4 Boom Town…monster hit….the last of the Tracy/Gable movies. #3 Tarzan and his Mate….one of the better Tarzan movies. Have not seen either #1 or #2. Voted up and shared
Hi Bruce, your comment made it to youtube, Flora tried a bunch of times a couple of days ago and didn’t succeed. There was a glitch in the system. Her comment and my reply is here at the UMR.
Tarzan and His Mate is probably my favorite Tarzan movie. Your tally 5, mine 7 and Flora way ahead with 22.
Thanks for the vote, share and comment, always appreciated.
Jack Conway had 3 overlapping careers and Wikipedia lists for him:
1/as an ACTOR nearly 80 silent films from 1909-1921 and one talkie, 1935’s Rooftops of Manhattan a 22 min musical short.
2/as PRODUCER, 4 movies from 1929-1934: Our Modern Maidens with a saucy Crawford and husband Doug Fairbanks Jr; Hell Below with Robert Montgomery; Just a Gigolo featuring William Haines; and Girl from Missouri with Harlow. Jack also directed these 4 movies. The Crawford flick was silent: the other 3 talkies. She and Doug Jr married the same year [1929].
3/as DIRECTOR, 64 movies from 1912 until 1929 and 34 talkies from 1929-1948. I have actually only ever seen two of his movies: Boom Town and A Tale of Two Cities but most of his other talkies are well know to me and many of them will probably be familiar to most movie buffs: New Moon, Yank at Oxford, Tarzan and His Mate, The Hucksters, High Barbaree, Villa Villa and Julia Misbehaves [his final one]
TRIVIA:”Jack’s second marriage was to Virginia Bushman, daughter of silent screen star Francis X. Bushman. They resided in Pacific Palisades, California. A street in Pacific Palisades, Jacon Way, is named for Conway. He retired from films in 1948 and died four years later at his home from pulmonary disease, 65.” Jack’s average placing over 3 Greatest Directors’ polls is 22nd
ADDITIONAL TRIVIA “Conway was one of a team of MGM contract directors, who: forsook any pretense to a specific individual style in favor of working within the strictures set forth by studio management. A thoroughly competent craftsman, he delivered commercially successful entertainments, on time, and within budget. Conway may not have achieved fame as a creative genius, but the majority of his films remain eminently entertaining to this day.” -Wikipedia
Best POSTERS in your video: 1/foreign language one for Dragonseed 2/Desire Me 3/Stamboul Quest 4/Hell Below 5/very sexy one for Our Modern maidens 6/1st one for Lady of the Tropics – luscious! 7/Crossroads 8/very risqué Nuisance 9/The Girl from Manchester 10/Both for Honky Tonk 11/set for Villa Villa 12/2nd one for Myrna Misbehaves 13/1st one for The Hucksters 14/the entire set for Tarzan and His Mate 15/1st one for Libeled Lady 16/two for Tale of Two Cities.
Great STILLS/LOBBY CARDS 1/Untamed 2/Stamboul 3/Crawford very bold in Our Modern Maidens 4/The Gay Bride 5/Crossroads 6/Gable and Harlow 7/Lon Chaney 8/Yank at Oxford – really beautiful lobby card 9/Gable AND Turner 10/Villa Villa 11/a very risqué Harlow 12/two lobby cards for Boom Town – the final Gable/Tracy picture as Spence would no longer accept 2nd billing to the King13/Tarzan and his Mate 14/two of Young Cantankerous 15/Tale of 2 Cities.
As always, to me your rare old posters, and glut of marvellous lobby cards in particular on this occasion, in the middle of much generally [and indeed at times very suggestive] classy material overall, are irresistible and the originals must surely be treasured collectors’ items which give me 99% satisfaction. Simply superb.
Hi Bob and Steve, I have tried to post a comment on Steve’s Jack Conway video three times now and it has disappeared! So I am answering his video through your comment so that Steve can find it in this mass of Youtube Forum comments.
I have seen 22 Jack Conway movies. Favourirte movies are A Tale of Two Cities, Libeled Lady, Boomtown, Love Crazy, The Hucksters, Red Headed Woman, Arsene Lupin, Honky Tonk, The Girl From Missouri, Saratoga, and Crossroads.
Favourite posters and stills are from A Tale of Two Cities, Libeled Lady, Boomtown, Too Hot to Handle, Arsene Lupin, Honky Tonk, The Girl From Missouri, Saratoga, Crossroads, The Gay Bride, Our Modern Maidens, and Easiest Way.
