Classic Films in Focus: DARK WATERS (1944)

Somewhere between Lifeboat (1944) and Gaslight (1944) lies the plot of Dark Waters (1944), in which Merle Oberon stars as the survivor of a U-boat attack whose fragile sanity is tested by a collection of nefarious characters. All three pictures appeared in the same year, but the first two are decidedly better films, while Dark Waters holds interest primarily for its cast. Joining Oberon for this wartime swamp Gothic are Franchot Tone, Thomas Mitchell, Elisha Cook, Jr., and Fay Bainter, with Rex Ingram making sporadic but memorable appearances as a former employee who suspects that something is amiss at the old plantation. Dark Waters fails to deliver enough creepy atmosphere to achieve its Gothic ambitions, and the ending is more a hard stop than a proper conclusion, but Oberon is fascinating to watch as she tries to figure out whether she's going or being driven insane.

Oberon's perpetually imperiled heroine is Leslie Calvin, whose family flees the Japanese descent on Batavia (present day Jakarta) only to fall victim to a German U-boat attack at sea. Leslie survives many days in an open boat before ending up in a New Orleans hospital. After months of convalescence she travels to a nearby plantation owned by her aunt and uncle, where she hopes to recover from her post traumatic stress. She meets a handsome doctor (Franchot Tone), who quickly falls for her, but everything else goes awry as she is constantly exposed to situations that recall her ordeal and unsettle her sense of reality. Leslie begins to suspect that the manipulative Mr. Sydney (Thomas Mitchell) and his sidekick, Cleeve (Elisha Cook, Jr.), are tormenting her on purpose, but to what end?

Gothic mystery is a fine setting for Oberon's exotic beauty, but she gets better material to work with in both Wuthering Heights (1939) and The Lodger (1944), where her characters have more energy and more successfully developed plots. Franchot Tone's country doctor, George, doesn't spark much chemistry, but he seems to be the only available man in the area aside from Elisha Cook Jr.'s creepy Cleeve. It doesn't take two minutes to recognize both Cleeve and Sydney as the villains of this piece, and Thomas Mitchell has a handful of effectively menacing scenes, but Fay Bainter's Aunt Emily is neither disturbing nor reassuring, and it's hard to justify John Qualen's presence as Uncle Norbert, since he barely comes out of his room to utter a few lines at dinner. Fine actors inhabiting the background don't get enough to do, either, especially Rex Ingram and Odette Myrtil, who turns up as the mother of a large, friendly Cajun family.

There's enough potential in Dark Waters to see the movie it could be, and that warrants a viewing, especially for contrast with moodier explorations of similar plots and atmospheres. The Louisiana bayou makes an evocative setting, and the premise of Leslie's very justified anxiety about water and boats creates numerous opportunities for her to be tormented. We know from the beginning where the third act of this story will inevitably end (hence the title), but when the film finally reaches that point it seems in a hurry to wrap things up, and quite a few loose ends are left dangling. The pacing is more of a shock because there had apparently been plenty of time to linger on an earlier fais do-do sequence that adds nothing to the story. It's hard to say if director Andre De Toth or the writers are to blame for these issues, but De Toth certainly made tighter pictures over the course of his career.

Do pause a moment to appreciate the underused Nina Mae McKinney as the housemaid, Florella, who unfortunately disappears from the picture in the third act. For more of Merle Oberon, try The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933), The Scarlet Pimpernel (1934), or That Uncertain Feeling (1941). See earlier roles for Franchot Tone in Bombshell (1933), Dancing Lady (1933), and Dangerous (1935). Thomas Mitchell is best remembered for more sympathetic characters in Stagecoach (1939), Gone with the Wind (1939), and It's a Wonderful Life (1946), while Elisha Cook, Jr. offers more of his usual type in The Maltese Falcon (1941), I Wake Up Screaming (1941), and The Killing (1956). For a more thoughtful and provocative treatment of a similar atmosphere, try I Walked with a Zombie (1943), or, for some really excessive gaslighting bayou horror, go for Hush... Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964).


* As of February 2019, DARK WATERS is available for streaming on Amazon Prime, but the print is rather muddy, especially in the outdoor night sequences.

Summer Under the Stars: Bette Davis in DANGEROUS (1935)

This post is part of the Summer Under the Stars blogathon hosted by Sittin' on a Backyard Fence and ScribeHard on Film. Visit their blogs for links to all of the Bette Davis posts in conjunction with TCM's day honoring the star on August 14, 2013.

Bette Davis won her first Best Actress Oscar for Dangerous (1935), a romantic melodrama directed by Alfred E. Green and costarring Franchot Tone. As the title suggests, Davis plays a female who proves fatal to the men who are drawn to her flame, but the story is melodrama than noir because Davis’ anti-heroine knows that she’s bad news and agonizes over what to do about it. With its top-notch Davis performance and excellent darker role for Franchot Tone, Dangerous is a must-see picture for the leading lady’s fans, even if it isn’t as well-known today as most of her other Oscar-nominated films.

