Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 137: Oh What a Circus!

Some critics are so harsh because I recently came over several lists which ranked the worst Oscar winners of all time and in the Top 5 of most of these lists was the latest film I watched - The Greatest Show on Earth. To give you a little background the film is Cecile B De Mille's cirucs-set extravaganza and is based around the Bingling Bros., Barnum and Bailey Circus. Charlton Heston plays circus manager Brad Braden who is trying to convince his bosses to give the circus another full season and to entice them he has hired famous acrobat and well known lothario The Great Sebastian. After agreeing to hiring Sebastian and getting a full season Brad has to deal with the fact that his acrobat girlfriend Holly will be bumped from the centre stage although she claims she will one-up Sebastian so the audience focuses on them. Throughout the film  a love triangle develops with Sebastian enchanting Holly with his risky attitude and his competitive spirit while Brad is more focused on getting the circus working. After Sebastian and Holly get together another performer Ginger goes after Brad but this infuriates her lover Klauss who vows to get revenge. James Stewart also appears in the film as Buttons the Clown, Buttons has an intriguing story where he never takes off his make-up clues throughout the story lead us to believe that he was a surgeon who mercy killed his own lover and is on the run from the police. During one of the journeys on the cirucs train a disgraced former employee along with the jealous Klauss plan to rob the train but Klauss has a change of heart when he realises he may hurt Ginger and there is a massive train crash. Brad is injured and with the Doctor unconcious Buttons operates on him but is caught by an FBI investiagtor who knows his suspect is somewhere in the circus after saving Brad's live Buttons is carted off to jail while Holly realises she loves Brad and Ginger and Sebastian decide to be together.

I have to say of the Best Pictures I have watched so far The Greatest Show on Earth is definitely not the worst but at the same time not the best. It does have some good points for one it is incredibly realistic with 1,400 members of the actual circus troupe starring alongside the actors accompanied by the whole ring set-up crew and a menagrie of animals. The film also lapses into documentary at times with De Mille providing a voiceover at various points to illustrate how hard it is to deconstruct and erect the tent each day and how hard the travel is on the performers. Heston provides a great leading man while the James Stewart story is very compelling and I wish I'd seen more of it while the camerawork for the most part is done well especially when focusing on the audience reactions. However at the same time it is far too long and there is no reason at all that we needed to see entire parts of some of the acts. While the acrobatics acts are pivotal to the plot everything elese could be just viewed in clip form and this is one of De Mille's main problems. In addition Betty Hutton is a bit of a damp squib as Holly and Cornel Wilde is almost too much as the exotic lover Sebastian. I also didn't really get the motivation for Klaus' momentary change of heart which caused the train crash. The theory is that this film won the Oscar because of De Mille's Hollywood pull and the fact that this would be his last chance to win a Best Picture Statuette. Overall the film is spectacular but it needs about 45 minutes cut from it to make it truly memorable film.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Days 134-136: Mostly Marlon

So after my Elizabeth Taylor retrospective we have four films from Marlon Brando an actor who was considered to have changed the way actors were percieved on films. Once upon a time you had the classic 'film star' such as Fred Astaire, Mickey Rooney or Cary Grant but then Brando was a new breed of actor who really got into the character and developed the phrase method acting. Over these four Oscar nominated films I will look at Brando's performances and the films as a whole.

We finished the last installment of the Oscar blog with a Tennesse Williams adaptation and we start our Marlon Brando retrospective with another Williams story - A Streetcar Named Desire. For those of you unaware with the story it sees the demure but emotionally fragile Blanche Dubouis journey to New Orleans to stay with her sister Stella and Stella's husband the brutish Stanley played by Brando. As time goes on Brando continues to resent Blanche's domination of Stella's time and her relationship with his friend Mitch so he starts to dig dirt on why she had to leave her old home. The final confrontation with ends in Stanley raping Blanche before she is carted off to a mental instution is very well done by director Elia Kazan by taking the camera around the expressions of all the characters and using the strong score to play the emotions of the two sisters with Stella finally seeing the light and leaving her husband with their new baby. As someone who read the play as part of my English literature A-Level I have to say that everybody involved did their best to recreate what this story should be. The set direction was rightfully given an Oscar for providing the claustrophobic atmosphere of both Stanley and Stella's apartment to the small area in which the characters inhabit. Vivien Leigh had previously played Blanche on the stage in London and bought both star power and incredible timing as a character who slowly loses her mind throughout the film. Kim Hunter is great as the tortured Stella while Karl Malden also stole the show in his couple of scenes as the hapless Mitch who wants to tame Blanche but realises that is impossible. Leigh, Malden and Hunter all won Oscars for their performances indeed the only person who didn't win an acting Oscar was Marlon Brando. However Brando won something else a new found fame for his great turn as Stanley he plays a man who was raised to behave a certain way and is almost tortured every time he hurts Stella and she leaves him briefly. He is brutish but at the same time doesn't go over-the-top and most importantly he becomes the character this isn't Marlon Brando as Stanley this is Stanley and you can really believe it. One more thing about the film is Alex North's great score who went against type composing short pieces of music to reflect the trauma of the characters but unfortunately he didn't win the Oscar but he did set a precadent in terms of film music as maybe Brando did with character development.

