It’s going to be tough for anything else to best the Criterion Collection’s Blu-ray of Sweet Smell of Success as my favorite of the year. There’s time, of course, and lots of things could happen. But right now? Hard to imagine a better all around package. It’s so nice to fall in love with a film all over again.

I thought I’d put together a fairly solid review of the release for The Digital Fix (click here to read it) but the first outside reaction I got was negative and mean-spirited. The bag’s in the river.

Where, I ask, is Billy Wilder on Blu-ray? To date I am not aware of any releases, past, present or future, of Wilder’s films on the format. There have been rumblings and rumors but those are of little help at the moment. No other director of Wilder’s stature has seen such a total lack of Blu-ray support, or at least none that I can place. It’s not that I’d claim this was a systematic snub. Nothing of the sort. It’s all circumstances and rights issues.

Wilder worked initially at Paramount. Many of those films are now in the hands of Universal while a couple like Sunset Blvd. and Sabrina are still with Paramount. Considering how reluctant Paramount has been to delve beyond The Godfather in its back catalog, it’s not terribly surprising, though nonetheless disappointing, that the Wilder properties there are still available only on DVD. (And Sunset Blvd. is, unbelievably, not even in print any more in R1.)  If the fog at Paramount ever lifts both of these pictures will probably be among the first few batches from their era released. Right now, there could hardly be less certainty about that happening.

Universal is hardly any better, and two of Wilder’s movies (A Foreign Affair and Five Graves to Cairo) still lack R1 DVD releases. The Lost Weekend is a Best Picture winner but Double Indemnity would be the most obvious candidate for a Blu upgrade. Considering the disinterest shown by Universal for putting out films of this vintage on Blu-ray thus far, I’m not holding my breath. Warner Bros. is clearly the most dedicated of the studios in bringing its bigger titles to the format, but none of Wilder’s most known movies are controlled by them. Should a Love in the Afternoon or The Spirit of St. Louis Blu-ray get released I’ll celebrate, but I know better than to expect anything of the sort.

Fox might be a possibility, considering the enduring popularity of Marilyn Monroe. If any Monroe does come to Blu via Fox, The Seven Year Itch would seem like the most obvious choice. Of course, any excitement I might muster up for such a release would be bordering on artificial since it’s not one of Wilder’s more sterling efforts. Also possible, maybe even our best current hope, is an upgrade of Ace in the Hole by the Criterion Collection. Other titles licensed from Paramount have been given high definition boosts so fingers remain crossed for that.

Most of Wilder’s output sits with MGM as a result of United Artists having released the many Mirisch productions he made. The bankrupted lion has been putting out some older titles lately, including the original versions of The Thomas Crown Affair and The Manchurian Candidate as Best Buy exclusives, so either Some Like It Hot or The Apartment might perhaps show up somewhere with little notice.

Overall, though, one can’t help but consider these last couple of years a dreadfully fallow period for Wilder’s output. Not long ago I treated myself (or at least thought so) to Buddy Buddy, which is available on DVD in Spain. The edition proved impossible to recommend. It’s VHS quality and non-anamorphic. The film itself, while not the disaster sometimes reported, is only for the faithful. It could conceivably, I think, show up in the Warner Archive at some point. Fedora meanwhile, the fourth and final of Wilder’s unreleased pictures in R1, reportedly was picked up by Olive Films. Let’s see which one happens first - Buddy Buddy given a purple underside by Warner Archive, Fedora out via Olive, or any Wilder film on Blu-ray.

EDIT: We seem to have a winner! Some Like It Hot is apparently scheduled for May.

Our grand schemer Warren William, friend to all who love pre-Code cinema, has finally gotten an inkling of recognition. It comes from the Warner Archive in a three-disc, DVD-R set containing a trio of rarities. Still nothing on William’s best work like but hardly limited to The Match King, Employees’ Entrance and Skyscraper Souls, all controlled by Warner Bros. (fingers crossed for pressed discs), but we can now all enjoy the actor in The Woman from Monte Carlo, Don’t Bet on Blondes, and Times Square Playboy.

A real discovery, Don’t Bet on Blondes, proves to be a flat-out joy. It’s just under an hour in running time and was released after the enforcement of the Production Code, but fear not. The film sparkles in that great screwball fashion that only ’30s Hollywood comedies can. William is Odds Owen, bookmaker of Broadway. He has a skilled team of men helping him rake in the dough by taking in most any bet, assuming it’s favorable to the house. A minor hiccup leads Odds into realizing that he could trade in the racket for an ostensibly legitimate operation in insurance, with almost identical levels of risk and return. His model is Lloyd’s of London, and nothing is too strange to consider. Clients taken on include a champion husband caller, a little man worried about having twins, and a touched Kentucky Colonel who wants to prevent his daughter from marrying.

Col. Youngblood (played by Guy Kibbee) could, I believe, be called a Civil War denier. He’s convinced that the South actually won, that Sherman was retreating, and that some victories by the North may not have actually taken place. He’s preparing a book to blow the cover off the official story but needs his well-paid daughter to stay single so that she can keep funneling him money. A quasi-legit businessman with a vendetta against Odds gets involved, intending to marry the girl (Claire Dodd) himself and claim a double victory in the process. There’s also Errol Flynn making an appearance pre-stardom as another potential suitor. What’s unexpected (though not to the viewer) is the reaction Odds has upon meeting Youngblood’s daughter, and he soon becomes a threat to his own $50,000 interest in the situation.