Davis plays alcoholic, has-been actress Joyce Heath, whose brilliant stage career collapsed when she became feared as a jinx on her plays. Her lovers have been unluckier still, as architect Don Bellows (Franchot Tone) discovers for himself when he takes Joyce in and promptly falls under her spell. Don breaks his engagement to socially prominent sweetheart Gail (Margaret Lindsay) and puts all of his money into financing a comeback for Joyce, but a terrible secret makes Joyce falter when Don presses her to marry him.

In Joyce Heath, Davis has an early version of the kind of character who would become her signature role, a wounded, emotional woman desperate for love and happiness but far too likely to lash out at those who only want to help her. Early on, Joyce has some of the low-rent, streetworn look of Mildred, the destructive character who had earned Davis her first Best Actress nomination in Of Human Bondage (1934). The drunk scenes are particularly reminiscent of the earlier role, but Joyce’s capacity for redemption prefigures great Davis characters like Julie Marsden in Jezebel (1938) and Fanny Skeffington in Mr. Skeffington (1944). Joyce is, like most of the really memorable Davis heroines, ready to go to extremes, especially in her willingness to take hints from Ethan Frome on how to solve romantic quandaries, but we sympathize with her because she is so unhappy and so ultimately determined to atone for her sins.

Davis has an adept costar in Franchot Tone as the latest lover to suffer for her bad luck. Tone played a lot of playboys and lovers in comedies during the 1930s, with memorable appearances in Bombshell (1933), Dancing Lady (1933), and The Girl from Missouri (1934), but here he gets to transform his happy golden boy into a miserable wreck. His cheerful face becomes gaunt and shadowy, his jaw hard, and his shoulders slumped as he gets deeper and deeper into a dangerous entanglement with Joyce, which eats away at his soul and drives him from the arms of his faithful girl. To her credit, Joyce tries to send Don away multiple times, honestly telling him that she will only bring him heartbreak and ruin, even as she yearns for him herself. Margaret Lindsay makes a plucky good girl foil to Davis’ Joyce, and Alison Skipworth does well in the role of Don’s middle-aged housekeeper. The weak link in the dramatic chain is John Eldredge as Gordon; he has a critical role to play late in the film, and it comes off badly, though to say too much about it is to spoil the plot for first-time viewers.

For more of Bette Davis’ early career, try Three on a Match (1932), The Petrified Forest (1936), and Marked Woman (1937). She continued to work for the rest of her life, making her final screen appearances in The Whales of August (1987) and Wicked Stepmother (1989) before her death in 1989. Franchot Tone stars in Mutiny on the Bounty (1935), Five Graves to Cairo (1943), and Advise and Consent (1962), and Margaret Lindsay also plays opposite Davis in Jezebel. For more from director Alfred E. Green, try Smart Money (1931), Baby Face (1933), and The Jolson Story (1946).

Full reviews to other  Bette Davis films airing on August 14 can be found here:

THE PETRIFIED FOREST (1936) 
JEZEBEL (1938)
THE LETTER (1940)
NOW, VOYAGER (1942)
DARK VICTORY (1939)

Classic Films in Focus: BOMBSHELL (1933)

Two of Jean Harlow’s film titles became permanently associated with her image; one is Platinum Blonde (1931) and the other is Bombshell (1933), a very Hollywood look at the life and trials of a fictional leading lady. Under the uncredited direction of Victor Fleming, Bombshell presents a comedic take on the hazards of stardom, with Harlow playing a role for which she already had plenty of personal experience. Although it’s a funny picture with a cast of memorable performers, Bombshell also suggests the darker side of Tinseltown fame, since Harlow’s harried movie queen finds that there’s really no exit from the gilded cage in which she resides.

Harlow plays Hollywood star Lola Burns, who is adored by her fans but beset by leeches and opportunists on every side. Lola’s fame and the studio’s overeager publicity head, Space Hanlon (Lee Tracy), conspire to make her love life impossible, while her nutty relatives thwart her desire for peace at home. Sick of her crazy life, Lola runs away, but neither the studio nor Lola’s family will let go of their meal ticket that easily.

Although she is remembered today primarily as a sex symbol, Harlow shows a natural gift for comedy, and she easily keeps up with her hammy costars. She throws several impressive fits throughout the picture, tossing her platinum curls and stamping her little foot to great effect. Lee Tracy and Frank Morgan give her plenty to fume about with their troublesome characters; Harlow’s screen presence is evident in her ability to keep such inveterate scene-stealers from walking off with her film. Una Merkel, however, has little to do as Lola’s secretary, which is a shame since she knows how to work a comic character just as well as any of her costars. Franchot Tone adds class as the latest man to enter Lola’s life, the well-heeled Gifford Middleton, with C. Aubrey Smith and Mary Forbes as his parents.

