TCM Schedule for Friday, September 26 -- Clint Eastwood

[Staph]

This morning finishes off Star of the Month Kay Francis, and this evening features a couple of Clint Eastwood's WWII films, both directed by Brian G. Hutton (who supposedly gave up directing movies in the 1980s and became a plumber!). Enjoy!


4:30am -- Storm At Daybreak (1933)
Fictionalized account of the events leading up to Archduke Ferdinand's assassination and the start of World War I.
Cast: Walter Huston, Kay Francis, Nils Asther.
Dir: Richard Boleslawski.
BW-79 mins, TV-G

The song "Two Lips Like Cherries" (music by William Axt and lyrics by Gus Kahn) is played on piano and sung by Kay Francis, but though it was probably dubbed. She sang in a few other films, but usually songs like Home on the Range and Happy Birthday.


6:00am -- Guilty Hands (1931)
A district attorney tries to frame an innocent girl for the murder he committed.
Cast: Lionel Barrymore, Kay Francis, Madge Evans.
Dir: W.S. Van Dyke II.
BW-69 mins, TV-PG

Director W. S. Van Dyke was also the director of most of the Jeanette MacDonald/Nelson Eddy films.


7:15am -- Allotment Wives (1945)
Unscrupulous women marry servicemen for their pay.
Cast: Kay Frances, Paul Kelly, Otto Kruger.
Dir: William Nigh.
BW-78 mins

Tagline from the original ad campaign -- "They're Pretty To Look At . . . But POISON To Love!"


8:45am -- The White Angel (1936)
In this true story, Florence Nightingale defies military leaders to organize humanitarian nursing services during the Crimean War.
Cast: Kay Francis, Ian Hunter, Donald Woods.
Dir: William Dieterle.
BW-92 mins, TV-G

Much disagreement to the origin of the source material exists. Some contemporary sources believed the source was Lytton Strachey's 1918 biographical essay in "Eminent Victorians". Others contend Michael Jacoby was the author. Warner Bros. executive Hal B. Wallis contended that the life of Florence Nightingale was in the public domain, and that screenwriter Mordaunt Shairp did his own research. The MPAA agreed with Wallis; no source credit was necessary.


10:30am -- The Young Don't Cry (1957)
An orphaned teen tries to help a wrongly convicted man who's escaped from prison.
Cast: Sal Mineo, James Whitmore, J. Carrol Naish.
Dir: Alfred L. Werker.
BW-90 mins, TV-PG

Sal Mineo donated the drum he used in The Gene Krupa Story (1959) to another teen idol, David Cassidy, the day after a dinner with David and his father, Jack Cassidy. David was 13 at the time.


12:00pm -- Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1961)
A factory worker lives for the chance to have fun on the weekends.
Cast: Albert Finney, Shirley Anne Field, Rachel Roberts.
Dir: Karel Reisz.
BW-89 mins, TV-14

The film had to go through some dialog changes before release, mainly owing to the swear words in the original script. Although 'bastards', 'bloody', and 'bleedin' were allowed, the censors refused to pass 'sod', 'christ' and 'bogger' (the latter being a script substitution for 'bugger').


1:37pm -- Short Film: From The Vaults: A Cinderella Named Elizabeth (1965)
Describes how Elizabeth Hartman was auditioned and chosen for the part of Selina in "A Patch of Blue".
Cast: Sidney Poitier, Elizabeth Hartman, Pandro S. Berman.
BW-7 mins

At the time of her Academy Award nomination in 1966 for A Patch of Blue, Elizabeth Hartman was the youngest nominee ever in the category of Best Actress. She was 22 years old at the time.


1:45pm -- A Patch Of Blue (1965)
A blind white girl falls in love with a black man.
Cast: Sidney Poitier, Shelley Winters, Elizabeth Hartman.
Dir: Guy Green.
BW-105 mins, TV-PG

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Shelley Winters

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Elizabeth Hartman, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White -- George W. Davis, Urie McCleary, Henry Grace and Charles S. Thompson, Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Robert Burks, and Best Music, Score - Substantially Original -- Jerry Goldsmith

Scenes of Poitier and Hartman kissing were excised from the film when it was shown in movie theaters in the southern states of the USA. These scenes are intact in the DVD version. We've come a long way, baby!


3:45pm -- The Caretakers (1963)
A progressive psychiatrist clashes with the conservative head nurse at a state institution.
Cast: Polly Bergen, Robert Stack, Joan Crawford.
Dir: Hall Bartlett.
BW-98 mins, TV-PG

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Lucien Ballard

Joan Crawford, then on the Pepsi-Cola board of directors, demanded that product placement shots be included in all her films of this era. Look for it here prominently advertised on the sides of dispensing carts at a mental hospital picnic.


