The Journey

Another of those movies that shows up on TCM regularly enough but that for whatever reason I had never actually watched in its entirety, is The Journey. With that in mind, the last time it ran on TCM I recorded it so that I could later watch it and write up a review to post here.

The opening credits play out over scenes at the exterior of an airport. We then are taken to the inside of Budapest Airport early in November 1956. For those who don't know, at the end of October student protests led to a new, somewhat less Communist government in Budapets, something which the Soviets couldn't tolerate, so they sent in tanks. The authorities also closed the airport, with a whole bunch of passengers stranded.

Among them is Hugh Deverill (Robert Morley), a British television representative who represents the worst of the British stereotypes about Brits who think they can just dictate terms to everybody around them and get their way. There's also an American family, the Rhinelanders (E.G. Marshall and Anne Jackson, with a very young Ron Howard as their younger son), and various people from other countries, all wondering how they're going to get out of the country.

Into all of this walks Lady Ashmore (Deborah Kerr), accompanied by a man calling himself Flemyng (Jason Robards) who is feeling rather unwell. It's also obvious that Flemyng isn't who he seems to be. Worse is that Ashmore has met Deverill in the past back in England. And Deverill is an absolute prick about it, constantly not wanting to give Lady Ashmore any privacy. He also knows she's married, so shouldn't be traveling in dangerous Communist Hungary alone, and certainly not with a sick man who isn't her husband.

The stranded passengers get put on a bus traveling to Vienna, since it's the closest airport in a non-Communist country, and get stopped at a couple of roadblocks, with Flemyng fainting at one of them and it being revealed that he's traveling under a false identity. They then get to the last major town before the border with Austria. There, the passengers are forced to stop, and wait at the hotel that has been commandeered for just this purpose.

At the hotel is a Soviet Red Army officer, Major Surov (Yul Brynner). He suspects something is up, and demands everyone surrender their passports so that he can interview them individually before letting them go through. This is going to be a particular problem for Flemyng, since he's not actually Flemyng but a Hungarian freedom fighter named Kedes. Not only that, but his physical situation is getting worse to the point that it's fairly obvious to everyone, even Surov, that something is badly wrong.

Further complicating matters is that Surov finds himself taken with Ashmore, or at least acting like he is. You could get the impression that Surov is going to ask for sexual favors in exchange for letting Kedes go, or something similar. But then, this is a movie from the late 1950s released by MGM, so most likely something like that isn't going to show up in a film subject to the Production Code.

Still, The Journey isn't a bad movie, although it's one that's not without its flaws. It runs a bit over two hours, which is a bit too long. It also feels a bit too pat, with the ending being somewhat unrealistic. Then again, I think it's less about the plot and more about the characters and their dealings with each other, with the various stars giving capable performances. The Journey is not, I think, the best movie for anybody involved with it, but is also something not to be ashamed of.

Beau Brummell (1954)

Stewart Granger was cast in a whole bunch of movies that were period pieces from various eras of British history. When last I posted about Granger, it was for the Victorian-era film Blanche Fury. This time, we go back a couple of decades to the Regency, for the MGM costume drama Beau Brummell. It's airing tomorrow (April 16) at 3:30 PM as part of a morning and afternoon of movies dedicated not to Granger, but to supporting star Peter Ustinov.

You probably know that "Beau Brummell" is, even to this day, a byword for stylish fashion, and the term comes from a real person named George Bryan Brummell, who got the nickname Beau (played here by Stewart Granger). As the movie opens, Brummell is a captain in the British army in the late 1790s, when the real-life Brummell would have been about 20. Brummell's regiment is doing a military parade, and showing up for inspection is the Prince of Wales, the future King George IV (that's Peter Ustinov). Brummell shows himself to be good with a sword on horseback, in exercises involving cutting melons, and putting the sword through rope rings. Brummell gives the rings to another attendee, the socialite Lady Patricia (Elizabeth Taylor). But Brummell gets himself in trouble when he comments to the Prince of Wales that the epaulettes are too big, seemingly designed to make his highness look slimmer and not for ergonomics.

