Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 275: Fonda Family Values

Throughout these 1980s posts I've primarily been concentrating on stars from the 1970s as well as those who made it big in the current decade. But one film contained two actors whose progress we've been following for the best part of fifty years and who both won acting Oscars for the movie in question. Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn were the stars in question and On Golden Pond would be his last film and her last major role also. In it they play old married couple Ethel and Norman Thayer who spend their summers in the titular lake community where nothing really happens. Their trip coincides with Norman's eightieth birthday and this occasion prompts the couple's estranged daughter Chelsea, played by Henry's real-life daughter Jane, to join them. Chelsea brings along her new dentist boyfriend Bill and his teenage son Billy Ray the latter of whom really doesn't enjoy spending time with an old married couple. Unfortunately this is just what he's forced to do when Ethel agrees to look after the youngster while Chelsea and Bill go on holiday round Europe. The cantankerous Norman and the disenchanted Billy Ray initially clash but later bond over their shared love of fishing. Billy Ray, whose often been disregarded by other adults, comes to love the elderly couple who really appear to care for him. On her return, Chelsea is dismayed to learn of the bond that Norman has formed with Billy Ray as she feels that he was never caring enough towards her.

The relationship between Norman and Chelsea apparently mirrored that of Henry and Jane Fonda who never really saw eye to eye. In fact Jane brought the rights to the play on which the film is based as she thought her father would be perfect in the lead role. I would agree with her as Fonda adds an air of dignity to a role that would seem cliched in the hands of a lesser actor. He also shares a wonderful chemistry with Katharine Hepburn and I was surprised to discover that the two had never even met up to this point. It was clear that they got on wonderfully to the extent that Hepburn even lent Henry the hat of her late partner Spencer Tracy which he would go on to wear throughout the film. Even before learning it was based on a play, On Golden Pond felt particularly stagy and the majority of the film plays out as a collection of scenes often with just two characters talking. Thankfully director Mark Rydell has added a certain cinematic flair to proceedings with some beautiful shots of Squam Lake in New Hampshire which doubled for Golden Pond. If there was a weak link in the film that it was Jane Fonda whose scenes and presence on screen were the only occasions when On Golden Pond lapsed into melodrama. Though I'm sure it was a fairly personal project for the actress I felt she was over-performing and her pondering over whether Norman never showered her with affection just felt a little corny. Ultimately, On Golden Pond played out as the Hepburn and Fonda show which I didn't think was a bad thing. They were both fantastic and deserved their respective Oscars even though it's slightly sad that this is the last time we'll see either of them on this list. However I felt that this exploration of growing old and family life in general was a fitting song for two of the greatest performers of all time.

Next up we meet an actress who won two awards during the 1980s for her leading performances in two inspiring films.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Days 183-185: The O'Toole Box

Poor old Peter O'Toole holds one of the more dubious records when it comes to the Oscars. At present O'Toole has received a total of eight acting nominations but is yet to win an award. His first Oscar nomination came for what is arguably his most famous role as the title character in Lawrence of Arabia. The 1960s also saw him get two nominations for playing Henry II in both Becket and The Lion in Winter. Of the films he received acting nominations for only those three films have also been nominated for Best Picture so this post will look at each of those pictures in turn.

O'Toole was much more famous as a stage actor before Lawrence and had only appeared in three films up to that point. Other names such as Albert Finney and Marlon Brando had been tossed around before O'Toole was finally given the role. For those unaware of the story, O'Toole stars as TE Lawrence who starts the film as an odd lieutenant who is sent to assess Arab Prince Faisal's attack on the Turks. Though Lawrence is told to agree with his colonel he later suggests to Faisal that they try to attack Aqba and create a passage for the Brits. During the trip across the desert, Lawrence manages to ingratiate himself with the Arab group after he goes back for one of their party who falls off his camel. It is at this point that Lawrence's army clothes are burnt and he becomes and Arab. When he returns to the British officer's quarters they are shocked to see that Lawrence has changed significantly and now thinks of himself as an Arab. The second half of the film then looks at Lawrence the conqueror as he listens less and less to his British superiors. Meanwhile American war correspondent Jackson Bentley starts to document Lawrence's story and is fascinated by the man himself. However Lawrence almost gets too big for his own boots and so both the Arabs and Brits plot to bring him down for different reasons.

