Category Archives: 1934

Movies released in 1934 and reviewed hr\ere

Treasure Island (1934)

Posted on April 5, 2013 | 2 comments

Treasure IslandTreasure Island Poster
Directed by Victor Fleming
1934/USA
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
Second or third viewing

 

Capt. Alexander Smollett: When there’s treasure in the hold, there’s fire in the fo’c’sle.

Old Billy Bones (Lionel Barrymore) turns up at the inn run by Jim Hawkins’s (Jackie Cooper) mother with a mysterious chest. Soon other unsavory characters turn up in search of Billy. Upon Billy’s untimely death, Jim discovers a treasure map in the chest. Gentlemen of the town hire a ship to search for the treasure. Before they know it, unscrupulous but loveable Long John Silver (Wallace Beery) has signed on as cook and brought aboard his pirate cronies as crew. Long John and Jim become fast friends and the adventure begins.

Treasure Island 1

This movie was a ton of fun and I’m sure immensely popular with boys when it came out. I thought the style foreshadowed The Wizard of Oz, also directed by Fleming, in its storybook exaggeration and charm. The pirates are deliciously vile!  I think those who enjoyed The Adventures of Robin Hood would like this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzjvpwTdqkk

Clip

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Posted in 1934, Movie Reviews

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Manhattan Melodrama (1934)

Posted on April 4, 2013 | 4 comments

Manhattan MelodramaManhattan Melodrama Poster
Directed by W. S. Van Dyke
1934/USA
Cosmopolitan Productions for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
First Viewing

 

James W. ‘Jim’ Wade: I’m going to clean out every rotten spot I can find in this city, and, Blackie, I don’t want to find you in any of them.

Blackie and Jim were childhood buddies. Both were rescued from a tragic steamship fire and then raised together by a man who was trampled to death at a political rally. Blackie (Clark Gable) grows up to be a gambler and tough while Jim (William Powell) grows up a lawyer and idealistic politico. Blackie’s main squeeze is Eleanor (Myrna Loy) but he eventually loses her to Jim who is the marrying kind. Jim becomes District Attorney and friendship and crime-fighting come into conflict.  I think we all know where this is going!

ManhattanMelodramaStill4

I thought the script really let down the actors, who were fine. There were just one too many coincidences and everybody was a tad too noble for me to bear. But what do I know? This won an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay in 1934.

This was the movie that bank robber John Dillinger had just seen before he was gunned down in front of Chicago’s Biograph Theater on July 22, 1934.

Trailer

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Of Human Bondage (1934)

Posted on April 4, 2013 | 1 comment

Of Human Bondageofhumanbondage_poster
Directed by John Cromwell
1934/USA
RKO Radio Pictures
First Viewing

 

Mildred Rogers: You cad, you dirty swine! I never cared for you, not once! I was always makin’ a fool of ya! Ya bored me stiff; I hated ya! It made me SICK when I had to let ya kiss me. I only did it because ya begged me, ya hounded me and drove me crazy! And after ya kissed me, I always used to wipe my mouth! WIPE MY MOUTH!

Leslie Howard plays Philip Carey, a club-footed medical student with the soul of an artist. He falls helplessly in love with Mildred (Bette Davis), a waitress with a heart of ice who treats him like dirt. She figures that she can always go to Philip for help when she is in trouble and she is right.

Of Human Bondage Davis

Bette Davis begged Warner Bros. to loan her to RKO so that she could play the meaty but unsympathetic role of Mildred. Her gamble paid off and the movie made her a star. Her performance is excellent and far less mannered than she would get in later roles. Leslie Howard is actually the central character and he acquits himself well as the pathetic young man.  I thought the ending was a bit weak but it turns out that it is the same as in the novel.

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The Black Cat (1934)

Posted on April 3, 2013 | 8 comments

The Black CatBlack Cat Poster
Directed by Edgar G. Ulmer
1934/USA
Universal Pictures
Second viewing

 

Highly enjoyable pre-Code Universal horror outing with boffo dual performances by Karloff and Lugosi.

Peter Allison: I don’t know. It all sounds like a lot of supernatural baloney to me.
Dr. Vitus Verdegast: Supernatural, perhaps. Baloney, perhaps not. There are many things under the sun.[/box]

Dr. Vitus Vendergast (Bela Lugosi) meets honeymooners Peter (David Manners) and Joan on a train and hitches a ride with them to their ultimate destination. On the way, the car goes off the road, the driver is killed and the party is forced to take refuge in the creepy modernist castle of Hjalmar Poelzig (Boris Karloff).