After his Oscar nomination for Streetcar, Brando was nominated for Viva Zapata at the next Oscar ceremony and then again at the Oscar ceremony held in 1954. However nobody quite expected that role to be in an adaptation of William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. The film saw a lot of Shakespeare pros take the parts that they'd already taken on stage for example British theatrical legend John Gielgud played Cassius and James Mason who also had Shakesperian experience was Brutus here. Even producer John Houseman had Caesar experience having been involved in the classic Orson Welles Mercury Theatre production but by this time Welles and Houseman had fallen out and Welles wanted nothing to do with this production. However Brando's casting as Marc Anthony was met with scepticism to the point of Paul Scofield being on standby if Brando's screen test bombed however Brando was so good that Gielgud offered him the lead in the production of Hamlet he was directing, Brando turned this offer down. I'm really not going to retype the plot of Caesar as we all know the first half sees many of his followers conspire his demise and the second half sees Anthony's rise. While we're on Anthony Brando was brilliant even though he had very little to do in the first half of the film from the 'Friends, Romans, Countrymen' speech onwards he captures the imagination being able to deliver Shakespeare's lines with all the precision of a pro and the doubts that the 'mumbler' wouldn't be able to perform were cast aside here. I'm not sure if it was good enough to be Oscar nominated but maybe the Academy were so surprised by Brando's performance that he got the nod just for doing something different. Aside from Brando the ensemble cast are all terrific especially Mason's Brutus and Louis Calhern's Caesar. I also have to applaud the set design for giving us something grandiose and recreating ancient Rome brilliantly and also for handling the crowd scenes very well.

After three years of striking out in the Best Actor category Brando finally came up trumps at the 1955 ceremony with the film that also won the Best Picture award that year - On the Waterfront. For this picture Brando reteamed with both Streetcar writer Elia Kazan and co-star Karl Malden to make a story based on real experiences that long shoremen had dealing with their mob-run environment. As the film starts Brando's Terry Malloy is instrumental in the death of long shoreman Joey Doyle who's death is interlinked with him testifying against gangster Johnny Friendly who runs the docks and trades illegally. Malloy's brother Charley works as Friendly's accountant and gets Terry to do some of the easier jobs through his guilt of making Terry throwing fights when he was a prize fighter. Events get complicated when Terry falls for Doyle's sister Evie who, along with Malden's priest Father Barry, tries to convince Terry to testify against Friendly. Worried that Terry is being swayed Friendly sends Charley out to set Terry straight where Terry delivers the still famous 'I Coulda Been a Contender' speech. Eventually Terry testifies and Friendly turns the rest of the dockworkers against him and has him beaten up but Friendly is then discredited with all the longshoremen turning their backs on him. There's so much to praise about On The Waterfront and thankfully for once a great film gets recognised by the Academy winning Best Picture, Actor, Director, Screenplay and Supporting Actress for Eva Marie Saint as Evie. Saint is great in the film so much so I think this was almost a Lead performance which would've seen the film scoop the much-touted 'Big Five'. If Streetcar was Brando's breakout then this was definitely his star-making turn playing a conflicting character wanting to do what's right but not wanting to test his loyalty against his brother and the men who have been giving him the job. There are also so many great filmic moments from the already mentioned speech, to the ending where a beaten Malloy makes his way to work despite being light on his feet and having blurred sight but my favourite scene is probably Terry telling Evie about his involvement in Joey's death which we don't hear as a big steamship comes past making their conversation inaudible. Of the supporting performances Karl Malden is probably my favourite as the priest, but Lee J Cobb also makes a convincing gangster and Rod Steiger as Charley also is strong in a couple of scenes all were nominated as Supporting Actors but to Edmond O'Brien in The Barefoot Contessa both a role and film that aren't best remembered. I also feel that the score is brilliant it stuck in my head afterwards and added to the atmospheric tone. The Oscar winning set direction and cinematography were both brilliantly handled with the shoot taking place over 36 days in Hoboken, New Jersey making all the shore scenes seem very real and the workers' silence over how badly their work is run and even some of Friendly's goons are played by real-life prize fighters. Just a brilliant film and a worthy Best Picture winner and definitely the film that made Marlon Brando.

