I sat down to watch Anchors Aweigh last Saturday, forgetting that I have to be in just the right frame of mind to watch a musical. There’s a really specific kind of suspension of disbelief that goes along with a musical and if I have trouble with that, the whole experience falls apart.

Anchors Aweigh is what I’d call a Kitchen Sink movie. It’s 2:20 long, and it has a little of everything in it. You want sexual innuendo? You got it. Cute little kids? Sure. Romantic love story? In spades. Guy dancing with a cartoon mouse in a castle where the cartoon animals aren’t allowed to have fun? That’s a bit specific, but what the heck.

It took me a bit to get into it but once I did, it was an enjoyable film. Short version of the plot: Two sailors deal with complications while trying to find romance (wink wink) on shore leave in sunny Hollywood.

Longer version: Our two sailors are Joe Brady (Gene Kelly) and Clarence Doolittle (Frank Sinatra), pictured above. After what must be recognized as just about the gayest scene in cinema ever, in which Kelly lounges on a table while sailors in their undershirts lean in and Sinatra’s face rests alarmingly close to Kelly’s bits and pieces, Doolittle asks Alpha-Male Joe to teach him how to be a ‘wolf’ with the ladies. (Sure, Clarence. The ladies. Now quit resting your head on his shoulder.) Hilarity ensues.

Kelly plays the role he seems to love; that of the jackass playboy whose hard exterior is melted by a woman’s love. He’s very good at the jackass part, I’ll give him that. It was a bit much in this film, though, what with him telling a girl’s perspective suitor that she’s a whore (in the song If You Knew Suzie) so the guy will leave and then being angry when she doesn’t swoon in gratitude.

Sinatra’s voice is impeccable in Anchors Aweigh. He performs several songs, including the mournful I Fall In Love Too Easily. Sinatra also attempts choreography with Gene Kelly, for which he should be commended, but nobody can keep up with Gene Kelly.

Kathryn Grayson (above) costars as Susan Abbott, the virginal romantic foil for the boys. She has a lovely voice, and gets to show it off several times. Assuming she was the one doing the singing voice, Grayson’s range is phenomenal, nearly Julie Andrews-esque, and showcased tremendously in her final number From The Heart Of A Lonely Poet.

I’m not totally sure, but I think Susan is supposed to be of Mexican heritage. Everything except her name and the color of her skin leads me to that conclusion, right down to the fantasy Zorro scene she has with Gene Kelly. It wouldn’t be the first time a studio tried to straddle the fence between inclusiveness and audience expectations, so I think I’m right.

José Iturbi heads up several musical numbers, and though I’m not sure why I’m supposed to know who he is, he’s very talented. The piano orchestra is a rare treat, and it uses the architecture of the Hollywood Bowl very well. The ending of Anchors Aweigh is telegraphed way in advance, to the point where I was almost surprised that there wasn’t a twist of some sort.

If this blog could have sound effects, this right here would be the place to have the record scratch. Look at that angelic boy up there. Isn’t he adorable? Now somebody tell me how in the name of Jumping Jehoshaphat that little boy grew up to be Dean Stockwell?!? That’s just … I wouldn’t have believed it.

Anyway, Stockwell is good in the role of Susan’s orphaned nephew Donald. Cute as a button and quick with a punchline, Donald heads up the Awwww department, kind of like Kelly heads up the jerkface department and Grayson heads up the woman department. (I’m not sure what department Sinatra is in, but man he has the world’s biggest ears!)

There’s a lot going on in Anchors Aweigh, and while some of it falls flat for me, other parts make up the difference. The music is varied and captivating, and the film ends with a good old fashioned happy ending for everybody. Who could hate that?

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Site note: Click the images for super-wide full-size 2.35:1 versions!

I’ve been hearing good things about 3:10 To Yuma since it came out last year, so when Dan from Truth on Cinema said last week that he was getting ready to watch a film I’d just reviewed, I decided to return the favor and move Yuma to the top of my Netflix queue.

It was a treat to be able to come to the film with only the most basic of knowledge of the story. I knew it was a Western, and I knew that Russell Crowe and Christian Bale were involved, but otherwise, I surprised myself by being an almost blank slate, having not even seen the original 1957 version (it’s coming soon, I promise).

