Classic Films

Staph

(6,253 posts) Tue Dec 27, 2022, 11:37 PM Dec 2022

TCM Schedule for Friday, December 30, 2022 -- What's On Tonight: TBA!

In the daylight hours, it's all Tarzan, all the time. Specifically, it's all Johnny Weissmuller, all the time - the best of the Tarzans in my not-so-humble opinion.

Then in prime time, it seems to be all about the law and the military, with A Soldier's Story (1984), Paths of Glory (1958), The Caine Mutiny (1954), The Rack (1956). and The Life of Emile Zola (1937). But the TCM Now Playing document just says "TBA". Enjoy anyway!

6:00 AM -- Tarzan, the Ape Man (1932)
1h 39m | Adventure | TV-G
A British lord raised by apes kidnaps a beautiful noblewoman exploring Africa with her father.
Director: W. S. Van Dyke
Cast: Johnny Weissmuller, Neil Hamilton, C. Aubrey Smith

Tarzan's distinctive call was either created by sound recordist Douglas Shearer from various sounds, or it was indeed Johnny Weissmuller doing the yell himself. Co-star Maureen O'Sullivan insisted throughout her life that it was Weissmuller doing the yell without any technical assistance. Johnny Weissmuller explained on the Mike Douglas show that he was the one that did the yell, which he did on the show.

8:00 AM -- Tarzan and His Mate (1934)
1h 45m | Adventure | TV-PG
The jungle king fights to protect his wife from a greedy ivory hunter.
Director: Cedric Gibbons
Cast: Johnny Weissmuller, Maureen O'Sullivan, Neil Hamilton

Maureen O'Sullivan does not appear as Jane during the film's famous nude swimming sequence. O'Sullivan is instead doubled by Josephine McKim, a member of the 1928 and 1932 U.S. Womens' Olympic Swim Teams and one of the four U.S. swimmers on that team to win the 1932 gold medal in the 400-Meter Freestyle Relay, setting Olympic and World records. (See Olympic swimming records for 1928 and 1932). The actress is never fully nude due to wearing a skin-colored strapless one-piece swimsuit. In a 1994 interview with Ron Miller, Maureen O'Sullivan revealed she was claustrophobic and couldn't bear to put her face under water. Otherwise she would have gladly gotten naked for the scene.

10:00 AM -- Tarzan Escapes (1936)
1h 35m | Adventure | TV-PG
Jane Parker's cousins try to kidnap the jungle king to get their hands on her inheritance.
Director: Richard Thorpe
Cast: Johnny Weissmuller, Maureen O'Sullivan, John Buckler

Three films into the series, Tarzan and Jane's nest-like home in the trees has expanded into a Swiss Family Robinson-like home with running water and an elephant-manipulated elevator to bring people up to the home.

11:45 AM -- Tarzan Finds a Son! (1939)
1h 30m | Adventure | TV-PG
The jungle king adopts the infant survivor of a plane crash.
Director: Richard Thorpe
Cast: Johnny Weissmuller, Maureen O'Sullivan, Johnny Sheffield

Tarzan had to "find" a son, because censors would not allow Jane to become pregnant because she and Tarzan were not legally married.

1:30 PM -- Tarzan's Secret Treasure (1941)
1h 21m | Adventure | TV-PG
Prospectors kidnap Jane and Boy to force the jungle king to reveal the location of a golden treasure.
Director: Richard Thorpe
Cast: Johnny Weissmuller, Maureen O'Sullivan, Johnny Sheffield

Reminiscent of how cowboys never need to reload their six-shooters, Tarzan swims under water at least a tenth of a mile and overturns multiple canoes, blowing bubbles all the while, and not taking a single breath until a crocodile tosses him in the air.

3:00 PM -- Tarzan's New York Adventure (1942)
1h 11m | Adventure | TV-PG
When a circus kidnaps Boy, Tarzan and Jane follow him to New York City.
Director: Richard Thorpe
Cast: Johnny Weissmuller, Maureen O'Sullivan, Johnny Sheffield

Because the jungle sets and elephants tend to dwarf the actors, the audience may forget that Johnny Weissmuller was 6'4", like his friend and fellow yachtsman John Wayne. His height and broad shoulders become more apparent in the New York scenes, where he towers over the other actors, even burly Charles Bickford.

4:30 PM -- Tarzan Triumphs (1943)
1h 18m | Adventure | TV-PG
The jungle king helps the princess of a lost civilization fight off Nazi invaders.
Director: William Thiele
Cast: Johnny Weissmuller, Johnny Sheffield, Frances Gifford

Jane's absence was explained in a letter saying that she was visiting relatives in England. Maureen O'Sullivan was sick of playing Jane, but her absence probably had more to do with the fact that the franchise had switched from MGM to RKO, and O'Sullivan was an MGM contract player. In her role as "Zandra," Frances Gifford was essentially auditioning to replace Maureen O'Sullivan as Tarzan's love interest. RKO was apparently unimpressed by the chemistry between Gifford and Weissmuller, since she never again appeared in a Tarzan film.