The final Best Picture nominee that Brando starred in during the 1950s, and again he got a Best Actor nomination, was Sayonara which I feel was a bit of a departure from the roles he played in contemporary American dramas in this particular blog post. The film sees Brando play Air Force Major Ace Gruver who moves from Korea to Japan where one of his troop - Joe Kelly is about to marry a Japanese woman. A lot of people in the Air Force and the military in general aren't happy with Kelly's choice to marry a Japanese woman but despite his reluctance Gruver agrees to be Kelly's best man. Also in Japan, Gruver's superior General Webster has bought along his daughter Eileen, played by Patricia Owens, who for a long time Ace has been in a relationship with. However during the time in Japan neither feel the relationship is prety solid with Eileen's feelings being a lot stronger than Ace's. As time goes on Gruver starts to accept Kelly's relationship with his wife Katsumi and himself becomes entranced by a Japanese dancer Hana-ogi. Things come to a head when Kelly is to be shipped back to America and his wife isn't allowed to come with him despite the fact she is pregnant. Ace is also to be sent back after his relationship with Hana-ogi is revealled but the day that Kelly is to be taken away he runs back to Katsumi and they both commit suicide deciding to be together in the next life. Ace then discovers that General Webster has made a law possible for men like Kelly to bring their Japanese wives back to America so he announces to the media that he is marrying Hana-ogi and people best get used to it. The biggest surprise in this film is probably seeing Brando in a kimono despite that this film is a little long-winded in its message of equality and that these soldiers are in love with these women rather than just wanting to be with the first woman they touch as Webster so eloquently puts it in once scene. Brando's Southern drawl adds an extra dimension to this character who is portrayed as being a natural leader but at the same time very simple in his views and he is one round by the differences that Japan and Japanese women have to offer. However the two standout performances come from Oscar winners Red Buttons and Miyoshi Umeki as Joe and Katsumi both giving spectacular performances as the doomed couple Buttons in particular is a revelation as he was much better known as a comedian than a dramatic actor but this film more than showed that he could do both. I have to say I felt the film needed to be about 20 minutes less and I didn't need to see as many of the Japanese sequences as I did and I felt James Garner was wasted in a worthless role as the military man showing Ace a different side of Japan. Overall though a film with a strong message and another great performance from Brando again displaying his range.

As I watched this quartet of films I really felt that Brando was improving as an actor as the decade went on from rough and ready in Streetcar he honed his skills for On the Waterfront before playing an almost naive character in Sayonara. Like with Elizabeth Taylor I'm looking forward to seeing more of Brando as we trek on through the decades but I guess its Sayonara for now.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Days 130-133: Elizabeth Taylor (1932-2011)

Sadly earlier this year we lost a big film legend in Elizabeth Taylor. Even sadder is the fact that I haven't really watched a lot of her films save National Velvet and The Flintstones when I was younger. So I have used the 1950s Oscar Hunt to watch five her films all nominated for Best Picture during this decade.