HI FLORA:
Sorry about your problems in transmitting a post. Hope the difficulties do not continue.
22 is an impressive number. Of the ones you mention Boom Town and Tale of Two Cities are of course the two I’ve seen and I enjoyed them both.
Britain’s Dirk Bogarde [my own favorite British star after Michael Caine] also made in 1958 a very good version of Tale of Two Cities.
Good choice of stills and posters by you. Most of your ones I also liked and as I’ve explained to Steve before the ones that I highlight in my posts to him are just my perception of the CREAM of the many that I admire.
Take care – nice to hear from you
Hi Flora there is something wrong with the comments on youtube, I tried posting something and it later disappeared. I received your comments in my gmail folder. Sorry about all the hassle. Here is your first comment –
From Flora to Top 10 Charts –
I have seen 22 Jack Conway movies. Favourites are A Tale of Two Cities, Libeled lady, Boomtown, Love Crazy, The Hucksters, Red Headed Woman, Arsene Lupin, Honky Tonk, The Girl From Missouri, Crossroads, and Saratoga.
I have also seen Julia Misbehaves, Too Hot to Handle, Viva Villa!, A Yank at Oxford, The Gay Bride, Lady of the Tropics, Hell Below, Desire Me, The Easiest Way, Dragonseed, and Untamed.
Favourite posters and stills are from A Tale of Two Cities, Libeled Lady, Boomtown, Love Crazy, Too Hot to Handle, Red Headed Woman, Arsene Lupin, Honky Tonk, The Girl From Missouri, Saratoga, Crossroads, The Gay Bride, Our Modern Maidens, While the City Sleeps, The Easiest Way, Dragonseed, and Untamed.
My reply to Flora’s comment on my Jack Conway video –
Hi Flora, can’t trust youtube can we? Where are our comments? Will they pop up later?
Anyway we’ll always have Bruce’s Movie Cafe to meet up if we get lost. 🙂
22 out of 30 is quite impressive, I only managed 7. My favorites are Boom Town, Viva Villa and Tarzan and His Mate. I don’t think I’ve seen A Tale of Two Cities.
Thanks for commenting, much appreciated. Glad you liked the posters and stills. And apologies again for this hopefully temporary glitch in communications.
Hi Bob, thanks for the review, generous rating (ooo), trivia and info, much appreciated. Glad you liked the posters, stills and lobby cards.
More lobby cards than usual this time, not sure why, just came out that way.
And I’ve noticed a fewer variety of movie stars in this top 30. Clark Gable, Jean Harlow, William Powell, Myrna Loy, Spencer Tracy and Joan Crawford have multiple movies here, it’s not Conway’s fault I seemed to gravitate to films featuring these stars, especially when chopping it down to a round 30.
Jack Conway’s A Tale of Two Cities seems to be one of the highest rated Charles Dickens adaptations. I want to see it.
Two films scored 10 out of 10 from my sources – Libeled Lady and A Tale of Two Cities. There is one 9 – Viva Villa. Seven more scored 8 out of 10.
Top rated at both IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes is Libeled Lady. A Tale of Two Cities received higher ratings at my other sources.
Bruce’s top 6 (critics chart) –
A Tale of Two Cities 8.2
Love Crazy 8.2
Tarzan and his Mate 8.0
The Hucksters 7.9
Libeled Lady 7.8
Saratoga 7.8
My video top 6 –
A Tale of Two Cities 8.8
Libeled Lady 8.3
Tarzan and his Mate 7.9
Boom Town 7.4
Love Crazy 7.4
The Hucksters 7.3
Trivia – Jack Conway is one of the few directors to have more than one film Oscar nominated for Best Picture in the same year. A Tale of Two Cities and Libeled Lady were both nominated at the 9th Academy Awards in 1937.
HI STEVE:Thanks for the response including additional rating information and trivia. Regarding your points about
1/A Tale of Two Cities: “In Conway’s most famous film, A Tale of Two Cities (1935), he utilized 17,000 extras for the Paris mob scenes alone. This spectacular adaptation of the Dickens classic is still regarded by many as the definitive screen version.”
2/The stars whom you chose for your selection of posters:“Moving on to MGM in 1925, Conway remained there until 1948, often helming prestige assignments featuring the studio’s top male star, Clark Gable: Boom Town (1940), Honky Tonk (1941), The Hucksters (1947) – all solid box office hits.