Brummell eventually quits the army, in part because life in the army is expensive since in those days officers had to provision their own uniforms and horses. Brummell runs across a candidate running for Parliament, and makes more comments, partly about fashion, such as the wasteful expense of powdering one's hair and how the flour could be used to feed the poor, as well as some comments about the royals, which again brings Brummell to the attention of the Prince of Wales. This time, however, Brummell is able to ingratiate himself to the prince, in part because of his views on the king, George III (Robert Morley in a small role). If you remember from The Madness of King George, the king's mental capacity had long been a question, along with his testy relationship with the Prince of Wales. The King wants his son to marry a suitable royal from Germany, while the prince is in love with a different woman.

The Prince of Wales, having become friends with Brummell, helps Brummell rise in society, but there are storm clouds on the horizon. One is that Brummell has been spending freely to maintain the appearances of being a member of the aristocracy, and this has led to heavy debts that he's going to be unable to pay off. If he can't pay them off, eventually the debtors are goingto come for him, with the likelihood of debtors' prison looming. The other issue is Lady Patricia. Brummell loves her, and she certainly likes him. But she's long been betrothed to a man who is of her proper social class, Lord Mercer.

Eventually, Brummell and the Prince of Wales have a falling out after he becomes regent and assumes more power. This means he no longer has a protector and is going to have to flee to France post-Napoleon to stay out of debtors' prison. The movie at least gives Brummell the chance at reconciliation with the former Prince of Wales, who by this time has assumed the throne and is George IV.

The problem, if you will, with Beau Brummell, is that it's a fairly fanciful version of history. Lady Patricia is not a real person, but the bigger issue is that in real life, Brummell outlived George IV by a decade. Additionally, from what I've read, he didn't particularly have public political views the way he's presented here. But the total Hollywood lack of historicity aside, Beau Brummell is a good example of how MGM could make a fine color costume drama. Granger is OK, Taylor doesn't have much to do, and Peter Ustinov steals the show. Morley is quite good too, although he only has one or two scenes. If you want to see an example of what MGM could do well, Beau Brummell is definitely a good example.

The hotel of free exchange

One more of the movies that TCM had as part of its tribute to Gina Lollobrigida and that I had never seen before is Hotel Paradiso. It's another one that sounded interesting, so I recorded it and am now finally getting around to doing the review, having decided to space out the reviews on all of the Lollobrigida movies I recorded.

The movie informs us that it's set in Paris of la belle époque, that elegant era at the turn of the century that we would probably think of today in terms of the upper classes being upper-class twits in comedies of manners. After idyllic scenes, we see a man checking into a room at the Hotel Paradiso, that man being based on Georges Feydeau (the playwright who co-wrote the play on which the movie is based). He sits down to write, and writes... nothing, really.

Cut to a fashionable district not in the center of Paris. Henri Cotte (Robert Morley) is a building inspector, married to Marcelle (that's Lollobrigida). She considers herself a long-suffering wife even though she hasn't been married as long as her neighbors, the civil engineer Benedict Boniface (Alec Guinness) and his wife Angelique. Henri informs Marcelle that he's going to have to go away on a late-night inspection to the aforementioned Hotel Paradiso, on the grounds that one of the rooms may be haunted, and due to a contract dispute, Henri has to figure out what's really going on. Benedict is outside ostensibly working in his garden, and overhears the dispute, as does Angelique, who tells the couple to wait until they've been married 20 years.

In any case, it gives Marcelle the idea to visit Benedict, who has no small amount of sympathy for her, because he's just as long-suffering as Marcelle. In theory it would be nice if they could spend some time alone together. And wouldn't you know it, but the two of them are both going to be alone tonight, as Angelique finds out her sister is sick and needs her to visit. Angelique then complains about some junk mail they've gotten, which just happens to be for... the Hotel Paradiso! What a great place for Benedict and Marcelle to spend an evening together with nobody noticing them.

But things are going to get a lot more complicated. We know that Henri is going to the Paradiso ostensibly for work. And then up shows a Mr. Martin with his four young daughters fresh out of the convent school, taking the Bonifaces up on an offer to come and visit sometime. Marcelle shows up and Benedict suggests the Paradiso. But Martin overhears it, and heads off there with his kids, not knowing what kind of a hotel it really is.

Finally, there's Henri's nephew Maxime (Derek Fowlds a dozen years before Yes, Minister. He's got a think for the Bonifaces' maid Victoire, and they decide that since everybody else is out, why not finally have some alone time themselves as well. Of course, they pick the Hotel Paradiso as well. You can guess all the havoc that's about to ensue as everybody tries to keep from being seen with and by everybody else.

