Mildred's Fatburgers
  • Home
  • The Blog
  • Clips & Quotes
  • Blogathon Archive
  • Contact

Great Villain Blogathon: Old Lady Vale, Domestic Tyrant

5/20/2016

9 Comments

 
Now, Voyager, Gladys Cooper
A Calamity on Both Sides

Now, Voyager
Cruises ain't what they used to be!

Gladys Cooper, Now Voyager
Seriously.

Bette Davis, Charlotte Vale, Now Voyager
The Beta Charlotte Vale
Bette Davis, Charlotte Vale, Now Voyager
Charlotte Vale, 2.0
Claude Rains
Who doesn't love Claude Rains?

Now, Voyager ​(1942)

Some people's favorite villains are the ones with the biggest gadgets, the deepest vendettas, or the loopiest plans for world domination. I get it. Who doesn't want to see a hero prevail over crotch-splitting lasers, flying monkeys, or Satan's minions? That kind of victory is exciting, high-stakes, splashy stuff. But for me, the more terrifying evil is the quiet, intimate kind that goes on right under everyone's nose: the mean girl spreading life-destroying rumors (These Three), a seemingly doting husband carefully driving his wife mad (Gaslight), and of course, any number of domineering mothers.

If Freud had been a girl, Mrs. Henry Vale (Gladys Cooper) in the 1942 romantic drama, Now, Voyager, would have been his worst nightmare. Mrs. Vale is the matriarch of one of Boston's oldest families, with a couple of grown sons we don't see much of and a 30-something daughter, Charlotte (Bette Davis), who lives at home. Since the day the child was born -- unwanted and late in life -- Mrs. Vale has told her what to do, where to go, whom to see, what to wear, what to eat, and when to talk. As a result, Charlotte is a thick-set, hand-wringing bundle of nerves, whom everyone in the family treats as an object of either pity or fun. 

We meet Charlotte on the day her kindly sister-in-law, Lisa (Ilka Chase), decides to help the poor girl by introducing her to Dr. Jaquith (Claude Rains), a friendly psychiatrist who runs a sanitarium in the country. Mrs. Vale thinks the whole idea is preposterous. Why, Charlotte isn't having a nervous breakdown, she's just seeking attention; simply one of her latest peculiarities. No one in the history of the Vale family has EVER had a nervous breakdown. The idea! Charlotte, stop that blubbering at once!

Bette Davis does a grand job of it, tricked out in a padded suit under an awful dress, insanely sensible shoes, and one big eyebrow. She walks like a person whose every move is scrutinized (because it is) and reads insult and contempt in every word she hears (because it's there). Dr. Jaquith manages to get Charlotte away from her mother for a quiet talk up in her room. She is skeptical and mistrusting, but when Jaquith shows a genuine interest in her artwork (Charlotte, in sublimating her intense frustrations, has turned naturally to the old whaler's craft of scrimshaw), she opens up slightly with a tale of mother-thwarted romance on the high seas. She gives Jaquith a box of tightly carved ivory in thanks for his kindness and attention.
Bonita Granville, Ilka Chase
Ilka Chase is having none of Bonita Granville's nonsense.
When Charlotte's niece, June (Bonita Granville, see evil child above), spies the gift in Jaquith's hand she teases her aunt about it in that casually cruel way pretty girls sometimes have with their plainer acquaintances; it is certainly the way her family has taught her to talk to Charlotte. Dr. Jaquith has seen enough. He insists that Charlotte check into the sanitarium immediately, giving old lady Vale a piece of his mind in the process.
​
​
After several months of weaving and eyebrow therapy, Charlotte is a new woman. Almost. Dr. Jaquith and Lisa give her a recovery gift of a pleasure cruise to South America, with the instruction to live a little and to try new things. One of the new things she tries is hanging out with handsome hard-starer, Jerry Durrance (Paul Henreid), an unhappily married man with great clothes and a sexy way of lighting cigarettes. The two get stranded on shore after a car wreck and fall in love. As you do.

Alas, it can never be; he is married, if unhappily, with two children to consider. Charlotte reunites with her cruise with a good deal more confidence and Jerry goes off to build stuff in the jungle or whatever. Once back in Boston, everyone is amazed, if not entirely delighted, by Charlotte's transformation. Even the loathsome June is nicer and apologetic. Charlotte 2.0 charms the entire family, with one notable exception: her mother.
Paul Henreid, Bette Davis, Now Voyager
Before they start smoking together. If you know what I mean.
​It seems the Mrs. Vale developed a heart problem (you think?) while Charlotte was away and has needed a nurse (the wonderful Mary Wickes) day and night since. But now that she's back, the old battleaxe expects Charlotte to take up her former position as unpaid, browbeatable servant. Bolstered by her shipboard romance, or more likely months and months of therapy, Charlotte politely but firmly refuses to return to the way things were. Mrs. Vale, not liking this newfound independence one bit, promptly throws herself down the stairs, but Charlotte holds her ground. Time passes, and the two women reach an uneasy truce. Charlotte gets engaged to a nice enough man and all seems to be working out.

