The DVD Report #11

What does an orphanage in Bombay have to do with a wedding in the Copenhagen suburbs? Nothing and everything as you will find out After the Wedding if you stick with it. The 2006 Oscar-nominated Danish film, directed by Susanne Bier (Open Hearts, Brothers), which plays like the last act of Fanny without the comedy, moves rather slowly but is ultimately rewarding. Mads Mikkelsen (King Arthur, Casino Royale) is the brooding star of the film, and he’s very good, but acting honors go to Swedish actor Rolf Lassgard as his mysterious benefactor. Like Bier’s last film, Brothers, the film is about a family dynamic far removed from the usual faire. It is one of the better new films released on DVD in the last few weeks.

Another film that moves slowly but is in the end worthwhile is 2005’s Sweet Land, which spent the last two years on the film festival circuit without getting a general release though it did win director Ali Selim the best first feature prize at this year’s Independent Spirit Awards. The film, which is about prejudice in America’s heartland of the 1920s, is told from the perspective of an old lady, the wonderful Lois Smith (Five Easy Pieces, Twister), looking back on her life. Elizabeth Reaser (Saved!, The Family Stone) plays Smith as a young German woman who comes to Minnesota to marry an American farmer of Norwegian descent, sight unseen. Tom Guinee (Ladder 49) plays her soft-spoken husband-to-be. Co-producer Alan Cumming (The Anniversary Party, Nicholas Nickelby) gave himself an excellent supporting role as a fellow farmer and father of nine children. Ned Beatty (Hear My Song, Rudy) as a greedy banker and John Heard (The Pelican Brief, Pollack) as a self-righteous minister are the other principal players.

Also getting a DVD release after playing the festival circuit for two years is Our Very Own. Set in Shelbyville, Tennessee, the hometown of Sondra Locke (The Outlaw Josey Wales, The Gauntlet), the film is about the town’s anticipation of Locke’s appearance at the 1978 horse show and the opening of her new film Every Which Way But Loose.

The film is noteworthy for showcasing several up-and-coming stars including Jason Ritter (TV’s Joan of Arcadia, Happy Endings), Autumn Reeser (television’s The O.C.) and Hilarie Burton (TV’s One Tree Hill). They, as well as Michael McKee and Derek Carter, are fine as the anxious teens, but the problem with the film is the playing of their elders as fools and morons. Top-billed Allison Janney (television’s The West Wing, American Beauty) was nominated for a 2006 Independent Sprit Award for playing Ritter’s mom, a woman so naïve she doesn’t realize her drunken, out-of-work husband, Keith Carradine (Nashville, TV’s Into the West), hasn’t been paying the bills until the furniture store comes to repossess her dining room set and the grocery store refuses to accept any more of her checks.

Other grotesques include Beth Grant (Flags of Our Fathers, Little Miss Sunshine) as Reeser’s cigarette-fiend mother, Faith Prince (Broadway’s 1990s revivals of Guys and Dolls and Bells Are Ringing) as a motor-mouth politician, and Mary Badham (To Kill a Mockingbird, This Property Is Condemned) in her first film in 40 years as a woman who lives in the woods and doesn’t speak. The film was written, produced and directed by actor Cameron Watson.

Another film that played the festival circuit, albeit one that had a brief regular release is 2006’s Come Early Morning directed by a first-timer, the veteran actress Joey Lauren Adams (Exorcist II: The Heretic, Chasing Amy). Ashley Judd (Twisted, De-Lovely), after years of squandering her talent, finally delivers a performance that lives up to the early promise she showed in Ruby in Paradise.

As a woman in her thirties who has had nothing but one-night stands, Judd gives a brave, heartrending portrayal of a woman who almost finds true love in middle age but is too set in her ways for it to last. Jeffrey Donovan (television’s Crossing Jordan and Burn Notice) is every bit her equal as the man briefly in her life, and there are fine supporting turns from Tim Blake Nelson (O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Syriana) as her uncle, Scott Wilson (In the Heat of the Night, Dead Man Walking) as her father, Stacy Keach (TV’s Texas and Mike Hammer, Private Eye) as her boss and Diane Ladd (Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, Rambling Rose) as her grandmother.

Another festival hit from a female director with a brief regular run is 2006’s The Dead Girl directed by Karen Moncrieff, who was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for her efforts.

The film, told from the perspectives of various women, is about the discovery of a body which may be the work of a serial killer. Chilling and creepy, it boasts award-worthy performances by a host of celebrated actors including Toni Collette (The Sixth Sense, Little Miss Sunshine), Piper Laurie (The Hustler, Carrie), Marcia Gay Harden (Mystic River, American Gun), Mary Steenburgen (Melvin and Howard, What’s Eating Gilbert Grape), Bruce Davison (Longtime Companion, Dahmer), James Franco (Annapolis, Flyboys), Brittany Murphy (8 Mile, Sin City), and best of all, Mary Beth Hurt (The World According to Garp, Affliction) as a woman who makes a gruesome discovery that turns her world inside out.

The most anticipated of this week’s new releases is the Criterion Edition of 1951’s Ace in the Hole, directed by Billy Wilder (Double Indemnity, Sunset Blvd.). This is Wilder at his most cynical, a film about a reporter who exploits a tragedy for personal gain. A flop at the time, they couldn’t even sell it with a title change to The Big Carnival, the film has grown in resonance as we see similar tragedies played out on television almost daily.

