Manpower (1941)
Posted: September 14th, 2007, 1:40 pm
I've been waiting to see this movie forever (the last showing was in December of 2005!) and I'm happy to say that it didn't disappoint. I'll watch anything that Edward G. Robinson is in and the added bonus of George Raft, made it even better.
I started the thread here because I'm not sure what genre it would go in. Is it a comedy? With support from Alan Hale and Frank McHugh, it was a comedy. There are various scenes where these two turn it into almost slapstick. The hospital scenes in particular were very comedic and when chasing the nurses around, Hale reminded me of Animal from The Muppet Show. His character was also reminicent of the one he played in "Desperate Journey", which I saw on Reagan day during SUTS. Eve Arden is her usual wisecracking self in her scenes with Marlene Dietrich and it's good to see.
But it's also a drama: there's the love triangle between Robinson/Dietrich/Raft, her father getting electrocuted at the beginning and Dietrich working as a "nightclub hostess" (I always enjoy those thinly veiled occupation titles hinting at prostitution).
I'm not a huge Marlene fan (although I always enjoy reading stories about her--she's a real character!), but she looked absolutely gorgeous in this film. The reason I most wanted to see this film however, was after reading about the behind the scenes fights between Robinson and Raft. Both were smitten with Marlene after separately meeting with her (I believe the book on Robinson I read uses the term, "Schooboy Crush"). When Hedda Hopper started a rumor that Dietrich was going to be replaced by Ann Sheridan, both actors stormed the WB front office with complaints. Raft didn't like sharing top billing with Robinson and wound up punching him during the scene in the hamburger place. Raft also objected to the ending, since letting Robinson go made him look weak; it was decided to have the line break instead.
The whole shoot was a total mess (even going overbudged) and I wouldn't believe it, since Robinson and Raft look so buddy-buddy throughout the whole thing (they finally made up during the shoot of "A Bullet for Joey" in 1955).
It's a shame TCM doesn't play it more often and that it's not on DVD. And even though it was somewhat unbalanced with the comedy to drama ratio, I enjoyed it and I'd watch it again. Good performances, especially by Eddie G--he plays kind of a woman-chasing schlub and then goes a little crazy at the end, which I love. He's so good at going nuts!
I started the thread here because I'm not sure what genre it would go in. Is it a comedy? With support from Alan Hale and Frank McHugh, it was a comedy. There are various scenes where these two turn it into almost slapstick. The hospital scenes in particular were very comedic and when chasing the nurses around, Hale reminded me of Animal from The Muppet Show. His character was also reminicent of the one he played in "Desperate Journey", which I saw on Reagan day during SUTS. Eve Arden is her usual wisecracking self in her scenes with Marlene Dietrich and it's good to see.
But it's also a drama: there's the love triangle between Robinson/Dietrich/Raft, her father getting electrocuted at the beginning and Dietrich working as a "nightclub hostess" (I always enjoy those thinly veiled occupation titles hinting at prostitution).
I'm not a huge Marlene fan (although I always enjoy reading stories about her--she's a real character!), but she looked absolutely gorgeous in this film. The reason I most wanted to see this film however, was after reading about the behind the scenes fights between Robinson and Raft. Both were smitten with Marlene after separately meeting with her (I believe the book on Robinson I read uses the term, "Schooboy Crush"). When Hedda Hopper started a rumor that Dietrich was going to be replaced by Ann Sheridan, both actors stormed the WB front office with complaints. Raft didn't like sharing top billing with Robinson and wound up punching him during the scene in the hamburger place. Raft also objected to the ending, since letting Robinson go made him look weak; it was decided to have the line break instead.
The whole shoot was a total mess (even going overbudged) and I wouldn't believe it, since Robinson and Raft look so buddy-buddy throughout the whole thing (they finally made up during the shoot of "A Bullet for Joey" in 1955).
It's a shame TCM doesn't play it more often and that it's not on DVD. And even though it was somewhat unbalanced with the comedy to drama ratio, I enjoyed it and I'd watch it again. Good performances, especially by Eddie G--he plays kind of a woman-chasing schlub and then goes a little crazy at the end, which I love. He's so good at going nuts!