PAULETTE GODDARD in THE CRYSTAL BALL (1943)

 "SHE'S A GAL WITH A PAST WHO KNOW YOUR FUTURE!"

The always likable Paulette Goddard stars with Ray Milland in the rom-com THE CRYSTAL BALL (1943). It’s a Paramount film distributed by United Artists due to Paramount having too much product to get on the screen during WWII.

Goddard plays Toni Gerard, a beautiful, sharp-shooting Texan redhead who is stranded in New York due to losing out to a blonde in a fixed beauty contest. For the sake of the plot, Toni decides to spend her last 38 cents on fortune teller, Madame Zenobia (Gladys George), a likeable low-rent grifter. Zenobia takes pity on Toni, letting her a room in the back of her shop and then sets her up working next door with shooting gallery owner, Pop Tibbots (Cecil Kellaway), who acts as her father confessor and guardian angel.

When Toni is forced to masquerade as the veiled Madame Zenobia, she gets mixed up in a plot (largely irrelevant to the film) to get the haughty rich widower, Jo Ainsely (Virginia Field), to buy into a crooked land deal. This gets Toni involved with Ainsely’s handsome estate counselor, Brad Cavanaugh (Milland). After this, the rest of the movie is a series of amusingly farcical scenes where Toni juggles trying to win Brad away from Jo without revealing that she is now also Madame Zenobia. No one will be surprized in how the story ends – happily for everyone, except Jo.

The script by the soon to be Executive Producer of Columbia Pictures, Virginia Van Upp (Cover Girl, 1944), from a story by Steven Vas, is bit too complicated for its own good, but it maintains a solid pace for its 81 minutes. I enjoyed two of the running gags that almost become their own subplots. This first involves Toni getting a hapless waiter (you’ll recognize the face of Sig Arno) fired from every job that she continuously runs into him (literally) at, all of which he accepts with the frustrated good grace of someone who can’t afford to explode with indignation. The second sees Toni, Brad, and Brad’s right hand man (the always wonderful William Bendix) mistakenly visiting the apartment of the squabbling Mr. & Mrs. Martin (Ernest Truex – Bensinger in His Girl Friday, 1940 & Iris Adrian – Lola in My Favorite Spy, 1951), and getting tossed out on their ears by one of the pair who mistakes each visitor as the indiscreet lover of the other. The scene is made funnier by the quips of snoopy onlooker (Mabel Paige).

Ray Milland, Virginia Field, Paulette Goddard & Cecil Kellaway

The story shares many similarities with Ann Southern’s Maise series that ran for 10 installments from 1939 to 1947. Like Toni, Maisie is a southerner who starts every film broke and out of work, but soon falls in love with someone who she has to separate from an annoying girlfriend/fiancée. Toni’s wardrobe and sharpshooter background also foreshadows Peggy Cummins’ doomed gangster, Annie Laurie Starr, in Gun Crazy (1950).

The ex-Mrs. Charlie Chaplin, Goddard might not have been an actress with a large range, but she more than made up for it by the sincerity she brought to every role. I can’t think of another actress from the 1940’s who had a more likable onscreen persona than Goddard. She was nominated for one Academy Award, for Best Supporting Actress in So Proudly We Hail! (1943)

Millard was the polar opposite talent-wise of Goddard, with the ability to easily move from gut-wrenching drama to light comedy. He’s quite enjoyable here and he and Goddard make fine sparring partners. Milland and Goddard costarred in three other films together, The Lady Had Plans (1942), Reap The Wind (1942) and Kitty (1945). Watch for Milland's comically small 2-cylinder Crosley convertible that, as he mentions, would have been a good, gas-efficient vehicle during the war. Paulette Goddard owned one in real life.

