Kitty Hollywood - The Court Jester - 1956

There has never been a point in time when this film has failed to put a smile on my face. I remember watching it as a child and thinking 'WHO is this guy who gets to go crazy making faces and funny voices he is NUTS and I love him' and that was the start of my relationship with Danny Kaye.

I'm not saying he's perfect - I find 'The Secret Life of Walter Mitty' very dull at various points in the story, but get him a good script that allows him to incorporate his madness as necessary plots points and you have a winner. He is an extraordinary performer and the work he did for numerous charities - UNICEF being the chief one, is something to be marvelled at. As he has said - "I believe deeply that children are more powerful than oil, more beautiful than rivers, more precious than any other natural resource a country can have," "I feel that the most rewarding thing I have ever done in my life is to be associated with UNICEF."

There are so many scenes in this film that I come to thinking 'oh good, it's this one now.' There's a section quite early on where Kaye is disguised as an old man and Glynis Johns is playing his granddaughter. The Evil King Roderick's guards descend on them and after a great deal of flummery they get to the point where the guard is asking about a royal babe with a mark on his bottom.

Guard Captain: Enough! Have you seen a group in the forest with a child?
Hawkins: Uh what's that? What? What?
Guard Captain: A child! A child!
Hawkins: A child. Child. Oh! (indicating Maid Jean) Lovely child, pretty little creature, isn't it? (Scolding) but you stay away from her!
Guard Captain: No, no no no, a child! (Gestures) So big! Uh with a little mark on...
Hawkins (shouted interruption): You do and I'll break every bone in your body!

You can see it coming and it doesn't matter one bit - you still laugh out loud. I know for a fact that I used to charge around the house saying 'Dire News, Sire' and Mr Kitty would look at me and sigh, but I was Having Fun, so it didn't matter. And as for 'The Pellet with the Poison' - well, interestingly, the  rumour was that the concept was generously borrowed from a Bob Hope film called 'Never Say Die' - "There's a cross on the muzzle of the pistol with the bullet and a nick on the handle of the pistol with the blank." You can compare the two here. I can certainly state which one I prefer.

Now, onto the other actors. Glynis Johns is not only famous for her Broadway performances - she is famous, especially to The Young for her performance in 'Mary Poppins' as Mrs Winifred Banks, mother and suffragette.

There is something about Johns - I don't know what exactly but I am sure her voice has a lot to do with it, that makes her absolutely compelling. One of the earliest films I ever saw her in was 'Miranda' - a 1948 British film about a mermaid (she is the mermaid) and she is just the whole package in that film - light and fluffy as it is - but so smart and cool and sexy.

Mildred Natwick and Cecil Parker are both superb in this film. Natwick plays the victim and the baddy at the same time in many scenes and her comic timing is a thing to behold.

Parker has no problem with appearing ridiculous, which is to his credit. His scene with Johns regarind Breckenridge's Scourge is a textbook exercise in characters commencing the scene with one point of view and exiting with an other. 


I believe I also indicated that I was going to tell you who John Carradine's granddaughter was. Now, I know John Carradine best from 'Stagecoach' with John Wayne, but he was in a gazillion film from the 1930's through to the 1980's. Dead Impressive. He also had five sons, and four of them became actors. Bruce, David, Keith and Robert.

Keith then went on to have some children, and one these children is....

The one, the only - Martha Plimpton. Running on Empty, The Goonies, The Mosquito Coast - she has many films to her credit that made an indelible impression on me. I can't particularly spot the resemblance, but I'm okay with that.

If you are looking at the credits and wondering who the hell 'The American Legion of Zouaves of Richard F. Smith Post No, 29 Jackson, Michigan' - they were a U.S Civil War reenactment group (ofcoursetheywere). They are the dudes who are doing all the fast marching in Kaye's Knighting Scene - I guess it was just easier (and cheaper?) to hire them to perform the scene than to train up dancers. It's a pretty extraordinary scene, and I keep wanting to pull up Danny Kaye's leggings every time I watch it. I know that that is the point, but stilll....