We start out the film meeting Dan Evans. Played by Christian Bale, Dan is a down on his luck rancher who just can’t catch a break. His kids are embarrassed by him, his wife doesn’t trust him, and absolutely nothing has gone right for him since he lost his foot in the Civil War. He’s an interesting character, in that his decisions are made of a complex mixture of character and desperation. Dan agrees to escort outlaw Ben Wade (more on him in a moment) to a train that will take him to Yuma prison. It’s the right thing to do, but his real reason for doing it is the $200 payoff that will keep his failing ranch out of foreclosure.

On top of that, there’s Dan’s need to be a hero to his boys, a man for his wife. There’s a terrific scene near the beginning of the film when Dan argues with his wife about his joining the posse. Dan says, “If I don’t go, we gotta pack up and leave. Now I’m tired, Alice. I’m tired of watching my boys go hungry. I’m tired of the way that they look at me. I’m tired of the way that you don’t. I’ve been standing on one leg for three damn years waiting for God to do me a favor. And He ain’t listenin’.”

It’s a powerful moment, a defining moment for the character, made more dramatic by the fact that the lines are whispered angrily so no one else will hear his confession. One minor complaint. I found the lack of resolution in Dan’s relationship with his wife to be a bit unfortunate. I’m not sure how I would’ve liked it addressed, but it was a dangling thread that needed to be sewn up.

Logan Lerman plays William Evans, Dan’s oldest son (above), who has a gigantic chip on his shoulder and nothing but contempt for his father. His father’s a fool, a wimp, a pushover, all the things a lot of 14-year-olds think magnified by his father’s real failure. William has his own journey in 3:10 To Yuma, the journey from boy to man. When the film begins William is enamored by the quick-shooting, uncompromising Ben Wade. Ben is everything his father isn’t, and his eager intoxication with Wade’s total opposite approach to life is deftly shown in Lerman’s performance.

William covertly joins the posse, saving his father’s life, in essence “proving” all the bad things William thinks of him. As the size of the posse slowly dwindles, Dan Evans takes more and more of a leadership role, a fact that goes unnoticed by William. Of course, eventually William learns about his father’s character and uncompromising beliefs, but I was surprised at how late in the film it happened.

Then there’s the outlaw. Ben Wade, played by Russell Crowe, leads a gang of robbers who rob the Southern Pacific’s payroll coach. Shown above with maniacal sidekick Charlie Prince (Ben Foster) and sharpshooter Campos (the impressively built Rio Alexander, who I’m hoping will be doing more movies), Wade finds himself caught and waiting for his gang to find and free him. Meantime, he isn’t going down without a fight as he methodically takes out several members of Dan Evans’ posse and plays psychological games with Evans.

As the title of the film would suggest, the big goal is to get Wade on the 3:10 To Yuma without getting killed in the process. The chances of that happening dwindle when the posse (what’s left of it) makes it into town and Prince offers to pay $200 to whoever mows down a member of the posse. With the entire town against him and the rest of the posse pussing out, Dan must figure out how to get Wade on the train without getting himself shot.

I think I’ll leave the rest of the spoilers unspoiled. Director James Mangold has given us various characters to identify with and see the story through. One that I’ve barely mentioned is Charlie Prince, whose ruthless loyalty to Ben Wade is fascinating to watch in an oddly demented way. There are some great twists and turns through the film, and some wonderful character moments. We learn that the good guy and the bad guy share one thing: they’re both trying to prove themselves, both trying to make sense of their lives.

In other words, they’re both human.

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A note before we start: More than with recently reviewed films, I feel I must point out that all of the pictures within this and most posts since mid-March link to larger images showing the entire screenshot. Usually (but not always) I just shrink the 1.85:1 image to a smaller version, but a different aspect ratio was used in older films. I’ve kept the correct 4:3 ratio for the larger images, but for design reasons have trimmed the smaller images to my standard 1.85:1 ratio. (Actually, a 1.37:1 ratio would have been more correct for the larger images, but I’m lazy and 4:3 is close and easier to figure. Seriously, click the pictures. The zoom effect is wicked awesome.)

