Angels in the Outfield

 Angels in the Outfield (1951)

Starring Paul Douglas, Janet Leigh, Keenan Wynn, and Donna Corcoran

Directed by Clarence Brown

Written by Dorothy Kingsley and George Wells

Click here for my Letterboxd review

The RyMickey Rating:  C

Movie Review - Holiday Affair

Holiday Affair (1949)

Starring Robert Mitchum, Janet Leigh, Wendell Corey, and Gordon Gebert

Directed by Don Hartman

Holiday Affair has been on my Christmas viewing list for a few years now particularly because of the pairing of Robert Mitchum and Janet Leigh in a romantic relationship.  Unfortunately, this Christmas flick doesn't quite work.  Leigh is Connie, a war widow with a young six year-old son named Timmy (Gordon Gebert), who has been in a relationship with lawyer Carl (Wendell Corey) for over a year now.  A few days before Christmas, Connie -- a competitive shopper for a major retailer -- enters the Crowley Department Store in order to determine prices for popular holiday items where she meets Steve (Mitchum), a salesclerk in the toy department.  Connie purchases a train set which she returns a few days later.  Steve believes that Connie is a competitive shopper and he shirks his duty of reporting Connie to the store detective.  Steve's boss discovers this and promptly fires Steve for failing to meet his responsibilities.  Connie ends up feeling bad for Steve and, needless to say, the two begin to have several meetings that lead to tentative romance.

The biggest issue for me in Holiday Affair is that I never really believed that Connie would fall for Steve.  I don't think it is Mitchum's typical tough-guy exterior that's doing the relationship in for me.  Instead, I think it's just the rather silly premise.  To me, there's no reason Connie wouldn't be leaning more towards the steady, kind, and reliable Carl.  Sure, maybe there's some "women love bad boys" kind of thing, but Carl is presented as such a good guy that we actually end up not caring for Connie as she contemplates leaving him.  Janet Leigh tries to get us to understand her emotions, but I just didn't buy into the premise which leaves Holiday Affair ultimately not working.

The RyMickey Rating:  C-

Hitchcock Month - Psycho

Psycho (1960)

Starring Janet Leigh, Anthony Perkins, Vera Miles, Martin Balsam, and John Gavin

Directed by Alfred Hithcock

***SPOILERS AHEAD***

There's really not a whole lot that needs to be said in this post beyond the following:

Psycho is the best film ever made.

Truer words have never been spoken.  Watching Psycho is watching a master at work.  It's the epitome of a Hitchcock film with all his classic themes in place.

• The "Hitchcock Blonde" -- A phrase that's well known in this day and age, Hitch more often than not had his lead female charcters be blonde.  Apparently he simply felt that women should be blonde and their male counterpart should not be.  According to him, this is what audiences wanted to see and it made the characters more relatable somehow. [Blondes were more comforting somehow.]  In Psycho, Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) is certainly blonde and both Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) and Marion's beau Sam Loomis (John Gavin) are decidely not.
• Discussions over Food -- You may think it silly, but this is a Hitchcock staple.  Watch his films (and I've now watched all of the "modern" ones during this fest) and at least half of them will feature discussions that take place while people were eating.  While these chats are often used to humorous effect, Hitch twists that notion here and a simple conversation between Marion and Norman turns frightening quite quickly.  The casualness of eating (which, let's be honest, Hitch liked to do) is toyed with often by Hitch and here it is no exception
• The Macguffin -- Hitch always wanted you to think you knew what the story was about at the very beginning of the film and then make you realize that it wasn't really about that at all.  In Psycho, we certainly think that the film is about Marion Crane stealing $40,000, but obviously it isn't really about that at all.  In fact, the film is really about Norman Bates' psychotic mind, but we don't even see Mr. Bates until about thirty minutes into the film.
• Voyeurism -- Although not the extent of Rear Window, we are certainly voyeurs into Marion Crane's life seeing as how the first shot after the opening credits is a peering in through a window to see her in a state of undress.  And let's not forget Norman peeking in on Marion as she prepares for her shower.  Of course, this voyeurism is also rooted in sexuality which is another Hitchcock staple.
• The Mom Complex -- This is obviously a big plot point in Psycho, but this notion of males having inordinately obnoxious, complicated, or overpowering mothers is always a key plot point touched upon by Hitch, especially in flicks like North by Northwest and Notorious.  

I'm sure there's many more motifs repeated in Psycho that Hitch utilized in his other films, but nothing that I write can do this film any amount of justice.  As I've stated before, it's a lot more difficult for me to write about films I like rather than films I hate, and that's certainly the case here.

Every time I watch Psycho, I simply can't fathom what it was like to watch this film in 1960.  Heck, they weren't used to seeing toilets onscreen back then (scandalous, I know), let alone the huge twist that occurs halfway through the film.  

Enough babbling from me, though.  If you haven't seen Psycho in a while, be sure to check it out.  If you've never seen Psycho, you don't know what you're missing.

I'll be back in the next few days with a wrap-up to this Hitchcock Month which I must say was thoroughly enjoyable for me.  I'm quite pleased that I actually stuck with it.

The RyMickey Rating:  A+

You can check out last year's Psycho posting here which, admittedly, is a little more fun than the above.

