Birth of a Notion: fantasy

Showing posts with label fantasy. Show all posts

Monday, December 18, 2017

A World of Toys

"Four stores and many Christmases ago, my father brought forth a factory conceived in innocence and joy and squeezable fun for everyone."

Leslie Zevo (Robin Williams)

You'd think that a movie called "Toys" that premiered at theaters exactly one week before Christmas would be a sure thing.

And yet Barry Levinson's "Toys," which starred Robin Williams and made its debut on this day in 1992, failed to make back half of its budget.

Perhaps, all evidence to the contrary, that is because "Toys" really wasn't a children's movie. It created a whimsical world, much like, say, "Willy Wonka" did, but it used simple childhood experiences and memories to make more complex and mature points.

A kooky toymaker (Donald O'Connor) was at death's door, and he knew it, but he had to decide who should inherit his toy empire. He didn't feel his children (Williams and Joan Cusack) were ready for the responsibility so he decided to leave it to his brother (Michael Gambon), a military general. He wasn't really suited for it; Williams' character had more in common with his father and would have made a better choice. He would have been more likely to represent continuity in the operation of the business.

Well, that was my opinion. (Of course, if the producers had done things in the way that made sense to me, they wouldn't have had a story to tell.)

For example, when the old man finally died, Williams and Cusack opted not to ride in a limousine to the graveside service, choosing instead to ride in their father's car — a bumper car.

It's the sort of thing their father would have done.

But their uncle was a different kind of guy. Frustrated by a career in the military that fell short of his expectations, he agreed to take over the toy factory when his brother died (after consulting with his father, played by Jack Warden in a very limited role) and made his biracial son (rapper LL Cool J) his second in command. He decided to run the factory in a very military way, cracking down on leaks and inaugurating the production of war toys.

That was important because his brother objected to war toys, wouldn't make them in his factory, and Williams' character had inherited that predisposition, it seemed.

The movie seemed to lose its direction, though. Critic Roger Ebert summed it up this way: "The opening scenes create a completely original world, and then the second half of the film invades that world, not with fresh imagination but with tired old conflicts. What are we to make of a world where the battle against war toys is carried out ... by programming peaceful toys to fight?"

It's even more bewildering when you realize how prescient "Toys" was. Several years before most people had heard of virtual reality, "Toys" introduced them to the concept.

"Toys" also introduced viewers to drones — again, many years before they became commonplace.

As always Robin Wright was pretty and charming, and there was an authentic quality to her down–home accent. I guess you could expect that, seeing as she was born in Dallas, but she was raised in San Diego. Maybe that's where she picked up her dolphin imitation.

In its way, I guess "Toys" was kind of a "Peter Pan" story for its generation. It was, more than anything, a tale about those who refuse to grow up — and those who are determined to drag them, kicking and screaming, into the adult world anyway.

Something's gotta give.

Monday, October 30, 2017

Unholy Matrimony

"Ever hear of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire? That was our crowd."

Jennifer (Veronica Lake)

It would be an understandable — but false — conclusion that "I Married a Witch," which premiered on this day in 1942, was the genre predecessor to TV's Bewitched. I've always felt it had more in common with "Bell, Book and Candle," which, in turn, was probably more of an inspiration for Bewitched. But that is really just my own opinion.

The story dated back to the famed witch hunts of colonial days. Two witches (Veronica Lake and Cecil Kellaway) were burned at the stake after being denounced by Frederic March. The witches' ashes were buried beneath a tree to imprison their spirits. Lake put a curse on March and his descendants — they would all marry the wrong women.

And, as the movie showed through the generations, March's descendants (all played by March) did indeed end up with the wrong women. One of March's descendants, who was living at the time of the Civil War, opted to sign up to fight in the war rather than stay at home with his wife.

Then one day lightning split open the tree, and the spirits were freed. Lake and Kellaway, who played her father, went looking for the latest member of March's family. He was running for governor and was about to marry perhaps the greatest shrew of them all (Susan Hayward).

The wedding was to be held on Election Day — a little publicity stunt dreamed up by March's soon–to–be father–in–law.

It was a slapstick love story in the same kind of mistaken–identity way as "A Midsummer Night's Dream." Lake originally intended to torment March, but she ended up accidentally drinking a love potion that had been meant for him — and she became determined to help him in any way she could.

Her father was against helping anyone in March's family so he and Lake were at cross purposes. It seemed he would win out when Hayward found March and Lake embracing and called off the wedding. Her father embarked on an 11th–hour campaign against March in all of his newspapers, and March went from a heavy favorite to a heavy underdog.

But Lake turned things around, engineering a unanimous landslide for March in which even his opponent didn't vote against him.

Who would need to collude with the Russians — or anyone — with a lover who could do that?

(In hindsight, it is rather astonishing that Lake was able to generate a persuasive on–scene attraction to March. She didn't have much good to say about working with him. "He treated me like dirt under his talented feet," Lake said. "Of all actors to end up under the covers with. That happened in one scene, and Mr. March is lucky he didn't get my knee in his groin."

(March didn't regard "I Married a Witch" to be a highlight of his career, either. He said it was the worst experience he had ever had.)

Considering the chemistry that Lake and March had on the screen, it can be a bit of a letdown to learn that they really didn't care for each other. But that is the magic of Hollywood, isn't it? They certainly weren't the first co–stars who couldn't stand each other — nor were they the last.

It is hard to know which, if either, was right, but the evidence I have seen suggests that Lake was the problem. Actor Joel McCrea was considered for the role that eventually went to March. He was even announced as the lead actor in the movie, but he backed out, later claiming it was because he did not want to work with Lake again. The two had been paired in 1941's "Sullivan's Travels."

Well, she may have been hard to work with, but she got results.

The slapstick nature of the story was aided by what I thought was one of Cecil Kellaway's most enjoyable performances — and the South African character actor had a lengthy movie resume that included a rather brief but still memorable role in "Harvey".

"I Married a Witch" received one Oscar nomination — for Best Dramatic Score — but lost to "Now, Voyager."

Monday, September 25, 2017

Telling a Story

The Grandson (Fred Savage): Grandpa, maybe you could come over and read it again to me tomorrow.

Grandpa (Peter Falk): As you wish.

My mother loved "The Princess Bride," which premiered on this day in 1987.

That is what I most remember about the movie.

Mom saw it at a theater. I didn't see it with her. For years after that, she kept urging me to rent the video tape, but I never did. Finally, she gave me a copy of the video tape for Christmas — just a few months before she died in a flash flood.

At the time of her death, I still hadn't watched the tape. I still had it, but I hadn't watched it. So one night I decided I was going to do it for Mom.

I thought the movie was cute, and I could see why Mom liked it, why so many people liked it. Critics liked it, and it was a modest success at the box office, too.

I would have liked to talk with Mom about it. That was what we did almost every time we saw a movie together. Our discussions were brief sometimes, extensive other times, but they were almost always the best part of the movie watching experience for me.