Liz Taylor really made her name in the afformentioned National Velvet but then was still considered a child star but she had to wait till 1950 for what many think as her first adult role in the original version of Father of the Bride a nominee at the 1951 ceremony. Obviously I'm very aware of the Steve Martin remake but have never seen the original starring Spencer Tracy as the father and Taylor as his daughter who gets engaged to Don Taylor's Buckley. Obviously the film shares a lot with the remake but what there is much more of an emphasis on is how much the wedding will cost Tracy's Stanley Banks and his wife Ellie played by Joan Bennett. It also doesn't strike me that the relationship with the daughter is as strong as it is in the remake despite this there is a good chemistry between Tracy, Bennett and Taylor as well as the two actors playing their sons. Tracy's comic voiceover is particularly affecting including in one of the opening scenes where he tries to remember which one of Taylor's potential suitors Buckley is. Tracy is also able to show off his slapstick side in a very long scene in which he tries to try on his old suit which is far too tight for him and which he ends up ripping. From the wedding onwards I recognised most of the scenes from Stanley worrying what he has to say in the church to the fact that he never gets to say goodbye to his daughter until she leaves. I feel that the film isn't quite as funny as it thinks it is but it is still very sweet and you believe that the Banks are a real family going through with a real wedding. To be fair Taylor doesn't have a lot to do apart from look very pretty and sulk occasionally when she feels her wedding is being planned by other people. An interesting Oscar nominee in that is predominantly a comedy film but nonethless a great film.

A year later Taylor starred opposite Montgomery Clift in A Place in the Sun again a film nominated for Best Picture and once again Taylor missed out on an acting nomination although Clift and fellow co-star Shelley Winters were both nominated. The film starred Clift as George Eastman a poor relation to a wealthy industrial family. George meets his uncle and cousins and is introduced to Taylor's society girl Angela Vickers instantly falling in love. However he feels he isn't good enough for her and instead starts working in the family factory and beginning a casual relationship with Winters' Al. Al and George go out a couple of times an then George is moved up the social ranks and eventually starts seeing Angela but things are complicated when Al reveals she is pregnant and wants to marry George telling him she'll reveal all to his new friends if he doesn't. Desperate for a happy ending with Angela, George sets out to kill Al while on a boat but instead he can't go through with it but when she accidentally drowns he covers it up and is eventually arrested for her murder in the end he doesn't get A Place in the Sun that he so desperately wanted to share with Taylor. As a romantic melodrama, A Place in the Sun was a great film but I'm not sure if it was Oscar-worthy while Clift and especially Winters both deserved their nominations I feel that Taylor was cruelly snubbed here as every time she breezed onto the screen it lit up. A scene in which she realises she is in love with George happens so smoothly that Taylor is able to show the audience her feelings just using her eyes. Its a bit odd to think that Taylor was only 17 here playing against Clift who was over twelve years her senior but their chemistry does work and you do really understand why Geoge would risk everything for Angela because at the end of the day it is Elizabeth Taylor!

Another year and another Oscar nominee for Liz this time in the swashbuckling adventure Ivanhoe. This was during the time in her career when Taylor wasn't getting the roles she wanted and in terms of this film she wanted the main romantic lead Rowena which went to Joan Fontaine and instead she had to settle playing Rebecca the girl who loved Ivanhoe from afar but could never get him and was forced into a relationship with George Sanders' Norman soldier De-Bois Gilbert who knew that Ivanhoe could never love her. In fact this was Taylor and Fontaine's film both women giving strong performances making the women more than just love interests and a lot more interesting than the lead man. Yes Robert Taylor's pioneering hero who was trying to fight King John's men and reinstate Richard the Lionheart was in fact incredibly bland. 15 years removed from the Errol Flynn era this almost seemed like a backstep for the 1950s cinema. I'm sure that the studio heads wanted to revisit these blockbusters to film them in technicolour but this did nothing for me and went downhill when Robin Hood had to step in to help Ivanhoe and introduce all his Merry Men. The final scenes in which Taylor is falsley accused of witchcraft were poorly but together and I didn't really care about any of the characters coming away from it. Taylor really wanted bigger films than a supporting role in a mediocre epic thankfully in a few years later she would get that chance.

