Fun New Author Interview

Just a quick link to an interview with me that Donna Jo Stone shared today on her blog, Almost an Author :-D  We chatted about the unique challenges and strengths of writing fairy tale retellings and writing for a YA audience.  Hope you enjoy it!

Were They the Best Years of Our Lives?

I picked up The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) off the shelf at the library a dozen or more years ago because I saw it had Myrna Loy in it, and I really like her. I love movies involving WWII, soldiers, and the 1940s, so I figured I’d give it a try. 

At that time, I mostly knew Loy from the Thin Man movies she made with William Powell, which are hilarious and snarky and fun. So I think I kind of expected that this movie would also be a lighthearted way to pass an evening on my night off from work that week. I didn’t expect it to surprise and awe me. I didn’t expect it to be a serious and soul-searching. I didn’t expect it to wow me. 

But, boy, am I glad it wasn’t what I expected. 

The Best Years of Our Lives follows three American servicemen as they return to their hometown after World War Two. Made in 1946, when some GIs were still returning from “over there,” it is an unflinching look at the frustrations, hardships, joys, and fears involved in reuniting fighters with families. 

Former Army sergeant Al Stephenson (Frederic March) comes home to his wife Milly (Myrna Loy) and kids Peggy (Theresa Wright) and Rob (Michael Hall). They welcome him eagerly, if a little awkwardly. It will take some time for them all to readjust to each other, they know. Al gets his old job at a bank back, but he doesn’t feel like he fits in either there or at home anymore. Everyone wants life to go back to being just as it was before, but he’s changed too much to feel that’s possible. He seeks solace in alcohol. Milly sees this and is worried, but stalwartly supports him however she can, helping him to work through his worries and doubts subtly and kindly. 

Former Air Force captain Fred Derry (Dana Andrews) comes home to his parents who live on the poor side of town and idolize him, and to Marie (Virginia Mayo), the wife he acquired during a quickie wartime marriage. She wants him to be the same heroic, charming, fun guy she married two years earlier, but he’s changed. They don’t call it this, but Fred suffers from PTSD. He has horrible nightmares and withdraws from his wife and others around him. Unable to get his old job back, he becomes a lowly salesman at a drug store. Marie constantly berates and demeans him for getting such a lame job, for being boring, for not throwing money and attention at her constantly. 

Former Navy sailor Homer Parrish (Harold Russell) has it the hardest. He returns home to a loving family and his devoted fiancée Wilma (Cathy O’Donnell), the literal girl-next-door… but he returns home without his hands. Fiercely independent, and yet physically dependent on others for so many things, Homer chafes at the love, the pity, the kindness, and the stares that meet him everywhere. He doesn’t want Wilma to marry him because he thinks she deserves better. He even considers taking his own life so he won’t be a bother to those around him anymore. 

Played by real-life double amputee Harold Russell, who lost his hands in an accidental explosion during WWII, Homer Parrish is nothing short of inspiring. He has two artificial limbs with hooks on them that enable him to eat, drink, write, smoke, play the piano… but not stroke Wilma’s hair. Not button buttons. Not tie shoes. Not do a hundred everyday things that Homer thinks are important. 

As their lives and the lives of their loved ones weave together in a myriad tiny ways, Al, Fred, and Homer come to rely on each other for support, understanding, and encouragement. All three of them understand what it was like in the war, what it’s like to come home, what it’s like to want to fit in, but fail. Together, they work to raise each other above their problems and see that maybe the years they spent apart from their families weren’t the best years, but that maybe the years to come will be the best years, if they can only allow themselves to live them.

(This post originally appeared in Femnista magazine on September 7, 2019.)

"The Iron Mistress" (1952)

Happy 9th Alaniversary to me :-D  I shall celebrate by reviewing Alan Ladd's biopic about James Bowie, the legendary frontiersman and inventor of the Bowie Knife.  

(Quick aside:  I always thought that a Bowie Knife and an Arkansas Toothpick were the same thing, but it turns out they're slightly different styles of hunting-and-fighting knives... which were both originally made by the same knifemaker in Arkansas.  Huh.)

