Libeled Lady: A Review (Review #1831)

 

LIBELED LADY

This review is part of the Summer Under the Stars Blogathon. Today's star is William Powell.

Robert Osborne once observed that modern comedies had no wit. If memory serves right, I think he was fond of Libeled Lady, which has a great deal of wit. Libeled Lady is a brilliant screwball comedy, a film that is amusing and logical even if the situations are outlandish. Ably acted and directed, Libeled Lady is a jewel in cinema.

New York Evening Star editor Warren Haggerty (Spencer Tracy) is not eager to marry Gladys Beaton (Jean Harlow) even though he loves her. Having already delayed their wedding twice, he is set to go through with it until the paper faces a crisis. It ran a false story about wealthy heiress Connie Allenbury (Myrna Loy) accusing her of being a homewrecker. The story is easily proven false, but a few copies managed to slip out before they can be recalled. Connie and her father, wealthy tycoon James Allenbury (Walter Connolly) cooly inform the Evening Star that they will sue the paper for $5 million.

Why so much? Well, the Evening Star and Allenbury have been at loggerheads for quite some time, and this libelous story is the perfect weapon for both Allenburys to use against them. How will Warren and the Evening Star get out of this jam? They turn to Bill Chandler (William Powell), a newspaper man whose gotten them out of jams before but with whom they had a falling out years ago. Warren swallows his pride and turns to his frenemy for help. Bill quickly comes up with a solution: make the story true. He will quickly marry someone, then get Connie in a compromising position where the fake wife will reveal herself. Where, however, will they find a wife in a hurry?

Over her loud objections, poor Gladys finds herself roped into this scheme. Bill sets his plan in motion and at first Connie gets his number. However, he soon starts working his charms and she falls in love with him. Problem is that Bill falls in love with Connie too. Now working to have his cake and eat it too, Bill has to find a way to satisfy both sides. He seems to eventually find the solution that pleases everyone, everyone except Gladys, who has also fallen in love with Bill. Gladys however proves that she is no dumb blonde, having a few tricks up her own sleeve, leaving everything in total chaos.

A great screwball comedy has a logic to its plot even if the plot itself is outlandish. Libeled Lady has that thanks to Maurine Watkins, Howard Emmett Rogers and George Oppenheimer's screenplay. The idea that they would force a fake story to be true by dragging someone like Gladys into this scheme is pretty wild. However, it works because Libeled Lady takes the time to build up the situation and show how we arrived at things. It goes from Point A to Point B in a straightforward manner even though the general idea is bonkers.

It is because of the screenplay that people can say things that on their own sound irrational but within the context of the story are perfectly sensible. After explaining that Bill's marriage to Gladys will be only temporary and they will divorce quickly, an exasperated Gladys states, "But I don't want a divorce! I want to get married and stay married!". On the surface, this statement would not make any sense. However, as Libeled Lady set up the premise, it is a perfectly logical thing to say. 

Late in the film, Warren is enraged to find that Bill is trying to play both sides as well as having Gladys fall for him. Someone points out correctly that Gladys is Bill's wife. "She may be his wife, but she's engaged to me!" Warren bellows. Again, this line seems totally irrational, even daring. However, as we have known what the situation actually is, it is perfectly sound.

The wit in Libeled Lady extends beyond the premise to some of the lines themselves. "Where did you go when you left us, Bill?" Warren asks. "The intelligence department, Warren" is Bill's reply. "I always did like the contrast". The pun in "intelligence department" is obvious and clever. When Bill and Connie present themselves to a justice of the peace for a quicky wedding, the justice of the peace's wife asks if they are sober. Connie assures us that they are. "This is love, not liquor" the patrician Connie states.

As part of the plot, Gladys herself is supposed to be divorced from a Joe Simpson. Near the end of Libeled Lady, she is referred to as "Mrs. Simpson". In 1936, another "Mrs. Simpson" by the name of Wallis was causing headlines and scandals all over the world. Whether this was intentional or coincidental I cannot say, though the opening disclaimer that any resemblance to anyone living or dead to Libeled Lady is purely coincidental suggest that maybe it was not.

Libeled Lady is exceptionally well-acted by everyone involved. William Powell is perfect as this charming scoundrel reformed by love. With just a raised eyebrow, Powell tells you whether he is contemptuous or amused by the situation. Powell can handle not just the rat-a-tat manner of screwball dialogue while looking elegant doing so. He also manages great physical comedy. His scene as he struggles with an out-of-control fish during a fishing trip is absolutely hilarious.