Hotel Paradiso is the sort of comedy of manners that was popular in the first half of the 20th century, but which for me isn't my favorite genre. It's supposed to be an elegant farce, but for me it's really the sort of movie that's closer to mean than funny, in that the characters don't come across as really likeable. Still, for people who enjoy this genre, they'll probably like it

The Great Air Race

It's time for another of those movies that recently started showing up in the FXM rotation and is going to be on again tomorrow. This time, it's Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines. It's got two airings tomorrow, at 3:30 AM and 9:30 AM.

A brief opening segment that reminded me of Conquest of the Air tells us of the difficulties man had in learning how to fly. But the movie is set in 1910, which is seven years after the Wright Brothers' famous flight at Kitty Hawk, and now man can fly, although it's nowhere near as safe as it would become in more recent years.

One of those "birdmen", as the movie calls them, is British military man Richard Mays (James Fox). He's in love with Patricia Rawnsley (Sarah Miles), daughter of press baron Lord Rawnsley (Robert Morley), although Dad flatly forbids his daughter from flying considering how dangerous it is. However, Mays comes up with the idea of having an air race from London to Paris in order to show the superiority of British aviation. Lord Rawnsley realizes this would be excellent advertising for his newspaper, and agrees to sponsor just such a race.

News gets out, and people from all over the world want to join in the race, since it's got a fairly substantial prize. There's Frenchman Pierre Dubois (Jean-Pierre Cassel); Italian Count Ponticelli (Alberto Sordi); American cowboy Orvil Newton (Stewart Whitman); and an entire team commanded by Count Manfred Von Holstein (Gert Fröbe), although the Count is not supposed to be the pilot. There's also another Brit, underhanded Sir Percy (Terry-Thomas), who plans to cheat his way to victory. Just before the race is set to start, a member of the Japanese navy shows up.

Most of the characters are gentle stereotypes. As I mentioned, Orvil is a cowboy; Pierre is a lover who is part of a running joke about a woman he romanced whom he should know (several characters with different names, all played by Irina Demick); the Germans are the model of officious efficiency; and so on. It's all meant to be in reasonably good taste and reasonably suitable even for children, although they'd probably prefer the aerial stunts once the race actually gets going, which isn't until two-thirds of the way through the picture. One big sub-plot has Orvil falling for Patricia, which creates a fair deal of conflict between Orvil and Richard, although it all comes out right in the end.

The movie runs a bit long, although not as long as The Great Race, a movie from the same year which was about a car race at the beginning of motoring. Including the intermission, the print FXM ran was about 139 minutes. This means that things take a while to get going, and I don't just mean the race itself. The comedy more or less works, but there's also not as much comedy as you'd expect. Not that there's really drama; it's more that all the scenes are slow to develop. Of the two movies, however, I did prefer Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines.

Murder at the Gallop

MGM's British unit produced four films in the early 1960s starring Margaret Rutherford as Agatha Christie's detective Jane Marple. TCM ran all four of them back in August during Rutherford's day in Summer Under the Stars, although I only had enough space on my DVR to record one of them, Murder at the Gallop. I recently got around to watching it and doing a review on it here.

At the start of movie, Marple is going around town with her companion and custodian of the local library, Mr. Stringer (Rutherford's real-life husband Stringer Davis, reprising his role from the first of the movies, Murder She Said), to raise money for a local charity. One of the stops is at the big manor-type house of a rich old man, Mr. Enderby (Finlay Currie), notorious for not donating to charity. He lets them in, however, where they find him getting scared by a cat and suffering fatal heart attack in the process!

Miss Marple just knows that it's murder, and figures that the last person before them to show up at the house deliberately brought a cat in order to induce that heart attack. So even before local police inspector Craddock (Charles Tingwell, also reprising his role in Murder She Said shows up, she's trying to get evidence, which you'd think would be a crime since she's technically impeding a legitimate police investigation.

Except that the police don't believe it was murder, just a run of the mill heart attack, leaving Marple free to come up with her batty conspiracy theories. Well, of course, this being Miss Marple maybe they're not so batty. First she concludes that the murderer, whoever it was, must have come over on horseback as she's able to get an impression of a riding boot. Find out whose boot it matches, and you've got the murderer. She also eavesdrops on the reading of the will.