The film is directed by Robert Florey, who later made the must-see horror classic The Beast with Five Fingers. It features a neat shot early on where Odds and his right hand man Numbers (William Gargan) are shown listening to a horse race on the radio as the announcer is superimposed into the top right corner and the race itself appears at the bottom left of the frame. Visually, that’s the apex, but there is a lot of quick humor and absurdity at play here. Also, Dodd is an actress I like quite a bit and someone who rarely gets any mention. She was clearly photogenic so perhaps her lack of notoriety comes from the types of roles she was given. She’s rather good in Footlight Parade as the gold digging, good for nothing secretary. Dodd is much sweeter in this picture. As for the man of the hour, William shows that he doesn’t need to be dastardly to exude charisma. His character is refreshingly likable here, and the actor remains a delight to watch.

Less successful is the rather one-note Times Square Playboy, based on a play by George M. Cohan. Directing reins are given to William C. McGann. The film has William play a wealthy man in his forties who has finally decided to settle down and marry. The bride-to-be is a nightclub singer (June Travis) whose brother (Dick Purcell) is her fiance’s star employee. Things go awry when William’s oldest friend (Gene Lockhart) travels with his wife from small town America to the big city. Lockhart is supposed to serve as best man at the wedding but his suspicions about the motives of William’s future in-laws paints a dark cloud over the whole thing. Then when he’s content, the family he’s now offended is not and so on until the happy ending.

Again, William is effective in a familiar role, and the whole cast does a nice job with what they have, but the material isn’t quite grade A caliber. Lockhart’s behavior is difficult to comprehend and almost everyone else’s subsequent motivations ring false. Settling down and approaching with calmness seems unheard of to these characters. If that’s the point, revolving around distrust of outsiders, then it’s not just stale but also poorly made. A more forceful actress than June Travis might allow for some forgiveness. Additional laughs would also go a long way in establishing good will. As it is, William nails his smiling emptiness of wealth routine and Barton MacLane has a scene-stealing supporting part as his trainer/butler. Otherwise, expectations should be kept decidedly modest.

The Woman from Monte Carlo is interesting for a few reasons, none of which involve Warren William. Chronologically, it’s first among these pictures but since it features William only in a supporting part I’ve saved it for last to discuss. The above the title star is Lil Dagover, a German actress who barely even gave Hollywood a try. This is a unique foray outside Europe, and in English, for Dagover, probably best known for having the female lead in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and Fritz Lang’s Destiny. Here she plays the neglected wife of a French commandant (Walter Huston) in 1912. He’s commissioned on a ship as France is on the brink of war. Unable to see Dagover in person at times, Huston has taken to sending messages via William. Whispers as to Dagover’s faithfulness seem to have spread amongst the men, with one in particular (John Wray) determined to cause trouble after she spurns his advances. The plot takes a sharp turn later in the film when an approaching ship fires on Huston’s vessel, resulting in his court-martial.

Despite mention being made in the movie that Dagover is supposedly quite younger than husband Huston - at one point she makes light at being not even half his age - the actress was actually just three years older than her co-star. Her performance is a tad awkward, and partially in German, but Dagover nonetheless had a clear stage presence that makes the film at least a curiosity. Direction by Michael Curtiz, who at points the camera right into a porthole, cleverly elevates the film a touch also. William, for his part, has little to do or add. Indeed, the attention this set of films gives the actor is appreciated but it’s ultimately a disservice. Those unfamiliar with Warren William, or classic film fans who’ve only heard about him without seeing his work, might exit these pictures without the least bit of understanding as to why he was so noteworthy. The converted might feel a pang of disappointment. Don’t be too disheartened, though, as the truly signature films William made seem closer to release on something like DVD than ever before.

Note, too, that the Warner Archive has quietly been kind to William elsewhere in its releases. He pops up as one of the leads in Frank Borzage’s excellent romance Living on Velvet, with Ginger Rogers on his hands in Upperworld, in the Barbara Stanwyck vehicle The Secret Bride, alongside Joan Blondell in the borderline offensive spousal abuse comedy Smarty, also directed by Florey, and with Marian Marsh in a couple of more typical and oily characterizations in Under Eighteen and Beauty and the Boss.

Errol Flynn in Don't Bet on Blondes

This Warner Archive set of three burned DVD-Rs is contained in a standard size keepcase. Each disc is single-layered and contains a progressive transfer.

These are technically unrestored and unremastered transfers of minor films from the 1930s so in some ways you cross your fingers and hope for the best upon inserting the disc. Good news, then, as Don’t Bet on Blondes and Times Square Playboy really only have some stubborn speckles of damage, the latter more so. Detail and sharpness are fairly consistent throughout and not bad at all. The Woman from Monte Carlo fares worst, plagued by some vertical scratches running the length of the frame and several reel change markers. Most obvious is that it looks a good bit softer than the other two, also with more grain and scratches. Still, there are generally okay and easy to accept transfer-wise, with the understanding that they look more natural than scrubbed and polished. The short running times help prevent any digital shortcomings. All films are 1.33:1.

