1948: Gentleman's Agreement

I needed to watch this. You need to watch this. We all need to watch this.

Gentleman's Agreement is about a journalist who goes undercover as a Jew to investigate anti-semitism in post World War II New York City. 

Let me quickly mention that it's a really good movie. Gregory Peck is great. Philip Schuyler Green is a different character than Atticus Finch, which is all I really knew about him before this movie. But the different characters have the same moral compass. I was expecting to write more about that and about director Elia Kazan and his role in the McCarthy hearings. But as good as the movie is (take a look at where I ranked it at the end), it's the overall theme that is so important.

I kept thinking about how watching Gentleman's Agreement so soon after Charlottesville and the national discussion involved serendipitous timing for me. It's so relevant. But then, and perhaps it was the history teacher in me, I realized that it didn't matter that I saw it now. It was timely when it came out, of course. It was timely in the 1960s. It will be timely today, was yesterday, and will be for far too long.

After watching the previous Oscar movies, I had expectations going into the movie (my prejudice?). I knew as much as my second paragraph above and nothing more. I had an image in my head of what this movie was going to be. They were going to call out the people who use anti-semitic words, don't hire Jews, and every other big stereotype. And they do. But they also call out those who sit back and allow it to happen.

One of the characters talks about sitting and listening to someone tell a joke filled with racist jokes. She describes how angry she was. She describes how hurt she felt. She states that she and several others felt uncomfortable. The response from the other character, who is Jewish, was simply "What did you DO?" That's all he keeps repeating. It works and gets the point across in the movie, but one that still hasn't spread.

Yes, you can absolutely watch this and replace "Jewish" with "Muslim," "immigrant," "black," "gay," or any other term that you are glad you aren't. Gentelman's Agreement discusses, though doesn't use the exact phrase, Christian Privilege. The same arguments work for White Privilege. If you are white, have heard the phrase white privilege, and still believe you don't have it, or just still don't understand it, this movie might be a good way for you to still figure it out and let it sink in.

If you're still supporting 45 even after his difficulty in condemning Nazis and those sheetheads, the KKK, and people are calling you racist even though you're only supporting him because of the economy, this movie might be too much for you. That's because you're wrong. You're on the wrong side of history. Your Facebook posts are Hazel Bryan's face.

But I did use the word "might." Hazel changed. Orange Julius Caesar still has plenty of time to do irreparable damage to the nation and to your place in history. you're wrong and you're running out of time.


NEXT WEEK: 1949 - Hamlet

Oscar Project Rankings:

1. Casablanca (1944)
   
2. It Happened One Night (1935)
3. Gentleman's Agreement (1948)
4. The Best Years of Our Lives (1947)
5. All Quiet on the Western Front (1931)
6. Rebecca (1941)
7. Mutiny on the Bounty (1936)
8. You Can't Take It With You (1939) 
9. Gone With the Wind (1940)
10. The Life of Emile Zola (1938)
11. Grand Hotel (1933)
12. Cimarron (1932)
13. The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
14. Broadway Melody (1930)
15. The Lost Weekend (1946)
16. Going My Way (1945)
17. How Green Was My Valley (1942)
18. Wings (1929)
19. Mrs. Miniver (1943)
20. Cavalcade (1934)

1947: The Best Years of Our Lives

The Best Years of Our Lives was number 37 on the AFI 100 Years... 100 Movies list, so I first watched it while going through that list. Watching those movies was one of my inspirations for starting this Oscar Project. I was introduced to a lot of great movies that I hadn't seen before, such as The Best Years of Our Lives. I was hoping for the same with this project, though most of the movies I've enjoyed I had already seen.

The Best Years of Our Lives starts off with a literal emotional hook that maintains through the movie. To me, that's what makes this movie work. The emotions. It never goes over the top with them.

The events that happen affect the characters and their lives. They feel happy. They feel sad. They feel angry. Excited. Love. Hate. And the situations change their lives. But nothing is ever a tragic life or death situation. Nobody is going through an emotional breakdown because of what they experience. Instead of an emotional roller coaster, it feels... like real life. And that's so appropriate because these guys had been facing real life or death situations in World War II.

Of course, many great works of art are all about taking emotions to the extreme. That's what we often love about movies and books and TV shows.  We often see that in slice of life type films, and sometimes it works. The Best Years of Our Lives isn't a slice of life movie. It isn't extreme. But it works.

Does it still hold up today? Some of the acting still feels very old fashioned and it's a bit too long. I think these two things might stop a younger audience from trying to like it. I believe it holds up much better than most of the movies I've watched in this project.

When I first watched this back in 2001 for the AFI list, I wrote that I planned to watch this again soon. I'm sorry it has taken me almost sixteen years to get to it, and I hope it won't be another sixteen.

NEXT WEEK: 1948 - Gentleman's Agreement

Oscar Project Rankings:

1. Casablanca (1944)
   
2. It Happened One Night (1935)
3. The Best Years of Our Lives (1947)
4. All Quiet on the Western Front (1931)
5. Rebecca (1941)
6. Mutiny on the Bounty (1936)
7. You Can't Take It With You (1939) 
8. Gone With the Wind (1940)
9. The Life of Emile Zola (1938)
10. Grand Hotel (1933)
11. Cimarron (1932)
12. The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
13. Broadway Melody (1930)
14. The Lost Weekend (1946)
15. Going My Way (1945)
16. How Green Was My Valley (1942)
17. Wings (1929)
18. Mrs. Miniver (1943)
19. Cavalcade (1934)

1946: The Lost Weekend

I'm starting to write this by looking at the list at the bottom. When this started, there were several movies that I had to sit through that drove me insane. I was really looking forward to watching Grand Hotel and Cimarron weigh down the bottom of the list. After eighteen movies, they really shouldn't remain in the top ten, and only a few places above Gone With the Wind. It looks like so many of the classic movies of the forties didn't win the Oscar.

