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Thursday 05/14/09

9:45 AM Turner Classic Movies
Anna Christie (1930 USA): This English-language version of Eugene O'Neill's play isn't quite as good as the German one shot at night on the same sets, but both films feature Greta Garbo as the titular heroine, a lady of the night trying to escape her sordid past. Garbo is, naturally, luminous, and her performance earned her a Best Actress Oscar nomination. In truth, her performance in the German-language version is superior--she simply seems more at ease in it--but that film was never intended for Academy voters and remained unseen in the United States for decades. The Anglophone Anna Christie also features perhaps my favorite screen heavy of all time, Charles Bickford, here cast against type as lovable lunkhead Matt Burke, as well as hatchet-faced Marie Dressler as the drink-sodden mistress of Anna's father.

6:30 PM Turner Classic Movies
My Man and I (1952 USA): Ricardo Montalban stars as a Mexican-American farm worker in this obscure but worthwhile drama from director William Wellman. Montalban portrays Chu Chu Ramirez, a newly naturalized bracero looking for full time employment in the orchards and farms of Southern California. He's hired by agricultural patriarch Ansel Ames (Wendell Corey, in a particularly fine performance) to help clear land, but his lean, shirtless torso soon attracts the attention of bored housewife Elena (noir bad girl Claire Trevor), who hides neither her interest in him nor her ingrained racism. Needless to say, Elena is not amused when Chu Chu finds himself in a relationship with white girl Nancy (Shelley Winters), and the film loses a bit of steam as it evolves into a somewhat predictable tale of unrequited love and jealousy. Still and all, My Man and I was pretty bold stuff for MGM in 1952, and needs to be watched and appreciated in that context.

7:00 PM Sundance
Eraserhead (1976 USA): Well, that's another one off The List. What's on The List, you ask? Films I never thought would get an airing on an American television channel, that's what. So let's see what's left...Wes Craven's Last House on the Left (the original one, of course)...Pasolini's Salo...Andy Warhol's Empire...yep, that's about it. As for Eraserhead, it was the film that made David Lynch a household name in underground circles (if that makes ANY sense, and I think it does), and features the legendary Jack Nance as a single dad trying to raise a most unusual child in a city that might be just across the river from the London of Lynch's Elephant Man. In heaven, everything is fine...on Earth, abstinence is clearly the only choice. This is a pedagogical tool for the scared straight crowd, who could use Eraserhead as a stark warning to hormonal teenagers regarding the perils of pre-marital sex.

Friday 05/15/09

9:15 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Anderson Tapes (1971 USA): Sidney Lumet's cracking action film (also, he says with a resigned sigh, now mooted for a remake) stars Sean Connery as an ex-prisoner and recidivist master thief out to empty a luxurious Manhattan apartment building of its occupants' riches. To do so, though, he has to circumvent the space-age security systems employed by the building's owners: yes, they've installed video cameras! Though the premise is somewhat dated and not particularly original, the story still thrills, thanks in part to a wonderful Quincy Jones soundtrack and a great supporting cast, including the underappreciated Dyan Cannon, Martin Balsam, Ralph Meeker, and Christopher Walken in his first sizable role as "The Kid". Added bonus: I do believe this is the film's widescreen television debut.

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