Welcome to another edition of Fedya's "Movies to Tivo" thread, for the week of May 4-10, 2020. We're fully into a new month, so we're getting a new Star of the Month on TCM. This time, that's Edward G. Robinson, whose movies are appearing on Thursday nights in prime time. However, I'm recommending enough other movies this week that I'm not actually mentioning any of the Robinson movies, what with there being several other spotlights worth mentioning and stuff on the other movie channels, too. As always, all times are in Eastern unless otherwise mentioned.
Monday's lineup on TCM has a bunch of head shrinkers, including a movie that will probably sharply divide opinions: Three on a Couch, at 4:00 PM. Janet Leigh plays Dr. Elizabeth Acord, a psychiatrist who's got three female clients (Mary Ann Mobley, Gila Golan, and Leslie Parrish) who all have a problems with men and who really need the good doctor (or at least think they do). Elizabeth is engaged to artist Christopher Pride (Jerry Lewis), who has received a commission to paint a mural in Paris. He wants her to accompany him to Paris, but she says she can't, at least not as long as she's got patients who desperately need to be cured. So Christopher comes up with the brilliant idea that he's going to help his fiancée cure the three women, in each case by taking on the persona of a man that fits what the patients claim they want! And, in one case, Christopher also disguises himself as the man's sister. Certainly all of them and Elizabeth are going to figure out what's going on, aren't they?
You probably remember Gremlins, and you may recall Goonies since that had the Cyndi Lauper theme song. But do you remember Ghoulies? That one shows up this week, at 9:19 AM Tuesday on ActionMax. Peter Liapis plays Jonathan Graves, an orphan whose father was the leader of a Satanic cult when Jonathan was an infant. Jonathan inherits Dad's estate while his foster father Wolfgang (Jack Nance) hasn't told Jonathan anything about Dad's past. So naturally, Jonathan wants to find out exactly what happened, which leads him to finding a whole bunch of occult-related stuff in the basement. At first it's all fun and games, because who doesn't like the faux spookiness of the occult. But then Jonathan performs some rituals alone, and these bring the Ghoulies to life. They get the unwitting Jonathan to perform another ritual that brings Dad back to life, whereupon Dad reveals that he's actually the master of the Ghoulies, not Jonathan, putting everybody in danger (well, everybody but Dad). This one spawned a series of straight-to-video sequels.
Now that we're in the first full week of a new month, it's time for some of the new monthly spotlights on TCM. The first of them is on Tuesdays in prime time, when TCM looks at “wonder women”. These are grouped into a couple of categories, with this first Tuesday (into Wednesday morning) looking at women rulers. Interestingly enough, there are going to be two movies about Russian Empress Catherine the Great, who was actually German and had to fight to take her place as Empress and not have the people turn against her when there was a bunch of palace intrigue. The first of those two movies is The Scarlett Empress at 8:00 PM Tuesday; this one stars Marlene Dietrich as Catherine in a very stylized movie directed by Josef von Sternberg, who was much more interested in putting pretty images on screen than any sense of historical accuracy. The other movie is one that I think is a TCM premiere, the British film The Rise of Catherine the Great at 9:30 AM Wednesday; this one stars Austrian Elisabeth Bergner as Catherine, marrying Douglas Fairbanks Jr.
A movie that recently made it into the FXM rotation which I hadn't heard of before is The Sad Horse. It's going to be on again this week, at 1:40 PM Wednesday. David Ladd (son of Alan and ex-husband of Charlie's Angel Cheryl Ladd) plays Jackie, a kid whose mom died and whose dad is planning to get remarried. So Dad leaves Jackie and his dog with Grandpa (Chill Wills), who runs a horse ranch. There, Jackie begins to learn to grow up, until he's introduced to client Leslie MacDonald (Patrice Wymore, Errol Flynn's wife and eventual widow) and the titular horse, a horse that used to race until its best friend, a dog, died. Eventually the horse begins to like the dog, which presents a problem since it's not MacDonald's dog. She thinks the right thing to do is to separate a boy from his dog by buying it in exchange for a trust fund to send the kid to college! Interesting ideas here, although there's some bad news in that FXM's print is panned-and-scanned down to 4:3.
Wednesday night's spotlight on TCM, or at least the first three Wednesdays this month, looks at Asian-Americans in classic Hollywood. Perhaps the most interesting movie on this first Wednesday is not actually a Hollywood movie, but Picadilly, at 9:00 PM. Chinese-American Anna May Wong plays Shosho, working in the kitchen of a fashionable nightclub. She's caught dancing to the music that the club's main attraction uses for their dance number, something that gets her fired. But she's such a mesmerizing dancer that the club's owner Valentine (Jameson Thomas) has to bring her back to the club to dance along with the former male dancer, Vic (Cyril Ritchard). Vic was in love with his female dance partner Mabel (Gilda Gray), but she was in love with Valentine. But then Valentine falls in love with Shosho and what she's doing for the club financially, leading to jealousy and melodrama. Watch for a very young Charles Laughton as one of the diners at the nightclub.
