Sunset Boulevard (1950)

Star Rating: 3
Length of Film: 1 Hour and 58 minutes
Director: Billy Wilder
Cast: William Holden, Gloria Swanson, Erich von Stroheim, Nancy Olson, Fred Clark, Lloyd Gough, Jack Webb, Franklyn Farnum, Larry J. Black, Eric von Stroheim (Actor in Supporting Role), Nancy Olson (Actress in a Supporting Role), John F. Seitz (PhotographYy), Doane Harrison, & Arthur P. Schmidt (Editing)

*This movie is in Black and White

The movie starts out with a man face first in a pool, DEAD! It flashbacks 6 months were we meet Joe Gillis, a well-known screenwriter who's having some financial troubles. He's also the narrator throughout the movie which gets really annoying. Joe tries to get away from debt collectors who want to repossess his car, and gets in a car chase ( a really terrible car chase, because they can't even stay in the correct lane. Awful...) Joe gets a flat tire and turns into a driveway on Sunset Blvd. It is a run down mansion. Debt collectors drive off, not noticing he pulled off the road, so Joe parks his car into the abandoned garage...or so he thought it was abandoned.

The butler calls Joe into the house, thinking he was an individual to help bury the owner of the houses pet chimp. (who would have a pet chimp...oh yes, a rich silent picture actress, very strange and has NOTHING to do with the plot of the movie).

 

Joe Gillis: Wait a minute. Haven’t I seen you before? I know your face.

Norma Desmond: Get out. Or shall I call my servant?

Joe: You’re Norma Desmond! You used to be in silent pictures. You used to be big!
Norma: I am big. It’s the pictures that got small.

I think those quotes sum up the personality of Norma Desmond. Norma hires Joe to help her write a screenplay for her "comeback", but she's really hiring him for her own personal reasons. She showers Joe with gifts, suits, and allows him to move into the house, the same room where her 3 husbands lived. Joe notices that there's no locks on any of the doors. Max, the butler states that it was by the doctors orders; she has had too many suicide attempts in the past.  New Years Eve comes, and Norma hires and orchestra; just for the two of them. Joe freaks out and leaves and attends a party with some of his other writers friends. He calls the house, to ask Max to pack up his belongings, and Max tells Joe that Norma just slit her wrists and tried to commit suicide (hmmm....we call that starving for attention). Joe rushes back to the house, and at midnight he allowed her to kiss him, or more…(they never showed sex scenes in the 50’s, so i'm not really sure if they had sex, but that's my take on it.)

Every night, Joe would sneak out of Norma's house to meet up with Betty, a reader for Paramount Pictures, who dreamed of being a writer, and they collaborated to write a screenplay. You can put two and two together to figure out what kind of relationship forms between the two of them.

This movie is about jealousy, greed, possession, power, insanity, murder, and money. This movie is worth watching. I mean, it's not amazing, and a movie I would buy and put on my movie shelf, but it's worth seeing, especially if you want to know who was face down in the pool, and see all the crap Norma does to get attention and to stay a "STAR". Gloria Swanson, who plays Norma, does a great job playing crazy.

"No one ever leaves a star. That's what makes one a star". -Norma Desmond

Mildred Pierce (1945)

Star Rating: 3
Length of Film: 2 hours
Director: Michael Curtiz
Cast: Joan Crawford, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, Eve Arden, Ann Blyth, Bruce Bennett, Lee Patrick, Moroni Olsen, Veda Ann Borg, & Jo Ann Marlowe
Oscar: Joan Crawford (Actress)
Oscar Nominations: Jerry Wald (Best Picture), Ranald MacDougall (Screenplay), Eve Arden (Actress in a Supporting Role), Ann Blyth (Actress in a Supporting Role), & Ernest Haller (Photography)


Mildred Pierce is a film based off of James M. Cain's novel, and HBO has recently made a miniseries starring Kate Winslet, Guy Pierce, and Evan Rachel Wood.

The movie starts off with gunshots, and Monte Beragon (Zachary Scott) is found dead on the floor. Police interrogate Mildred of the murder of her husband, and while she talks to the police about her life, the film flashbacks to past. Mildred is in a loveless marriage with a real estate broker, Bert Pierce (Bruce Bennett) who ends up leaving his wife, and two children; 16 year old Veda and 10 year old Kay. Veda is such a bitch! Her mother bought her a new dress, and left it on her bed. Veda runs up the stairs to see the dress, and doesn't have anything nice to say, she was very ungrateful and was nitpicking that it was "cheap".

