Friday, June 25th, marked the sixtieth anniversary of the start of the Korean War. Coming just five years after the end of World War II, the fighting would last three years and cost the lives of 34,000 Americans, 17,000 soldiers from other UN nations, and several million Koreans and Chinese — both military and civilian.

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You would think with such serious statistics and the pain, suffering, sacrifice and drama they imply, that Hollywood would have been drawn to the Korean War as a setting for a bevy of war movies. But sadly there are only a few films that tackle the subject. Still, some notables do stand out.  So if you are looking for a way to honor the veterans of what has been called “the forgotten war” (apparently by Hollywood, as well), I hope you’ll look back at the previous chapters of this series in which I humbly presented my five favorite Korean War films, starting with the most recent one produced.

My thoughts on the war and its meaning (especially since my dad fought there) can be found at Big Government. Here at BH my interest was in Hollywood’s treatment of the subject matter as expressed through the motion picture medium.  (more…)

Oscar season approaches, which means that once again it’s time for the annual cry of … There-Are-No-Good-Roles-For-Women! Maybe “cry” isn’t the best word. ”Whine” is more suitable — from a self-inflicted wound. Here’s a taste of this year’s first-whine from a Hollywood Reporter story titled: Shallow Pool for Oscar’s Actress Contenders:

How shallow is the pool? Some are talking about performances such as Sandra Bullock’s in the feel-good film “The Blind Side

The lack of depth has led to a slew of awards-season chatter, from the expected downplaying — all categories are cyclical — to blanket explanations about studios making fewer awards movies in general. …

But it also highlights that, for all the strides made by the women behind the camera, the women in front of them can still be subject to the old prejudices. Indeed, the more cynical in town — including at least one actress awards-contender — say that the director and actress trends are hardly a coincidence. Many female directors, they argue, can feel pressure to cast a preponderance of strong male leads to negate the perception that theirs is a female-oriented film.

The article is simply wrong on one very important point. These aren’t “old prejudices,” these are new prejudices. (more…)

The sun is sinking in the west
The cattle go down to the stream
The redwing settles in her nest
It’s time for a cowboy to dream….

Exquisitely crafted, but never ostentatious. Pleasantly mellow, but never lazy. Thematically rich, but never preachy. Respectful of tradition, but never stolid. Deeply compassionate, but never descending into schmaltz. Five decades ago, a group of men now long-dead (and, it must be said, one smokin’-hot woman, still-living) followed an aged veteran director into the Arizona desert to make a humble, heartfelt western based firmly on quintessentially American notions of courage, decency, and good humor. The result of their collaboration, Rio Bravo (1959), remains one of the great visceral pleasures of cinema.

Howard Hawks’ masterpiece stemmed from his disgust with the joyless anti-heroics of uptight, melodramatic westerns like Fred Zinnemann’s High Noon (1952) and Delmer Daves’ 3:10 to Yuma (1957) — dark “message movies” that seemed to revel in smugly depicting small-town Americans as cynics and cowards. The man behind such classics as Scarface (1932), Only Angels Have Wings (1939), To Have and Have Not (1944), Red River (1948), and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) was in his early sixties in 1958, his career winding down after decades of constant production. He had interned for Famous Players-Lasky way back in 1916, and directed his first features in the mid-1920s. Thirty years later he was old and tired, and his last film, Land of the Pharaohs (1955), had been a disheartening flop. Since then, the previously prolific director hadn’t helmed a picture in three years, an unheard-of period of self-exile for a man who had cranked out movies regularly for decades. But the brazen slap across the face that High Noon had given America’s western mythology had bothered him. “I made Rio Bravo,” he later told an interviewer, “because I didn’t like High Noon. Neither did Duke. I didn’t think a good town marshal was going to run around town like a chicken with his head cut off asking everyone to help. And who saves him? His Quaker wife. That isn’t my idea of a good western.” (more…)