In case you were wondering, it’s sheer coincidence that three films I caught recently all came from that year.
Mum had a huge crush on actor/singer Danny Kaye so we watched Kaye’s classic THE COURT JESTER (1955) whenever it aired on TV. I have it on DVD so TYG and I watched it for a recent date night; happily, she loved it too.
England is under tyranny, the usurper Roderick (Cecil Parker) having seized the throne and put the family to the sword — except the rightful heir, an infant, yet lives, under the care of the Robin Hoodesque Black Fox (Edward Ashley-Cooper). Kaye plays Hawkins, a carnival entertainer who joined up with the Black Fox’s band but his duties are limited to caring for the baby and clowning to entertain the other freedom fighters. Then circumstances give him a chance to impersonate the legendary jester Giacomo (John Carradine), giving him entrance to the castle and a chance to obtain the key to a secret passage that would let the Black Fox and his forces in. However the schemes of Ravenhurst (Basil Rathbone), the witch Griselda (Mildred Natwick) and the Princess Gwendolyn (Angela Lansbury) complicate things — can Hawkins save the day? Will he ever get anywhere with fellow freedom fighter Maid Jean (Glynis Johns)? Always a pleasure to rewatch; I did find myself speculating fanfic style that the nobleman known as “the grim, grisly and greusome Griswold” might be the ancestor of Chevy Chase’s family in the Vacation films. “No — they broke the chalice from the palace. The flagon with a dragon now contains the pellet with the poison.”
PETE KELLY’S BLUES (1955) was a film based on Jack Webb’s unsuccessful radio series of the same name. Webb once again takes the leading role as a jazz trumpeter in Prohibition-era Kansas City, feuding with best buddy Lee Marvin, fending off advances from wealthy Janet Leigh, and trying to stay out of the clutches of gangster Edmond O’Brien while also serving as minder to O’Brien’s alcoholic girlfriend Peggy Lee. Watchable but not much more — Webb’s stoneface definitely worked better when he played Officer Friday on Dragnet. Ella Fitzgerald plays a supporting part as a blues singer, making me suggest Spike Lee’s Mo’ Better Blues as a double-bill (it gives the black talent center stage rather than making them backup to white talent). “The whisky’s aged … if you get there late in the day.”
5 AGAINST THE HOUSE (1955) adapts the same-name Jack Finney novel, a caper story about law-school students plotting to rob a casino. Kerwin Matthews is the instigator, intrigued by the challenge of beating the airtight security, promising to give the money back when it’s done; Guy Madison, Alvy Moore and Madison’s girlfriend Kim Novak reluctantly go along for the ride. Unfortunately the fifth member of the tram is PTSDed veteran Brian Keith who figures if they keep the cash, his cut will make him rich enough he’ll never be committed to a mental hospital again. This is a decent drama with some good banter but the scheme isn’t clever or plausible enough; as it involves a tape recorder, the Rex Harrison murder comedy Unfaithfully Yours would double-bill well. “That is kind of a deathless remark, at that.”“
The third season of SUPERMAN AND LOIS has the Kents trying to take down Intergang leader Bruno Mannheim (Chad L. Coleman), combining Clark’s superpowers and Lois’s investigative skills. Complicating things: Lois has breast cancer and ironically she’s getting treatment at Mannheim’s Suicide Slum clinic. Further complication: Mannheim has a sonic powered assassin (I’m surprised she never got a comics name, though the obvious Silver Banshee is already taken) who can even hurt Superman.
This season was more fun as soap opera — everyone’s relationships get shaken up in different ways — than for the main arc. I like Mannheim, who comes off as very much like the post-Crisis Luthor, presenting a charitable face to hide his schemes, but that battle wraps up early to introduce Luthor (Michael Cudlitz), who spent years in prison after Lois’s journalism led to his conviction for one of Mannheim’s killings. Now he’s out, he’s angry and he’s not about to let Superman stop him from his revenge on Lois.
Luthor here is a hard-as-they-come mob boss; Cudlitz plays the role well but it has nothing in common with any version of Luthor I recognize; no Luthor should treat Superman as a mere obstacle rather than a target. It’s also discontinuous: Jon Cryer’s Luthor was a presence for three seasons on Supergirl which takes place on the same Earth so how was he in jail all that time? And Lois’s handwringing over Luthor’s imprisonment ignores that he’s undoubtedly committed many murders he wasn’t caught for: that doesn’t excuse sending him to jail but he’s not an innocent either. Overall, though, more fun than the first two seasons. “I’m handing over years of investigative work and your big concern is my handwriting?”
My only disappointment with the fourth and final season of NANCY DREW is that it is indeed the final season. At the end of S3, Nancy’s ancestor Temperance cursed her so that if she (Kennedy McCann) and Ace (Alex Saxon) ever got together, it would be Nancy’s death. Failing to break the curse this season, they try to move on without much success, Ace working in the morgue, Nancy opening a PI’s office. Then the Scooby Drews discover the existence of the Sin-Eater, an entity that provides the well-connected members of Horsehoe Bay society with a magic that erases memories of their crimes (“Negligent homicide can ‘t be punished if everyone forgets about it.”)— but where did it come from and how can they destroy it? The answers, of course, prove more complicated than expected … This one went out on a win. “I think your past lives have come to check out what you’re up to.”
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