San Francisco
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Movie Reviews of San Francisco
Movie Review: San Franciso
Summary: 4 Stars
Great movie - thank you. Could you please carry more of the Janet MacDonald movies in DVD.Movie Review: Grand Finale of Earthquake and Aftermath Makes the Rest Tolerable Entertainment
Summary: 3 Stars
On the centennial of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, it's worth seeking out this 1936 chestnut if you can - even though it represents both the best and worst of what MGM did back in Hollywood's golden age. Be forewarned that it's rather slow going until the last twenty minutes when the studio pulled out all the stops to recreate the legendary earthquake and fire that destroyed the entire city. It's hard to believe that neither the Golden Gate Bridge nor the Bay Bridge was even built when this film was made, and in fact, only thirty years had elapsed since the earthquake occurred.
Directed by W.S. Van Dyke in less than subtle fashion, the patently old-fashioned melodrama stars Clark Gable as notorious gambling hall owner Blackie Norton and Jeanette McDonald as virginal parson's daughter Mary Blake. The silly, cornball story revolves around Blackie's attempts to turn Mary into the hall chanteuse despite her more elevated aspiration to become a world-famous opera singer. Even though he treats her like a chorus girl, Mary falls for Blackie for reasons unclear except that he's Gable. A limited actress especially as she moved further away from her more sophisticated Ernst Lubitsch roles, the overly mannered McDonald sings frequently in the film in that soprano operetta vocal style that apparently was popular back then. There is even an overlong sequence where she plays Marguerite in Gounod's "Faust" and brings Blackie rather incredibly to tears.
A large supporting cast was assembled, which includes the redoubtable Spencer Tracy, then a rising MGM star. In a thankless role, he plays the pugnacious but kindly Father Mullen, who symbolizes the film's heavy religious overtones resulting in a most unbelievable conversion at the end. However, the recreations of the earthquake and fires are impressive by any standards, much less those of 1936. Van Dyke seems to borrow quite a bit from the Odessa Steps sequence in Sergei Eisenstein's 1925 classic "Battleship Potemkin", but the quick cuts and implied carnage work very well in any context. Anita Loos, who later penned the classic "The Women", is responsible for the heavy-handed script.
There's a good amount of extras with the new 2006 DVD package from Warner Bros, which contains a decent though not outstanding print transfer. It starts with a 45-minute documentary on Gable, hosted by Liam Neeson, which ironically gives short shrift to the movie. There are a couple of vintage travel featurettes about San Francisco itself at the time of filming, as well as a cartoon. Of special interest is a very quick (45-second) alternate ending that includes shots of the Golden Gate and Bay Bridges under construction.
Movie Review: Let Down
Summary: 3 Stars
I yield to no man in my admiration for Jeanette MacDonald, and in fact I remember seeing San Francisco in a movie house packed to the rafters with disaster and Gable fans, and a loud burst of applause at the end (well, it was the Castro, and we give standing ovations to Patty Duke). And so I was looking forward to seeing San Francisco again, and it was with bewilderment as the minutes ticked by and I found myself increasingly bored when not puzzled by what was going on. Anita Loos or whoever it was, gave San Francisco a plot structure that moved, all right, but in shuddering creaks like the Titanic stuck on an iceberg. And what's worse, Gable looks awful, so greasy and slick, while my wonderful Jeanette MacDonald gives off only a few moments of her patented charm, and even her low-key but remarkable sex appeal has been somehow tamped down, way down. Was it, as people say, that she had no offscreen fondness for Clark Gable? Or did she resent being cast in a non-musical? I don't know; she seems to think that she IS in a musical, and gives her many numbers the old college try. Maybe not having anyone to sing duets with (bar the long, long, hour-long sequence in which she triumphs as Marguerite) didn't give her the chance to strike up sparks with anyone, not even a maid this time as in the later CAIRO.
As for Spencer Tracy, yes, he's energetic, but for the life of me the Hays Code restrictions were so severe that it left the screenplay a mess without a cause. What had Blackie Norton done that left Father Mullin so convinced of his utter damnation? (Because we get the speech that he never did wrong to women, never stole, never cheated, etc., so why is Tracy so upset with him?) It might have been better had Blackie been an actual cad. But the fatal miscalculation is thinking that audiences would care about Blackie's so called Reform of the board of supervisors over some issue involving not enough fire trucks or whatever.... The movie might have worked had Rossellini been around to direct it--someone who cared about actual social and civic issues--but as it stands it's just about who can bluster better, Gable, Tracy, or the opera guy who loved Mary Blake body and soul but who just doesn't care about the people. I'm let down. I usually love this kind of old movie.
Movie Review: Dated historical melodrama
Summary: 3 Stars
Produced during the throes of the Depession, the musical melodrama San Francisco had very clear delineations between good and evil following Hollywood morality codes of the time. Not being a lover of romantic musical drama, I found the excellent special effects depicting the great earthquake of 1906 to be the film's saving grace.
The crux of the story surrounded the arrival of the good girl virtuous daughter of a country preacher Mary Blake played by Jeanette MacDonald at the Barbary Coast gambling saloon of Blackie Norton looking for employment. The aptly named Norton a man about town, bon vivant type with questionable scruples played by a pre-Rhett Butler Clark Gable offered her a job after hearing her impressive voice. MacDonald worked for Gable as a nightclub singer but with aspirations to sing opera. Her dreams were bolstered when singing for gentlemanly Jack Burley and his protege Signor Baldini played by Jack Holt and William Ricciardi. They offered her the lead in the local Tivoli Opera house.
MacDonald and Gable eventually fell in love, but Holt also deeply loved her. Conflicted by her allegiance to Gable she bounced back and forth between the opera and Gable's saloon. Both Holt and Gable proposed marriage to MacDonald. Gable's long time friend the pious Father Tim Mullin, a familiar role for Spencer Tracy, acting as MacDonald's confidante dissuaded her from persuing matrimony with the shady Gable. The devastation of the eathquake however proved to Tracy the depth and sincerity of Gable's affections.
In the finale the entire cast unbelievably breaks into cheerful and hopeful song as they espy the devastation wrought by the massive earthquake. Only is Depression era Hollywood cinema could that happen.
Movie Review: Slow moving but builds to a great climax!!
Summary: 3 Stars
First let me say that Clark Gable is not my favorite actor of the Golden Age. I find a lot of his performances annoying and this one is no exception. Second, I do like Jeanette MacDonald but to put it plainly, I simply cannot understand her when she sings. Third, Spencer Tracy rounds out the trio in what amounts to a wasted part as a priest. But he makes the most of it and delivers a fine performance. That being said the screenplay is very slow moving (I found myself dosing from time to time). But when the earthquake hits (in the last twenty minutes of the film) the effects are spectacular! I need to watch this film again in order to appreciate it more. Sometimes if I find a film "slow moving" the first time and I watch it more and more, it gets better. Hopefully, this will be the case here. This film was made in the era of MGM when its prime mogul, Louis B. Mayer, wanted happy, inspiring endings. I don't fault him for that. I enjoy the music in this film (despite MacDonald's undistinguishable warbling)and the production values (aside from the slow-moving screenplay) are first rate. The film contains some great extras: a documentary on Clark Gable produced by the network TNT called "Tall, Dark and Handsome", a mini-documentary of San Francisco, the original theatrical trailer and subtitles. Its a good film, but not a great one.