Welcome to Fedya's "Movies to Tivo" thread, for the week of March 25-31, 2013. Easter is this coming Sunday. To celebrate the undead Jesus, I think it would be appropriate to show a bunch of zombie movies, but that would probably offend some people. So instead, TCM is going to have traditional Easter fare on Sunday. There's also the last Monday of Greer Garson movies, and the last Friday of Roberto Rossellini movies. As always, all times are in Eastern, unless otherwise mentioned.
I've mentioned a couple of times before that Hollywood movie musicals tended to be a pretty dreadful affair until Busby Berkeley changed things by putting those outrageous musical numbers in 42nd Street (which will be airing at 9:30 AM Friday). If you want to see a good example of how mediocre those early musicals could be, you can watch Spring Is Here, at 4:30 AM Monday on TCM. Based on a Broadway show by Rodgers and Hart and retaining a few of their songs while adding some others, the story basically revolves around Betty (Bernice Claire), a Long Island socialite who loves Steve (Lawrence Gray). Her parents (Ford Sterling and Louise Fazenda), however, know that Terry (Alexander Gray) is the right man for their daughter, and try to turn him into the sort of lover Betty will want. The problem is, the whole thing looks stagy, the singing style is dated, and the songs are for the most part not particularly good, with the characters standing around like they're declaiming poetry or something.
Greer Garson has been in the spotlight as TCM's Star of the Month every Monday in prime time. This Monday brings some of the films from later in her career, including the only western she made: Strange Lady in Town, at 8:00 PM. Set in Santa Fe, NM, in the 1880s, the movie sees Garson as a lady doctor who, having studied back east, moves out west because her brother, a US Army lieutenant (Cameron Mitchell) is already stationed in the territory. Her arrival peeves the city's current doctor (Dana Andrews), because he doesn't like the competition and because she's got more recent knowledge than he does, making her more competent. Meanwhile, you know those Garson and Andrews are going to fall in love. At the same time, Mitchell falls for Andrews' daughter, and further complicates matters when he starts getting involved in crime. The story is messed up, and the casting is strange, but that makes it interesting, to say the least.
Actor Sterling Hayden was born on March 26, 1916. Since Tuesday is March 26, TCM si honoring Hayden with a number of his movies, including The Golden Hawk, at 8:00 AM. Here, Sterling Hayden plays a French pirate who wants to gain revenge on Spanish pirate John Sutton, so he kidnaps Sutton's fiancée (Helena Carter) to hold her for ransom. Also along the way, Hayden falls in love with the English Lady Rouge (Rhonda Fleming), who has a dislike of men -- so much so that it's turned her into a pirate. That hatred of men only grows deeper when, not knowing Rouge is a pirate and the woman Hayden is pursuing, his men destroy her land because they're expecting to get that land themselves by defeating the Spanish pirates. Or something. The producers must have spent their limited budget on the stars and on Technicolor, because they certainly didn't spend it on a coherent plot. But Hayden is always interesting, and Fleming always gorgeous.
Tuesday night brings a night dedicated to the music of Henry Mancini. I think I've recommended the first four movies before, but they're worth watching again:
The Days of Wine and Roses at 8:00 PM, in which Jack Lemmon and Lee Remick play a married couple who both become alcoholics;
Dear Heart at 10:00 PM, starring Glenn Ford as a man going to meet his fiancée (Angela Lansbury), but getting waylaid by spinster postmaster Geraldine Page in a New York City hotel and finding that perhaps she's better for him;
The Pink Panther at midnight Wednesday (ie. 11:00 PM Tuesday LFT), in which Peter Sellers plays Inspector Clouseau trying to stop the heist of a famous jewel (the titular "Pink Panther"); and
Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation at 2:00 AM Wednesday, a family comedy with James Stewart as a father who tries to bond with his family by taking them on a vacation at a rented beach house.
On Wednesday evening, TCM will be here in a fast car. (Is it fast enough so we can drive away? We've gotta make a decision.) The night spans a bunch of eras, from Steve McQueen in Le Mans at 8:00 PM to 1932's The Crowd Roars, at 10:00 PM. James Cagney stars as a successful race car driver who is idolized by his kid brother (Eric Linden). In fact, kid brother wants to become a race car driver himself despite his older brother's misgivings. You know that this is going to cause conflict between the two. Adding to the conflict is the fact that Cagney's girl (Ann Dvorak) has a friend (Joan Blondell) whom Cagney thinks is terrible, and Blondell tries to woo Linden. Even worse is that Linden winds up winning the championship from under Cagney's nose. Oh boy, how many clichéd plot devices can we stick in here? To be honest, though, Cagney and Blondell make anything watchable.