Bombshell is ostensibly a comedy, and it does offer some very funny scenes and performances, but there’s also something terribly sad about Lola’s situation. She ends the movie no better than she started, even though we long to see her throw off the mooching father, the opportunistic secretary, and the two-faced publicity man once and for all. She never has a meaningful relationship with another person, even though her desire to adopt a baby shows how much she longs for it. Her career is ultimately nothing more than a glamorous trap from which she cannot escape, even though we know that an actress’ fame lasts only as long as her looks and her youth. Harlow herself would die at the tragically young age of 26, right at the height of her popularity, but her three marriages and two divorces indicate that she must have known something of Lola’s struggle to find real love.

Look for Ted Healy, Pat O’Brien, and Louise Beavers in supporting roles. For more of Jean Harlow, see Platinum Blonde (1931), Wife vs. Secretary (1936), and Saratoga (1937). You’ll find Lee Tracy in Doctor X (1932) and Dinner at Eight (1933). Frank Morgan, best remembered as the Wizard in The Wizard of Oz (1939), also turns up in The Great Ziegfeld (1936), Dimples (1936), and The Shop Around the Corner (1940). Franchot Tone gets better leading man roles in Dancing Lady (1933) and opposite Harlow in The Girl from Missouri (1934). Victor Fleming, the uncredited director of some half dozen films in the 1930s, is best known for his work on Gone with the Wind (1939) and The Wizard of Oz (1939), but he also directed Captains Courageous (1937) and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941).

Classic Films in Focus: DANCING LADY (1933)

There's something of a kitchen sink feeling about Dancing Lady (1933) that is bound to pique the interest of any classic film fan. You want Busby Berkeley style musical numbers with lots of skin? Done. How about Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, and Franchot Tone in a steamy love triangle? Yes, you can have that, too. But wait, you say you want more? How about the official screen debut of Fred Astaire? Dancing Lady has that covered, as well. Just for kicks, it also throws in the Three Stooges yukking it up, Nelson Eddy singing, Sterling Holloway pitching a fit, and Eve Arden and Lynn Bari making early uncredited appearances. If it's not the best of the 1930s musicals (and it's definitely not), all of these goodies at least make Dancing Lady one of the most jam-packed, and certainly entertaining enough to be worth watching.

Joan Crawford stars as Janie Barlow, an aspiring dancer who gets a lucky break when a wealthy admirer named Tod Newton (Franchot Tone) helps her escape the burlesque shows for more legitimate theater. Tod has plans to make Janie the star of his bedroom as well as the stage, but Janie's gratitude only goes so far, especially after she meets Patch Gallagher (Clark Gable), a temperamental director who realizes that Janie has real talent. Tod ups the ante by proposing marriage, but Janie feels torn between her dreams of stardom, her feelings for Patch, and her opportunity to trade everything else for a life of leisure as Mrs. Tod Newton.

The story works well enough as a romantic drama, although Franchot Tone's character is rather hard to pin down; should we think he's a manipulative heel or a smitten guy just trying to get the girl by any means necessary? The real chemistry is clearly between Crawford and Gable, but there's still enough heat coming off of Crawford and Tone to keep things up in the air. In real life, Crawford carried on affairs with both Gable and Tone, and she actually married Tone in 1935 (they would divorce in 1939). Crawford is at her best in passionate clinches with both of her leading men, but her brief scenes with Astaire reveal the limitations of her abilities. He floats away, while she stomps out a hoofer's heavy beats, leaving the audience wondering exactly what kind of talent the show's managers think they see in her.

In keeping with its kitchen sink ambitions, Dancing Lady throws in musical numbers and comedy in more or less equal amounts with its drama. Imitating the successful 42nd Street (1933), which had come out earlier the same year, the movie offers a lot of chorus girls in weirdly suggestive outfits doing some very improbable dance routines, and this is certainly entertaining in its own way, although the choreography is not as eye-popping as that done by Busby Berkeley. Equally weird, and perhaps more entertaining, are the scenes featuring Ted Healy and the Stooges, especially the "brush-off" segment with the Stooges wrecking Janie's audition. Janie's sidekick, Rosette (Winnie Lightner), also provides some memorable laughs, as does May Robson as Tod's mostly deaf grandmother. Eve Arden and Lynn Bari appear only briefly, although Arden does get a few good lines. Sterling Holloway enjoys a more noteworthy role in which he huffs and puffs in vain at Clark Gable's Patch.

If you want to see more films directed by Robert Z. Leonard, try The Great Ziegfeld (1936), Ziegfeld Girl (1941), and In the Good Old Summertime (1949). For other Joan Crawford films with Clark Gable, see Possessed (1931), Love on the Run (1936), and Strange Cargo (1940). Franchot Tone earned an Oscar nomination for Best Actor for Mutiny on the Bounty (1935), in which Gable also stars, but you can also catch him with Jean Harlow in The Girl from Missouri (1934) and with Bette Davis in Dangerous (1935). If you can't get enough of the early 1930s musical style, move on to 42nd Street (1933), Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933), and Footlight Parade (1933).