And finally - the gowns. Oh my goodness the gowns. Edith Head and Yvonne Wood should have opened a shop together. I am sure that this is one of those films I watched as a child where they just seemed to have utterly glamorous gowns in every colour of the rainbow and I wanted them all.  What matter does it make that they are utterly racy and obviously very well corsetted in an age when they would not have been?

I really like Angela in this blue number. It suits her beautifully.

Danny and Glynis both look pretty foxy here - he's got that whole open shirt thing going on without being sleazy.

She looks pretty fabulous in this green one as well - plus there are all the other actors in the background who are dying of jealousy about her Off The Shoulder thing.

Plus draperies. You can never have enough draperies.

Enough. You need to go watch this film. I need to go watch this film. Again.
'I live for a sigh, I die for a kiss, I lust for a laugh, ha HA!'

Top Ten Christmas Movies - Number Two - The Muppet Christmas Carol

This beautiful version of Dickens’ classic story captures its essence entirely. Never you mind that there are singing vegetables, Fezziwig (now Fozziwig) as a rubber chicken manufacturer or ice-skating penguins, that’s what makes it great. The great Michael Caine plays Ebenezer Scrooge with many a snarl and a dead eye. Kermie and Piggy are Bob Cratchit and his wife Emily, Robin the frog is Tiny Tim and the Great Gonzo is Charles Dickens himself. This is one of the masterstrokes of the film. A great deal of Dickens’ original language is used throughout the film and the delicate hand behind this keeps the integrity of the story intact whilst using the familiar Muppet madness to make its point. People forget that Dickens would employ much humour and absurdity to tell his stories – it is entirely fitting here. I tear up every time Scrooge heads to the Cratchits house with the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come – the scene is deeply touching.

This was the first Muppet film made after the death of Jim Henson, with Kermit the Frog (and Henson’s regular other roles) being voiced by Steve Whitmire. When it was released, the film was up against Home Alone 2 and Aladdin, so it had some very tough competition. It was financially successful, and largely speaking, critically successful as well. It has gone on to become a staple of Christmas viewing for many – and so it should for you. 

Top Ten Christmas Movies - Number Three - The Santa Clause

This 1994 Christmas offering might have many turning up their nose – but I love it. The story of a cynical, divorced father who, through a series of misadventures, inherits the role of Santa Claus is genuinely heartwarming. Tim Allen is a consistently underrated performer (I’m not saying Home Improvement is Oscar worthy or anything, but take Galaxy Quest. Superb.) and his genuine and earnest Santa Claus is a delight. If the rumours that he was at least third  are true (Bill Murray and Chevy Chase ahead of him) then I am happy that they turned it down. Wendy Crewson, Judge Reinhold (Mock Trial with J. Reinhold), Eric Lloyd, David Krumholtz and Peter Boyle all co-star.

P.S. Don’t Watch The Sequels

Top Ten Christmas Movies - Number Four - Elf

Awesome 10 Days of Christmas Movie Greatness - Number 4 - Elf

On paper, we'd all be forgiven for passing on Elf. Will Ferrell plays a human, accidentally raised as an elf in Santa's workshop after a delivery mishap in the orphanage. His world is turned upside down when he is finally given the heart-to-heart that not only is he adopted, but his birth father and family have been located in the mysterious far-away land of New York.

Buddy the elf has an incredible journey ahead, and much growing up to do, and it's easy to see the clear referencing of "Miracle on 34th St": updating the tale of a cynical world coping with the possibility that festive fantasy is real. Crucially, the film hinges on Ferrell's utterly devoted and un-satirical fish out of water performance, who will not - CAN not - see anything but positivity and joy in everything he experiences.

