Barbara Stanwyck noir

[Steve-O]

Kim Morgan doesn't write enough about noir... but when she does she makes some interesting observations.

Her blog entry this week on Barbara Stanwyck noirs (http://sunsetgun.typepad.com/sunsetgun/2010/03/stanwyck-six-noir-and-one-essential-sirk.html) is a must read:


After watching Shutter Island, a friend asked me what one might consider an odd question, but a query that made perfect sense to me: "If you could step into a movie, which of the most insane cinematic places/towns would you most like to visit?" The question was to be answered immediately, without more than five seconds to think about it. I immediately stated: "Iverstown." Perhaps it was the word "town" that tipped my brain, and, thinking further there were other "nutty" places I would consider like, spending time with Big and Little Edie at Grey Gardens, or shacking up in Ray Milland's booze soaked apartment in The Lost Weekend, or Katharine Hepburn's house and garden in Suddenly Last Summer (or the vacation Liz takes with Sebastian), or the alternate second life of Seconds (if I could get the hell out of there after the grape smashing scene), but again, my first thought was Martha and her strange love in Iverstown. Though this could make for another nice list habit entry (crazy cinema cities...I'll get on it), it made me dip into my archives and return to Barbara Stanwyck, an actress I revere, and one who appeared in some brilliant (and some crazy brilliant) noir. A woman I'd like to spend time with -- even in the most demented circumstance. With that, here's six Stanwyck noir, with one Sirk for measure. You can’t deny yourself some Sirk...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzNllwTAXa8

She pretty much picked the same ones I would have. What are your favorites?

[Fast Eddie]

I'm disappointed that Paramount has apparently decided not to re-release SORRY WRONG NUMBER in a deluxe edition. A lot of work went into the special features, including a staged recreation of the original radio broadcast, an in-depth doc on the history of the story, radio show, and movie, and a yak trak by yours truly -- plus my first filmed intro for a DVD, a la Robert Osborne. Apparently the future of DVDs is bare bones ... if they're released at all.

[Steve-O]

That is bad news... I was really looking forward to it.

What they need to do is get PPV streaming movies online (on Netflix and Amazon, for example) to include all extras. People would pay the extra cost to get them.

[Hard-Boiled-Rick]

I wouldn’t call it my favorite, but one of the more fascinating Barbara Stanwyck appearances is in Frank Capra’s “The Bitter Tea of General Yen” (1933). She plays the captured concubine of a Chinese war-load.

http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/3412/bitterteaofgeneralyen.jpg

[Steve-O]

thanks for the tip Rick. Never heard of it!

I should clarify that I find Sorry, Wrong Number (http://www.noiroftheweek.com/2008/06/sorry-wrong-number-1948.html) one of my personal favs from Stanwyck -- but not necessarily her best noir. I think Double Indemnity is a much better film... but I do find her hard to take in later classic noirs like Clash By Night (http://www.noiroftheweek.com/2009/04/clash-by-night-1952.html) and Jeopardy (http://www.noiroftheweek.com/2005/10/jeopardy-1953-10032005.html)...

[Hard-Boiled-Rick]

thanks for the tip Rick. Never heard of it!

I should clarify that I find Sorry, Wrong Number (http://www.noiroftheweek.com/2008/06/sorry-wrong-number-1948.html) one of my personal favs from Stanwyck -- but not necessarily her best noir. I think Double Indemnity is a much better film... but I do find her hard to take in later classic noirs like Clash By Night (http://www.noiroftheweek.com/2009/04/clash-by-night-1952.html) and Jeopardy (http://www.noiroftheweek.com/2005/10/jeopardy-1953-10032005.html)...

Agreed. She is superb in "Sorry, Wrong Number."

[Spoiler Alert]


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1EwmawiCgs&feature=related

[Harry Fabian]

Definitely agree with Indemnity, Sorry, Martha, and Thelma. Did not care much for Clash-but not so much her fault (or Robert Ryan's). Keeping with dark/noirish themes, I would add pre-code "Baby Face", and maybe "The Two Mrs. Carrolls."