I miss many things about my mother, but that exchange of thoughts and ideas may be what I miss the most. I have no doubt that our conversation about "The Princess Bride" would have been one of our best.

Reading Roger Ebert's review was almost as good. Not quite, but almost.

"'The Princess Bride' reveals itself as a sly parody of sword and sorcery movies, a film that somehow manages to exist on two levels at once," Ebert wrote. "While younger viewers will sit spellbound at the thrilling events on the screen, adults, I think, will be laughing a lot."

I wanted to know which parts Mom found funny — and why. I think I know the answer, but I never truly will.

Ebert elaborated on that point, and I couldn't disagree.

"In its own peculiar way, 'The Princess Bride' resembles 'This Is Spinal Tap,' an earlier film by the same director, Rob Reiner," he wrote. "Both films are funny not only because they contain comedy, but because Reiner does justice to the underlying form of his story. 'Spinal Tap' looked and felt like a rock documentary — and then it was funny. 'The Princess Bride' looks and feels like 'Legend' or any of those other quasi–heroic epic fantasies — and then it goes for the laughs."

Without going into too much detail, the movie was the telling of a story by a grandfather (Peter Falk) to his bedridden grandson (Fred Savage) — and if Mom could be here, I have no doubt she would say that I shouldn't spoil too much for anyone who hasn't seen it.

I don't think it would spoil too much, though, if I told you that, in the context of the story, it was established that the phrase "As you wish" really means "I love you."

When I discovered that, I understood the meaning of the note Mom had attached to that Christmas gift. "I think you'll like this," Mom wrote. "As you wish."

I remember being puzzled by that at the time, and I asked Mom about it. But all she did was smile. She knew what it meant, and she knew I would understand only if I watched the movie.

Monday, June 05, 2017

Bigfoot in the House

"Nancy, I'm not a doctor, but it's got no pulse, it's not breathing, and it's cold as a Popsicle. Believe me, honey, whatever he is, he's definitely dead!"

George (John Lithgow)

As I have mentioned here before, I usually like to look for the lesson or moral of a movie or TV show I write about.

But sometimes you don't want to watch something with a lesson or a moral. Sometimes you just want to escape. Know what I mean?

And if anyone in the movie industry knows about escapism, it's Steven Spielberg.

Spielberg didn't direct "Harry and the Hendersons," which made its debut on this date in 1987, but the production company he founded — Amblin Entertainment — produced it. And, unless you happen to believe in Bigfoot, it was pure escapism — reminiscent of "E.T." in many ways.

(In fact, I know people who think "Harry and the Hendersons" was better than "E.T." Personally, I don't, but that's just me.)

Actually, there was a lesson or two — kinda — at the end, but I'll get back to that.

When the movie began, the Henderson family (John Lithgow, Melinda Dillon and their children, played by Margaret Langrick and Joshua Rudoy) had been on a hunting/camping trip in the Pacific Northwest and were on their way to their home in Seattle when their car struck a large figure whose details were obscured by glare.

At first it appeared to be a bear but, upon closer inspection, the Hendersons concluded it must be Bigfoot. They also concluded it was dead and decided to bring it back with them, figuring it would be worth a lot of money to them.

But the creature (played by 7–foot actor Kevin Peter Hall) was not dead and, after learning rather belatedly that the world at large was not ready to accept the notion of Bigfoot's existence, they decided to make him a member of the family.

That was quite a challenge by itself. "Harry" (in the movie, it was suggested that his name originated from his appearance — but, in fact, it was an homage to Harry Nilsson. Bill Martin, who wrote the screenplay for the movie, also wrote some songs for Nilsson's "Harry" album) was not exactly domesticated and caused considerable damage to the house and the car.

And he was shocked to see Lithgow's hunting trophies on the wall. After all, some of them could have been Harry's friends.

But he was a gentle giant. His destructive behavior wasn't deliberate. It was mostly a matter of not knowing how his bulk and strength could affect his new environment — but you sure didn't want to make him mad.

He was remarkably intelligent. After only a short time with the Hendersons, he seemed to understand what they said to him. He even managed to speak one word of English before the end of the movie. Even in a situation in which observers really had to suspend their disbelief, that was tough to swallow.

It is safe to say that everyone had adjustments to make.

And while they were making those adjustments, there were other characters from outside the family circle who became involved in the story — notably a Bigfoot researcher (Don Ameche) and a Bigfoot–obsessed hunter (David Suchet).

Their contributions to the plausibility of the story were significant, and I'll leave it to you to discover how — if you're so inclined.

But as for the lessons of the story, which I mentioned briefly earlier ...

"Harry and the Hendersons" essentially told viewers not to judge a book by its cover. In this story some humans could — and did — behave in more beastly manners than the beast. Harry's compassion was genuine, but you had to look past his intimidating exterior to see it.

For those with more saintly dispositions, there was a lesson in the story that went like this: Forgiveness is a powerful thing. Do it whenever you can.

And another theme that was a little ahead of its time — but would be embraced by many today — is the suggestion that we should play an active role in protecting our environment.

It was more entertaining than I expected, and it was definitely a family friendly movie in the sense that objectionable language was kept to a minimum.

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

A Most Unusual Board Game

"I've seen things you've only seen in your nightmares. Things you can't even imagine. Things you can't even see. There are things that hunt you in the night. Then something screams. Then you hear them eating, and you hope to God you aren't dessert. Afraid? You don't know what afraid is."

Alan (Robin Williams)

In the aftermath of Robin Williams' suicide last year, it was easy to reel off a list of his greatest acting achievements — "Awakenings," "Dead Poets Society," "The World According to Garp," "The Fisher King," "Good Morning, Vietnam," to name but a few — and start a debate over which was the best.

But, really, identifying those movies is easy because they were recognized at the time as being overall quality productions. Williams was always good — he was nominated for Oscars four times and even won once — but he was often made better by the people around him.

To have a truly representative discussion of his best performances, it seems to me it would be necessary to include movies that weren't generally well regarded, but in which he gave his customary brilliant performances. I wrote about such a movie a few days ago — 1980's "Popeye" — and another such movie premiered on this date in 1995 — "Jumanji."

That isn't really accurate, I guess, to suggest that "Jumanji" wasn't a good movie. "Jumanji" was a good movie, creative and all that. Critics were mixed, but audiences seemed to like it well enough. After all, it made more than $100 million.

At the time, I chose not to see it in the theater. What I had seen in the previews simply didn't appeal to me. I regretted that decision when I finally did see it on the small TV screen, though. The special effects of "Jumanji" really were quite good, well worth seeing on the big screen.

But the acting was pretty good, too.

The focus of the story was a young boy named Alan, the heir to a shoe manufacturing business. Several things happened early to set up the rest of the story, although that wasn't immediately clear. I won't go into detail about them here. If you haven't seen the movie, take my word for it. Everything eventually makes sense — even though there's a lot of crazy stuff that goes on. The movie does its best to trick you — and manages to do so. Be prepared for that.