The movie opens with Jim Bowie (Alan Ladd) leaving his Louisiana backwoods home for the first time to go sell his family's lumber in New Orleans.  In New Orleans, he gets tangled up with the aristocratic de Bornay siblings, Narcisse (Douglas Dick) and Judalon (Virginia Mayo).  He quickly falls for the spoiled and scheming Judalon; Narcisse tries to warn his new friend away from his sister, but of course, Jim Bowie's not thinking with his head at the moment.

Nothing Jim Bowie does convinces Judalon he's worthy of her love.  She doesn't dig poor guys.  Oh, she enjoys kissing him from time to time, and flirting with him, but no, she could never love a poor man.  So, Jim goes home, works hard, and gets rich.  When he encounters Judalon again, he's on an equal economic footing with her... and she's married.  But Judalon claims she's trying to get a divorce.  Jim believes her, of course.  

And then there's this whole thing involving horse races where Jim enters a horse race, and his horse wins, and all the aristocrats refuse to pay their gambling losses unless he can prove he owns the horse.  Insults and challenges ensue, and Jim ends up attending a duel as the second for a friend.  The duel is a set-up, an ambush to kill both Jim and his friend because they just don't belong in the fancy New Orleans world, no matter how rich they get.  

The movie does a reasonably good job recreating the Vidalia Sandbar Fight here -- a real-life event where a duel turned into a brawl.  Jim Bowie gets shot, then stabbed with a sword, but cuts down his opponent with a special knife he had made to his specifications.  Oh, and he still has the other guy's sword sticking out of him when he does it (which is historically accurate). 

Judalon reneges on her promise to leave her husband for Jim Bowie.  He leaves for Texas, hoping to find a new purpose for his life.  But he's ambushed on the way and left lying on the road, presumed dead.  There, he's found by Senorita Ursula de Varamendi (Phyllis Kirk), who takes him to her family's home so he can recover.

It turns out Ursula's father is the Governor of Texas.  She clearly would like to get together with Jim Bowie, but he is still obsessed with Judalon.  He leaves Texas, saying he's going to wrap up his business affairs in New Orleans, but Ursula can see it's really so he can have one final chance to find and woo Judalon.

Bowie encounters Judalon and her husband Phillipe (Alf Kjellin) on a riverboat.  Phillipe is a terrible gambler and desperate for money.  When he loses a huge sum of money to some card sharps, Jim saves the day by exposing the cheaters and getting Phillipe's money back.  Judalon tells her husband she's leaving him for Jim.  Phillipe decides to ambush Jim in his cabin on the boat.  There's another guy called Black Jack Sturdevant (Anthony Caruso) aboard the boat and planning to kill Jim too because of reasons.  (I kind of left out his whole part of the plot, but he's been after Jim Bowie for a while now -- and he stole Jim's knife.)  

Now, we all know that Jim Bowie died during the siege of the Alamo, not on a riverboat, so obviously, he survives the ambush.  And he finally realizes that Judalon has never and will never love him, that she's a scheming opportunist and liar.  He is through with her at last, and heads back to Texas to marry Ursula (also historically accurate!) and start a new life there.  And he tosses his special knife in the river on his way out for symbolic emphasis.

While the main plot of this whole movie is made up (everything involving Judalon, basically), it does at least hit some facts here and there.  It's one of those "well, this COULD have happened" sorts of movies.  And it's a good time -- lots of knife fights and duels and brawls, Alan Ladd looks gorgeous throughout, and he even gets to do some stunts.  The two things that you would think most likely to stretch your credulity -- that fight where he kills a guy while he's got a sword is sticking out of his chest, and the fact that he married the governor of Texas's daughter --  are totally true.  

Is this movie family friendly?  Basically.  There's a lot of hand-to-hand violence and some gunplay, but it's all very '50s-style and non-gory, non-scary stuff.  Judalon clearly is untrue to her husband, and even kisses Jim after she's married to Phillipe, but it's very tastefully handled and could even be a good talking point for parents and children about what marital infidelity is.

