Showing posts with label Deborah Kerr. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Deborah Kerr. Show all posts

Sunday, 19 February 2012

Final day of Berlinale - about awards: Bears and in general..

So finally Berlinale 2012 came to an end..


~ Berlinale 2012 ~

Very quick a little bit about another film which was showed during "Berlinale Special":



THE LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL BLIMP (UK, 1943)

A Powell and Pressburger film (love their films) - with Deborah Kerr and my beloved Anton Walbrook - I guess I don't have to tell you about the story or anything else about this film which was dubbed "the English answer to CITIZEN KANE"..


So right back to Berlinale:

Yesterday the Berlinale awards - the Berlinale Bears -  were given to the awardees - except for the Honorary Golden Bear for Meryl Streep: she  received her award in a special gala before..


I think the Berlinale awards are very cute:



I won't write much about the awards (and awardees) - because frankly I do not care too much for awards. I love those shows - and I enjoy all those featured films around "award season".. I accept that awards are very nice gesture. And I think that it might be wonderful for the winners to finally receive a feeling of being appreciated and loved (or their work - if they can divide that from another) - but I really don't think that an artist becomes a better artist because a bunch of people says so. Though: I like Honorary awards - those awards for life's work.. I know I might be not logical in your point of view..


~ James Mason and Judy Garland in A STAR IS BORN (1954) ~


Awards just don’t mean so much to me. It’s no difference to me whether an actor has an Academy Award or not. I either like them/their performances or not. Yes, of course I am happy for the actors who I like  to receive an award – it means that a small group of people think they did a good performance. How nice for everyone to know that he/she is appreciated – and of course for an actor it means he/she will get “better” parts – and very likely better payment. But if one actor gets an award – and another not: Is the one who don’t receive one a not so good or maybe even a bad actor?



And how often did you read/hear somewhere that an actor received an award this year because last year his work wasn't awarded? 

...

Don't we all know one or more actors/ actresses whose work we adore - and who never won an Academy Award? 

...

If you're interested you can read about all the awardees of Berlinale here.


Have my favourite Award picture:

~ Joanne Woodward and her Oscar - Paul Newman and his Noscar.. ~

We'll see whether I will post again next year about Berlinale again..

Thank you very much for listening,


Yours


 Irene

Tuesday, 24 August 2010

Lunch at the usual time

A play by Terence Rattigan - usually perfomed in two one-act plays, in which the same actor performes the male main characters and the same actrice the female main characters - became a movie, directed by Delbert Mann which brought David Niven the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role with the shortest performance (16 minutes!) on screen that ever won this price: SEPARATE TABLES. (1958)


In a nutshell:

Serveral people are living in a little boarding house in England - some of them for years. Pat Cooper (Wendy Hiller), the landlady, has to find out that her secret fiancƩ John Malcolm (Burt Lancaster), still cares for his ex-wife (Rita Hayworth) and the longtime tennant Mrs. Railton-Bell (Gladys Cooper) discovers that Major Pollock (David Niven) - to whom her timid and prudish daughter Sybil (Deborah Kerr) is secretly attracted - is no Major at all and is pleaded guilty that he badgded women in a cinema. Now Mrs. Railton-Bell does everything in her power to evict him out.

Watch out for:
David Niven's and Deborah Kerr's performance! It's the cat's pjyamas!!


Schmooze:

  • Wendy Hiller also received an Acadamy Award for her performance.
  • Gladys Cooper was the most popular Pin Up Girl for the British in WWI. She and Cathleen Nesbitt (who played her friend in SEPARATE TABLES) both played the mother of Prof. Higgins (played by Rex Harrison) in MY FAIR LADY - Gladys Cooper in the movie version and Cathleen Nesbitt on Broadway.

  • Though she was introduced with the phrase: "...not a day over 30" Rita Hayworth was actually 40 years old.

  • The pool split Miss Meacham (May Hallat) does was cutted afterwards. It was actually her doing the split and no stand-in was used, though you are not able to see that now.

  • The title song "Separate Tables" became a bestselling single for Vic Damone.

  • Instead of Rita Hayworth Vivien Leigh was designated for the role of Ann Shankland, John Malcolm's ex-wife. She dropped out as her then husband Laurence Olivier didn't assume the direction of this picture.

My favourite feature:

I confess: In thisfilm I don't have an eye for anything but the ensemble.

Scene to see:
The conversation between the Major and Sybil after she learned, that he behaved in a way she can't put up with!

Window shopping:
I'd like to sneak a peek into that fashion magazine that Rita Hayworth pages through.

Quotes Corner:
"I have no couriosity about the working classes."


This film sure is talkative - it has to. After all: This is a play. And for that it may come off a bit tiring if you are not used to films like it.
It was pretty daring in the 1950ies because: It is all about sex and domination. You won't see anything and compared to todays TV-Crime Series as C.S.I. and the like. It seems not to be that dreadful that the Major nudged (!) a women in a cinema - nonetheless molestation starts in little things. Despite that he still engages my sympathie - and that is a bit confusing for me. But as he is pictured as a very VERY inhibited man I feel something like compassion.
And David Niven is incredible! Similarly is Deborah Kerr! You would not believe that this is the same woman that kisses Burt Lancaster in FROM HERE TO ETERNITY in that famous beach scene - she is so a mousy person in SEPARATE TABLES!
And I love Rod Taylor's facial expressions in this movie - his girlfriend (Audrey Dalton) is frequently trying to distract him from learning for his medical exam by seducing him..
Goodbye I'll go and watch another movie - or this one again? -

"Cherrie-bye"

And as a goody - Gladys Cooper, dream of oh so many soldiers in WWI: Enjoy it, boys! ;"p