Until one night, she runs into Jerry at a party. The two must pretend they've only just met and have a silly non-conversation along the lines of "(Louder than necessary) Architecture, that must be very interesting -- (slightly quieter) Oh Jerry, how I've longed to see you." "(also louder than required) Yes, building a hospital...(lighting two cigarettes) darling, how I love you." They say goodbye again and Charlotte realizes that she can't marry the new nice guy because she doesn't love him. Back home, exhausted, she tells her mother that the engagement is off and the two quarrel. The ONE TIME Charlotte says something remotely mean to her mother, the old lady's heart gives out and she DIES. 

Now that's commitment to the villain project.
​
Wracked with guilt, Charlotte checks herself back into the sanitarium. It doesn't take as long to bounce back, partly because she has tweezers now and other therapeutic tools, but also because she meets an awkward young girl with self-esteem issues there; a girl who reminds her of herself at that age. Turns out the child is none other than Jerry's daughter, Tina, and Charlotte takes her under her wing. It gets a little weird after that, boundary-wise, but in the end, Charlotte finds a calling, Dr. Jaquith gets to build a new wing at the sanitarium, and Jerry, one supposes, finds some other ladies to share cigarettes with.
Picture
​I'd always imagined -- in the world beyond the movie -- that Charlotte wound up with Dr. Jaquith somehow. He's infinitely more suitable than Smoky McTwoCigs. Or how about she just chooses not to be with anybody. Why not? This is one of the few films where the heroine saves herself in the end: she gets some much-needed romance on the high seas; gets out from under her mother's toxic control; develops a relationship with her remaining family; declines to marry a guy she doesn't love; and uses her Boston money to help others. 

I don't know why they call this a romance; this is a success story.

Picture
This post is my contribution to the 2016 Great Villain Blogathon, hosted by Speakeasy, Silver Screenings, and Shadows and Satin.

SO much evil in the world -- get reading!

9 Comments

Anachronism in the Afternoon

2/7/2014

0 Comments

 
Hitler's Children, Bonita Granville, Tim Holt, HUAC
Nazi babies. Seriously.

By the way...

Hitler Carpool
I'm talking to YOU, Capital Beltway commuters.

Hitler's Children (1943)

To be honest, I was looking for My Bill, because I was thinking fondly of Kay Francis today and wanted to feature a movie starring Bonita Granville, our recent "Wednesday's Child," and that would have been a two-fer. Instead, I found that Hitler's Children was available for viewing in full on YouTube. 
Imagine! A crew-cutted Tim Holt as a Nazi student at the Horst Wessel Schule, Berlin c. 1933, and Bonita in pigtails at the American Colony School across the way. You know, before things go south.

It never ceases to amaze me that a person could walk into an American movie house any day between 1939 and 1945 and see a pretty thorough excoriation of the German government and general enemy evilness (without managing to convey the depth of that evil) even before we declared war. Do we do this now? I mean apart from action pictures, which I tend not to see? I like propaganda as much as the next person (which I hope is not much), and Hitler's Children, one of RKO's top money-makers, really delivers.

This particular film is one of those "out of the mouths of babes" types where, in one scene, the American kids are enjoying an outdoor social studies class and each one happens to express an opinion about the European war that reflected public opinions of the day: appeasement, isolationism, America should get involved and help the world. The teacher looks on happily while the students demonstrate for us the superiority of democracy. The boys next door, of course, are getting lectured about Germany needing to take its rightful place on top of the food chain and avenge the humiliation of the Treaty of Versailles. Those kids are sad and quiet. And indoors.

That's the setting. Here's the set up: Anna Müller/Miller (Granville) is an American born in Germany and Karl Bruner (Holt) is a German, born in America. They become friends. Until five years later, that is, when Karl goes Gestapo and removes Anna (now a teacher) from the school, informing her that she is now German. They also take away the Jewish, Polish, and Lithuanian kids...ssssomeplace.

These crazy kids fall in love, even though Anna is sent to a sort of Labor Camp to have babies and Karl keeps telling her to play nice. 

It doesn't end well.

If you have 80 minutes to spare and are feeling a little Red-Dawn (1984)-y, give Hitler's Children a try. It is  kind of a conversation starter.