Lawrence of Arabia won the Best Picture at the 1963 ceremony and you can definitely see why. As we've seen in the past the academy loves an epic and David Lean's film gave them quite the epic. The sweeping cinematography of F.A. Young is quite iconic especially in the scenes in which Lawrence and his company traverse across the desert. Maurice Jarre's iconic score has also lasted the test of the time and to me perfectly captures the essence of Lawrence's journey. O'Toole himself excels in his breakthrough role as he is able to portray Lawrence's change in attitude with ease. Though comment was passed about how much more attractive O'Toole was than the actual Lawrence I don't think this hampered his performance at all. Of the other cast members Omar Sharif was absolutely captivating as the sheriff who warms to Lawrence throughout the film. The realism of the piece is also enhanced via the costumes and sets which are all incredibly well-designed while the Jordanian and Moroccan scenery perfectly doubled for Cairo. I know it may be a little sacrilegious but I felt the film dragged a little bit certainly in its first third. I personally believe that the scenes before Lawrence got to the desert could have been a little less baggy which would've improved the pace. Thankfully the second half of the film was great as Lawrence almost gets a little bit too big for his boots and you can see his downfall coming a mile off. The film itself won seven awards including one for Lean and one for Young's cinematography. Meanwhile O'Toole shot to stardom however he failed to win the Best Actor Award an accolade that would evade him throughout his career.

Two years later and O'Toole was nominated for Best Actor once again for playing Henry II in Becket. The film explores the relationship between Henry II and Thomas Beckett who here was played by Richard Burton. At the start of the film Beckett is presented as Henry II's dogsbody who often sets up extra-marital one night stands for his king. A lot of Henry's noblemen distrust the Saxon Becket's intentions towards their Norman king. However Henry almost falls in love with Becket and feels that he is his most trusted confident so for that reason he appoints him as Archbishop of Canterbury. Henry feels that he can easily manipulate Becket however this turns out not to be the case. Instead Becket begins to take his job awfully seriously and decides to favour God over his King. Henry becomes increasingly jealous of Becket's relationship with God and decides to frame him for embezzlement. The rest of the film sees Becket's attempt to flee Henry's attempts to arrest him and Henry's continued obsession with Becket.

Throughout Becket it is easy to spot O'Toole's diversity as an actor because here he plays quite a petulant and immature character. His King Henry is easily the most interesting thing about Becket as he captures a man who has never really had to grow up. As we learn Henry as locked his wife up in the dungeon, more on that later, and relies now on meaningless hook-ups. In fact his most fulfilling relationship is the one he shares with Becket and therefore his betrayal hurts Henry even more. Richard Burton is the perfect straight man to O'Toole's immature cad and the two bounce off each other perfectly. It is the Burton/O'Toole chemistry that really drives Becket and both of them really made me believe in Henry's motivation for causing Becket's downfall. Both Burton and O'Toole lost the Best Actor award this year but Becket did win one Oscar for its tightly-written script. While Burton would later feature in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, O'Toole would return to the role of Henry II four years later.

This time his Henry II was a lot more forceful as he had to decide which one of his sons was most deserving of being his successor. The film was The Lion in Winter which is set around the succession conflict in which Henry couldn't decide between his aggressive eldest son Richard or his much dumber son John. The film also explores Henry's relationship with Eleanor of Aquitaine who he releases from the dungeon for the Christmas celebrations. Henry champions John as his son, seeing him as easy to manipulate, therefore Eleanor wants Richard to be Henry's successor mainly to get one over on his husband. It appears as if Richard doesn't get on with either of his parents so attempts to form an alliance with his uncle King Philip II. John meanwhile is manipulated by his brother Geoffrey who himself wonders why he hasn't been chosen as successor. Over the course of the Christmas period more devious plotting is afoot as Henry suggests that his mistress Alais marries Richard. However this wedding doesn't go through mainly because of arguments breaking out in the family. The film ends with Eleanor's return to the dungeons and Britain still finding itself without a future king.