6:00 PM -- Tarzan's Desert Mystery (1943)
1h 10m | Adventure | TV-PG
The jungle king braves a lost prehistoric world to obtain malaria serum for the Allies.
Director: William Thiele
Cast: Johnny Weissmuller, Nancy Kelly, Johnny Sheffield

When the movie was released in France after the war, the French version changed the Nazi intrigue to focus on ivory smugglers as the bad guys, instead of Germans and Hitler henchmen.

7:30 PM -- Sunkist Stars at Palm Springs (1936)
19m | Short | TV-PG
Winners of a dance contest spend a day at Palm Springs with famous movie stars.
Director: Roy Rowland
Cast: Fuzzy Knight, Frankie Darro, Claire Trevor

Filmed at the El Mirador Hotel which opened in 1928. During WWII, the U.S. Army purchased the hotel and turned it into a hospital for sick and injured soldiers from the Pacific Theater. After the war the property returned to private ownership and was again a destination for Hollywood stars. In 1972 it was sold to the adjacent hospital, now known as the Desert Regional Medical Center. in 1989 fire destroyed the original hotel building and the landmark tower which can be seen in a few shots in this picture. The hospital rebuilt the tower in 1991 from the original plans.

WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: PRIMETIME THEME -- TCM AIN'T TELLING US!

8:00 PM -- A Soldier's Story (1984)
1h 41m | Drama | TV-MA
During World War II, an African-American officer investigates a murder that may have been racially motivated.
Director: Norman Jewison
Cast: Howard E Rollins, Adolph Caesar, Denzel Washington

Nominee for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Adolph Caesar, Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- Charles Fuller, and Best Picture

The picture was originally given a rating of R by the MPAA since the film was submitted for a rating shortly before July 1 when 'PG-13' became active but came out after. This meant, by definition, that the picture was classified as being potentially "detrimental to children". The rating was eventually changed to a PG rating upon appeal. Norman Jewison has said of this: "Strange, looking back on it now, that anyone could find the film detrimental to young people. I made it for young people. I wanted them to know how heroic their forefathers were. How their fathers and grandfathers had fought for a country that wouldn't acknowledge them as equals with the white men who fought alongside them. How you could give your life in defense of your country, but couldn't be led into battle by a black officer. I wanted my children, and their white friends, to see it, and understand more about racism, and its insidious spread over the centuries, and into our lives".

10:00 PM -- Paths of Glory (1958)
1h 26m | Drama | TV-PG
A military lawyer comes to question the status quo when he defends three men accused of cowardice.
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Cast: Kirk Douglas, Ralph Meeker, Adolphe Menjou

In 1969, Kirk Douglas said of the film, "There's a picture that will always be good, years from now. I don't have to wait 50 years to know that; I know it now". NOTE: As of December 2022, it's still in IMDb's 100 top-rated movies.

11:45 PM -- The Caine Mutiny (1954)
2h 5m | Drama | TV-PG
Naval officers begin to suspect their captain of insanity.
Director: Edward Dmytryk
Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Jose Ferrer, Van Johnson

Nominee for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Humphrey Bogart, Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Tom Tully, Best Writing, Screenplay -- Stanley Roberts, Best Sound, Recording -- John P. Livadary (Columbia SSD), Best Film Editing -- William A. Lyon and Henry Batista, Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture -- Max Steiner, and Best Picture

There was considerable opposition to the casting of Humphrey Bogart, since he was much older than Capt. Queeg was supposed to be. In addition, Bogart was already seriously ill with esophageal cancer, although it would not be diagnosed until January 1956. However, Bogart's tour-de-force performance in the climactic courtroom scene was so powerful, that it completely captivated the onlooking film technicians and crewmen. After the scene's completion, the company gave Bogart a round of thunderous applause.

2:00 AM -- The Rack (1956)
1h 40m | Drama | TV-14
A Korean War veteran is accused of cracking under enemy torture.
Director: Arnold Laven
Cast: Paul Newman, Wendell Corey, Walter Pidgeon

Rod Serling took nineteen months to complete writing the teleplay, the longest amount of time he ever spent writing a single screenplay. It also took seven rewrites to get to the final version, the most of any of his screenplays.

4:00 AM -- The Life of Emile Zola (1937)
2h 3m | Drama | TV-G
The famed writer risks his reputation to defend a Jewish army officer accused of treason.
Director: William Dieterle
Cast: Paul Muni, Joseph Schildkraut, Gale Sondergaard

Winner of Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Joseph Schildkraut, Best Writing, Screenplay -- Heinz Herald, Geza Herczeg and Norman Reilly Raine, and Best Picture

Nominee for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Paul Muni, Best Director -- William Dieterle, Best Writing, Original Story -- Heinz Herald and Geza Herczeg, Best Art Direction -- Anton Grot, Best Sound, Recording -- Nathan Levinson (Warner Bros. SSD), Best Assistant Director -- Russell Saunders, and Best Music, Score -- Leo F. Forbstein (head of department) with score by Max Steiner

The film was shot in reverse order; Paul Muni grew his own beard for the role, and it was trimmed and darkened as he proceeded to scenes where Zola is younger. His makeup took 3-1/2 hours to apply each morning.