English mono audio varies a little from picture to picture. Don’t Bet on Blondes, which is the clear winner in all categories, has some small crackle that can be heard on occasion. A more frequent hiss is present in Times Square Playboy’s audio. The Woman from Monte Carlo, the oldest of the bunch, might have a more modest recording method but it isn’t plagued by pops or the like. Dialogue in all three is not that difficult to make out, and emits at a consistently reasonable volume. As is policy for the Warner Archive, there are no subtitles and, really, that never becomes any less ridiculous.

Two of the titles have trailers attached as nominal extra features. Don’t Bet on Blondes has a suitably goofy trailer (2:28) while Times Square Playboy’s preview (2:22) emphasizes the George M. Cohan factor.

This is a crude, perhaps lazy, way of sharing what films, discs and related events of 2010 proved to be my favorites. I should be making a revision later in January once the late releases get a chance to be seen. Everything’s in alphabetical order. Links are to my reviews at The Digital Fix.

5 Favorite Cinema Experiences

The Burglar at Film Forum

Carlos Roadshow Edition at IFC Center (w/ introduction by Olivier Assayas)

Funny Face at Film Society of Lincoln Center (w/ Stanley Donen in conversation with Mike Nichols)

Pale Flower + Masahiro Shinoda retrospective sidebar at New York Film Festival (w/ Shinoda in person)

The Prowler at Film Forum

5 Favorite US DVD Releases (Single Film)

Brewster McCloud (Altman) [Warner Archive]

Dark City (Dieterle) [Olive Films]

The Law (Dassin) [Oscilloscope]

Make Way for Tomorrow (McCarey) [Criterion Collection]

A Town Called Panic (Aubier, Patar) [Zeitgeist]

5 Favorite US DVD Releases (Box Set)

3 Silent Classics by Josef von Sternberg (Underworld/The Last Command/The Docks of New York) [Criterion Collection]

Columbia Film Noir Vol. II (Human Desire/The Brothers Rico/Nightfall/City of Fear/Pushover) [Sony]

Film Noir Classic Collection, Vol. 5 (Cornered/Desperate/The Phenix City Story/Deadline at Dawn/Armored Car Robbery/Crime in the Streets/Dial 1119/Backfire) [Warner Bros.]

Oshima’s Outlaw Sixties - Eclipse Series 21 (Pleasures of the Flesh/Violence at Noon/Japanese Summer, Double Suicide/Sing a Song of Sex/Three Resurrected Drunkards) [Criterion Collection]

Rossellini’s War Trilogy (Rome Open City/Paisan/Germany Year Zero) [Criterion Collection]

5 Favorite US Blu-ray Releases (Single Film)

The African Queen (Huston) [Paramount]

Bigger Than Life (Ray) [Criterion Collection]

The Night of the Hunter (Laughton) [Criterion Collection]

Steamboat Bill, Jr. (Reisner) [Kino]

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (Huston) [Warner Bros.)

5 Favorite UK Blu-ray Releases

Le Cercle Rouge (Melville) [Optimum]

City Girl (Murnau) [Masters of Cinema]

The Edge of the World (Powell) [BFI]

Metropolis (Lang) [Masters of Cinema]

Profound Desires of the Gods (Imamura) [Masters of Cinema]

5 Favorite UK DVD Releases (Single Film)

Adelheid (Vlacil) [Second Run]

Diamonds of the Night (Nemec) [Second Run]

Le Grand Jeu (Feyder) [Masters of Cinema]

There’s Always Tomorrow (Sirk) [Masters of Cinema]

While the City Sleeps (Lang) [Exposure]

5 Favorite Films (English Language)

The American (Corbijn)

Black Swan (Aronofsky)

Shutter Island (Scorsese)

The Social Network (Fincher)

Winter’s Bone (Granik)

4 Favorite Films (Non-English Language)

Carlos (Assayas)

Mother (Bong)

Police, Adjective (Porumboiu)

Vincere (Bellochio)

4 Favorite Male Performances

George Clooney in The American

Thierry Guetta in Exit Through the Gift Shop

John Hawkes in Winter’s Bone

Edgar Ramirez in Carlos

4 Favorite Female Performances

Amy Adams in The Fighter

Marion Cotillard in Inception

Jennifer Lawrence in Winter’s Bone

Giovanna Mezzogiorno in Vincere

The pros and cons of Netflix in general can be debated until one’s fingers tire out, but I’m only interested right now in discussing the vast number of movies that have popped up on the streaming Watch Instantly area that are not otherwise available to watch on DVD in R1. Some are in the wrong aspect ratio, especially the ones coming from Starz, but most are of acceptable quality and OAR. Here’s a good list I’ve made of movies of note that can currently only be seen in the U.S. by using the Netflix streaming service, which comes free with any by-mail subscription. It’s chronological, with the director’s full name included. I’ll try to update as necessary.