That film was Giant an epic with a difference going over the span of many years of the Benedict family as they become parents and later grandparents. The head of the family Jordan 'Bick' Benedict was played by Rock Hudson while Taylor played his wife Leslie. The film concentrates on old versus new as Bick is the latest in the long line of Benedicts to own the Reata Ranch and is assisted by Mercedes McCambridge's Luz and James Dean's Jett Rink. When Luz dies she leaves a patch of land to Jett and later he strikes rich after finding oil and finds a new way to get money from the land which Bick isn't too pleased with. Bick sells some of his land and gets even more rich from the oil meanwhile Bick and Leslie have three children the eldest of which, Jordy played by a  young Dennis Hopper, wants to be a doctor rather than run the ranch while the older daughter Judy wants to follow in her father's footsteps. Jordy later marries an American Indian woman and fights the prejudice that that brang meanwhile Jett buys a hotel and starts dating the younger daughter Luz II but she stops their relationship after realising he's a bitter drunk and the film ends with Bick raelises how good his life is and how much he actually loves his wife. Although overlong there's no doubting that Giant is a magnificent film from the outdoor shots to the story itself I felt it flew through most of its two and a half hour run time. I have to say I could've done without some of the scenes including the one in which Leslie journeys home to see her sister get married to her former beau played by Rod Taylor. As well as a best picture nomination George Stevens managed to win Best Director with acting nominations for Dean, Hudson and McCambridge but nothing for Taylor which is a shame as she really anchors the film playing a woman who doesn't understand why she isn't allowed in Bick's inner circle of men who constantly discuss business. Even though she ages throughout the film she still looks really glamorous and so pretty this is one film in which she shines yet not even a nomination.

But she did get a nomination towards the end of the decade at the 1959 ceremony she was nominated in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof an adaptation of the Tennessee Williams play and one of a handful of Williams stories that became Oscar nominated pictures in the 1950s. The story revolves around Paul Newman's Brick Pollit a drunken ex-Football player now commentator who has come back to Mississippi for his father, Big Daddy's birthday with his wife Maggie known as Maggie the cat. The film, like the play, is centred all around the day of Big Daddy's party with Brick drunk and in his room while Maggie spends most of the time fighting with Brick's brother and his horrible wife and children. Brick is upset with Maggie because he believes she was responsible for the death of his friend Skipper. Apparently one of the things Williams hated about this adaptation was that the supposed homosexual feelings that Brick had for Skipper were cut out so his outbursts aimed towards Maggie weren't as barbed as they might have been had those themes remained in the film. This was alledgelly to do with the Hays Code, the censorship body at the time, disallowing references to homosexuality and therefore muddying this adaptation. The film also ends with a reconciliation between Big Daddy and Brick after the latter finds out the former is dying, this was another scene that was lengthened so the audience could go out with a happy ending. Despite recieving a plethora of nominations the film didn't win a single one possibly because the subject matter and Taylor's very provocative performance were a bit too risque for an Oscar Ceremony in which the Best Picture statuette went to Gigi. I have to say though this film was very good, although it was quite confined as it was used to being played on the stage the actors still gave it their all.

So in the 1950s Taylor went from young innocent daughter to full on vamp while playing the medieval heroine, glamorous socialite and many eras of the same woman in between. This voyage through five of her films has given me an insight into the career of a great actress and there's two more films from her in the 1960s section which I am yet to view and I have to say now I'm looking forward to it.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge 129: Wilder Wilder West

We trickle on down the river of the Oscar hunt as we have two westerns for your delication and delight.

Kicking off with High Noon, a nominee from the 1953 ceremony but a film that did win four awards including Best Actor for Gary Cooper and Best Original Song for the completely annoying Do Not Forsake me My Darling which plays throughout the film. Cooper stars as Will Kane the sherrif of a small New Mexico territory who is to give up his job and leave the town with his new wife Grace Kelly's Amy. However just before he is to go he gets word that Frank Miller, a criminal that he convicted, is to return and has his mind set on revenge. Even though he is advised to leave the town he realises that things will only get worse if he doesn't take care of Miller. He desperately tries to drum up support in his help of taking down Miller and his three gang members but is met with resistance from everyone he asks some on personal reasons, others because they are scared and some because they think that it will make the town look bad if it became associated with a shootout. At noon, Miller gets in and a classic shootout begins in the deserted town between Miller's gang and Kane. I have to say I really like High Noon mainly because of its simplicity. The central theme with Kane going round the town is handled well with everybody finding different reasons not to help him even though most concede that Kane has helped clean up the town they just don't want to help him. The design of the town is also deftly handled each set is laid out well and this helps in the final scenes with the shootout. Cooper gives a good performance and is ably supported by Lloyd Bridges as his deputy who refuses to help out as he is jealous of Kane and thinks he still has designs on his ex girlfriend now Bridges' girl. This girl is Helen Ramirez played by Katy Jurado who sizzles in the film coming across as a strong latino woman and a lot more interesting than Grace Kelly's pacifist who has little to do for most of the film apart from hang around at the station although she does come into her own in the final scenes. As I've said I found the song completely annoying and its not perfect but as a classic western High Noon still stands up today.

