Like “Cleopatra” (1963), it’s impossible to discuss “Stromboli” (1950) outside the context of the headline-churning extramarital scandal that embroiled its star and director, Ingrid Bergman and Roberto Rossellini. While Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton became bigger stars than ever because of their liaison, Bergman — then Hollywood’s biggest female star, already a four-time Oscar nominee who won Best Actress for “Gaslight” — and Rossellini, a highly respected founder of Italy’s Neorealist movement known for such films as “Open City,” never scaled such heights again in their careers. Even though Hollywood later lavished two Supporting Actress Oscars, as well as a posthumous Emmy on Bergman after she left Rossellini, all seen at least partly as apologizes for his ostracism from Tinseltown.
Gorgeous restorations of “Stromboli” and a pair of thematically similar black-and-whites films that Rossellini and his muse made together are collected in “Robert Rossellini Directs 3 Films Starring Ingrid Bergman,” a deluxe set available on Blu-ray and DVD from the Criterion Collection, which previously released Rossellini’s three post-World War II classics and historical films he directed for television toward the end of his career in the 1960s and 1970s, as well as his only major box-office successor, “General Della Rovere.”
Bergman had already gravitated toward more challenging fare following the expiration of her contract with David O. Selznick, which ended with her being included in the package for “Notorious,” a notably darker role than her previous Hollywood outings. She had already made “Arch of Triumph,” “Joan of Arc” and “Under Capicorn” (all money losers) when she received a response to a letter she sent offering to work for Rossellini, whose “Open City” she greatly admired. Trouble was Rossellini, who was married and carrying on an affair with actress Anna Magnani, didn’t just want to work with the beautiful Hollywood star. Swept off her feet by Rossellini’s tour of Italy, Bergman accepted his offer to play a Lithuanian war refugee who escapes a displaced persons camp in Italy — only to learn that she’s imprisoned herself by marrying a fisherman who takes her home to a remote volcanic island off the coast of Sicily (that Rossellini had learned about from a cousin who shot a documentary there.)
An excellent Italian TV documentary included among the copious extras by Criterion recounts what a truly grueling shoot Bergman had signed up for — on an island that didn’t even have a hotel, but did have an active volcano spewing lava and emitting toxic gases. The film’s assistant cameraman also reveals that it was no time at all before the small crew was gossiping about the blossoming affair going on between the director and Bergman, who was also married and had a young daughter who grew up to be TV reviewer Pia Lindstrom. The presence of the spurned Anna Magnani making a rival film called “Volcano” (written by Rossellini’s cousin, who also got squeezed out of “Stromboli”) under William Dieterle’s direction on a nearby island further piqued the curiosity of the press, who eventually told the world that Bergman was with child. The Vatican was particularly displeased, and Catholic Church in the United States spearheaded a boycott of Bergman, who had not only played the Maid of Orleans but a nun in her most popular film, “The Bell’s of St. Mary’s.”
Even before it opened in Europe, Howard Hughes’ RKO, which had co-financed the film, rushed a heavily-edited English-language version of “Stromboli” with a softened ending (possibly to appease the Production Code Authority) into saturation release (a remarkable 120 theaters in the New York market alone) in an unsuccessful attempt to cash in on the scandal, or at least get the film out (shortly) before the birth of its star’s love child. This 81-minute version, which had been disowned by Rossellini in telegrams to prominent U.S. critics before its opening but continued circulating for years, is not included in the Criterion release. Instead, there is Rossellini’s preferred version, mostly in English (with the three principal male actors speaking the language phoenetically) with RKO credits and running 108 minutes, as well as a slightly different, concurrently shot Italian-language version with English subtitles.
“Stromboli” and the other Bergman-Rossellini releases in the set — “Europe ’51” with Alexander Knox and Giulietta Masina (sponsored by Carlo Ponti and Dino DeLaurentiis and released in the U.S. as “The Greatest Love”) and “Voyage to Italy” co-starring George Sanders (called “Strangers” here), both released on the art-house circuit — got terrible reviews when they came out. But they came to be regarded as a trilogy when they were rediscovered by French critics in the 1960s who praised them as essays on alientation as (the increasingly weary-looking Bergman) confronts and engages with Italy on its own terms. (The Rosselllini-Bergman marriage, which ended in 1957, also produced Isabella and Ingrid Rossellini and two more features, as well as a short film included here). Criterion offers both English and Italian-language versions of “Europe ’51” and an English-language version only for “Italy,” which is the most polished production of the three. What really makes this set is the extras, a cornucopia of new and old material, including vintage introductions for each film by Rossellini, a short film about him by his daughter Isabella, home movies of the family shot during the making of “Voyage,” and newly-filmed video essays by scholars. It’s quite a package.
