In the 1940s, there was no bigger name in Hollywood than Judy Garland, she had ended the 1930s with a bang, starring in The Wizard of Oz, one of the most popular movies of the decade and of all time. She continued that momentum in the early 40s by continuing to star alongside Mickey Rooney in the very popular Andy Hardy musicals. However, by the mid-40s Garland was tired of playing juvenile roles and was ready to start playing adult roles. Her first big hit as a headlining grown up, and one that established her as superstar, was The Harvey Girls. Set during the 1890s, The Harvey Girls stars Garland as Susan Bradley, who is heading west to Arizona from Ohio to answer a "lonely hearts" letter. Along the way she meets the "Harvey girls," young ladies who are going to work as hostesses at the Harvey House restaurants. After arriving in Sandrock, Susan discovers that the man who wrote the letter doesn't want to marry her. Stuck with nowhere to go, Susan joins up with the Harvey Girls and gets embroiled in a battle between the Harvey restaurant and the local saloon and dance hall run by Ned Trent (John Hodiak), who eventually falls for Susan, in spite of the best efforts of sultry saloon girl Em (Angela Lansbury). Despite being paired with a fairly flat, b-level leading man in Hodiak, The Harvey Girls is bursting with life, excitement, and color due in no small part to Garland's magnetism as both a singer and an actress. While Garland has a lot to do with the movie's success, she doesn't have to do it completely on her own, it helps that she is performing some tremendous musical numbers, written by Johnny Mercer, Lennie Hayton, and Harry Warren, and featuring one of the all-time great numbers "On the Atchison, Topeka, and the Santa Fe." It is bursting with the chugging rhythms and exuberant hope, symbolizing the joy and excitement of an adventure westward on the trains of the late 1800s. It won the Academy Award for Best Song and was the biggest hit of the year. It isn't just the music either, The Harvey Girls features some great supporting performances by Ray Bolger, who delivers one of his signature goofy dance numbers; as well as deadpan Virginia O'Brien, surly Lansbury, and a young Cyd Charisse in one of her first films. The 1940s was the decade of decadent color musicals and The Harvey Girls is one of the best examples of a period musicals
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Do to his involvement in the production in many patriotic films during World War II, Frank Capra, who ruled the box office in the 1930s, only released four Hollywood movies during the 1940s, after producing 15 the decade earlier. Towards the end of the 30s Capra's films, while remaining comedies, had grown more serious in tone; whether it be the scathing view of the rich, or government and political corruption, his movies always had an overlaying message. Not since It Happened One Night in 1934 had Capra truly given himself over to a comedy for comedy's sake, all the changed with Arsenic and Old Lace. Based on a popular Broadway stage play, Capra didn't collaborate his long time writer Robert Riskin to adapt the screenplay, instead working with twin brothers Philip and Julius Epstein who's most famous film, Casablanca, would be written the next year. The script they produced stayed close to the original play and utilized many of the best lines, while also tailoring it to suit leading man Cary Grant. In the movie, Grant plays Mortimer Brewster, a dramatic critic who falls in love with and marries Elaine (Priscilla Lane), the neighbor of his elderly Aunts, Abby and Martha (Josephine Hull and Jean Adair) and uncle Teddy (John Alexander), who believes he is Teddy Roosevelt. After marrying Elaine, Mortimer visits his relatives while waiting for his bride to pack up so they can leave on their honeymoon. However, before he can depart he discovers a dead body in the window seat; he first suspects that his uncle Teddy has gone from harmlessly imitating Roosevelt to becoming a dangerous murderer. He is horrified to discover that it is actually his gentle, beloved Aunts did the deed and that they have been poisoning lonely old men for years as a charity to relieve them of their unhappiness. Mortimer has to keep it a secret from Elaine and others while trying to figure out what to do with his family. Complicating matters is the return of Mortimer's brother Johnathan, a criminal and murderer accompanied by his partner, the plastic surgeon "Dr. Einstein" (Peter Lorre) who are seeking a place to hide from the police. While this may seem like the plot of a horror story, it is in fact a comedy, one as black as pitch, but a comedy none the less. Capra has made movies featuring some notably eccentric families before, but nothing can top the insanity of the Brewster family, from the Aunts calm justification of murder, to Teddy charging up the stairs like San Juan Hill and Johnathan vindictive psychopathy, it is enough for Mortimer to question his own sanity. Grant plays the character perfectly, slowly unraveling from love-struck newly wed to a panicked, neurotic mess because of the antics of his crazy family. Much of Capra's trademark style makes it into Arsenic and Old Lace: his ability to blend physical and verbal comedy, as well as his gift for using faces and reaction shots to get laughs are all in a refined form. As always, Capra stocks his movies with interesting and humorous side characters, utilizing some of the best character actors in Hollywood so there is a perfect depth to his movies, even if a character is only on screen for a minute or two, the quality of the acting and humor never lags; In Arsenic and Old Lace, Jack Carson, Edward Everett Horton, and James Gleason all appear in small roles, despite the fact they could get supporting billings in other movies, but things are always different with Capra, he was true Hollywood royalty. Unlike many of his films, Arsenic and Old Lace doesn't feature any grand message or moral, and it may not be the same level as his masterpieces, but it is Capra fully unleashing his comedic ability and the result is marvelously, and wickedly, funny.
