Columbia Classics: Frank Capra at Columbia

[swo17]

My copy from Deep Discount was mostly naked in a box, with just some air pillows on two sides to keep it from jostling around, but it wasn't damaged during shipment

[unclehulot]

My copy from Deep Discount was mostly naked in a box, with just some air pillows on two sides to keep it from jostling around, but it wasn't damaged during shipment

I guess their packing philosophy is You Can't Take it With You?

[MichaelB]

Given typical running times and 1.37:1 framings (i.e. with a fair chunk of the image taken up with plain black), I can't see how a BD-100 would have been necessary.

[soundchaser]

I’ll probably be working my way through this set at a slow pace, what with the holidays and general life events. But it’s my sincere intention to provide at least some kind of a write-up about each film, if for no other reason than it’s been a while since I’ve really contributed.

Before I get into my thoughts, it’s worth mentioning that Capra directed SEVEN films at Columbia in 1928 alone. That there is any kind of creativity to these first two should be celebrated. (Side note: what’s with the ordering here? It’s not 100% chronological, as far as I can tell.)

That out of the way…

So This Is Love - …is it? So This Is a Weird Boxing Film, more like. Only, it’s not – at least, not for the film’s first half, which is a mawkish love triangle between a handsome yet brutish boxer, a talented yet entirely ineffectual artist, a charming but self-loathing delicatessen counter girl. Ultimately, this culminates (through a series of improbable circumstances) in a boxing match between the two former characters, of which more later.

It may be foolish to view a film this early in Capra’s career, and this much a part of an assembly line process, through an auteurist lens; nonetheless, there’s an argument to be made that this slots neatly into the director’s oeuvre. It’s very much about the gulf between our ideal and our reality, particularly where “great men” or “heroes” are concerned. There’s even a sense of the ways in which we perpetuate our own systems of oppression: the artist refuses to take an obvious chance at victory before the climactic bout, the deli girl goes back to the boxer even after he’s insulted her, etc. But these subtextualities are few and far between, and they don’t add up to much in the end. The artist gets the girl by doing absolutely nothing of his own volition – he ultimately wins the match because she’s drugged the boxer – and he’s even chastised by his mentor for thinking of fighting dirty. I don’t think films need to preach amorality (or morality!), but this one isn’t saying anything at all. Compare what would happen in a Keaton film: the hero would do something clever and we’d cheer his victory; or he’d win through a series of outlandish gags that show his abilities even if he’s bewildered by them. Here, though, the boxer simply collapses at one point, and that’s that. I know this isn’t a straight-ahead comedy, but it has gestures at being all sorts of things without actually nailing any of them.

I may be harping on this boxing match point, but it’s emblematic of the problems with the film: it’s wafer-thin, even for a 54-minute silent. The slapstick isn’t particularly good (there’s an early sequence with rocks that’s trying its best); the gags in general are laborious; the visuals are competent if uninteresting (with two major exceptions: an early transition involving the girl and a fully-cooked turkey, and a piece of set dressing involving a band). It’s almost bewildering in its obviousness.

The Way of the Strong - a marked improvement from the word go, as Capra shows he’s actually a pretty solid director of action. Who knew? The film opens with a car chase, which is a fantastic hook, and had me excited for what was to come. Unfortunately, what follows – while not bad – is weirdly paced, sluggish, and uninteresting, at least for its first 15 minutes. We’re introduced to the ostensible protagonist a full quarter of the way through this already short piece, with the lead-up giving us character work between two opposing men, bootlegger Denver Louie and the ironically named hijacker Handsome Williams, that doesn’t serve to inform the key relationship between Williams, his hired pianist Dan, and blind violinist Nora. You could trim the fat off much of the Williams/Louie plot and you’d still have the meat of the story: Williams takes in down-on-her-luck Nora, who falls for his charms but can’t see his deformities. Afraid he’ll lose her, he has young Dan stand in when she asks to feel his face. From there, the stakes ratchet, and while I won’t spoil the ending, I will say I was genuinely surprised with how far the script takes its final moments.

On almost every level, this is a step up from its predecessor – the acting is far less stagey, the gags more tightly incorporated (there’s a bit about measuring Nora for a wedding ring that made me laugh out loud), the fundamental conceit simply more interesting. A story about face feeling can have much more tension behind it than a story about face beating; all it takes is for the audience to care about what happens to the characters. Capra really does well with the material, too. There are some shots that would get labeled “avant-garde” today (gun barrels superimposed over a phone operator’s earpiece) but convey their visual information tightly. The aforementioned car chase really is superb; it’s more engaging and easy to follow than any number of contemporary action setpieces.

This has its flaws – again, the pacing is all backwards; and the actress playing Nora simply isn’t up to snuff, comparatively (take a shot every time she forgets her character is blind…). But it’s already showing a talent that Capra will build on when he gets some deeper characters and genuine stars to work with.

[Stefan Andersson]

Rodney Sauer on scoring two of the silent films:
https://www.nitrateville.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=36678