TCM Schedule for Thursday, March 26 -- The Korda Brothers

[Staph]

This morning we've got a teen-aged crime spree, followed by that womanizer Alfie. Then this evening we return to the Korda Brothers, with a quintet of films directed by produced by Alexander Korda. Enjoy!


4:15am -- The Great Escape (1963)
Thrown together by the Germans, a group of captive Allied troublemakers plot a daring escape.
Cast: Robert Graf, Nigel Stock, Angus Lennie, John Leyton
Dir: John Sturges
C-172 mins, TV-PG

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Film Editing -- Ferris Webster

During the climatic motorcycle chase, John Sturges allowed Steve McQueen to ride (in disguise) as one of the pursuing German soldiers, so that in the final sequence, through the magic of editing, he's actually chasing himself.


7:15am -- Delinquent Daughters (1944)
Two teenage girls find trouble when they fall in with the wrong crowd.
Cast: June Carlson, Fifi D'Orsay, Teala Loring, Mary Bovard
Dir: Albert Herman
BW-70 mins, TV-PG

Although she made her career playing the quintessential Parisian coquette, Fifi D'Orsay was actually a Canadian.


8:30am -- Teen-Age Crime Wave (1955)
Juvenile delinquents pull a young innocent into their crime spree.
Cast: Tommy Cook, Mollie McCart, Sue England, Frank Griffin
Dir: Fred F. Sears
BW-76 mins, TV-PG

Also known as Jail Bait.


10:00am -- No Greater Glory (1934)
A frail boy fights to win acceptance from the leader of a street gang.
Cast: George Breakston, Frankie Darro, Jackie Searl, Jimmie Butler
Dir: Frank Borzage
BW-74 mins, TV-G

Based on a novel by Ferenc Molnar, whose novel Liliom became the basis for Rodger's and Hammerstein's Carousel (1956).


11:15am -- Short Film: One Reel Wonders: Murder In The Pullman (1932)
Cast: Donald Meek, John Hamilton
Dir: Joseph Henabery
BW-22 mins

Filmed at Warner Bros.' Eastern Vitaphone Studios, Brooklyn.


11:40am -- Short Film: One Reel Wonders: The Week End Mystery (1932)
Cast: Donald Meek, John Hamilton
Dir: Joseph Henabery
BW-16 mins

Based on characters created by S. S. Van Dine.


12:00pm -- Room at the Top (1959)
A young accountant claws his way to the top in the boardroom and the bedroom.
Cast: Laurence Harvey, Simone Signoret, Heather Sears, Donald Wolfit
Dir: Jack Clayton
BW-115 mins, TV-PG

Won Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Simone Signoret and Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- Neil Paterson

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Laurence Harvey, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Hermione Baddeley, Best Director -- Jack Clayton, and Best Picture

At 2 minutes, 32 seconds, Hermione Baddeley's performance is the shortest Oscar-nominated performance in movie history.


2:00pm -- I'm All Right Jack (1960)
A veteran starting out in business gets caught between management and labor.
Cast: Ian Carmichael, Peter Sellers, Richard Attenborough, Terry-Thomas
Dir: John Boulting
BW-105 mins, TV-14

Based on Alan Hackney's novel Private Life.


3:49pm -- Short Film: One Reel Wonders: Looking At London (1946)
A colorful travelogue of London's most historic buildings and the residual damage still left from WWII.
Narrator: James A. FitzPatrick
C-10 mins

Featured are views of Buckingham Palace, Piccadilly Circus, and the destruction caused by the bombing of areas surrounding St. Paul's Cathedral.


4:00pm -- Alfie (1966)
A British womanizer refuses to grow up until tragedy strikes.
Cast: Michael Caine, Shelley Winters, Millicent Martin, Julia Foster
Dir: Lewis Gilbert
C-114 mins, TV-14

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Michael Caine, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Vivien Merchant, Best Music, Original Song -- Burt Bacharach (music) and Hal David (lyrics) for the song "Alfie", Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- Bill Naughton, and Best Picture

On its original release, the film had an all instrumental soundtrack, by Sonny Rollins. The Oscar nominated song, by Bacharach and David, was added for the American release, and to a British re-release. For the UK release, the song was sung by Cilla Black over the end credits, which went to #9 on the British charts. For the US release, the song was originally to be sung by Dionne Warwick over the end credits, but was replaced at the last minute by the version sung by Cher. Ironically, Warwick's version outperformed Cher's on the Billboard charts.


6:00pm -- The Late George Apley (1947)
Young love rocks a staid Boston family.
Cast: Ronald Colman, Vanessa Brown, Richard Haydn, Charles Russell
Dir: Joseph L. Mankiewicz
BW-96 mins, TV-G

Based on the play by George S. Kaufman.