Throughout the 1930s, Billy Wilder and his writing partner Charles Brackett authored the scripts to some of Hollywood's most popular and critically acclaimed hits. However, instead of being satisfied with their success, the duo - Wilder in particular - was growing increasingly frustrated by the lack of control writers had at that time. What especially irked Wilder were the directorial decisions and changes made to his scripts. Because of this, Wilder decided to become a director himself so he never had to deal with these grievances again. Brackett and Wilder approached Paramount with a scrip he wanted to directed, they gave him the go-ahead, and the rest is history. That script eventually became The Major and the Minor, starring Ginger Rogers and Ray Milland. Rogers plays Susan Applegate, a smalltown girl moves to New York City, but becomes disillusioned with her life their and decides to return home to Stevenson, Iowa. The only problem is she doesn't have enough money for the train ticket home. Susan does, however, have enough money for a child's fare, so she disguises herself as a 12 year-old and gets on the train. However, she runs into some incredulous train conductors who catch her smoking and is forced to take refuge in what she thinks is an empty room. In fact, the room is inhabited by Major Philip Kirby (Milland), the commanding officer at a boy's military school. Susan convinces Philip she is a little girl on her way home to her mother and he takes her back to the school after the train tracks get washed out. There she meets Philip's selfish, conniving fiancee Pamela (Rita Johnson) and he sarcastic younger sister Lucy (Diana Lynn), who is the only one to see through Susan's act, but the two become friends regardless. While at the school, Susan falls in love with Philip, but has to fight of the boys at the school who thinks she is their age, while also helping Lucy to foil Pamela's plans to ruin Philip's chance at returning to active service. The Major and the Minor was written by Wilder and Brackett with Rogers in mind as the star and it was an excellent decision. Despite being 31 at the time of it's release, Rogers is thoroughly convincing playing a 12 year-old, quite the feat for a recognizable face like Rogers. Her terrific performance and that of supporting players are only boosted by the script, which is full of classic Wilder and Brackett dialogue: sardonic and witty, but never unnaturally so. No one ever speaks in a way that doesn't fit their character. Though his writing was in peak form, Wilder's immense directorial talent is also very apparent, albeit in a raw form, but they style, rhythm and timing of his cutting and close ups meshes with the dialogue. The Major and the Minor would be notable simply because it is the debut of the eight-time Best Director-nominated Wilder, but it is also a very funny movie starring one of the most charming and endearing leading ladies from Hollywood's golden age in one of her most unique and unforgettable roles.
