Treasure Trove on TCM today: Casablanca; Suspicion; Goodbye Mr. Chips; Mrs. Miniver

Just wanted to share some TV-watching suggestions with you on this 4th of July weekend of damp fireworks. And ask you to ponder Six Degrees of great film making.

As some of you have no doubt read from time to time, many prominent film historians regard 1939 as the greatest single year in the history of motion pictures, and today, courtesy of Turner Classic Movies, you'll see great evidence that suggests there's more than mere hyperbole at work in that assessment. http://www.filmsite.org/aa39.html

I mention for your viewing consideration 5 films, 4 of which are among my personal Top 20 favorites, all of which will be on Turner Classic Movies over the next 24 or so hours, including 1939's Goodbye Mr. Chips.

Back when I lived in the D.C, area, and had both the time and inclination to do so, I used to host
friends of mine -and their significant others- over at my townhouse to watch classic films, based on either then-current events or suggestions.
Sometimes, owing to larger than expected crowds, we were accommodated at a friend's huge
house, which had more room for eager cinéastes to stretch out and be comfortable.

While I'd hardly call my little enterprise an avant-garde film salon, it beats the crummy AFI theatre in Washington where I saw Taxi Driver, and that townhouse in Arlington did have the geographical advantage of having a consistently good Papa John's Pizza but two blocks away.

And it was just a mile from the greatest German bakery and deli in the entire Washington area, Heidelberg Bakery. 2150 N Culpepper St, Arlington, VA 22207 http://www.heidelbergbakery.com/
Whenever my mother would fly up from Miami for a visit to the Nation's Capitol, eager to see yours truly and grab some culture at all the museums and art galleries, the Heidelberg was considered an absolute must-visit on the first morning. No exceptions!
While there were clearly restaurants in Arlington with more extensive breakfast menus or even
cheaper breakfasts, none smelled quite so yummy as that one, esp. on very cold days.

What I wouldn't give to have something even three-quarters as good as Heidelberg now in the SE Broward or NE Miami-Dade area. (And sorry, but Whole Foods is not even close.)

(The Heidelberg is where nearly twenty years ago, I called and made a special order for a huge rectangular German chocolate cake, with the colors of the German flag inside of a heart.
Once it was ready, I took it over to the beautiful German Embassy on Reservoir Road in NW
Washington, 4645 Reservoir Road NW, Washington, DC, 20007-1998
http://www.germany.info/relaunch/info/missions/embassy/embassy.html

There, with some friends who were German diplomats and economic counselors, I celebrated the formal re-integration of East Germany into a combined Federal Republic.
There were lots and lots of tears and laughter that day! (So many lives needlessly ruined and taken!) But the main mood among them as I recall was genuine optimism, not regret.

My small token of thanks of a cake was due to the fact that owing to my personal and professional interests, and how often they overlapped, I'd been very fortunate over the years to be a guest over at the Embassy on many occasions, visits I never took for granted.
My favorite were lunches in their above-ground outdoor patio, where, on beautiful late spring afternoons before the DC heat and humidity made your head (and hair) explode, with a cold, cold bottle of German beer and a delicious meal, it was more than sehr guht, it was heaven.

Those sunny afternoons sitting there, absorbing that unique atmosphere, and interacting with smart and well-informed friends who'd share their insight on current political or economic news, or their amazing stories about being posted around the world, was one of the highlights of my 15 years in Washington.
Often, those stories were quite heartbreaking, as was the case for my economic counselor friend and colleague, Wolfgang E.A. Gaerte, who recounted what life under Nicolae Ceaucescu was like, and the German govt.'s efforts to help or save people, however they could.
This was back when the only American politician speaking on the issues of personal and political persecution in Romania and Hungary was the late Rep. Tom Lantos.
I hardly need say here that nothing in South Florida quite compares to those particular days.)

One of my frequent film two-fers consisted of running the original Goodbye Mr. Chips -not the later Peter O'Toole version- and conclude the evening with Mrs. Miniver and the inimitable Greer Garson, the object of affection of the first film.
Another popular combination for me and my friends was Hitchcock's Foreign Correspondent and Saboteur, the latter of which he did after Suspicion.

The 1933 Chips novel seemingly came out of nowhere from the head of author James Hilton, who had just gained a measure of fame as the author of Lost Horizon, a novel that could hardly be more different in time, place and scope than the one he paints so vividly in Chips.
Hilton's film adaption of his own work is so faithful that, for me at least, it's one of the rare books that was equalled on the big screen.