The Warner Archive Collection’s “William Powell at Warner Bros” set collects four lesser-known, but still quite watchable, titles that span 1931 to 1934, when Powell (offloaded by Paramount, struggling to avoid receivership during the Depression, along with Kay Francis and Ruth Chatterton) was the studio’s top-paid male star, surpassing even Richard Barthlemess, with whom he the rare privilige of script approval. Powell is the main attraction in Alfred Green’s “The Road to Singapore” (1931), a wheezy colonial melodrama in which is patented charm is much appreciated as a roue who comes between workaholic physican Louis Calhern and his new-to-the-tropics wife. She is played by Doris Kenyon, one of WB’s more lackluster holdovers from the silent era. The more interesting scenes involve Calhern’s teenage sister (Marian Marsh) who throws herself at Powell — though he’s still too much of a gentleman to take advantage of her.
Mervyn LeRoy’s “High Pressure” (1932) is the most entertaining film of the set, a fast-paced comedy that casts Powell as fast-talking con man who peddles stock in a phony process for artificial rubber. Neither Evelyn Brent, as his long-suffering fiance, or Evalyn Knapp, as his secretary, are really fitting consorts for the star, but he does get great comic support from ethnic-comedy specialist George Sidney (late of Universal’s “Cohens and the Kellys” series), Frank McHugh, and Guy Kibbee as an idiot Powell installs as his corporation’s president because he looks the part.
Still sporting the British accent from “Cavalcade” that landed her a WB contract, the ubiquitous Margaret Lindsay debuts at the studio as Powell’s leading lady in Michael Curtiz’ “Private Detective 62” (1933). He’s a disgraced former U.S. intelligence agent reduced to working for shady shamus Arthur Hohl, who orders Powell to frame Linsday because their underworld sponsor is in her debt. Not hard to guess what happens instead. Ruth Donnelly is especially funny as Hohl’s secretary. Penny-pinching WB, which had owned a large catalogue of popular songs, specially licensed Rodgers and Hart’s “Isn’t it Romantic?” from Paramount (where its use became something of a trademark lasting decades).
Powell already had one foot out the door when he made his last under contract to Warners, Curtiz’ “The Key” (1934). The actor personally chose this romantic triangle set against the Irish rebellion of 1920. He’s a British officer with a chequered past who arrives in Dublin to discover the woman he’s always loved (Edna Best, making a false start in Hollywood the same year she made her most famous film, Hitchcock’s first version of “The Man Who Knew Too Much”) is newly married to his best friend (Colin Clive, who made several films at WB before his death in 1937). Curtiz seems more interested in the hunt for IRA leader Donald Crisp, whose capture leads to Clive being taken hostage — setting the stage for stiff-upper-lip self-sacrifice by Powell. One wonders what George Brent — who worked for the IRA as a youth — thought of this romantic folderol, released to mild business after Powell’s first two smashes at MGM, “Manhattan Melodrama” and “The The Thin Man.”
The four films in “William Powell at Warner Bros.” have been remastered and are offered on four pressed (replicated) discs, a premium treatment reserved for multi-discs sets with large potential sales at WAC, which mostly deals in burned manufactured-on-demand releases. WAC has already released all of Powell’s other WB contract titles — “One-Way Passage” with Francis, as a single, as well as including the wonderful “Jewel Robbery” (Francis again) and “Lawyer Man” (Joan Blondell) in “Forbidden Hollywood Collection Vol. 4.” Also available from WB is “Fashions of 1934,” a comedy with Powell, Bette Davis and one of Busby Berkeley’s most infamous production numbers, and — as part of WAC’s “Philo Vance Mystery Collection” — the public-domain favorite “The Kennel Murder Case.” I understand that rights issues preclude WAC from rescuing “Life From Father” from PD Hell with an authorized release.