Birth Father, James Caan, thinks the entire story is a crock, and Step-mother Mary Steenburgen simply wants a family Christmas without tension. Director Jon Favreau's debut, best known for penning and starring in the '96 surprise hit "Swingers", and Ferrell's first feature after leaving Saturday Night Live, 'Elf' steers clear of schmaltz by showing us Buddy's pure heart break in slow motion, as he struggles to comprehend how something as magical and honest as Christmas has been tainted by his own race, and just because you have a family, it doesn't necessarily guarantee you'll fit in. Ferrell reportedly turned down a $30 Million offer to star in a sequel last year, hopefully well aware that the adventure of Buddy the Elf is perfect just the way it is.

Top Ten Christmas Movies - Number 5 - Miracle on 34th Street (1947)

Legend has it that 8 year old Natalie Wood was convinced she was starring in a film with the real Santa Claus during production. Whether this is urban legend, or perhaps what she was led to believe by sneaky producers, is a case of life imitating art somewhat. Not only is this a story of a jolly old man, perceived as a lunatic when claiming to be the real Kris Kringle who ultimately has his day in court, but actor Edmund Gwenn was in fact Father Christmas in the 1946 Macy's Thanksgiving parade, all planned by 20th Century Fox, and all footage of the parade was shot live on location - a feat virtually unheard of at the time. Studio head Daryl F. Zanuck disliked the script so much, he forced writer / director George Seaton into an unconditionally assigned three picture deal, and pulled the release date forward to summertime to try and maximise box office profits. The film grossed four times its original budget, was nominated for an Oscar, and is ranked 9th on the AFI's Most Inspirational Movies of All Time.

Top Ten Christmas Movies - Number Six - Die Hard

I have thought long and hard about posting this. It is so sad and so strange that we now live in a world and in a city where this is an issue. A week ago, this was one of my top ten Christmas movies. It still is. Should I let what happened this week prevent me from listing it? I don't think so, which is why I have. Feel free to stop reading, if you'd rather. 

Die Hard

No Christmas movie list ever, nay, no list of any kind relating to screencraft can be without Die Hard. Released just four months prior to Scrooged, Die Hard manages to take the combined stresses of marital woes, holidaying in L.A. and office Christmas parties, throw in a band of menacing German thieves, and trap them all in the Nakatomi Plaza over the course of just a few hours of madness. Television star Bruce Willis, who at the time was filming for "Moonlighting" during the day, and then shooting relentless action sequences all night, was roughly the seventh choice for the role of Officer John McClane, and it's fair to say his fame was then catapulted somewhere above the stratosphere. So, too, was unknown British actor Alan Rickman, debuting here as possible terrorist Hans Gruber, after director John McTiernan saw him on stage in Dangerous Liaisons the year before. (Actually, the first time I saw this film I saw Dangerous Liaisons and Die Hard on the same night - straaaaange) The suspense is beautifully plotted, the action is manic, the set pieces are seamlessly blended into the plot, it's got soul, it's got laughs, it's got terrible European accents, it's got around 700 unnecessary sequels, it's got the Christmas spirit all over it, and it's just as much fun watching it for the fortieth time as it is the first.

Top Ten Christmas Movies - Number Seven - Scrooged

Another ripper black comedy from yuletide days of yore (is that a thing?), Scrooged is a screwball take on Dickens' Christmas Carol from 1988, starring Bill Murray at roughly the beginning of his actually-fascinating-and-not-just-wacky-novelty phase. Scrooged was Murray's first non-ensemble role, and he carries the film effortlessly on his dour back, encountering the three ghosts who are trying to change his ways before he, well, gets even more dour, I suppose. 

 

Director Richard Donner made the film in-between the first two Lethal Weapon movies, and despite clashing with Murray often on set, he had been pitching Murray to Tim Burton for the role of The Joker in the about-to-be-cast Batman. A couple of moments are a tad too ghoulish for youngsters - one in particular was an unexpected bone-shattering special effect that stayed with me for years - but if you like a touch of mayhem with your Dickensian fables, give it a whirl and see if you think it's aged as well as I do. (Extra props to the supporting work of Karen Allen, Carol Kane from TV's "Taxi", and a bonkers score by Danny Elfman at the peak of his bonkers-ness)