There's Sometimes a Buggy

In this week's episode of our Gloria Grahame Acteurist Oeuvre-view, we explore the unique casting of unmusical Gloria in Fred Zinnemann's film version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma! (1955) and follow the thread that leads (through Jud Fry) from the supposedly "wholesome" musical to Charlie Kaufman's dark, experimental I'm Thinking of Ending Things. Then we switch over to British espionage curiosity The Man Who Never Was (1956), starring Gloria and Clifton Webb... although they never share a scene. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, another curious pairing: Cameron Crowe's quintessential 90s romantic comedy Singles (1992) and Luc Moullet's weirdo Western A Girl Is a Gun/Une aventure de Billy le Kidd (1971) offer wildly divergent perspectives on the problem of love.

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: OKLAHOMA! (1955) [dir. Fred Zinnemann]

0h 32m 04s: THE MAN WHO NEVER WAS (1956) [dir. Ronald Neame]

0h 40m 38s: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Cameron Crowe's Singles (1992) at The Revue Cinema and Luc Moullet's A Girl is a Gun /Une aventure de Billy le Kid (1971) at TIFF Lightbox

+++

This Paramount 1933 Studios Year by Year episode features two of the studio's defining stars of the era: the Marx Brothers, in their final, most famous, and (maybe) most nihilistic Paramount film, Duck Soup, directed by Leo McCarey, and Gary Cooper, miscast (or maybe not) in One Sunday Afternoon in the role that would go to James Cagney in the Warner Bros. remake, The Strawberry Blonde. We zero in on Groucho's authoritarian anti-authoritarianism and Cooper's embodiment of a charismatic man's class resentment. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, we share our first experience with the cinema of Nouvelle Vague primitivist Luc Moullet, his quirky and candid examination of second-wave feminism's effect on his relationship (and anatomy), Anatomie d'un rapport (1976)

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: 1933 and Paramount

0h 06m 53s: ONE SUNDAY AFTERNOON (1933) [dir. Stephen Roberts]

0h 27m 01s: DUCK SOUP (1933) [dir. Leo McCarey]

1h 01m 22s: Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto – Luc Moullet and Antonietta Pizzorno's Anatomie d'un rapport (1976)

+++

Studio Film Capsules provided by The Paramount Story by John Douglas Eames

Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler

1933 Information from Forgotten Films to Remember by John Springer

+++

For our November 2025 Special Subject we watched the Antoine Doinel films of François Truffaut: The 400 Blows (1959), Antoine et Colette (1962), Stolen Kisses (1968), Bed and Board (1970), and Love on the Run (1979). In addition to the charms of star/auteur avatar Jean-Pierre Léaud, we focus on the films' evolving style and increasing interest in the women in Doinel's life. And in our Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto section we discuss Paul Leni's horror comedy The Cat and the Canary (1927) and a Hitchcock double feature, Shadow of a Doubt (1943) and Saboteur (1942).

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: THE FOUR HUNDRED BLOWS / LES QUATRE CENTS COUPS (1959) [dir. François Truffaut]

0h 28m 50s: ANTOINE ET COLETTE (1962) [dir. François Truffaut]

0h 37m 30s: STOLEN KISSES / BAISERS VOLÉS (1968) [dir. François Truffaut]

0h 54m 42s: BED AND BOARD / DOMICILE CONJUGAL (1970) [dir. François Truffaut]

1h 05m 15s: LOVE ON THE RUN / L'AMOUR EN FUITE (1979) [dir. François Truffaut]

1h 19m 32s: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Paul Leni's The Cat and the Canary (1927) at TIFF Lightbox and Alfred Hitchcock's Saboteur (1942) and Shadow of a Doubt (1943) at The Paradise

+++

Our Gloria Grahame Acteurist Oeuvre-view continues with two 1955 liberal institutional melodramas: Stanley Kramer's Not as a Stranger, starring Robert Mitchum as a monomaniacally idealistic doctor, Olivia de Havilland as the wife he takes for granted, and Gloria as the Other Woman; and Vincente Minnelli's underrated The Cobweb, starring Richard Widmark as a monomaniacally idealistic psychiatrist, Gloria (in one of her best roles) as the wife he takes for granted, and Lauren Bacall as the Other Woman. The relatively counter-intuitive casting of the latter film is an indication of its greater subtlety, but the pairing of the two makes (so we hope) for interesting discussion. And then in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto we say goodbye to Diane Keaton (belatedly, by the time this episode will go up) with a viewing of Annie Hall and ask whether either its "feminist" or its "misogynous" reputations are deserved.

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: NOT AS A STRANGER (1955) [dir. Stanley Kramer]

0h 36m 29s: THE COBWEB (1955) [dir. Vincente Minnelli]

1h 03m 33s: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Annie Hall (1977) by Woody Allen (Diane Keaton tribute at The Carlton Cinema)

+++

We've got a Halloween Hangover on this week's episode, with two Universal 1932 horror movies, James Whale's The Old Dark House (based on a novel by J. B. Priestley) and Karl Freund's The Mummy, starring Karloff. We explore the curious tone, social themes, and stellar cast (including Charles Laughton, Ernest Thesiger, Eva Moore, Melvyn Douglas, and the excellent Lilian Bond) of Whale's Gothic oddity and The Mummy's connection to Dracula movie history. Then the hangover continues in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto: we discuss our latest theatrical viewing of the great Dead of Night (1945) as well as a Canadian Thanksgiving viewing of the boomer classic The Big Chill (1983) for a different kind of grappling with mortality and confrontation with horror.

Time Codes:

0h 00m 35s: THE OLD DARK HOUSE (1932) [dir. James Whale]

0h 35m 45s: THE MUMMY (1932) [dir. Karl Freund]

0h 58m 08s: Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto – Dead of Night (1945) by Basil Dearden, Cavalcanti, et al and The Big Chill (1983) by Lawrence Kasdan

Studio Film Capsules provided by The Universal Story by Clive Hirschhorn

Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler

1932 Information from Forgotten Films to Remember by John Springer

+++