POLLY BERGEN

Polly Bergen, who died at 84, had a fascinating and varied career. She began as a radio singer at the age of 14. She was nominated for a Tony award for her performance in Follies. She was also nominated for an Emmy for The Helen Morgan Story. Most recently she was seen as Stella Wingfield, Felicity Huffman’s mother, on Desperate Housewives. And she was quite an entrepreneur, founding and running a highly successful cosmetics corporation. 

Her filmography is equally varied and interesting. Her best, and most famous role, was as the terrified mother Peggy Bowden in Cape Fear (1962). This is a genuinely scary film with Robert Mitchum just eerily creepy. He is the stalker who is out to kill the Bowden children who may have witnessed him committing a murder. The final chase and confrontation at the ocean is riveting. The 1991 Martin Scorsese remake with Robert DeNiro is every bit as good, but of course Ms. Bergen isn’t in that one.

Escape From Fort Bravo (1953) is an above-average western with William Holden and Eleanor Parker involved with a Civil War prison camp, hostile Indians, a prison escape attempt and some good action scenes. As Alice Owens, Polly Bergen doesn’t have a whole lot to do but stand around and look pretty. 

Polly Bergen snared a Golden Globe nomination for her performance as a mental patient in The Caretakers (1963). And she is quite convincing- not over the top as many playing this role would be. This film demonstrates how little we have progressed in the treatment of mental illness. 

Move Over, Darling (1963) is a remake of the 1940 screwball comedy My Favorite Wife. The plot sounds like something Shakespeare might have cooked up- Doris Day and husband James Garner are lost at sea but he survives and she apparently does not. He waits a while then decides to marry the lovely Bianca (Polly Bergen). Of course it turns out that the first wife not only isn’t dead but shows up on the day of the Mr. Garner’s second wedding. Hilarity ensues!

Once Upon A Time When We Were Colored (1995) is based on the true story of Clifton Taulbert and his travails as a Black boy growing up in the South. Polly Bergen is okay in a frankly minor part as a fairly nice White lady. 

Paradise, Texas (2005) features Timothy Bottoms as an overworked actor knocked out of a part in a blockbuster movie because he decides to work on a small-budget independent film shot in his home town. The film is quite good in portraying the problems confronted by actors who often have to choose between family and work. Polly Bergen is quite effective in a small role as the actor’s mother.

All of the films in this column are available on DVD. All are for grown-ups.

                                               Good Little Known Movies

Part 7

        So you still don’t quite feel like it’s safe to go into the theatre? . I feel your pain. So- another batch of really good movies you’ve probably never heard of.

        I will admit to being absolutely smitten with Charles Dickens. The Man Who Invented Christmas (2017) is a fictionalized account of how he came to write A Christmas Carol. Almost everyone is at least familiar with the basic outline of the story. Each set-piece in the film shows how it could have happened that he wrote this scene. Little-known Dan Stevens is Dickens. Miserly, miserable Ebenezer Scrooge is brilliantly portrayed by the unmatchable Christopher Plummer.

        Wild Tales (2015) is a Spanish film that more than lives up to its title. The movie is a series of vignettes about crazy coincidences. They do not seem  to be related, and some are better than others. The best shows a group of passengers on an airliner who gradually discover they have all done bad things to one man- who turns out to be the pilot of the plane! All the others are almost as good. What fun!

        Victoria And Abdul (2017) is about the unlikely, but true, story of how the Queen became fast friends with an Indian servant. Surrounded by sycophants and ungrateful children (9 of them, waiting for her to die), the Queen is really lonely. Enter a handsome Indian sent to England to present the monarch with a commemorative coin. Soon they are fast friends and he is teaching her Urdu and Hindi as well as cultural matters. Her court is outraged. Too bad...she’s still the Queen! This movie is worth watching for Judi Dench’s performance alone, but it’s an interesting story of an interlude no one would have predicted. 

        Learning To Drive (2015) features two of my all-time favorite actors: Patricia Clarkson (The Station Agent) and Ben Kingsley (Ghandi). She is a high-strung New York City book editor. When her husband leaves her for another woman, she realizes she must learn to drive if she wants to visit her daughter in Vermont. She hires Mr. Kingsley who plays the role of an American Sikh. The culture clash is both humorous and touching, as each gradually learns about and warms to the other. These two actors could carry anything and they make this small, pleasant movie very enjoyable. 

        The great Hayao Miyazaki, the genius of Japanese anime films, says that The Wind Rises (2013)  was his last movie. We hope not, but we can enjoy this beautiful animated film. As always with his work, you could take any scene and frame it. It is the story of a young man who dreams of flying, but eyesight problems prevent it. So he becomes an aeronautical engineer and designs wonderful planes. 

