WHAT FILMS HAVE YOU SEEN LATELY?

[CineMaven]

Here's how I see them (realizing that everyone is going to view these people completely differently)

Wendy, I picked names that came to my head in a teensy combination of stream-of-consciousness and conscious thought. I'll show you how I think of the various names below:

Norma Shearer - movie star (and a damn good one)



MOVIE STAR ( her name alone could bring in the throngs. She’s so overdramatic. You know...like a movie star. )

* * *

Claude Rains - actor



ACTOR ( a very good supporting character actor. Changed his wigs from “Robin Hood” to “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” to “Four Daughters.” How could the man in "Deception" be the same man in "Notorious" be the same man in "Now, Voyager" Ahhh...he's not. )

* * *

Mary Astor - actor and movie star



ACTOR ( often always such the second fiddle behind a more glamorous name. I thought she was a glamorous character actress who slightly had the élan of a movie star, but not quite. I still love her though. )

* * *

Helen Hayes - actor



ACTOR ( didn’t have the glam and sex appeal of a movie star, but there’s nothing wrong being an Actor. I am intrigued by her...she's got "something." )

* * *

Gary Cooper - movie star and actor



MOVIE STAR ( maybe he was an actor in the 30’s...maybe he was an actor in the 50’s but those 40’s I could only see him stuck in an “Aw shucks” box without stretching his acting chops. But hey, there’s nothing wrong being a Movie Star. Who doesn't want to drink in a tall glass of water? )

* * *

Garbo - movie star and actor



MOVIE STAR-ACTOR ( lets get real, Garbo was the most famous person on the planet at one point - no movie star today is more popular than Garbo was in her heydey. - Okay, alright, apples and oranges. - I consider her a fine actress too. Very natural. Able to exhibit deep wells of emotion. And if I were being fair, if Coop got stuck in an “aw shucks” box - IMHO - maybe Garbo got stuck in a “tragedian” box. But it’s Garbo and my bias dictates...all bets are off! )

* * *

Deborah Kerr - movie star (I know this is the one I'm going to get flack about. She took acting seriously, but in my mind she's a movie star all the way, and no pretense of being an 'actor'. She's great, but somehow I can't get her in the actor category. I'm weird)



ACTOR ( no flack from me, mi Hermana! But I do primarily see her as an Actor. I guess I associate Movie Star with glamour and pizzazz and a heightened sense of their own screen persona. She was beautiful and I’d put her in a rung above Astor. We can discuss your weirdness over drinks. )

* * *

Melvyn Douglas - actor



???? I honestly couldn’t decide. Hey, you don’t think I’m giving this deep thought d’ya? This is just my own little Rorschach test of what first comes to mind when I think of these names. I think of him as a combination of both - with a caveat. He was rarely given weighty enough material to be given the Actor mantle, and not handsome and sexy enough to be a Movie Star. Uh-oh, not handsome or sexy enough? Yeah. He might be handsome and sexy if you think about it intellectually...but viscerally...ladies, you know what I’m talkin’ about. Or am I out on that limb alone? Again. Hey, I’m lucky to recently come around to even liking Melvyn Douglas. The article you posted here about him long ago Wendy tipped me over to the Douglas side. Loved the way his voice cracks. He nailed it in "HUD." See...all you need is a good script. )

* * *

Warren William - movie star



MOVIE STAR ( Charming roué...he has a different kind of handsome look that I got used to. He did have his moment in the sun in the 30's. )

* * *

Trevor Howard - actor



ACTOR ( but he was sooooo romantic in "Brief Encounter." A romantic actor. Do I need a doctor? )

* * *

George Sanders - movie star and actor



ACTOR ( primarily I see him as an actor. But he’s got such a highbrow persona, he can make me believe he’s a Movie Star. Does that make sense? Oy vey, am I s’posed to be making sense here?? I never made "sense" part of the deal... "The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry" and "All About Eve." Same man? )