Movie Review - Psycho (1960)

Starring Janet Leigh, Anthony Perkins, Vera Miles, John Gavin, and Martin Balsam
Directed by Alfred Hitchcock

For the past several years on Halloween, I've made it a tradition to watch my favorite movie of all time -- Psycho. Viewing after viewing, it holds up for me. I still think it's chilling even after watching it close to twenty times (if not more...likely more...I wrote at least two papers on it in college and I know multiple viewings were had for each paper).

Anyway, I'm just going to watch the movie and randomly write down thoughts. Warning: there be spoilers ahead.

00:00:06 - From the opening string orchestra "Main Titles," I'm hooked...and on edge. Creepy music, to be sure. And the simplistic Saul Bass title designs are spot on for the music.

00:02:00 - I've always loved the opening zoom-in shot. Panning over Phoenix, Arizona, right into the window at a cheap motel at "Two-Forty-Three P.M."

00:06:00 - "I'll lick the stamps." An incredibly cheesy line. This whole post-coitus scene of Sam and Marion is very B-movie, but I've always found it very believable. Janet Leigh makes her frustration over the relationship come through.

00:06:38 - There's Hitch!

00:10:48 - Love the shot that starts with Marion, zooms to the money on the bed, then zooms to her suitcase. The camera's forwarding on the plot here, telling us exactly what she's doing.

00:11:30 - First shot of Marion in a mirror -- I wrote a paper on this motif in college...something about the mirror showing her true deceitful self and a manifestation of guilt...likely a bunch of crap, but I remember it got me an 'A-'.

00:19:00 - "You can do anything you have a mind to...being a woman, you will."

00:25:00 - I never noticed this before, but the freakishly eerie grin Marion smirks here totally mirrors Norman's grin in the final scene. And there's a voiceover in both scenes as well. Always fun when you notice something new like this...

00:34:40 - First shot of the stuffed birds. Once again, another paper topic...Norman's inability to take flight from his mother/his psychotic mind. More bs...

00:36:30 - "Well, a boy's best friend is his mother." Creepy line reading from Perkins and a great facial reaction from Leigh. This whole scene starts as calmly as possible and gets so intensely creepy by the end.

00:42:00 - "We all go a little mad sometimes."

00:46:15 - I remember watching this movie for the first time in my early teens (Hitchcock was always allowed in the household regardless of the MPAA rating) and being shocked by the shower scene...even though I knew it was coming (I had been to Universal Studios and seen the Hitchcock show there, you see). The quick cuts at the beginning; the long cut while we see the killer sneak up on the shower; the quick cuts again at the end; following the bloody water to the drain; the spiraling out on Marion's eye as the water drips down her nose; the pan from the bathroom floor to the newspaper hiding the stolen money to the Bates' home. The music. All of it -- Chill-inducing. I can't imagine what it must've been like to watch this in 1960.

00:49:45 - Norman running down to the shower, seeing Marion dead, clutching his hand to his mouth, knocking down the bird picture (another symbolic image I wrote in my paper...it's gotta mean something, right? Everything means something if you want it to.).

00:59:45 - The last time I watched this, I noticed the lengthy amount of time spent on the clean-up scene after Marion's death (it takes nearly ten minutes until he pushes that car into the moat). The meticulousness that the audience sees Norman go through. We almost feel bad for the guy...cleaning up after "his mother's" mess...I mean, at this point, if we were watching it for the first time, we would have no idea that he was the killer.

1:00:00 - And, at the hour mark, we switch our allegiance from Marion to Marion's sister, Lila.

1:01:00 - Welcome creepy private eye Arbogast (Martin Balsam) to the scene! You're going to die in my least favorite shot from the movie very soon...

1:15:30 - I love the shot of Arbogast walking up to the Bates home. The way it's lit gets me everytime.

1:16:59 - And my least favorite shot in the film -- Arbogast "tumbling" down the stairs. I will say, it oddly kind of grew on me with this viewing, though. Didn't dislike it nearly as much as I previously had.

1:25:30 - Another long shot...a great shot of Norman walking up the stairs, a pan to the door, then the camera rises up to be an overhead view of the stairs as Norman carries his mother to the basement. Love it...

1:34:30 - Once again, love the shot of Lila, this time, approaching the house. Sure, it's daylight, but it's still a creepy shot.

1:38:00 - I can't help but think that every single thing that we see in Norman's mother's room has to mean something. One of these days, I'll decipher it...

1:40:30 - Another scene that never ceases to freak me out. Lila going into the secret room in the basement, hitting the single hanging lightbulb, Norman with his frightening smile. Good God, it's good. Chills again.

1:41:30 - Yes, this scene with the psychiatrist seems to be out of place, but I have grown to enjoy it. Learning the psychosis behind the madman...

1:47:00 - This last shot...this one long shot zooming in on Norman as his mother's voiceover plays...the way he looks up at the end. Scary shit.

It doesn't get better than this. Perfectly paced, wonderfully acted, exquisitely shot. While there may be one or two nitpicky things I could say about the flick, Psycho is undoubtedly my favorite movie I have ever seen. Until next Halloween...

The RyMickey Rating: A