Going forward one year we have Shane another fairly simplistic western seeing Alan Ladd as the titular stranger who comes to a town which is involved in a war between the homesteaders and the landowners lead by Emile Meyer's Ryker. Shane eventually moves in with Van Heflin's homesteader Joe Starrett and helps strengthen their cause while at the same time becoming a second father to Starrett's son and falling in love with his wife Marian played by Jean Arthur in her final film role. Shane incorporates several showdowns between each gangs as Ryker becomes rattled by Shane and hires ruthless gunslinger Jack Wilson played by Jack Palance. Wilson quickly takes out one of the best loved homesteaders who is able to stick to his ground. After his funeral Starrett tries to rally the homesteaders against Ryker and most agree to help him. Shane realises that the only way to help Starrett is to take down Wilson and Ryker and free the homesteaders of the threat of them losing the land once and for all. After a gun battle, witnessed by Starrett's son and his dog, Shane is wounded and goes off on his horse at the end with the audience wondering whether he is dead or not. As we are now into the 1950s colour is starting to be used more and more and that is evident in Shane which won an Oscar for its cinematography. Taking advantage of its large sweeping landscapes and exterior shots Shane is a gorgeously shot film and also is great in its themes of what it means to be a man with the juxtiposition between the classic hero Shane and the grounded family man Starrett both envy each other for different reasons and that's why each of them want to sort out Ryker. Ladd, Arthur and Hefflin all play their roles very well and Ladd in paritcular has a difficult job portraying a character with very little dialogue. None of these got an acting nomination instead Palance was nominated as the striking Wilson while Brandon De Wilde as Joey Starrett also got a nod despite being realy annoying throughout the film like most child actors in the 1950s. The biggest problem with the film for me is Meyer whose Ryker never comes off as a viable threat appearing more as a panto villain but despite this Shane is a competently directed Western which capitalises on the use of technicolour cinematography and utilises to its full extent.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 128: A Trip to Italy

After two pretty heavy classics I'm ready to have a bit of a break and a bit of light relief so next up are two films both featuring Americans living in Italy and, in the case of the first film Roman Holiday, what happens when a member of the royalty rocks up. That member of royalty is put-upon Princess Ann, played by Audrey Hepburn in her first major role and the only one that would get her the Best Actress Oscar, who while on an official visit to Rome escapes to see the city. Eventually finding herself tired out she is encountered by Gregory Peck's American journalist Joe Bradley who begrudgingly allows her to sleep on his couch. Bradley eventually discovers her idenity and smelling a scoop decides to try and trap Anne long enough so he can write a story about it to impress his editor. But during their trip around Rome, accompanied by Joe's photographer friend Irving who is secretly taking pictures of the princess, they inevitably fall for each other and share a kiss before Anne realises that she must return to her duties and leaves Joe in the cold. Joe realises that with his new found feelings for Anne he can no longer publish the story and tells his suspicious editor that he has no idea where the princess is convincing Iriving not to sell the photos they journey to the palace for a press conference where the princess discovers that they are both members of the press. During the press conference Joe and Anne both share their feelings for each other in thinly veiled messages while Irving presents Anne the pictures he took of the three of them together. The final scene seees Joe lingering in the palace eventually leaving.

It is this final scene that stuck with me most of all as I was glad that the film ended with the two going their seperate ways rather than having a happy ending. As a whole Roman Holiday was a satisfying film there were parts of it where I found myself getting a little bit bored. I thought Hepburn did very well in her first starring role and opening scenes in which she finds herself tiring of her overly-structured life were particularly endearing. Her chemistry with Peck was also one of the things that made the film work and the way she grows as a character as their relationship develops was another plus point to the film. However I just felt there was just too much dilly dallying and too many establishing shots of Rome its like William Wyler was trying to drum home the fact that it was shot entirely on location in the Roman capital. Hepburn did indeed deserve her Oscar but I'm surprised that Peck didn't get a nomination as he was just as good as her and the closing scenes really showed a vulnerability to the character that a lesser actor couldn't have mustered. I also don't understand why Eddie Albert, as Irving, was nominated for Supporting Actor when Peck didn't get a look in as Albert had such a minor role in the film that I didn't feel an Oscar nomination was justified. Roman Holiday is certainly a very light film but the romantic comedies of today can't really hold a candle to it.