TCM's theme for Thursday is twins and the confusion they can cause. You've all probably heard of the Disney movie The Parent Trap, with Hayley Mills playing a pair of twins who bring their divorced parents back together. That, or the 1998 version with Lindsay Lohan before she engaged in a decade of substance abuse. Neither of those is airing, but you could be forgiven for thinking The Parent Trap was on if you watch Twice Blessed at 1:30 PM Thursday. It's pretty much the same story, except that this time the twins are played by a pair of real-life twins, Lee and Lyn Wilde. Each of them went with a different parent when the parents (Preston Foster and Gail Patrick) got divorced, and each wants to be like the other. So they switch places without telling anybody, and learn that perhaps their parents would be better off remarrying. Dad's having a girlfriend is a problem, of course. Piffle, but you get to watch a time capsule back to the way teens supposedly were back in the 1940s.
I mentioned 42nd Street at the beginning of the thread since it's airing on Friday. In fact, it's airing as part of a birthday salute to Warner Baxter, who was born March 29, 1889. TCM is showing Baxter's films all morning and afternoon Friday, ending with his final film, State Penitentiary, at 6:15 PM Friday.. Baxter plays an engineer who is sent to prison for embezzling $400K from the aircraft manufacturer he works for. He knows he's innocent, of course, but it's going to take a long time for his wife (Karin Booth) to prove it. On the othside, she visits his former business partner to try to get the goods on him, which would free her husband, but to do so, she might have to divorce her husband and engage in a sham marriage with the partner. Meanwhile, Baxter is asked to take part in a prison break, because what would a prison movie be without an attempted prison break? You know Baxter's name will get cleared at the end, and the way it happens probably isn't realistic, but hey, it's the movies.
Friday night brings the last night of films directed by Roberto Rossellini. The night kicks off with a pair of biopics which, according to IMDb, were originally made for TV. First, at 8:00 PM, is Socrates. This is based on the last part of the ancient Greek philosopher's life. Those of you who remember your history classes will recall that Socrates was put on trial for allegedly corrupting the youth of Athens, for which he was found guilty and forced to drink hemlock.
The second one is Blaise Pascal, at 10:15 PM. Pascal was a 17th century French philosopher and mathematician, who was also deeply confliced inside and a bit of a religious heretic as well. Note that the movie is listed as having a running time of 135 minutes, while the next film is scheduled to begin at 12:30 AM Saturday, so you might have to set your recording devices for several extra minutes.
Is TCM doing anything particularly original for Easter? I don't think so. Their Christian- and Easter-themed movies are many of the famous ones that show up year after year, precisely because they're famous. The Charlton Heston version of Ben-Hur, for example, comes on at 7:30 AM. You might want to note that TCM's online schedule is listing it in two parts, with two hours beginning at 7:30 AM and the other two hours beginning at 9:30 AM. So I don't know what your particular DVR is going to be doing. Frankly, I prefer the silent version anyway.
Also on the TCM schedule for Easter, you've got hippies singing the Gospel of Jesus in latter-day New York in Godspell, at 5:45 AM;
The story of Jesus' life in the 1961 version of King of Kings at 11:30 AM and The Greatest Story Ever Told at 2:30 PM; and
what I think is the TCM premiere of Richard Burton being touched by Jesus' robe in The Robe at 8:00 PM.
If you want something not so Easter-related on Sunday, try switching over to Cinemax, which is showing Splash, at 8:05 AM Sunday. Tom Hanks plays a man who, as a boy, fell into the bay off Cape Cod and was, he thought, saved by a mermaid. He goes back to Cape Cod and again falls into the salt water, again being saved -- unbeknownst to him, it's by the same mermaid (played as an adult by Daryl Hannah). So, after the second rescue, she decides to go to New York to look him up. She's able to do that because, once her bottom half fully dries out, she's got legs. It's only when they get wet that they turn back into a mermaid's fish half. Anyhow, she looks up Hanks, and the two fall in love without him realizing the truth at first. Complicating matters is that you've got people who want to know the truth about this "woman".
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