1943 poll 2.0

[ole dole doff]

1943 poll viewing No9:
FOOD AND MAGIC (Jean Negulesco)
https://letterboxd.com/film/food-and-magic/

https://youtu.be/IWcBUAN6kY4

[ole dole doff]

1943 poll viewing No10:
YOU, JOHN JONES! (Mervyn LeRoy)
https://letterboxd.com/film/you-john-jones/

https://youtu.be/Edi2-iOX3nc

[Evelyn Library P.I.]

I nostri sogni – Recommended: Vittorio De Sica worms his way into your home as a charming con artist, takes your family's life savings, but then gets sidetracked and falls in love with you. The things that girls like me see only at the cinema!

[ole dole doff]

1943 poll viewing No11:
THEY STOOGE TO CONGA (Del Lord)
https://letterboxd.com/film/they-stooge-to-conga/

Plot
The Stooges are incompetent and dim-witted repairmen fixing the doorbell of a large house, which, unbeknownst to them, is the secret headquarters of a group of Nazi agents, headed by the ruthless Hans (Vernon Dent). They manage to disembowel not only the wiring of the walls and destroy most of the house as they work but also totally confuse the city telephone wire system! Moe and Larry then subdue Hans and his Japanese cohort, assume their wardrobes (emulating Adolf Hitler and Hideki Tojo) and ultimately sink their submarine by remote control. The boys are caught before the remote control falls, but unloose stooge mayhem against Hans and his three goons leading to an explosion. In the last scene Hans and the spies pinned under a wooden beam while Stooges bonk the spies to the sound of radio sign off!

Production notes
They Stooge to Conga was filmed May 6-9, 1942. The film title is a parody of the 18th-century play She Stoops to Conquer.
The doorbell repair segment was reworked with Shemp Howard in 1952's Listen, Judge. The footage of the submarine jumping out of the water was recycled from Three Little Sew and Sews. A similar gag was used in the 2012 film The Three Stooges where Larry (Sean Hayes) is wearing a sandwich board.

A young Lloyd Bridges appears as "Telephone Customer #2" in one of his last uncredited roles.
This is the third Stooges short where Moe plays a parody of Adolf Hitler; the first two, with Moe portraying "Moe Hailstone" as the Hitler parody role in both, were You Nazty Spy and its sequel I'll Never Heil Again, both of which had no connection to this short.

This entry also marked the second time Curly says the word, "sabatoogie," a mispronouncing of "sabotage". The first time was in 1942's "Loco Boy Makes Good".

https://youtu.be/yA3SERnf1aA

[Searchlike]

Good luck with this, thoxans!

April 29 Edit: No internet, no list.

[greennui]

I:38, now I know why Carmen Miranda seemed so familiar when I first watched her in The Gang's All Here, used to watch these T&J shorts over and over again as a kid. Do kids these days still watch them?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVxoIAgumzk

[sally]

god i haven't seen a tom & jerry short for years! i'm not sure i could separate them from childhood. paul vecchiali preferred droopy in his best-of lists though...

i just watched le baron fantôme and apparently cocteau was involved, no shit. it's total fairy tale. (also intensely sexual, there's thorns and blood and white veils draping and vertiginous heights and lots of views from nooks and crannies - it's so so so well shot!) if there was any oblique reference here to the occupation i'm afraid it went right over my head (my eyes were watching this movie from much further down)

although i will be honest i never had alain cuny down as the brutish heathcliff type but i'll go with it

sporting phallic weapon under a bower of blossoms


hugging the ghost of him

[nrh]

i just watched le baron fantôme and apparently cocteau was involved

he wrote dialogue and acts in it i believe?

giono talks about going to see it in his 'occupation journal' -

"The next day I saw L. I had lunch and dinner at his house. In the afternoon, a film, Le Baron fantome, Cocteau. Beautiful images. Literary text. Dialogue with all the same flaws as mine. Not to be imitated. But a better day. A little peace and quiet."

i think it's the only film in that book he mentions seeing and didn't hate.

[sally]

i just watched le baron fantôme and apparently cocteau was involved

he wrote dialogue and acts in it i believe?

yeah, i'd call that pretty involved also that's a nice summation from giono. bit harsh on himself, but nevermind

[Curtis, baby]

The Gang's All Here (Busby Berkeley, 1943)
The Ox-Bow Incident (William A. Wellman, 1943)
Day of Wrath (Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1943)

Le Corbeau (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1943)
Stormy Weather (Andrew L. Stone, 1943)
Shadow of a Doubt (Alfred Hitchcock, 1943)

"Red Hot Riding Hood" (Tex Avery, 1943)
"Meshes of the Afternoon" (Maya Deren/Alexander Hammid, 1943)
Dangerous Blondes (Leigh Jason, 1943)

