Showing posts with label Peter Lorre. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Peter Lorre. Show all posts

Tuesday, 31 January 2012

The CASABLANCA - Factor

So - this is it. That was January 2012.. I promised you the CASABLANCA factor post about this month's theme "On The Run".


Just by the way - it was so much fun to see it in cinema - with some people in the audience who didn't know CASABLANCA (1942) before.. 

Can you imagine how wonderful that is when people hear those great lines for the first time? 

Especially my beloved Claude Rains made a deep impact there..



One of the connections of CASABLANCA to my On The Run Series is quite obivous: It's a film about people trying to escape from the Nazis - on their way in to a new life - the other connection is nothing to actually see: Most of the cast (and I love the cast - it causes my love for this film) actually were refugees or emigrants:

There are of course Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman) and Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid) - a famous resistance fighter on their way to America to go on fight against the Nazis (well.. she is more or less "just" his wife..)

~ Paul Henreid (who is one of my favourites) was really an avid anti-fascist. ~


Even Rick (Humphrey Bogart) is running away from his past - and maybe his love..

Ugarte - a criminal - is not running fast enough.. He is personated by Peter Lorre - who was a guest before on my On The Run Series - what I forgot to mention there: He also used another way to run away: he was addicted to morphine..



Conrad Veidt (another one of my favourite actors.. he played Major Strasser) fleed Germany with his then wife who was Jewish. 




Michael Curtiz who directed this film moved to Hollywood in 1926. 


The pickpocket was personated by the wonderful Curt Bois - another great comedian Germany lost because of the Nazis.



There are of course more characters on the run like a young couple trying to get enough money:  Annina (Joy Page) and Jan Brandel (Helmut Dantine)




Helmut Dantine (Jan Brandel) was born Helmut Guttman in Vienna, Austria in 1917. He lead a Anti-Nazi-youth movement there - but when Austria was annexed he was arrested - and sent to a concentration camp for three months. After that his parents made sure that he left to live in America with a friend. They themselve died in a concentration camp later..

Have Herr & Frau Leuchtag (Ludwig Stƶssel and Ilka Grüning both were also emigrants in real life) here in one of my favourite scenes of this film:

 

- as much as I love it - it breaks my heart. Can you imagine to leave your home, your friends, your language? I don't want to use ageism - but I can imagine that Herr & Frau Leuchtag didn't plan to leave their home (country) at the age they are now..

Back in those days AUFBAU the monthly German Jewish magazine (setted till 2004 in New York, USA - it moved then to Zurich, Switzerland) told it's readers who were in the main German Jewish imigrants (as obviously were it's writers..) not to speak German in public. So for they're home country didn't accept them as one of them anymore - in their new country they still were Germans - which was much too easily of course taken as a pseudonym for Nazi.. 

~ common sight in WWII  - this picture was taken in Germany - but does that matter at all? ~

A classic question from German journalists nowadays is to ask people who fleed the Nazis and came back later, why they returned to "the land OF the comitters". This actually made my grandfather angry whenever he heard it - and makes me still sad: So it was after all NOT the land of the ones who had to leave it? It is after all the land of the Nazis? As my grandfather used to state: "So the Nazis after all have actually won the war..". It is just a question of phrasing - I know.. but still..

And the trouble is - and I know I might sound a bit shizophrenic: If you're leaving your home you can't come back. It might be the same place - but it isn't home anymore. You have changed - and the people you knew have changed too. If you leave you'll leave forever. But that is no question which was actually to consider if you were Jewish/homosexual/or-what-ever-else-Nazis-think-is-not-good-enough-for-"their"-country  in 3rd Reich. 

I could of course go on and on with all those cast members and their connection to January's series - but I fear that January will be gone before I have finished this post.. And I fear that I might have already put some of my readers off with all those refugees talk in the end of this post..

So: thank you all for listening!

Hope to see you next month again at Rick's CafƩ AmƩricain - here at my blog!

