Awkward Early Talkie Theatre: "The Younger Generation"

Despite its title, Frank Capra's 1929 film "The Younger Generation" is really mainly about an old guy -- Julius Goldfish, a junk dealer from New York City's Lower East Side, played by Denmark's own Jean Hersholt. (A Dane playing a Jew -- Hollywood!)

The Goldfish family -- papa Julius, mama Tilda (Rosa Rosanova), daughter Birdie (Lina Basquette) and son Morris (Ricardo Cortez) -- are living the American dream, only, as Papa might say, it ain't so dreamy. They have moved on up, moved on up, to the Upper East Side, to a deluxe apartment in the sky-hi-hi because Morris, inheriting Papa's junk business, has become a fancy-schmancy antiques dealer and the family has moved in with him.

Based on a story by Fannie Hurst, who also gave us "Imitation of Life" and "Back Street," "The Younger Generation" has its own kind of Hurstian family heartache -- Morris dominates his family and orders them to assimilate or else! This means Papa has to dress for dinner and bathe a little more regularly than he's used to. Mama loves her new life, but Papa finds himself schmoozing with the delivery men because it reminds him of his old, simpler life.

Little by little, in fact, Papa's heritage is being taken away. Morris becomes the family's alpha male, forbidding his sister to see the struggling musician she's loved for years. Then Morris makes an announcement -- he's changed his surname to Fish. (Here we see a little jab at rival producer Sam Goldwyn, aka Sam Goldfish.) Papa and Birdie commiserate:

BOOM

And still there's more! Morris ostracizes Birdie and makes his parents think that Birdie has deserted them. As a result, Papa wastes away, a prisoner on Fifth Avenue:

But WE know differently -- that Birdie has married her musician, who's in jail for a jewel robbery, and they have a daughter:

By the time Papa finds out the truth, he has faced the final indignity -- he has become an object of embarrassment to his meshugenah son:

"The Younger Generation" is a part-talkie, and the transitions between silent and talking sequences are a little bumpy. But director Frank Capra is already demonstrating his skill in mixing heart and humor, and in peppering "The Younger Generation" with the same salt-of-the-earth types that show up in his later films. And the ending is a killer -- Morris, left alone after everyone has moved out, covers himself in Mama's shawl and suddenly looks much older in front of his massive fireplace.

Here are the complete credits.

"Ladies of Leisure," or Easel to Love

Barbara Stanwyck enters the 1930 film "Ladies of Leisure" -- and film history -- in a rowboat. The oars squeak. Her face is marked by mascara-streaked tears and she's clutching a broken dress strap. She's Kay, a party girl who just left a wild one on a yacht.

On shore is Ralph Graves as Jerry, who's also left a wild party, this one at his Manhattan penthouse. He's gone for a drive, but now he's fixing the flat tire on his Lincoln. Stanwyck climbs on shore, shivering.

Kay: How far is it to town?

Jerry: What town?

Kay: There's only one town.

So Jerry gives her a ride back to Manhattan, where the night is obliterated by blinking neon signs selling Squibb's Dental Creme and Aeolian Player Piano Rolls -- but where Kay will eventually learn to see beyond them to the stars.  

"Ladies of Leisure" isn't Stanwyck's first film, but it's the one that made her a star. It also marked the beginning of a five-picture collaboration with director Frank Capra (seen with Stanwyck at right) -- one that almost didn't happen. Capra wasn't impressed with Stanwyck at their first meeting, and she left upset. It wasn't until Capra was bawled out by Stanwyck's husband, comic Frank Fay, who urged Capra to watch an older Stanwyck screen test, that she was cast in the role.

Now back to the plot -- Jerry's an artist who's anything but starving. He lives high thanks to his family wealth -- dad runs a couple of railroads. On the ride back, Kay dozes off:



While she's asleep, Jerry sees something in Kay's face -- something that leads him to use her as a model for his new painting, "Hope."

"She had a mask on, like everybody else," Jerry tells his mother, "but underneath I think she had this."

The tricky part is getting down to it, and their first rocky sessions together show a bit of improvisation on Stanwyck's part:



 Jerry knows that if Kay can get past her streetwise exterior, Hope will come through. But she's a tough nut to crack.   

Jerry: It's like a man I knew once. He was suspicious, bitter, harsh, cruel. Those things were written in hs face like a map of his life. He died -- I saw him laid out. His face was a new face -- it was fine, noble. There was peace in it. He was himself again. Do you see what I mean?

Kay: No. All I get out of it is you gotta die to find yourself. Not me -- not for two dollars an hour.

Also hanging around is Jerry's upper crust fiancee (Juliette Compton). She's cool and controlling -- we know she isn't right for our hero because she calls him "Jeddy." Marie Prevost is around for comic relief as Kay's roommate and best friend. And then there's Jerry's boozy friend Bill Standish, played by the ever-welcome Lowell Sherman. He and Stanwyck are perfectly matched in the wisecrack department:

Kay (seeing Bill enter): Drunk again!