Blithe Spirit (David Lean, 1945)

The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry (Robert Siodmak, 1945)

Diary of a Chambermaid (Jean Renoir, 1946)

Odd Man Out (Carol Reed, 1947)

The Other Love (Andre de Toth, 1947)

I Walk Alone (Byron Haskin, 1948)

Moonrise (Frank Borzage, 1948)

Caught (Max Ophuls, 1949)

No Man of Her Own (Mitchell Leisen, 1950)

The Big Night (Joseph Losey, 1951)

The Bullfighter and the Lady (Budd Boetticher, 1951)

Cry Danger (Robert Parrish, 1951)

Hard, Fast, and Beautiful (Ida Lupino, 1951)

The Mating Season (Mitchell Leisen, 1951)

The Captive City (Robert Wise, 1952)

Horizons West (Budd Boetticher, 1952)

The Turning Point (William Dieterle, 1952)

Cry Vengeance (Mark Stevens, 1954)

Private Hell 36 (Don Siegel, 1954)

Run for Cover (Nicholas Ray, 1955)

Strategic Air Command (Anthony Mann, 1955)

China Gate (Samuel Fuller, 1957)

He Who Must Die (Jules Dassin, 1957)

Hidden Fear (Andre De Toth, 1957)

Short Cut to Hell (James Cagney, 1957)

The Savage Innocents (Nicholas Ray, 1960)

Phaedra (Jules Dassin, 1962)

A Child Is Waiting (John Cassavetes, 1963)

Lord Jim (Richard Brooks, 1965)

Redline 7000 (Howard Hawks, 1965)

Cul-de-sac (Roman Polanski, 1966)

The Group (Sidney Lumet, 1966)

The Climax (Pietro Germi, 1967)

Hurry Sundown (Otto Preminger, 1967)

Up Tight! (Jules Dassin, 1968)

The Happy Ending (Richard Brooks, 1969)

10 Rillington Place (Richard Fleischer, 1970)

The Landlord (Hal Ashby, 1970)

Leo the Last (John Boorman, 1970)

Born to Win (Ivan Passer, 1971)

The Heartbreak Kid (Elaine May, 1972)

The Offence (Sidney Lumet, 1973)

Busting (Peter Hyams, 1974)

The Spikes Gang (Richard Fleischer, 1974)

The Context [Illustrious Corpses] (Francesco Rosi, 1976)

Drum (Steve Carver, 1976)

Looking for Mr. Goodbar (Richard Brooks, 1977)

That Sinking Feeling (Bill Forsyth, 1980)

The Keep (Michael Mann, 1983)

Garbo Talks (Sidney Lumet, 1984)

It wasn’t long ago that Sony finally entered my good graces. Like a white knight for older films on DVD, the formerly most negligent of all studios picked up the slack left behind when Warner Bros. and Fox virtually abandoned proper releases of their back catalogs. Over the last two years Sony’s commitment to putting out Columbia titles in R1 has easily made it the leader among the major studios for the so-called classics. Star sets devoted to Jack Lemmon and Kim Novak, director collections for Michael Powell, Budd Boetticher and Samuel Fuller, and genre offerings like two volumes each of screwball and film noir goodies, plus another pair of separate Bad Girls of Noir releases, have really proven Sony’s commitment to consumers who’ve otherwise been largely snubbed.

Late 2010 and I’m suddenly a little worried about the studio’s plans for the future. Only a much-delayed Rita Hayworth set has been given an official due date. The New Hollywood set promised and prepped by Sony somehow ended up in the (quite capable, to be sure) hands of the Criterion Collection. More rumors and soft confirmations still exist, including the Frank Capra-Barbara Stanwyck collaborations, but the question persists as to when, and maybe whether, we’ll see more releases on the ever-aging and slowly dying format of DVD.

Particularly disappointing is Sony’s venture into Warner Archive territory with its own DVD-R burn-on-demand service deemed Screen Classics by Request. That’s not a name that exactly rolls off the tongue or stays in the memory banks. The initial selections have mostly consisted of things from the ’50s and ’60s onward as far as I can tell, still ignoring Columbia pre-Code titles. Some of these would seem prominent enough to deserve more attention. Films like Mickey One, I Never Sang for My Father, 10 Rillington Place, 711 Ocean Drive, and The Pumpkin Eater are given equal footing with a bunch of Hart to Hart TV movies. Even Nicholas Ray’s Hot Blood, deemed important enough in the UK for an edition, has been thrown into the pit.

The prices are roughly in line with the Warner Archive, which is to say that they’re ridiculous. Expect to pay around $20 for a burned DVD-R without extra features or even a menu. For the dedicated, Deep Discount is a decent enough option. My curiosity recently got the best of me so I went for something I’d not yet seen nor even heard of previously. My choice, for better or worse, was Otley, a 1968 effort directed by Dick Clement and starring Tom Courtenay. It’s based on a novel written by Martin Waddell and centers on the ne’er-do-well title character who stumbles into a spy plot. Romy Schneider also gets above the title billing. You can glimpse a woman in a supporting role who bears a definite resemblance to Emma Thompson. That would be her mother, Phyllida Law, in a rare film part.

Courtenay plays Gerald Arthur Otley, identified as “a man you can lean on (if you’re desperate)” on the poster and DVD cover art. He’s facing eviction, even after sleeping with his landlady, and just trying to find a place to sleep for a few days. A pal lends Otley his couch only to be swiftly murdered at home. Otley was there when it happened, on a Saturday night, but doesn’t remember anything else when he wakes up at Gatwick Airport on Monday morning. The police want to speak with him and so do some shadowy men. Things, including the plot, get messy.

This is clearly not a forgotten gem by any means but I’d be reluctant to cite Otley as completely bad either. Courtenay was why I took a chance on the film and DVD-R, and it was nice to see him relish the character’s irresponsibility. He brings both a rakish quality and a more disheveled attitude to the picture. I still can’t find any other British actor of the era to compare Courtenay to in terms of being relatable and charming without taking himself too seriously. For me, he’s the main draw of Otley and, save for a few looks at Romy Schneider, just about the only one. The tone feels all wrong and confused as to whether to give way to the kookiness of something like The President’s Analyst or try to keep up the spy thriller ruse. Courtenay seems to belong in the former, though he was also quite good in a supporting part in A Dandy in Aspic, a picture that plays it straight. Otley really can’t play it straight throughout because its plot is too far-fetched and unconvincing. A lighter, more farcical take and maybe it would’ve been on to something.