You can easily find The Iron Mistress on DVD, but I don't know that it's streaming anywhere.

We Love Musicals Week -- Giveaway Winners + Wrap Up

Well, here we are at the end of another blog party.  This was such a fun one!  I'm still catching up on reading posts, but the ones I've read so far have been lovely :-)

If you have any last-minute posts you want to contribute, you are not too late!  Here's the link-up widget once again:

And here are the winners of the giveaway:

Prize One:  a used DVD copy of Guys and Dolls (1955) -- Chloe the Movie Critic

Prize Two:  a used DVD copy of Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) -- Ivy Miranda

Prize Three:  a used DVD copy of Holiday Inn (1942) -- Amanda O.

Prize Four:  a used DVD copy of Oklahoma! (1999) -- Crystan R.

Prize Five:  a Newsies sticker sheet -- Nicole B.

Prize Six:  a My Fair Lady vinyl sticker -- Gill J.

I will be alerting the winners by email this evening, so please keep an eye on your inboxes!

I hope you've all had lots of fun this week!  

Answers to "What Musical is That Song From?" Game

Here are the answers to Tuesday's game, and everyone's scores.  How'd you do?

1.  "Defying Gravity" and "Popular" are from Wicked

2.  "Lonesome Polecat" and "Spring, Spring, Spring" are from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers

3.  "It Might as Well be Spring" and "It's a Grand Night for Singing" are from State Fair

4.  "Sisters" and "Count Your Blessings" are from White Christmas

5.  "It Ain't Necessarily So" and "Summertime" are from Porgy and Bess

6.  "Do-Re-Mi" and "Edelweiss" are from The Sound of Music

7.  "This is Me" and "Tightrope" are from The Greatest Showman

8.  "Good Mornin'" and "You Are My Lucky Star" are from Singin' in the Rain

9.  "Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat" and "Luck Be a Lady" are from Guys and Dolls

10.  "On the Street Where You Live" and "The Rain in Spain" are from My Fair Lady

11.  "All I Ask of You" and "Music of the Night" are from The Phantom of the Opera

12.  "King of New York" and "Santa Fe" are from Newsies

SCORES

Grace Avender -- 10

Katherine -- 10

Ivy Miranda -- 9

Sam the Library Mouse -- 9

Chloe the Movie Critic -- 8

Lizzie Hexam -- 8

Gill at Realweegiemidget Reviews -- 6

Debra She Who Seeks -- 5

Anonymous -- 5

Charlotte (Mother Owl) -- 4

The Hopeful Pen -- 3

Anonymous -- 3

My Answers to the We Love Musicals Tag

Time for me to fill out the We Love Musicals Tag!

1. What are your favorite musicals?

1. Guys and Dolls (1955)
2. An American in Paris (1951)
3. White Christmas (1954)
4. The Greatest Showman (2017)
5. The Phantom of the Opera (2004)

For the rest of my top ten, read this post :-)

2. What do you like about musicals? 

I like how a good musical allows characters to express their thoughts and emotions through song and dance instead of only words.  A good musical uses music the way Shakespeare used soliloquies.

Bonus points if they're really fun and leave me smiling, and if they have wonderful songs I want to learn all the words to!

3. What's the first musical you can remember seeing? 

The Sound of Music (1965) -- I have a vague memory of half-watching it when I was maybe four or five years old.  We didn't own a TV set until I was 4, so it can't have been earlier than that.

4. Have you ever seen a live musical onstage? 

Yes!  I saw Hayley Mills in a touring production of The King and I in 1997.  I also saw a production of The Mikado as a teen.  And I saw a couple of Gilbert and Sullivan musicals back when I was in college -- I think Princess Ida and The Gondoliers? 

5. Have you ever performed in a musical? 

Yes!  During college, I was in the chorus of three Gilbert and Sullivan musicals: The Sorcerer, The H. M. S. Pinafore, and The Yeomen of the Guard.  I had several friends who were in them too, which made rehearsals and sitting around in the Green Room lots of fun.  Not to mention, learning how to do stage makeup has come in really handy now that my daughter does ballet and needs stage makeup for her performances.