[Hart]

Definitely agree with Indemnity, Sorry, Martha, and Thelma. Did not care much for Clash-but not so much her fault (or Robert Ryan's). Keeping with dark/noirish themes, I would add pre-code "Baby Face", and maybe "The Two Mrs. Carrolls."

No, wouldn't fault her in Clash by Night. Just didn't find Paul Douglas convincing in the nice guy/meathead role and the film really lost my interest in the latter half.

[bogie]

Cry Wolf(1947)
http://www.tcm.com/mediaroom/index/?cid=92004
Barbra and Errol Flynn(His ONLY Film Noir.)

92004

[bogie]

Two MRS Carrolls(1947)
http://www.tcm.com/mediaroom/index/?cid=80046

80046

[bogie]

Witness To Murder(1954)
http://www.impawards.com/1954/witness_to_murder.html

208052

[bogie]

Jeopardy(1953)
http://www.impawards.com/1953/jeopardy.html

[bogie]

File On Thelma Jordan(1950)
http://www.impawards.com/1950/file_on_thelma_jordon.html

[bogie]

The Lady Gambles(1949)
http://www.impawards.com/1949/lady_gambles.html

[noirguru]

I wouldn’t call it my favorite, but one of the more fascinating Barbara Stanwyck appearances is in Frank Capra’s “The Bitter Tea of General Yen” (1933). She plays the captured concubine of a Chinese war-load.

http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/3412/bitterteaofgeneralyen.jpg

This is the film that opened, Radio City Music Hall in 1933!

[Christine M]

Double Indemnity is my favorite Barbara Stanwyck noir, but Sorry, Wrong Number is a close second. I'm also kind of fascinated by her pre-code films Baby Face and Night Nurse.
As for Sorry, Wrong Number--both the radio play and movie. I own a website devoted to the radio show Suspense, and it appears that there is a lot of fatigue with that episode. There is an assumption that because it is so well known, that it is still very popular. Not true. What is interesting about the radio play is that it currently lives on in high school/ amateur theatre productions and student videos. That is where you see the traditional presentation of this story being challenged and reworked--so that the lead role is not played by a Barbara Stanwyck or Agnes Moorehead type.
On the other hand, Lucille Fletcher's other famous work "The Hitch Hiker" is still a big favorite.

[bogie]

Barbra was in Two Untouchables Episodes
Elegy(1962)
Search For A Dead Man(1963)

[Christina Delassalle]

Babs really shines and out does herself in Lady of Burlesque, a Gyspy Rose Lee murder mystery. It is a real gem. I also love her to death in The Furies, she is very macho in this film.

But I'll always think of her as Phyllis Dietrichson, that role was made for her. Ok and as Martha Ivers.

[Steve-O]

I've never seed Lady of Burlesque (http://www.archive.org/details/LadyofBurlesque) but it does sound like fun.

Gypsy Rose Lee was in a noir years later -- appearing in Screaming Mimi (http://www.themoviedb.org/movie/37679) -- another stripper mystery.

[Christina Delassalle]

Haven't see that Gypsy Rose Lee movie, sounds fun though.

This makes me think of some of the Pre Code Hollywood Collection, I just watched a boat load of them...they are fun to watch, even just to see a young Ida Lupino for one thing.

http://turnerclassic.moviesunlimited.com/product.asp?sku=d53807

"Search for Beauty" (1934) that turns up Buster Crabbe and Ida Lupino, among other Olympic athletes showing the kind of skin the Production Code would later frown upon.

Barbara Stanwyk is in a few of the Forbidden Hollywood collections. "The Purchase Price" (1932), a torch singer flees her criminal boyfriend to become a farmer's mail-order bride. Barbara Stanwyck, Lyle Talbot, George Brent star.
Barbara Stanwyck is a "Night Nurse" (1933) who cares for two fatherless children and uncovers a plot to kill them for their inheritance hatched by their drunken mother and her chauffeur lover (Gable).