Indeed: The Work Horse’s adjusted WORLDWIDE grosses [slightly rounded] for the 3 movies are-
Boom Town $545 million
Honky Tonk $385 million
Hucksters $290 million
OVERALL Adjusted worldwide gross approx $1.2 billion [average $400 million per movie]
That was a whopping worldwide figure for those days when the foreign market was not nearly as buoyant as it is today: on average in those times overseas grosses were only about one third of the total gross figures whereas today the foreign earnings usually match and often considerably exceed the domestic gross.
In fact in 2019 dollars the combined budget for the 3 movies was around $75 million according to Wikipedia; so that the worldwide combined gross for the 3 was 16 times the combined budget. Only Old Cantankerous, or Young Cantankerous as he then was, would probably have objected to the statement that Gable was MGM’s biggest male star in the 1940-1947 period concerned.
We have to thank the Work Horse for the fact that today we do not have to just take somebody’s word for the accuracy of such statements as Bruce gives us the figures which enables us to check out matters for ourselves.
Hey Bob and Steve. Good discussion on Jack Conway. I will be checking out Steve’s video very soon.
Added Steve’s Aldrich video to this page….our thoughts found on his video channel.
“I have always enjoyed his movies. Seen #30 The Frisco Kid…Harrison Ford has some moments..but this is a Gene Wilder movie. #28 Four For Texas….my least favorite Dean/Frank movie…Frank looked bored out of his mind in this one. #14 Too Late The Hero…love the ending of this one….movie is alright at best #10 Hush Hush….if only Joan had made the movie too. #7 Emperor of the North….not impressed with this one…though Ernie Borgnine makes a good villain. #6 The Longest Yard…one of Burt Reynolds’ better movies. #4 Flight of the Phoenix…James Stewart’s last good leading man role. #3 Kiss Me Deadly…film noir classic. #2 The Dirty Dozen…his most famous movie. #1 Baby Jane…..Bette Davis steals the show. So that is 10 of his movies seen…or 33%….not too bad..but not that good either. Voted up and shared.”
I have seen 17 of Robert’s films and my favourites among them are Autumn Leaves, The Last Sunset, The Dirty Dozen and especially Force of Evil starring John Garfield and of which Aldrich was the assistant director. The latter film was another almost B movie which Garfield’s presence probably led to being treated as an A movie by exhibitors and the many critics who praised it. Anyway it was relatively short for even its day: I have seen 3 prints of slightly varying length –74, 78 and 79 mins.
I have long cherished it but it has been described as one of the bleakest and most morbid films ever made. Certainly some of those associated with it had good reason to be bleak themselves. Abraham Polonsky who was lead director and who co-wrote it along with Ira Wolfert was an avowed Marxist who had joined the Communist Party and was blacklisted for refusing to testify before McCarthy’s committees; and it certainly didn’t help Abraham’s cause being associated with Force of Evil which in political circles was regarded as an “anti-Capitalist” movie.
I always thought it rather ironic in the circumstances that Polonsky’s full Christian names were Abraham Lincoln! The star of Force of Evil, Garfield, was of course also blacklisted and it has been suggested that the stress of the latter helped lead to his premature death at just 39 in 1952. [Garfield is often spoken of along with Brando, Dean and Monty Clift as being one of the ‘fathers’ of screen Method acting.]
“Polonsky, along with Chaplin and Losey remains one of the great casualties of the anti-Communist hysteria of the fifties. Force of Evil stands up under repeated viewings as one of the great films of the modern American cinema and Garfield’s taxicab scene with Beatrice Pearson takes away some of the luster of Kazan’s Brando-Steiger tour de force in On the Waterfront” [Film historian Andrew Sarris 1968]
Part 2 of this post tomorrow.
“I think anybody with any brains in 1936 to ’40 would have been a Communist. They were the brightest, they were the quickest, they were the best, and you found working with people of that persuasion more stimulating, more exciting.” – Robert Aldrich. Clearly Aldrich and the guys he was speaking about were ‘political animals’ I wonder what they would have thought of today’s controversial political climate: Trump in America and Brexit over here!
I used to mix up Robert Aldrich with Robert Altman, one chief distinction being though that Altman has gotten ALL the Cogerson love so far, though WH gives Force of Evil a high 81% rating. Your video, which is jam-packed with goodies, does Aldrich proud though and it earns from me a 99% personal satisfaction rating [hence it deserves 3 part treatment fro me ]. Fly in ointment: exclusion of Force of Evil presumably because Robert was just assistant director. Among other films where he was assistant director was Chaplin’s Limelight where of course Charlie was lead director. Robert was in fact assistant director on 6 movies from 1945-1952 Here is my pick of the best material in the video.