Fun Fact: This low-budget, financially successful propaganda piece was directed by Edward Dmytryk, one of the Hollywood Ten, who served time in prison for contempt of Congress, but who later denounced former friends and colleagues as Communists to HUAC.

USA!!
0 Comments

Wednesday's Child: Bonita Granville

2/5/2014

4 Comments

 
Bonita Granville
Born February 2, 1923

Not Even Close to a Biography, but Fun

Bonita Granville and the Mystery of Star Island, whitman publishing
My copy of Bonita Granville and the Mystery of Star Island
By Kathryn Heisenfelt
Whitman Publishing, 1942

What my sister wrote on the front endpaper of a gift copy:
Picture
(I *did* already have it, but wasn't that nice?)

Such a Good Creep

And by all accounts a very nice person in real life.

I'm always glad to see Bonita Granville when she shows up in a picture. Some of her earlier work was uncredited (Little Women, Anne of Green Gables, Westward Passage) and her later work was eminently supporting (The Mortal Storm, Now Voyager) so there's ample opportunity to be pleasantly surprised. Thanks to her breakout role as Mary Tilford, the manipulative sociopath of a girl who ruins the lives of two teachers in These Three  (the movie version of Lillian Hellman's play, "The Children's Hour"), Granville became the go-to brat/crumbum child in the late 1930s. 

She was the daughter of actor Bernard "Bunny" Granville, who before pictures worked in a traveling minstrel show, the circus, and vaudeville, ultimately headlining in the Ziegfield Follies. The family moved from New York to Hollywood where "Bunny" appeared in a handful of pictures, and Bonita began her long career in 1932 at the ripe old age of eight. Her father died a few years later, but I can't seem to find out how or why; he was only 50. (Note to aspiring biographers: I would very much like to read The Bunny Granville Story; transient youth, three wives, WWI aviator, died young...writes itself.)

Bonita Granville made 50 movies by the time she was 23 years old and left the business when she married oil millionaire Jack Wrather, also a producer. Granville became a successful businesswoman in her own right, producing the very popular Lassie TV series and running Wrather Corp. after the death of her husband. She was the fifth chair of the American Film Institute, although she didn't care to see many modern movies, because of the "indecency" and general explicitness therein: "It destroyed romance and imagination that goes along with sex. And that's pretty important because, otherwise, sex becomes mechanical. Don't get me wrong. I'm a great believer in sex. But that's not the way to go about it." 

One cannot argue. 

I admit, I enjoy her better when she's playing a meanie or a schemer, but I do have a special fondness for her Nancy Drew: all bright-eyed and plucky and smart.

Bonita Granville Wrather died in Santa Monica in 1988 of cancer at the age of 65. She was a peach.

Favorite Five

  • These Three  (1936): So evil!
  • My Bill  (1938): She's mean to Kay Francis...Kay Francis.
  • Beloved Brat  (1938): not a great movie, but come on, the name alone...
  • Nancy Drew: Detective  (1938) - any of the four in this series, really
  • Strike It Rich (1948) - good, clean fun
Haven't seen this one, but it looks good, don't you think? 
4 Comments

Wednesday's Child: Marcia Mae Jones

1/22/2014

2 Comments

 
Marcia Mae Jones
Born "Marsha" Mae Jones in Los Angeles, August 1, 1924

Growing up on the set, child star biography
Interviewed in Growing Up on the Set,
By Tom Goldrup and Jim Goldrup, McFarland & Company, 2002

Played Bratty and Bullied Equally Well

Who knows? If it weren't for Shirley Temple, Bonita Granville, or Jane Withers, Marcia Mae Jones might have been better known today or would at least have had meatier roles. She did seem to get the choice second part to a bigger box office child actor, however, and always turned in an admirable, and often excellent, performance.

I first came to know her as the mean Lavinia in The Little Princess (1939), and since (sorry) I'm not the biggest Shirley Temple fan, I was kind of rooting for the brat. By that time, 15-year-old Jones had already been in about 25 pictures, pushed into show business by one of those mothers, who pushed her siblings into movies as well, Like Baby Peggy, Marcia Mae Jones was the family breadwinner at an early age and also had to contend with the professional jealousies of her brothers and sister when her career outpaced theirs.

Perhaps her best and most famous performance was as the tormented Rosalie Wells in the 1936 adaptation of Lillian Hellman's play, "The Children's Hour." Retitled These Three, the film starred Merle Oberon, Joel MacCrea, and Miriam Hopkins, with Bonita Granville as the evil child, Mary. The film was remade in 1961 under the play's original title, with Veronica Cartwright (also excellent and not as famous as she should be) in the part played by Jones.