So what was good about The Lost Weekend? It shows the dark side of alcohol (until the last two minutes, that is) and more of a reality of alcoholism. Perhaps it was one of the first to really do so.

A bartender has a pretty good line in speaking about a shot of whiskey. "One's too many and a hundred's not enough."

The best part is when the main character, Don, gets caught stealing a purse, he gets kicked out of the bar. The piano man at the bar starts to sing, "Somebody stole a purse... everybody!" and then the rest of the bar sings along as he gets kicked out. That was pretty good. I think we're probably getting pretty close to the having the technology to have similar scarlet songs follow around criminals

But I didn't care for Ray Milland. The Wikipedia article on The Lost Weekend states that "The film was intended to have no musical score, but preview audiences laughed at what they considered Milland's overwrought performance." As far as I'm concerned, the score didn't cover his Oscar winning performance enough.


NEXT WEEK: 1947 - The Best Years of Our Lives

Oscar Project Rankings:

1. Casablanca (1944)
   
2. It Happened One Night (1935)
3. All Quiet on the Western Front (1931)
4. Rebecca (1941)
5. Mutiny on the Bounty (1936)
6. You Can't Take It With You (1939) 
7. Gone With the Wind (1940)
8. The Life of Emile Zola (1938)
9. Grand Hotel (1933)
10. Cimarron (1932)
11. The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
12. Broadway Melody (1930)
13. The Lost Weekend (1946)
14. Going My Way (1945)
15. How Green Was My Valley (1942)
16. Wings (1929)
17. Mrs. Miniver (1943)
18. Cavalcade (1934)

1945: Going My Way

It's a... nice movie. But it's not particularly interesting.

The first thirty minutes were not great. I had to stop to take a nap so that my nap wouldn't be during the next thirty minutes. But it got a bit better from there.

This movie is about a Catholic priest. One of the subplots is about him working with a bunch of boys as he turns them into a choir. It was all innocent, and I'm sure that viewers in 1944 thought nothing of it. But watching it in 2017, especially after the Oscar winner from a few years ago, Spotlight, there were some bits that are a bit cringeworthy.

Another of the subplots, one that ties in with the boys later, involves Father O'Malley's music. O'Malley, played by Bing Crosby, is a song writer. Going My Way isn't just the name of the movie but it's the name of the song he wants to sell. The funny thing is that it isn't that great of a song. In fact, that's acknowledged in the movie with the music publishers not thinking much of it either. But it's featured twice and the movie is named after it.  But then he sings another of the songs O'Malley wrote, "Swinging on a Star." It's a much more fun song, and one that has survived. So since it's a better song, how about naming the movie after that one? And feature it twice instead of the other?

One good thing about Going My Way is that it wasn't predictable. All throughout the movie I though I knew what was going to happen next and which direction the various subplots were headed. I was just about always wrong. So it's got that going for it, which is nice. I would have rather watched Double Indemnity, which was nominated. It looks like I'll get a film noir fix with the next movie.





NEXT WEEK: 1946 - The Lost Weekend

Oscar Project Rankings:

1. Casablanca (1944)
   
2. It Happened One Night (1935)
3. All Quiet on the Western Front (1931)
4. Rebecca (1941)
5. Mutiny on the Bounty (1936)
6. You Can't Take It With You (1939) 
7. Gone With the Wind (1940)
8. The Life of Emile Zola (1938)
9. Grand Hotel (1933)
10. Cimarron (1932)
11. The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
12. Broadway Melody (1930)
13. Going My Way (1945)
14. How Green Was My Valley (1942)
15. Wings (1929)
16. Mrs. Miniver (1943)
17. Cavalcade (1934)

1944: Casablanca

I've seen Casablanca several times. My favorite viewing was at the Paramount Theater in Oakland a few years back. Watching it with an audience made me realize what a funny movie it is. I think that every line by Claude Rains as Captain Renault is absolutely perfect in an economy of words and delivery.

Looking through the list of Oscar movies I still need to watch, there will be very few contenders for the top spot after Casablanca. Clearly, my delay in getting to this movie had nothing to do with dread in watching it. In fact, I just watched it and I could happily pop it in again right, perhaps with one of the commentaries (Ebert's is excellent). No, I just forgot about this project for awhile.


NEXT WEEK: 1945 - Going My Way

Oscar Project Rankings:

1. Casablanca (1944)
2. It Happened One Night (1935)
3. All Quiet on the Western Front (1931)
4. Rebecca (1941)
5. Mutiny on the Bounty (1936)
6. You Can't Take It With You (1939) 
7. Gone With the Wind (1940)
8. The Life of Emile Zola (1938)
9. Grand Hotel (1933)
10. Cimarron (1932)
11. The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
12. Broadway Melody (1930)
13. How Green Was My Valley (1942)
14. Wings (1929)
15. Mrs. Miniver (1943)
16. Cavalcade (1934)