George Bailey’s Christmas: It’s A Wonderful Life Closing Scenes
Posted on December 24, 2014 at 3:26 pm
The All-Time Best Movie Sandwiches
Posted on November 12, 2014 at 8:00 am
Slate has a wonderful compilation of the top ten movie sandwiches of all time. But they left out my favorite, which was the inspiration for my 101 Must-See Movie Moments
Can I make a tuna sandwich?” Julie (Claire Wilcox) asks her dad Bill (Van Johnson), who is working on his typewriter in their cramped tenement apartment. Julie is 7¾ years old. Bill distractedly gives her his permission, and then realizes, with horrified fascination, that her idea of making a tuna fish sandwich is to put four small plates on the table, place lettuce on one, tuna on one, mayonnaise on one, and bread on one, and then take a pinch of each with her fingers and put it in her mouth.
Any parent will identify with Bill’s inability to prevent himself from making the obvious comment and asking her what she is doing. She looks up at him as though he is a little slow and explains she is eating a tuna fish sandwich. Again, knowing he probably should not, he explains that most people combine the ingredients, and she tells him she does not like to have her foods touch each other. Like every parent going back to the cave days, when Cro-Magnon patiently explained that wooly mammoth tastes better when it is combined with some greens, Bill tells Julie that when it all gets to her stomach, it will be touching, and she says with a little shudder, “I don’t want to hear it.”
Later in the film, Bill takes Julie to Sardi’s. She does the same thing with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and it is just as charming.
Michael Mirasol’s Tribute to Movie Fathers
Posted on June 15, 2014 at 12:20 pm
My friend Michael Mirasol has created a beautiful tribute to some of the greatest fathers in the movies.
Must-See Movie Moment: The April Fools
Posted on April 1, 2014 at 8:00 am
Happy April! This is from my book, 101 Must-See Movie Moments
The April Fools
Lemmon plays Howard Brubaker, a good man who tries to do his best but is not quite sure how he got caught up in the phony notions of success he seems stuck with. No one else is questioning it, so he hardly lets himself be aware of how unsatisfied he is. He is married to a woman who seems to care only about decorating their home (Sally Kellerman). His boss (Peter Lawford) encourages Howard to find happiness the way he has – by having a lot of affairs. When he politely asks a woman at the party (Deneuve as Catherine Gunther) if he can buy her a drink she takes it as an invitation to leave the party and he is nonplussed. And he is even more so when he finds himself falling in love with her. What he does not know is that she is married to his boss.
They go off together and spend an evening that will lead them both to realize how much they had been missing and how dishonest they had been with themselves.
Lemmon was so good in outlandish roles like “The Great Race” and “Some Like It Hot” it is easy to forget that no one was better at playing a decent guy struggling with the challenges of modern life and trying to do the right thing. Deneuve struggles with the English dialog, but she is so serenely gorgeous it does not really matter. It is a pleasant, if bittersweet little trifle, but one scene makes it worthwhile and that is when Howard and Catherine meet an older couple who more by example than by anything they say make them think seriously about where they want to be at that age and who they want to be with. And that couple is magnificently portrayed by two of the all-time greats, Charles Boyer and Myrna Loy.
Joseph Campbell wrote about the prevalence in myth of “the old man in the woods,” the character sought out by the hero to help guide him on his journey. Think of Yoda in “The Empire Strikes Back” or Professor Falken in “Wargames” or “Deep Throat” in “All the President’s Men” or Dumbledore in the Harry Potter films or Aslan in the Narnia movies or the psychiatrist in “Ordinary People.” These are the hero’s corner men, the ones who throw water on his face and rub his shoulders and get him back in the ring swinging. “The April Fools” is a particularly good example because as the characters played by Boyer and Loy show the younger couple how much they appreciate what they have together, we also get a sense of the older generation of actors passing the torch to Lemmon and Deneuve.
