"frankie": a different destination

"frankie": Isabelle Huppert dans la disparition graduelle de une jeune fille. à plus tard.

During the past decade or so, we've experienced various examples of The New Normal, including destination events grounded in the current wide-spread narcissism.The Destination Wedding, of course, is one example

The Destination Bar Mitzvah, another case in point.

It takes an astute mind to bring a newer, shrewder layer to this self-addiction - and filmmaker Ira Sachs rather wittily and poignantly manages to push matters to yet another level with ... Destination Funeral, a conceit that not only works surprisingly well (to a limited degree) but functions perfectly in tandem with his star's commanding persona.

That would be the iconic Isabelle Huppert whose character here is in the throes of death and is intent on spreading the word to family and friends, but in only one specific location for her passing and funeral - the dreamy, sun-dappled Portuguese seaside town of Sintra.

The movie, with the real-time feel of an unrushed afternoon, consists of Huppert performing acting duets with her wonderful supporting cast - sharing secrets, expressing regrets and often testing them with a dour playfulness that's wholly suitable for this very unusual occasion.

She's Françoise Crémont, known as a great actress but whose greatness has often minimalized other aspects of her life  Her outsized personality, so crucial on stage and screen, has worked out with decidedly different results with family and friends. On hand to attest to this are Frankie's first husband, Michel (Pascal Greggory); her current husband, Jimmy (Brendon Gleeson) and Jimmy's family from his first marriage; Paul (Jérémie Renier), her son with Jimmy; Frankie's best friend Ilene (a terrific Marisa Tomei) and Ilene's hanger-on, would-be fiance Gary (Greg Kinnear). All great company.

But this is clearly Isabelle's film - her year, in fact. What with the film, "Greta" and her success on stage in "The Mother" (two more title roles), Huppert is experiencing something of a new destination herself. An invigorating second act.

'Frankie" opens today in San Francisco and Palo Alto.

 Regarding Comments: All comments are enthusiastically appreciated but are moderated before publication. Replies signed "unknown" or "anonymous" are not encouraged. Please sign any response with a name (real or fabricated) or initials.  Be advised that a "name" will be assigned to any accepted post signed "unknown" or "anonymous." Thank you. -J

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~Isabelle Huppert on stage during Florian Zeller's play, "The Mother" 
~photography: Ahron R. Foster 1960© 

 ~Huppert in her a publicity shot for her movie debut in Otto Preminge's "Rosebud." Age 22
~photography: Paramount 1975©

~Forty years later - Huppert today. Age 66.
~photography: Eurovision 2019©

thoroughly awful

The sublime Julie Andrews has a new book to pitch - "Home Work: A Memoir of My Hollywood Years" (Hatchett Books) - and, not surprisingly, for the occasion, she'll join Ben Mankiewicz on Tuesday evening  for what I anticipate will be another swell Turner Classic Movies conversation.

Four titles from those Hollywood years will be screened, starting with George Roy Hill's dismal "Thoroughly Modern Millie," an unwatchable 1967 pseudo-musical that TCM disinters with (thankfully) only limited regularity. The movie was made during Andrews' brief reign in the '60s as Roadshow Queen (it was filmed back-to-back with Hill's "Hawaii), and its brand of forced fun apparently still enjoys her embrace and enthusiasm.

It remains an affront that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, an outfit known for thoughtlessly throwing away Oscars, saw fit to reward this mess with seven - count 'em - seven Academy Awards nominations, including one for Carol Channing's screeching, amateurish supporting turn.

There's a reason why some stage performers never make it in movies.

And it remains jaw-dropping that Universal was oblivious to its film's batant racism. The presentation of Asians here, as personified by the wince-producing performances of Jack Soo and Pat Morita, is unacceptable, a brand of racist entertainment tossed off as innocent fun by Hollywood during the 1930s and 1940s.

t was a different culture back then but times had supposedly changed by the time "Thoroughly Modern Millie" was made in the so-called, enlightened late '60s - a prevalent theme these days unlikely to be addressed during Ben and Julie's pre- and post-screening discussions.

If Julie was to celebrate one of her other roadshow films during the same period, I'd have nudged her towards Robert Wise's brilliant, hugely underrated "Star!" (1968) or Blake Edwards' troubled "Darling Lili" (1970).

The three other titles selected for screening are Arthur Hiller's "The Americanization of Emily" (1964), with a screenplay by Paddy  Chayefsky, and two by Edwards, the urbane "Victor/Victoria" (1982) and the little-seen family affair, "That's Life!" (1986), starring Jack Lemmon, Sally Kellerman, Robert Loggia, Felicia Farr and all the Lemmon, Edwards and Andrews children. The film was a last-minute addition to the 1986 Toronto Film Festival and it was the first - and only - time that I met Andrews.

She was one of the singularly nicest movie people I met and perhaps the most beautiful. I was struck by her incredibly dreamy complexion.

