Under discussion:

The Women  (1939)

I just recently saw a new trailer of a remake of THE WOMEN, the chick flick of 1939.  The new movie will star Meg Ryan, Jada Pluckett Smith and Eva Mendes will respectively take the Norma Shearer, Rosalind Russell and Joan Crawford roles.  I saw enough to see this will be a different movie than the original but decided to take a look back.

Once upon a time, there was a studio that was considered the Rolls Royce of the studios in the height of the studio system.  That studio was called MGM.  This studio had stars that had their own public persona that would what roles were given to them.

Of course, MGM had other actresses but three were considered their biggest female stars.  There was Greta Garbo, the regal Swedish beauty nowhere to be found in this.  The was Norma Shearer, who generally played high society ladies, at times a bit spoiled but usually showing integrity at the end.  And there was Joan Crawford, the only one of the three who continued her career after 1941.  Her thirties persona was that of a working girl who was also pretty much a go-getter.  She would also usually show victorious virtue at the end of her movies. 

It's worth noting that both Shearer and Crawford were early contenders to play Scarlet O'Hara in GONE WITH THE WIND and of course, neither played her.  Cukor, who started the film, was replaced by Victor Fleming, thus freeing him to adapt the then famous Claire Booth Luce play. The resulting movie would show no man or boy throughout.

Society dame Shearer finds out her husband is having an affair with shop girl Crawford.  Norma spends a lot of time at beauty parlors and fashion shows wtith wise cracking Rosalind Russell (gets the best lines), elder busy body Mary Boland, then novice Joan Fontaine and slapstick foil Paulette Goddard (then Chaplin's wife).

At their brief encounter, Crawford gives Shearer back her husband saying she got what she wanted from him and she was doing her a favor.  Shearer tearfully begs over the phone for her husband to take her back.  If that phone scene sounds difficult to watch, it definitely was for me.  What make it worse is that Boland practically demanded that to happen.  So much for women's lib for 1939.

It will be fascinating to see how the upcoming new version compares.

Under discussion:

Fight Club  (1999)

This movie definitely has it's moments and this does have one of Edward Norton's best performances.   He is strongly supported by Brad Pitt and Helena Bonham Carter.

The whole premise of a fight club that guys go to to break their office routines was fresh.   That it could have led to anarchy and/or other types of craziness was good.  But it ended up just being part of Norton's imagination.  It took me by surprise and felt left down by it.

Under discussion:

Batman Begins  (2005)

A few years ago, Tim Burton gave the public two Batman movies.  He gave a nice visual style and cinema a Batman one could almost take seriously.   The two that followd were inferior, the last one bad enough that they were no more Batman movies for awhile.

Christopher Nolin took a crack at the Masked Manhunter and gave the Batman origin a delicious spin. Mainly, from the death of his parents to being a full fledged Batman, what did Bruce Wayne do in between those times?

Christian Bates as Bruce Wayne is well cast as the bored billionaire that Wayne pretends to be and Katie Holmes is the best I've seen her as the quizative reporter.  Lian Nelson has the best role, actually as Wayne's mentor turned into Batman's nemesis in a character arc that actually makes some sense.  I enjoyed seeing how the belt gets invented, the suit.  This is the best Batman to date and look forward to the next one but only if it's Nolan directing.

Musicals are not a favorite genre.  In fact, growing up in the sixties, the major musical stars were able to sustain massive fan bases strictly on their audio recordings.  There was a notable exception, Elvis Presley, whose sixties musicals actually lost fans to the more creative Beatles, Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones.

However, many successful musicals were made in the sixties.  West Side Story, which won ten Oscars, was the first one..  For me, it's the best and holds up extremely well.  Though the viewer believe for one second that they're watching gang members, it presented race relations in such a way that would  not only frustrate Maria and Tony, it would actual slayings and an attempted rape in this musical.

The songs are top natch, especially the haunting "Maria", but there's not a bad song in this Bernstein-Sondheim score.  Add the choreograhy of Jerome Robbins and the visual editing skills of veteran director Robert Wise and this is one movie I have seen over and over again with much pleasure.

Top billed Natalie Wood actually gave her best performance of her career in her previous movie "Splendor In the Grass."  She also was the female lead in James Dean's best movie "Rebel Without a Cause" and though brief, a very pivital role in John Wayne's best movie "The Searchers."  Yes, she's actually Russian but she made a perfect Maria and very believable as a Puerto Rican.  Richard Breymar as Tony was very acceptable.  Even beter was Russ Tamblyn as Riff and the Oscar winning performances of George Chakiris as Bernardo and Rita Moreno as his lover, Anita. 

Minus the Juliette suicide, this is an updated version of Shakepeare's Romeo and Juliet.  The Jets and the Sharks are what we first see.  Though they sing and dance, there is an underlying message of racism on both sides.  Riff as the leader, sings out the Jet theme song.  Afterwards, he meets Tony, who's got a job loading and unloading crates for the neighborhood store.  He agrees to come to the dance and feels that something's coming.

That something is Maria, at her first dance being overprotected by her brother Bernardo, who've we've eariler as the leader of the Sharks.  Tony and Maria lock eyes and everything else goes out of focus.  Reality, mainly Bernardo and Riff, snaps them out of it  and there's going to be a rumble soon.  Tony's in loves and sings he can't stop saying Maria. 

My favorite choregraphed scene is Anita and Bernardo doing their tete-a-tele with America.  There's dark humor in the lyrics and  the men and the women have their dancing moments to shine.

Tony meets Maria at the back stairways and declare their love for each other.  They meet where Maria works and have a touching pretend wedding scene with the clothes.  Anita disapproves but lets them.  Maria begs Tony to stop the rumble and actually reduces it a single fist fight.  The Jets do a great comedy song Officer Krukey and there's a big chorus of "Tonight" by the major characters.

However, at the rumble, Tony arrives to stop the fight and gets baited as a chicken.  This angers Riff who pulls out a knife. So does Bernardo and he kills Riff.  Right away, Tony kills Bernardo and gang members flee from the two dead bodies.

Tony spends the night with Maria and when he leaves, askes Maria to meet him to leave.  Rita, extremely angry that Maria slept with Bernardo's killer, nevertheless agrees to go to the store where Tony works to pick up the money.  However, the Jets member almost rape her and she tells them that Maria has killed herself.  This drives Tony crazy.  He runs out of the streets begging Chico to kill him as well, which Chico does.  The movie ends with "Somewhere" and Maria demanding a truce of the gangs.

Now you don't have to see the movie, but see it anyway.