This is another teaming of William Powell and Myrna Loy, among the greatest screen duos of all time. Loy is charming and beautiful as Connie, but she also makes her a bright woman. Loy's Connie is dubious of Bill, figuring he has an angle. She has a great moment of silent acting when she shows her clear frustration and boredom while Bill and Mr. Allensbury discuss the joys of trout fishing. She also has tender moments, such as when admitting to Bill that she was wrong about him. Technically, she wasn't, but she was unaware of it.

One does not usually associate Spencer Tracy with screwball, but here it works. He's gruff and flustered, but he also is able to keep up with the rapid-fire delivery and wacky situations. For me, Jean Harlow is a major standout. From her first scene, where she storms into the Evening Star office in her elaborate wedding gown, Harlow dominates her scenes. She is no dumb blonde, merely a put-upon one, forever at the mercy of the men playing her for a fool. She works well with everyone: having a woman-to-woman talk with Loy, sparring against Tracy and Powell, even biting Powell at one point. 

In real life, Powell and Harlow were romantically involved during Libeled Lady. While they never married in real life (Harlow tragically dying a year later at 26), it is nice to see them get a wedding scene.  

Libeled Lady is surprisingly daring for the time. You have strong and overt suggestions of bigamy that remain unresolved by the end. You have the attempted framing of a woman's reputation. The whole situation is pretty wild. However, director Jack Conway moves things briskly, and the film has a strong sense of logic amid the wild goings-on. 

Libeled Lady is a delight from start to finish. Hilarious and romantic, well-acted, well-directed and well-written, it is one of the best films in the filmography of everyone involved. 

DECISION: A+

The Golden Girls: The Operation

THE GOLDEN GIRLS: THE OPERATION

Written by: Winifred Hervey

Directed by: Terry Hughes

Airdate: February 6, 1986

As the son of a nurse, I never dreaded hospitals. To be honest, I rather enjoyed them and still like hospital food. That would not be much comfort to one of the Golden Girls characters in The Operation, light on plot but winning on dance numbers. 

Housemates Dorothy Zbornak (Bea Arthur), Blanche Deveraux (Rue McClanahan) and Rose Nylund (Betty White) are taking tap dancing classes together and form the Tip Tap Trio. Dorothy, however, comes back after one class hobbling in pain. Her mother, Sophia Petrillo (Estelle Getty) is quite worried and pushes for Dorothy to go to the doctor. The other women agree, and Dorothy reluctantly goes. She comes back to tell them she has Morton's Neuroma, a benign tumor on her foot. She also tells them she refuses to have a simple surgery done due to her paranoia about hospitals. 

Reluctantly, Dorothy goes. However, when Dr. Revell (Robert Picardo) tells her about how her regular doctor is in the middle of a malpractice suit and presents release forms, Dorothy freaks out and flees. The other women push Dorothy back to the hospital. When she meets and talks to her hospital roommate, breast cancer survivor Bonnie (Anne Haney), Dorothy realizes how foolish she has been.

The dance recital Rose and Blanche ultimately perform almost does not come to pass. Blanche confesses to Rose her terror at performing, in front of audiences that is. A humiliating dance recital when she was five has traumatized Blanche from dancing in solo numbers. Rose is thoroughly unsympathetic and drags Blanche to the recital. Despite her initial fears, Blanche and Rose are a massive success. Dorothy, however, is enraged when she finds they are no longer the Tip Tap Trio but the Two Merry Widows. Performing Tea for Two, Dorothy eventually makes her rage known. 

The Operation does not fill in much if any character background. We learn that Dorothy's phobia about hospitals comes from when she was left alone in the hospital at age five when she had her tonsils removed. Sophia reveals that she was in labor for 23 hours to deliver Dorothy and that she worked as a fry cook to help Dorothy pay for college. 

Two scenes get cut from The Operation rebroadcasts. The first is a scene in the kitchen where Dorothy goes a little more into her hospital fears and shows she is physically unable to dance. The second is when a priest (Bill Quinn) accidentally performs the last rites of the Catholic Church to a horrified Dorothy. I think the second scene is not always cut though. In a curious note, Belita Moreno as the Nurse is uncredited. This is surprising given that she has dialogue in The Operation. 

The Operation's overall plot is simple: Dorothy needs surgery but is terrified of hospitals. The real highlights are the two dance numbers that White and McClanahan have. Rose and Blanche have a shared interest in showbusiness given how often they both perform on stage during the course of The Golden Girls. This is the second time where Rose and Blanche perform for audiences after The Custody Battle. In future episodes, we will see Rose and Blanche either auditioning or acting in community theater, even cohosting a telethon. Dorothy rarely partakes in performing in community theater with them. Yet I digress.