Bill: Congratulations, so am I.

Of course, Jerry eventually gets through to Kay and she lets down her defenses and becomes a perfect model. They also fall in love, in a scene that echoes the moment in Capra's "It's a Wonderful Life" when George Bailey (James Stewart) realizes in a mixture of anger and awe that he loves Mary Hatch (Donna Reed):



 The Jerry-Kay relationship upsets Jerry's wealthy parents, and there's a father-son standoff. Jerry's mother (Nance O'Neil) visits Kay and tries to get her to break up with Jerry for his own sake, and in return mom gets the full Stanwyck:



Capra writes in his autobiography that, if she was filming an emotional scene, Stanwyck left everything on the field in the first take. And in this performance, so early in her career, she already has the ability to combine outer toughness with a sudden inner vulnerability that can tear your heart out. Sherman and Prevost perform like the pros they are. Graves, who was already a star thanks to his roles in the Capra-directed action pictures "Flight" and "Submarine," has a tough time impersonating someone with artistic temperament.

Here are the complete credits for "Ladies of Leisure."

Un-Awkward Early Talkie Theatre: "Flight"

In his 1929 film "Flight," Frank Capra demonstrates a skill that would take other directors a few more years to accomplish -- he makes an early talkie movie filled with action.

Outside.

While keeping the sound quality high and the performances natural.

To understand how different "Flight" is from its contemporaries, consider the entries in our "Awkward Early Talkie Theatre" category -- stagy, immobile, filled with overacting and arched reading of dialogue.

"Flight," by contrast, boasts an easy assurance and striking locations, most notably a naval base at San Diego that poses as Pensacola.

This was the second of three films that Capra would direct with Jack Holt and Ralph Graves -- the first was 1928's "Submarine" and the last would be 1931's "Dirigible." These movies were the "Top Gun" of their day, filled with the latest in military equipment and technology.

Beyond the flashiness, though, the movies worked because of the rapport between Holt and Graves -- a macho camaraderie that also included moments of startling vulnerability.

In "Flight," Graves (who is also credited with the story) is Lefty Phelps. In the opening moments of the film, his college football team is playing in the Rose Bowl, giving Capra the chance to include lots of real-life game footage. Lefty isn't a team star, but the coach puts him in for one last crucial play -- one that Lefty screws up by running in the opposite direction and scoring a winning touchdown for the other team.

After the game, as Lefty is hiding out in the men's room, he has a brief tussle with Panama Williams (Holt), a Marine sergeant. He accuses Lefty of intentionally throwing the game. Lefty heatedly denies it. Panama, seeing that Lefty is genuinely hurt and scared, apologizes.

We fast forward a few weeks, and Lefty has joined the Marines -- maybe because of Panama's considerate behavior, or maybe because of the snazzy recruiting poster he saw in the men's room. Anyway, Lefty is trying to keep his identity secret, but when it comes out, he confides again in Panama, and shows him a particularly harsh newspaper article:

           

Certainly Holt and Graves have their moments of roughhousing and swaggering, but their relationship is unexpectedly warm. Capra seems to let them ad lib some of their dialogue, which leads to a "damn" or "hell" getting slipped in now and then.

Despite the help of Panama, Lefty washes out as a Marine pilot. He watches dejectedly as his fellow Marines get their wings:



But Panama has a plan -- he'll keep Lefty around as his mechanic.

Meanwhile, there is some romantic tension in the form of nurse Elinor (Lila Lee). Panama is crazy about her, but she only has eyes for Lefty. Lefty feels the same way, but he keeps Elinor at arm's length out of loyalty to Panama. This leads him to leave camp and get stinking, only to be rescued by Panama:

 

Elinor confesses to Panama that she loves Lefty just as the Marines, who by now are in Nicaragua, have to leave to fight a group of bandits. The pilot Lefty is riding with makes a crash landing, leaving Panama to set out on a dangerous rescue mission.

Certainly "Flight" fits a pattern that action/adventure movies use to this day -- heroes/friends quarrel and then unite against a common enemy at the end. And Lefty gets his confidence back by becoming a hero in dire circumstances. But this is a particularly well-done example -- all the more striking, and un-awkward, considering its age.

Here are complete credits for "Flight."

"Ladies They Talk About," or The Old Cell Game

It's not news to proclaim Barbara Stanwyck as one of the screen's greatest actresses, and it's practically impossible to dislike her once you learn of her casual, profane attitude on the set, or her preference for directors like Preston Sturges and Billy Wilder, or that fact she had an affair with Robert Wagner when he was in his 20s and she was in her 40s (he says they did, anyway).