As for the quality of Sony’s Screen Classics by Request DVD-R, I wouldn’t consider it to be a disappointment. Sony’s site boasts that Otley has been newly remastered and this seems believable. It’s in the 1.85:1 aspect ratio and enhanced for widescreen televisions. The print is clean, with good color balance. It’s sharper at times than others but generally worth deeming as acceptable videowise. Maybe more noise than I would’ve liked, though the grain is balanced well. The palette has that familiar late ’60s look of other British films I’ve encountered, mostly on DVD or via TCM viewings. I was content overall with the image and really wish that a proper DVD could have been released. Audio is a modest English mono track, without subtitles.

Not even a menu has been provided, much less any bonus features. Just some legal warnings. The single-layered disc itself is white on top, with the film’s title repeated in the same font as used on the cover. Unlike with Warner Archive packages, there’s no mention here of the content having been made on demand (though it clearly was).

Exposure Cinema in the UK released Fritz Lang’s While the City Sleeps on DVD about three weeks ago. I finally had the chance to get my hands on a copy the other day and turned in a review of the disc for The Digital Fix. In short, it’s an easy choice between paying something like eight pounds for the R2 edition versus waiting for the Warner Archive to do its thing to the tune of $20 or even $25 at some point in the future. I’m so glad a company like Exposure is giving consumers an alternative to the Warner Archive model.

If you’ve not had the pleasure of seeing Lang’s film, wait no more. It’s a late career highlight for the director, and very much worth owning.

The red light is on and we are recording. Last week’s picks didn’t get written up, which was unfortunate since the John Gilbert and Lee Remick days were great, but here are some things to consider for the end of Summer Under the Stars and the start of September. Vivien Leigh will get special attention as the Star of the Month. Also, I added a nice Ava Gardner header to the rotation. She will be Star of the Month in November. As always, all times are EDT and program days begin at 6:00 AM.

Saturday August 28

7:30 AM The Night of the Generals (Litvak, 1967) - C-144 mins. - I can’t let the Summer Under the Stars day for one of my favorite actors go unnoticed. The great Peter O’Toole gets a total of nine films on the schedule this Saturday. No surprise that Lawrence of Arabia is the prime time headliner, and that a lot of what’s being shown seem like the usual suspects. Still, The Night of the Generals is a lesser known one, and an underachiever. With a cast also including Tom Courtenay, Omar Sharif, and Christopher Plummer, expectations are high for this story of prostitutes being murdered in Poland and Nazi generals being the lead suspects. I did try to watch it once before but didn’t succeed. Perhaps I’ll try again. The cinematographer was Henri Decae, dear to me for having also done several films for Jean-Pierre Melville. There’s a DVD out in the UK but the film, which I believe is a Sony property, hasn’t been released on disc here.

Monday August 30

11:30 AM Hips, Hips, Hooray (Sandrich, 1934) - BW-68 mins. - Lots of Thelma Todd on the schedule today, and I mean that not just in the sense that she’s the star of the day but also because there are a ton of shorts and features being shown. Most of these are things I’m not familiar with, but I did notice that she often appears with the same co-stars more than once. The first couple of things on the schedule have her with Joe E. Brown, then there are shorts with Charley Chase, a pair of features with Wheeler and Woolsey (including this one), more shorts but now as a lead alongside Zasu Pitts and then Patsy Kelly, and finally the pictures she did with the Marx Brothers and some Laurel and Hardy comedies. I guess a title like Hips, Hips, Hooray is somewhat of an obvious choice to pick. It’s pre-Code, has Wheeler and Woolsey as lipstick salesmen, and also features musical numbers. According to IMDb, Finland banned it in 1936. Looks to be an RKO property, likely now with Warner Bros., and not on DVD.

Wednesday September 1

6:00 AM The Bishop Misbehaves (Dupont, 1933) - BW-86 mins. - This sounds like a nice little way to spend an hour and a half. The Oscar-winning Kris Kringle himself, Edmund Gwenn, stars as the bishop of the title, a lover of mysteries who falls into a real one by accident. It involves Maureen O’Sullivan and tourist accomplice Norman Foster and a robbery. The picture was released by MGM, putting it in the burned and purple hands of the Warner Bros. folks now. It isn’t on DVD.

7:30 AM Petticoat Fever (Fitzmaurice, 1936) - BW-80 mins. - Robert Montgomery and Myrna Loy play cute in this screwball romance set in Alaska. She’s engaged to Reginald Owen, on his way to a conference, but they end up in the lonely area where Montgomery is a weather radio operator. Two actors I’d watch in anything so I’m sure it’ll be charming. MGM again, with Warner Bros. currently with the rights and no DVD available.