Since her husband divorced her, Mildred and the girls were not being provided for; financially, Mildred decided to get a job as a waitress, something she hids from her daughters. Once she started making a steady income, she was able to hire a maid, Lottie (Butterfly McQueen). Mildred came home, and found Lottie wearing her waitress dress. She questioned Lottie and found out that Veda, gave her the dress and forced her to wear it, (see...bitchy!) Mildred questioned Veda on where she found the dress, and asked her why she went into her room. Veda smarted off to her mother and Mildred slapped her in the face.

After working in the restaurant business, she realized that there was a lot of financial perks in owning a restaurant. She went to her ex-husbands real estate partner, Wally Fay (Jack Carson) who propositioned Mildred with marriage, after learning that she and Bert were about to divorce. Fay helped Mildred find a property for her restaurant, a house owned by the smooth, duplicitous cad, Monte Beragon. Mildred bought the house, and opened a restaurant entitled "Mildred's", which ended up turning into a chain of restaurants. Mildred is finally financially secure to feed into her bratty, selfish daughter's efforts to climb the social ladder.

Monte Beragon, courts Mildred for years, and they end up getting married. Veda continues being selfish and vindictive, and ends up lying that she got pregnant to blackmail the father for $10,000! Keep in mind, this was set in the 1940's...CONTROVERSIAL!!! 

This movie is worth watching, just to see Veda, because she's such a bitch,and ...to find out who shot Monte.

Cabaret (1972)

Star Rating: 3 (Liked It)
Length: 2 hours, 12 minutes
Director:Bob Fosse
Cast: Liza Minnelli, Michael York, Helmut Griem, Joel Grey, Fritz Wepper, Marisa Berenson, Elizabeth Neumann-Viertel, & Helen Vita
Oscars: Bob Fosse (Director), Liza Minnelli (Actress), Joel Grey (Actor in supporting role), Rolf Zehetbauer, Hans Jurgen Kielbach, Herbert Strabel (Art Direction), Geoffrey Unsworth (Photography), David Bretherton (Editing), Ralph Burns (Music), Robert Knudson, David Hildyard (Sound).

Everyone talks about Liza Minnelli and how amazing and  popular she is...especially in the gay community. As a lover of musical theater, I was excited to sit down and watch this movie.

The film starts out as Brian (Michael York) steps off the train to Berlin, Germany in 1931. He meets Sally Bowles (Liza Minnelli) at their apartment building. Sally works as an American singer at the Kit Kat Klub, a cabaret club. Sally becomes VERY interested in Brian, and literally throws herself at him. Liza Minnelli is strikingly beautiful and very charismatic. She sucked me right in! No wonder she has many men fighting for her attention throughout the film; even Maximilian von Heune (Helmut Griem), a rich playboy baron. But Maximilian is also attracted to someone else, other than Sally (There are NO gay scenes, it is just mentioned).

When the cast is at the Kit Kat Klub, the props and costumes aren't overly dramatic and not appealing (it lacks in my opinion). The dancers aren't attractive, but I don't think they're supposed to be. I think they were trying to make it as authentic to the time period of the film, but it was really cool to see the world of "Cabaret" in Europe.The following songs were sung in the movie:

1. "Willkommen" (Welcome) - Master of Ceremonies (Joel Grey), the Cabaret Girls
2. "Mein Herr" - Sally
3. "Maybe This Time" - Sally
4. "The Money Song" - Master of Ceremonies, Sally
5. "Two Ladies" - Master of Ceremonies, two of the Cabaret Girls
6. "Tomorrow Belongs to Me" - Nazi youth
7. "Tiller Girls" - Master of Ceremonies, the Cabaret Girls
8. "Heiraten (Married)" - Greta Keller
9. "If You Could See Her (The Gorilla Song)" - Master of Ceremonies
10. "Cabaret" - Sally
11. "Finale" - Master of Ceremonies

This film has a lot of surprises that I won't mention, you'll just have to watch and see :)

This is How It Works

For each of my posts, I will rate the movie based off of 5 stars;


1 star-Hated It
2 stars- Didn't Like It
3 stars- Liked It
4 stars-- Really Liked It
5 stars- Loved It


I will also include the year, cast, length of film, director, movie poster, Oscar wins and nominations, and synopsis of the film.