The-Black-Cat 2

This suits Vendergast just fine as he is on a mission to make Poelzig, his sworn enemy, suffer slowly. Poelzig left Vendergast to rot in prison for 15 years then told Vendergast’s wife she was a widow and took her for his own.

Hjalmar Poelzig: The phone is dead. Do you hear that, Vitus? Even the phone is dead.

The movie is basically a duel of wits between Vendergast and Poelzig, who also has plans to use Joan as the sacrifice in a Black Mass.   As for a black cat, well one wanders around, but it’s basically just an excuse to use the Edgar Allen Poe title

Black Cat 1

This is the kind of thing I just eat up. Sure it can be a little campy in places and Lugosi over-emotes furiously but that is part of the fun. The Expressionist cinematography and art direction are quite wonderful.  Recommended for lovers of classic Universal horror.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1yyr5UfVWE

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Posted in 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, 1934

Charlie Chan in London (1934)

Posted on April 3, 2013 | Leave a comment

Charlie Chan in LondonCharlie Chan in London Poster
Directed by Eugene Ford
1934/USA
Fox Film Corporation
First Viewing

 

 

Charlie Chan: If you want wild bird to sing do not put him in cage.

A woman is convinced that her brother, who has been sentenced to death, is innocent of murdering the Secretary of the Hunt at a mansion where he was staying.  Charlie Chan (Werner Oland) is called in on the case only three days before the hanging.  Will he be able to discover the true killer on the grounds of the British country house?  Need you ask?  Also with Ray Milland as the condemned man’s attorney and Alan Mowbray as the owner of the mansion.

charlie chan in london 3

This is a pretty good entry in the Charlie Chan series.  Charlie does without the assistance of Number One Son here.  The DVD comes with a featurette in which various people argue that the Charlie Chan character, despite some stereotyping, was a positive development for the image of Chinese Americans in films.  Up to then, Chinese were generally portrayed as either servants or evil doers.  Charlie Chan was always the smartest guy in the room.  It’s unfortunate that the times allowed him to be portrayed by a Swede, however talented.

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It’s a Gift (1934)

Posted on April 1, 2013 | 8 comments

It’s a Giftits_a_gift DVD
Directed by Norman Z. McLeod
1934/USA
Paramount Pictures
#81 of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die
Second viewing

 

W.C. Fields plays Harold Bisonette (that’s Biso-NAY when his wife’s around). The hen-pecked Bisonette owns a corner grocery but dreams of moving to California and running an orange ranch. His uncle dies and leaves him the money to move his family West, much to their disgust. The orange grove turns out to be a bust but there is always a happy ending in a W.C. Fields movie.

Harry Payne Bosterly: You’re drunk!
Harold: And you’re crazy. But I’ll be sober tomorrow and you’ll be crazy for the rest of your life.

It's a Gift 3

I have been trying to figure out why Fields just isn’t funny to me. I think he lets each of his gags run on too long and telegraphs them too obviously. Also much of the humor relies on destruction, irritating noises, etc., which I find more annoying than comic. Finally this movie has a scene of food humor toward the end. I can’t help it, I just find anything involving making a mess with food more disgusting than anything else.

This is one of the 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die. The only reason I can find is that W.C. Fields is a name everybody has probably heard of. I now have seen this film twice and that’s more than enough for one lifetime.

The porch scene (Karl L-a-F-o-n-g)

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Posted in 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, 1934, Movie Reviews

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The Scarlet Pimpernel (1934)

Posted on March 30, 2013 | 2 comments

The Scarlet PimpernelScarlet Pimpernel DVD
Directed by Harold Young
1934/UK
London Film Productions
Second Viewing

 

Percy Blakeney: They seek him here, they seek him there, / Those Frenchies seek him everywhere. / Is he in heaven? Or is he in hell? / That damned elusive Pimpernel!

During the French Reign of Terror, the mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel saves French aristocrats from the guillotine and spirits them away to England. Leslie Howard plays the gallant Pimpernel and his alter ego the foppish Sir Percy Blakeley. Merle Oberon is the French-born Lady Blakeley, who adores the Pimpernel but disdains her husband and is easy prey to the evil French Ambassador Chauvelin (Raymond Massey).

Sir Percey shows Chauvelin how to tie his cravat.

Sir Percy shows Chauvelin how to tie his cravat.

