popcorn and red wine: January 2016

Saturday, January 30, 2016

Deathmatch: "Casablanca" (1942) vs. "To Have and Have Not" (1944)

History

The unproduced stage play "Everybody Comes to Rick's" ended up sold to Warner Brothers for a record figure of 20,000 in 1942. Originally written by husband and wife team Murray Burnett and Joan Alison, the project had been retooled and renamed "Casablanca" once sold by Julius and Philip Epstein.

"[Capra] asked Phil and me and half a dozen other screenwriters to join him in an effort our government considered very important--to write a series of films to be called "Why We Fight." We, of course, gladly consented. The Studio said, "No. We have just borrowed Ingrid Bergman from David Selznick to play the lead in "Casablanca." There is a stop date in the deal, which means that for every day we need Bergman beyond the stop date, we have to pay Selznick a fortune. We want you to start writing the screenplay of "Casablanca" immediately. You can't go to Washington." But we said we're going and we went." ("Prepared Statement of Julius Epstein, Screenwriter and Member, Writers Guild of America, West")

For four weeks, Howard Koch took up the project, offering 30 to 40 pages, including highlighting the reality and politics of pre-World War 2. But once back in Hollywood, the brothers Epstein were reassigned to the project. Casey Robinson also contributed three uncredited weeks of work as well as Warner Brothers producer Hal Wallis contributing the now famous line, "Louie, I believe this is the start of a beautiful friendship."

Production began May 25, 1942 and finished in August "eleven days late and at a cost of 1,039,000 dollars - 75,000 dollars over budget." (p. 79, James Crighton Robertson, The Casablanca Man: The Cinema of Michael Curtiz) Starring Humphrey Bogart and the borrowed Ingrid Bergman from RKO, "Casablanca" was essentially a campground of some of the best European actors of the period: Conrad Veidt ("Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari") and Peter Lorre ("M") of the German Expressionist wave, Austrian immigrant Paul Henreid, the beloved Hungarian S.Z. Sakall, and British royalty Claude Rains and Sydney Greenstreet.

"Casablanca" would go on to attain great status, but not without some criticism. Variety found "some of the characterizations a bit on the overdone side." (Casablanca | Variety) The New Yorker found Bogart's previous film "Across the Pacific" more preferable than the "pretty tolerable" "Casablanca." (p. 13, Aljean Harmetz, Round Up the Usual Suspects: The Making of Casablanca: Bogart, Bergman, and World War 2)

Although the title of an Ernest Hemingway short story, "To Have and Have Not" is anything but the original. What had started out on a fishing trip in 1939 with the famous writer, Howard Hawks bragged to his friend that he could "make a picture out of [his] worst story, [...] that god damned piece of junk To Have and To Have Not." Hemingway already had a solid character in Harry Morgan where Hawks could simply "give [him] the wife. All [he had] to do is make a story about how they met." (There's Something About Harry: To Have and Have Not as Novel and Film - Bright Lights Film Journal)

But Hemingway had already sold the rights to his book prior to this meeting to RKO for 10,000. Paying Howard Hughes 92,500, Hawks then sold "To Have and Have Not" to Warner Brothers for the same price as well as a fourth of the gross receipts. Now with Hemingway's story in hand, most of the actual plot was scrapped except for names and some principal characteristics. Jules Furthman and, ironically, William Faulkner both have writing credits, the latter contributing to the upstairs sequences towards the end of the film. Hawks created the now famous "you know how to whistle" scene just for Lauren Bacall's screen test without any intention to be in the film.

The first Bogart-Bacall vehicle would go on to enjoy 3.65 million at the box office with varying degrees of criticism. Krahn from Variety considered "To Have and Have Not" as a "considerable picture [...] because of some neat characterization." (To Have and Have Not (1944) - Articles - TCM.com) The New York Times described the film as a "tough and tight-lipped tale [with] much more atmosphere than action of the usual muscular sort." Although Lauren Bacall's performance was heavily criticized and Bogart in his element at his "best when his nature is permitted to smoulder in the gloom," the common consensus had been that it was merely a Casablanca duplication.

"Just Remember This" to "How to Whistle"

In pre-WW2 Casablanca, "Rick's Cafe Americain" is a popular spot for both military officials and the refuges who seek passage to the still neutral America. Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart), the owner, finds the most unlikely patron in "all the gin joints, in all the towns, in all the world, she walks into mine." She being Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman), Rick's married ex-love now with her husband and famous Resistance leader currently finding passage to America. Although holding onto two "letters of transit" that a crook killed two Germans for, Rick finds himself in a war with himself as to giving the letters to the woman he loves but cannot have and where his expatriate patriotism truly lies.