White and McClanahan have two dance numbers in The Operation. They showcase their dancing skills quite effectively. Both dance numbers are funny, but not because they are klutzes. Instead, the humor comes from the situations themselves. In the first dance number, the humor comes from how long they would be backups to what would have been Dorothy's very big and long solo section. In the second, once they magically appear in full costume, they perform Tea for Two, where the humor comes from Dorothy's visibly enraged reaction to being cut out. Rose and Blanche's obliviousness to Dorothy's anger, complete with them tossing a flower to a furious Dorothy, makes it all the more hilarious.

I think White proved herself the best dancer, as she had to do some impromptu tap-dancing steps twice. McClanahan was no slouch in the dance department by any means. Her dancing was smooth and flowing. The Tea for Two number, while good and amusing, was a bit uncoordinated as they were not always in sync. 

White had some excellent acting moments, with her confronting Blanche about her fears being a highlight. White is playing against the normal manner of Rose: sweet, kind and empathic. We see in The Operation a Rose Nylund who is thoroughly unsympathetic to Blanche's past traumas. Once Blanche confesses a deep, dark and humiliating secret, White's face immediately darkens. "Hey, we've all got our sad stories," a cold-blooded Rose quietly but firmly tells Blanche. Rose is absolutely right in her reproach. What makes it funny is how against type White is playing here.

Equally funny is McClanahan. The story Blanche tells Rose is in itself funny, with McClanahan's delivery of it hilarious. What puts the coda on the scene is McClanahan's shocked reaction at finding Rose so dismissive of Blanche's trauma. Her disbelief in being told off by Rose is brilliant. 

Oddly, Arthur came off as the weaker element despite The Operation being a Dorothy-centered episode. She was hardly bad in the episode. Arthur had a great scene where her growing panic about the hospital erupts in her fleeing in terror. She also has a great moment of alliteration, where she complains about being "probed, poked and prodded" by endless doctors to where more men have seen her behind in one day than in her entire life. She also has a quiet moment of reflection when Bonnie tells her about how she is there for her second mastectomy and how traumatic the first one was. 

It is just that Arthur had to carry more of the drama. That and she had no big musical numbers. Getty rattled off some strong quips both hilarious (at the end of Rose and Blanche's rehearsal, a deadpan Sophia says, "I won't dance, don't ask me") and heartfelt (pointing out Dorothy's ridiculousness by being ridiculous herself).

I think the dance numbers elevated The Operation. It was a good episode, with moments of humor and heart. 

Maybe if they wanted to keep being the Tip Tap Trio, Dorothy's spot could have been filled in by Coco. 

8/10

Next Episode: Second Motherhood

Summer Under the Stars 2024: The Catalog

 

SUMMER UNDER THE STARS 2024

This is a catalog for the movies that I will review for the 2024 Turner Classic Movies Summer Under the Stars series. Films with an asterisk (*) will be shown for that star's day. Entries with two asterisks (**) are television films. Outrage, the film for Ida Lupino's day, is a film that Lupino directed.

August 1: William Powell: Libeled Lady *

August 2: Ida Lupino: Outrage 

August 3: John Wayne: Stagecoach *

August 4: Julie Andrews: Star!

August 5: Gordon MacRae: Oklahoma! *

August 6: Jean Harlow: Red Dust

August 7: Peter Ustinov: Death on the Nile (1978)

August 8: Eleanor Powell: Born to Dance *

August 9: Montgomery Clift: The Search *

August 10: Meryl Streep: She-Devil

August 14: Anne Bancroft: The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone **

August 15: Joseph Cotten: Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte

August 16: Jane Russell: Gentlemen Prefer Blondes *

August 17: Jerry Lewis: The King of Comedy

August 18: Katharine Hepburn: Katherine Hepburn: All About Me **

August 19: John Gilbert: The Hollywood Revue of 1929

August 20: Jeanne Crain: Gentlemen Marry Brunettes *

August 21: Jose Ferrer: The Private Files of J. Edgar Hoover

August 22: Bette Davis: The Star

August 24: Grace Kelly: Mogambo *

August 25: Fred MacMurray: Pushover

August 27: Ossie Davis: 12 Angry Men **

Summer Under the Stars 2024: Some Thoughts

 

Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn again?

One wonders why 2024's Turner Classic Movies Summer Under the Stars series decided to dive yet again into the filmographies of people who have been featured ten times already. I figure that Grant, Hepburn, Bette Davis (now on her eighth SUTS presentation) and John Wayne (on his ninth) have a wide variety of films in their long careers. However, there must be actors who have either never been featured or who have not been featured as often as figures like Grant or Hepburn.