The single-disc “Lost and Found: Treasures From the New Zealand Film Archive,” out Tuesday, may not be as expansive as the previous multi-disc “Treasures” DVDs from the good folks at the National Film Preservation Foundation, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a treat for film buffs and cinephiles. This 3 1/4-hour sampler of long-lost films repatriated to American by the New Zealand Film Archives includes the first glimpse since 1927 of an early John Ford comedy, “Upstream,” as well as 43 minutes from “The White Shadow” (1924), the first film on which Alfred Hitchcock had a credited role.
The delightful, 61-minute “Upstream” is mostly a series of colorful vignettes set at a theatrical boardinghouse in New York City populated by fond archetypes, including an Irish and Jewish vaudeville team known as the Callahans and a sister team that’s actually comprised of a mother and daughter. What little plot there is concerns the black sheep of a famous theatrical family (Earle Foxe) who is suddenly summoned to play Hamlet in London. Coached by a washed-up stage veteran (Raymond Hitchcock, Foxe is so successful that is complicates the romance between a knife thrower (Grant Withers) and his partner (Nancy Nash). A trailer for a still-lost (and more characteristic-looking) Ford film, “Strong Boy” (1929) with Victor McLaglen, is also included.
Hitchcock served as screenwriter, production designer and editor for his mentor, director Graham Cutts, on “The White Shadows.” Even the first three reels (all that survives) demonstrates that the young Hitchcock had a sophisticated visual approach in a film that’s much more fast-paced than most soporific British product of the era. Storywise, it’s strictly Victorian melodrama with a Jazz Age twist, with Betty Compson imported from Hollywood to play twins, one of whom succumbs to the temptations of a dissolute Parisian cafe designed by Hitchcock. The leading man, Clive Brook, would soon be exported to Hollywood.
This fascinating restoration grabbag also includes Mabel Norman’s earliest surviving short as a director, “Won in a Cupboard” (1914), newsreels, and an intriguing chapter from “Dolly of the Dailies” (1914), in which an interepid newpaperwoman investigates a Tong War. There are newsreels, industrial films, a 1922 novelty film with sound, a comedy short based on the Andy Gump comic strip directed by Norman Taurog — and a great-looking ersatz travelogue from 1927, photographed in two-color Technicolor by Ray Rennahan.
Digging back in the Fox vaults for its first Blu-ray release from the 1930s, the boutique label Twilight Time has come up with a breathtaking transfer of “Drums Along the Mohawk,” the master’s first film in three-color Technicolor. It’s also one of Ford’s best, a vivid depiction of frontier life in upstate New York on the verge of the American revolution, where “Tories” (the euphemism for Brits with World War II looming in early 1939) teamed up with local Indian tribes to drive out Indians.
Another Ford film about a tight-knit community, this one is told from the point of view of a young woman (Claudette Colbert) from a wealthy Albany family who gets much more than she bargains for after marrying farmer Henry Fonda. He makes a fine stalwart hero and romantic lead, but the film really belongs to Colbert and Oscar-nominated Edna May Oliver, as the feisty widow who takes in Colbert and Fonda after the Mohawk burn the couple out of their homestead. Oliver fares best, especially in a death scene that seems to acknowledge her character has had something going on with hunky Ward Bond. John Carradine’s role as the sneering Tory villain is smaller than you’d think given the billing.
Unusually violent for the era — there’s even a clear suggestion gun-toting Claudette is going to be raped before the camera cuts away from one scene — “Drums Along the Mohawk” was also Oscar nominated for Rennahan and Bert Glennon’s cinematography, which beautifully captures Utah locations. It’s a great example of how Ford could take a script written for another director (Henry King, who at one point was going to do it with Linda Darnell and Don Ameche) and make it unmistakeably his own.
Fox’s own Studio Classics line has offered a handsome Blu-ray upgrade of “A Letter to Three Wives” (1949) that particularly highlights the masterful Arthur Miller’s black-and-white location shooting in Cold Spring, N.Y. Joseph L. Mankiewicz’ warmup for “All About Eve” (he’s the only winner of back-to-back trophies for Best Director and Best Screenplay) is one of the sharpest comedies of its era, as the divorced town trollope (a never-seen Celeste, who narrates) sends the title missive to three suburban housewives informing them he’s running off with one of their husbands.