Young Alan found a board game called Jumanji — how he discovered it is what established this movie as a fantasy — and he and a female friend sat down to play it one afternoon. Turned out Alan got sucked into the world of the game. The adults never figured out what happened to him, and his companion needed years of therapy to come to grips with what she had witnessed.

Fast forward 26 years — when Alan's house was being acquired by a woman (Bebe Neuwirth) and her late brother's children (Kirsten Dunst and Bradley Pierce). The children discovered the game and tried to play it — and, without realizing it, resumed the game that had been started in 1969.

And that summoned Alan back from wherever he had gone 26 years earlier — only he was an adult now, played by Williams. Well, physically he was an adult. Emotionally he was still that child from 1969.

I'm sure that kind of role was too juicy for Williams to pass up.

And really, I can't imagine anyone else playing the role except Robin Williams.

There are roles that are like that. They might have gone to other actors, but they were played so well by the people who were cast in them that you simply can't imagine anyone else playing the role.

Of course, Robin Williams was such a unique talent that it is really hard to imagine anyone else playing any of the roles Williams played in his life. He always put his personal, manic stamp on every role he played — in the movies or on TV.

He was one of a kind, and he is missed.

Tuesday, October 13, 2015

A Pooka's a Pooka ...

"Harvey and I have things to do ... we sit in the bars ... have a drink or two ... play the jukebox. Very soon the faces of all the other people turn towards me, and they smile. They say, 'We don't know your name, mister, but you're a very nice fellow.' Harvey and I warm ourselves in these golden moments. We came as strangers — soon we have friends. They come over. They sit with us. They drink with us. They talk to us. They tell us about the great big terrible things they've done and the great big wonderful things they're going to do. Their hopes, their regrets. Their loves, their hates. All very large, because nobody ever brings anything small into a bar. Then I introduce them to Harvey, and he's bigger and grander than anything they can offer me. And when they leave, they leave impressed. The same people seldom come back, but that's — that's envy, my dear. There's a little bit of envy in the best of us."

Elwood P. Dowd (James Stewart)

Jimmy Stewart is one of my favorite actors, and he has been in some of my favorite movies, but my very favorite Jimmy Stewart performance of all was the one he gave in "Harvey," which premiered 65 years ago today.

As she so often did, my mother introduced me to that movie. She laughed at eventual Best Supporting Actress winner Josephine Hull, who played Stewart's sister, when she delivered lines like "Myrtle Mae, you have a lot to learn, and I hope you never learn it."

Myrtle Mae was her daughter (played by Victoria Horne), and Hull was always giving her advice about men, such as "Oh, Myrtle, don't be didactic. It's not becoming in a young girl. Besides, men loathe it."

I laughed, too, and I still do when I watch "Harvey." Josephine Hull reminded me then — and she still reminds me today — of the older women I knew when I was growing up.

Harvey was a pooka, a six–foot invisible rabbit — or, as Stewart (as Elwood P. Dowd) said in the movie, "Six feet 3½ inches. Now let's stick to the facts."

Speaking of the facts, Stewart was 6–foot–4 and wanted to change Harvey's height from what it had been in the original play. But the folks who made the movie wouldn't give in on that point.

Stewart played a mild–mannered tippler who was always embarrassing his family with his invisible rabbit — which led to some pretty delicious dialogue. With writing like that, it was no wonder the play on which the movie was based was such a hit.

For example, at an afternoon tea party, Hull and Horne had a delightful conversation with an elderly aunt, who noticed that Elwood wasn't around and wanted to know if "Elwood sees anyone these days."

"Oh, yes, Aunt Ethel," Myrtle Mae replied, "he does."

But no one else could see Harvey. Well, almost no one.

At one point, Hull confessed there were times when she thought she could see Harvey, too. And a doctor at the sanatorium where Hull tried to commit Stewart spoke of seeing Harvey as well.

But everyone else seemed to think Stewart was nuts — even though there was ample evidence that Harvey the pooka really did exist.

Anyway, whether Hull really did see Harvey or not, she conspired to have her brother committed to that sanatorium I mentioned earlier. When the head of the sanatorium told Stewart what his sister had done — "This sister of yours is at the bottom of a conspiracy against you. She's trying to persuade me to lock you up. Today she had commitment papers drawn up. She has your power of attorney and the key to your safety box, and she brought you here!" — Stewart's disarming reply was "She did all that in one afternoon. That Veta certainly is a whirlwind, isn't she?"

Stewart had several conversations with the head of the sanatorium (Cecil Kellaway), at one point getting the doctor to talk about his secret desires, the greatest of which seemed to be to spend two weeks in Akron, Ohio, with a woman whose name he didn't know. They would drink cold beer, and he would tell her of his life, and she would pat his hand and say, "You poor, poor thing."

"Wouldn't that get a little monotonous," Stewart wanted to know, "just Akron, cold beer and 'poor, poor thing' for two weeks?"

Wallace Ford was a character actor who probably was best known for his westerns, but he played a crucial role in "Harvey" as a taxi driver who drove Stewart to the sanatorium, where he was scheduled to be given an injection of a serum that would bring him back to the reality his sister wanted for him.

The cab driver tried to explain to Veta that it wouldn't be a good thing.

"I've been driving this route for 15 years," he said to her. "I've brought 'em out here to get that stuff, and I've drove 'em home after they had it. It changes them. On they way out here, they sit back and enjoy the ride. They talk to me. Sometimes we stop and watch the sunset and look at the birds fly. And sometimes we stop and watch the birds when there ain't no birds. And look at the sunset when it's raining. We have a swell time. And I always get a big tip."

"But afterwards, uh oh!"

Veta asked him to clarify, and the cabbie was only too happy to do so.

"They crab, crab, crab," he told her. "They yell at me. Watch the lights. Watch the brakes, Watch the intersection. They scream at me to hurry. They got no faith in me or my buggy. Yep, it's the same cab, the same driver. And we're going back over the very same road. It's no fun. And no tips."

Then Ford delivered what has always been the line of the movie for me.

"After this he'll be a perfectly normal human being — and you know what stinkers they are!"

That statement certainly resonated with Veta. She ran back inside the sanatorium demanding to stop the procedure.

And Harvey remained a part of the family.

In addition to Hull, Stewart was nominated for an Oscar, but he lost Best Actor to José Ferrer.

Sunday, March 01, 2015

Fantasy Does Have Its Problems

"I just met a wonderful new man. He's fictional but you can't have everything."

Cecilia (Mia Farrow)

I guess nothing epitomizes the concept of movie escapism like the 1930s — when unemployment was high and nearly everyone was struggling. No wonder the people of that time wanted to escape.