Brubaker and Catherine go to the club the boss recommended, an outlandish place with a jungle theme, where animal-skin waitresses are summoned by popgun blasts to their rear ends. They leave for a disco, where they meet Grace (Loy) and when her driver turns out to be drunk, they take her back to her home. There they meet her husband André (Boyer), who explains that nothing good happens during the day (the sun beats down, people have to work), so he has chosen to live at night (women are beautiful, there is champagne to drink). This is just one of the ways in which Brubaker and Catherine have entered an upside-down world that encourages and enables them to think about what is possible for them. Grace tells Catherine her fortune, smiling that “it’s bad luck to be superstitious but the cards are so pretty” and guiding her to let herself insist on being happy. But the most important way Grace and André guide Brubaker and Catherine is by showing them that there is such a thing as sustaining, enduring love. Whether it is Grace and André or Loy and Boyer, we cannot help being moved and inspired by the example of these wise and beautiful souls.
For Valentine’s Day: Three Great Movie Kisses
Posted on February 14, 2014 at 7:00 am
From my book, 101 Must-See Movie Moments
It was reputed to be Alfred Hitchcock’s own favorite of all his movies, and it was the acknowledged favorite of critic-turned filmmaker Francois Truffaut, whose book-length interview of Hitchcock is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the way movies tell stories. Hitchock biographer Donald Spoto wrote, “’Notorious’ is in fact Alfred Hitchcock’s first attempt—at the age of forty-six—to bring his talents to the creation of a serious love story, and its story of two men in love with Ingrid Bergman could only have been made at this stage of his life.”
Bergman plays Alicia Huberman, the daughter of a Nazi spy. Humiliated by his trial and conviction and the assumption of everyone she knows that she was helping her father, she has tried to lose herself in wild parties and bad behavior. But T.R. Devlin (Cary Grant), an American agent who has overheard the wiretaps of Alicia’s conversations with her father, knows that she is loyal to the United States. He persuades her to go to work for the American government as a spy, using her father’s connections. One of his old associates, Alexander Sebastian (Claude Rains) is living in Brazil with some other Nazi refugees. Devlin takes Alicia there to meet up with Sebastian and find out what he is hiding. In order to infiltrate thoroughly enough to find out, Alicia has to accept Sebastian’s marriage proposal and move into his home. Under the watchful eye of Sebastian’s suspicious mother, Alicia must, like Bluebeard’s wife, steal the key to unlock the door and uncover what has been hidden.
This is a gripping story and the scene where Alicia hides the key is a small masterpiece of tension and suspense. The overlay of the complicated relationship between Devlin and Alicia adds enormous dramatic power to the storyline. Both use a tough exterior to hide their feelings. The suspense of the emotional connection between them is even more compelling than the spy story. Will Devlin refuse to acknowledge his feelings for Alicia because of his professional obligations or because he cannot bear to admit to himself the risks he has urged her to accept? Will he be so blinded by that refusal that he will put her at even greater risk?
And that is what makes their kiss so meaningful. These days, most romantic movies are dreadful because the script cannot think of a good reason to keep them from going to bed together in the first 20 minutes of the story. (Twilight author Stephanie Meyer has acknowledged that the reason she made her main character a vampire was to provide a meaningful – if fantasy – obstacle to physical contact.) In “Notorious,” there are story and psychological barriers keeping them apart. Even worse, Alicia is (presumably) having sex with someone else as a part of her cover. And yet, the longing they have for each other is evident and by the time it finally happens, we are almost as anxious for them to have some overt confession of their true feelings as they are.
And then, at long, long last, they kiss. And in an art form that has spent more time than any other on the kiss, this one just might be the very best in the history of the movies. The Hays Production Code banned kisses of longer than three seconds. So, Hitchcock told Bergman and Grant to just keep kissing, stopping to murmur to each other and nuzzle, and then kiss again. They move from the balcony overlooking the ocean into the room, talking about dinner and calling the hotel as though they are talking about sex, and as though being more than two inches apart is unbearable. “This is a very strange love affair,” Alicia almost whispers as he is calling his hotel to ask for his messages. “Why?” Devlin asks. “Maybe the fact that you don’t love me.” “When I don’t love you, I’ll let you know.” The result is a scene of piercing intimacy.
And two more classic movie kisses:
Breakfast At Tiffany’s
And Lady and the Tramp
And while you are inspired, take a look at Flavorwire’s list of the ten best kisses in literature!