By all accounts, she was rigorously professional in front of the camera, and pretty down to earth otherwise. She did comedy as well as she did drama, and had enough of a sense of humor about herself that she made numerous guest appearances on "The Jack Benny Program." Stanwyck grew up in Brooklyn, in poverty, and came to Hollywood with her husband, vaudeville comic Frank Fay -- in true "A Star Is Born" fashion, his career faded as hers flowered.

The 1933 film "Ladies They Talk About" finds Stanwyck still learning her craft. She had already made a couple of movies with Frank Capra and the first film version of the best-selling novel "So Big," but still there are moments in this film when she seems uncomfortable. Then, in others, she's startlingly self assured.

Stanwyck plays Nan Martin, a gangster's moll who gets caught when the gang pulls a bank job and the investigating cop sees through her disguise:



She ends up in jail, but Nan has an admirer -- the anti-crime crusader Dave Slade (Preston Foster). They grew up in the same neighborhood and Slade believes in her innocence. He even talks a skeptical D.A. (Robert McWade) into paroling her:



But for once, Nan thinks of someone else. She knows if her guilt is proven, it'll tarnish Slade's reputation. So she confesses to her role in the robbery. She's sent to San Quentin, and this is where "Ladies They Talk About" kicks into high gear with vivid little set pieces about life in a woman's prison. And Stanwyck has a great sidekick in Linda, played with winning ease by singer Lillian Roth:



(In real life, Roth's career as a singer and stage star was overshadowed by alcoholism, and her biography, "I'll Cry Tomorrow," was made into a 1955 film with Susan Hayward as Roth.)

Meanwhile, back in stir, Nan's only enemy is Susie (Dorothy Burgess), an unbalanced little number who's obsessed with Slade and whose cell is filled with his photos. We see her in one scene that scans a cell block as the prisoners are turning in:



Oh, and here's one more interesting touch -- the giant cockatoo that belongs to prison matron Noonan (Ruth Donnelly):

Noonan gives them the bird.

The films builds to a moral dilemma -- will Nan help her male co-robbers escape from a nearby prison? Will she meet Dave Slade for love -- or revenge? One thing's for sure -- in love or war, Stanwyck's a badass.

For full cast and production information, click here.

"Platinum Blonde" and the Birth of "Cinderella Man"

Give Frank Capra credit -- once the guy found a formula, he stuck with it. Specifically -- an honorable man, pure at heart, up against powerful and/or wealthy forces out to destroy or at least ostracize him. You can apply it to almost any Capra film, from "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" to "Meet John Doe" to "It's a Wonderful Life" to "A Hole in the Head."

And this isn't meant as a criticism -- if the idea was a little familiar, Capra knew enough to work with writers who infused his scripts with lively, humorous dialogue. And Capra put the words in the mouths of some of Hollywood's best actors -- Gary Cooper, Barbara Stanwyck, James Stewart, Thomas Mitchell, Jean Arthur. And his own background as a gagman and director of comedies for folks like Harry Langdon didn't hurt, either.

Still, it is interesting to see the idea of the "Cinderella Man" and the phrase itself being introduced in Capra's 1931 film "Platinum Blonde."  Clearly it captured the public's imagination -- columnist Damon Runyon applied it to boxer James Braddock in 1935 (director Ron Howard used it as the title of his 2005 film about Braddock), and it pops up again in Capra's "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town" in 1936.

Anyway, back to "Platinum Blonde." The titular heroine of the 1931 film is Jean Harlow, who singleheadedly made the haircolor famous. She's Ann Schuyler of THE Schuylers, a high-society family whose blood is as blue as their noses. When the Schuyler son gets mixed up in a scandal with a chorus girl, Ann's path crosses that of reporter Stew Smith (Robert Williams). She takes a fancy to him and tries to sweet talk him into caving on the story. He doesn't do that -- he might be a goofoff and a drinker, but he's a dedicated newspaperman. But once the story is published, he does help her out:



A romance develops between Ann and Stew, and they get married. She almost immediately begins to try and change him, though he resists. All of this happens to the dismay of Stew's best "buddy" on the newspaper, Gallagher, played by an 18-year-old Loretta Young, already demonstrating her acting chops:



And speaking of acting chops, "Platinum Blonde" is a real showcase -- tragically, one of the only ones -- for Robert Williams. He'd done a fair amount of stage work before coming to Hollywood, including a long run in the Broadway hit "Abie's Irish Rose," but in this role he's a movie natural -- and sadly, he died of peritonitis just after this film was released. With his pipe, easy-going manner and hooded eyes, he's an early Bing Crosby. His rapport with Harlow is so obvious that they can get away with scenes like this, when she tries to make him wear garters:



Young is luminous as the girl who gets left behind, at least temporarily. And the cast includes old pros like Walter Catlett and Halliwell Hobbes. There aren't many other 1931 films that move with the style and assurance of "Platinum Blonde," made when Capra was hungry and still making a name for himself as a real-life Cinderella Man.

Here are the first few minutes of the movie: