"A Star Is Born" - 1954 version

Cafe Society
1

This weekend, I Tivo’d and watched the 1954 version of A Star Is Born. I had always dearly loved the older version that starred Fredric March and Janet Gaynor, but somehow had never seen this one. I didn’t think it would be as good as the 1937 one.

I was wrong. It was better.

  1. Judy Garland, in addition to completely kicking ass in the singing department (which I expected), also blew me away with her dramatic acting (which I didn’t expect). I don’t cry during movies usually, but I had the kleenex out several times during her scenes.

  2. The cinematography was spectacular in HD, particularly during location shots in Hollywood and Los Angeles. Lileks would probably wet his pants to see the old buildings and cars.

  3. I had no idea that the original movie had been chopped up to shorten it so that more showings and seat turnovers would be possible. The movie has been restored as much as possible, but I thought the “photographic sequence” was somebody’s 1954 idea of an artsy rendering and it was pissing me off. Then I looked at IMDB and saw that a good chunk of film had been cut out and lost. Good Lord, what a travesty!

  4. My husband still hates Judy Garland with every fiber of his being. He had to leave the house while I watched the movie. Do any straight men like Judy?

2

I actually prefer the original original, What Price Hollywood?, with the great Constance Bennett and Lowell Sherman.

3

In a period of six weeks or so, I watched the 1954 version, the 1937 one and the one featuring Barbara Streisand. Actually, I only kinda, sorta, watched the Streisand version–the music didn’t appeal, and I just didn’t like the movie.

My favorite by far was the 1954 version, mostly because of Judy Garland, the music just appealled to me so much.

4

As good as Garland is, this movie is owned up-and-down by James Mason, and this was during the peak of his career (culminating in his fantastic work in Bigger than Life a few years later).

However, I think each subsequent version of ASiB* (starting with Eve’s Hollywood citation) is weaker than the one before, and while Star is good, I wish the musical numbers were better (only “The Man that Got Away” really delivers) for they end up feeling like padding for what ends up being an overlong running time.

5

The 1954 is a spectacular Technicolor marvel, and Garland’s rendition of “The Man That [sic] Got Away” is alone worth the price of admission. (And I’m not a fan of Judy. Well, I’m a Fan of Judy, just not a fan of Judy.) But I have to agree with Eve on this one: if I had to pick one for my carry-on luggage, it would be What Price Hollywood?

6

I really want to see this original original, Eve, but I’ve never yet seen it listed on TCM or any other channel. I keep an eye out for it, though. I love Constance Bennett.

7

Heh…and I love the Barbra Streisand version. Absolutely love it. It’s a 12-hanky blubberfest for me.

8

The 1954 version is my favorite, though I’ve never seen the original original. Or the Barbra Streisand, for that matter.

But James Mason (swoon)…

9

I’ll see your James Mason and raise you a Kris Kristofferson. Shoo-Weee! He’s a hottie!

10

I saw A Bore is Starred, as we called it, when it first came out . . . All my friends went out and got Barbra Streisand Jewfros.

11

I’ve seen it on TCM. A couple years ago, in conjunction with their original production Complicated Women, they showed it, along with a bunch more pre-code Tough Broad films. Anytime you see Constance Bennett, Irene Dunn, Kay Francis, Barbara Stanwyck, Norma Shearer, Ruth Chatterton, or Loretta Young’s name in the credits of a pre-1934 film, set your TiVo on “keeper.” The films those broads made between 1929 and 1933 are almost all worth watching, if only because Joan Blondell or Una Merkel will be in most of them as the sidekick.

Coincidentally, TCM is showing Complicated Women tomorrow, October 10, at 6am. I think that’s Eastern time, although there’s a glitch on the TCM website right now and the page for October 10 is broked. They’re showing it again December 4 at 11pm EST, as part of an evening of pre-code movies. Including the IMPOSSIBLE to see, never released on video, I’ll kill myself if my TiVo screws up, original of Waterloo Bridge, directed by the great James Whale and starring Mae Clark and Bette Davis. If the only version you’ve ever seen is Vivian Leigh’s prettied up (I almost said “tarted up,” which would have been totally inaccurate) version, you ain’t seen it. In the original, Myra is a prostitute; in the remake, she’s a dancer. (Although, now that I think of it, by “prettying up” the story for the Hays Code, somebody was prostituting themselves . . . you just couldn’t show it on the screen.)

Anyway. Also that evening are the not-to-be-missed Babyface, perhaps the pre-code-iest of the pre-codes. I hope they show the recently discovered uncensored print, in which Barbara Stanwyck’s character deliberately sets out to manipulate rich men using her, um, power over them, rather than–as in the censored version–being driven to do so out of necessity and victimhood.

Also the wonderful Stanwyck vehicle, Night Nurse (yay Joan Blondell!), with the slick and sleazy chauffeur played by the young and pre-mustachioed Clark Gable. And the also not-be-missed Red Headed Woman, script doctored by Anita Loos:
Jean Harlow:* [Trying on a dress] *Can you see through this?
Salesgirl: I’m afraid you can, Miss.
Jean Harlow: I’ll wear it.

12

I prefer the Craig Russell version, Outrageous! Which even includes a slam on the Barbra Streisand version, which sucks.

I might possibly be the biggest and most unabashed Judy queen on the boards and while I liked her version and still agree with Groucho Marx’s assessment that her losing the Oscar was the biggest robbery since Brinks, ASIB is far down the list of my favorite of her movies. I’d much rather watch Meet Me in St Louis or The Wizard of Oz or The Clock or The Harvey Girls.

I’ve seen WPH but it’s been a lot of years and I don’t have a really clear recollection of it.

13

I totally agree. *MMiSL *is my lifetime top 10, and *THG *makes my top 25. *ASiB *is maybe in the top 1000 or so.

14

Dang. One of my pet peeves is when people don’t capitalize “Is” in titles, and I just reflexively did just that. Please note the correction.

15

K, Complicated Women is on at 3am EST, tomorrow morning. Followed by Devotion (1931), which I’m not familiar with, and then with Week-End Marriage (1932), which I love.

16

Dang. Hit tab-replay accidentally.

Anyway, Week-End Marriage is great until the ending, which feels tacked on. Which is possible: the Code was applied retroactively to movies re-released after its inception. Which is why the recent discovery of the uncensored version of *Babyface *is such a big deal.

17

Unless you start spelling things out, young man, I am going to break your TiVO.

18

Check out this month’s “Vanity Fair”. Kris is in there in a country music pictorial. I had to turn to his page with asbestos mitts. And he’s 70!!! :eek:
VCNJ~

19

Well, yeah…you gotta hate the hair. And most of the costumes. But it was still a great tear-jerker.

20

The 1937 Star Is Born is not officially a remake of What Price Hollywood (1932). As a matter of fact, it was more of a ripoff. The legal department at RKO, which produced What Price Hollywood, considered a copyright infringement action against Selznick International Pictures, which produced A Star Is Born. Not-so-coincidentally, David O. Selznick was head of production at RKO when What Price was made.