These Movies Won NO HOLLYWOOD AWARDS: A Film-Lover’s Guide to the Best of the Rest (Hollywood Classics)

An interesting and unusual title for a book, “These Movies Won No Hollywood Awards” is nonetheless a great new entry in the John Howard Reid series. 142 movies are covered in this volume, with the special added attraction of two articles about director Henry Hathaway and his movies. John was the first critic to make people aware of Hathaway’s importance. At first, only the French critics agreed with John, but eventually reviewers worldwide came to the party. Hathaway is now recognized as one of the great masters of the cinema. As for the films reviewed in this volume, they include Affair in Trinidad, Beau James, Betty in Blunderland, Bitter Rice, The Blue Veil, The Bohemian Girl, The Browning Version, Carrie, Dancing Lady, Destry, Detective Story, Footlight Parade, Mr Denning Drives North, My Wild Irish Rose, On Moonlight Bay, Pandora and the Flying Dutchman, Phone Call from a Stranger, The Prisoner of Zenda, Queen Christina, She Done Him Wrong, De Mille’s first version of The Ten Commandments, Wee Willie Winkie, Woman of Affairs, A Yank at Oxford, You Can’t Cheat an Honest Man and scores of others. Why are these films so important? Affair in Trinidad was Rita Hayworth’s big comeback film after a four-year absence from the screen. Although it was a huge boxoffice success, the movie was panned by the critics. As Hayworth, who produced the movie herself, said later, “It wasn’t really a movie. It was a culmination of compromises made by everyone from the gateman at Columbia right up to Harry Cohn himself.” At least Rita had a typical role and didn’t disappoint her fans. Bob Hope, however, lost a great deal of his own money on his production, Beau James, in which he cast himself in a straight part, rather than a comedy role. In Reid’s opinion, Hope did extremely well by the title character. In fact, he describes Hope’s effort as “one of his best performances ever!” But most picture-goers avoided the movie. Fortunately, few people would disagree with Reid’s next inclusion, Betty in Blunderland, which is widely regarded as the best Betty Boop of all time! Next up is Bitter Rice, a sensational international success which made both its stars, Silvana Mangano and Vittorio Gassman, household words. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer even offered both stars Hollywood contracts. Gassman accepted and was soon cast opposite the studio’s top-ranking Elizabeth Taylor. Another super-popular movie, The Blue Veil, earned a Golden Globe award for Jane Wyman. Less fortunate and far less publicized was Thelma Todd, whose last role in The Bohemian Girl was heavily butchered by the studio. She was reduced to 9th billing in the hope that no-one would notice her. True, she has a song, but it’s dubbed; and she then disappears without any explanation at all after this initial scene! To sum up: A fascinating book! [Adapted from a review by Ross Adams in "Dress Circle" magazine].