Fantasy can be a blessing and a curse, I suppose. Perhaps it is nature's way of protecting us — mentally and emotionally — from things that could overwhelm us, and that makes it a force for good. But if fantasy is allowed too much freedom in our lives, it can be a destructive force. It's a fine line.

Woody Allen's "The Purple Rose of Cairo" premiered 30 years ago today, and I have concluded — after watching the movie several times since that day in 1985 — that it explored both of those concepts within the same character, Cecilia (Mia Farrow).

Apparently, film critic Roger Ebert and I agreed. "The movie is so cheerful and open that it took me a day or two, after I'd seen it, to realize how deeply Allen has reached this time," Ebert wrote. "If it is true, and I think it is, that most of the time we go to the movies in order to experience brief lives that are not our own, then Allen is demonstrating what a tricky self–deception we practice."

The audience learned early Cecilia's reasons for such self–deception. She was a waitress (which must have been a pretty grim existence in the Depression) and she was trapped in an apparently loveless and abusive marriage. She often went to the movies and sometimes saw the same movie several times. "She is a good candidate for the magic of the movies," Ebert wrote. "Up on the screen, sophisticated people have cocktails and plan trips down the Nile and are recognized by the doormen in nightclubs."

As our story began, she was watching a fictitious movie of the same name about an archaeologist in Egypt who meets a Manhattan playwright and his companions, and they all return to the U.S. for a "madcap Manhattan weekend."

She went to the theater to see the movie several times. Finally, the archaeologist (Jeff Daniels) turned to look at the movie audience (but his eyes were focused on Cecilia) and said, "You must really love this picture" — and stepped off the screen into Cecilia's life. It was a fantasy come true. Well ...

"He is a genial, open–faced smoothie with all the right moves," Ebert wrote, "but he has a problem: He only knows what his character knows in the movie, and his experience is literally limited to what happens to his character in the plot. This can cause problems. He's great at talking sweetly to a woman and holding hands and kissing — but just when the crucial moment arrives, the movie fades out, and therefore, alas, so does he."

That could be endearingly naive — and infuriating at the same time. I suppose that is evidence of how well Daniels played the role. "The Purple Rose of Cairo" wasn't his first film — he had been in three others prior to that, and his breakthrough role, I guess, was in "Terms of Endearment," which led to his starring role in "The Purple Rose of Cairo."

So it wasn't the first time I had seen him. But his modest appearance in "Ragtime" escaped me at the time, although I did notice it on additional viewings — and, when I saw "The Purple Rose of Cairo," I only remembered his supporting role in "Terms of Endearment," but I can't say I paid much attention to him in that one. His role in "The Purple Rose of Cairo" was the one that put him on my movie radar.

Anyway, Tom the archaeologist did have his problems, being a fictional character, but Tom was the problem for Gil, the actor who portrayed him in the movie. Emboldened by the first Tom's departure from his celluloid cell, the Toms in copies of the movie all across the country were trying to liberate themselves as well, causing chaos in movie theaters from sea to shining sea.

So Gil embarked on a mission — he was going to New Jersey to look for that first Tom, who by that time was off on a night on the town with Cecilia.

Gil wanted Tom to return to the movie — he was wrecking Gil's acting career — and he was willing to go to great lengths to achieve that objective, including convincing Cecilia that he was in love with her — and forcing her to choose between the fictional and seemingly perfect but limited Tom and the real and flawed but virtually unlimited Gil. And, as infatuated as Cecilia was with the make–believe world of the movies — and as abused as she had been by her husband (Danny Aiello) — she chose the real. She committed herself to it by breaking up with her husband.

But Gil hadn't committed himself to Cecilia — only to his career — and he had used her to get Tom to return to the movie. When that was accomplished, he hopped a plane for Hollywood, leaving Cecilia homeless, loveless and jobless. And, once more, she retreated to the fantasy world of the darkened movie theater.

That led to what may have been Ebert's most salient observation.

"[Allen] is interested in the conﬂicts involving who you want to be, and who other people want you to be," Ebert wrote. "'Stardust [Memories]' was about a celebrity whose fame prevented people from relating to anything but his image. 'Zelig,' the other side of the coin, was about a man whose anonymity was so profound that he could gain an identity only by absorbing one from the people around him. In 'Purple Rose,' the movie hero has the first problem, and the woman in the audience has the second, and when they get together, they still don't make one whole person, just two sad halves."

Many words leaped to mind when I saw that movie the first time — poignant, ironic, touching. They are still appropriate because "Purple Rose of Cairo," as creative as it was, was still an Everyman tale at its core, that tug–of–war within every human heart between what is and what we think should be. As such, the story is timeless. It remains relevant for succeeding generations.

Allen was nominated for the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay but lost to Earl Wallace for "Witness."

Monday, December 22, 2014

More Work Was Needed on Remake

"I know now that the love we hold back is the only pain that follows us here."

Pete (Richard Dreyfuss)

It's hard for me to think of "Always" (which debuted on this day in 1989) without comparing it to the movie upon which it was based, "A Guy Named Joe."

And, for the most part, I think the actors who were cast in the remake were pretty good choices, but the movie fell short of the mark.

Holly Hunter has been excellent in just about everything she has done, and she was a good choice to play Dorinda, the role originally played by Irene Dunne. Film critic Roger Ebert agreed. "The best casting in the movie is Hunter," Ebert declared, "bringing some of the same urgency and hard-bitten impatience that made her right for 'Broadcast News.'"

I like John Goodman. He's one of those guys who is funny no matter what he says or does. As far as I was concerned, he was much better than Ward Bond as Al, the colleague and best friend of the main character, Pete, who died early on and appeared as a spirit for the remainder of the film. But Goodman has been in better movies.

There were different characters who assisted Pete in his transition from the mortal world to the spiritual one. In "A Guy Named Joe," which was set in wartime, it was the spirit of a fellow pilot who had died in a fiery crash. He was played by Barry Nelson, who wasn't as good as the spirit Hap, played by Audrey Hepburn, who assisted Pete, a peacetime pilot who put out forest fires, in "Always."

Van Johnson played the guy who courted Dorinda after Pete died in "A Guy Named Joe," and it might seem like a no–brainer to prefer him to Brad Johnson, who played the role in "Always," but Van Johnson was appearing in his first movie. He wasn't as polished as he became. Brad Johnson was one up on him, having appeared in a low–budget production the year before "Always" was made, but, essentially, they were at the same point in their careers; over the long haul, it is safe to say that Van Johnson did more with his than Brad Johnson did.

It was pretty close, but I would give the nod to Van Johnson.

It was in the starring role where "A Guy Named Joe" had a decisive advantage, as far as I was concerned. Don't get me wrong. I like Richard Dreyfuss very much. I think he is quite talented, and I liked his performance in "Always."

But Spencer Tracy delivered what may have been the best performance of his career in "A Guy Named Joe."