Me with two friends backstage in our Yeomen of the Guard costumes.

6. Do you periodically dance about and burst into song in real life? 

I do.  Sometimes in public and fairly often at home.

7. What's the newest movie musical you've seen? 

Wicked (2024), which I took my daughters to see in the theater in December.  I liked it all right.

8. What's the oldest movie musical you've seen? 

The oldest one I know for sure I've seen all of is The Wizard of Oz (1939).  I've seen parts of some Shirley Temple movies too, but I'm not sure which ones I've seen all of -- that would have been when I was a kid, and I just don't remember now.  So I'll say The Wizard of Oz because it's so nicely symmetrical that the newest musical I've seen is a sort of retelling of the oldest one I've seen!  Neither of which are movies I actually love, but that's okay.

9. What's the last musical you watched? 

I watched The Music Man (1962) last week with my kids.  It was their first time watching it, and we laughed and laughed!  Good times.  Being from Iowa myself, I've always had a particular soft spot for it.

10. What musical do you hope to watch for the first time soon?

Hmm.  Probably either Pirates of Penzance (1983) or Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again (2018).  They're both on my TBW shelves, so it will just be a matter of which I'm in the mood for first.

If you want a clean version of this tag, you can find it in the blog party kick-off post.

My Ten Favorite Musicals -- 2025 Update

I shared my original list of ten favorite musicals a whole decade ago!  I've definitely got some slightly different favorites now, though many of the same dear favorites are still tops.  Here is my current list!  As usual, all titles are linked to my reviews if I have reviewed a particular movie.

(Random note, but I find it amusing how this graphic color-coordinated itself.  I didn't try to arrange the movies so they would have white posters all in a block and colorful ones in another block!  So funny.)

1. Guys and Dolls (1955)

Nathan Detroit (Frank Sinatra) bets Sky Masterson (Marlon Brando) that he can't get social reformer Sarah Brown (Jean Simmons) to go on a date with him. This movie made me fall in love with the stories and writing style of Damon Runyon, which the musical is based on. Personally (and that means in person), I adore the odd patter the characters speak. 

2. An American in Paris (1951)

An ex-GI painter (Gene Kelly) falls in love with a girl (Leslie Caron), not knowing she's engaged to his night club singer friend (Georges Guetary). The whole movie is an excuse to sing and dance to Gershwin tunes, which is one of the best reasons for making a musical I've ever heard. 

3. White Christmas (1954) 

A team of showbiz stars (Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye) try to rescue a retired general (Dean Jagger) from bankruptcy by staging a show at his ski lodge. Why yes, this heads up my list of favorite Christmas movies too. 

4. The Greatest Showman (2017) 

P. T. Barnum (Hugh Jackman) gathers up the misfits of the world and gives them jobs, friendship, and a purpose.  And that includes his protégé Phillip Carlyle (Zac Efron), who falls in love with a trapeze artist (Zendaya).  The message of everyone deserving friendship and love and a place to belong, no matter what they look like, really resonates with me.

5. The Phantom of the Opera (2004)

A talented young singer (Emmy Rossum) is mentored and stalked and abducted and generally haunted by a disfigured man (Gerard Butler) who lives under the Paris Opera House.  Thank goodness for her childhood friend Raoul (Patrick Wilson), who stands by her and helps her however he can, and eventually falls in love with her as well.  This production is overwhelmingly lavish and opulent and everything it ought to be.  I'm particularly taken with Patrick Wilson's portrayal of Raoul as a brave and manly young fellow who protects and defends and is generally awesome.  And his voice is like butterscotch.  I wish Wilson made more musicals.

6. State Fair (1945) 

A family spends a week at the Iowa state fair, where the daughter (Jeanne Crain) falls in love with a newspaper man (Dana Andrews), the son falls in love with an entertainer, and the parents take home prizes for their mincemeat and hog. There's a 1960s remake that stars Bobby Darin in the Dana Andrews role, but aside from dearest Bobby, that version lacks the charm of this one. 