As they are tied up on an all-day outing, there’s plenty of time for the three ladies to reflect on their maritial problems. Jeanne Crain is a farmgirl who snagged rich husband Jeffrey Lynn while they were both serving in World War II but who doesn’t feel entirely comfortable in her new, upscale setting.
More interesting is her friend Ann Sothern (borrowed from MGM) whose part-time work as a writer of radio soap opera is so successful that it’s beginning to concern her husband, an underpaid college professor (a young, and fourth-billed Kirk Douglas) Things come to a hilarious head when she invites her sponsor (Hobart Cavanaugh) and his overbearing wife (Florence Bates) to dinner, where Douglas finally explodes.
But the funniest segment involves the third wife, a golddigger played by a never-better Linda Darnell. Though she lives so close to the wrong side of the tracks that her house shakes every time a train goes by, she plays hardball with her boss, appliance-store magnate Paul Douglas (in his film debut), to get him to reluctantly cough up a wedding ring. Both performers — reteamed immediately afterwards for “Everybody Does It” — have terrific comic chemistry. And there’s some expert scene stealing by Thelma Ritter as the Douglas’ part-time maid, who is also the sarcastic best friend to Darnell’s mom (Connie Gilchrist). Darnell, pregnant during shooting, reportedly had an on-an-off affair with her married director, Mankiewicz.
Clarence Brown’s “Of Human Hearts” (1938) starring James Stewart, Walter Huston and Beulah Bondi, joins two previously announced Stewart vehicles debuting on DVD today from the Warner Archive Collection: George Stevens’ “Vivacious Lady” (1938) with Ginger Rogers and Bond and William Keighley’s “No Time for Comedy” (1940) co-starring Rosalind Russell. Sony
Sony Pictures Choice Collection — their MOD DVD line — will bow Carl Reiner’s “The Comic” (1969) with Dick Van Dyke on DVD Oct. 8, along with Albert Rogell’s “Air Hostess” (1933) starring Evalyn Knapp and James Murray.
Francis Martin’s “Tillie and Gus” (1933), starring W.C. Fields and Alison Skipworth, turned up on DVD announced last month from the Universal Vault Series MOD program (exclusive to Amazon), along with C.B. DeMille’s vigilante drama “This Day and Age” (1933) with Charles Bickford, John Farrow’s wartime drama “China” (1943) starring Alan Ladd and Loretta Young, and Joe Pevney’s “Back to God’s Country” (1953), a Technicolor epic starring Rock Hudson and Steve Cohran.
Another highly-sought title, the Capara-esque comedy “The Whole Town’s Talking” (1935) with Edward G. Robinson (in a dual role) and Jean Arthur, will finally debut on DVD October 5 as part of “John Ford: The Columbia Pictures Collection” from the TCM Vault Collection. Also new-to-format are Ford’s British-made “Gideon of Scotland Yard” (1958) with Jack Hawkins and, surprisingly, “Two Rode Together” (1961) starring Stewart and Richard Widmark. The five-disc set is rounded out by remastered versions of two other Ford classics: “The Long Gray Line” (1955) with Tyrone Power and Maureen O’Hara, which is still available, and “The Last Hurrah” (1958) with Spencer Tracy, which is officially out-of-print. TCM is promising Leonard Maltin commentaries on each title, as well as a Ben Mankiewicz intro for the set, among other features.
On the Blu-ray front, Leo McCarey’s enormously popular “The Bell’s of St. Mary’s” (1945) starring Bing Crosby and Oscar-nominated Ingrid Bergman, will bow in high-defintion on Nov. 19 from Olive Films. An essay booklet by film historian R. Emmet Sweeney is included. The next two releases from Fox’s Studio Classics line are Blu-ray upgrades for Walter Lang’s “On the Riviera” (1951) with Danny Kaye on Oct. 8 and Nunnally Johnson’s “The Three Faces of Eve” (1957), starring Oscar winner Joanne Woodward, on Nov. 5.