I’ve been reviewing fairly recent movies lately, so I decided last week that it was time to finally watch the Orson Welles classic Citizen Kane. That this directly follows The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie is a bit jarring, but what the heck. Let’s give it a whirl.

Citizen Kane is often referenced as indisputably the best film ever made. While I think that may be a bit of an overstatement, it’s damn good. Technically speaking, it’s a marvel. There’s an air of daring innovation and creativity that we don’t see nearly enough today. I’m not going to be able to touch on all of the greatness in this space, nor am I able. Instead, I’ll look at the bits that interested me and leave the rest for the experts.

The circular structure of the story is captivating to me. Within the first five minutes of the film, we know who Charles Foster Kane is, how he came into money, how he lived, who he married, why he divorced, and how he died. It gets the bare facts out of the way so we can focus the next couple of hours on finding out the sordid details of Kane’s life and what made him tick.

Held together ostensibly by the mystery of Kane’s last word, the story follows a generic reporter, often obscured by shadow, as he visits the important people from Kane’s life and learns of their time with Kane through a series of non-sequential flashbacks. Kane’s dirt-poor mother (above, Agnes Moorehead in her first film role) came suddenly into money and signed her son away to be cared for by the bank. This seems harsh and unthinkable, but Welles uses a simple closeup and, later, one line inform us that Mrs. Kane’s reasons were pure.

Much of the mood of Citizen Kane is built with light and shadow. Above, the reporter gains rare access to Kane’s deceased guardian’s memoirs. Kept under close guard, he is escorted into a darkened room with a shaft of light filtering in through a high window. There are many other examples of mood setting like this, but here it gives a feeling of cold, almost frightening authority as we learn of Kane’s earliest days.

Welles also used some optical illusion to subtly augment the message that audience was being told. For example, right after we watch Mrs. Kane sign papers giving him away, we flash to a parallel scene. Very late in life Kane is forced to give up control of his business. In the middle of that scene Kane walks slowly into the back of what appears to be a room with average height features.

(Click here for Kane in the front of the room. Click here for Kane in the back of the room.)

As his advisors talk about his failure at what had been his focus in life, Kane becomes more and more diminished until he appears to be two feet high. No attention is drawn to the effect. Instead, Welles left it for the viewer to find, either consciously or not. Especially in those days before CGI and extreme visual effects, this illusion is pulled off remarkably.

But that isn’t the only visual effect that Welles used to tell the story of Citizen Kane. One of the more amazing effects cinematographer Gregg Toland’s use of what later became known as Deep Focus. Several times throughout the film, everything on the screen is in focus, from the actor in the very front to the one way in the back. The above picture of Kane in his newsroom is one example of this, but even better is the first picture in this post. The focus is crystal clear on young Mr. Kane in the front, and just as clear on the lettering on the sign in the back (you’ll have to click the picture for that).

It’s an amazing technique, one that forces the audience to decide what to look at in the shot. Welles plays to this requirement of a more involved audience by staging shots so that little cutting is needed. Several scenes are done with remarkable camera work and minimal cutting between shots. Robert Wise, who of course went on to direct many films including The Sound of Music, did a superb job of extending the creativity to the editing of the film.

I’ve gotten to nearly the end of the post and I’ve barely mentioned the story. As I said at the top, the film is really a character study. Kane’s last word is the device used to pull the audience through the film, but by the time we learn Rosebud’s identity, it’s almost irrelevant. The real story has been in beginning to understand the rise and downfall of a complex character.

The wonderful acting in Citizen Kane is surprisingly done by a cast of mostly unknowns. Other than Orson Welles and Agnes Moorehead, none of the principal cast went on to do much else of note. Dorothy Comingore, who played Kane’s second wife, was wonderful in the film (Her performance in the scene pictured above brought to mind Jean Hagan’s Lina Lamont in Singin’ in the Rain.) but apparently was blacklisted in the 1950s and never recovered.

While it’s not my favorite film, Citizen Kane has pushed its way near the top of my list of impeccable films.

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