Among the heirs is Enderby's sister Cora, so Marple goes to visit Cora, finding her dead, and a housekeeper Miss Milchrest (Flora Robson) who wonders whether Marple is in fact the killer. As for the other heirs, there's Enderby's nephew Hector (Robert Morley) who runs a local inn that also provides horse riding as part of the recreation; art dealer Crossfield (Robert Urquhart); and Mr. and Mrs. Shane. All of the heirs are staying at Hector's in the Gallop, so Marple decides she's going to take a "vacation"... at the Gallop.

Some vacation, since it's patently obvious that she's going to investigate the murder. Along the way, she's going to be put in a bit of danger as she finds everybody is a suspect. But you know that she's ultimately going to figure out who the killer is.

Eddie Muller, in the wraparounds, stated that this particular movie is based on one of Christie's books that did not in fact have Miss Marple among the characters. So for Agatha Christie purists, they may not like the movie as a result. I more or less liked it, as the mystery is good enough and Margaret Rutherford brings the same humor to the Marple role that she did in Murder She Said. I have to admit, however, that I preferred Murder She Said.

Still, anybody looking for a relatively undemanding mystery can enjoy Murder at the Gallop.

The Alphabet Murders

My sister was a big fan of Agatha Christie when she was a teenager. I never really got into reading mysteries, but when one or another of the movies based on Christie's stories has shown up, I've always been willing to give them a try. Recently, that meant watching The Alphabet Murders, based on Christie's book The A.B.C. Murders.

Tony Randall shows up, sans make-up, at the beginning of the credits to inform us that he's going to be playing Hercule Poirot, Christie's Belgian private eye who just loves a good mystery. Poirot shows up in London to see his tailor, followed by a man from Scotland Yard, Capt. Hastings (Robert Morley). Scotland Yard ostensibly wants to keep Poirot safe since his being harmed while in England would create an international incident. But the real reason is that Scotland Yard doesn't want Poirot involved in investigating a murder on English soil.

Of course, you just know that there's going to be a murder and that Poirot is going to wind up investigating it. At a public swimming pool, the clown Albert Aachen, who does a high-diving routine, gets killed by a poison dart to the neck, the killer leaving behind a copy of a guidebook called ABC London. Not long after that, a woman with the odd name of Amanda Beatrice Cross (Anita Ekberg) shows up where Poirot is taking a steam bath and gives Poirot a bowling scorecard.

So Poirot goes to the bowling alley, which is where he meets Betty Barnard, an instructor there. Not that Poirot needs a bowling instructor, but that's another story. Anyhow Barnard gets killed, and Poirot puts two and two together. The first victim had the initials AA and the second BB, so the next is going to have the initials CC.

Scotland Yard, meanwhile, knows fully well that Poirot is trying to investigate, and at every turn, Hastings and his boss Inspector Japp (Maurice Denham) try to get Poirot deported and sent back to Belgium. But every time, Poirot is able to outwit them, on his way to ultimately solving the murders. Well, with a little help from the police who keep him from getting bumped off.

But we're getting ahead of ourselves. Poirot learns that Amanda's psychologist has the initials DD, being a man named Duncan Doncaster (Guy Rolfe). He also learns that the CC who seems to be the next victim is one Carmichael Clarke, who has family set to inherit a large sum of money should he die. But how does it all tie together?

Frankly, I found the mystery in The Alphabet Murders to be rather convoluted and unsatisfying. I think that's in no small part because director Frank Tashlin and the writers seem to have decided to make this a rather more comic mystery, with the casting of Randall. Tony Randall is not a bad actor by any means, and can certainly do comedy. But I get the impression Tashlin wanted Randall to be way over the top here, and a little bit of Randall's Poirot goes a long, long way.

I thought the print TCM ran didn't look so good, and since it was 4:3, I figured it had to have been panned-and-scanned. But a look at IMDb suggests that it was in fact filmed this way.

If I were going to introduce people to Agatha Christie movies, I think I'd start with the 1974 Murder on the Orient Express. I also like the Margaret Rutherford Marples, even though supposedly Rutherford isn't anything like the Marple that Christie wrote. The Alphabet Murders would be far down the list.