Don't let that take anything away from Dreyfuss' performance. He was very good. But there was only one Spencer Tracy, right?

Ebert struggled with many of the same issues when he reviewed the movie 25 years ago. His bottom line about "Always" was that it suffered from a "lack of urgency."

"Even though pilots are flying into the jaws of hell," Ebert wrote, "they have an insouciance, a devil–may–care attitude, that undermines the drama."

Hmmmm. I hadn't really thought about that, but it does explain some of my ambivalence about the movie. I mean, with all the advantages "Always" had in its cast and director (well, I guess that depends on how one feels about Spielberg as opposed to Victor Fleming, who directed "The Wizard of Oz" and "Gone With the Wind" before he directed "A Guy Named Joe"), why, I wondered, did I prefer "A Guy Named Joe"?

I think it was because there was a kind of nobility, an admirable sense of self–sacrifice in "A Guy Named Joe" that was missing from "Always." Maybe that was a by–product of the war backdrop. Tracy didn't like helping someone else win Dunne's love, but it was part of his mission to "give back" to the living. He seemed to fully grasp that fact after his conversation with the general (Lionel Barrymore).

Tracy's mission went farther than just helping Dunne love again and move on with her life. His mission involved passing along his expertise as a pilot and contribute to a greater cause.

Putting out fires is an important cause, too, and Dreyfuss' character was one of the best at it, but fires are more random than war. I'm not saying that firefighters don't put everything on the line because they do, but the pressure on a soldier during wartime is unrelenting whereas the pressure on a firefighter mostly exists (it seems to me, anyway) while the fire exists.

That was the impression I got from the characters in "Always." They were dedicated to their jobs, but they were relaxed when they weren't trying to control a fire. It went in waves.

Of course, this is all speculation on my part. I was never a firefighter, and I never fought in a war.

I'm sure many of my beliefs about both have been influenced by things I have seen in movies — and movies, I will grant you, are not necessarily factual.

It just seems to me that the pressure on soldiers would be constant. Even if they are not in a battle, soldiers can't let their guard down for a second because an enemy attack could happen at any time.

The only comparable experience for pilots who fight forest fires would be during periods of extreme drought. In such times, pressure must be unceasing for those pilots.

A kind of sense of invincibility seemed to permeate the pilots in "Always."

Of course, one of the points of the story was that they were not invincible.

And I would be remiss if I didn't say more about Hepburn's contribution to the story.

She was, as I have said, the spirit who helps Dreyfuss make his transition to the spiritual world. I've been a Hepburn fan for many years, and I was deeply saddened by her death at the age of 63.

She was the third–greatest movie actress, according to the American Film Institute.

And Hap's understated way of breaking the news to Pete — while she was cutting his hair in the woods — was really delightful.

"I don't want you to think that I'm doubting your good faith," Pete said. "I just want to get one thing clear, okay?"

"Okay," Hap relied.

"Am I dead?" Pete asked.

"That's right," Hap answered.

"I'm dead?" Pete asked again.

"Right," Hap replied again.

"Keep the sideburns," Pete said. "Boy, what a jerk I turned out to be. Dead! And now I'm sitting in the woods, getting my hair cut."

"Always" was only modestly successful commercially (unlike most Spielberg productions), which may be why Hepburn wasn't nominated for an Oscar. Of course, her part was really just a cameo appearance, but it was her final movie role. Seems a shame for a great actress like that to go out without even a nomination for her final performance.

Of course, at the time, no one knew it would be her last performance.

Actually, "Always" received no Oscar nominations so it isn't as if Hepburn was denied something her colleagues received.

So the Oscar shutout wasn't really a surprise. It wasn't an original story, and the cast, while good, didn't really make a major impression.

Ultimately, I had to agree with Ebert's conclusion: "The result is a curiosity: a remake that wasn't remade enough."

Saturday, December 20, 2014

'All That Jazz' Told a Creative Tale

"It's showtime, folks!"

Joe Gideon (Roy Scheider)

I remember seeing "All That Jazz" for the first time. After I saw it, I earnestly believed it should be the Best Picture winner. At the time, I thought it was the most creative movie of 1979. Still do, for that matter.

If that was the only factor in choosing a Best Picture, then I would believe, as I did when the Academy Awards were given out the following spring, that "All That Jazz" got robbed. But I have come to realize that there are many factors to consider, and, if I had to choose the Best Picture of 1979 today, I probably would go along with the choice that was made ("Kramer vs. Kramer").

The absence of a Best Picture statuette took nothing away from "All That Jazz," which received nine Oscar nominations — and it did win four of them (Best Original Song Score or Adaptation Score, Best Art Direction, Best Costume Design and Best Film Editing).

It did well in the technical categories, but it came up empty in the major awards — Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor — and that is where it lost the battle to "Kramer vs. Kramer."

I was really impressed with "All That Jazz." As I have written here before, the era of the Hollywood musical really ended in the '60s and, with the exception of 2002's "Chicago," practically no musical has been so well received by both critics and garden–variety moviegoers since. "All That Jazz" was an exception — in a sense. I mean, it was pretty well received by critics and did reasonably well at the box office, but it suffered from the audience's general fatigue with heavy movies in the late 1970s. It fell far short, for example, of the public's reception of the more light–hearted "Grease" the year before.

The movie was director Bob Fosse's semi–autobiographical account of his life — and anticipation of what the end would be like for him (he died in 1987). He wasn't too far off. Like his lead character, Joe Gideon (Roy Scheider), he died of a heart attack.

Joe Gideon was motivated by his work, but he never felt that he measured up. That was at the heart of a conversation he had with Angelique (Jessica Lange), the angel of death.

"Nothing I ever do is good enough," Gideon said. "Not beautiful enough, it's not funny enough, it's not deep enough, it's not anything enough. Now, when I see a rose, that's perfect. I mean, that's perfect. I want to look up to God and say, 'How the hell did you do that? And why the hell can't I do that?'"

Angelique, who had probably heard it all before, replied, "Now that's probably one of your better con lines."

"Yeah, it is," he answered. "But that doesn't mean I don't mean it."

"All That Jazz" was filled with moments like that.

I guess the word that best described Joe Gideon was driven. It was why he took daily doses of amphetamines — so he could juggle his work on his Broadway show and a movie he was editing. He was just as driven in the other direction, though. A hard–drinking, chain–smoking, drug–abusing, womanizing sort, Joe was burning both ends of his candle with blowtorches. At some point, the movie's viewers realized where the movie was inevitably taking them. It was just a matter of time before Gideon's reckless lifestyle would land him in the hospital — or the cemetery.

En route, the audience watched him try to gain the approval of the backers for the content of the show, which became considerably more risque than the backers had anticipated.

Joe Gideon was always pushing boundaries.

It occurred to me once, as I was reflecting on "All That Jazz" after watching it for the umpteenth time, that Joe Gideon was probably one of those people who was told from a young age that he was special, gifted, and he would do — and be — great things.