Heaven Can Wait (Ernst Lubitsch, 1943)
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (Michael Powell/Emeric Pressburger, 1943)
"Passing Parade No. 44: Storm" (Paul Burnford, 1943)

[sally]

Air Force 1943 Howard Hawks
Lumière d'été 1943 Jean Grémillon
Mechta 1943 Mikhail Romm
Münchhausen 1943 Josef von Báky
Ordet 1943 Gustaf Molander
Stormy Weather 1943 Andrew L. Stone
The Song of Bernadette 1943 Henry King
This Land Is Mine 1943 Jean Renoir

these are the DtC 43 noms in case anyone is still slogging their way through that....

netflix uk/most of europe except sweden has added EVEN MORE swedish films & guess what, ordet is there. insane. (oh i guess i never caught it before, because they've listed it as danish)

[Silga]

I've already watched some great films for the poll:

I Walked with a Zombie (Jacques Tourneur). It immediately became my favourite of Val Lewton produced films so far.
The Desperadoes (Charles Vidor). Columbia studio's first Technicolor film and what an enjoyable western with great dialogues and one-liners.
These two will definitely make my final list.

And I'll think about Background to Danger (Raoul Walsh). A simple yet entertaining escapist thriller.

The only let down so far was an all-over-the-place Journey Into Fear (Norman Foster and(?) Orson Welles).

[sally]

i've had to embrace the fact that 43 is full of war movies, and especially the fact that a medium of sight produced SO many films about the hidden, in the zillion spy movies they pumped out (which tbh don't really excite me even though they should) but i'm still hoping to cherry pick around the pretty things i like - sea & snow (& vast horizons, so i can include sahara which i quite fancy watching)

can anyone therefore recommend any suitable watches? anyone seen northern pursuit? is it very snowy?

i watched the sea-based san demetrio, a british film which every review said was boring but i was engaged enough, possibly because the war meant that the habitual british cynicism was displaced by something like jingoistic sincerity, so may watch a few more british films even if they're not ocean-going just for that novelty.

[Curtis, baby]

Stormy Weather has by far the most incredible tap number I've ever seen. I was fortunate enough to see the film at the cinema and I remember being shocked, just not understanding how some of this was physically possible. I won't go into details as I don't want to spoil the mind-blowing for anyone else

[Evelyn Library P.I.]

anyone seen northern pursuit? is it very snowy?

Yes, if memory serves, it's very snowy and very cosy!

[sally]

well in that case i will definitely get to it! (except not tonight because my internet is rubbish)

[Searchlike]

Stormy Weather has by far the most incredible tap number I've ever seen

You're absolutely right! I just finished watching it for the first time. Had already seen the legendary dance scene and still found the whole film an absolute joy, but holy moly, THAT number...

Finally watched Meshes of the Afternoon too, some cinephile I am, should have watched it ages ago. If only my nightmares were directed by Maya Deren, I had a particularly horric one last night that I'm still recovering from, mise en scène was awful too. I joke, but that shit was fucked up, I need a hug.

Anyway, I have some more watching to do. SCFZ homework is the best type of homework!

[sally]

matsu the untamed (inagaki) is 2008 on imdb which is nonsense, i've watched it for this poll. lead actress died in hiroshima. main character had much of the the rough-and-ready but good at heart macho idiot from a ford movie and camera was unpredictable. lovely ending

everyone was grinningly positive in 43. i may have nightmares too

[St. Gloede]

Wilder urlaub / The Deserter (1943, Franz Schnyder)



Shot in a stunning film noir look, complete with a journey into night and darkness The Deserter follows the anguished attempts of a soldier to escape to France after killing his commanding officer. It is refreshingly sympathetic and humanistic for a film created in the midst of WW2 - and while not directly looking at Swiss neutrality, the war looms all around them - so does the fear of being invaded and uncertainty. The blackouts and curfews add additional suspense, while the guilt starts to tear down our protagonists' psyche. At times almost tenderly eerie, and filled with a sense of human weakness, The Deserter stands out as a tight, effective and great film. 8/10.



O noapte furtunoasa  / A Stormy Night (1943, Jean Georgescu) Rewatch



Plot: A husband, unbeknownst to him, asks his wife's lover to see if she is having an affair. Comedy ensues.

A Stormy Night, held up as one of the pillars of Romanian cinema, left me entirely unimpressed when I first saw it. Feeling it sloppy, silly and poorly tossed together, with limited cinematic value.

On this viewing it grew on me. In some ways it does feel like an early sound film/filmed play mix. The filmmaking and use of visuals are fairly basic , it almost feels a little like a film made at the advent of sound - but, I did appreciate the raunchy humour and general naughtiness - with a great touch of social satire quite more - and silly beards cannot take that away.

If I ever choose to rewatch it again (unlikely) this may be where it grows. It can however feel a little like a Lubitsch without the visuals and it really enjoys what it does. 4 --> 5.5/10.

[sally]

Wilder urlaub / The Deserter (1943, Franz Schnyder)

looks fantastic! it was on my list to watch but now it's a sooner rather than later

[Lencho of the Apes]

A whole YT channel that looks like a magpie hole just waiting to be fallen into. I think I got my idioms tankled, but whatever.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqq2LxrgMsI

[sally]

who is this british council? never heard of them!

but thanks for link lencho

is this just a british thing? seemingly thousands of little public info docs? or is it that we just have a good archive due to rosy-hued idiot nostalgia for the past/brexit moron mentality?

[wba]

films seen: 40+

Current Ballot (and final one, if I don't get to see any more masterpieces from that year till the end of the poll)

ranked in order of preference


Tier 1

01. Großstadtmelodie / Melody of a Big City (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, Germany)
02. Sophienlund (Heinz Rühmann, Germany)
03. Phantom of the Opera (Arthur Lubin, USA)
04. Vredens dag / Day of Wrath (Carl Theodor Dreyer, Denmark)
05. Die beiden Schwestern / The Two Sisters (Erich Waschneck, Germany)
06. Immensee (Veit Harlan, Germany)
07. Das Bad auf der Tenne (Volker von Collande, Germany)

Tier 2

08. Wenn der junge Wein blüht (Fritz Kirchhoff, Germany)
09. Lache Bajazzo (Leopold Hainisch, Germany)
10. Five Graves to Cairo (Billy Wilder, USA)
11. Above Suspicion (Richard Thorpe, USA)
12. Romanze in Moll / Romance in a Minor Key (Helmut Käutner, Germany)
13. Geliebter Schatz (Paul Martin, Germany)
14. Baby Puss (Joseph Barbera/William Hanna, USA)



current watchlist:

Ordet / The Word (Gustaf Molander, Sweden))

[ole dole doff]

who is this british council? never heard of them!

omg, i can't believe you never heard about the notoriously known British Council!
if a Bohemian wants to get more Brit-like he/she goes to the British Council (it was like this since the bygone 1990s ages — not sure if even before).
the same way as if one wants to Germanize oneself a bit, he/she goes to Goethe Institut.
tho i have to admit Goethe Institut is more active in Bohemia than British Council.

and when i noticed on Ltbxd you watched a film about British farming and i got the urged to watch it too i found it on British Council's Vimeo channel.
https://vimeo.com/user10739281
there i also watched the short films about British glass and British education via radio broadcast.
there are many more old educational shorts (as on their YT channel) and i intend to watch all from 1943.

[ole dole doff]

https://www.britishcouncil.cz/en/about/ ... h-republic
The British Council builds connections, understanding and trust between people in the UK and other countries through arts and culture, education and the English language.
...
We have been working in the Czech Republic since 1946.

[Curtis, baby]

1943 poll viewing No1:
IN PASSING (Alexander Alexeieff) ... Ltbxd 1945 but IMDb 1943
https://letterboxd.com/film/en-passant-1945/

Pinscreen animated wonder accompanying a Canadian-French folk song. A squirrel romps through a fine summer day doing squirrel things.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BIViI1 ... OldCartoon

En Passant used to be the official chess magazine of Canada

[ole dole doff]

if a squirrel is/was the official mascot of the Canada chess team, then it is obvious from where it comes!

[sally]

omg, i can't believe you never heard about the notoriously known British Council!
if a Bohemian wants to get more Brit-like he/she goes to the British Council (it was like this since the bygone 1990s ages — not sure if even before).

ah i see, no wonder i've never heard of it, it's the propaganda unit for pesky know-nothin forriners. (must be a hard job trying to sell britain now, i pity them, although this month, after the government declared that we've solved racism, it must be slightly easier)

i haven't abandoned 1943, only i need to watch some doubling the canon films as well...

[Evelyn Library P.I.]

Fans of classic British comedy will not want to miss My Learned Friend. Fav discovery of '43 viewing thus far. Will Hay's final film, a splendid proto-'Ealing Comedy' about a serial killer trying to kill Will Hay.

[Silga]

Five Graves to Cairo is another great discovery and a sure addition to the final list.

I've also watched all three of the Sherlock Holmes adventures from 1943 and I prefer The Spider Woman.

John Farrow's China is another film I'm glad I've watched only thanks to the 1943 poll. A great trio of Alan Ladd, Loretta Young and William Bendix. I can see where George Lucas got his Indiana Jones look from. Ladd's character is also named Jones, by the way.