Humphrey Bogart plays Harry Morgan in "To Have and Have Not" as a fishing boat charter in Martinique after the fall of France. When a pickpocket, Marie Browning (Lauren Bacall) steals his next client's wallet, there is a sudden a twist of fate involving a shootout between the Resistance and the police serendipitously shooting the client. Now under the suspicious eye of Martinique's police, Morgan is broke and ready to take any job even if it might involve a life-risking boat ride sending a husband and wife to safety.

Death Match Round

While Casablanca is indeed a classic with great actors speaking famously clever lines, I have to give it to "To Have and Have Not." Perhaps it's the suspension of disbelief considering the macguffin that are the letters of transit. While an entirely fictional device to pull and push the movie characters together and apart, there is no solid basis in reality that a document would allow free travel around Europe and Portugal pre-World War 2. However, there is possibly a genesis to this macguffin, according to Joe Janes from the University of Washington, "The closest document [...] is probably a "laissez-passer," a safe conduct issued for one-way travel to the issuing country, sometimes for humanitarian reasons, but also to allow diplomats of newly enemy nations to leave after war is declared."

There seems to be more at stake in "To Have and Have Not," with Humphrey Bogart's more romantic anti-hero character falling in love, both within film and real life, as he sheds a little of that cynicism at the beginning of the film. After being wrongly accused and interrogated by Martinique police, Morgan seems rather humbled by this experience even despite all the cynicism he offers authority figures. He treats both Captain Renard (Dan Seymour) and hotel owner "Frenchy" (Marcel Dalio) equally with an acerbic sarcasm, but Morgan's soft spot exists for his involuntary "carer" and first mate Eddie (Walter Brennan in a defining role) as well as his budding relationship with Lauren Bacall's Marie. The real life chemistry worked in the plot's favor as Morgan's affections become dangerous in having the transportation that could get more Resistance members out of the country resulting in less violence around his environment.

Rick Blaine is Morgan's opposite, a more tragic anti-hero in having to make up his mind in a more smoldering setting of North Africa. Having fallen in love then left by an already married woman, Rick's heart is broken and has no reason to do anything but brood and avoid the political happenings around him for the first half of the film until his scenes with Ingrid Bergman (although at gunpoint with that astounding lighting effect via Adam Edeson and a soft gauze filter). Finding his ex-love back in his establishment, Rick is torn into a question of morals once finding that Ilsa and husband are looking for those weakly devised letters of transit much like how Morgan is unsure of taking on this new job.

But in "To Have and Have Not," his life is in danger, but in "Casablanca," his heart seems to rule his actions outside of all the political drama. Rick ends the film by choosing to not ignore the changes around him in possibly taking Renault's suggestion of joining the Free French movement in the Congo. Perhaps when "To Have and Have Not" was written and under the influence of the danger of WW2, Morgan, Marie, the Bursacs, and Eddie all climb on the boat Queen Conch heading to relatively safer shores, but not without some of that Bogart darkness. Even before the happier of endings in a WW2 related film, Morgan gives into his soft spot holding Captain Renard at gunpoint and forcing him to sign Eddie's prison release and harbor passages out of the country.

Although both films are aesthetically stunning from the shots of Ingrid Bergman in "Casablanca" to the extraordinary Weimar influence of shadows in "To Have and Have Not," the latter is far superior when it comes to the addictive mystique of the man Hollywood has affectionately nicknamed "Bogie" and this rarely seen vulnerability.

Thursday, January 28, 2016

My Best Dressed Moments in Film Vol. 2

Cyd Charisse in Morris Brown/Grace Kuhn
in "The Band Wagon" (1953)

Phyllis Calvert
in "Indiscreet" (1958)

Natalie Wood in Edith Head
in "Sex and the Single Girl" (1964)

Jean Simmons in Christian Dior
in "The Grass is Greener" (1960)

Ingrid Bergman in Christian Dior
in "Indiscreet" (1958)

Deborah Kerr in Christian Dior
in "The Grass is Greener" (1960)

Wednesday, January 20, 2016

Woman Empowerment Wednesday: Carole Lombard Tells: "How I Live By A Man's Code"

from Photoplay, June, 1937, by Hart Seymore

She's as delectably feminine as Eve, but watch out! That's no apple in her hand; it's a blackjack!