2:00 AM Middle of the Night (Mann, 1959) - BW-117 mins. - It’s worth acknowledging that TCM will shine the spotlight on Kim Novak this evening. The recent Sony box set featuring her in five films is well-represented here, with four being aired including Middle of the Night. I read somewhere, and she might say it on the new extras for this disc, that she’s really fond of Middle of the Night. It stars Fredric March as a widowed man in his fifties who meets the much younger Novak, his secretary, and pursues her romantically. The Notorious Landlady, one I just watched recently where she co-stars with Jack Lemmon and Fred Astaire, follows at 4:15 AM. I enjoyed it despite some flaws, and the film can be had in Sony’s Lemmon box.

Thursday September 2

10:15 AM So Big (Wise, 1953) - BW-102 mins. - From an Edna Ferber novel and directed by Robert Wise, this melodrama stars Jane Wyman as a schoolteacher who marries Sterling Hayden. His eventual death causes her to cling to their farm as a son grows up. Nancy Olson is among the supporting cast. It sounds a little soggy for my taste but still interesting. Warner Bros. is the studio. It isn’t available on DVD.

5:00 AM Paid (Wood, 1930) -BW-86 mins. - This recently hit DVD-R via the Warner Archive Collection, which is all the more reason to see it for free on TCM if you’re among the curious. A young Joan Crawford comes out of prison for something she didn’t do and wants revenge on those responsible. Robert Armstrong is the male lead. Pre-Code, of course!

Friday September 3

6:15 PM The Badlanders (Daves, 1958) - C-84 mins. - This can be had from the Warner Archive also but you’re better than that. It’s a remake of John Huston’s The Asphalt Jungle, done just eight years earlier. That would be like remaking The Bourne Identity now. Except turning it into a western, because that’s what Delmer Daves and company did here. Alan Ladd stars with Ernest Borgnine, Katy Jurado and several other recognizable names and faces. Ladd isn’t Sterling Hayden though. Widescreen cinematography by Billy Wilder’s Paramount cameraman John Seitz.

8:00 PM Así era Pancho Villa (Rodriguez, 1957) - C-90 mins. - TCM celebrates the 100th anniversary of the Mexican Revolution this month, beginning with three films directed by Ismael Rodriguez and starring Pedro Armendariz as Pancho Villa. I have no idea what the quality of the prints or the actual  movies will be but it’s interesting to see such rarely shown material on the channel. This first installment promises to be told from the point of view of Pancho Villa’s disembodied head and includes several stories rather than a single narrative. Pancho Villa y la Valentina comes on next, at 10:00 PM.

12:00 AM Cuando ¡Viva Villa..! es la muerte (Rodriguez, 1960) - C-92 mins. - Stay up for all three of the Rodriguez and Armendariz films being shown if you like. Here it’s the common folk like teachers and even prisoners who recount stories about Pancho Villa. When else will you have the chance to see these movies? IMDb only has 11 votes on this one. Later in the month, Viva Zapata! is scheduled.

I’ve cheated a little to include the early Saturday morning showing of The Outfit, but otherwise this is as back to normal as I can get for the time being. Things have been busy with reviews mostly taking up my writing time that usually would at least partially go to posts here. The good news is that I’ve covered some really interesting things like the BFI’s Blu-ray release of Ozu’s Late Spring. Thanks for sticking around and I hope to be back next week. As always, all times are EDT and program days begin at 6:00 AM.

Friday August 13

4:00 AM The Outfit (Flynn, 1973) - C-103 mins. - Be forewarned that TCM’s website doesn’t indicate letterboxing for this airing so it’s likely to be in full frame instead of the original aspect ratio (1.85:1). That aside, the film is rarely shown and not on DVD. It’s here as the cherry on top of Robert Ryan day, a lovely and well-deserved tribute that also included excellent fare like Men in War and The Set-Up. The star here isn’t Ryan though, it’s Robert Duvall, who plays newly released ex-con entangled with the syndicate of the title. It’s based on a Donald Westlake novel, which is reason enough to check the movie out. In addition to Ryan, the supporting cast includes Joe Don Baker, Karen Black, Timothy Carey and Richard Jaeckel. It should be a Warner Bros. property, having been distributed originally by MGM.

Saturday August 14

8:00 AM Personal Affair (Pelissier, 1953) - BW-82 mins. - What a glorious day on TCM to have all of the movies starring Gene Tierney. This is really special also because Tierney was under contract to Fox and only rarely does TCM show films from that studio. Personal Affair has Tierney play the wife of a teacher (Leo Genn) whose rumored to be having an affair with a student (Glynis Johns). The town explodes in gossip after the student disappears. This might be with MGM since United Artists is listed as U.S. distributor at IMDb. It isn’t on DVD I don’t think.

4:30 PM China Girl (Hathaway, 1942) - BW-96 mins. - Six of the Tierney films on the schedule today are listed as TCM premieres, including this one. It stars George Montgomery as an American newsreel photographer helped out of Japan by the beautiful Tierney. Another picture she did for director Henry Hathaway, Sundown, airs just previous. It’s scheduled to get a TCM-exclusive DVD release at the end of the month. Mitchell Leisen’s The Mating Season follows at 6:15 PM. China Girl is a Fox property, not available on DVD, at least in R1. I wonder why Fox never bothered to release a box set of Tierney’s films.

Monday August 16

2:15 PM Great Day in the Morning (Tourneur, 1956) - C-92 mins. - Robert Stack all day and night, and most of the pictures being shown aren’t on DVD. This is probably minor Jacques Tourneur, but it looks to have come during a good time in his career considering it’s sandwiched alongside Wichita, Nightfall and Night of the Demon. The film has Stack play a Southerner who wins a Denver hotel in a card game and gets there just in time for the Civil War to break out. Virginia Mayo and Ruth Roman are the ladies in town. It’s classified as a western but doesn’t sound terribly action-oriented. Made for RKO, Warner Bros. probably controls in R1 and hasn’t put out anything.