        All these except Learning To Drive are fine for all ages. All are available on DVD. And many are available without charge at your local library. 

                                                             MERCHANT-IVORY

An actor in one of their films was not alone in thinking that Merchant-Ivory was one person. Actually, this extraordinary pair was director James Ivory and producer Ismail Merchant. I say was because Mr. Merchant died in 2005. They formed one of the most successful partnerships in the history of the movies, which lasted more than 40 years. Though they had their share of misfires (including, unfortunately their last one, The White Countess (2005), they also produced a handful of classics that will be viewed as long as there are movies. And their imprint always meant unsparing quality and class. 

Remains of the Day (1993) Is simply extraordinary. It features Anthony Hopkins’ finest performance as a self-sacrificing butler, and the luminous Emma Thompson as the smart, capable head housekeeper. They both work in a baronial English home owned by James Fox, who in a larger story is dabbling with Nazisim. Christopher Reeve (last film before his accident), Tim Piggott-Smith, and Hugh Grant add to a distinguished cast. The scene in which Mr. Hopkins and Ms. Thompson come that close to a romantic attachment will absolutely break your heart. Unforgettable.

A Room With A View (1986) is a beautiful film, beautifully done, that won Oscars for art direction, costume design and screenplay adaptation (Ruth Prawer Jhabvala). Helena Bonham Carter is a proper English young lady touring Italy to complete her education. She is, of course, chaperoned and you couldn’t improve on Maggie Smith in that role. She encounters attractive young men, including Daniel Day- Lewis. The film is a most successful adaptation of an E.M. Forster novel, and has lots of insights into British mores and manners. It is also very funny and just a joy to look at.

Howard’s End (1992) garnered Oscars for screenplay (again Ms. Jhabvala), art decoration, and for Emma Thompson’s wonderful performance as a young and feisty English girl with no particular fortune or prospects in early 20th century England. Anthony Hopkins is a worldly, urbane and somewhat sinister older man who casually seduces the wide-eyed Ms. Thompson. Vanessa Redgrave and Helena Bonham-Carter add to a splendid cast.  

It is so much fun to watch Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward as a middle-aged married couple in Mr. and Mrs. Bridge (1990) that you can forgive the fact that there really isn’t a lot to this movie, based loosely on two novels by Evan Connell. Their lives are jostled (but never jolted) by changes in society and their growing children. 

All of the movies in this column area available on video and DVD. While there is nothing objectionable in any of them, the content is strictly grown-up fare.

                                                            ERNEST BORGNINE

He had a face that would frighten hardened criminals. Ernest Borgnine died at the good old age of 95 and worked literally up until his death. He made more than 100 movies and more than 200 TV shows. Some of you may remember him as the title figure in the long-running TV comedy, McHale’s Navy (1962-66), which still shows up on some of the more exotic cable channels. 

Because of his looks, he was almost always cast as a bad guy. He first attracted notice as the villainous Fatso, in the splendid Oscar-winning From Here To Eternity (1953). He slays heroic Frank Sinatra in a knife fight, instantly earning the hatred of millions of women (and some men). This great film still features one of the hottest loves scenes ever as Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr roll in the surf (not naked!). It also features the saintly Donna Reed as a prostitute. 

Mr. Borgnine is Bart Lonergan, one of many really bad guys, in the little-known classic western, Johnny Guitar (1954). It’s saloon owner Joan Crawford versus self-righteous moralizer Mercedes McCambridge. Nicholas Ray’s direction gets the most out of Phillip Yordan’s quirky screenplay. 

        Bad Day At Black Rock (1955) is another classic western. Spencer Tracy shows up in a one-horse town that has a terrible secret. Ernest Borgnine is one of the many townspeople determined to thwart his efforts and keep the lid on. 

      The Wild Bunch (1969) had enough bad guys for three or four movies. Ernest Borgnine, as Dutch Engstrom,  is one of them.  Based loosely on The Seven Samurai, it is about a bunch of bad guys hired to run a bunch of badder guys out of town. It is  most famous for Sam Peckinpah’s direction of the violent action. It is the first movie to show people getting shot in slow motion, complete with flying dust and blood. However, it is really good and fairly mild by today’s standards. 

The very best Ernest Borgnine part came in 1955 when he played the title character in Marty. Marty is just an ordinary working Joe, trying to get along, trying to have a life. When he describes himself on the phone to Betsy Blair as he asks for a date, it is one of the truly great moments in filmdom. Mr. Borgnine deserved, and won, an Oscar. This is an underplayed, and very great, movie. 

Mr. Borgnine also shines as one of the guys on an impossible mission in The Dirty Dozen (1967), a film that spawned numerous copy-cats. He is also very good in The Badlanders (1958) and in Jubal (1956).  

All of the movies in this column are available on DVD. All are for mature audiences.