The Beautiful Blonde From Bashful Bend (1949, USA, Sturges)
Betty Grable rampaging across the West, shooting bullets and Preston Sturges’ dialogue. Yes! Watched it all. An unpolished, but otherwise worthy forerunner to Blazing Saddles.
City Across the River (1949, USA, Shane)
Did you know that Poor People often live in Slums and suffer terribly from Juvenile Delinquency? Watching a movie that pretends to know what that is like is the least you can do about it. Watched: 8 minutes.
Mr Belvedere Goes to College (1949, USA, Nugent)
I feel like Shirley Temple is the nemesis of this movie marathon. She’s been there since the mid-30′s, and even now she’s still playing teenage roles. I’d be depressed if I didn’t know she would retire a year later. (And btw, she’s still alive!) To be fair, though, this is quite good, with Temple playing only an ignorable minor role. It’s the old “successful grown-up returns to college to get a formal education” ploy, featuring Sheldon Cooper from The Big Bang Theory. I’m particularly impressed with Mr Belvedere’s familiarity with Norwegian, demonstrated in the clip above. Watched: 7 minutes.
The Inspector General (1949, USA, Koster)
Through accidental circumstances, Danny Kaye is thought to be someone he isn’t. Hilarity ensues. He’s maybe the only funny comedian of the 1940′s, but I’m getting tired of Kaye. He’s like Jim Carrey: Once you’ve seen him make one or two odd faces, you’ve seen it all. Watched: 25 minutes.
I remember seeing an exceptionally well-done performance of The Inspector General years ago, in the original Russian. Typical, but funny Russian black comedy of its period=at the end everybody dies. I must now see the Danny Kaye version. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.
Well, I fast forwarded to the end, and it looked like everybody lived happily ever after, so I’m not sure how much of the black Russian humor has survived.
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