Any cracks in the script are ably patched over by the dozens of great uncredited actors who fill out almost every scene. Top billed costars Gladys George, Virginia Field, Cecil Kellaway and WilliamBendix deserve full Atomic Surgeon reports of their own. But keep an eye open for a young Yvonne De Carlo (future Lily Munster) as Milland’s sassy secretary; Hillary Brooke (little Jimmy’s mom in Invaders From Mars, 1953) as Jo's catty friend; and Nestor Paiva (Capt. Lucas in Creature from the Black Lagoon) as the restaurant owner caught in the middle of Toni's scheme (an imaginary mouse in a teapot) to meet Brad. I'd have watched a film about any one of these characters. If there was any justice in the world, Paramount would have given Milland and De Carlo's characters their own film series.

The Crystal Ball was directed by Elliott Nugent, who had previously directed Goddard opposite Bob Hope in The Cat and The Canary (1939) and Nothing But The Truth (1941). Nugent started out as an actor costarring with Marion Davies in Not So Dumb (1930) and Lon Chaney in The Unholy Three (1930) before switching careers into directing. He specialized in light comedies, notably directing Bob Hope and Harold Lloyd. It’s worth watching his She Loves Me Not (1934) starring Miriam Hopkins and Bing Crosby that helped establish Bing as a top Hollywood screen personality.

The director of photography was twice Oscar nominated Leo Tover. He was one of the top cinematographers in the 40’s and 50’s working mostly for Paramount and 20th Century Fox. He made the intergalactic robotic enforcer, Gort, look menacing in The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951), and made us all want to Journey To The Center of The Earth’s (1959) glorious CinemaScope lost world.

Is THE CRYSTAL BALL worth my time? An unqualified yes. While not quite an A picture, it delivers on the laughs with a fun, watchable cast. Goddard is as adorable as ever (just look at that picture above!), and everyone in it shines.

Availability: As a MOD (manufactured on demand) DVD from ClassicFlix’s Silver Screen series. Check for availability, but very good copies of The Crystal Ball are currently watchable on many online platforms..

Joan Blondell in GOOD GIRLS GO TO PARIS (1939)

 A GIRL’S GOTTA BE GOOD TO GET TO PARIS. 

GOOD AND SMART!

GOOD GIRLS GO TO PARIS (1939) is a Columbia Pictures romantic comedy directed by Alexander Hall and starring Joan Blondell, Melvyn Douglas and Walter Connolly.

Jenny Swanson (Blondell) plays a good-hearted waitress who thinks that she is not above a little harmless gold digging blackmail to fulfill her dream of going to Paris. All that changes when she meets the Aesop-quoting, English exchange professor, Prof. Ronald (‘Ronnie’) Brooke, (Douglas) who sets her conscious – and heart – aflutter.

Jenny is working at the diner near the local college as she tries to snag herself a rich student, extract a promise of marriage from him, and then collect a big payoff from his father when he objects to the marriage. When Jenny strikes up a friendship with Douglas’s professor and tells him of her plan, he advises her that "good girls go to Paris, too" and that she should go straight back home to Minnesota. When her blackmail plan seemingly blows up in her face, she heads for the train station, but in a last minute decision buys a ticket for New York City.

On the train she hooks up with the Tom Brand (Alan Curtis), brother of Brooke’s previously unmentioned fiancée, Sylvia (Joan Perry), and soon ends up as the inadvertent house guest of the wealthy Brand family.

All of the family have their secrets. Brooke’s fiancée, Sylvia, is really in love with medical student Dennis Jeffers (Henry Hunter), the son of the Brand’s butler. Mother Caroline (Isabel Jeans) has a not-so-secret paramour, Paul Kingston (Alexander D’Arcy), and Tom has a $5000 gambling debt hanging over his head. All of their problems stem from their inability to stand up to their overwrought, overbearing and continuously apoplectic patriarch, Olaf (Connolly).

Can our little Jenny untangle everyone’s problems and ensure that everyone – including her and the professor – all end up with the right partners?