Out of the 31 performers for this year's Summer Under the Stars, there are some who have a surprisingly small number of appearances in TCM's annual August extravaganza. I was surprised to find that William Powell, who kicks off the month, is only on his third appearance, as are Montgomery Clift, Jean Harlow, Fred MacMurray and Joseph Cotten. Ida Lupino, Anne Bancroft, Jane Russell, John Gilbert, Jeanne Crain, Donna Reed, Marlene Dietrich and Tony Curtis are making only their second appearances in SUTS. Apart from Gilbert, whose heyday was in the silent film era, I am surprised that the others are barely coming back for a second time. 

They could not have substituted one of Cary Grant or Katharine Hepburn's years for a day of Tony Curtis or Jane Russell?

We are getting an astonishing 13(!) debuts for this year's Summer Under the Stars. Julie Andrews and Meryl Streep, who are among those making their debuts, are the only living performers featured this year. The other newcomers are Gordon MacRae, Peter Ustinov, Anita Page, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Jerry Lewis, Jose Ferrer, Robert Shaw, Ossie Davis and Leo Gorcey.

Gorcey's inclusion is a big surprise, as he was never a major star. He is mostly known as one of the Bowery Boys, which was a B-picture series. Like Gilbert, Anita Page will have mostly silent films for her day. Belmondo, I figure, will be this year's foreign film performer. Davis is the African American performer, and I think Ferrer will take up the Hispanic slot. I say "think" because Ferrer, despite being proudly Puerto Rican and the first Hispanic to win an acting Oscar, was rarely if ever featured as a Hispanic. 

You may have noticed that I said there would be thirteen debuts but mentioned only eleven actors. It is because two performers who are making their Summer Under the Stars debuts took me by surprise. 

I am not too surprised that Grace Kelly is on her very first journey through SUTS. Her filmography is smaller than most due to her marriage to Prince Rainer of Monaco, consisting of only eleven films overall not counting three documentaries where she appears as herself. Curiously, one of those films, The Wedding in Monaco, will be part of Princess Grace's SUTS day but not The Children of Theater Street where she appears on-camera and narrates. I would consider an Oscar-nominated documentary feature slightly more interesting to watch than a documentary short about Her Serene Highness' nuptials.

The big surprise is on the last debuting Summer Under the Stars player. I still cannot believe that this will be the first year Eleanor Powell will have a day dedicated to her. Not only is this Powell's first Summer Under the Stars, but it is the very first time Powell has been the focus of anything on TCM. In the thirty years of Turner Classic Movies, Eleanor Powell has not only not been a Summer Under the Stars player but not even been a Star of the Month!

I am absolutely astonished to read that. I am sure that we could have skipped one more romp through Bringing Up Baby for one of those Broadway Melody dance numbers. 

That leads to another longtime complaint on Summer Under the Stars. I do not get why we get many of the same films we have had before. Why not, for example, feature Kiss Them for Me for Cary Grant? Throw in Love Affair for Katharine Hepburn. I'd love to see TCM show the original Dune for Jose Ferrer, if only for the shift towards more contemporary or at least eccentric programming. Show Marlene, the 1984 documentary directed by Maximilian Schell for Dietrich's day. I think one year for Katharine Hepburn, TCM broadcast Katharine Hepburn: All About Me, and another time, the Vivien Leigh documentary Scarlett and Beyond was shown for either Summer Under the Stars or her Star of the Month programming, so what is to prevent TCM from featuring Marlene? 

As a side note, has Maximilian Schell ever been a Summer Under the Stars player? He could fit into programming. Alas, TCM waited until Jean-Paul Belmondo was dead before bothering to bring him in. He died in 2021, meaning that there were many years when he could have been saluted during his lifetime. I am sure that we could have skipped a Cary Grant year to show 24 hours of Belmondo. Diane Baker is still very much alive, but we won't be seeing her because we need to see Bette Davis in The Letter once again. Anthony Hopkins could have films from The Lion in Winter to The Father featured, but we'd be lucky to have the former shown for Katharine Hepburn's day. 

I get that there may be issues with broadcast rights and costs. However, I would like to see some of the lesser-known or later works from some of the featured players. Peter Ustinov's final film was 2003's Luther, yet 1982's Evil Under the Sun will be the one to show him in the latter part of his career. You could make a whole programming around his various turns as Hercule Poirot, but instead of featuring Death on the Nile, you opt for Evil Under the Sun? 

That at least makes some sense for Ustinov was the lead in that. How one can rationalize screening Around the World in 80 Days for Marlene Dietrich when she makes a cameo in it, I simply cannot guess at. If that is the case, TCM might as well show The Great Muppet Caper for Peter Ustinov since he made a cameo in there too. 

Turner Classic Movies could have taken the chance to honor Glynis Johns, Janet Paige and/or Donald Sutherland by letting them have a day of Summer Under the Stars programming. Anyone arguing that it would be impossible due to scheduling issues has forgotten how when Olivia de Havilland died on July 26, 2020, shortly after turning 104, she was fitted into that year's Summer Under the Stars scheduling. Curiously, she took the day reserved for Bette Davis, which if not for this last-minute substitution would have given Davis nine Summer Under the Stars presentations. That same year, John Wayne was replaced with Natalie Wood. I do not know what reason there was for the latter.

I do enjoy Summer Under the Stars; it is also true that there really is no such thing as an old film since a film is new the first time you see it no matter when it was made. However, we are getting into a hopeless rut: showing the same performers in the same films. I like how we are getting a large group of first timers, so that is a plus. However, if Turner Classic Movies is to advance, it must look to lesser-known players and/or feature lesser-known films from the big names. 

Otherwise, this might be my final Summer Under the Stars.

The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare: A Review (Review #1830)

THE MINISTRY OF UNGENTLEMANLY WARFARE

How to appeal to the young kids to learn about such things as sacrifice, courage, fighting a monstrous evil. The answer is simplicity itself: turn everything into a joke. The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare took a true story and turned it into something so outlandish and cartoonish that it makes one doubt that it is remotely based on a true story. Even that could be forgiven if it were fun and exciting. Instead, director/co-writer Guy Ritchie's answer to Inglourious Basterds is all style, not substance.

In 1942 the Second World War looks on the verge of ending with a British defeat. Prime Minister Winston Churchill (Rory Kinnear) decides that extraordinary methods must be used against a ruthless enemy. The Nazis are not playing by the rules, so the British should not either. With that, Brigadier Gubbins also known as "M" (Cary Elwes) is tasked to recruit a team for an unauthorized mission. This team must destroy the support system for German U-boats which are chocking off British supplies. The problem is that the U-boat cache is on a remote Spanish island off the African coast. With Spain officially neutral, an open British raid risks dragging the fascist Spanish government into the war. As such, Operation Postmaster must be completely hush-hush.

"M", with help from his aid Ian Fleming (Freddy Fox), finds Gus March-Phillips (Henry Cavill), whose unorthodox and dangerous methods are not to the government's liking but whose unorthodox and dangerous methods are what Operation Postmaster needs. He insists on recruiting his own team, an international and Academy Award-qualifying multicultural cast of figures to take on this mission. There's Irishman Henry Hayes (Hero Fiennes Tiffin), Swede Anders Lassen (Alan Ritchson), and Freddy Alvarez (Henry Golding). Helping him also are American actress Marjorie Stewart (Eliza Gonzalez) and their man on the island of Fernando Po, Richard Heron (Babs Olusanmokun). 

Gus also insists on rescuing his BFF, Geoffrey Appleyard (Alex Pettyfer) from a Nazi prison, requiring a side mission. Finally arriving on Fernando Po, the groups perform their tasks, with Marjorie set out to seduce and distract Nazi Heinrich Luhr (Til Schwieger), the Nazi head at Fernando Po. With the various pieces put together, this Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare sets to work on their most dangerous mission. Will they succeed? Will they all make it out alive?

If you are physically capable of staying awake to find those answers, you are made of stronger stuff than I am. I have not read Damien Lewis' Churchill's Secret Warriors, the nonfiction book on which The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare was very loosely based on. I figure that the true-life story is a fascinating and exciting one to attempt a film version. 

However, I cannot think of a few films as boring as The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. The problem is in how Ritchie as both director and cowriter, took this story and decided to make everything deadpan. Perhaps by now I should not be astonished that there are four credited screenwriters in The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. However, I am still astonished that four people managed to take a true-life war story and turn it into a thoroughly fictional project.

The problem is a simple one but one that doomed The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare: the tone. The film is so deadpan and stylized that it looks artificial. Everyone acts in such a nonchalant manner that it makes both the action and the comedy look fake. It is one thing to have someone make a quip at what is meant to be a tense or exciting scene. It is another when your film is almost nothing but quips. The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare simply tries too hard to be breezy and fun, which has the opposite result. 

Take the Appleyard rescue. Leaving aside how we got a recap of information that we already received, everyone in the rescue is directed to be so deadpan in their delivery that it comes across almost as spoof. I get that the filmmakers were trying to make everything look breezy, fun and almost a lark. However, they went overboard in their endeavors. Anders has shot a group of Nazis with his bow and arrows. Gus, Hayes and Freddy all see the Nazis fall to their deaths and they register no reaction, apart from perhaps a wry bemusement. It is as if they are so removed from things that it is of no consequence what actually happens.

The whole cast is trying so hard, so very hard, to be so cool and blase that it looks fake. It tells the audience, "None of this is real". If it is not real, why should we care what happens to these people? 