Kirk Douglas (Lust for Life, Paths of Glory) had one of his best roles as the reporter, and Jan Sterling (Caged!, The High and the Mighty), who won a National Board of Review Award as the year’s best actress though her role is really supporting, is devastating as the uncaring wife of the man trapped in a cave.

The film plays well on a double bill with the same year’s Fourteen Hours, directed by Henry Hathaway (The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, The House on 92nd Street). This film has all of the suspense of Ace in the Hole but is ultimately more hopeful in its resolution of an exploited tragedy involving a man threatening to jump from a high-rise hotel window ledge. Richard Basehart (Moby Dick, Being There) won the year’s National Board of Review Award for best actor though his, too, is basically supporting role albeit one in more of an ensemble piece.

Also outstanding are Paul Douglas (A Letter to Three Wives, Angels in the Outfield), who was Sterling’s husband in real life, as a cop on the beat drawn into the nightmare, Barbara Bel Geddes (I Remember Mama, TV’s Dallas) as Basehart’s estranged wife, Agnes Moorehead (The Magnificent Ambersons, Hush.Hush, Sweet Charlotte) as his bitch of a mother, and Robert Keith (Young at Heart, Written on the Wind) as his ineffectual father. Also starring, in her film debut, is Grace Kelly (Dial M for Murder, The Country Girl), and Jeffrey Hunter (Sailor of the King, Hell to Eternity), in his second credited screen role, both oozing star quality in minor roles as by-standers.

Esther Williams is by all accounts one of the nicest people in Hollywood, but her films are an acquired taste. Warner Bros. is hoping more people will acquire that taste with the release of TCM Spotlight: Esther Williams, Vol. 1, which throws together five of her films, none of which are available outside of the set. The films include Bathing Beauty, Easy to Wed, On an Island With You, Neptune’s Daughter and Dangerous When Wet. Presumably there will be a Vol. 2 to include her best film, Million Dollar Baby, which is also the title of her autobiography.

Williams had played small parts in films before MGM decided to showcase her swimming attributes in 1944’s Bathing Beauty, but this is the one that made her a star despite taking second billing to Red Skelton (Three Little Words, Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines). Basil Rathbone (The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Court Jester) is also on hand, but it’s the spectacular ending you’ll remember, if anything. George Sidney (Pal Joey, Bye Bye Birdie) directed.

For some reason MGM decided to remake the screwball classic Libeled Lady as Easy to Wed a mere ten years after the original with Williams, Van Johnson (Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, The Last Time I Saw Paris), Lucille Ball (Dance, Girl, Dance, Best Foot Forward) and Keenan Wynn (Dr. Strangelove, Nashville) in place of the once-in-a-lifetime teaming of Myrna Loy, William Powell, Jean Harlow and Spencer Tracy, and under the direction of Edward Buzzell (At the Circus, Song of the Thin Man) in lieu of the original’s Jack Conway. What were they thinking?

Williams was a top MGM star by 1948 when they put her On an Island With You or rather with Peter Lawford (Exodus, Advise & Consent) and Ricardo Montalban (Sayonara, Sweet Charity) under the direction of Richard Thorpe (Ivanhoe, Jailhouse Rock). The result was a pleasant, if unexceptional film.

With 1949’s Neptune’s Daughter they at least gave her a Frank Loesser score which included the Academy Award-winning “Baby, It’s Cold Outside”. They also surrounded her with familiar co-stars, the aforementioned Skelton, Montalban and Wynn, as well as the delightful Betty Garrett (On the Town, My Sister Eileen) with whom she appeared in Take Me Out to the Ball Game. Her director was once again Buzzell.

In 1953’s Dangerous When Wet they paired her with Fernando Lamas for the second time, but provided her with an eclectic supporting cast that include Jack Carson (A Star Is Born, Rally ‘Round the Flag, Boys!), Charlotte Greenwood (The Gang’s All Here, Oklahoma!), William Demarest (The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek, The Jolson Story), and even cartoon characters Tom and Jerry. Charles Walters (Please Don’t Eat the Daisies, The Unsinkable Molly Brown) directed.

The perfect antidote for those who find the Esther Williams films too sweet is the Hammer Film Noir Double Feature collectionwhich now boasts 7 volumes of two films each. Sets 1-3 and Sets 4-7 are also sold together at a discount.

The films that comprise these sets were Grade B films released between 1952 and 1955. A little over an hour long each, they were the forerunners of the later TV crime shows. They all featured actors who alternated playing second leads in Grade A films with their leads in these highly effective potboilers.

Among the titles are Bad Blonde, Man Bait, Stolen Face, The Glass Tomb, The Black Glove and The Unholy Four. Among the stars are Barbara Payton, George Brent, Diana Dors, Dane Clark, Paul Henreid, Lizabeth Scott, Alex Nicol, Dan Duryea, Zachary Scott, John Ireland, Lloyd Bridges, Paulette Goddard and Richard Conte. Check them out, they’re a great cure for insomnia.

Peter J. Patrick (July 17, 2007)