TCM spent last month looking at New York City in the 1970s. This week, I'll point out a movie showing New York in the late 1960s: Coogan's Bluff, at 3:07 AM Thursday on StarzEncore Classics. Clint Eastwood plays Coogan, an Arizona sheriff's deputy who given a choice would like to do things his own way, which constantly brings him into conflict with his superiors. So his sheriff out in Arizona decides to get Coogan out of Arizona by sending him out to New York to pick up Ringerman (Don Stroud), a suspected wanted for extradition back to Arizona. Coogan's liaison in New York, Lt. McElroy (Lee J. Cobb) tells Coogan that Ringerman is in Belleview after having had a bad LSD trip, and that Arizona is going to have to wait several days before he can be extradited. Coogan doesn't think he can wait that long, but when he tries to get Coogan, things go wrong and Coogan escapes. Now Coogan has to go around New York without help from the official authorities, or his gun, to find Ringerman.
On Thursday morning and afternoon, TCM is running a bunch of movies directed by Basil Dearden. I've mentioned The League of Gentlemen a couple of times before; that one will be on at 7:45 AM. One that I haven't recommended in the past is Sapphire, which kicks off the morning at 6:00 AM. On London's Hampstead Heath, the dead body of a music student is discovered. That victim turns out to be Sapphire Robbins, who was in a relationship with architecture student David Harris (Paul Massie). Sapphire's only known living relative is her doctor brother (Earl Cameron), so he comes down from Birmingham, where we find out… he's black. Actually, he and Sapphire were both mixed-race, although the brother looks “obviously” black and the sister “obviously” white, and for some time now trying to pass as white and not mixed-race to escape the racism of late 1950s London. Indeed, Sapphire had a whole bunch of secrets, from a fairly wild life with London's international black community to having been knocked up, most likely by David, who claims to have been perfectly willing to marry Sapphire even knowing she was mixed-race. So who did kill her?
While The Sad Horse may seem like a western but really isn't, a movie that is a full-fledged western is Gun Fever, showing up at 2:27 AM Saturday on StarzEncore Westerns. Mark Stevens, who also directed, plays Luke Rand, a man who's out for revenge. Apparently, somebody pissed off the Indians who raided the stagecoach depot where Luke's father worked, and in that raid they killed Luke's parents. So now, along with his friend Simon Weller (John Lupton), he goes looking for the white guy who caused all of this. Things get complicated when Luke discusses his eyewitness account to Simon and Simon realizes that his father was one of the whites who led the Indians on the raid, although he's not about to tell Luke this. In fact, Simon had been a part of his father's gang before leaving some years previously. Older viewers will spot Larry Storch (of F Troop fame) hilariously miscast as a Mexican in this ultra low-budget western.
If you like weird Robert Altman films, then you might like Brewster McCloud, which is on TCM at 2:15 AM Sunday. Bud Cort plays Brewster, who is hiding out in a fallout shelter in the Houston Astrodome where he's trying to construct a set of wings that he hopes will allow him to fly. He's helped in part by Hope (Jennifer Salt), and by Louise (Sally Kellerman), the latter of whom is a sort of guardian angel to Brewster. Brewster has to remain uncaptured by the guards in the Astrodome, but also eventually by the police. There's been a series of murders in Houston in which the victims have been covered with bird droppings, so people who have some idea of what's going on naturally begin to suspect Brewster. He develops a love interest in Suzanne (Shelley Duvall), but when he's stupid enough to trust her and tell her that he in fact did commit the killings, she repays his kindness by telling the police, who come after him. But he might still be able to fly away with those wing he's been making….
Sunday is Mother's Day, so if your Mom is alive and not being held prisoner in her own home by a power-mad state governor, congratulations to her. TCM is showing a bunch of Mom-themed movies, which includes the seemingly annual Mother's Day showing of Mildred Pierce, which is this week's Noir Alley selection at 10:00 AM Sunday. Joan Crawford plays Mildred Pierce, who at the start of the movie finds out that her second husband, Monte Beragon (Zachary Scott), has been shot. Flash back to how Mildred got here…. Her first husband Mr. Pierce (Bruce Bennett) was failing financially and seeing another woman while Mildred was spoiling the two children, especially older daughter Veda (Ann Blyth). So Mildred files for divorce, forcing her to get a job, and with one thing leading to another, she winds up running a chain of restaurants co-owned by her, Monte and old friend Wally (Jack Carson at his unctuous best). But Mildred keeps spoiling Veda, and that could lead to financial disaster. Who wouldn't want that beach house?