I have to say I really enjoyed The Lion in Winter thanks in part to Anthony Harvey's assured direction and the performances provided by the ensemble cast. Peter O'Toole was on fine form here as the swaggering Henry who really enjoyed throwing his weight around. The Henry of The Lion in Winter was much more mature and worldly-wise than the one O'Toole portrayed in Becket. As Eleanor, Katharine Hepburn is utterly brilliant as she manipulates her sons and plots to make Henry's life as miserable as possible. To me the best scenes of The Lion in Winter were those in which Hepburn and O'Toole were on screen together as their interplay was absolutely electric. The Lion in Winter also saw the film debuts of both Anthony Hopkins and Timothy Dalton who played Richard and Philip respectively. Hopkins made a good impression here as the war-hungry yet frustrated Richard who felt that he would make a much better king than John. Meanwhile Dalton, John Castle, Nigel Terry and Jane Merrow all made their characters distinctive and intriguing whenever they were on screen. The French exterior shots were also fabulously captured by Douglas Slocombe whose camera-work was outstanding throughout. John Barry's score was equally iconic and went on to win one of The Lion in Winter's three Oscars alongside the very intelligent script. The third award went to Katharine Hepburn's amazing turn as Eleanor however here she had to share the prize with Barbara Streisand's performance in Funny Girl. Peter O'Toole meanwhile had to cope with a third Best Actor loss however at the time I'm guessing he thought he'd win one eventually.

Having watched these Peter O'Toole films back-to-back I discovered that he was a versatile actor even during his first years as a film actor. His tour de force performance as Lawrence alone should've shown people that he would go on to be one of the nation's best actors. I was also surprised at how convincing he was at playing the older Henry II in The Lion Winter only four years after playing a much younger version of the king. Despite Lawrence of Arabia winning Best Picture, my personal favourite of these three films had to be The Lion in Winter mainly due to the verbal sparring between O'Toole and Hepburn. Seeing as O'Toole is still around there's still may be a hope of him winning that elusive Best Actor Award however it does seem as likely as it did back in 1963.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 170-171: Simply Sidney

For those of you who have been following the Oscar challenge you will now that when I can I group a number of films together by actor or genre. This is true of this latest trio of films all starring Sidney Poitier who historically was the first African-American actor to become a big star and in terms of this was also the first black male to win an Oscar outside of the honorary categories. We first met him at the tail end of the 1950s in The Defiant Ones for which he was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar and his golden touch continues with all the three films in this list winning at least one award. As you can imagine with a black actor in the 1960s a lot of these films deal with racial prejudice with Poitier often playing against how people of his colour were often portrayed here playing doctors and detectives. But we'll start off with a film in which he neither plays a professional nor is race the main issue.

The film I am referring to is Lilies of the Field the film that won Poitier his Best Actor Oscar and sees him play Homer Smith a drifter and jack-of-all trades who has no fixed abode. When his car runs out of water one day he stops to fill it up at a convent run by Eastern European nuns with the mother superior of the outfit hiring Homer to do some work around their property for the day. However after a while he discovers the mother superior won't let him leave until he has built them a chapel and he soon learns from others the exploitative nature of these nuns. At the same time he sympathises with their struggle to leave their native Germany, they had to climb over the Berlin Wall, and as he had always wanted to be an architect he sets about trying to build the chapel. As word spreads people from the community, mainly Hispanics, come to lend support and materials however Homer refuses their help wanting this to be a single-handed project. He eventually gets the help and the chapel is finished however Mother Maria is too proud to let him stay and so he slips away while the other sisters are singing one of the Baptist hymns he taught them. Lilies of the Field is such a simple film but at the same time is lovingly produced and well put together by director Ralph Nelson. The main theme of the film here is outsiders coming together in this case an African-American drifter, a group of East German nuns and poor Hispanic families as they work to construct something that the community can be proud of. Poitier's performance is larger-than-life with his laughter being infectious and his general aura radiating from the screen he is tasked with leading the film for the most-part and does an excellent job. The desolate locations are well-filmed by Ernest Haller and there is also an excellent supporting performance from Lilia Skala as Mother Maria which earned her an Oscar nod also. This was just a lovely simple tale about family and taking the gifts that are offered to us when they are given.

Four years later, at the 1968 ceremony, Sidney starred in two of the five films nominated for Best Picture including the movie that went onto to win Best Picture that year - In the Heat of the Night. In this film the plot is centred around Poitier's Virgil Tibbs' race as he hauled to the police station in Sparta, Mississippi as he believed to have killed a man he had never met. The racist police Chief Bill Gillespie, played by Rod Steiger who won a Best Actor Oscar for this film, is embarrassed to learn that Tibbs is actually a homicide detective and devices ways to keep him around in order to have his help on the murder case. As Tibbs' targets the wealthiest man in Sparta he soon his confronted by a mob who threaten his life and he is advised by Gillespie to leave the town however a defiant Tibbs refuses until he's solved the murder. Tibbs is able to link the crime to the pregnancy of a local teenager who police officer Sam Wood had taken a liking to and after a conversation with the local backstreet abortionist he is able to track down his man. However will it be too late for Tibbs who has angered even more of Sparta's residents during his snooping. In the Heat of the Night is an excellent film showing racial prejudice at its most extreme with the scenes in which Tibbs his hunted down by a mob being very shocking indeed however the film is also keen to point out that Tibbs is also prejudice against many of the Sparta police department seeing them as stupid. Though Poitier does lend almost a moral backbone to the film it is Rod Steiger who is the star here as Gillespie learns some tolerance and some respect towards Virgil towards the end of the film. There were some points when I watched In The Heat of the Night where I wondered if it should've won the Best Picture award but this film had a good central mystery as well as having a good message about not judging anyone on where they live or the colour of their skin.