I'm not sure if parents who tell their children such things do them any favors. In some, it may serve as catalyst to achievement, but in most, I fear, it may only encourage a sense of entitlement, a conviction that the rules and natural laws that apply to others do not apply to them. At the very least, excessive praise for things that deserve little, if any, praise fosters a belief that little effort is required from them. It gives them little to shoot for and often seems to lead them down a self–destructive path.

I have no children so what I say on this may be irrelevant, but I have come to the conclusion that it is best to let children discover for themselves what their strengths and weaknesses are and try to nudge them toward their strengths. Encourage them to confront and overcome their weaknesses — and let them learn for themselves what their talents are.

I understand parents who want to boost their children's self–esteem, but sometimes there is a fine line between self–esteem and self–absorption.

Of course, I don't know what kind of parents Joe Gideon had — but we can get a pretty good idea what kind of parent he was.

Mostly an absent one.

Viewers never saw Joe Gideon in a domestic setting. His marriage had already ended by the time the movie began, and his interactions with his daughter were confined to his workplace and his weekends with her, not a day–to–day existence.

I was very impressed with Erzebet Foldi, the young girl who played Scheider's daughter (but never, to my knowledge, appeared in another movie again). Only 13 when the movie came out, Foldi's character was the one who succeeded — sort of — in keeping Scheider's character grounded.

But she and her mother often seemed to be living in a different world from Joe. They both vividly recalled one of his conquests — "the blonde with the television show" — but he couldn't remember her name.

Perhaps more than any other time in my memory, the movies of 1979 paid attention, indirectly if not directly, to the plights of the children of divorce. Justin Henry of "Kramer vs. Kramer" became the youngest person ever nominated for Best Supporting Actor (and lost to perhaps the oldest, Melvyn Douglas) for his portrayal of a child torn by the divorce of his parents. Foldi's character had already been through that; in "All That Jazz," we got to see how she was coping with the aftermath.

I always thought one of the most engaging scenes in the movie came when Foldi and Joe's girlfriend (Ann Reinking) performed a song–and–dance routine to "Everything Old Is New Again."

Sunday, December 07, 2014

Existential Angst Aboard the Starship Enterprise

James Kirk (William Shatner): Spock, did we just see the beginning of a new life form?

Spock (Leonard Nimoy): Yes, Captain. We witnessed a birth. Possibly a next step in our evolution.

Kirk: I wonder.

Leonard McCoy (DeForest Kelley): Well, it's been a long time since I delivered a baby. And I hope we got this one off to a good start.

Kirk: I hope so, too. I think we gave it the ability to create its own sense of purpose ... out of our own human weaknesses ... and the drive that compels us to overcome them.

McCoy: And a lot of foolish human emotions. Right, Mr. Spock?

Spock: Quite true, Doctor. Unfortunately, it will have to deal with them as well.

If you're under 40, you need to understand the status of the Star Trek franchise on this day in 1979.

Up to that time, there had been only one primetime Star Trek TV series — the original one that aired for three seasons in the 1960s and starred William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy. There was an animated series that ran on Saturday mornings for a couple of years; otherwise, Star Trek's fan base had to content itself with reruns of the original primetime series, which were plentiful.

"Trekkies" — if that is what they were called — spent tons of money on the Star Trek promotional materials that were marketed in those days. Hard–core Trekkies could purchase a set of blueprints for the fictional Starship Enterprise. In hindsight, all the signs were there that Star Trek was about ready to take off — and it did. It became a cultural phenomenon.

There were also signs that many Trekkies suffered from undiagnosed mental disorders.

When "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" premiered 35 years ago today, it launched a movement. I've never been a Star Trek fan, but, by my count, there have been at least four TV series and five additional movies to date since the first movie's debut. Not all of the movies were good, but the first one, as even non–Trekkies such as myself had to admit, was pretty good.

The movie that premiered on this date in 1979 reunited the original cast and touched on all the running themes from the original series. It must have been everything that every Trekkie had dreamed about. It earned three times as much as it cost to make.

Interestingly, film critic Roger Ebert saw the reunion of the original cast as a negative.

"Epic science–fiction stories, with their cosmic themes and fast truths about the nature of mankind, somehow work best when the actors are unknown to us," Ebert wrote. "The presence of the Star Trek characters and actors who have become so familiar to us on television tends in a strange way to undermine this movie. The audience walks in with a possessive, even patronizing attitude toward Kirk and Spock and Bones, and that interferes with the creation of the 'sense of wonder' that science fiction is all about."

Maybe so. As I say, I was never a Trekkie, and I always have had a little trouble getting into Star Trek plotlines, whether they were on TV or the big screen. That was particularly true of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture." Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry produced the movie, and I think he felt liberated by the big screen because special effects were splashier than anything I had seen on TV. I think, to a certain extent, I was dazzled by that.

Consider, for a moment, what an achievement that was. The late '70s and early '80s probably produced more blockbuster sci–fi movies than at any other time in film history. Coming in the wake of such recent releases as "Star Wars," "Alien" and "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," the special effects had to be impressive — and the special effects in "Star Trek" really were quite extraordinary.

Anyway, the plotline of the movie bewildered me just as the plotlines of the TV episodes bewildered me. My mind is not oriented toward science fiction.

But then at the end it all came together for me — just as it often did with the episodes in the TV series — in a kind of cosmic metaphysical twist.

Spock: Each of us ... at some time in our lives, turns to someone — a father, a brother, a god — and asks,"Why am I here? What was I meant to be?"

I'm not sure I ever really bought the movie's conclusion at the time — and if you haven't seen it, I don't want to spoil it for you.

But if you have seen any of the original Star Trek TV episodes, you can probably guess.

"The Star Trek movie is fairly predictable in its plot," Ebert wrote. "We more or less expected that two of the frequent ingredients in the television episodes would be here, and they are: a confrontation between Starship Enterprise and some sort of alien entity, and a conclusion in which basic human values are affirmed in a hostile universe."

Nevertheless, Ebert wrote, "There is, I suspect, a sense in which you can be too sophisticated for your own good when you see a movie like this. ... My inclination, as I slid down in my seat and the stereo sound surrounded me, was to relax and let the movie give me a good time. I did and it did."

"Star Trek: The Motion Picture" was nominated for three Oscars and lost all three.

Saturday, November 22, 2014

Telling the Tale of a Trip Through Time

1955 Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd): It was nice talking to you. Maybe we'll bump into each other sometime in the future.

1985 Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd): Or the past.

I thoroughly enjoyed the original "Back to the Future."

When I saw it, it was pretty obvious that a sequel was planned — if not already in the works — and that was OK with me.

But I was disappointed.

See, I already knew "Back to the Future" was going to end up being a trilogy; consequently, I knew that the second installation would be incomplete, as second chapters in trilogies always are. They are extensions of the original — and promises that conclusions will be forthcoming — but they do not provide satisfactory resolutions. After all, gotta save something for Part III, right?