POSTERS [FL=foreign language] 1/Frisco Kid [beautifully colored] 2/2FL for 4 for Texas 3/luscious Set for Sodom and Manchester 4/The Angry. Hills 5/World for Ransom 6/Racy one for Garment Jungle 7/saucy one also for All the Marbles 8/FL for Sister George 9/FL for Autumn Leaves [my Joan wanted my Marlon for her male romantic lead but he rudely told her that he wasn’t into “mother and son pictures”] 10/FL for Apache 11/FL for Too Late the Jason 12/set for Vera Cruz [when I first heard of that I thought that Vera Cruz was a woman!] 13/FL for Twilight’s Last Gleaming 14/1st one for Hush Hush Sweet Myrna 15/The Big Knife- Robert produced as well as directed but although the film cost just $400,000 in its day to make and was therefore highly profitable Robert lost money as the studio kept all of the profits.
Super STILLS 1/Four for Texas [the only Sinatra ‘clan’ picture where Dino had slightly the lead] 2/Sodom and Manchester 3/ensemble for Last Sunset – beautiful feel-good photo 4/a solo Sir Maurice 5/Burt and Gary 6/Hush Hush Sweet Myrna 7/Ulzana’s Raid 9/My Jimmy & Lord Dickie 10/Kiss Me Deadly 11/scene from Baby Jane 12/Crawford/Davis on Baby Jane set – collector’s item 13/The Big Knife 14/Chandler and Palance in Ten Seconds to Hell [aka The Phoenix and The Extra Edge]-Surprisingly for once Jeff was the Bad Guy and Jack although 2nd billed was the hero and lead – and “gets the girl!”.
ADDITIONAL TRIVIA (1)“Originally they had Alan Ladd in mind for my role in The Angry Hills but when they called at his home and saw the skinny runt crawl out of his swimming pool, they decided that he wasn’t right for the rugged action hero that I play.” Mitchum in an interview. Mitchum was obviously a lovely guy!
(2) Jack Palance in an interview after making The Big Knife. “It’s the longest part I’ve ever had. It lasts 1 hour and 51 mins; I’m on screen for all but 1 minute; and in that minute when I’m off screen to go to the bathroom in the plot, everyone on screen is still talking and arguing about me!” The part was originally written for Garfield before he died. Rod Steiger’s vicious film mogul is supposed to have been based on Louis B Mayer.
(3) I’ve mentioned that though the Bad Guy and second lead in Ten Seconds to Hell Chandler got top-billed over Aldrich favorite Palance. A peculiar thing about Jeff was that once he became a star he never got 2nd billed to another major male star in his pictures, but droves of times accepted 2nd billing to his prestige leading ladies. Yul’s son Rock Brynner said that his father “sold his billing” [took 2nd spot for an extra $200,000 on top of basic salary]. JEff was notorious for romancing his leading ladies so maybe that was HIS compensation! Possibly word got around: Crawford was said to have insisted upon him as her romantic lead in 1955’s Female on the Beach]
Hi Bob, thanks for the review, generous rating (nice), info, quotes and trivia, very much appreciated. Glad you liked the posters, stills and lobby cards.
You’re a fountain of trivia Bob. I enjoyed reading all your movie stories. I liked the quote by Mitchum about Alan Ladd – I can imagine the look on their faces when the studio people calling at Ladd’s house see this skinny little guy get out of his pool. But movie magic (and the proper camera angles) can make him look bigger. 🙂
No Force of Evil here but the poster should make an appearance in my John Garfield video, I hope.
I would have preferred The Dirty Dozen in the no.1 spot on the video, it’s my favorite of his films – but Baby Jane did have better ratings.
Some websites chose Kiss Me Deadly as Aldrich’s best film or ‘magnum opus’ as one guy called it. A clever little noir with a shock ending. It’s one of Tarantino’s favorites.
Two films scored 10 out of 10 from my sources – Baby Jane and Kiss Me Deadly, Five more scored 9 including Ulzana’s Raid, The Longest Yard and The Dirty Dozen.
Baby Jane tops both IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes charts.