The ending might not be a surprize, but the path that Jenny takes to get there, constantly guided by her inner ‘flutter’, is a continuously unfolding delight. Jenny’s every interaction adds a new complication that she has to solve by hook or by crook – happily using the latter when she gets cornered into doing a little well-meaning blackmail to save Tom’s hide from the gangster he owes money to.

By the end of the film every male has proposed marriage to Jenny at least once - all except, of course, for Prof. Brooke! 

If you wanted to call this a screwball rom-com, I would not argue with you. The cascading series of comedic crises that drag Blondell’s character into the Brand family’s orbit, and the sparks they generate, are the hallmarks of a good screwball. But every really good screwball comedy needs a solid cast of memorable (and often eccentric) supporting characters. Blondell, Douglas and Connolly all have terrific screen presence and know how to get the most out of an almost A-quality script, but the rest of the cast are so bland as to be interchangeable. While writing this review I had to consult the IMDB a dozen times to keep these characters straight. Is Isabel Jeans playing Olaf’s wife or another daughter? I had to rewind the film to confirm that she’s his wife.

Good Girls Go To Paris is the second of three films that Blondell and Douglas made together within two years, the others being There’s Always a Woman (1938) and The Amazing Mr. Williams (1939). They would not appear together again for almost thirty years until MGM’s Advance to the Rear (1964). The two actors were probably initially brought together to try to capture the Nick and Nora box office magic that William Powell and Myrna Loy had generated in The Thin Man series.

Blondell and Douglas make a great comedic team & this film is by far the best of their three 1938-39 films. Blondell exudes her natural effervescence and quick tongue without any of the underlying tinge of bitterness found in many of her best roles. Her Jenny may not have gotten any breaks, but she’s not yet cynical. She is warm and loving, and any potential larceny in her heart is totally without malice.

The director and the script give Douglas a break from his frequent aggressive misogyny that he was forced to portray in many of his comedic roles (see my previous review of Two-Faced Woman (1941) where he plays opposite Greta Garbo) and that mars both of the other two Douglas-Blondell pairings. Here his Ronnie is sympathetically good natured, but too restrained to acknowledge the deep connection that he and Jenny quickly make. We’ll soon learn that he’s engaged to be married to the rich debutante, Sylvia Brand, which will be the spark that ignites the oncoming farce. And, even though Douglas is supposed to be playing an Englishman, he never attempts an accent, which I found funny in itself.

As in any well-constructed story, when things seem to be happening too fast to follow, the film slows down to allow us some introspective one-on-one moments between the characters. Jenny and the constantly agitated Olaf bond over their shared love for their simple Minnesota upbringings. Jenny works her way into Olaf’s heart by being the only one in the house not afraid to speak her mind to him. Their scene together playing cards while Olaf is in his sick bed reminded me of the gentle interaction between Deanna Durbin and Charles Laughton in It Started With Eve (1941), where Deanna's warm charm soon lifts Laughton from his proclaimed death bed. 

Jenny and Ronnie also get a few, but not enough, scenes where they debate Jenny's plans to get to Paris. Their unacknowledged love grows as they gently spar back and forth. If Ronnie will just say the word, she’ll give up her plans to go to Paris, at least by herself;

Ronnie:  Jenny, have you lost your flutter?
Jenny:  Oh, no. I'm fluttering something awful right now.

Ronnie, just kiss the girl already!  

The chemistry between the two leads is unforced and enjoyable to bath in. Although Jenny is supposed to be younger than Blondell’s real age at the time the film was made (she was 32, Douglas was 38), there does not seem to be the usual awkward age gap between the female and males leads that was so common in films of the era, where men in their 40’s are always engaged to 17 year old girls. Such was the time.

As usual, I enjoy digging into the background of the supporting characters.

