For fans of the oldies, found an obscure one on TCM: After Office Hours. In high concept terms, it's His Girl Friday five years earlier.
Clark Gable plays the Cary Grant role of the newspaper editor without scruples, and Constance Bennett plays the wealthy young woman who's a reporter on the paper. Gable both loves Bennett and uses her to get scoops on the private lives of three persons in her social circle (a married couple and the is-he-or-isn't-he her lover who's going to run for office).
Then, a murder. Not a whodunit because we know who's guilty even before the victim is dead. But the characters need to figure out whodunit.
So, it's a combination screwball comedy and mystery. Plus Billie Burke doing her usual shtik in a supporting role as Bennett's mother. All in a zippy hour and a quarter.
I think there's enough foreign-ness in a period drama (setting, clothes, the way people behave) that you don't need a "foreign" accent to signify "these people are not from your space-time location."
On the down side, there is Tony Curtis, "I taught da classix to da children of my meastah." American Broadcaster English, okay, but hearing Brooklyn out of a Roman slave is pretty effin weird.
(In Spartacus, Kirk Douglas talked Strangely Enunciated American, but was surrounded mostly by Brits -- Olivier and Ustinov as the lords, and the lovely Jean Wossname as a fellow slave, all talking Beeb English. As mish-mashes go, probably nobody cared about accent.)
(Then again, I just don't want to hear Tony Curtis attempt an accent of any kind, the way you don't want Tom Cruise or Kevin Costner to attempt an accent.)
I saw Funny Face for the first time the other night. Hello to the garish 60s design! The titles were done by Richard Avedon -- who knew? (I mean, besides the whole rest of the world?)
From Slashdot:
"Marvel has raised $525 million to independently finance 10 movies based on its comics over seven years. The titles named are Captain America, The Avengers, Nick Fury, Black Panther, Ant-Man, Cloak & Dagger, Dr. Strange, Hawkeye, Power Pack and Shang-Chi. The company's also changing its name from Marvel Enterprises to Marvel Entertainment."
Ant-Man! He has the strength of a human!
The only encoding-foreign-language-as-accents thing that ever really made sense to me was having French people sound British (when there's no "English" spoken. Then it gets complicated). The US:UK::Canadian French:French French always made sense to me.
I just saw
The Aristocrats,
and my face hurts from laughing.
I saw Funny Face for the first time the other night. Hello to the garish 60s design! The titles were done by Richard Avedon -- who knew? (I mean, besides the whole rest of the world?)
He also shot the photos of Audrey Hepburn during the fashion shoots. I love Funny Face for the fashion thing more than the dancing, sad to say (considering it's an Astaire pic).
Just finished downloading a widescreen version of
Robinson Crusoe on Mars.
Haven't seen this movie for about 20 years, so I'm looking forward to sitting back and watching this on the weekend.
"Marvel has raised $525 million to independently finance 10 movies based on its comics over seven years. The titles named are Captain America, The Avengers, Nick Fury, Black Panther, Ant-Man, Cloak & Dagger, Dr. Strange, Hawkeye, Power Pack and Shang-Chi. The company's also changing its name from Marvel Enterprises to Marvel Entertainment."
Ant-Man? Shang-Chi? Cloak & Dagger? Power Fucking Pack? Why not just put the money directly into the shredder?
Also, I'm worried that Marvel won't be able to attract good directors all on their own. Directors can make shitty scripts watchable, but nothing can make up for bad directing.
(Then again, I just don't want to hear Tony Curtis attempt an accent of any kind, the way you don't want Tom Cruise or Kevin Costner to attempt an accent.)
"I lawve you, Spahtacus." I laughed until I stopped.
I'm watching
A Knight's Tale.
It's not as good as I remembered, but it's still pretty fun.