7.  Hello, Dolly! (1969)

A fairy-godmother-like matchmaker (Barbra Streisand) finds love matches for two store clerks (Michael Crawford, Danny Lockin), two milliners (Marianne McAndrew, E. J. Peaker), an irascible businessman (Walter Matthau) and his niece (Joyce Ames)... and herself.  I have a penchant for fairy godmothers, and Dolly Levi has been an inspiration to me since I was in single digits. 

8.  West Side Story (1961) 

A modern retelling of Romeo and Juliet set in 1960s NYC, with rival street gangs taking the place of rival families. So heartbreaking and beautiful, with some of the coolest dancing ever -- I much prefer it to Romeo and Juliet. The soundtrack was one of the first CDs I ever bought, and I know all the words to every song. 

9.  Brigadoon (1954) 

Two hunters (Gene Kelly and Van Johnson) stumble on an enchanted Scottish village that only exists one day out of every hundred years, whereupon one of them falls in love with a local girl (Cyd Charisse).  I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it. 

10. Oklahoma! (1999) 

A cowboy (Hugh Jackman) tries to win the heart of a girl who claims she hates him. Yes, you read that correctly: Hugh Jackman. This is the London stage version, not the famous Hollywood one, and I prefer it because, well, Hugh Jackman!

This post is one of my contributions to We Love Musicals Week.  I hope you've been enjoying the fun so far!

What Musical is That Song From? Game

Ready to play a game?  Listed below are two songs each from twelve famous musicals.  All you have to do is tell me which musical goes with each pair! 

I will put comments on moderation this morning so people can't be tempted to cheat off each other.  I'll share the answers and scores at the end of We Love Musicals Week.

Have fun!

1.  "Defying Gravity" and "Popular"

2.  "Lonesome Polecat" and "Spring, Spring, Spring"

3.  "It Might as Well be Spring" and "It's a Grand Night for Singing"

4.  "Sisters" and "Count Your Blessings"

5.  "It Ain't Necessarily So" and "Summertime"

6.  "Do-Re-Mi" and "Edelweiss"

7.  "This is Me" and "Tightrope"

8.  "Good Mornin'" and "You Are My Lucky Star"

9.  "Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat" and "Luck Be a Lady"

10.  "On the Street Where You Live" and "The Rain in Spain"

11.  "All I Ask of You" and "Music of the Night"

12.  "King of New York" and "Santa Fe"

We Love Musicals Week -- Kick-off and Tag

Welcome to We Love Musicals Week!  Together, we can spend five whole days celebrating everything we love about musicals, whether they're on film or on the stage.

Remember to use one of the party buttons in your own posts, and to link back here so your blog readers can visit the party too.  Also, please remember to keep your posts family friendly and celebratory.  If you don't like musicals, that's okay -- you are free to ignore our partying.  Just, please, don't bring around a cloud to rain on our parade :-)

Whenever you create a post for this week's party, add a link to it using this widget:

Make sure you check out posts from other participants!  And don't forget to check out (and enter) my giveaway.

Also, here's the official party tag, which you can fill out on your own blog!  It's a handy way to participate even if you don't have time or ideas for a different sort of post.

The We Love Musicals Tag

1.  What are your favorite musicals?  (Tell us a top 3 to 5, that sort of thing.)

2.  What do you like about musicals?

3.  What's the first musical you can remember seeing?

4.  Have you ever seen a live musical onstage?

5.  Have you ever performed in a musical?

6.  Do you periodically dance about and burst into song in real life?

7.  What's the newest movie musical you've seen?

8.  What's the oldest movie musical you've seen?

9.  What's the last musical you watched?

10.  What musical do you hope to watch for the first time soon?

Giveaway for We Love Musicals Week

Behold the prizes for my We Love Musicals Week giveaway!