But then he had a lot riding on it, not least of all, in those pre-Harry Potter days, Hilton had the personal knowledge that people all over the world had taken his characters firmly into their hearts and head, as it reminded so many of an earlier and less dangerous time to be young and hopeful. He didn't want to disappoint them.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/mrchips/ei_hilton.html

Robert Donat's performance as Brookfield's Latin master Mr. Chipping is, in a word, masterful.
Over the course of sixty years, we see thru his eyes, a rapidly changing world that loses a bit of tradition every year -except at Brookfield- as the first year "Stinkers" get their first dose of Mr. Chips.
His calm demeanor brings forth poignant insight into everyday ways of living and suddenly coping with deep personal grief, as his boarding school "boys" grow-up and become men of means and power, from the England of Victoria 'till the the England of Churchill.
That insight is learned the hard way, first-hand, and shared with his students and former students as he morphs from awkward social outsider to becoming the living embodiment of the school itself, as one era falls upon itself.

In the greatest year of American film, Robert Donat wins the Best Actor Oscar -his second- against a veritable Murder's Row of Clark Gable (Gone With The Wind), James Stewart (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington), Laurence Olivier (Wuthering Heights) and Mickey Rooney (Babes in Arms).
A competition so tough that John Wayne doesn't even get a nomination for his great performance in Stagecoach, one of his best, still as watchable today as ever.

This amazing and heartwarming film led by Donat, packed with a great cast, is one that I have personally seen now more than just about all but 4 or 5 of of my favorite films.
By now it's got to be well over thirty times, including the times I've watched it up in Maryland with my adorable nieces as they grew-up, two of whom, as it happens, are now whizzes in Latin at high school.

I particularly call your attention to the subtle-but-sure performance of Paul Henreid as Chips'
fellow teacher and friend, Max Staefel, the German (Saxon)-born teacher who makes it his job to bring Chips out of his shell on a bike/hiking holiday in Europe, a journey that will forever change Chips life, bringing a sense of balance and confidence that had previously been lacking.

Even knowing that he is the very same actor who so famously played anti-Nazi resistance hero Victor Laszlo in Casbalanca, is to see the very definition of a versatile actor.
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002134/

For your consideration, besides all the usual links I include, I have the original trailer for the films, including the one for Chips, which begins with critic Alexander Woollcott, The Town Crier positively gushing, declaring it the best motion picture he's ever seen .

As you look below, consider the following killer line-up: Ingrid Bergman, Joan Fontaine, Greer Garson, and my longtime favorite, Audrey Hepburn.
I defy you to name four current actresses who could best them on the big screen in terms of impact and versatility -and you can't just name Meryl Streep four times.
____________________________
Sunday July 6th
12 noon Casablanca (1942)
Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid.
Dir: Michael Curtiz. B/W-103 mins.
Overview: http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title.jsp?stid=610
Original trailer: http://www.tcm.com/video/videoPlayer/?cid=16009&titleId=610


615 pm Suspicion (1941)
Cast: Joan Fontaine, Cary Grant, Nigel Bruce. Dir: Alfred Hitchcock. B/W-100 mins.
Overview: http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title.jsp?stid=1177
Trailer: http://www.tcm.com/video/videoPlayer/?cid=12006&titleId=1177


8pm Goodbye Mr. Chips (1939)
Cast: Robert Donat, Greer Garson, Paul Henreid. Dir: Sam Wood. B/W-114 mins.
Overview: http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title.jsp?stid=76737
Original trailer: http://www.tcm.com/video/videoPlayer/?cid=29684&titleId=76737
Will also air Thursday August 14th at 6 pm


Monday July 7th
1 am Paris When It Sizzles (1964)
Cast: William Holden, Audrey Hepburn. Dir. Richard Quine, 110 mins.
Overview: http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title.jsp?stid=86269
Original trailer: http://www.tcm.com/video/videoPlayer/?cid=158839&titleId=86269
Not for everyone, but one of best films ever made about screenwriting, small number though that is, with lots of film allusions and references tossed about by Holden and Hepburn ten years after they made Sabrina, which I watched yesterday. And who played Holden's brother in that film, which earned Audrey Hepburn an Oscar? Humphrey Bogart, who stars in Casablanca.

and finally, a great film that stands the test of time
6 am Mrs. Miniver
Cast: Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, Teresa Wright, Richard Ney, Dame May Whitty and Henry Travers. Dir. William Wyler. B/W-133 mins.
Overview: http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title.jsp?stid=329
Original trailer: http://www.tcm.com/video/videoPlayer/?cid=9877&titleId=329

Garson, famously won for Best Actress and Wright won her second consecutive Best Supporting Actress Oscar after having won the year before for Little Foxes, also directed by Wyler.
Wright's next film, also made in 1942, earns her another Oscar nom, this time for Best Actress as Eleanor Gehrig in Pride of the Yankees, opposite Gary Cooper, in a film directed by Chips director Sam Wood. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0939992/
(Her next film? Shadow of a Doubt -for Hitchcock!)

Obviously, Wright loses to Garson in the lead category but still picks up some hardware for the second year in a row and has the honor of being nominated twice in one year, a rare feat!

I never had any real security in my life until I found the false security of stardom.
-Robert Donat