5:30pm -- Torn Curtain (1966)
A U.S. scientist pretends to defect to follow his mentor behind the Iron Curtain.
Cast: Paul Newman, Julie Andrews, Lila Kedrova.
Dir: Alfred Hitchcock.
C-128 mins, TV-PG

From the book "It's Only a Movie", "There was an ending written for Torn Curtain", Hitchcock said, "which wasn't used, but I rather liked it. No one agreed with me except my colleague at home (his wife Alma). Everyone told me that you couldn't have a letdown ending after all that. Newman would have thrown the formula away. After what he has gone through, after everything we have endured with him, he just tosses it. It speaks to the futility of all, and it's in keeping with the kind of naivete of the character, who is no professional spy and who will certainly retire from that nefarious business."


7:49pm -- Short Film: From The Vaults: Operation Dirty Dozen (1967)
This promotional short for the feature film The Dirty Dozen (1967) shows the film's actors at work and at play.
Cast: Lee Marvin, John Cassavetes, Jim Brown.
Dir: Ronald Saland.
C-9 mins

Jim Brown is the only man to be inducted during his lifetime into three sports Halls of Fame: Pro Football, College Football, and Lacrosse.


What's On Tonight: TCM PRIME TIME FEATURE: CLINT EASTWOOD


8:00pm -- Kelly's Heroes (1970)
An American platoon tries to recover buried treasure behind enemy lines.
Cast: Clint Eastwood, Telly Savalas, Donald Sutherland.
Dir: Brian G. Hutton.
C-144 mins, TV-14

Mike Curb, who wrote the lyrics to the movie's theme song "Burning Bridges," served as the Republican lieutenant governor of California between 1978 and 1982, during the second administration of Democratic Governor Edmund G. "Jerry" Brown, Jr.


10:30pm -- Where Eagles Dare (1969)
An Allied team sets out to free an American officer held by the Nazis in a mountaintop castle.
Cast: Richard Burton, Clint Eastwood, Mary Ure.
Dir: Brian G. Hutton.
C-155 mins, TV-14

In the scenes where Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood climb the step fortress walls, Burton moves with ease, while Eastwood is clearly working hard physically. This was due to the fact that Burton, who was a hard-drinker and out-of-shape by that point, chose to ride a crane (made invisible by special effects) up the wall, whereas the young, healthy Eastwood was actually climbing the wall.


1:15am -- Aventure Malgache (1944)
A French actor in Madagascar during World War II makes enemies on both sides.
Cast: Clarousse, The Moliere Players.
Dir: Alfred Hitchcock.
BW-31 mins, TV-PG

Alfred Hitchcock did not make his customary cameo appearance in Aventure Malgache (1944), nor did he in his other short propaganda war film Bon Voyage (1944).


2:00am -- Night Of The Lepus (1972)
Husband-and-wife scientists unwittingly unleash a horde of giant man-eating rabbits.
Cast: Stuart Whitman, Janet Leigh, Rory Calhoun.
Dir: William F. Claxton.
C-89 mins, TV-14

This was DeForest "Dammit, Jim, I'm a doctor, not a monster rabbit" Kelley's last non-"Star Trek" film.


3:30am -- The Giant Claw (1957)
A giant anti-matter bird invades the Earth's atmosphere.
Cast: Jeff Morrow, Mara Corday, Morris Ankrum.
Dir: Fred F. Sears.
BW-74 mins, TV-PG

In an interview, star Jeff Morrow said that neither he nor anyone on the film saw the title "monster" until they went to the film's premiere in Morrow's home town. It turned out that producer Sam Katzman had contracted with a low-budget model-maker in Mexico City to construct the "Giant Claw" and no one in the cast or crew had any idea it would come out looking as bizarre and, frankly, laughable as it did. Morrow said that the audience roared with laughter every time the "monster" made an appearance, and he wound up slinking in embarrassment out of the theater before the film was over so that no one who knew him would recognize him.


5:00am -- Watch the Skies! (2005)
This TCM original documentary explores the history of the science fiction genre beginning in the 1950s. Features interviews with George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, James Cameron and Ridley Scott.
Narrator: Mark Hamill.
Dir: Richard Schickel.
BW-56 mins, TV-PG

Includes clips from The Flying Saucer (1950), Rocketship X-M (1950), Destination Moon (1950), The Thing from Another World (1951), The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), Flight to Mars (1951), The Atomic City (1952), The Bad and the Beautiful (1952), Invaders from Mars (1953), It Came from Outer Space (1953), The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953), Abbott and Costello Go to Mars (1953), The War of the Worlds (1953), Them! (1954), Tarantula (1955), Forbidden Planet (1956), The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957), The Monolith Monsters (1957), The Space Children (1958), Teenagers from Outer Space (1959), and War of the Worlds (2005).