During the Appleyard rescue, Christopher Benstead's jazz score, while enjoyable, underscores the falseness of it all. There are no stakes, no potential for moments of genuine tension or suspense. It is all very remote, very separated, very off-putting. 

It ends up looking forced, mannered and worse of all, dull.

I struggled mightily to stay awake through it. I wrote in my notes how I was both fighting and desperate to stay awake. I would not be surprised if some of the actors struggled to stay awake during filming. My disdain for Henry Cavill is well-known and, in some corners, openly mocked. The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare does not suggest that Cavill is an actor. It manages to remove the idea that he is even an action star. To be fair, Cavill is asked to be deadpan, which is at about his level of acting skills, so he is not too bad. However, Cavill's character is all raised eyebrows and "old boy" this and "old girl" that. Elwes genuinely made me wonder whether he was deliberately hamming it up with the British aplomb manner. 

Everyone in the cast appears to treat everything as a joke, one where they can be so "veddy proper" that it is not fun or funny. Playing into the stereotype of the forever unbothered British sucks the life out of things. Ritchson, this mountain of a man, attempts what I think is a Swedish accent. I doubt anyone would mistake him for Ingrid Bergman's brother. 

There is a stubborn remoteness to everything in The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. The action scenes, culminating in what is meant to be a massive series of explosions, looks so distant and dull. The shocking discovery that Luhr makes about Stewart's heritage when she inadvertently uses Yiddish while singing Mack the Knife is not tense. That she gets out of it rather easily and quickly undercuts even the pretense of tension.  

Yes, I suppose the entire sequence is pretty. It is also pretty dull.

The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare is a waste. Boring, trying too hard to be fun and breezy, it might have been better to have stuck to a more realistic adaptation than this stab at war hijinks. 

DECISION: F

Deadpool & Wolverine: A Review (Review #1829)

DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE

I was pretty much appalled by Deadpool, snarky and violent. I was in the minority though, as millions loved it precisely for those qualities. I cannot remember if I saw Deadpool 2, but now we have Deadpool & Wolverine. It is what I figure Deadpool and Marvel Cinematic Universe fans wanted: the blending of the unserious Merc with a Mouth and the uber-serious Logan. If that appeals to you, then I figure Deadpool & Wolverine is right up your street. If you don't, and you don't keep up with every minute detail of the world's longest and most expensive soap opera, then there is nothing in Deadpool & Wolverine to convert you.

Wade Wilson/Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) is searching for Logan/Wolverine, but surprisingly finds him dead. That does not stop him from using Logan's remains to fight off a group of fighters while dancing to N*Sync's Bye Bye Bye. Why does Deadpool need Wolverine? Well, we have to back up a bit.

Deadpool wanted to join the Avengers but was rejected by Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau). Dejected by being rejected, Wade has been miserable working as a used car salesman with his friend Peter (Rob Delaney). His birthday party causes him no joy since his ex-girlfriend Vanessa (Morena Baccarin) is also there. Things pick up a bit when agents of the Time Variance Authority come in to take him to renegade TVA bureaucrat Mr. Paradox (Matthew Macfayden). 

Paradox tells Deadpool that the Sacred Timeline is being affected and that while he can remain, his own timeline has to be obliterated due to the death of Deadpool's anchor being. That anchor being is Logan. Rather than see his loved ones erased, Deadpool will find his anchor being and prevent him from dying.

That's thirty minutes before we go back to where we started and move forward. 

He does eventually find Logan (Hugh Jackman), though his Logan/Wolverine is the worst of all of them. Thrown into the Void, Logan and Wolverine must join forces to fight both Paradox and Cassandra Nova (Emma Corrin), unofficial ruler of the Void and Charles Xavier/Professor X's twin sister. 

As a side note, is baldness both a hereditary trait and requirement in the Xavier family? 

From there, they meet various heroes and villains from past MCU movies, even those not from the official Marvel Cinematic Universe. There's Johnny Storm/Human Torch (Chris Evan), Elektra Natchios (Jennifer Garner), Gambit (Channing Tatum), Laura/X-23 (Dafne Keen) and Blade (Wesley Snipes). There are also villains such as Pyro (Aaron Stanford) working against the Resistance, as well as those in between such as the various Deadpools in other worlds. Nicepool (Reynolds in a dual role) is in the Void as well. Ultimately Deadpool & Wolverine must fight to keep all the timelines intact.

Deadpool & Wolverine has five credited screenwriters including both Reynolds and director Shawn Levy. I always take such a high number of credited screenwriters as a cause for alarm. It smacks of writing by committee; it suggests that there are too many cooks in the kitchen who couldn't form a unified vision. It also tells me that there were probably more hands on the project than people are willing to admit. 