By the 1940s, Marcia Mae Jones had gone from playing decent secondary roles to kind of crummy teenage starring roles with titles like Lady in the Death House * (1944) and Street Corner **(1948). She made a number of appearances on television comedies and dramas throughout the 50s, 60s, and 70s. She also had a part in the 1973 film The Way We Were, but I honestly can't remember her in it.

As an adult, Jones was plagued by personal and emotional problems, which she attributed in part to her stage mother. Her second husband, television writer Bill Davenport (Hogan's Heroes, I Dream of Jeannie, All in the Family, Maude), struggled with drugs and alcohol and eventually committed suicide. Jones herself fought alcohol addiction, overcoming her dependency later in life. 

She remained lifelong friends with Jane Withers since they appeared together in the film Gentle Julia (1936).

Marcia Mae Jones died September 2, 2007 of pneumonia at the Motion Picture & Television Fund retirement community at the age of 83.

* A film I totally need to see.
** Not about prostitutes as the name implies, but about a young girl who gets pregnant on prom night and seeks an illegal abortion. Six of one, I suppose, in the late 40s?
2 Comments

    About Mildred

    I'll do just about anything a movie tells me to do. Unless it tells me wrong...

    Then I get cranky.

    But go ahead, like me on Facebook.

    RSS Feed

    Visit Mildred's profile on Pinterest.

    Proud Member Of

    Picture
    Classic Movie Blog Hub Member

    Archives

    May 2019
    December 2017
    October 2017
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013