Prize One:  a used DVD copy of Guys and Dolls (1955) starring Frank Sinatra, Marlon Brando, and Jean Simmons 

Prize Two:  a used DVD copy of Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) starring Judy Garland (two-disc special edition)

Prize Three:  a used DVD copy of Holiday Inn (1942) starring Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire

Prize Four:  a used DVD copy of Oklahoma! (1999) starring Hugh Jackman (a British stage version filmed and shown on TV)

Prize Five:  a Newsies sticker sheet

Prize Six:  a My Fair Lady vinyl sticker

Please note that all four DVDs are used -- I tested them out in my DVD player to see if they load and play, but I can't guarantee they'll work for you.

I will award one each of these prizes to six different people. This giveaway is open WORLDWIDE.

Enter this giveaway using this widget:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Rules and Regulations:

This giveaway will end at 11:59pm EST on Friday, February 14, 2024. I'll draw six winners on Saturday, February 15, and announce them here on my blog that day, as well as alert them by the email the winners provided to the widget. Use an email address you check often!  If I don't receive a response from a winner by Saturday, February 22, that winner will be disqualified and I'll draw another. 

This giveaway is open worldwide to anyone living in any country where the USPS delivers. I am not responsible for the activities of any postal service -- I will send off your prize in the condition shown above, but its arrival condition is not something I can control. 

To enter, must be 18+ or have parent's permission to provide a mailing address. Void where prohibited. Not affiliated with Blogger, Google, or the USPS. I purchased all these prizes, they were not donated or solicited in any way. I will use your email and mailing addresses solely for the purpose of this giveaway. They will not be saved by me to use another way or provided to anyone else. 

You will note that some of the ways to enter involving participating in the blog party. More information on how to participate is in the kick-off post!

"A Fistful of Dollars" (1964)

I may have seen A Fistful of Dollars (1964) more times than any other movie besides The Sound of Music (1965).  That's because, when I was in my tweens, we owned two movies: A Fistful of Dollars and a recorded-off-TV copy of The Sound of Music.  And that odd pairing probably explains a lot about my personality, heh.

When I was growing up, if we came down with a cold or flu bug that was too severe for us to handle schoolwork, we got to watch a movie.  Mom or Dad would go to town and rent a VCR (oh, yes, you could rent VCRs from the video store if you were too poor to own one yourself, like we were!) and a movie.  A single movie.  That meant, if we wanted to watch something besides the movie that got rented, we had two options to choose from.

Now, you're probably saying to yourself, "Um, isn't A Fistful of Dollars kind of... inappropriately violent and gory for people who aren't even 13 yet? Isn't it rated... R?!?!?"  Yes, well, here's the thing: it wasn't rated R when it was released in 1964 because the R rating didn't exist yet.  The MPAA and its rating system started up in 1968 (and ratings were rather different back then than today's ratings, too).  (Also, A Fistful of Dollars was an Italian movie, not an American one, so it wasn't made under the last gasp of the Hays Code anyway.)  That means that when the movie was released to VHS back in the 1980s, it said "NR" on it, for "not rated."  What that actually meant was exactly what I explained in this paragraph -- it was released before there were ratings.  However, my parents thought that meant the same thing as being rated G -- that it was suitable for all ages.  

Today, the film carries an R rating, for violence, because the MPAA eventually went back and rated all the old movies as they got released to VHS and DVD.  However, my parents watched it first when they bought it, to see if it was suitable for us kids, and they figured since the violence is pretty obviously fake, since all the blood is kinda orange and a very paint-like consistency, and since the makeup for things like scars and wounds looks like Silly Putty and Play-doh, my brother and I would not find this movie alarming.  And they were absolutely correct.  We did not find this movie realistic or scary in any way.  We found it thrilling.  And we watched it a lot.  Well, multiple times a year for several years, anyway.  I mean, we weren't invalids -- we didn't get sick every month or anything like that.  But a few times a year, we'd get a cold or a flu bug, and then we'd get to watch a random rental from town, plus probably one or both of the movies we owned.

All of that is why I know this movie backwards and forwards.  I know all the dialog.  I know every squint and sneer and twitch of Clint Eastwood's face.  I can listen to Ennio Morricone's soundtrack and tell you what's happening in the film at pretty close to every given moment.  In fact, there was a time when I got a bit tired of A Fistful of Dollars and decided that I liked the second Man with No Name movie, For a Few Dollars More (1965), better than this one.  It's probably a better movie.  It probably has a better score.  And, for over a decade, I told people it was my favorite Clint Eastwood movie.

