MASH, EASY LIVING AND MORE

EASY LIVING, ’37 — Johnny: Mary you've got a job!  Mary: What is it?  Johnny: Cooking my breakfast!  Not politically correct by today's standards but a zany Preston Sturges script screwball depression era Cinderella romcom wherein a mink coat thrown from a luxury penthouse literally lands on a hapless working girl.  Hilarious slapstick automat scene as well. Great sendup on the foibles of capitalism pre-war.

NIGHT AND THE CITY — Hustler Harry Fabian (Richard Widmark) is chased through the alleys and back streets of London in a memorable scene from a ’50 British film noir that may not be available. Video store operators in ’92 were offered free copies of this gritty gem if they bought 5 cassettes of the remake with De Niro.  I stumbled on a promotional tape at a thrift store. Great British character actors include Francis Sullivan, Googie Withers and Herbert Lom plus American Mike Mazursky (Murder My Sweet.)

DR. X.  When you least expect it, the monster appears in bizarre colors in the restoration of this much anticipated 1932 horror masterpiece with the same cast, crew and color process as the 1933 Mystery of the Wax Museum.  Lee Tracy plays a dim witted newspaper reporter and Fay Wray warms up her vocal chords with random screams in anticipation of King Kong.  Of course Lionel Atwell is the focus of the ensuing mayhem. Even the butler is super creepy.  Dr. X exceeded my expectations ten fold.  

LABOR UNION members help save an east coast plastics factory from bankruptcy by developing a unique system for manufacturing TV set knobs in 1951 in Whistle at Eaton Falls.  It may be a true story since the producer Louis De Rochemont is known for films dealing with actual events.  Lloyd Bridges and Carleton Carpenter are feature.  The film was streamed this week from the DC Labor Film Festival. 

MASH. Taking a break from writing Plan B papers in 1970, I crowded into Northrup Auditorium (U of MN) with faculty and students to see a special preview and discussion with director Robert Altman concerning his new movie MASH.  If I would have been thinking like a journalist I would have written that "this is the movie that would define the decade."  But it all went before me in a blur.  From the opening theme song, "Suicide is Painless" to the Last Supper for Painless the dentist, it was a buffet of buffoonery, irreverence and caustic commentary as the country sacrificed lives to napalm in Southeast Asia.  It takes my breath away.