cinemabon
05-11-2006, 12:48 PM
Two Stinkers and a classic
Long before “The Love Boat” or “Fantasy Island” stacked their casts with aging famous actors, Hollywood knew the ‘drawing power’ of a movie star. If one movie star brings people to theaters, perhaps more stars will bring more people. Hence, films like Dinner at Eight, Stagecoach, Grand Hotel and many others gave rise to numerous vehicles through the years that headlined, to borrow a phrase, ‘casts of stars’ to help sell films with weak or non-existent plots. These films were created for one reason, to make money for everyone involved, purely commercial ventures.
Down through the years, some of these films have succeeded while others have failed miserably. Some of the worst stinkers arrived in the 1970’s, when Hollywood hit an all time low with quality in films. The old guard was dying out. But before they went, several films featured these aging actors, such as Earthquake with overweight and heavily made up Ava Gardner, among others.
Along comes Irwin Allen, a graduate of Columbia School of Journalism, with a history in radio advertising. He created a documentary in 1952 called “The Sea Around Us” for which he won an Academy Award. He then entered into television production bringing us Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Lost in Space, Time Tunnel, and Land of the Giants. He finally and successfully ventured into feature films with “The Poseidon Adventure” followed by “The Towering Inferno” (amazingly nominated by the Academy for Best Picture!) He poured a great deal of money into salaries and special effects to ‘wow’ his audiences. The formula worked the first time out. Poseidon made Allen a ton of money and it won an Oscar for special effects.
It did not matter to Allen whether any person with the least bit of knowledge about movies panned the film. However, burned once, twice shy. His second big budget feature with the same formula went over budget and flopped at the box office. The Towering Inferno is often burned in effigy (pun intended) as one of the worst films of all time.
Examining both films closely, there is little difference between the two. Actors go off to ‘hammy’ extremes with pathetic results, while they dodge falling objects on fire and scream a lot. If Gene Hackman is a priest, I’m Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm. (He played ‘Popeye’ Doyle the year before! Totally miscast!) Too bad more deserving films don’t get better treatment. So much for these new slick packaged double disc releases. Their release may have more to do with remakes than their merit. (i.e., this week’s release of Poseidon in Imax, 3-D and everything else they can do to make a buck!)
Lastly, this past week saw MGM re-release one of its 1950’s treasures (they own the rights anyway) of Samuel Goldwyn’s version of Frank Loesser’s “Guys and Dolls.”
Based on a series of stories about New York by writer Damon Runyon; this one about Sarah Brown, a young Salvation Army worker that falls for and redeems a gambler known as Sky Masterson. The roles were somewhat reversed in the stage play, and carried into the film. Only Vivian Blaine and Stubby Kaye, along with a few dancers Michael Kidd brought, arrived in Los Angeles transplanted from the production in New York. Goldwyn, semi-retired brought his son to see the production in New York and bought the rights (he’d been a gambler most of his life, literally). After he hired Joe Mankiewicz for the helm, Joe brought in Brando (whom he directed in Julius Caesar) and Simmons (she just appeared with Brando in Desiree). Mankiewicz flush with four Oscars from All About Eve and Letter to Three Wives rewrote the book (with Loesser looking on) to create larger meatier rolls for the dramatic actors. Sinatra, wanting originally to be cast as Masterson, reluctantly came aboard only after they expanded his part and wrote additional music for him to sing. Ironically, when Brando struggled to blurt out “Luck Be a Lady” on the set, Frank flew to Vegas’ Sands Hotel every night and made the number his signature piece.
The two performers never became friendly on the set, Frank the no nonsense guy and Brando the prankster. One humorous anecdote on the DVD includes the story told by Michael Kidd that Brando kept flubbing the lines during his scene with ‘one take’ Sinatra when the crooner had to eat a bite of cheesecake during each take. The skinny Sinatra was forced to eat bite after bite; his anger growing as the day wore on. Finally after a long frustrating day trying to shoot the scene, Mankewicz called it quits. Kidd met Brando in the parking lot and asked him why he had so much trouble. “I would have emptied the lot’s refrigerator of cheesecake than let that louse get away with one take!” the grinning Brando quipped.
The performances and singing are genuine (no dubbing). This is one “old fashioned” musical that most who hate the genre can sink their teeth into and come away satisfied.
