Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 149: Happy Holliday

Its not hard to make links between The Country Girl and the next film on the list - Born Yesterday. Both are based on plays and so mainly feature people talking in rooms, both star William Holden and both have the winner of that year's Best Actress award in them and in this instance it was Judy Holliday. More surprising is the fact that Holliday beat both All About Eve's Anne Baxter and Bette Davies as well as Sunset Boulevard's Gloria Swanson. Holliday's character is Billie Dawn a former chorus girl who is the girlfriend of dodgy uncouth tycoon Harry Brock and is forced to go to a Washington hotel so Harry can do a deal with a few politicians. While meeting with the upper-classes Harry realises that Billie won't be able to mix with the people that he'll be doing business with so he organises her to have some lessons with Holden's journalist Paul Verrell. Obviously as this is a screwball comedy Paul and Billie soon become romantically entwined as she learns more about the country she lives in and is able to understand more than Harry wants her to. As soon as Billie becomes more aware of some of the documents that Harry is having her sign she refuses to do his dirty work so he hits her. Eventually she gets her revenge as she and Paul leak documents of his underground shenanigans to the press before they leave together.

There was much debate on the YouTube comments if Holliday should've won the Best Actress Award at the 1951 ceremony. I have to say it's certainly a memorable performance as she makes Billie the stereotypical gangster's moll with a high-pitched voice and a funny walk. But she is captivating as the character grows and learns to stand up for herself and her final scenes where she gets one over on Harry is a fist punch in the air moment. Holliday is ably supported by William Holden as the straight man and by Broderick Crawford, himself just coming off a Best Actor Oscar win, as the brutish Harry. The main problem with the film is that again it is a play adaptation and therefore there are many scenes in Harry's hotel suite in which he welcomes his guests and has meetings with his dodgy lawyer. Obviously the medium of film allows for exterior scenes so we see Paul and Billie exploring Washington landmarks but this almost seems a little forced like the director needed to differentiate the film and the play however it all still fits together. I did enjoy Born Yesterday and found Holliday's performance extremely funny and likeable and I laughed a lot. While Davis, Baxter and Swanson all gave memorable dramatic turns and at points chewed the scenery I have to say that we all like a laugh once in a while and it's good to see a comic actress pick up the prize something that hardly ever happens these days.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 148: Amazing Grace

Imagine you're Judy Garland, I know it's an odd way to start this blog but stick with me, you've just given birth to your son and the Oscars have sent cameras to the hospital where you are about to receive your Best Actress Award at the 1955 ceremony for her role in A Star is Born and then the winner is... Grace Kelly and you're left with a bunch of flowers from Groucho Marx describing the decision as the biggest robbery since Brinks Which I think is doing Kelly a disservice as her role in The Country Girl, the next film on the Oscar list, is probably her best. Kelly was possibly one of the first glamorous actresses who learnt that if you want to win an Academy Award its best to go a bit dowdy and a play a brow-beaten character since then the method has been used as by Charlize Theron, Holly Hunter and Nicole Kidman among others. Kelly plays Georgie Elgin the wife of once great actor Frank who has become an alcoholic since the death of their young son an incident for which he blames himself. Frank is given a second chance at a career by William Holden's Bernie Dodd who was a fan of his earlier work but has to fight the show's producers and financial backers. Dodd believes that Georgie is holding back Frank and affecting his performance especially since Frank tells him stories about her suicide attempts and drunke behaviour which are actually about him. After Frank causes an incident in a bar and is arrested Dodd then realises that all of his hatred for Georgie comes from both Frank's lies and the fact that he is has feelings for her. Frank pulls himself together and becomes a star and realises that Dodd and Georgie both have feelings for each other he gives her permission to begin a relationship with him but in the final scene she decides to stay with her husband.

I hadn't really read anything about The Country Girl before watching it, which is sometimes the best way, but after viewing I was convinced it was based on a play and it turns out I was right. I had this inkling as the majority of the scenes feature characters in rooms talking to each other but because those characters are played by Crosby, Kelly and Holden you don't really care. Obviously since you've got a talented singer like Crosby you may as well use him but the context here sees him playing a man haunted by the fact that he let his son's hand go to take a promotional picture the song he sung that day is used a reason for him to start drinking again. In fact of all the films I've seen him in I feel that this is Crosby's best performance it's so much more gritty than all of the others in which he essentially plays himself and a lot better than Going My Way for which he won his Best Actor Oscar for. I feel The Country Girl was unfortunate to come up against On The Waterfront so Crosby lost to Brando but any other year I reckon he would've won the award. Kelly is also great having to play the doting wife with the alcoholic husband with her hair up and glasses on she doesn't look like Grace Kelly which is why you can really feel for Georgie and William Holden is also great basically playing another member of the audience trying to guess which of the couple is telling the truth. The only thing I didn't like was the fact that Dodd finally decided he was in love with Georgie I could see it coming but didn't think it fit with the rest of the film. Also winning an Oscar for its brilliant adapted screenplay, The Country Girl is a great film from beginning to end featuring three fine performances from a trio of the time's top stars and I would highly recommend it.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 147: Going Stir Crazy

Basically all of the films on this list are coming from either LoveFilm or various YouTube sources so if I can't reference a movie on either of those then I probably won't get to watch it. A nominee from the 1956 ceremony, Mister Roberts, was one such film which I had already banished to the unwatchable pile so imagine my surprise when it suddenly appeared on the T.V. listings for a Channel Five Saturday afternoon. Thanks to that I was able to watch the film whcih it turned out was a comedy-drama set during the final days of World War 2 on a naval Cargo Ship. To me it reminded me of The Caine Mutiny which I recently watched as it was about mundane life on a ship featuring a quartet of impressive performance from big names - Henry Fonda as Mister Roberts, James Cagney in his final MGM performance as the tyrannical Captain, William Powell in his final performance as the world-weary ship Doctor and Jack Lemmon winning the Supporting Actor Oscar here as the jovial ensign in charge of morale and laundry. For me this was one of Henry Fonda's best turns, apart of course from 12 Angry Men, playing a man who is desperate to serve properly and writes weekly letters to be let off the ship however Cagney's Captain sees him as an asset so keeps him around and he is well liked by his crew members whom he doesn't impose strict rules on. As time goes on the Captain is frustrated by Roberts and feels he isn't respecting him so he grants the crew their leave as long as Roberts tows the line and agrees with his orders. When the crew finally find out about this they decide to forge a letter from the Captain and get him transferred from the ship and he finally gets to serve in Japan the film tragically ends with the news that Roberts died when a suicide bomber killed all the crew of his new ship. While the death of your main character would usually be a downer in the case of Mister Roberts it was slightly more poignant and uplifting as he died getting what he always wanted to do and that was serve properly during the war.

I have to say I really enjoyed Mister Roberts mainly how easily it was able to demonstrate how not all men had heroic jobs during the war some of them just were there to ship cargo from one port to another and weren't happy about it. There are a lot of comic segments throughout the film demonstrating this including one where the men try and spy nurses on a nearby island while they are in the shower while one long scenes sees Fonda, Powell and Lemmon try and knock up some home-made scotch. These segments are transposed with some truly heart-wrenching moments such as Cagney opening up to Fonda about his life before he became a captain which was fairly reminiscent of Bogart's speech to his crew in The Caine Mutiny and also the scene in which Fonda goes crazy after he realises that he might not serve when peace in Europe is announced. Lemmon's performance is indeed great combining his comic timing with more dramatic moments of clarity personally his ways of getting revenge over a captain he's scared of are particularly memorable. All in all a great quartet of performances coupled with John Ford's skilled direction and a great script means that Mister Roberts is one of the better Oscar nominees never to take home the prize.