[Staph]

1. Torn Curtain

When Alfred Hitchcock began his 50th feature film, Torn Curtain (1966), he should have been at the pinnacle of his career. After four decades as a director his films were still popular, French critics were proclaiming him a great artist, some American critics were beginning to agree, and intelligent career management by his agent Lew Wasserman (and later head of Universal Pictures) had made him a very rich man.

However, as Hitchcock began putting the ideas together for Torn Curtain, he felt very insecure. The Birds (1963), although popular, was nowhere near as big a hit as Psycho (1960) and his next film, Marnie (1964), had been a critical and box-office disaster. Fearing he might be losing his touch, Hitchcock allowed the Universal Pictures front office to make more and more demands to ensure that Torn Curtain would be a popular hit.

The idea behind the movie was a sound one. After the 1951 defection of the English spies Burgess and MacLean, Hitchcock wondered, "what must Mrs. MacLean have thought?" As a result, a spy adventure that centered on the reaction of the spy's bewildered fiancee began to take shape in his mind. Fifteen years later, at the height of the James Bond boom, seemed the perfect time to bring this story to the screen. Copying the adventures of agent 007, however, held no interest for Hitchcock. He wanted to reveal the dark side of spying: "The theme deals with 'average man' feeling what it's like to be a spy, and what a dirty business it is. He gets involved in a murder, he cheats an old professor, et cetera. The theme, really, is that spying is a despicable business. But, unlike other yarns that indicate this, I bring it home to an individual. In other words, the audience can identify themselves with him, with 'average man,' and feel what a nasty and unpleasant business the whole thing is. A spy is a hero in his own country, but he's a villain in enemy country." (from Who the Devil Made It?: Conversations with Legendary Film Directors (Ballantine) by Peter Bogdanovich).

Hitchcock commissioned novelist Brian Moore to write a screenplay but by September 1965, after several drafts and further doctoring by the screenwriting team of Keith Waterhouse and Willis Hall, the script was clearly not up to the usual Hitchcock standards. Instead of shelving the project or doing further re-writes, the picture was rushed into production because Universal was putting pressure on Hitchcock to use then top stars Paul Newman and Julie Andrews, and Andrews' availability ended in early 1966. Hitchcock was unhappy with the choices but went along with Universal's wishes. Newman particularly irritated Hitchcock, behaving in a manner Hitchcock considered boorish at a private dinner at Hitchcock's home and sending the director a three-page memo detailing script problems.

The big name stars also caused financial headaches. Since their salaries ate up so much of the film's budget, Universal skimped elsewhere, hiring an inferior German team that shot poor background plates for a key scene. Universal's pressure also caused Hitchcock to lose one of the key people that had made his movies of the late 1950's and 1960's so popular. At this time, the vogue at the studios was for pop music soundtracks instead of orchestral scores. Hitchcock still wanted to use Bernard Herrmann who had written the great scores for Vertigo (1958), North by Northwest (1959) and Psycho. Hitchcock telegraphed the composer, asking him to write a more "pop" score for Torn Curtain and Herrmann seemed to agree. When the score was finished, however, Hitchcock was shocked to discover that Herrmann had written one of his heaviest orchestral scores. "You don't make pop pictures. What do you want with me? I don't write pop music," Herrmann announced. Hitchcock had no choice but to fire him (he was replaced by John Addison), marking the end of their professional collaboration.

For all the troubles behind the scenes, Torn Curtain does have one key scene that stands out as one of Hitchcock's greatest. "People are killed so easily in movies," Hitchcock said. "The whole idea was not only to show how difficult it is to kill a man, but to point up to the character what espionage entails: you're involved in killing!" This horrifying scene, as Newman's scientist and a farmwife slowly and awkwardly murder an East German agent, is as disturbing and powerful as anything in Psycho.

Critics did not hold Torn Curtain in very high esteem at the time of its release. Were the compromises the studio introduced a waste? From Universal's point-of-view, certainly not. The movie was Hitchcock's biggest hit after Psycho, earning $7 million dollars domestically and much more overseas. For Hitchcock, however, it only seemed to confirm that he should bend to the will of the studio even on important artistic decisions. As Bernard Herrmann said, "Universal made him very rich, and they never let Hitchcock forget it."

Director/Producer: Alfred Hitchcock
Screenplay: Brian Moore
Cinematography: John F. Warren
Art Direction: Frank Arrigo
Music: John Addison
Editing: Bud Hoffman
Cast: Paul Newman (Professor Michael Armstrong), Julie Andrews (Sarah Sherman), Lila Kedrova (Countess Kuchinska), Hansjoerg Felmy (Heinrich Gerhard), Tamara Toumanova (Ballerina), Wolfgang Kieling (Hermann Gromek)
C-128m. Letterboxed. Closed captioning.

by Brian Cady