Long before “The Love Boat” or “Fantasy Island” stacked their casts with aging famous actors, Hollywood knew the ‘drawing power’ of a movie star. If one movie star brings people to theaters, perhaps more stars will bring more people. Hence, films like Dinner at Eight, Stagecoach, Grand Hotel and many others gave rise to numerous vehicles through the years that headlined, to borrow a phrase, ‘casts of stars’ to help sell films with weak or non-existent plots. These films were created for one reason, to make money for everyone involved, purely commercial ventures.
Down through the years, some of these films have succeeded while others have failed miserably. Some of the worst stinkers arrived in the 1970’s, when Hollywood hit an all time low with quality in films. The old guard was dying out. But before they went, several films featured these aging actors, such as Earthquake with overweight and heavily made up Ava Gardner, among others.
Along comes Irwin Allen, a graduate of Columbia School of Journalism, with a history in radio advertising. He created a documentary in 1952 called “The Sea Around Us” for which he won an Academy Award. He then entered into television production bringing us Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Lost in Space, Time Tunnel, and Land of the Giants. He finally and successfully ventured into feature films with “The Poseidon Adventure” followed by “The Towering Inferno” (amazingly nominated by the Academy for Best Picture!) He poured a great deal of money into salaries and special effects to ‘wow’ his audiences. The formula worked the first time out. Poseidon made Allen a ton of money and it won an Oscar for special effects.
It did not matter to Allen whether any person with the least bit of knowledge about movies panned the film. However, burned once, twice shy. His second big budget feature with the same formula went over budget and flopped at the box office. The Towering Inferno is often burned in effigy (pun intended) as one of the worst films of all time.
Examining both films closely, there is little difference between the two. Actors go off to ‘hammy’ extremes with pathetic results, while they dodge falling objects on fire and scream a lot. If Gene Hackman is a priest, I’m Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm. (He played ‘Popeye’ Doyle the year before! Totally miscast!) Too bad more deserving films don’t get better treatment. So much for these new slick packaged double disc releases. Their release may have more to do with remakes than their merit. (i.e., this week’s release of Poseidon in Imax, 3-D and everything else they can do to make a buck!)
Lastly, this past week saw MGM re-release one of its 1950’s treasures (they own the rights anyway) of Samuel Goldwyn’s version of Frank Loesser’s “Guys and Dolls.”
Based on a series of stories about New York by writer Damon Runyon; this one about Sarah Brown, a young Salvation Army worker that falls for and redeems a gambler known as Sky Masterson. The roles were somewhat reversed in the stage play, and carried into the film. Only Vivian Blaine and Stubby Kaye, along with a few dancers Michael Kidd brought, arrived in Los Angeles transplanted from the production in New York. Goldwyn, semi-retired brought his son to see the production in New York and bought the rights (he’d been a gambler most of his life, literally). After he hired Joe Mankiewicz for the helm, Joe brought in Brando (whom he directed in Julius Caesar) and Simmons (she just appeared with Brando in Desiree). Mankiewicz flush with four Oscars from All About Eve and Letter to Three Wives rewrote the book (with Loesser looking on) to create larger meatier rolls for the dramatic actors. Sinatra, wanting originally to be cast as Masterson, reluctantly came aboard only after they expanded his part and wrote additional music for him to sing. Ironically, when Brando struggled to blurt out “Luck Be a Lady” on the set, Frank flew to Vegas’ Sands Hotel every night and made the number his signature piece.
The two performers never became friendly on the set, Frank the no nonsense guy and Brando the prankster. One humorous anecdote on the DVD includes the story told by Michael Kidd that Brando kept flubbing the lines during his scene with ‘one take’ Sinatra when the crooner had to eat a bite of cheesecake during each take. The skinny Sinatra was forced to eat bite after bite; his anger growing as the day wore on. Finally after a long frustrating day trying to shoot the scene, Mankewicz called it quits. Kidd met Brando in the parking lot and asked him why he had so much trouble. “I would have emptied the lot’s refrigerator of cheesecake than let that louse get away with one take!” the grinning Brando quipped.
The performances and singing are genuine (no dubbing). This is one “old fashioned” musical that most who hate the genre can sink their teeth into and come away satisfied.