OTTO PREMINGER, S / D

Denby on Preminger. I haven't finished it.

Oy, Denby:

Preminger was perhaps too refined and modulated in his sophistication to achieve more than occasional greatness as a director. He doesn’t compare, for instance, with his fellow-émigrés Fritz Lang and Billy Wilder. It’s hard to think of a heartbreaking or truly exhilarating moment in his work. Yet, at his best, he raised civil discourse to the level of subtle entertainment: one can get caught up in the intricately choreographed give-and-take of “Advise and Consent” without caring whether the nominee gets confirmed or not

If AAC was just one of many "subtle entertainments," then isn't Preminger a great director?

I think "at his best" suggests there weren't "many." I don't know that O.P. has more than two great films.

Depends how academic we get: Laura, Fallen Angel, Anatomy of a Murder, maybe Advise & Consent as a near-great.

I've got The Cardinal in my queue.

"Can technical skill and craft, combined with worldliness and urbanity, and presented in a distinct style, rise to the level of art?"

UGH!!!!!!

I'm not yet a Hawks convert, but that argument is total idiocy

http://theband.hiof.no/band_pictures/levon_and_the_hawks_1964.html

aargh
http://theband.hiof.no/band_pictures/levon_and_the_hawks_1964.gif

I was this close to going to see Saint Joan last night but didn't make it and now I am regretting it.

i went to the screening of bunny lake w/ keir dullea. he did a funny impression of otto preminger (and confirmed once more that the man was a complete monster)

:o

A friend wd've gone if Carol Lynley had been there. He was scared shitless by Bunny as a kid.

i think denby is pretty much on the money, and i don't usually.

I didn't know that OP and Dorothy Dandridge were lovers, or I just forgot.

I remembered. They had a son, no?

Exodus is surprisingly sentimental and awkward, and about as long as this primary season.

Mort Sahl allegedly stood up at the Exodus premiere at the 3-hour mark and yelled "Otto, let my people go!"

joe, one Dullea monster story, plz!

Yeah, you gotta back these things up with anecdotes.

in bunny lake, made martita hunt do one scene over again about 40 times because she kept making the wrong gesture (the 40th take, she realized she was doing it again, paused halfway, and muttered "oh, FUCK it"). he also said the best day he had while filming BLIM was getting the phone call that he'd landed the main role in 2001

OP wouldn't raise his voice at olivier, tho

dullea's looking really good for his age, btw

well, he was rebirthed by tasteful aliens.

Morbs, have you seen Where The Sidewalk Ends? Pretty good, even if Gene Tierney's a drip.

long ago, I think. Just got Fallen Angel from library.

I'm perversely tempted by that Otto/Milton Berle co-star thing next week.

the only twinbill i may get to the rest of the retro might be The Fan/ Forever Amber

I saw When The Sidewalk Ends once at random as the second half of a double during some noirfest years back and remember being pleasantly surprised.

I might could try to see that twinbill next Tuesday, Morbs.

Fallen Angel is deliciously put together, even if Alice Faye is kind of an annoying simp; her walk through the town w/ Dana Andrews, and her arrest in San Francisco, are one-take tours de force. Great scene of dirty ex-cop Charles Bickford working over sleazy suspect Bruce Cabot.

The first ten minutes (in that bar) are wonderful, aren't they?

I lover "BEER" on both sides of the front door too.

I've riffled through that new Otto bio; Dullea def not fond of OP... more from M Musto:

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/dailymusto/archives/2008/01/foster_hirsch_a.php

musto was also at the BL screening

yes, he gives rundown.

Otto wanted Dr. King to play a senator in Advise & Consent. Yes, MLK.

Destroy w/ extreme prejudice: Skidoo

I saw this when I was about 8 (no, not when it first came out), so I'd love to see it again

how was Forever Amber, ken?

joe, one Dullea monster story, plz!

Dullea and bio author Foster Hirsch were interviewed on WFMU a couple weeks ago. Listen to it at: http://www.wfmu.org/playlists/SE (it's the January 7 show)

Worth the listen

FYI to LA ILXors, there's a Preminger tribute starting now at the American Cinematheque: http://egyptiantheatre.com/archive1999/2008/Egyptian/Otto_Preminger_Films.htm

Ran across this today too...

"In Otto Preminger's luxurious Manhattan townhouse, Tim ran an LSD session for the famed director, then doing 'research' for a movie entitled _Skidoo_. As soon as the acid kicked in, Preminger went into
manic action. Turning on one television set after another, he had three going at once. 'His shiny, hairless head had turned into a space helmet and he was high as an orbiting com-sat as he dialed and tuned ever-changing realities, deliberately disrupting focus and color.' As Tim searched for a Ravi Shankar record to slow Preminger down, he had an epiphany. 'Watching Otto's acclerated brain in action jolted me out of the nostalgic-pastoral phase. At Millbrook we had been living in a time warp. Millbrook was a pleasant but repetitious feudal drill The next stage in evolution, my own at least, was going to involve information and communication. I resolved on the spot to move to Hollywood and learn how realities were produced and directed."

-p.318, _Timothy Leary: A Biography_, Rbt Greenfield (Leary quotes culled from "Emergence of the Drug Culture" from _Flashbacks_)

Morbius, The Fan was so-so, but Forever Amber was very good. Nice painterly Technicolor. Linda Darnell was well cast, and with the red hair she looked kind of like Drew Barrymore. George Sanders was excellent as King Charles II of England and had this great bit where his dogs would follow him everywhere and when he left a room he would say to them "Come, children."

ooh!

Just was leafing through Dark City Dames and for some reason there is a picture of Otto Preminger sitting with Marie Windsor with a caption that says something about the tyrannical director taking her under his wing.

"The tyrannical director proved to be a guardian angel to the young, struggling actress."

Never seen any Preminger, but Anatomy of Murder arrives in my mailbox tomorrow.

(And yes, it was the Denby article that did it.)

hey, Daisy Kenyon's out, pounce.

http://www.slantmagazine.com/dvd/dvd_review.asp?ID=1302

I've been skipping around in the Hirsch book, what a trip and a half OP was...

I almost picked it up at the store last weekend. how's his crit?

his crit? better than his dish?

It's OK, he doesn't overpraise stuff that hasn't aged all that well (Man w/ Golden Arm). Quotes a lot of actors who say OP gave em virtually no direction.

Daisy Kenyon is excellent, excellent. Love how the Preminger renaissance is as much a Dana Andrews rediscovery.

and Andrews didn't want to do DK.

Maybe Crawford's most human performance? I dunno -- she seemed looser and, god, more IRONIC?

Joan was going thru menopause during the shoot; the temperature on the set was kept at 50 degrees F.

Yeah, I watched the "featurette." Your boy Hirsch does the commentary and hosts the featurette.

Also: is this the only instance in film of a feeble father-in-law?