9:45 PM The Tarnished Angels (Sirk, 1957) - BW-91 mins. - Strangely, Stack’s Oscar-nominated performance in Written on the Wind isn’t being shown today but the harder to see reteaming of that film’s director Douglas Sirk and lead cast members Stack, Rock Hudson and Dorothy Malone is on the schedule for tonight. The source material is nothing less than a William Faulkner novel. Stack is a barnstorming pilot married to Malone and Hudson is the newsman trying not to do the wrong thing. The black and white CinemaScope image is well-represented on a DVD in the UK but hasn’t been available in the U.S. That will change soon, when TCM and Universal combine forces to release the film on DVD. It will be available individually and in a Sirk set, but only at TCM’s website and through Movies Unlimited.

Tuesday August 17

7:45 AM The Fallen Sparrow (Wallace, 1943) - BW-94 mins. - John Garfield stars as a Spanish Civil War veteran inadvertently embroiled in an international Nazi search for something that had belonged to his murdered friend. Maureen O’Hara, whose Summer Under the Stars day it is, tags along. Director Richard Wallace also made a pretty good film noir called Framed, four years later. The Fallen Sparrow is based on a novel written by Dorothy B. Hughes, whose other books were adapted to become the films Ride the Pink Horse and In a Lonely Place. The picture at hand is now a Warner Bros. property in R1, having been made for RKO. It’s available, you guessed it, through the Warner Archive on a pricey DVD-R.

Wednesday August 18

2:00 AM The Unfaithful (Sherman, 1947) - BW-109 mins. - Ann Sheridan finally gets some attention, though most of these are movies that do often get shown on TCM and/or can be found in the Warner Archive (Nora Prentiss, Juke Girl). Add The Unfaithful, a film I’ve neglected to see for much too long, to that list. Even more than it starring Sheridan and being considered film noir, I’m most intrigued by the fact that David Goodis worked on the screenplay. I don’t know the extent of his contributions but he is credited alongside just one other writer. The story, a reworking of Maugham’s The Letter which had already been filmed twice before, has Sheridan play a married woman who claims to have killed a stranger in self-defense when it was actually her lover. Zachary Scott is the husband and Lew Ayres is her attorney. I’ve never much cared for either actor. As hinted at, this is available from the Warner Archive Collection.

Thursday August 19

8:45 AM The Shopworn Angel (Potter, 1938) - BW-85 mins. - One more Archive title for good measure. This stars Margaret Sullavan and James Stewart as, respectively, a showgirl and soldier who fall in love just before he goes to fight in WWI. Walter Pidgeon plays Sullavan’s initial love interest, a gangster. The Sullavan-Stewart romance is a ruse at first but does develop into something. Any of the films those two made with each other is highly worth watching. This was MGM, and, like I mentioned, is in the Warner Archive.

12:15 PM Design for Scandal (Taurog, 1941) - BW-85 mins. - Walter Pidgeon is back, as he is all day, and now has Rosalind Russell in tow. He’s a reporter and she’s a judge. It’s a match made in professional, ethical heaven. The actual plot begins with newspaper big shot Edward Arnold talking Pidgeon into investigating Russell, who had ruled heavily for Arnold’s now ex-wife in their divorce proceedings. The romantic comedy roots surely poke through soon enough. This looks to have been an MGM production, likely handing off the rights now to Warner Bros. It isn’t on DVD.

8:00 PM Man Hunt (Lang, 1941) - BW-102 mins. - I’m not sure how Walter Pidgeon ended up being so well-represented in this week’s picks but here it is nonetheless. Fox has a strong, affordable DVD out in R1 of this film but it hasn’t been a regular part of the TCM rotation so I figured a mention couldn’t hurt. The plot centers around a plan to kill Hitler, but, unlike Valkyrie from a couple of years back, this isn’t based on the actual assassination attempt that went awry. Pidgeon is the lead, an Englishman who ventures to Germany and flirts with shooting Hitler. Joan Bennett, beginning her frequent and fruitful period of collaborating with Fritz Lang, co-stars as a Cockney prostitute Pidgeon meets upon returning to London.

There are two very different ways to enter Brewster McCloud for the first time, and I’d say they’re probably of roughly equal preference. One is totally blind, or at least almost so. Those who wish to go that route can safely know that the film was Robert Altman’s follow-up to M*A*S*H, that the director could do almost anything he wanted at that point and chose something extremely weird. The script was by the guy who wrote Skidoo, a movie directed by Otto Preminger on acid where Jackie Gleason is married to Carol Channing and Groucho Marx plays a mobster named God. And Brewster McCloud is even stranger still. It stars Bud Cort, just before Harold and Maude, as a young man who lives in the fallout shelter of the Houston Astrodome and has plans to fly, like a bird and with real wings. Concurrent to this is a serial strangler being hunted by the Houston police and hot shot San Francisco cop Frank Shaft (Michael Murphy). Are they connected? Perhaps. Will you care about the investigation? Probably not.

