Such campy good fun! "Sunset Boulevard" with Gloria Swanson and William

[Cleita]

Holden. I haven't seen it in decades. I finally opened the DVD I had bought some months ago last night and watched it. Of course, we all remember Carol Burnett's send up of Norma Desmond, with Harvey Korman hamming it up as Max. What struck me was that it wasn't such a big stretch for them. Gloria Swanson pulled out all the stops with memorable dialog that is still remembered today, along with the facial expressions and body language.

"We didn't need dialog then! We had FACES!"

I believe it ruined her career. I don't know why, she was perfect as the demented silent movie star who lived in the past. I actually knew such a lady, a silent film star, who was a client of a firm I worked for. She had been a bridesmaid at Jean Harlow's wedding, still wore the flapper outfits and 1920's makeup, in the early sixties. She was also known to chase my very handsome, but very married boss around the desk a few times.

Also, it was fun to see Sunset Boulevard as it was back then. My star struck mother used to drive me up there on Sunday from our little clapboard house that we shared with my grandmother in greater Los Angeles. She really wanted to live there and not where we lived. We even went to Schwab's for milkshakes on these excursions.

The Norma Desmond mansion was a crazy set designer's nirvana, from the baroque furnishings, the huge pipe organ, and Norma's satin and velvet boudoir complete with a swan shaped bed embedded with cupids.

All in all it's actually a great story in the tradition of the Greek tragedy. If you like film noir, you will like this.

[laststeamtrain]

1. I always wanted a swimming pool.

I love me some Billy Wilder.

[Cleita]

2. Yes, he didn't know the swimming pool would bite him. n/t

[laststeamtrain]

3. That's quite an opening, isn't it?

I had the distinct pleasure of introducing a younger person to Sunset Blvd.

They were just the right age.

I made a 'classic' film fan for life.

Gawd, I love the movies.

:hi:

[wtmusic]

4. I'm going to rent it tonite.

Thanks for the tip :thumbsup:

[Cleita]

7. If you haven't seen it,

I hope you enjoy it. It also has a lot of celebrities of that day playing themselves in it.

[mucifer]

5. Billy WIlder is amazing especially considering English was not his first language.

The man wrote some amazing scripts. Check out " The Apartment" with Shirley McClane and Jack Lemmon.

[Cleita]

6. Oh that was another classic!

I think it's because his characters ring true. I mean we have all know someone like the Shirley McLaine character and the Jack Lemmon character. As a matter of fact, a bachelor neighbor in the apartment building across from my parents apartment seemed to run a similar scheme. My mother even remarked to me that the comings and goings at his apartment reminded her of the movie.

[Warpy]

8. I knew one of the original Rockettes

who moved from Missouri to NYC and stayed there. She'd been a singer and dancer for many years after her few with the Rockettes, eventually doing the lounge circuit.

She was a fabulous old gal, garish stage makeup and silk kimonos and I wouldn't have given up knowing her for anything, even though it meant being terrified in a fifth floor walkup of a firetrap building with no fire escapes in the late 60s in Boston.

I can never watch "Sunset Boulevard" without thinking a little of her, but she wasn't living in the past. She was sharp as a tack.

[Cleita]

9. She sounds like an interesting person.

I hope you kept a diary. Bigger than life characters like her are what fuel stories.

[Warpy]

10. No diaries

I feared blackmail.

[Cobalt-60]

11. Its a great film

Everyone in it from Gloria Swanson to Cecil B DeMille is outstanding.
A friend's son saw Gloria Swanson on the dvd cover and absolutely reuses to believe that
Nora Desmond's crazy eyes weren't shopped.
I loved the house, too.

[swimmernsecretsea]

12. I went to college in the late 70's, early 80's,

and met and saw a few people like Norma. I loved to walk around LA. It always filled with sadness and regret, like a Joan Didion novel, even the places that had been built up new around the old Hollywood. I'd always accidentally find places that had once been something, but were lingering behind, faded as if being themselves would have called attention and made people want to bulldoze over their carcasses.

I recalled walking along Pico Boulevard once, and seeing the Pan Pacific, which later featured prominently in the movie Xanadu. At the time, it was a miserable wreck, weeds all over the front, chain link surrounding it. But I could look at the bones and see how lovely it must have been. We have great architecture today, but do we have drama like this? Not often enough.


All the film books (I was a film major) made me seek out the landmarks and places where things once happened. It was tragic to look at their remains and think about what kind of dreck was produced today, but I felt it was important to touch history.

Sunset Boulevard was shown in Dolores Park in San Francisco last year at an open air screening, and it was great fun to watch it again. I enjoyed seeing it. It brought back memories of when I used to walk through the streets of Hollywood, looking for the glamorous past.

The history of the film is quite interesting. I've added a link to IMDB.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043014/

[Cleita]

13. Thanks for the link.

Also, to date myself, I remember going to the Pan Pacific, back in its heyday to see the Ice Follies.

[cemaphonic]

14. I wouldn't say it ruined her career

As with Desmond, her career went into decline with the talkies. Sunset Boulevard was made about 20 years past her prime, and she got a short career boost from it.