    Categories

    All
    Agnes Moorehead
    Akira Kurosawa
    Alan Mowbray
    Albert Salmi
    Alice Terry
    Aline MacMahon
    Allen Jenkins
    Alloy Orchestra
    Anna Massey
    Ann Dvorak
    Anne Bancroft
    Anne Baxter
    Anne Revere
    Anne Shirley
    Ann Miller
    Ann Sothern
    Anthony Quinn
    Anton Walbrook
    Arthur Penn
    Art Linkletter
    Arturo De Cordova
    Audrey Hepburn
    Baby Peggy
    Barbara Bel Geddes
    Barbara Stanwyck
    Barton MacLane
    Basil Rathbone
    Bea Benadaret
    Beatrice Straight
    Bette Davis
    Beulah Bondi
    Billie Burke
    Bill Scott
    Billy Wilder
    Birthday Of The Week
    Bob Newhart
    Bonita Granville
    Boris Karloff
    Brian Aherne
    Bugs Bunny
    Burt Lancaster
    Busby Berkeley
    Butterfly Mcqueen
    Carl Boehm
    Carl Theodor Dreyer
    Carol Haney
    Cary Grant
    Charles Boyer
    Charlton Heston
    Chester Morris
    Christopher Morley
    Claire Bloom
    Claire Trevor
    Clark Gable
    Claude Rains
    Claudette Colbert
    Cliff Robertson
    Cloris Leachman
    Connie Gilchrist
    Conrad Veidt
    Constance Bennett
    Cybill Shepherd
    Dana Andrews
    Dana Delany
    Dan Duryea
    David Niven
    Dean Stockwell
    Deborah Kerr
    Dennis Morgan
    Diana Lynn
    Diana Wynyard
    Dick Moore
    Dick Powell
    Donald Sutherland
    Donna Reed
    Doris Day
    Dustin Hoffman
    D.W. Griffith
    Eddie Albert
    Edie Adams
    Edith Fellows
    Edward Arnold
    Edward Everett Horton
    Elaine May
    Elissa Landi
    Elizabeth Taylor
    Ella Raines
    Ellen Burstyn
    Elvis Presley
    Emilio Fernandez
    Ernest Borgnine
    Ernst Lubitsch
    Errol-flynn
    Ethel Barrymore
    Eugene-pallette
    Eve-arden
    Evelyn Varden
    Fay-bainter
    Fay-bainter
    Firesign-theater
    Frank Hurley
    Frank McHugh
    Frank Morgan
    Frank Sinatra
    Freddie Bartholomew
    Frederic March
    Fredi Washington
    Fred MacMurray
    Fritz Lang
    Friz Freleng
    Gabriel Figueroa
    Gary Cooper
    Gary Merrill
    George Brent
    George Murphy
    Geraldine-fitzgerald
    Ginger Rogers
    Gladys Cooper
    Glenda Farrell
    Gloria Jean
    Government Cheese
    G.W. Billy Bitzer
    Hal E. Chester
    Hal Roach
    Harold Lloyd
    Hedda Hopper
    Henry Fonda
    Herbert Marshall
    Howard DaSilva
    Howard Hawks
    Howard Hughes
    Howard Keel
    Hume Cronyn
    Humphrey Bogart
    Inga Swenson
    Ingrid Bergman
    Irene Dunne
    Jackie Butch Jenkins
    Jackie-coogan
    Jackie Cooper
    Jack Lemmon
    Jacques Tourneur
    James Craig
    James-garner
    James Gleason
    James Mason
    James-stewart
    James Whitmore
    Jane Darwell
    Jane-powell
    Jane-withers
    Jane-wyman
    Jay Ward
    Jean Dixon
    Jeanette-macdonald
    Jean Harlow
    Jean Simmons
    Joan Blondell
    Joan Crawford
    Joan-fontaine
    John Carradine
    John Ford
    John Hurt
    Joseph Cotten
    Juano Hernandez
    June Foray
    Karin-swanstrom
    Karl-malden
    Katharine Hepburn
    Kathleen Byron
    Kathryn Grayson
    Keenan Wynn
    Kevin Mccarthy
    Kirk Douglas
    Lauren Bacall
    Lee J. Cobb
    Leif Erickson
    Leila Hyams
    Leonard Nimoy
    Letitia-palma
    Lew Ayres
    Lewis Stone
    Lillian Gish
    Lillian-roth
    Lizabeth-scott
    Loretta Young
    Louise-beavers
    Lucille Ball
    Lurene-tuttle
    Lyle Talbot
    Maggie-smith
    Marcia Mae Jones
    Margaret Sullavan
    Maria Schell
    Marie-dressler
    Marjorie-main
    Marni-nixon
    Marsha Hunt
    Marx-brothers
    Mary-boland
    Maxine-audley
    Max-linder
    Max Ophuls
    Mel Blanc
    Mercedes McCambridge
    Mia Farrow
    Michael Powell
    Mickey Rooney
    Mike-mazurki
    Mike Nichols
    Miles-mander
    Miriam Hopkins
    Moira Shearer
    Montgomery Clift
    Movie-theatres
    Ned Sparks
    Niall Macginnis
    Nicholas Ray
    Nigel Hawthoren
    Ninon Sevilla
    Norma-shearer
    Orson Welles
    Pamela Franklin
    Patsy Kelly
    Patty Duke
    Patty McCormack
    Paulette Goddard
    Paul Henreid
    Paul Lynde
    Peggy Cummins
    Percy Kilbride
    Peter Bogdanovich
    Peter Breck
    Peter Falk
    Peter Lorre
    Peter Ustinov
    Preston Foster
    Ralph Bellamy
    Ramon Novarro
    Renee Falconetti
    Rex Ingram
    Ricardo Montalban
    Richard Barthelmess
    Richard Basehart
    Richard Briers
    Richard Mulligan
    Rita Hayworth
    Robert Benchley
    Robert Ryan
    Robert Wagner
    Rock Hudson
    Rodolfo Acosta
    Roger Livesey
    Roland Young
    Rosalind Russell
    Royal Dano
    Rudolf Valentino
    Sabu
    Sam Fuller
    Sandra Dee
    Shelley Winters
    Shirley MacLaine
    Shirley Temple
    Skippy/Asta
    Soyuzmultfilm
    Spencer Tracy
    Spring Byington
    Sterling Hayden
    Susan Hayward
    Sydney Greenstreet
    Takashi Shimura
    Teri Garr
    Tim Holt
    Tod Browning
    Tommy Kirk
    Tony Randall
    Toshiro Mifune
    Una Merkel
    Van Johnson
    Veronica Cartwright
    Victor Buono
    Victor McLaglen
    Virginia Weidler
    Walter Huston
    Walter Matthau
    Walter Tetley
    Warren William
    Wednesdays Child
    Wendy Hiller
    William Demarest
    William Powell
    William Shatner
    William Wyler
    W.S. Van Dyke
    Yasujiro Ozu
    Zero Mostel

    More

    Upcoming Blogathons

    Picture
    Rhoda Penmark flaunts some norms in THE BAD SEED (1956)

    Blogathons Gone By

    Great Breening Blogathon
    NIGHT NURSE (1931)
    Picture
    THE LAST PICTURE SHOW
    Nature's Fury Blogathon
    THE GRAPES OF WRATH
    Reel Infatuation Blogathon
    Sugarpuss O'Shea changes my life in BALL OF FIRE (1941)
    Great Villain Blogathon 2016
    Charlotte Vale's Mean Mom in NOW VOYAGER (1942)
Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.