Otto Preminger

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Vic Pardo
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Re: Otto Preminger

#101 Post by Vic Pardo » Wed May 13, 2009 5:01 pm

Fierias wrote:Could someone give me, someone who has never seen anything by Preminger, advice on what to see at the Cinematheque Ontario retro? Preferably harder-to-find films and must-sees-in-the-theatre rather than necessarily his 'better' or more famous films. I already have tickets to the following:

Advise and Consent
Bunny Lake is Missing
Laura
Anatomy Of A Murder
The Man With The Golden Arm

any help is appreciated.
Good list, but I would add WHERE THE SIDEWALK ENDS, easily one of his best films, a gritty New York cop thriller, and FOREVER AMBER, a big-budget Technicolor costume picture based on a famously sexy novel that everyone said could never be filmed, but Fox managed to do it anyway. Not a great movie, but a fascinating one, like so many studio-era Hollywood movies with troubled histories.

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#102 Post by domino harvey » Wed May 13, 2009 5:08 pm

Depending on whether Fox struck a new print, Forever Amber's hyper-lush Technicolor would probably look gorgeous on the big screen.

jojo
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Re: Otto Preminger

#103 Post by jojo » Fri Jun 12, 2009 5:54 pm

I missed Anatomy of a Murder. Just curious--if anyone here went to catch the screening in Toronto last Sunday, can anyone comment on the aspect ratio? Was the print shown widescreen (approximate ratios) 2.35:1, 1.85:1, or 1.33:1? It's been a long running controversy around the web.

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Fierias
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Re: Otto Preminger

#104 Post by Fierias » Fri Jun 12, 2009 11:49 pm

jojo wrote:I missed Anatomy of a Murder. Just curious--if anyone here went to catch the screening in Toronto last Sunday, can anyone comment on the aspect ratio? Was the print shown widescreen (approximate ratios) 2.35:1, 1.85:1, or 1.33:1? It's been a long running controversy around the web.
it was 1.85:1

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#105 Post by domino harvey » Wed Aug 05, 2009 6:59 pm

Can I get a mod to kindly update the first post with the following information:

Margin For Error (BFI R2)
A Royal Scandal (BFI R2)
Daisy Kenyon (Fox R1)
The Fan (BFI R2)
the Moon is Blue (Warners Archive R1)
the Man With the Golden Arm (Warners R1)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (Needs a disclaimer about not being in the original aspect ratio)

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doghouse reilly
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Re: Otto Preminger

#106 Post by doghouse reilly » Sun Aug 09, 2009 11:49 pm

Something I found interesting in the Bunny Lake trailer is how prominent The Zombies are featured. All the performance footage seen in the film is in the trailer and I believe Preminger even implicates them as possible suspects in the disappearance. So when I finally saw the film, I was a little surprised at how meager and pointless their role was.

A few months later, I caught Advise and Consent (weak) on Turner and a similar thing is done with Sinatra. His music is in the trailer and his name is in the opening credits, but his entire involvement in the film consists of a song played over the silly gay club scene. I think it was that same sort of hey-look-who's-in-my-movie exhibitionism that led Preminger to offer a role to Martin Luther King, Jr.

I don't know what point I'm trying to make, other than I wish The Zombies had abducted Bunny Lake.

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#107 Post by domino harvey » Wed Aug 12, 2009 5:02 pm

It's a great day in America, as I just got ahold of four rare Preminger titles, plugging quite a few of my gaps.

First up is the surprising In the Meantime, Darling, a minor little film which certainly exceeded low expectations. Preminger starts off the picture like a (not particularly funny) homefront comedy before taking a left turn into its gradual theme: the ineffectual humbling of a college educated woman by other army wives. Preminger's film, while never undermining the military, more or less refuses to change Jeanne Crain's selfishness any more than just enough to squeak the film past the studio. The whole film is spent waiting for a comeuppance that really never comes-- even though the narrative is constructed under the assumption that it does! The film stands proudly the Affairs of Dobie Gillis as some of the best, most unapologetic paeans to selfishness ever filmed. Couple all this with Eugene Pallette's easily-flummoxed businessman father and the absurdly attractive Gail Robbins bedding down with Stanley Prager's Kevin James-prototype and this whole thing went down real nice.