With so many people hacking away at a script, it looks like Deadpool & Wolverine opted for a "more is more" plan. All kinds of fan service were thrown at the viewer (Chris Evans as the Human Torch from earlier Fantastic Four films! The original Blade is back! The Alabaman Channing Tatum as the Cajun Gambit!). Double, triple, quadruple down on all these callbacks and throw in some more. Shoutouts both metaphorical and literal to Furiosa and the demise of Twentieth Century-Fox. 

For me, a reason as to why I thoroughly disliked though not detested Deadpool & Wolverine is what so many people loved about it. The various callbacks, the fourth wall breaking, the "aren't we being clever" bits did not impress me. There were many people laughing at various parts, such as a major fight between Deadpool and Wolverine to Grease's You're the One That I Want. I do not take away from anyone's enjoyment of such things. I just want, for myself, something with a little more substance, even in a comic book film.

Pointing out things like montages or how a particular creature was in a Loki episode cuts no ice with me. In fact, it separates me from any serious stakes. Why Logan in particular is Wade's anchor being is unclear (and I think I'm being generous in using that word). The few times Deadpool & Logan pause to give Jackman a more dramatic moment seems jarringly at odds with all the craziness going on around here. Far be it for Wade/Deadpool to have a serious moment. I think the film tried, but no one would believe it. 

Moreover, since we have all these variants going on in multiple universes, there are no stakes to anything here. 

The various cameos did not impress me. I get that Tatum was always in the running for a separate Gambit film. However, separate from the fact that Taum has no acting skills or any real skills apart from taking his clothes off, the deliberately exaggerated Cajun accent was maddening. Pointing out that he was almost unintelligible is not clever. It only draws more attention to a gag that was not funny to start with. Having Snipes say, "There's only going to be one Blade!" could be mildly amusing. Having Reynolds as Deadpool face the camera to give us a knowing look is not. 

Also, why throw in a Furiosa reference when presumably in any of their worlds the Mad Max franchise would not necessarily exist. 

I don't think there were any performances here. People came, cashed their checks, and moved on. Taking jabs at the presumably high salaries is not impressive or clever. After Evans' Johnny Storm is killed, Reynolds' Deadpool tells Logan "Do you know what he was doing to the budget?". Sure, the audience laughed, but I did not. I did not laugh once at Deadpool & Wolverine, though did find myself nodding in agreement when Logan mocks Deadpool. Wolverine rants that Deadpool can't save the world, he couldn't even save his relationship with a stripper! Yet I digress.

I suppose it's nice for Jackman to show off his incredible physique at age 55, but it would be nice if he actually moved on in his career. The same for 47-year-old Reynolds, who has been doing the same snarky schtick since Two Guys, A Girl and a Pizza Place back in 1998. I liked the show, but how is he still doing a variation of Berg all these decades later. Jackman did best in the few dramatic scenes he was in. His Logan was fine, but I was not overwhelmed. Macfayden could have been fun as Paradox, but I wonder if he even knew what was going on. Tatum did not make clear whether Gambit was the joke or just in on it. Garner looked bored and almost desperate to get out of things. Snipes looked like was having a good time.

Oddly, I did not find Deadpool & Wolverine to be as violent as I thought it would be. Yes, you do get graphic depictions of all sorts of killings. However, I was curiously numb to it all. 

The entire premise of Deadpool & Wolverine (Deadpool doing what he can to save his friends) got a bit lost in the Paul Rudd jokes and shade throwing. I did not know those characters enough to make the stakes feel high. I just did not care for the film on any level. 

"I don't want to spend my life being an annoying one-trick pony," Wade Wilson tells Happy Hogan early in Deadpool & Wolverine. That's about the only funny thing in Deadpool & Wolverine since that's the only thing Deadpool has ever been. Deadpool & Wolverine sorely test whether it is better than Argylle. Very briefly, it was worse than Argylle. It is teetering on the edge, but Deadpool & Wolverine did not leave me in a state of shaking fury as Argylle did. It left me cold, which may be worse. 

DECISION: F

King Kong Lives: A Review

 

KING KONG LIVES

The 1976 King Kong remake has been, in my opinion, unfairly bashed as terrible. It is not a good film, but I find it oddly entertaining and much better than the second remake. I had heard of King Kong Lives but was too young at the time to see it. Moreover, what little I knew was due to Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert's extremely negative review. Now, through the magic of streaming, I have seen King Kong Lives. Living up to its reputation, King Kong Lives is a mix of the 1976 and 2005 versions. It is terrible (2005) but oddly entertaining (1976). 

A decade after King Kong fell to his apparent death from the World Trade Center, we find that he is not dead. He is in a coma, kept alive artificially at the Atlanta Institute, a rival to MIT and Harvard. Dr. Amy Franklin (Linda Hamilton) has an artificial heart ready for Kong, but due to his decade-long coma, he needs a blood transfusion to have the artificial heart work. It is not, however, like there are giant apes running around somewhere, right?