Yours very well and truly

Irene


Thursday, 5 January 2012

Completely having kittens.. ..with a lady and two gents


Today this post features the always popular Siamese cats, an apparently red cat and hopefully much to the delight of Michelle (and Alice) several black cats..

This is part of a meme hosted by Michelle @ THE TRUE BOOK ADDICT.

When it comes to male actors there are two who are my number one 
- I know, I know.. I really can't decide who I like more - I just love them both! 

These two gentlemen are 

Peter Lorre and Vincent Price.

Both men had their appearence in this series before - but nevertheless: here they are again - and they brought the wonderful Joyce Jameson with them! I also like her very, very much - a very funny (and quite gorgeous) actress she was.

They appeared in TALES OF TERROR (1962) (based on Edgar Allan Poe's stories) together in the segment THE BLACK CAT..

From the film:






and here they are together: 

Joyce and the boys:





Just Joyce:



Just "the boys":




You can tell me what you want:
 I think black cats seem to have the most impressive eyes! 
Just look at those little fellas! 

Those of you who visit via THE TRUE BOOK ADDICT might not know that this month my blog has a special theme - it's called On the Run : Runaways & Refugees - Escapees & Escapists

So how does this post fit into the theme?

It fits because of Peter Lorre - born as LÔszló Löwenstein on June 26, 1904 in Rószahegy (Austria-Ungary - now: Ruzomberok, Slovak Republic) - ran away from home when he was a teenager. In Vienna (Austria) he first worked as a bank clerk before he became an actor (a really great actor if I might add this..). He appeared on several stages and in some German films before he had to leave Germany to rescue his life. Being jewish he wasn't safe in now 3rd Reich..



And in a very sad way also Joyce Jameson  fits into the series: she decided to choose the ultimate way to run away: On January 16, 1987 she commited suicide

...

Without the approach to belittle Joyce Jameson's fate - but to make this post end with some brighter thoughts:

- here are my favourite cat pictures of Peter Lorre:

The first one I posted now three times:


But this one is (as I hope) new to you:


Thank you all for visiting and listening!
Have a wonderful day!

Yours

Irene

Thursday, 29 December 2011

Completely havin kittens.. ..2011 wrap up - and a new one..

 Welcome to the last completely having kittens post of 2011..


This is part of a meme hosted by Michelle @ THE TRUE BOOK ADDICT.

Michelle re-posted some of her favourite Cat Thursday pics, which she shared with us through 2011. I'd like to share three of them with you, too before I am going to show you twelve of my favourite this year (followed by a "brand new" one on this blog..)

Here are three I borrowed from Michelle, who posted loads of great pics beside those..: 



And my favourite of them:




Okay - here are my 12 favourite pictures I posted this year on this blog:

 I was participating on this meme before I started it here - I did it on another blog of mine NOT SOPHISTICATED (I'M THE SWEET AND SIMPLE KIND)..

Frankly - I love almost every picture I posted in this series - so I had a hard time to pick just twelve of them.. But here we go - and of course we'll end with my favourite picture of them all..

We had a lot of cats showing their pals (most of them I confess are my favourite actors):

Ava Gardner



Agnes Moorehead



 Elizabeth Taylor



Marilyn Monroe



James Mason



Judy Garland



 Alain Delon



Ursula Andress
(I simply had to re-post both pictures..)




Peter Lorre



Laird Cregar



Romy Schneider


 And here is the new picture - sporting one of the few actors I dare to call by first name when talking about her (another one would be Romy Schneider..) - our cat-lady of the week is a lady who would have turned 110 years this week:

Marlene Dietrich


* Decemeber 27, 1901  Berlin-Schƶneberg, Germany
† May 6, 1992 Paris, France

Thank you all for listening!

Yours

Irene

Thursday, 29 September 2011

Completely having kittens (13)

It's Thursday.. which means it's "purrs-day"!

This is part of a meme hosted by Michelle @ THE TRUE BOOK ADDICT.

Here we have another of my top ten favourite actors:

Peter Lorre - really completely having kittens..

Have a great day!!

Yours very well and truly

Irene