 Regarding Comments: All comments are enthusiastically appreciated but are moderated before publication. Replies signed "unknown" or "anonymous" are not encouraged. Please sign any response with a name (real or fabricated) or initials.  Be advised that a "name" will be assigned to any accepted post signed "unknown" or "anonymous." Thank you. -J

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~The poster art for "Thoroughly Modern Millie"
~photography: Universal 1967©

~ Julie Andrews in "Star!"
~photography: Twentieth Century-Fox 1968©

~Andrews with Jack Lemmon in "That's Life!"
~photography: Sony 1986©

marriage a la mode

The title of this essay is not original.  It was coined by the late film critic Richard Schickel back in 1962 for his landmark coffeetable book, "The Stars" (Houghton Mifflin) to describe the united perfection of the stars of the six-film MGM series, "The Thin Man," William Powell and Myrna Loy.

The duo made a total of 14 films together, sharing the pleasure of their company with us, but only a half dozen were devoted to the marital bliss and playful sleuthing of "The Thin Man" collection. Only six? Really?

There seems to have been so many more.

The moniker Marriage a la Mode handily summons up a union very much in place, balanced and perfected, but doesn't conjure the possible messiness of arriving at that point - namely, the courtship.

But recently, Turner Classic Movies picked up the slack in a wholly clever way. It generally airs the "Thin Man" series during one long afternoon or evening. And during a prime-time night earlier this month, TCM considered the courtship of Nick and Nora Charles with a clever difference. In preamble to an evening with The Charles, Turner scattered other Powell-Loy titles throughtout the daytime, along with clips and shorts to demonstrate the chemistry that the studio heads may have deemed necessary for any commitment to the eventual series.

It played like an audition - a collection of tryout bits in which Loy and especially Powell do turns that are nothing remotely like what they do as Nick and Nora.

The humor is much broader, often flat-out hilarious.

Among the other full-length titles showcasing the team's versatility were "Evelyn Prentice," "Manhattan Melodrama," "I Love You Again" and "Love Crazy." 

Clips from other films included "G: Men," "Don't Tell the Wife," "Libeled Lady," "The Tell-Tale Heart" and  "Surprise Parties,"and the shorts, "Better Say Goodbye"and "Angry Marbles."

In a way, we got to see Nick and Nora behind closed doors and how their inimitable chemistry came to produce Marriage a la Mode.

 Regarding Comments: All comments are enthusiastically appreciated but are moderated before publication. Replies signed "unknown" or "anonymous" are not encouraged. Please sign any response with a name (real or fabricated) or initials.  Be advised that a "name" will be assigned to any accepted post signed "unknown" or "anonymous." Thank you. -J

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~Powell/Loy - Nick/Nora
~photography: MGM 1930s©

who's that girl?

They weren't stars, but when they were on screen, they managed to attract attention, no matter the limitations of their screen time.

The invaluable character actor.

But beyond the likes of Eric Blore, Margaret Dumont, Connie Gilchrist, Franklin Pangborn and, of course, Thelma Ritter, there were other sub-sections of of small actors breathing big life into movies.

Case in point: The esoteric breed of actor known as The Dress Extra - performers who specialized in playing swells at swank dinner parties, always decked out in gowns, pearls, sable and white tie and tails.

When one of them was on screen, you could smell the money. And there was no one more representative of this group than Bess Flowers, who appeared in no fewer than 500 titles, regal as ever in all of them. It's impossible to watch an old movie and not spot her. She was  rightly dubbed The Queen of The Dress Extras by the ever astute Vienna on her site, Vienna's Classic Hollywood.

But much more compelling to me is Larri Thomas, largely because she was every bit as present as Flowers in films but even less well-known.

The wildly statuesque Larri was one of the many Goldwyn Girls to appear for Sam on stage and screen. I remember her largely for her trademark platinum ponytail and ligament-straining high kicks.

Throughout the 1950s and '60s, I also  remember myself frantically looking to spot her in movie after movie - she made only 38 - and asking "Who's that girl?" The answer never came; to this day Larri Thomas remains a mystery. (She died in 2013 at age 81.)

 Regarding Comments: All comments are enthusiastically appreciated but are moderated before publication. Replies signed "unknown" or "anonymous" are not encouraged. Please sign any response with a name (real or fabricated) or initials.  Be advised that a "name" will be assigned to any accepted post signed "unknown" or "anonymous." Thank you. -J

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~Larri Thomas's hand on Marlon Brando' right shoulder for a publicity still for "Guys and Dolls"

~photography:Samuel Goldwyn 1955©

  ~The ubiquitous Bess Flowers
~photography: RKO 1942©

 ~Larri's brief bit during the "Marian the Librarian" production number in "The Music Man"
~photography: Warner Bros. 1962©  

~The definitive Larri publicity still
~photography: Samuel Goldwyn 1956©