In 1933, as King Kong climbed the Empire State Building, audience's fascination with special effects was born. With each successive decade, one or two movies continued to take steps forward pushing the limits of the technology at the time to bring bigger and more dazzling spectacles for audiences. The next movie after King Kong to really push forward effects is Alexander Korda's The Thief of Bagdad. Like King Kong however, it is much more than just a pretty looking technical accomplishment. The Thief of Bagdad is set, obviously, in Bagdad during the time of Arabian Nights, and stars John Justin as Ahmed, the King of Baghdad, who is robbed of his throne by the wicked Grand Vizier Jaffar (Conrad Veidt). Ahmed escapes the clutches of Jaffar, to Basra, with the help of young thief Abu (Sabu). While in Basra he meets and falls in love with it's princess (June Duprez), who runs away when she finds out she must marry Jaffar instead of Ahmed. Throughout the rest of the movie, Ahmed, Abu, and the princess attempted to foil Jaffar's plans and retake the throne of Bagdad. Shot in sumptuous Technicolor, the first thing you notice about the movie is the gorgeous design of the city, evoking the look of a classic, Arabian fairy tale city. The extends to the extravagant interiors of palace throne rooms and gardens. The dazzling special effects aren't just an achievement, but they are beautifully and artfully created like the mechanical horse that flies over the city rooftops of Bosra, a grotesque overgrown spider, and the gigantic Djinn towering over Ahmed and Sabu as he holds them in his hands. These effect, which include the first green screen work, still hold up today and are as beautiful as ever. What the best movies offer - blockbuster spectacles or not - is entertainment, however what most large budget movies today miss is that special effects on their own don't equal entertainment of any lasting value on their own. Big explosions and computer-generated, large scale action sequences don't stick with the viewer years down the line, but an engaging story and interesting and likable characters are what makes movies last, and more than just a flash in the pan. Nothing defines this better than The Thief of Bagdad, which is an technical achievement full of beautiful imagery, set designs, and ground-breaking effects, but it also has great acting, memorable characters, a classic story, and a overarching feeling of fun and adventure. Most all though, it is just good plain fun.
By the time the 1940s rolled along, Charlie Chaplin, the most iconic star of the silent film era, had been fighting against the inevitability of sound for over a decade, he produced three silent movies while the rest of Hollywood completely abandoned silent film. His only slight dalliance into sound was a couple of lines in Modern Times (1936). Finally though, a full thirteen years after the release of The Jazz Singer in 1927, Charlie Chaplin finally entered the sound era of Hollywood and it took a maniacal dictator and a viewing of Triumph of the Will to get him there. The story goes that Chaplin, who had long been apposed to the Nazis treatment of the Jewish people, saw Leni Riefenstahl's famous propaganda film and found Hitler's over-the-top mannerisms so funny that it inspired him to make The Great Dictator. Of course, humor wasn't the only motivation for Chaplin, he also wished to bring to the attention of English speaking audiences the practices of fascist Germany and their Antisemitism. At the time of it's filming and release, America wasn't at war yet, and popular culture had yet to lock on to Hitler and Nazi's as bad guys or objects of ridicule, only a few films like Confessions of Nazi Spy (1939) had really taken aim at the Third Reich and none had been so brash as to impersonate Hitler himself, or featured a world-wide star like Chaplin. In The Great Dictator, Chaplin plays a dual role of "Adenoid Hynkel," dictator of Tomainia, as well as playing a Jewish barber who bears a striking resemblance to Hynkel. The barber lost his memory during World War I, and after waking up 20 years later, discovers where he used to live has been turned into a ghetto and his barbershop is now next door to the beautiful Hannah (Paulette Goddard) and her family. Chaplin and Goddard, who worked together on Modern Times and were married in real life, provide a sweet, tragic, and comedic love story set against the background of the persecution and violence in the Jewish ghetto. As Hynkel, Chaplin perfectly imitates Hitler's delivery in a famous portion of the film where he addresses the Tomainia people in half-German, half-gibberish. Also lampooned in the movie are Mussolini aka Napaloni (Jack Oakie), Joseph Geobbles aka Garbitsch (Henry Daniell), Hermon Gorring aka Herring (Billy Gilbert), who in one may or another are mocked. When you combine the caricatures of Hitler with Chaplin's signature brand of slapstick you get one of the funniest movies ever made, but the most important thing that the humor in The Great Dictator does is free up Chaplin to address subjects to dark for serious movie, as well give him a wider audience with which to deliver his crucial message. Towards the end of the movie, the barber is mistaken for Hynkel and taken to make a speech before the people of Tomainia. Seizing his opportunity, the barber pleads for democracy, peace, and the end of dictatorships, but really this is Chaplin breaking the fourth wall and addressing the audience. Much like Joel McCrea at end Foreign Correspondent, the little Jewish barber transcends the medium in a passionate plea for the world to wake up to the evils of fascism.
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