The colour of skin also has a massive impact in Poitier's last film here the outstanding Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. Here Poitier plays widower doctor John Prentice who while on holiday in Hawaii meets Christina Drayton and falls in love planning to marry her but first wanting to get the consent of her parents who he thinks will worry that a black man is with their white daughter. Christina's parents, played by the brilliant Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracey the latter in his final film role, have always preached her tolerance but her father Matt is concerned now that he may have a black man as a son-in-law. Things get more complicated when John's parents decide to fly in for dinner despite the fact he has yet to tell them that he wishes to marry a white girl. The film is essentially based around people's opinions of a mixed-race couple for example if love is more important than the colour of someone's skin. I just found it hard to fault Guess Who's Coming to Dinner apart from the fact that I think Poitier should've shown up in the acting categories alongside Hepburn and Tracy both of whom shine throughout this wonderful film. Possibly it's not as cinematic as it could been but the performances and script are flawless throughout so by the time Tracy delivers his final monologue you'll be entrnaced. For me this was the better of the two Poitier films released this year due to its themes, acting, music and script. Though out of the three films this is the one in which Poitier has the least to do yet his presence is still felt which is the mark of a great actor as is the fact that everyone of the roles in these three films he plays very differently.

Big Oscar Challenge Day 93-94: Catch-Up Part 4

The 1940s Oscar contenders didn't tend to be light-hearted and as well as Chaplin's masterpiece there are only two other pieces that are fairly easy-going. The first is the first winner of the Best Picture Oscar when the field thinned back to five nominees at the 1945 ceremony. Going My Way was a sort of comic musical and featured Oscar winning turns from both Bing Crosby as a young priest and Barry Fitzgerald as the older priest who Crosby has come to take over from. The film is an easy-going film about Crosby's Father O'Malley's efforts to improve the parish by getting all the boys together into a choir as well as mentoring a young woman who also surprisingly has a lovely voice. As the film stars Crosby there is plenty of singing and also plenty of life lessons learnt. Crosby is a fine, jovial lead but it is Fitzgerald as the older priest who seems to have more to do as he realises that he isn't as relevant as he once was. Going My Way was a triumph winning a total of seven Oscars including one for its director Leo McCarey.

The other comedy film is The Philadelphia Story a nominee from the 1941 awards it stars Katherine Hepburn alongside Cary Grant as her ex-husband and James Stewart as the reporter come to cover the story of her relationship. I know The Philadelphia Story much better in its musical version of High Society and had never seen the original version which I quite enjoyed thanks in part to Cary Grant however this was the film that James Stewart won his Oscar for despite him putting in much better turns in Mr Smith Goes to Washington and It's A Wonderful Life. But The Philadelphia Story was an enjoyable enough fare but it never really bothered Rebecca as a serious contender for Best Picture.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 52: My Day with Katharine Hepburn

So far I've encountered a lot of the great female icons of the era during this search - Greta Garbo and Joan Crawford in Grant Hotel, Bette Davis in Jezebel, Marlene Dietrich in Shanghai Express and Claudette Colbert in a number of films. However one star has eluded me so far so I decided to watch all three of her nominated films from that decade in one day, that star is Katharine Hepburn.