It's really too bad Preminger fired Pallette midshoot for being a racist Nazi sympathizer, because his amusing part is relegated to more or less a cameo-- though he still got off at least one classic Pallette moment: After a soldier falls asleep on his shoulder and angrily decries being awoken by the large man, Pallette incredulously replies:

Image
"WAR-- The great leveler!"

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souvenir
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Re: Otto Preminger

#108 Post by souvenir » Thu Aug 13, 2009 1:48 am

I don't think anyone's mentioned (and domino didn't have it in his updates list) that Rosebud was released in the UK by Optimum earlier this year. DVD Times reviewed it.

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#109 Post by domino harvey » Sat Aug 22, 2009 9:08 pm

david hare wrote:I havent watched this yet but indeed Chris Fujiwara thinks a lot of it too in his excellent Preminger book. I assume you've read this? If not you must.
I've actually been putting it off until I can polish off as much of my unseen Premingers as possible. And subsequently, my only regret as I work my way deeper and deeper into Preminger's works is that I will have fewer and fewer opportunities to see his films for the first time.

And I moved one step closer to the end today with Preminger's first musical, 1946's Centennial Summer. The film outwardly appears to dabble in Meet Me in St. Louis-type nostalgia for a bit before Preminger pulls the rug out in the last third. That's when the bawdy jokes (!) and the comedy tag team of Cornell Wilde (as a Frenchman!) and Walter Brennan take over and the film steamrolls to an immensely satisfying finish. For a musical, Preminger is rarely interested in his numbers, and in fact seems to shove them along as quickly as possible, despite having some very catchy tunes at his disposal. But undoubtedly the finest moment comes with the completely superfluous, showstopping "Cinderella Sue" number, performed by Avon Long and backed by an all-black cast of dancing ragamuffins. The number's interjection, in the midst of the film's most dramatic moments, is jarring in its total spontaneity and lack of connection to anything else in the film-- and it works completely.

Though there's a somewhat wayward quality to the middle of the film, it does open strong with another of Preminger's intense long takes, and this one's clever to boot. A lengthy crane shot of Pres. Hayes speaking to a crowd of hundreds in 1876 Philadelphia moves from his place on the podium out into the furthest reaches of the massive crowd. The reverse shot then picks up Brennan crying out for the President to speak up so he can hear him. The camera stays with Brennan as he picks a fight and, in what I'm sure amused Preminger to no end, pejoratively accuses his sparring partner of being a Republican! The camera then follows Brennan as he drags his family through the thick crowd and this is how Preminger introduces his two starlets, Darnell and Crain: By shoving them through a throng of people with only a brief glimpse allotted for the audience. And then the scene ends, with no coverage and no introductory close-ups. Total genius.

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#110 Post by domino harvey » Sun Aug 23, 2009 4:24 pm

And now, with That Lady in Ermine, comes the other side of the coin. I was (and am) one of the few defenders of the other Preminger-rescued Lubitsch project, A Royal Scandal, but I have nothing good to say about this total disaster. I'm not sure the surprisingly lifeless Samson Raphaelson script could have been salvaged by Lubitsch at the throne, but Preminger is less interested in making his own movie from someone else's material (as he was in the previous project) than sort of guessing what Lubitsch might have done and poorly treating the final product with a reverence it doesn't deserve. As a result the film feels like nothing at all. For a comedy, there's really no jokes and the dialog is banal save one good line, which I will repeat in a spoiler so that no one will ever have to waste an hour and a half on this pic, should it ever reach a wider release:
SpoilerShow
Betty Grable: "Oh I don't care if you shoot him, or shoot yourself, or slightly injure me!"

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reno dakota
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Re: Otto Preminger

#111 Post by reno dakota » Sun Aug 23, 2009 4:38 pm

domino harvey wrote:I was (and am) one of the few defenders of the other Preminger-rescued Lubitsch project, A Royal Scandal
I loved every moment of this one, and can't remember when I've laughed as much at such clever word-play, so it surprises me to hear that it has few defenders. Is it possible that it just has few viewers?