Next to Blondell and Douglas, Walter Connolly (playing Olaf Brand) is the biggest presence in the film, both physically and vocally – this big man is always shouting. You’ll recognize him as the father of Claudette Colbert’s character in It Happened One Night (1934) and as Frederic March’s hot-headed editor in the classic screwball, Nothing Sacred (1937). Connolly’s specialty was playing sweating, yelling, always outraged men who could not get the people around him to do what he wanted. Although a memorable character (your enjoyment of his screen persona may vary), his main career in Hollywood was short (1932 to 1940) after which he died at age 53.

Alan Curtis (playing Tom Brand) was a handsome actor who often got close to leading and supporting roles from the late ‘30’s until his death (following surgery) in 1953. Some of his more notable parts were as Babe Kozak, the hot-headed and inexperienced robber opposite Bogart and Ida Lupino in High Sierra (1941) and the engineer whose loyal secretary (Ella Raines) needs to find The Phantom Lady (1944) to save him from execution.

Dorothy Comingore plays an uncredited tearoom hostess. Can you pick her out in the lineup of cute waitresses that introduces us to Blondell’s character? In two years time she would be acclaimed for playing the feather-brained second wife of Charles Foster Kane in Orson Welles Citizen Kane (1941). But her star quickly fell as she felt the wrath of William Randolph Hearst who hated his inferred portrayal in the film and Comingore’s character who was modeled after his mistress, Marion Davies. Hearst used his power to destroy Dorothy’s career. Her fate was sealed when she was blacklisted for refusing to cooperate with the House Un-American Activities Committee. She spent time in an asylum, became an alcoholic and died at age 58. [I think that's her third from the right standing next to Blondell]

Although Isabel Jeans (playing Caroline Brand) did not make much of an impression for me in this film, she soon had a much better role playing  Mrs. Newsham in Alfred Hitchcock’s’ Suspicion (1941). Sauvé Alexander D'Arcy (playing Paul Kingston), went on to star in the underground cult classic, Horrors of Spider Island (1960). 

And finally, a tip of the hat to hard working actor Sam McDaniel as the confused train porter trying to figure out where to put Jenny up for the night. You’ve seen him in at least one of his over 200 roles, almost all uncredited and almost all playing porters, janitors or servants.

Good Girls Go To Paris is from a story by Oscar nominated Lenore J. Coffee (Four Daughters, 1938) and William J. Cowe (Kongo, 1932 [Director]), with a screenplay by Oscar nominated Gladys Leham (Two Girls and a Sailor, 1944) and Ken Englund (No, No, Nanette, 1940). The script is well-written and generates a lot of fun scenes for Blondell to show off her innate comedic chops. Straight man Douglas manages to get in a few zingers as well, but his character is more reactive than proactive in driving the storyline.

The direction by Alexander Hall (Here Comes Mr. Jordan, 1941) is fast-paced and keeps the 75 minute story in constant motion. One does tend to lose track of the convoluted complications that come up between Jenny and almost everyone in the Brand household, but – as in the best films of this sort – we’re having too much fun to be concerned with trying to keep the plot straight. Has anyone ever figured out who killed Sean Regan in The Big Sleep (1946)?

Is GOOD GIRLS GO TO PARIS worth my time? A definite yes. If you like 1930’s romantic comedy’s this is a probably a little gem that you’ve overlooked. A nod as well to cinematographer Henry Freulich for his assured hand on the camera and his unfussy, but well-chosen, set ups that never distract us from story. He specialized in light fare and B comedies, being Director of Photography on many of the Blondie films from the 30’s to the 50’s. The only complaint I might have is that the film is TOO short at 75 minutes. I would have enjoyed being with Blondell’s Jenny for another half hour.

Availability: As far as I can determine, the film has never had an official DVD release, which is a shame. It is available as a print-on-demand DVD from the usual grey market sources, and watchable copies are currently up on the interweb. Keep your eyes open for it to turn up on TCM.