Although Katharine Hepburn won her first Best Actress Oscar for only her third performance in Morning Glory. The first film that she was in that was nominated for the Best Picture Oscar was George Cukor's adaptation of Little Women that was up for Best Picture at the 1934 ceremony. Most people already know the story of Little Women but if you don't it basically concerns four sisters as they grow up and become women by finding love and independence. In this version it is Hepburn who plays second eldest sister Jo an aspiring playwright who meets the shy Laurie and they begin to fall in love however she rejects his advances and goes to New York to work as a nanny and to concentrate on her writing. Meanwhile of her other sisters Meg gets married, Amy goes off with her auntie and Beth contracts and eventually dies of Scarlet Fever. The end of the film comes full circle as Beth's death reunites the family and Jo discovers that Amy and Laurie have fallen in love and are about to be married so she accepts the proposal of the German linguist who works with the children that she nannies. Approaching this film I only had a smattering of what the story was about, mainly from that episode of Friends where Rachel gets Joey to read it. At first I found this a little hard to grasp and at times I mixed up the non-Hepburn sisters but once it found its stride and the male characters were introduced I really started to enjoy it. Hepburn's regular strong female stance was on display here as Jo, here she never lets her guard down till the very end and anchors the film from beginning to end however I also thought Jean Parker as Beth was particularly compelling and older character actress Edna May Oliver did a good job of portraying the wealthy but harsh aunt of the girls. Overall this was a good literary adaptation and as so won the Adapted Screenplay Oscar and Cukor was nominated for his strong direction. This probably would've made it into the list of nominees had it been five strong but it just wasn't as different and challenging as that year's winner Cavalcade.

Two years later at the 1936 awards Hepburn was nominated for her second Best Actress Oscar for her titular performance in the film Alice Adams. Hepburn here would be unsuccessful losing to Bette Davis for the film Dangerous but for me Alice Adams marked a departure for Hepburn in terms of character, Alice displayed little in terms of bravado and instead was quite weak and understated. The film is all about class as Alice and her mother hope to rise above their lower-middle class status. The family's father is ill in bed and, even though his job at the glue factory has been left open, they have little money. Alice goes to a party and unable to find a job has to go with her smart Alec brother. While there she meets and dances with the dashing Arthur however her lowly class means that she feels she isn't good enough for him. Alice's mother convinces her father to sell an invention for a new type of glue without consulting his business partner and boss essentially meaning he gets called a thief. The finale of the film sees the Adams family host a dinner party with Arthur which is awkward as Alice struggles to make conversation with Arthur while the rest of the family is worried about the consequences of the father's actions. However just when everything seems lost Alice's father and his business partner make up and Alice gets her man, something I found a little far-featched. Despite that finale, Alice Adams was a charming enough picture with another great little performance from Hepburn who is ably supported by Fred MacMurray as Arthur and Frank Albertson as her brother. Again not a film that was ever going to hold a candle to that year's winner Mutiny on The Bounty but again there was nothing particularly wrong with the film.

Hepburn's final Best Picture nominated film came two years later and this time she shared the headline status with Ginger Rogers. This film was Stage Door about a group of aspiring actresses who share a boarding house together with Rogers playing the street-smart dancer and Hepburn the haughty rich-girl newbie who puts everyone's noses out of joint. As well as Hepburn and Roger's characters is Kay Hamilton played by Andrea Leeds a young actress who had won rave reviews for her first performance but was struggling to find enough work to pay for rent and meals. Hamilton's chance comes when she auditions for a show directed by Anthony Powell, a respected director who is pompous and arrogant and refuses to see Hamilton leading to her fainting and Powell getting a tongue-lashing from Hepburn's Terry Randall. However eventually Terry's rich father agrees to finance Powell's show but only if his daughter in the lead role which again means that Randall is an outcast in the boarding house once again. In the end Kay dies and Terry dedicates her performance to her and is eventually forgiven by the rest of the inhabitants. The final scene sees yet another aspiring actress enter the boarding house and life goes on as normal. Out of these three films I think I enjoyed Stage Door the most, the mainly female cast do a great job of everyday banter and you can really believe that they are struggling actresses. Hepburn returns to her strong nature playing the posh girl in a house full of down-to-Earth characters but she really has some good chemistry with Ginger Rogers. Even though Rogers played a small grittier role in 42nd Street this film sees a complete departure from the work she did with Fred Astaire and is great. But it is Andrea Leeds as Kay who was nominated for Supporting Actress that year and that was rightly deserved. Rounding off the cast was Adolphe Menjou again playing a little bit of an unsavoury gentlemen, while some of the smaller parts were taken by actresses who would find fame later on including Lucille Ball, Eve Arden and Ann Miller. Despite this being my favourite of the three films it did the worst at the Box Office and by the end of the 1930s Hepburn along with Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire were considered Box Office poison and weren't getting the roles that they once got.

However Hepburn would turn that around and still holds the record for the most Best Actress Oscars but most of those would be awarded in the 1950s and 1960s so for now its goodbye to Miss Hepburn.