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Human factor: question

#112 Post by igorarbizu » Sat Oct 10, 2009 3:13 pm

Which is the aspect ratio of the human Factor ? Anyone can confirm that is 2.35?
I don't find much info about it on the web, I've just bought the dvd edition that comes in 1.33 and I'm afraid it's useless if that's not the original format.

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Re: Otto Preminger

#113 Post by igorarbizu » Sun Oct 11, 2009 6:59 am

david hare wrote:Yes it should be Scope

The current Oz TV print is happily in that OAR.
So, does it mean I can get the theatrical format zooming to widescreen?
I¡m not an expert but my understanding is that a matte instead of anamorphic process was used to film and the 1.33 version was printed opening the matte.
is that right?

Perkins Cobb
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Re: Otto Preminger

#114 Post by Perkins Cobb » Mon Oct 12, 2009 11:30 am

David, are you sure it's Scope and not 1.85? Rosebud is definitely 2.35, but I saw The Human Factor letterboxed on TCM years ago and don't remember it being that wide. Plus my Maltin guide does not list it a widescreen process as it typically does for Scope films. I have the Fujiwara book at home and will consult it tonight.

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#115 Post by domino harvey » Fri Apr 09, 2010 10:38 pm

Caught up with a couple more Premingers this weekend:

First was Danger-- Love at Work, one of Fox's entries into the Screwball Comedy lotto of the 30s. It's hard to say much about it from an auteurist standpoint, as it has little in common with Preminger's work from the 40s on, though one good extended take gag involving a train does seem to prophesy his later affinity. The film has a solid consistency of forced eccentricity, though most of the actors are quite good (particularly John Carradine as a tortured artist) save the insufferable Jack Haley as the eyelash-curled male lead. Edward Everett Horton has fun as something of an aggressor (!). The film's biggest sin is probably falling somewhere between My Man Godfrey and You Can't Take It With You, both in quality and chronology. As I write this I'm humming the catchy titular song, which I suspect will be the only thing I really take away from the film in future recollection.

Slightly more in character but still not particularly a high note was Rosebud, Preminger's trip back to the well of Israel-Palestinian conflict that served him so well in Exodus. Working on a smaller landscape but still tackling pretty huge concepts like Black September and the actions of the PLA, the film makes a nice bookend to the earlier epic. The film works best when it reveals the layers of intrigue and deception inherent in so much of the terroristic mechanics, but the need for a Hollywood finish makes Attenborough's trap at the end like something from another movie. The film doesn't pretend to play it impartial and certainly those who disagree with its message will find little to suffer, but Preminger does seem bemused by the wheel-spinning on either side, with the last scene in particular being one of his more pronounced thumbed noses to the audience. O'Toole plays a cipher among many, second-billed Richard Attenborough has maybe three minutes of screentime, and apparently Peter Lawford was in this one too but damned if I recognized him. Rosebud is ultimately a minor, enjoyable film that nonetheless lacks the keen eye and vitality of Preminger's best work.

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Re: Otto Preminger

#116 Post by Perkins Cobb » Mon Apr 12, 2010 10:24 am

So I was *cough, cough* correct above.

I like The Human Factor a lot. It's such an anti-thriller, in the deadness of Preminger's mise-en-scene and the lethargy of Nicol Williamson's very non-movie star turn, that it's of a piece with the revisionist genre movement of the 70s. Not a bad one for Preminger to go out on given the tone-deaf, out-of-touch quality of a lot of his films from the preceding two decades.

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#117 Post by domino harvey » Tue Apr 13, 2010 1:18 pm

David, I haven't seen Human Condition yet, but could you elaborate on why you found In the Meantime, Darling to be Preminger's worst film? I thought it was kinda subversive fun myself

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#118 Post by domino harvey » Tue Apr 13, 2010 7:30 pm

Didn't he disown every film he made before Laura? I wonder if he had a cut-off for his later films as well

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Svevan
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Re: Otto Preminger

#119 Post by Svevan » Mon May 17, 2010 4:08 am

Is the Region 2 version of Bonjour Tristesse identical to the Region 1, other than PAL speedup?