7:38pm -- Short Film: One Reel Wonders: Little White Lie (1945)
Dir: Paul Burnford
BW-11 mins

I can't find a bit of trivia about this one!


What's On Tonight: TCM SPOTLIGHT: THE KORDA BROTHERS


8:00pm -- The Scarlet Pimpernel (1935)
A British aristocrat's effete facade masks a swashbuckling hero rescuing victims of the French revolution.
Cast: Leslie Howard, Merle Oberon, Raymond Massey, Nigel Bruce
Dir: Harold Young
BW-98 mins, TV-G

The original play opened in London on 5 January 1905, three years before it was novelized.


9:42pm -- Short Film: One Reel Wonders: Hollywood Extra! (1936)
True story of aspiring actress Jane Barnes, who went on to bit parts in twenty-odd films.
Cast: Jane Barnes, Ralph Bushman
Dir: Felix E. Feist
BW-10 mins

Jane's first role is as a stand-in, for Maureen O'Sullivan as Jane (in one of the Tarzan movies!).


10:00pm -- Things To Come (1936)
Two generations of philosophers try to bring an end to war.
Cast: Raymond Massey, Edward Chapman, Ralph Richardson, Margaretta Scott
Dir: William Cameron Menzies
BW-97 mins, TV-PG

The date on the newspaper in the scene in 1966 when the war ends is 21st September 1966--which would have been the 100th birthday of H.G. Wells.


11:41pm -- Short Film: One Reel Wonders: Knight Is Young (1938)
June, refusing to leave her apartment for fear of being evicted, notices Hal painting a billboard outside her window. Hal tries to woo her and soon ends up helping her as they share their love of muisic and dancing
Cast: June Allyson, Hal LeRoy, Earlayne Schools, Billy Reed
Dir: Roy Mack
BW-20 mins

The soundtrack includes There's So Much Music In Me, sung by Earlayne Schools.


12:00am -- Knight Without Armour (1937)
A British spy tries to get a countess out of the new Soviet Union.
Cast: Marlene Dietrich, Robert Donat, Irene Van Brugh, Herbert Lomas
Dir: Jacques Feyder
BW-107 mins, TV-G

During the bath tub scene, Marlene Dietrich slipped on a bar of soap falling naked and spreadeagled before cast and crew. Ever the professional, she picked herself up, laughed and continued shooting.


2:00am -- The Thief of Bagdad (1940)
A young thief faces amazing monsters to return Bagdad's deposed king to the throne.
Cast: Conrad Veidt, Sabu, June Duprez, John Justin
Dir: Ludwig Berger
C-106 mins, TV-G

Won Oscars for Best Art Direction, Color -- Vincent Korda, Best Cinematography, Color -- Georges Périnal, and Best Effects, Special Effects -- Lawrence W. Butler (photographic) and Jack Whitney (sound)

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Music, Original Score -- Miklós Rózsa

Filming began in Britain, but because of the Blitz, the production relocated to Hollywood. When filming began in the USA, the stricter US censorship codes were applied. One of the most obvious differences between the scenes shot in the UK and those filmed in the USA is that the tops of the actresses' costumes were buttoned up all the way to satisfy the Hays Office. That kind of clue makes it easier to identify the US-shot scenes than trying to spot differences in the sets.


4:00am -- Anna Karenina (1947)
Adaptation of Tolstoy's classic tale of a woman who deserts her family for an illicit love.
Cast: Vivien Leigh, Ralph Richardson, Kieron Moore, Sally Ann Howes
Dir: Julien Duvivier
BW-112 mins, TV-14

One of at least 25 different versions of the Tolstoy novel. Other Annas include Greta Garbo (in both silent and talkie versions), Claire Bloom, Nicola Pagett, Jacqueline Bisset, Carol Alt, Sophie Marceau, and Helen McCrory.

[Staph]

1. The Scarlet Pimpernel (1935)

"Alex was Hungarian, imaginative, intelligent, extravagant. Although lacking business sense, he had an uncanny ability to find money, and he also had an uncommon feeling for quality." - Raymond Massey

The "auteur" theory of film authorship may apply most often to directors, but other artists can certainly acquire the label, be they writers, actors, cinematographers or composers. The Scarlet Pimpernel (1934), one of the great costume adventure films of its time, is the work of an auteur producer, Alexander Korda. His stamp is simply all over the movie, beginning with the script's overall wit and humor - two qualities which were in short supply in the original source material.

The Scarlet Pimpernel began life as a 1905 play by Hungarian Baroness Emmuska Orczy and Montagu Barstow. Three years later it was novelized by Orczy as the first of a series of novels. The story is set during France's Reign of Terror. Innocent French noblemen are being guillotined daily, but a mysterious man heroically rescues many of them, always leaving behind a small red flower - a pimpernel - as his trademark. The Scarlet Pimpernel, as he is called, is revealed to us to be Sir Percy Blakeney, a British aristocrat who pretends to be a foppish and ineffectual dandy in order to throw off suspicion. Even his disgusted French wife is unaware of his secret identity. The French, however, figure out that the Pimpernel is English and send an emissary, Chauvelin, to London to find him.

Korda originally had Charles Laughton in mind for Blakeney, but luckily he ended up with Leslie Howard, who became a huge star because of this picture. As Blakeney's wife he cast the beautiful Merle Oberon (who later became Mrs. Korda), and playing the villain Chauvelin was Canadian actor Raymond Massey.

Two more production members imported from America were cinematographer Harold Rosson and editor William Hornbeck, both among the finest in Hollywood at their professions. This was a sign of Korda's extravagance - bringing over such craftsmen was definitely not the norm for British movies at this time. Assembling the right crew, however, is one of the chief jobs of a producer, and Korda knew how to hire a winning combination of people to achieve what he wanted. In the case of The Scarlet Pimpernel, Korda wanted to fully and lavishly recreate the French revolution, and these were the people to pull it off in style. (Both Rosson and Hornbeck stayed to work on a few more Korda pictures as well.)

The Scarlet Pimpernel's original director, Rowland Brown, was famously fired on just the first day of production after butting heads with Korda. According to Raymond Massey's autobiography A Hundred Different Lives, Korda watched Brown direct a scene and then told him disapprovingly that he was shooting it as if it were a gangster film. Brown replied that he would direct it his way or walk out. Korda said, "Please walk," and Brown was gone. Korda directed the scene himself and by that afternoon had hired a replacement, Harold Young. Korda kept Young on a tight leash, however. As Massey wrote, "The next day Young ostensibly took over, but the direction throughout the months of shooting remained an unofficial but smooth collaboration."

While acting in The Scarlet Pimpernel, Massey was also starring in and directing the play The Shining Hour on London's West End, following a 125-performance run on Broadway. He managed to handle both the play and the movie even though it meant consistent 15-hour days. Korda accommodated him by providing a car and driver each day, thereby allowing Massey to catch up on sleep during the one-hour drive to and from Elstree Studios. It also helped that during each performance of The Shining Hour, Massey ate two full hot meals on stage as part of the play itself. (In theater circles, the play was known jokingly as "The Dining Hour.")

"I never had such fun working in a movie as I did on The Scarlet Pimpernel," Massey would later recall. "Of all the heavies I have played on the screen, the most wicked and the most fun to do was Chauvelin. There was a spirit in that company, a feeling of confidence, a sort of élan which I have often found in the theater but never sensed in any other movie."

The Scarlet Pimpernel has been a popular source for moviemakers over the years. It was made into several silent films and remade countless more times for film and TV. Korda himself oversaw two further versions - a sequel, Return of the Scarlet Pimpernel (1937), with a different cast, and a remake, The Elusive Pimpernel (1950), directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. Leslie Howard directed an entertaining modern-day version of the story in 1941 called "Pimpernel" Smith (also known as Mister V), in which he plays an effete academic who rescues victims of Nazi Germany.

Producer: Alexander Korda, Grace Blake
Director: Harold Young
Screenplay: Emmuska Orczy, Lajos Biro, S.N. Behrman, Robert E. Sherwood, Arthur Wimperis
Cinematography: Harold Rosson
Film Editing: William Hornbeck
Music: Arthur Benjamin
Cast: Leslie Howard (Sir Percy Blakeney), Merle Oberon (Lady Marguerite Blakeney), Raymond Massey (Citizen Chauvelin), Nigel Bruce (Prince of Wales), Bramwell Fletcher (Priest), Joan Gardner (Suzanne de Tournay).
BW-90m.

by Jeremy Arnold

[Matilda]

2. I think Leslie Howard was a perfect Pimpernel.

The film is very good fun to watch, and there was nobody miscast, as I recall. The only other Pimpernel I ever
really liked was Marius Goring in the TV series which was made in the 1950s, and shown in Australia around the early
1960s. All the other versions I've ever seen were rubbish, and I've tried to forget them as quickly as I could.

I grew up with the Scarlet Pimpernel books - I still have most of them. They were terribly British in their
patriotism, but as an Australian, I was raised as a good child of the British Empire, so it seemed perfectly normal
to me. It was only when I got older and started forming political opinions of my own that I began to wince a little
at some of Orczy's rather elitist views. I was always on the side of the aristocrats as a teenager; now I can see
the other side, which would have shocked my teenage self.