Then I got a chance to go see A Fistful of Dollars on the big screen at the local Alamo Drafthouse Cinema a few years ago.  Weird as it may sound, I got tears in my eyes during the opening credits.  I cried repeatedly during the film, flooded with nostalgia and fondness and joy.  I had forgotten how much I simply love the storyline of this movie!  How satisfying the ending is!  How much I love the trumpet theme during the final showdown!  (Okay, I hadn't actually forgotten that.)  How many personal Storytelling Buttons it pushes for me!  (Since I saw it so often at a young age, it may have actually formed a lot of my storytelling tastes, to be honest.)  I came out of the theater reconvinced that this is my favorite Clint Eastwood movie.  I put it back on my list of 100 favorite movies where it belongs.  And I have re-watched it several times since, most recently when I was struck down by an upper respiratory infection last fall.

The movie starts when a stranger (Clint Eastwood) rides into a dusty little nowhere town.  (Storytelling Button #1: someone new comes to town, and everything changes.)  He sees a child forcibly separated from its mother, which clearly bothers him, though he doesn't intervene.  (Storytelling Button #2: the watchful lurker who bides his time.)  Later, as he rides through the town, some yahoos take pot shots at him and scare his mule.  The stranger faces them down and tells them to apologize to his mule, which gets him into a gunfight with them, and he wins, of course.  (Storytelling Button #3: making someone apologize for being rude.)

The stranger makes friends with a lonely bartender and studies the situation in town.  The Rojos are a wealthy Mexican family who sell illegal guns.  The Baxters are a wealthy American family who sell illegal alcohol.  The Baxters and Rojos hate each other and are constantly warring for control of the town.  The bartender and his friend who makes coffins nickname the stranger Joe, so I'll refer to him as Joe for the rest of the review because calling him "the stranger" is clunky.  (Storytelling Button #4: a stranger uses the nickname bestowed on him, and we never learn his real name.) Joe decides he could make a lot of money by pitting the Rojos and the Baxters against each other, convincing each of them he's on their side and willing to kill for pay, and so on.  And he proceeds to do exactly that.

The woman Joe saw at the beginning is named Marisol (Marianne Koch), and the meanest Rojo brother, Ramón (Gian Maria Volontè), is madly in love with her.  She's already married and has a son, but Ramón claims her husband cheated him at cards and is holding her a hostage until her husband pays back what he won at cards.  He refuses to let her little son see her.  We can all imagine what Ramón is keeping Marisol around for, but all the movie ever shows is him forcing her to kiss him.  (Storytelling Button #5: families divided by force.) 

Joe not only becomes rich by working with both the Rojos and Baxters, but he also finds a way to get Marisol out of Ramón's clutches, reunites her with her husband and son, and sends them on their way.  In fact, viewers gradually realize this may have been Joe's whole reason for sticking around in this nowhere town.  He tells Marisol and her husband that he knew someone like her once, but there was no one there to help, and that's about all the backstory we ever get for Joe, but it's a powerful bit of history in one short sentence.  (Storytelling Buttons #5 and #6: rescuing someone who can never rescue themselves, and a mysterious character who remains mysterious.)

From here until the paragraph just above the blogathon button, there be spoilers.

Ramón eventually figures out it was Joe who freed Marisol, and he and his men beat and torture Joe in retaliation.  (Storytelling Button #7: hero who sustains a brutal beating and/or torture without revealing any information.)  Joe escapes their clutches using cleverness.  (Storytelling Button #8: escaping prisoner.)  

He then recuperates in hiding.  His hand was crushed until it's almost useless, and he has to learn how to draw and shoot all over again.  (Storytelling Button #9: regaining lost skills/gaining new skills while in hiding.)