Because that apparently soft and defenseless girl curled up in the pillows is completely deceiving and if you think you, most lordly Male, can deal with her in the time-honored manner of the dominant sex, then you don't know Carole Lombard.

Having found herself plumped down into a world where men are supposed to be masters of all creation, Carole has simply adapted herself to her surroundings.

She lives her life on the logical premise that, she has equal rights with the male of the species, but she also (wise girl) preserves all her feminine perogatives.

She organizes her affairs, lives by a code designed to fit a man's world, and handles her business affairs with devastating serenity, yet she never forgets that a woman's first job is to choose the riht shade of lipstick.

She competes in sports and plays tennis better than most men, but she doesn't let her nose get shine doing it.

All of which makes "Missy" Lombard the perfect example of the modern Career Girl.

So you girls live alone and still don't like it, take a leaf from the notebook of that ultra feminine success-in-life, Carole Lombard. What one woman has done, others can do.

Of course you need a few of the more essential elements, such as a pair of eyes that can open wide in bland innocence or give off sparks that can shock and numb; a figure that looks so luscious in an evening gown that it wouldn't seem possible that it could look even better in riding dungarees -- yet it does; plus a mind that is as intuitive and fanciful as any woman's, and still forthright, outspoken and sometimes painfully honest.

That's all you need. That's all that Carole has that some girls haven't. But it's plenty.

"What's your secret -- how do you get along so well in a man's world?" I asked her.

"Because I don't believe it is a man's world," Carole replied promptly, and so, with a leap and a bound, we were right in the midst of the story.

"A woman has just as much right in this world as a man, and can get along in it just as well if she puts her mind to it" Carole announced firmly

"Take business -- that's supposed to be a man's province Yet I can name you the most outstanding success in the business life of the movies and that person is a woman: Mary Pickford. You can't match her. She's supreme in every department.

"As a matter of fact, women have an advantage in business. Men are so secure in their belief that they are supreme in business that they are often caught napping b alert women. Man thinks he's dealing with an inferior brain when it comes to woman, and that makes him a sucker. Furthermore, women have a highly developed sense of intuition that's just as valuable as hardheaded logic"

Carole has scored neatly, I'll admit. But she leaves out another excellent example of success in business; herself. She, too, has met with men in the marts of trade and emerged victorious. It's all in the record so don't take my word for it. She has recently negotiated a new contract that man a big star would give his eye teeth to own, plus the right to do an outside film at another studio,the responsibility is entirely on her shoulders. She has to talk business with dozens of producers scrambling to sign her up to their advantage, not hers. She must read dozens of scripts, for if she chooses a poor story it's going to be just too bad for little Missy. That means, in this particular case, that Carole must have every wit sharpened to be on guard against a bad contract or an even worse script.

True, she has counsel, as all good business men should. She has a capable agent, plus the advice of a most capable associate -- who happens to be another woman, her secretary, Madeline Fields. What Miss can't think of, Fieldsie can. For a pair of completely feminine women, they are a formidable combination in the dog-eat-dog of the picture business.

And does she fritter away the fruits of victor in cars, furs, big homes? She does not. Carole has always lived in small, unpretentious homes, which she decorates herself in an exquisite taste. Carole is one girl who knows where she's going and just how she's going to get there.

If you want the signposts she follows, here they are:

1. Play Fair.

"You'll find that men usually play fair," Carole said. "It's all very well to say that you want to back out of a bargain because you've changed your mind. That's supposed to be a woman's privilege. But men don't play the game that way. A man who says he'll do a thing. then reneges, is soon put where he belongs, out in the cold.

"'I' I say I'll do something, I make it stick."

2. Don't brag.

"Men can brag," Carole points out, "but that's where a woman can't do what men do, and still be feminine. No man will endure listening to a girl boast about how smart she is."

3. Obey the Boss

"A career girl who competes with men has to learn that rule -- or else. If she won't accept discipline, or bow to the rules of the institution and take orders, she can't succeed. I know that the picture director knows best. I remember when I was making "My Man Godfrey" with William Powell. Gregory La Cava was directing. One day he was ill, but he insisted that work go on while he rested.

" 'You know what to do,' he told us. ' Just pretend I'm there and go ahead.'