Bruce’s top 5 (critics chart) –
The Dirty Dozen 8.6
Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? 8.4
Attack 8.2
Emperor of the North 8.0
Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte 8.0
My video top 5 –
Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? 8.5
The Dirty Dozen 8.4
Kiss Me Deadly 8.2
Attack 7.8
The Flight of the Phoenix 7.8
Aldrich on Baby Jane – “Judging by the initial press reaction. I wasn’t sure whether I was going to produce and direct a motion picture or referee a fight.”
Aldrich on Bette Davis – “Davis is a tough old broad and you fight. But when you see what she puts on the screen you know it was worth taking all the bull.”
Aldrich on Frank Sinatra – “Unpleasant man. No one has yet worked out what really makes him tick. But he sings well.”
Aldrich on Burt Lancaster – “He has matured gracefully, plays men his own age and understands the need not to win the girl. He is much more tolerant of other people’s point of view.”
“I can’t imagine how people, certainly working people, can be Republicans. It amazes me.”
HI STEVE: Good comprehensive feedback with very interesting quotes from you as always. I always look forward to your normally thoughtful responses. Kiss Me Deadly: terrific – and one of the most sudden and shocking endings I have ever seen on screen.
I never liked Baby Jane which I found an unpleasant and ‘feel-bad’ film. I prefer my Joan in glossy ‘feel-GOOD’ movies dressed up like a clothes horse and looking romantic and glamorous; you ARE familiar with my comfort zone!
Regarding Davis, I CAN understand Aldrich living with her shenanigans if she was delivering for him on screen. However I feel that talented people as Bette obviously was should content themselves with letting their talent alone speak for them and should refrain from being exhibitionists by sounding off publicly in rude and banal ways about fellow artists who presumably have done them no harm. Around 1980 Bette got up in public and told her audience that Greg Peck “couldn’t act”. I think she later had to retract it.
As for Mitchum, he was big so he probably got away all his life, even at school, with throwing his weight around, being verbally insulting and generally making a nuisance of himself; and assuming that the reports that I have read about him, his utterances and his antics are reasonably correct, he strikes me as someone whom I would not want to have known socially. Size, a loud mouth and aggressive behaviour in themselves do not automatically equal true greatness and if you have the latter you don’t need to behave like Big Bob apparently did. Indeed there are some perceived astute observers who argue that if you carry on like Mitch you CAN’t he truly great as a certain emptiness exists.
1/ “At school we called him Little Al: he’s Big Al now!” [boyhood friend of Pacino’s after Alfonso had become an overnight sensation in Godpop 1972.]
2/ ”I was always mystified by the Ladd phenomenon and then I got to work with him on Botany Bay and could observe him up close. He was one of the most athletic individuals I ever saw and he moved about the set like lightning.” [James Mason].
3/Katie Hepburn [in high heels at first on-set meeting with Tracy in 1942’s Woman of the Year]: “Do you realise I stand taller than you Mr Tracy.” Old Cantankerous: ”Never mind Miss Hepburn: I’ll soon cut you down to my size!”
4/”Tough guy! – actually Bogie couldn’t fight in real life to save his life.” [Bogart professional acquaintance in the mid 1950s.]
5/”Do you never wish you had had the size and physical presence of a Wayne, Cooper or a Gable?” Joe Yule Junior: “Oh do you mean did I ever want to be one of those big, stiff clumsy guys? No!”
Steve’s Stanley Kramer Video is now on this page. Our thoughts on that video are below.
It’s A Mad Mad Mad Stanley Kramer video. Good selection. First match is #12 Pride & Passion…another dud from Cary Grant. #7 Ship Of Fools…better than I thought it was going to be. #6 On The Beach…my mom hates the ending on this one…I like it. #5 Mad Times 20 World….fun movie to watch. #4 Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner…monster hit back in the day. #3 The Defiant Ones….one of Tony Curtis’ best roles. #2 Inherit The Wind…finally saw this one a few months ago…Tracy and March are awesome together. #1 Judgement At You Tube….classic movie filled with so many great roles…including Billy Shatner. So that is 9 of the 15 or 60%…..but seen his entire Top 7. I am pretty happy with my tally count. Voted up
Hi Bruce, your tally of 9 beats my 6 and ties with Flora’s 9.
It’s been a while since I last watched Nuremberg, might be worth another look, grim subject matter especially the newsreel footage. I couldn’t resist adding a still of William Shatner with the great Spencer Tracy.
Thanks for the comment, vote and share, much appreciated.