 

PAT O’BRIEN & CLAIRE TREVOR in “CRACK-UP” (1946)

 

Crack-Up (1946) is a film noir-ish crime drama from RKO starring Pat O'Brien, Claire Trevor and Herbert Marshall.

The film starts with a crazed George Steele (O'Brien) punching out a cop and breaking into the museum where he works as an art critic and forgery expert. Once subdued, he relates that he has just been in a train wreck – which he is told never happened!

 Is Steele cracking up or is he caught up in some elaborate plot?

 

Pat O'Brien, Claire Trevor and Herbert Marshall

Driven to figure out the truth, Steele retraces his steps to the phantom wreck only to be caught up in a web of mystery that includes murder and an art forgery cover up. Can he trust his girlfriend (Trevor) who seems to know more than she is letting on and what is her relationship with Traybin (Marshall) who is dogging his heels?

Crack-Up was directed by Irving Reis who is primarily remembered for directing many of The Falcon movies of the early 1940’s, with his highest profile film probably being The Bachelor and The Bobby-Soxer (1947) starring Cary Grant, Myrna Loy and Shirley Temple. Crack-Up is about on par with the best of The Falcon films – solidly made and reasonably enjoyable to watch, but driven by too many small implausible character choices required to keep the mystery afloat.

Although the movie moves along at a reasonable pace, many scenes in the first two acts have enough lags in them for the viewer to question what is going on rather than being swept up by the action. One can almost see the actors straining to take their scripted lines in a better direction.

The third act picks up steam when O’Brien and Trevor finally team up to uncover what art has been forged and why. At least one minor character does a classic film noir about face leading to our hero once again being taken to the edge of madness in the clutches of the finally-revealed, scene-chewing villain. In an odd choice for a movie like this, Steele is largely sidelined for the big finale, leaving the film to end on a flat note that has the various characters trying to explain why they otherwise inexplicitly acted as they did throughout the movie.

O’Brien and Trevor both deliver solid performances even while they don’t seem to be totally invested in the material that they have to put across. Herbert Marshall’s few scenes don’t require him to be anything more than aloofly mysterious in trying to keep the viewer off balance as to whether he is a foe or ally to Steele.

Claire Trevor brings a riveting presence to her role, meaning that all eyes are on her whenever she is on screen. One can almost sense her nascent film noir muscles rippling under her skin, straining for a release that would only come in her next two films - Born To Kill (1947) and Raw Deal (1948).  

Other notable actors to watch in small, but pivotal roles, are Wallace Ford as police Lt. Cochrane and Mary Ware as Mary, secretary to museum trustee, Dr. Lowell.

Ford (above) is not not required to be anything other than a disbeliever in Steele's story and all too anxious to lock him up, but he's fun to watch in the role. Ford had the lead in Tod Browning’s Freaks (1932) and continued to have lead roles in mostly B pictures throughout the 30’s and 40’s, later transitioning to memorable supporting and character roles. He ended his career with a Golden Laurel nomination for A Patch of Blue (1965).

Mary Ware is a real mystery. She only has five listings on IMDB (1945-1948) and I could find almost no other information about her anywhere. But, she is effective in her small role, with a memorable face that could have been used to good effect in other noirs.

The shadowy cinematography by Oscar-nominated (Vivacious Lady, 1937) Robert de Grasse is possibly the best reason to watch Crack-Up. Even when you’re questioning the plot, de Grasse’s moody set ups and stylish chiaroscuro shadings give the film a rain-soaked luster even when it’s not raining.

Crack Up is based on the short story ‘Madman's Holiday’ by prolific SF and mystery writer Fredric Brown, published is the pulp magazine, Detective Story (July, 1943). Brown’s SF stories are noted for their often humorous or satirical slants, although if they were present in the original story they didn't make it into the script. His short story Arena was the basis for the much loved original Star Trek episode ‘Arena’ (1967) that has Kirk face off against a Gorn. The story was also likely the basis for The Outer Limits episode, Fun and Games (1964).