But there were other problems with this sequel.

In many ways, I thought Derek Armstrong of Allmovie.com made a good point when he wrote, "A successful sequel duplicates the characteristics that drew audiences to the original, but [director Robert] Zemeckis saps the buoyant spirit from the series by presenting a world dominated by the pimp–like, unimaginably wealthy and vulgar Biff."

The dark vision of the future in "Back to the Future Part II" offered little of the joy of the original — only most of the original cast.

I must say, though, that I appreciated the detail of the research. In the scene where young Biff was driving along and listening to the football scores on the radio, I can say that the scores are accurate from Saturday, Nov. 12, 1955. I checked on this once when the movie was showing on TV and was able to quickly confirm the authenticity of the scores in the sports almanac.

UCLA really did kick a late field goal to beat Washington, as Old Biff bet a skeptical Young Biff would happen while they sat in Young Biff's car and they listened to the final minute of the game on the car radio — and all those other scores that were mentioned by the radio announcer were accurate, too — but Biff shouldn't have been so surprised that UCLA pulled off a come–from–behind win.

UCLA was ranked fourth in the nation and ended up going to the Rose Bowl. Washington hadn't won a game in a month. As any sports fan can tell you, near upsets happen all the time; truly talented teams frequently find ways to overcome.

Of course, Biff confirmed that the scores matched the scores in the almanac — something he shouldn't have been doing while operating a vehicle, but perfectly in keeping with his character.

(Considering the size of the almanac and the movies' attention to detail, I — as a former sports copy editor — found it difficult to believe that every score of every sports event over half a century could be contained within its covers.)

There was a dark side to "Back to the Future Part II" that was more personal for Marty McFly, as answers.com observed.

I guess the point that the "Back to the Future" series made so well was Doc Brown's repeated admonition not to meddle in future (or past) events. His intention was to use the time machine only for research purposes, to observe and learn, not to become involved.

It isn't a new theme, this idea that history cannot be altered, and it would be a wise rule — if time travel were possible. But it isn't, and so the influence of the insertion of a visitor from another time remains theoretical.

Still, it makes sense, doesn't it? I'm a Southern boy so I liken it to something I saw all around me when I was growing up — dominoes. If you look at time like a row of dominoes — I don't know what the dominoes would represent; increments in time (days, weeks, months, years), I suppose — and if you further assume that one at the end of the line is not permitted to remain standing, its fall will affect the next domino, and that effect will continue until there are no more dominoes standing.

If you apply the domino analogy to the context of the "Back to the Future" movies, especially Part II, you do get to see an apocalyptic vision of a radically altered future.

And that seems to have been what Zemeckis was aiming for.

There really was a lot going on.

"I should have brought a big yellow legal pad to the screening," Roger Ebert wrote, "so I could take detailed notes just to keep the time–lines straight."

Ebert wrote of the "paradoxes" of time travel. That's probably the best word for it. I have to admit it was not what I was expecting. Given the nature of the first movie in the franchise, I expected something similar. Zemeckis threw me a curve.

But it intrigued me. What did the final installment in the trilogy have in store? We only had to wait six months to find out.

Wednesday, August 27, 2014

'Mary Poppins' Was a Musical Moneymaker

"Kindly do not attempt to cloud the issue with facts."

George Banks (David Tomlinson)

Fifty years ago, it was still possible to win an Oscar for acting in a musical that was, essentially, written for children.

Julie Andrews proved that, winning Best Actress for her performance in "Mary Poppins" over some formidable competition: Anne Bancroft, Sophia Loren, Debbie Reynolds and Kim Stanley.

"Mary Poppins" was nominated for 13 Oscars in all and won five. Few musicals have had the kind of influence on the culture that "Mary Poppins" had. For years after they saw "Mary Poppins" at the theaters, kids everywhere were singing "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious," "A Spoonful of Sugar" and "Chim Chim Cher–ee" as effortlessly as any of the older, more traditional (and, perhaps, in some quarters, better known) songs of childhood.

My family had the soundtrack, and my brother and I listened to it over and over. Even though the movie had been away from the big screens for years. Surely, we weren't the only ones!

Just about every child must have recognized Mary Poppins with her trademark umbrella, especially when she was descending over the London skyline. It's kind of hard to forget a thing like that.

In the movie, the enchanting Mary Poppins was retained to be the nanny for two children who had a reputation for running off nannies. But things just had a way of working out for Mary Poppins.

So she came to work in the Banks household — the family patriarch, the aptly named Mr. Banks, was a banker. Turned out Mary was a close friend of a jack–of–all–trades by the name of Bert (Dick Van Dyke). Bert happened to be in her neighborhood, and their interplay suggested that they had been friends for a long time. Long enough, anyway, for Mary Poppins' abrupt arrivals and departures to come as no surprise to Bert. Apparently, he'd seen it all before.

I never had the opportunity to see "Mary Poppins" on the big screen. I saw it on my family's TV, and I loved the whole movie, but my favorite scene involved Ed Wynn as Uncle Albert who floated in the air when he laughed.

Uncle Albert loved to laugh; appropriately, his song was "I Love to Laugh."

The songs in "Mary Poppins" were all first rate. "Chim Chim Cher–ee," sung by Bert as a chimney sweep (one of several jobs he had during the movie), won the Oscar for Best Song.

It's been a long time since I have seen "Mary Poppins." In fact, I probably haven't seen it all the way through since I was a child. But even now, when I see a clip of a song, the lyrics come easily to my mind, summoned forth from wherever they were buried in my brain. I couldn't have recited the lyrics a few minutes before, but hearing the music and seeing the images brings it all back.

That was the magic of "Mary Poppins," which was the jewel of Walt Disney Studios when Disney was alive. It was the top moneymaker of 1965, bigger than "The Sound of Music," which also starred Andrews, bigger than "Goldfinger," bigger than "My Fair Lady."

Of course, those were the days when movies could — and did — stay at theaters for months, even years.

No one could blend live action with animation the way Disney could, and that was the kind of thing that made money for Disney over and over again — but never quite as well as in "Mary Poppins."

However, I would never underestimate Andrews' contributions to the movie's success.

Monday, August 25, 2014

Follow the Yellow Brick Road

"There's no place like home; there's no place like home; there's no place like home."

Dorothy (Judy Garland)
(#23 on the American Film Institute's list of the Top 100 movie quotes)

(1939 is widely regarded as the greatest year ever for the motion picture. Ten movies were nominated for Best Picture that year, and today I take a look at the sixth of those 10 movies to hit the theaters.)

I don't know how old I was the first time I saw "The Wizard of Oz." Probably 5 or 6. I do know that it was long after it made its general theatrical debut on this date in 1939. My mother and father might have seen it at the theater — they were children then — but maybe not. It wasn't a blockbuster in 1939. That came later.