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lubitsch
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Re: Otto Preminger

#120 Post by lubitsch » Mon Sep 06, 2010 4:51 am

reno dakota wrote:
domino harvey wrote:I was (and am) one of the few defenders of the other Preminger-rescued Lubitsch project, A Royal Scandal
I loved every moment of this one, and can't remember when I've laughed as much at such clever word-play, so it surprises me to hear that it has few defenders. Is it possible that it just has few viewers?
That's what I thought, too. Looks like a classical case where an evaluative scheme (Humorless brute mishandles a comedy of the master of wit) is too tempting not to be repeated again and again.
I watched yesterday Margin for Error which is insanely bad, not only badly directed and acted, but how on earth can this have been successful in any way on stage. It isn't funny, it isn't suspenseful, it isn't interesting and so badly structured that it easily qualifies as one of the worst written films I've ever come seen from classical Hollywood. After this genuinely embarassing experience I had no hopes for Royal Scandal but it is a very witty affair and shows quite ruthlessly how all concerned have made theirselves a place in a rotten society which masks its decay with wit and how a honest man can be nevertheless a complete fool (played quite apropriately by the young lead). The problem seems to be that the film has no Lubitsch style to speak of, Preminger is a indeed a much more sober and impassioned director, but on the other hand I think he gives the film surprisingly a lot of speed and verve, the 90 minutes just fly by.

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Jeff
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Re: Otto Preminger

#121 Post by Jeff » Tue Nov 02, 2010 12:45 am

Roger Ebert, behind the scenes on Skidoo, which will apparently play in 35mm in Chicago this month.

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knives
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Re: Otto Preminger

#122 Post by knives » Sun May 22, 2011 5:23 pm

Just wanted to thank Dom for suggesting The Moon is Blue which is criminally hilarious (though I'm not sure if I entirely like the usage of a thoroughbred MPG). David Niven's reaction shots alone are worth any price.

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#123 Post by domino harvey » Sun May 22, 2011 5:54 pm

He gives much different reactions in Preminger's Bonjour Tristesse!

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knives
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Re: Otto Preminger

#124 Post by knives » Sun May 22, 2011 6:50 pm

I nearly saw that one when it was showing on TCM, but I think I was hosting people at my house that night.

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domino harvey
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Re: Otto Preminger

#125 Post by domino harvey » Thu Jul 28, 2011 2:30 am

Well, Skidoo's not quite the train wreck it's sold as, and is more of a piece with, say, Wilder's Buddy Buddy or Hawks' Man's Favorite Sport?-- flawed films that say more about the auteur at the helm's inability to change with the times than anything else. These are not bad films to an auteurist but intensely interesting for both how they deviate and, generally for the worse, how they change from the established abilities of the auteur. These titles make Hitchcock's ability after the disaster of Topaz to adapt completely to and indeed excel in new cinematic freedoms with Frenzy all the more laudable. The biggest question while watching Skidoo is the most basic: Why is this an Otto Preminger film? It's a question I ultimately can't answer. I can't even figure out the intended audience for this thing. It's a television sitcom cast from a Dean Martin Friar's Club Roast, hopelessly courting older viewers in its casting with a story they'd never go anywhere near. And seeing some of these borscht belt-y comedy legends bump up against rawer material is jarring-- if you ever wanted Jackie Gleason to call a hippie a faggot or see Groucho Marx try to feel up Alexandra Hay, good news! For everyone else, the film is a curiosity at best. And yet, were this not a Preminger film, no one would being crying "disaster," as the proper response to this misguided but harmless comedy sans comedy is more in the vicinity of a shrug. But it is and they are, and ultimately that's the problem: Preminger doesn't pick sides in his films, and you can't make a culture clash flick about how silly hippies are without lobbing most of your bombs at the free love set. And with this signature distance removed, Preminger's experiment is a bad trip indeed. Thank God he got back up again.

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