Random Movie Club

Your April Random Movie Club Results Are In!

Tagline: See 'em sizzle in the big, buxom, beautiful musical!

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GENTLEMEN MARRY BRUNETTES IS A NIGHTMARE
...IN CINEMASCOPE

You may think the 1953 movie with Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell was the first screen adaptation of GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES, but believe it or not there was a silent film version, released twenty-five years earlier. Although there's a cast list, not one print of this movie remains. Both versions were based on Anita Loos's wildly popular book of the same name, published in 1925.

And now, a diversion. "JED IS DEAD" - PART ONE: Eighty-three years ago, a rebel teenager, let's call him Jed, swiped a print of 1928's GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES. If Jed is alive today, he's about 100 years old. That's a fine age to die. So later this year (2012), when his kids, all in their 70s, clean out Jed's apartment in Dayton or Biloxi or wherever that reformed hooligan ended up, they will discover, among his personal effects and Depends, the only existing print of the original 1928 version of GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES. (To be continued...)

Three roaring years after Loos released BLONDES, she wrote a sequel called BUT GENTLEMEN MARRY BRUNETTES. Trying to capture the success of the 1953 BLONDES film, and even though it has little to do with Loos's book (all new characters), they made GENTLEMEN MARRY BRUNETTES, which is the movie that the demons that operate the Random Movie Generator spat out for us tonight.

"JED IS DEAD" - PART TWO: Upon saving the only existing silent movie print of BLONDES, Jed's kids decide to swap it out for every print and digital download (hey, it's my story, lay off) of the 1955 film GENTLEMEN MARRY BRUNETTES and place them all in the coffin with Jed, right before it slides into the crematorium. (To be continued...)

I know, I know, Fictitious Jed's story is a long way to go to illustrate just how bad BRUNETTES is, but I wanted to go flowery. I'm not, however, the only one guilty of folderol, because BRUNETTES is a comedy with no comedy, with witty quips without the witty, and Alan Young, who will eternally be known as Mr. Ed's owner, singing AIN'T MISBEHAVIN' in a gorilla suit (actually, that was the only part I liked). I'm guessing that there was a moment while making this movie when Young called his agent - "I'd rather work with a talking horse than be on this picture!"

For some reason unknown to everyone in the world, they gave the airhead "Marilyn" role (Dialogue example: "Well, all that loot didn't get here by radar.") to the usually brassy Jane Russell, who played the brassy role in the original. This left Jeanne Crain to bring on da brash. And that's just one of the problems. Here are the lights, both high and low:

The movie centers around the Jones Sisters, Bonnie (Jane Russell) and Connie (Jeanne Crain). Bonnie's just a girl who can't say 'no' to any man who proposes to her (CONNIE to Bonnie: "Are you a sex maniac?"). And apparently, any man who meets her does propose to her. With all these suitors, Connie and Bonnie have to take their singing act to another town. Again. But this time a telegram from Paris means they can also leave the country. And who is sending for them? An agent/man of action named David Action (Scott Brady) and his trusty manservant Charlie (Alan Young). Charlie, an aspiring entertainer that Action can't seem to promote (this is a storyline that's almost invisible), has a different job every day - traffic cop, lion feeder, street cleaner, ice cream salesman, tourist guide, museum caretaker. This is what passes for humor.

Crain-Russell-Leopard by Random Movie Club

Rudy Vallee plays Rudy Vallee (at one point, someone actually refers to him by his real name - Hubert Prior Vallee), who knew (and proposed to both of) the original Jones Sisters, Mitzi and Mimi, in the '20s (played in flashbacks by Russell and Crain as blondes). Mimi and Mitzi were the hit of Paris back then (and major golddiggers). When Action tells Rudy that Mimi's daughters are arriving in France, well, Rudy wants to repeat history and make them famous. But in the 1920's Paree, anything went, including the wardrobe. The girls turn down offers in three places, presented to us in four (they take the fourth job) identical scenes in a row, all repeating the same thing (audition, "what do we wear?", promoter gives them a bangle or tells them "pumps and a headband", they pass). Just when they're giving up hope on working (the fourth gig doesn't go so well) and on love (Bonnie loves Charlie, Connie loves Action...but it's not going well for any of them), an unknown benefactor arranges for the girls to open in a club in Monte Carlo. But first, another series of repetitive beats where the girls are showered with Moët, cognac, Dior, a pair of poodles, jewels, and a fashion show in their hotel room.