I'm not sure if the next film Three Coins in the Fountain, also considered itself a romantic comedy, but one of the problems with it was that it had no definite tone. The Fountain in question is the Trevi Fountain in Rome and the three coins belong to American women working as secratries in the Italian captial played by Dorothy McGuire, Jean Peters and Maggie MacNamara. Inevitably each find love McNamara plays Maria the newest secretary out in Rome and is told by Peters' Anita that Rome is horrible place for secretaries to fall in love. But soon both find romance Maria with an Italian prince and Anita with local boy and fellow office worker Georgio however the latter's romance is in jeapordy as the boss has a strict rule about the American girls fratenising with the Italians. Finally McGuire's Frances has been in love with her boss the reclusive writer Shadwell, played by Clifton Webb, but her coin in the fountain finally works out as the two fall in love but the hinderance here is the fact that Shadwell finds out he is dying. Three Coins is the first film since I entered the 1950s that is filmed in technicolour and that it was one of its advantages. The colour cinematography, which one it an Oscar, allows the film to capture some of Rome's landmarks in beautiful sparkling colour and therefore does a better job of selling Italy than perhaps Roman Holiday does. The other thing the film is famous for is the Dean Martin song of the same name which is better remembered than the film and won it its second Oscar. However beautiful it might look and sound there was really not enough going on for me in Three Coins to keep me interested. I feel that if it had been One Coin in the Fountain then I may've been hooked but there wasn't enough time to cover all three romances in depth especially that between Anita and Giorgio which was almost a two-scene love affair. The corniest part of the whole film is the final scene in which each woman is at the fountain and is greeted by her respective love interest. I think if this film had been made today then it wouldn't have been nominated for an Oscar but back in the 1950s a sparkly new colour film made in Italy was probably seen as being revolutionary by the Academy.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 127: Faded Stars and Small Pictures

By the 1950s film-makers and screenwriters were playing around with new ways to drive the action and one way this was done was by focusing on Hollywood itself and 1951 nominee Sunset Boulevard does just that. Narrated by its lead character, William Holden's struggling screenwriter Joe Gillis, it tells the story of how he came to be living with former star of silent pictures Norma Desmond. Gillis while trying to escape from people who owes money to has a flat tyre and drives into the garage of what he believes to be a deserted mansion. It is only when he is confronted by the only member of staff, Erich Von Stroheim's Max, that he finds out that the house actually belongs to Desmond. Gillis, who owes money all over town, agrees to help Desmond edit her screenplay about Salome and bit by bit he finds himself living in the house and eventually in the room in which all of Desmond's former husbands have lived in. Although a satire the film almost becomes a horror picture with Joe feeling trapped in the house, which in itself becomes a character, and by Desmond who buys Joe expensive clothes and accesories to make him stick around. Meanwhile Joe is secretly sneaking out to Paramound Studios to work on one of his own screenplays alongside the beautiful Betty Schaefer who just happens to be engaged to one of his best friends. These nightly rendevouzes quickly turn into something more and when Desmond discovers what he's been up to she goes into a fit of hysterics. She also discovers that she is no longer wanted by any director, Cecile B De Mille pops up at one point as himself as one of Desmond's former friends and has to do something drastic for the cameras to focus on her.

Sunset Boulevard was partly succesful at the 1951 Ceremony winning three awards including a very deserved prize for Best Screenplay and Story. One thing that drives Sunset forward is its narrative provided by Gillis now looking back on all the mistakes he had made throughout the course of the film. The Art Direction of the daunting house and Franz Waxman's haunting score also picked up wins. I believe though had the film not come up against the juggernaut that was All About Eve it would've triumphed even more. It is one of only a handful of films to have someone nominated in all four acting categories and I was especially surprised to see that Swanson lost to Judy Holliday rather than one of Eve's two principal actresses. Swanson is definitely the best thing about the film her Norma Desmond sticks in the mind long after you've finished watching from her manic eyes to her raspy commanding voice everything about her strikes fear in the viewer. Holden is brilliant as the down-on-his-luck everyman who thinks he spots an opportunity to exploit Desmond before seeing that it is the other way around. Von Stroheim, also nominated, adds something more to the film as Max's true identity is revealled later in the film we find out why he is devoted to Norma in the way he is. Finally the beautiful Nancy Olson as Betty was also nominated for bringing a strong presence to a character who could've just become the token love interest. I'm so glad I rewatched this film as I'd forgotten just how good it was and just how brilliant the writing is. I've not got a problem with the fact that it lost but as long as people still remember the film and still watch it then I'll be happy with that. And I think I agree with Desmond one aspect the pictures now have gotten smaller than they were when Sunset was released.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 126: My Day in Court

