This being Thursday, it's time for another edition of Thursday Movie Picks, the blogathon run by Wandering Through the Shelves. The theme this week is "Summer Break", which I suppose is reasonable for the middle of the summer, at least for us in the northern hemisphere. This is more or less a theme that was done in July 2017, and unsurprisingly I found that two of my selections back then are movies I was thinking of using this time around: Mr. Hulot's Holiday and Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation. So I had to think of some other movies instead:
Having Wonderful Time (1938). Ginger Rogers plays a working girl from New York who takes a trip up to one of the non-Jewish Borscht Belt resorts in the Catskills, where she meets waiter Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and the two fall in love. Jack Carson plays Ginger's would-be boyfriend back in the city, while Lucille Ball is one of Ginger's housemates at the resort.
A Summer Place (1959). Arthur Kennedy and Dorothy McGuire, together with son Troy Donahue, live in an old house turned into a resort on an island off the coast of Maine, when family Constance Ford, Richard Egan, and Sandra Dee come to visit for the summer. McGuire and Egan had had a torrid affair 20 years earlier, while Donahue and Dee fall hard for each other, which is a problem since Dee's mom Ford is one of the iciest most controlling mothers in Studio Hollywood history. It gets more over the top, and 50s steamy from there. Oh, and there's that theme that was a huge hit back in the day.
The Vanishing (1988). A young Dutch couple, Rex and Saskia, go on vacation in France. But at one of the service stations the two get out to do their own thing, and Saskia never shows up again. Rex obsesses over what might have happened to Saskia, until he hears from Raymond, who might know something about the case. But how far will Rex go to get that information? Remade, rather palely, by Hollywood in the 1990s.
6 comments:
Having Wonderful Time has such a great cast so it's hard to understand why it's so pallid, but it is. The film isn't bad by any stretch but it's just sort of there.
Constance Ford OWNS A Summer Place! Her character is a dreadful woman but she swallows every scene she's in. Her only real match is Arthur Kennedy in their brief face-off. Otherwise the movie is swoony, romantic and gorgeous to look at(and that theme song is an earwig) but it's so much pap in retrospect.
I've only seen the American version of The Vanishing which wasn't that great but the concept is so creepy and sick I've never felt any pull at all to watch the original, especially since I've heard that it expounds on that concept.
I jumped around for mine with a dark drama, low-key comedy and tense adventure.
Last Summer (1969)-Spending the summer unsupervised on Fire Island Sandy (Barbara Hershey), wealthy, spoiled and bored meets fellow teens Dan (Bruce Davison) and Peter (Richard Thomas) on the beach where the three quickly form a tight circle. One day they become acquainted with the awkward and naive Rhoda (Catherine Burns-Oscar nominated for Best Supporting Actress). At first friendly the trio close ranks and Rhoda becomes a figure of sport, teased and humiliated by the group. Distressing and disturbing story of maliciousness, sexual domination and cruelty with a pitch-black ending.
The Flamingo Kid (1984)-Just out of high school Brooklyn teenager Jeffrey Willis (Matt Dillon) unhappy with his modest home, chances into a summer job at the posh Flamingo Club during summer break. Enticed by the heady atmosphere he is taken under the wing of smooth-talking club member Phil Brody (Richard Crenna) who extolls the pursue of the easy buck over the hard work of college much to Jeffrey’s father Arthur (Héctor Elizondo) chagrin. There are some late-summer hard lessons ahead for Jeff though.
The River Wild (1994)-Troubled married couple Gail and Tom Hartman (Meryl Streep & David Strathairn) are taking their son, Roarke (Joseph Mazzello), on a birthday rafting trip down Idaho’s Salmon River during their summer vacation. Misfortune and danger come their way when they are taken hostage by fugitives Wade (Kevin Bacon) and Terry (John C. Reilly) who force Gail, a former raft guide, to help them attempt escape down the treacherous rapids.
I still need to see The Vanishing. It's been on my watchlist for years.
The Vanishing has been on my list for a while but I've never gotten to it.
I watched The Vanishing with Kiefer and Sandra Bullock way back when... I am ashamed to say I never knew it was a remake!
I have wanted to see a Summer place for quite a while now. It looks soap opera to the hilt. The Ginger Rogers film looks like fun to watch. I have heard of the vanishing but unsure if I want to see it.
I was a bit amazed last week at how everybody wanted to see Rome, Open City and this week how everybody really wants to see The Vanishing.
And yes A Summer Place is soap opera to the hilt, which is what makes it so much fun.
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