I don't remember much about that experience — except that the winged monkeys scared me enough to give me bad dreams for several nights.

I still think of that whenever I sit down to watch "The Wizard of Oz." I thought about it back in February when I watched it during Turner Classic Movies' annual salute to the Academy Awards, "31 Days of Oscar."

And I concluded that there are some movies that are so closely linked to childhood that every time we see them, we feel almost as if we are children again. "The Wizard of Oz" is such a movie — for me, anyway.

See, there are parts of that movie that I appreciate as an adult that escaped me as a child; even so, I always feel like a child when I watch it — at least a little bit and for a little while. I suppose that is part of the movie's enduring magic.

I'm sure I don't have to recite the plot for you. Surely, everyone has seen "The Wizard of Oz" at least once — probably more than that — so I may simply refer to specific scenes. Warning: This will not, in any way, be written sequentially. I probably will jump around a lot. (So hang on. It's apt to be a bumpy ride.)

Anyway, when I watched it most recently, I found myself questioning some parts of the story — and I had to remind myself that it is, after all, a children's story. It would help if everything made perfect sense — but this is a fantasy. By definition, a fantasy doesn't make sense. Things happen in fantasies that simply do not happen in real life — like monkeys with wings.

The movie version of "The Wizard of Oz" is so familiar that the characters need no introduction, do they?

"You are under the unfortunate delusion that simply because you run away from danger, you have no courage. You're confusing courage with wisdom."

Wizard of Oz (Frank Morgan)

Oh, and before I forget ...

Dorothy said, "Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore."

She did not say, "Toto, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore," which is how people have been misquoting it for decades.

(Wow, it feels good to get that off my chest. Kind of like knowing that Bogart actually said, "Play it, Sam," not "Play it again, Sam," in "Casablanca" but not saying anything about it.)

While we're on the subject of "The Wizard of Oz" trivia, as I said earlier, the movie wasn't successful in its first theatrical run, earning about what it cost to make. But it got in the black about 10 years later when it was brought back to theaters, and its annual airings on TV, which began in the 1950s, were moneymakers.

And this doesn't qualify as trivia, exactly, but I'd like to mention Billie Burke, who played Glinda the Good Witch of the North, Dorothy's defender in Oz. Her role didn't require her to speak many lines, but it is the role for which she is remembered — even though she is hardly ever mentioned.

She was 55 the day "The Wizard of Oz" premiered. I would never have guessed that.

For awhile, I worked in an office that encouraged employees to wear costumes for Halloween. It became a competitive thing, and groups of employees would come up with themes. Sometimes the costumes were very elaborate, very detailed. It was quite entertaining.

One year, a group came dressed like the protagonists from "The Wizard of Oz" — the Cowardly Lion, the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman and Dorothy (carrying a basket with a little stuffed dog doll in it). Everyone knew who they were, and they were the unanimous winners of the office contest.

As universal as those characters are, it's hard to believe that "The Wizard of Oz" was a big disappointment at the box office. And that iconic foursome might have been quite different.

Judy Garland is so closely associated with the role of Dorothy that most people probably can't imagine anyone else playing it. But it is my understanding that she was the second choice. The first choice was Shirley Temple, but she dropped out of the project. In hindsight, it's hard for me to imagine Shirley Temple singing "Over the Rainbow" as well as Garland — although it would be a mistake to assume that whoever played Dorothy would sing "Over the Rainbow." It was almost dropped several times.

She wasn't the first actress to play Dorothy, either. There were three other versions made before hers.

Buddy Ebsen was slated to play the Tin Woodman, but he had an allergic reaction to the metallic makeup he had to wear to play the part, and he was replaced by Jack Haley.

W.C. Fields was the first choice to play the wizard, but MGM couldn't meet his demands. He was replaced by Frank Morgan.

(An interesting piece of trivia about Morgan: The somewhat shabby coat he wore in the movie was a thrift–store discovery. It was later determined that the coat actually did belong at one time to L. Frank Baum, the author of "The Wizard of Oz."

(Apparently, his name was stitched inside it, and his widow confirmed that it did, indeed, belong to him.)

I notice little details now that I didn't notice when I was younger. Strangely, I never really noticed the winged monkeys flying away after grabbing Dorothy and Toto. Maybe I blocked that part out. Maybe I was too traumatized by my first glimpse of the winged monkeys to process their departure.

In general, though, I am impressed with the movie every time I see it. Color was still rare in the movies in 1939. Out of 10 Best Picture nominees that year, only two — "The Wizard of Oz" and "Gone With the Wind" — used it. And "The Wizard of Oz" only used it part of the time, bookending the color segment with two black–and–white segments.

That was a creative way to draw the line between the real world and the dream world. Dorothy's real world really was varying shades of gray as nearly as I could tell. Her dream world came alive with vibrant colors — the Yellow Brick Road, the Emerald City, ruby slippers — even though I've heard it said that we don't dream in color.

To be able to imagine the color scheme of a world that is not your own is a rare gift, it seems to me — whether in dreams or conscious thought.

I don't know if that's true. I honestly don't know if I dream in color or not.

Economically, the decision to use color is fairly easy to comprehend. Because of my experience working for newspapers, I know that the color process was — and, to an extent, still is — more expensive than black and white in print, and I'm sure that was the case when movies were being made in the 1930s and 1940s. It became more commonplace in both pursuits when it became more feasible.

In 1939, though, its very rarity made it an effective way to differentiate between the real and the fantasy.

I was unaware of the color part of it when I saw it the first time. My parents had just bought our family's very first TV. It was a black–and–white portable, and it was our only TV for many years so the color part of the movie looked black and white to me. I probably didn't see the color part in color until we got our first color TV.

The first few times I saw the movie, the Yellow Brick Road looked gray. So did the Emerald City and Dorothy's ruby slippers.

And I completely missed out on what has come to be one of my favorite sequences in the movie, the Horse of a Different Color that drew the coach carrying Dorothy and her friends into the city.

It's a subtle thing, really. The horse is a different color with each shift in the camera angle, but no fuss is made over it. It is hardly mentioned, except for a point when the coachman tells Dorothy, "That's the horse of a different color you've 'eard tell of."

The last time I watched "The Wizard of Oz," I counted the horse's color changes. There were six.

When I first saw the movie, those color changes probably appeared as varying shades of gray on our black–and–white set. I wonder what I must have thought ... if, indeed, I thought anything ... about that.

I never felt that I got the full effect of "The Wizard of Oz" the first time I saw it. People who first saw it in movie theaters in 1939 saw that horse changing color, witnessed the brilliance of the Emerald City and the Yellow Brick Road.

It was all black and white to me, and it wasn't the same. By the time I saw the horse of a different color — in color — it was anticlimactic to me.

In all, "The Wizard of Oz" was nominated for six Oscars and won two — Best Original Score and Best Song ("Over the Rainbow").