So finally a new decade in the Oscar challenge and we move from the tumultous 1940s to the glorious 1950s in which the big screen came alive as technicolour became more and more frequent and the cinemas were dominated by large, colourful epics luckily Oscar still had place in its nomination slots to hnour smaller films that were well written but may've only had two or three sets to their name. And we're starting off with two such films both based in a courtroom setting.

The first of these two films is 1958 nominee Witness for the Prosecution the adaptation of Agatha Christie's novel starring Charles Laughton as the belligerent Sir Wilfred a brilliant barrister who has just returned to his chambers having suffered from health problems. It is not long before Wilfred is visited by a soliciter friend who has a new client - Leonard Vole who is accused of murdering the wealthy spinster Emily French with strong circumstancial evidence pointing towards him as the killer. The only person who can vouch for his whereabouts and act as his alibi is his German wife Christine, here played by the sultry Marlene Dietrich, but Wilfred warns that a testimony from a loving wife doesn't hold up to much. The best scenes of the film happen in the Old Bailey mainly because the set is so impressive, it had been recreated by Alexandre Trauner, and is also where the trial begins The prosecution calls several witnesses before their key witness is revealled as Christine acting as the titular Witness for the Prosecution. Anything I say from there would spoil the film and I was told specifically at the end of the film by a stern voice-over not to tell my friends anything about the film's conclusion. I will say however that I very much enjoyed Witness for the Prosecution and most of that is down to Laughton's performance a mix of drama and comedy he captures what I believe the character needed and ultimately is able to do the right thing. It is odd to see Laughton act this way after portraying a bunch of villains in the 1930s, in films such as Les Miserables and Mutiny on the Bounty, however he did display comic flare in Ruggles of Red Gap and he uses that here getting a Best Actor Nomination but ultimately losing to Alec Guinness. The other Oscar nominee here is Elsa Lanchester who plays Sir Wilfred's fussing personal nurse Miss Plimsoll with whom Wilfred clashes but by the end they have a grudging respect for what the other does while I did enjoy this performance I'm suprised Dietrich didn't get a nomination for playing her feme fatale role to great effect. Sometimes the tone doesn't feel just right, ocassionally the comedy feels misjudged especially since this is a film about an old woman who has been murdered but the great ending which I didn't see coming makes up for any shifts in tone.

Also nominated at the 1958 ceremony was a film which is still my favourite of all time that being the late Sidney Lumet's classic 12 Angry Men. If you haven't seen the film then you need to as, in the words of one of my friends, its good for you but I will indulge you with a small plot summary nonetheless. Almost all of the film takes place in a jury room in which the twelve men who make up the jury are discussing whether the boy on trial killed his father or not and if they find him guilty he will go to the chair. The boy has been raised in a slum and two witnesses atest to seeing the boy stab his father or that they heard him shout that he was going to kill him. Initially only Henry Fonda's Juror Number 8 stands up for the boy voting Not Guilty in the first round of votes so that there can be a discussion about the trial and whether all the evidence was completely accurate. Some people bring their own prejudices to the table for example one juror has a problem with people from slum backgrounds while another lets his personal issues cloud his judgment. The best thing about the film, in my opinion, is the way in which the plot unravels and the characters are given more depth as the time goes on. We only learn two of the juror's names and that only happens in the very final scene instead they are referred to simply by their juror numbers. Despite the cramped setting, filmic techniques are still employed throughout 12 Angry Men including using different shots to focus on either the whole set or one character in particular for example a close-up on Juror Number 4 who in his own words never sweats but is in fact seen persipirating during one key moment. I honestly can't find fault with this film and have seen it so many times and I'm still horrified that it didn't win Best Picture or at least Best Screenplay. The only actor nominated for his role in the film was Fonda which I think is a mistake there are plenty of strong performances most notably from Lee J Cobb as the last angry man Juror No. 3. Overall a masterpiece and that's my final word on the matter.