* * *

Douglas Fairbanks - movie star to end all movie stars



MOVIE STAR ( his panache is incredible. )

* * *

Myrna Loy - actor and movie star



MOVIE STAR ( I love Loy. I can’t quite say Actor though she was very accomplished opposite Powell, Gable, Tracy. She’s shiny and glamorous and gorgeous. I can't get the sound of ice tinkling against a martini glass out of my head. But I want to be persuaded if anyone cares to make a case. )

* * *

John Wayne - actor and movie star



MOVIE STAR w/shades of ACTOR ( Hmmmmm...he’s so darned larger than life, that maybe he blocks out the rays of his acting talent. But there’s no doubt in “The Searchers” even Spencer Tracy couldn’t touch him. And I’m sure John Wayne fans can cite other films of his where he is an Actor - “Red River” to name one. )

* * *

Anne Bancroft - actor



ACTOR ( I...miss...Anne Bancroft...so...much. )

[CineMaven]

[JackFavell]

What she said.

[CineMaven]

Yeah...I thought so.



I thought so.


( Maybe George Clooney could do a remake of "The Thomas Crown Affair" with cool blonde Charlize Theron. I'm just trying to think of an actor today who has McQueen's....je ne sais quoi. Slim pickin's. Or Slim Pickens. )

[ChiO]

Slim pickin's. Or Slim Pickens.

Speaking of whom....

Finally, for the first time, last night I saw DR. STRANGELOVE on a big screen. Absolutely my favorite War movie. Depending on the day of the week, absolutely my favorite Comedy (DUCK SOUP sometimes is #1). And, after INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and ROSEMARY'S BABY, my favorite Horror movie.

When Peter Sellers is the least funny guy (with a major role(s)) in a movie, that's Comedy.

Sterling Hayden...le genius!

Thank you, Stanley Kubrick.

[JackFavell]

Maven,

in reply to your great descriptive movie star/actor post:

Mary Astor : Now I know we agree here, but give me a minute to clarify why I place her in both categories, and high up in each.



She started out as a bona fide movie star, opposite Barrymore, Douglas Fairbanks, Warner Baxter, and William Boyd, but she herself said she had no idea what she was doing. She worked and worked and worked to become a good actress, and by the time she gets to about 1932 or so, she's really starting to become a very complex, deeply motivated character actress. As her career peaked and then waned, Mary doesn't give up, or retire, or even rest on her laurels. She keeps getting better, and better and BETTER. This is why I say movie star first, but actor foremost. Do yourself a favor, and just type in Mary Astor in IMAGES on your computer. Then tell me she isn't one of the best actresses in classic film.



Gary Cooper is in much the same category for me. I think he worked hard to do what he did, and you can see when he gets to the later Mann films, that he has some considerable backstory going on. His range may not be huge, but that doesn't mean he didn't work to get a certain quiet depth. He has a lot in common with Loy, in that his demeanor was everything, but that doesn't mean it isn't acting. And I ask you, could he really get away with this



if he wasn't an actor?


Oh yeah. Myrna Loy is definitely a movie star.



but for me, she's principally an actor.... I can't believe some of the sharp line readings, and the way she basically never mis-stepped in her entire career. Pretty much from day one, she could say her lines and move in a way that shows the thought went into what she is doing. She's deceptively natural, like Kerr, but I bet a lot went into that naturalness. That's why I revere her as an actor - it looks so easy. And yes, she has that indefinable something that makes you watch her - that's a movie star.

George Sanders:

Aww, c'mon! This is a movie star! Look:


I saw him this morning in Action in Arabia, and let's face it, the man who walked across the screen at the beginning of the movie, well that is a MOVIE STAR. All he has to do is walk, or open his mouth, and you are bedeviled by him. You MUST watch. And yet, as you say, there's that actor, dying to get out - the George of The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry, or This Land Is Mine. Here's another reason I think of him as a movie star - his brother, who pales in comparison.

[JackFavell]

Slim pickin's. Or Slim Pickens.

Speaking of whom....