Finally, he's ready.  Thanks to a couple gifts from his friends the bartender and the coffin maker, he makes a surprise re-entrance and challenges Ramón to a gunfight.  (Storytelling Button #10: rising from the dead or near-dead to mete out justice.)  He appears to magically repel bullets from Ramón's rifle, repeatedly staggering when shot, but always getting his feet back under him.  (Storytelling Button #11: appearing to have superpowers through trickery.)  That lets him get close enough to Ramón for his own pistol in his damaged hand to be accurate, and he slays Ramón and his brothers and their gunmen and everyone else who tries to take him on.  (Storytelling Button #12: sweeping the floor clean of your enemies.) 

And then, he leaves.  Just mounts his mule and rides out of town, having cleaned out the Rojos (who cleaned out the Baxters) and leaving the town open for the honest town folk to start over in.  (Storytelling Button #13: leaving when the job is done instead of staying to enjoy a reward.)

End of spoilers!

Ahhhhhhhh, just recounting it like that fills me with warm fuzzies!  Yes, warm fuzzies, even though this is a violent movie filled with cruel people.  It is also a movie centered around one man who sees injustice and finds a way to combat it, who sees cruelty and evil and finds a way to end them, and who sees three suffering people and finds a way to rescue them.  Man, I love this movie.

This has been my contribution to the Journey to Italy Blogathon hosted this week at Realweegiemidget Reviews and Speakeasy.  Click either of those blog names to find the list of all the other participating blog posts.

Obsession or Love: "Laura" (1944)

What’s the difference between love and obsession? How can you tell if you’re in the throes of one versus the other? Can obsession become love? Can love become obsession? 

These questions are at the heart of the 1944 noir film Laura. While it explores all of them fairly thoroughly, it does not provide any definitive answers. Instead, it seems to present obsession and love as two sides of the same coin, never far apart. 

The New York Police Department tasks Detective Mark McPherson (Dana Andrews) with investigating the murder of a high-society working girl, advertising whiz Laura Hunt (Gene Tierney). Like any good detective, he collects clues, interviews those who knew the deceased, and follows up on any hunches he might have. 

Everyone he interviews professes to have loved Laura. They are all confused how anyone could have wanted her dead, much less murdered her. Yet, the body found on the floor of her apartment, clad in a negligee and shot at close range in the face, proves at least one person in New York City did not love Laura Hunt. Perhaps they were obsessed with her, and their obsession took a deadly turn. 

As he investigates her murder, McPherson becomes more than a little obsessed with the dead woman himself. Everyone who knew her tells him how elegant and sophisticated, yet sweet and kind Laura was. She was intelligent and had exquisite taste, helped her out-of-work boyfriend find a job at her advertising firm, was always polite and friendly to her maid, and dazzled the entire world. How could anyone help himself from falling in love with her, even in her permanent absence? 

It seems no one can resist Laura’s charm, even after she’s dead, not even McPherson, a working-class snob who calls women ‘dames’ and looks down his nose at his wealthy suspects because they live in expensive apartments surrounded by beautiful things. The only person he interviews that he appears to respect is her maid Bessie (Dorothy Adams), a working-class woman who practically worshiped her employer. Bessie and McPherson get off to a rocky start, but once he stops casting aspersions on Laura and starts listening to Bessie, they get along fine. 

McPherson may be a reverse elitist, but when it comes to the murdered woman, all his prejudices go out the window. He doesn’t mind that her apartment is expensive, her things beautiful, her furniture and clothing in the best taste. That just makes him more fascinated with her. So fascinated that he spends the night in her apartment, going through her clothes and personal possessions, drinking her alcohol, and staring at her portrait. He even puts in a bid on her portrait when he learns it will be sold at auction. 

You can’t fall in love with a dead person you’ve never met, but you can become obsessed with them. Maybe even as obsessed as the person who killed her so she could never be someone else’s. McPherson almost gets so lost in his own yearning for this woman he’s never known that he stops investigating her murder… but only almost. In the end, he finds the killer, and even gets a chance at actual love, the kind that could replace his unhealthy obsession with Laura.

(This post originally appeared in Femnista magazine on October 29, 2019.)