OTTO PREMINGER, S / D

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?

the bio was returned today, I read about half.

yeah, the dad-in-law reallty rolled over for Dana. The child-abuse thing is kind of amazing.

a still newer bio, by Chris Fujiwara:

http://thephoenix.com/article_ektid61433.aspx

Oh yeah, I saw that in the bookstore a month or two ago and meant to post about it.

Watching Bunny Lake is Missing tonight. Any thoughts?

I seriously hope the audiences of 1944 realized that Vincent Price and Clifton Webb are playing insolent fags.

Of course. But you need EVIDENCE. You need eeeeeeeeeeeeevvvvvvvvvvidence!

P.S. Bunny Lake is Missing = masterpiece, one of his many. In some ways, it's the perfect Preminger gateway drug since his observational style doesn't mute the thriller aspects that rise to the surface only in subsequent viewings of Fallen Angel or Angel Face. And what he does with Noel Coward is a moral triumph. We are not worthy.

Did you dig it?

I don't think Such Good Friends gets mentioned anywhere here. I used to watch it on TV in the '70s, hoping I'd see Dyan...well, never mind about my bilious private life. Saw it for the first time in ages last year, part of a Preminger series at the Cinematheque. It was okay, barely.

Well, unsurprisingly, I love the shit out of it. Of his 1970s films, it's second only to his apocalyptic swansong The Human Factor. The ending of Such Good Friends offers one of cinema's great images of calm acceptance and mature focus, particularly felt after such a juicily off-kilter film.

I did like the ending, and almost mentioned it in my post--couldn't remember specifically how it ended, though.

Just remembered my favourite film joke ever, attributed to some famous director (forget who): "I passed Otto Preminger's house the other day--or should I say, 'a house by Otto Preminger'?"

Did you dig it?

Laura? Yeah! I own it -- one of my favorite films.

No, no, Bunny Lake is Missing

saw Otto in the Nilsson documentary, encased in a groovy blue hippie outfit on the set of Playboy After Dark as Harry sang.

I just started the Hirsch biography.

Should I bother with In Harm's Way? Not too stodgy?

I bought a remaindered copy of this a few weeks ago:

http://www.jonathanrosenbaum.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/ottopreminger-fujiwara.jpg

I read the Advise and Consent chapter while killing time before a movie. Based on that, I'd never make it through the whole book:

"Appropriately, the dialogue of Advise and Consent is filled with performatives. Senators say 'I move,' or 'I yield,' or 'I ask,' or 'I suggest,' or 'I release,' and their saying these things effectuates the things they say."

Making it the complete opposite of American Beauty, where Kevin Spacey says "Pass the asparagus" and everyone ignores him.

Am reading yet another recently published bio of the guy different from the ones you guys are reading.

j/k. But the guy does seem to have even more biographers than Nikola Tesla.

oh, In Harm's Way is a must, if only for what Kirk Douglas's character... does.

anyone rep for The Human Factor? Dave Kehr presiding over a screening in Brooklyn Monday. I remember hearing Otto being interviewed by Julian Schlossberg (onetime studio exec) on his WABC radio show "Movietalk" when OP was doing press for it.

ok, I guess it was WMCA or WOR (ABC was still a music station then)

Anatomy of a Murder is so good. Jimmy Stewart's performance is the capstone of his fifties work: we see how his aw-shucks manner is an act, turned on and off for deliberate manipulative effect.

Criterion forthcoming btw.... supplements v intriguing:

http://www.criterion.com/films/27901-anatomy-of-a-murder

from G Kenny on above:

"Even in the wrong—-that’s right, wrong—-Academy ratio framing of this 1959 film released on DVD by Sony many years back, this picture maintained a great deal of its fluid multi-leveled visual complexity. The correct 1.85 framing and the boosted detail here (some of which, admittedly, conks out briefly for a shot or two at a time—look for decreased forehead-wrinkle levels in a shot in the first Gazzara/Stewart confab about 19 minutes in, for instance) AMPLIFY that quality, which helps in turn to reveal why it is, in fact, one of the Great Films. The shot of Stewart’s character scoping out the awards and newspaper clippings on the wall of the Thunder Bay Inn here shows Preminger as a definite info-fiend precursor to David Fincher. Haven’t explored extras but don’t need to to award this a personal:— A+ "

LOVE THIS MOVIE

Seeing Laura this Sunday in its newly restored versh - can't wait.

awesome

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54muV-xIhIU

Bonjour Tristesse is on now or soon at FF, I believe

^^It's also due to be announced sometime soon on limited edition bluray from Twilight Time.

box o' three sleeper/dud '67-71 films:

http://www.slantmagazine.com/dvd/review/the-otto-preminger-collection/2478

so Jackie Gleason tripping balls isn't worth a look?

yes

doesn't mean it isn't awful

Need to check out some more stuff by this guy.

Anatomy of a Murder is brilliant – probably the best courtroom drama I’ve ever seen. There’s only one weak acting performance (from the main prosecuting counsel) which sticks out a bit but the rest of them are outstanding. Great score from Duke Ellington too.

Laura is super too. Beautiful theme music drifting through it.

Can't remember much about Bunny Lake is Missing a bit of an oddity as I remember...

Bonjour Tristesse was shown (restored!) at the London Film Festival this year. Didn't like it when I first saw it, find myself liking it more and more as time goes on.

Exodus lasts forever but was ok. The old story about it was that at a pre-release screening, one of the production company’s executives (a jew named Mort Sahl) stood up about 2 and a half hours into the movie and called out “Otto, Let my People Go!” (probably apocryphal)...

River of No Return was good but I’ve forgotten most of it. For years I’ve wanted to see Advise and Consent but have always missed it

one of the production company’s executives (a jew named Mort Sahl)

uh? Sahl was one of the great innovative post-Catskills standup comics

(still living btw)

Ah yes, my mistake...

"When Exodus was first released, a funny story circulated concerning comedian Mort Sahl. Supposedly, he stood up in the middle of a premiere screening of the film with Preminger present and shouted, 'Otto, let my people go' in reference to the interminable length of the film. Most critics, but not audiences, tended to agree with Sahl."

Bunny Lake will always be classic to me just because of that one turning point involving a doll

Anatomy of a Murder is brilliant – probably the best courtroom drama I’ve ever seen. There’s only one weak acting performance (from the main prosecuting counsel) which sticks out a bit but the rest of them are outstanding. Great score from Duke Ellington too.

Always loved the way that the score runs through the first half of the film, which is lively and jumping as Stewart's record collection, before disappearing completely for the formal courtroom procedural in the second half, only returning in full swing once the film leaves the courtroom at the very end.

watched 'bunny lake' for the 1st time - solid until the reveal, then nearly unwatchable

Agreed.

i don't know about "unwatchable," but the ending is definitely a letdown. before that there are passages that rival preminger's best work.

bonjour tristesse 4eva

briefly available on DVD in spring '08, alas

that chris fujiwara book mentioned above is pretty worthless IMO. just superficial "analyses" of films with very selective biographical information. and lots of errors of fact.

xpost

i sold my DVD of bonjour tristesse to ryuichi sakamoto!

For the longest time, the Fry's by me kept a copy of BT in their "Foreign" rack.

that's understandable, i guess

is it just me who gets annoyed when foreign films are alphabetized by article? so "la ronde" is in the Ls (as are many if not most French films), "il grido" is in the Is, etc. i feel like video stores would be doing the world a service if they stopped this.

i will always love that ridiculous turning point/reveal in Bunny