This is my favorite ever performance by Howard. He is just wonderful in both the guises he plays.  I especially like him as the fop.  Raymond Massey is always good and the story is suspenseful and romantic. Recommended.

Sir Percy as a fop

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Posted in 1934, Movie Reviews

Dames (1934)

Posted on March 29, 2013 | 1 comment

DamesDames_DVD_cover (1)
Directed by Ray Enright and Busby Berkeley
Warner Bros.
1934/USA
First Viewing

I love the 1933 Busby Berkeley musicals and was really looking forward to finally catching up with this one.  What only a year can do … The Production Code put quite a damper on the sex appeal of the Warner Brothers backstage musical. Although this had its points, it all seems a bit lackluster in comparison to something like Gold Diggers of 1933.

Barbara Hemingway: I’m free, white, and 21. I love to dance AND I’m going to dance.

Rich Uncle Ezra (Hugh Herbert) wants his money to go to a strictly moral fruit of his family tree and has settled on his cousin Mathilda (Zasu Pitts) and her husband Horace (Guy Kibbee). Ezra has banished his wicked Broadway-show writing cousin Jimmy (Dick Powell). Naturally, Jimmy is in love with Barbara (Ruby Keeler), Horace and Mathilda’s daughter. Somehow a chorus girl (Joan Blondell) is able to blackmail Horace into backing Jimmy’s show and all the hijinks begin.

DamesDick Powell sings some love ballads (including “I Only Have Eyes for You”) toward the beginning of the film but the three main chorus numbers are saved for the end. Of these, the only one that begins to capture the Busby Berkeley magic is the title tune “Dames”. That, however, was worth seeing the movie for.

Clip – “Beautiful Girls”

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Posted in 1934

Imitation of Life (1934)

Posted on March 28, 2013 | Leave a comment

Imitation of Lifeimitation of life dvd
Directed by John M. Stahl
1934/USA
Universal Pictures
Second Viewing

 

Bea Pullman (Claudette Colbert) is a young widow who carries on her husband’s maple syrup business to support her daughter Jesse.  Delilah Johnson arrives on her doorstep looking for work with her own daughter Peola and proves to be a godsend.  Bea goes on to use Delilah’s secret pancake recipe to climb to success first in the restaurant business and then as a pancake mix queen (under the Aunt Delilah label).  Bea offers Delilah a share in the business but Delilah says she is not interested in money or in having her own home.

Delilah Johnson: What’s my baby want?
Peola Johnson, Age 19: I want to be white, like I look.

Peola (Fredi Washington) easily “passes” as white and struggles against her black identity, eventually disowning her own mother and breaking her heart.  Bea has daughter troubles of her own when Jesse falls for Bea’s beau, Stephen Archer (Warren William), world’s richest fish scientist.

imitation-of-life-3

There is obviously quite a bit of stereotyping in this film.  Poor Delilah seems to downright enjoy getting the short end of the stick in the eyes of the film makers.  On the other hand, this is one of the few films from classic Hollywood to give black characters emotional lives of their own.  And although Delilah is content to serve, Peola, while conflicted and full of self-loathing, is portrayed as a sophisticated complex woman.  The performances of Louise Beavers and Fredi Washington are quite good and Claudette Colbert is sympathetic as Bea.

imitation_of_life_1934 2

This was remade in 1959 with Lana Turner, Juanita Hall, Susan Kohner, Sandra Dee and John Gavin.

Trailer

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You’re Telling Me! (1935)

Posted on March 26, 2013 | 2 comments

You’re Telling Me!You're Telling Me DVD
Directed by Erle C. Kenton
1934/USA
Paramount Pictures
First viewing

 

Sam Bisbee: Stand clear and keep your eye on the ball!

When he is not drinking liquor out of a jug, Samuel Bisbee (W.C. Fields) is an optometrist and inventor who embarrasses his long-suffering wife no end.  His daughter is in love with the son of a society family (Buster Krabbe) but they are having none of Sam.  Sam’s hopes are further dashed when he screws up the sales presentation of his puncture-proof tire.  Luckily, Sam meets a princess who solves all his problems.

You're Telling Me 1

The plot, such as it is, only gets in the way of the gags.  Chief among these is a reprise of Fields’s golf routine from his 1930 short “The Golf Specialist”.  Fields is hit and miss with me and, unfortunately, this was a miss.  I smiled a few times but I didn’t laugh.

Clip – the golf routine

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