Of course, wrong. Explorer Hank Mitchell (Brian Kerwin) just happened to stumble onto a giant monkey in Borneo. He offers "Lady Kong" to the institute for a price. Price met, Mitch flies Lady Kong to what I presume is Atlanta so Mr. Kong can have transfusion and his new heart.

It gets sillier from here. 

Unsurprisingly, Dr. Franklin strongly objects to having a female Kong so close to a male Kong, fearing they will go ape for each other. Unsurprisingly, Dr. Franklin and white hunter Mitchell also go ape for each other. King Kong is so aroused by Lady Kong's scent that he storms his way to her. The search for this ape allows Franklin and Mitchell to storm their way to each other. Lady Kong is recaptured, King Kong hides out in the Georgia swamps, is captured by rednecks whom he devours, then they are reunited in time for Lady Kong to give birth to Son of Kong. Will the family Kong (King, Lady and Donkey) manage to escape?

King Kong Lives and the 1976 King Kong have one thing in common: both are blessed with a musical score that is so far above the film itself. John Scott's score is wonderful, flowing and enjoyable. He created luxurious romantic music when we see scenes of romance. It is not his fault, though, that the romantic music played when King and Lady Kong finally set eyes on each other.

There is something absolutely and oddly hilarious about lush music when you see two adults in ape costumes making googly-eyes at each other. That director John Guillermin never saw just how odd to laughable the mix of music and images come across makes one wonder whether he and everyone involved in King Kong Lives was bonkers. These love scenes between the Kongs are just weird. The love scene between Franklin and Mitchell are not far behind. The dialogue by Ronald Shusett and Steven Pressfield does not help. Just as Mitchell is to start making love to Amy, he says, "Are you sure about this?". Her response? "We're primates too", she whispers.

Why these two fell so suddenly in love King Kong Lives does not bother explaining. How King Kong lives all these years King Kong Lives does not bother explaining. Why King Kong lives at all King Kong Lives does not bother explaining. What is the plan once the heart transplant goes? What are they going to do with Kong after he recovers from surgery? There's no setup, so there are no stakes. It is all very strange to idiotic. 

About the only moment of wit is when the Army comes to the Georgian backwaters to find dozens of rednecks with their shotguns looking for a giant ape that has managed to hide in various swamps. "What the hell is this: Deliverance?" one of them says. 

Over and over again, the strange blending of music and imagery makes King Kong Lives look bad and unintentionally funny. At least, I think it was not meant to be funny. Late in the film, there's a scene where Kong is rampaging through a small town. There is an old man with a shotgun apparently just shooting around in random. Everything here is hilarious. A later scene at a family reunion hoedown is equally bizarre. We see the Kongs walking towards them, the hootenanny oblivious to these giant creatures coming their way. "You never know who's going to show up in our of these family reunions, do you?" one of them says to the other as we see the Kongs coming closer and closer.

I get what King Kong Lives was going for. I also get that they were too obvious and forced about it to make it funny. Funny is when Lady Kong grabs Mitchell. I almost expected her to say how she would hug him and squeeze him and call him "George". The scene where King Kong chomps down on an alligator while a frog looks on is inexplicable to me. Throwing in gruesome endings for some of the rednecks is appalling.  

King Kong Lives was made after The Terminator. As such, why Linda Hamilton opted to use what cache she earned from The Terminator to star in this rubbish I can only guess at. She looks blank throughout, making the idea that she is a brilliant physician frankly ludicrous. Kerwin is no better, attempting "brash and daring" and ending up looking desperate, confused and embarrassed. John Ashton as barking Lt. Col. Nevitt was a stereotype, almost always yelling out his lines and chomping the scenery with crazed abandon.

The 1976 King Kong won a special Academy Award for its Visual Effects, which I find strange given how poor the VFX were in King Kong. They are Lord of the Rings quality compared to the simply awful VFX in King Kong Lives. Even 1940's B-pictures had better rear screen projections than King Kong Lives. The two people playing Kong and Lady Kong (Peter Elliot and George Yiasomo respectively) running around in what are meant to be mountains look so idiotically fake that even children would say it was a set. When Nevitt meets his end, everything about it is bad: the acting, the look, the end results. 

There is no reason for King Kong Lives. Minus the music everything in King Kong Lives is dreadful. Despite that, I did not hate King Kong Lives. It is just short of being so bad that it's good. It is more "so bad that it's watchable if you want to laugh at how bad it all is". King Kong Lives, but one wishes he had stayed most sincerely dead. 

DECISION: D-