Because the plot is labored, as so many of these "whimsical" musicals were, they rely on the musical numbers to keep the train on the track. But for me, that problem is compounded because truth be told, the Jones Sisters act is terrible. I can't imagine these two being a hit anywhere, even in the corny-as-Kansas-in-August era of musicals. Twelve songs, three of them Rodgers and Hart, fill the movie, the last of which is the one mentioned earlier on this very page; the one that features Alan Young in a gorilla suit singing AIN'T MISBEHAVIN'. Halfway through, the girls join in, cementing this as the best part in the film, especially if you listen to the natives' (it's a stage production number) hilarious backing vocals.

Then there's a whole section of the movie where Action and Charlie show Bonnie and Connie around Paris. Why? Because they didn't spend all that money on Cinemascope just to show indoor musical numbers. And I have no source for this, but perhaps they were trying to ride the success of AN AMERICAN IN PARIS, released four years earlier. Speaking of which, there's one scene where Bonnie and Connie have nightmares. When they awake - BONNIE: "I'm having bad dreams!" CONNIE: "Dreams? It's more like nightmares...in Cinemascope." But there's some really nice footage of Paris in '55, including one song that was shot on the Eiffel Tower, or as kids today must think it's spelled, iFull Tower.

This is not to say there was nothing entertaining in this movie. If you poke around, you'll enjoy a song here and a quip there.

I did laugh a few times, like when the sisters were auditioning at the Casino de Paris, doing the same act their mother and aunt did 30 years earlier; the booker, who had seen that original act, says: "The only thing that's changed is my...(pats his fat stomach)...age." Another moment finds Bonnie and Connie removing their feather boas to reveal they are wearing clothes, prompting the outraged French theater manager to squawk: "I have never seen anything so vulgar!!" And in a production number, Rudy plays a sax that someone holds up to his lips, when needed. But the movie itself plods so badly that these moments are like using a Dixie cup to bail out your Titanic. Oh! Oh! I nearly forgot! The biggest laugh in BRUNETTES is when Bonnie talks about her inability to say 'no'. BONNIE: "...and then he proposes, and something inside of me snaps!" This line is immediately followed by the sound effect of a cartoon boink! And it's not like this was done throughout the movie. It was just this one time, which is just so damn goofy it made us laugh. Did some producer say, "Hey you, put a boink! after she says that line. People'll die laughing." If he did, he was right. It killed us. Boink!

I know that these movies are musicals, and there are different rules. My problem is, just because rules are different doesn't mean you can break them. For example, when they find themselves with the invite to play Monte Carlo, they borrow Rudy Vallee's car and drive 1000 miles (which probably took even longer in those pre-highway days). And when they arrive, they are surprised to find Rudy Vallee there in town for a film festival. But wait, how did they borrow Rudy's car in Paris if he was in Monte Carlo? And didn't Rudy need his car to drive to Monaco for the film festival? And why is Rudy Vallee even friends with David Action, a loser and sham? And how come Charlie is Action's, shall we say, bitch? [SPOILER] And if Charlie is secretly a gazillionaire, why is he stealing a loaf of bread and a bottle of milk the first time we see him? Aladdin and Jean Valjean, at least they had motives. And...and....and....oh, forget it. I suppose I'm trying to find logic in an illogical world. But just so you know, as it does in the movies, illogical things bother me in real life too. If you want proof, next time you see me, ask me to tell you the dune buggy story.

Scott Brady (Action) and Jane Russell (Bonnie)

BRUNETTES was written by Anita Loos's niece Mary, a busy screenwriter in her time, and directed by her husband Richard Sale. It was produced by husband and wife Robert Waterfield and Jane Russell (Russ-Field Productions). Maybe we're learning how this movie came together. That said, Twentieth Century Fox, who made BLONDES, wasn't very happy with someone else (United Artists, I think) making this movie. So that's why the new lead characters were invented. But you can bet your ass if they pulled that today, there'd be a lawsuit with all the details available on Deadline.com.

JED IS DEAD - PART THREE: There's a party at the Sands Hotel in Vegas. Sinatra is there, and so is Chet Baker and Elvis Costello. They perform MY FUNNY VALENTINE together, a song that they all recorded. There are bowls filled with Wise potato chips, cans of Tab, and M & M's. When the music's over, everyone looks around, stunned into silence. "What the hell is going on, Jilly?" snaps Frankie. And he's right. Sinatra and Baker are alive? The Sands Hotel is open and swingin'? And while everyone tries to figure it out, I stand watching, washing the Wise chips down with Tab. And then I smile, because I know that all of the prints of GENTLEMEN MARRY BRUNETTES are buried with Jed. And that there's a whole bowl of M & M's calling me. The end.

NOTE: If BRUNETTES can break rules and get all wacky for no reason, why can't I? At least my story has M & M's and Sinatra.

Posted by Rich on April 01, 2012 at 10:00 AM | Permalink