The other option when considering a watch of Brewster McCloud, either for the first time or on the much-needed second viewing, is trying to immerse yourself as much as possible in understanding Altman’s film ahead of time. Good luck. It’s just not a movie open to serious analysis. I don’t care what people say or what they write or even what I write, Brewster McCloud is beautiful lark to be seen rather than studied. It does stand as a nice pillar of Altman’s career and something that gets far too little attention despite it being perhaps the signature work of his best decade the 1970s. As a reminder, Altman did M*A*S*H and then Brewster. His next film was McCabe & Mrs. Miller, followed by the underrated Images, my personal favorite The Long Goodbye, a key work California Split and the acknowledged masterpiece Nashville. That’s some kind of streak. I’m not sure an American director has ever put together seven films of that caliber in a row. Images isn’t too well known, but Brewster had never even been on DVD prior to the Warner Archive throwing out this purple-undersided DVD-R option. It’s a trip. Most people won’t get or enjoy the film but Altman enthusiasts are virtually commanded to seek it out.

Be warned that the so-called spoilers are about to fly. It’s flight that plays perhaps the most vital role in Brewster McCloud. Cort’s title character is almost like an alien creature, obsessed with birds and flight and wings. He’s shown chauffeuring around the character of Abraham Wright (Stacy Keach), an impossibly old man with a pair of famous brothers. Brewster fleeced the book inside Wright’s home given to him by his famous aviator siblings, Orville and Wilbur. Wright becomes a murder victim few really mourn. Other ill-fated characters include the singer of the national anthem at the Astrodome. She’s played by Margaret Hamilton, best known as the Wicked Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz. We see more of her ruby-laben slippers than her face. The filmic references continue, with Steve McQueen in Bullitt as the target hit the hardest. His sweater, gun holster, blue eyes, and car chase are all sent up by Michael Murphy as the very serious Frank Shaft. Also look for a direct M*A*S*H callback and a quick cameo for that film’s poster.

Rene Auberjonois has one of the oddest roles in the history of studio-financed American film here. He plays a professor of some sort, identified in the opening credits as the lecturer, who comments on the film via bird-related factoids. He progressively becomes more and more birdlike in appearance, at one point even feasting on bird seed from the chalkboard tray. It does actually add a more introspective angle to the picture which allows for further consideration, though we wouldn’t expect anything less from Altman. Throughout, the director’s fingerprints are consistently stained across the film via both irreverence and playful, authority-questioning anarchy. I really love the line at the end of the trailer that frames Brewster’s troubles as coming at the hands of “the combined forces of gravity and the Houston Police.”

The treatment of Brewster, who’s sort of a deranged serial killer if we want to get right down to it. becomes the single most fascinating part of Altman’s film. The character’s background is never revealed or hinted at, and it’s empathy all the way that Altman prescribes to the viewer. I don’t know if this is honestly so bad. Altman apparently altered the script to remove more explicit accounts of Brewster’s indiscretions. As it exists, he’s the obvious choice for these crimes but they’re blunted by various external factors. Certainly Sally Kellerman as something resembling a fallen angel or a devilish bird turned human specimen adds a great deal of bird shit intrigue. I’m left with the primary idea of just not trying to take anything plotwise away from the film. Enjoy what you can, including the gloriously off-kilter nature of it from start to circus-inspired finish, but never kid yourself that Altman was doing much beyond making a movie he dug at that very moment. Reading too much into it is a mistake, I think. There’s a reason the label of “cult favorite” has formed around Brewster McCloud. Foremost, it’s weird and far from mainstream sensibilities. That it’s also great and a major stepping stone for Robert Altman that he needed to exorcise in order to make more conventional yet still subversive masterpieces is simply a gleaming hope in the eye of the potential viewer. This is, frankly, Altman’s strangest exercise in the kinds of films he liked to make. But it’s still essential and much too obscure.

We finally get Brewster McCloud and it’s for $25 as a remastered title from the Warner Archive. What a load of crap, if you’ll excuse my dissatisfaction. Had Warner Bros. been more proactive years ago then we’d probably have a full commentary from Altman and maybe even a nice retrospective featurette. It wouldn’t set you back $25 either. Yet, from a business standpoint, this isn’t the sort of film that would ever be a top seller and I do understand that. My respect for Warner Bros. has evaporated but I do hope there are people like me who can’t help themselves from being interested in such distinguished titles and thus appreciate these types of reviews.

The film is listed at the 2.40:1 aspect ratio but actually comes in at 2.35:1, and is enhanced for widescreen televisions. It gets the “Remastered” label and thus costs five bucks more than other Warner Archive titles. I don’t know exactly what goes into such a distinction but I can report that Brewster McCloud looks very pleasing indeed. Only some minor and occasional marks of damage pop up and detail is mostly excellent. It’s a progressive transfer, scrubbed nicely but not enough to give it an artificial feeling. Grain is present and at fine levels. Only some darker scenes exhibit mild concern but these too are largely forgivable in their naturalism.

Audio is a basic English mono track that sounds slightly weak in volume.  Dialogue remains easily understandable and clear. The songs courtesy of John Phillips come through nicely. Boo again to the Warner Archive’s anti-subtitles policy. This simply needs to be corrected as soon as possible.

The film cries out for extras and contextualization but only a non-anamorphic trailer (2:46) has been included. Warner Archive doesn’t do extras. The idea there seems to be a tendency towards less supplemental content and nary a happy medium. You can either bang your head against the wall or relent on particular favorites being made available. Both options seem equally admirable.