"Well, it didn't work. Bill and I were used to taking orders because it's part of the discipline of the studio. It was a simple scene, we knew what to do but the director wasn't there and we felt lost. Somebody has to be the boss in every big enterprise,and if the boss is absent the business soon comes to a halt."

4. Take Criticism.

"Men have learned to take criticism, that is, the successful men. The ones who flare up and go home mad are the kind of who never get the last installment paid on the radio.

"Here again the movies have taught me. I have learned to take criticism and stand up to take it like a man. Yet a woman will simply burn if you hint that the hat she's got on doesn't look quite perfect, or that she might, just might, have led from the queen, jack, ten instead of tossing in an eight spot.

"I went to a showing of the first rough cut of 'Swing High, Swing Low,' in a small college town.

"In the tragic scenes, where I screwed up my face to cry (I can't help it if I look that way when I cry), the audience laughed. When I really turned it on and emoted, they howled. It was heartbreaking. I felt like crawling under the seats and losing myself among the gum and other useless things.

"But I had to take it. If you're playing according to masculine rules, which is required of any girl with a career, you've got to accept criticism and profit by it. Otherwise how could you become a singer, decorator painter or private secretary? I learned something from that experience, too. I'm best if I top off tears with a laugh. A star who is too big for criticism sooner or later loses out. That goes for working women, too."

5. Love is Private.

"When it comes to your personal life, such as love and romance, girls should take a tip from the men and keep their affairs to themselves. Any man worth his salt regards his private life as his own: To kiss a girl and run and tell would mark him as a cad. Why doesn't that apply to girls also?"

6. Work -- And Like It!

"All women should have something worth while to do," says Carole, "and cultivate efficiency at it, whether it's housekeeping or raising chickens.

"Working women are interesting women And they're easier to live with. Idle women who can think of nothing to do with their time are dangerous to themselves and to others. The only 'catty' women I've known were idlers, with nothing to do but gossip and make trouble."

7. Pay Your Share.

"Nobody likes a man who is always fumbling when it's time to pay the check," Carole points out. "I think the woman who assumes that the man can afford to pay for everything is making a mistake. More and more the custom of the Dutch treat is coming in vogue, particularly among working men and women. You don't have to surrender your feminity if you pay your share of the bills."

8. The Cardinal Virtue.

"--Is a sense of humor," says Carole. "Do you laugh in the right places? Then, you'll get along, in fair weather or foul. Humor is nothing less than a sense of the fitness of things. Something that's out of proportion, like an inflated ego, should strike you funny, particularly if it's your own inflated ego. Otherwise you are pathetic and quite hopeless."

9. Be Consistent.

"By that," remarks Carole, "I mean you should take a hint from the men. They are terrible consistent, as a rule. You can tell what they'll do in any given circumstance.

"if a girl puts her best foot forward at the office, she shouldn't change steps when she gets home. A career girl must be neatly turned out, even-tempered and willing to take orders at work and there's no reason why she must check those virtues with her hat and coat when she leaves her place of business.

"I manage to add enough inconsistency to my behavior at the studio so that I'm the same there as at home; inclined to blow off steam at odd moments or be very demure and sweet-tempered -- just to keep 'em guessing. In fact I've got myself guessing. I don't quite know which way I am. That's being consistently inconsistent, anyway.

"Men are about the same at home as they are at work. Don't say it's because they lack the imagination to be otherwise -- just take the hint. Men are creatures of habit and comfort, and the are puzzled and disturbed by change. That's why so many of them marry their stenographers; it's in the hope of finding the same efficiency at home as at the office. They are supreme optimists.

"If you go into the business world to meet male competition, then you've got to play the game more or less according to their rules.

"By doing that, I've found that any intelligent girl can get along very well. About the only important difference I've noticed is in the problem of travel; men can travel alone easier than women. However, old habits of transportation are changing and the comfort of women is more and more the concern of air, railroad and bus travel."

10. Be Feminine.

"All of this," Carole declares, "does not keep you from preserving your feminity You can still be insane about a certain brand of perfume and weep when you get a run in your favorite pair of stockings.

"You can still have its when the store sends out the very shade of red drapes you did not order, and which swear horribly at the red in the davenport. But when you go down to complain, be a man about it.

"All of which sums up to this: Play fair and be reasonable. When a woman can do that, she'll make some man the best manager he ever found, or wind up running a whole department store. And being a woman, thank heaven you still have that choice!"

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I hope you don't mind, Carole & Co, this was so delightfully and tangibly bad ass, I just had to!