Finally, for the first time, last night I saw DR. STRANGELOVE on a big screen. Absolutely my favorite War movie. Depending on the day of the week, absolutely my favorite Comedy (DUCK SOUP sometimes is #1). And, after INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and ROSEMARY'S BABY, my favorite Horror movie.

When Peter Sellers is the least funny guy (with a major role(s)) in a movie, that's Comedy.

Sterling Hayden...le genius!

Thank you, Stanley Kubrick.

That's awesome! Did you notice anything more on the big screen? How did it work for you? Even funnier?

[RedRiver]

Deborah Kerr - movie star (I know this is the one I'm going to get flack about

Prepare for flack! I consider this passionate redhead one of the very best actors I've seen. She's almost unrecognizable in her timid characterization in SEPARATE TABLES. She explores uncomfortable issues in TEA AND SYMPATHY. Her presence in THE INNOCENTS elevates the movie to something more than a ghost story. I don't think I've ever been disappointed.

[ChiO]

Did you notice anything more on the big screen? How did it work for you? Even funnier?

Couple things I noticed -- one for the first time and the other accentuated. In the scene when General Turgidson is giving his first rant standing up in the War Room, he is in the foreground and everyone else is sitting at the table behind him. At the farthest end of the table, before the character is introduced, is Dr. Strangelove (the hair is the giveaway). Never noticed that before. The interior of the plane -- Kubrick's interiors, regardless of what I think of the movie overall, always astound me. Seeing the close-ups of the plane's interior on a big screen was breathtaking.

Even funnier? Not really (of course, when it's at the top of my Funny List, it's tough to rise). Except...the weakest part of the film for me has always been Seller's Strangelove schtick at the end -- the first "Heil" is funny, the second not so much; "Mein Fuerher, I can walk!" seems rather vulgar; and, choking himself never did anything for me. But, oddly, rather than being worse when magnified, it added a surrealistic element that was more in keeping with the rest of the film. So, not necessarily "funnier", but more of a piece. What the big screen really ramped up for me was the Horror. Especially when the camera is looking almost straight up at General Jack D. Ripper's face, with that cigar, in super-close-up and he's explaining the World as he sees it to Col. Mandrake -- what had always just been screamingly hilarious (in a black sort of way) had an increased sense of Horror added that almost made me forget to laugh. Maybe fluoridation was a bad thing? I'm switching to pure grain alcohol and rain water. And still denying women my essence.

Survival kit contents check. In them you'll find: one forty-five caliber automatic; two boxes of ammunition; four days' concentrated emergency rations; one drug issue containing antibiotics, morphine, vitamin pills, pep pills, sleeping pills, tranquilizer pills; one miniature combination Russian phrase book and Bible; one hundred dollars in rubles; one hundred dollars in gold; nine packs of chewing gum; one issue of prophylactics; three lipsticks; three pair of nylon stockings. Shoot, a fella' could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all that stuff.

Priceless.

[JackFavell]

I can definitely visualize how it would be exponentially more horrifying, more of that genre too, which I never really thought of before. That's really interesting about the Peter Sellers' Strangelove section - I think we've all seen that part so many times that it seems a bit much. This is why I like to see movies on the big screen, or at least HEAR about them being on the big screen. Thanks!

[Rita Hayworth]

This is why I like to see movies on the big screen, or at least HEAR about them being on the big screen. Thanks!

Amen to that!

[movieman1957]

Oh, I did see a fairly tame picture called "Man Of The World" with Carole Lombard and William Powell. It's an odd picture of Powell living in Paris making a living blackmailing people. Not very long and a rather odd ending but it is nice to see them together.

It was on a disc with "We're Not Dressing" which I thought was kind of quirky in a fun way when I saw it on TCM a few years ago. This time not so much. Of course, that could all be me.

[JackFavell]

Ooh, that sounds interesting, it's always great to see them together even if it is a bit of an oddity.

Gosh, I think I need to reply to Maven here. I just can't remember why.