IS CRACK-UP WORTH MY TIME? This is a film that you don’t need to seek out, but if it turns up on TCM you can do worse than spend 93 minutes watching it. Although Claire Trevor does not get a lot of screen time, she is the reason you’ll stay with the film. I’m not sure if I believe Pat O’Brien as an art expert, but Robert de Grasse’s cinematography makes him and film look great.

Watch for the scene early in the film where O’Brien’s character runs down the surrealistic paintings of Salvador Dali who was well known in America by this time. During 1946 Dali even worked with Walt Disney and animator John Hench on the animated film Destino that was not released until 2003.

AVAILABILITY: A very watchable copy is currently up on YouTube if you can’t find the Warner Archive DVD from 2010.

MADAM SATAN... Is Death!

"The Devil searched far and long for an ally to wreak havoc amongst mortals…..then, the black corrupt soul of a beautiful woman, a victim of her own fiendish plan on Earth, left its bodily habitation to stand before the king of purgatory…..and his search was at an end….the Devil had found himself a fitting mate and called her……Madame Satan" (from the origin of Madam Satan in Pep Comics No. 16, 1941)

Madam Satan was an evil woman named Tyra who lured men to their destruction. During her first appearance she dies and is recruited by Satan who returns her to Earth to provide him with souls of good men that she would corrupt. As the ultimate Femme Fatale, she used her unearthly beauty to lure unsuspecting men into her clutches. As she prepares to kill them, her face is revealed to be an inhuman green skull.

The dark Madam Satan stories contained elements of the violent crime comics that were doing big business on the newsstands at that time, but pre-dated the macabre EC horror comics by over a decade. MJL Magazines Inc. was just one of many publishers vying for display space in the Golden Age of Comics with the hopes of taking home a share of the sales pie that was dominated by Batman, Superman and Captain Marvel. Publishers in the 1940’s where willing to try any concept to see if they could accidentally create the next comic book sensation – would Madam Satan make the cut?

Alas, Madam Satan only had a short run in Pep Comics (Nos. 16-21, 1941), plus a preview cover appearance on Pep No. 15 that would suggest that her debut had been scheduled for that issue, but was bumped to the next. When the first Madam Satan story appeared, the buying public did not know that in a mere six issues she would be remembered only for being replaced by Archie Andrews and his friends (Pep No. 22). Archie’s inauspicious debut eventually boosted MJL into one of the most successful publishing empires ever, lead in a large part by the distinctive art of Harry Lucey, Madam Satan’s co-creator. MJL was officially rechristened Archie Publications Inc. with issue Pep Comics #57 (June 1946).

Writer and co-creator Abner Sundell may have been influenced by Cecil B. DeMilles’ film, Madam Satan (1930) which is worth watching for Kay Johnson’s stunning outfit and the crazy Art Deco dance performance on a doomed zeppelin. Sundell’s only other notable Golden Age creation was Steel Sterling. Sundell only wrote Madam Satan’s first story, with all other stories being attributed to Joe Blair. Blair was a regular MJL/Archie writer who co-created The Fox with Irwin Hasen.

Artist Harry Lucey (Nov. 13, 1913 – August 28, 1984) began his comic book career in the late 1930s. In addition to Madam Satan, he drew Magno, Crime Does Not Pay, Sam Hill and Captain America. From the 1950’s until the 1970’s, he was the primary artist for Archie, drawing not only the flagship title, but also the in-house ads, covers and various other comics for the publisher. Lucey named the character Betty after his girlfriend’s sister. In 2012, Harry Lucey was inducted into the Will Eisner Awards Hall of Fame.

In the new millennia, Madam Satan has had a remarkable rebirth, appearing as a recurring character played by Michelle Gomez on The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina TV show (Netflix, 2018-2020) and in the comic book of the same name, and in her own one-shot (2020), self-titled comic. — The Atomic Surgeon, March 2022