"Confessions of a Nazi Spy" starts off as a documentary-style revelation of secret Nazi spies in the U.S. meeting and gathering information to send back to Germany. By the end it becomes less a narrative film and more a message about the dangers lurking in the dark. It's interesting enough but falls short of greatness.This 1939 release was apparently the first major studio release to attack the Nazi party, and Germany was none too happy with Warner Brothers for doing so. The foreign markets were still open, although it was becoming clear what would soon be happening. And since the film made money, other studios followed with their own Nazi-themed stories. I must admit the trailer is a lot of fun and I love ! the ending tagline, "It was our duty to make it, it's your American privilege to see it!" That's marketing gold.The movie opens without the usual credits that typified almost all movies of this time. It goes right into the silhouette of the narrator setting up the story, much like a radio announcer or radio newsman, giving everything an authentic feel to what's going to happen next. And indeed it does unfold -- an international spy ring where messages are funneled through a contact in England, where Dr. Kassel (Paul Lukas) gives rousing pro-Nazi talks to loyal Germans living in the U.S., where Germany plots how to infiltrate the U.S. and gather its secrets, where children are groomed to be good Nazis.
The film also ma! kes it clear that a majority of Germans in the U.S. were loyal! to Amer ica. About halfway through the film G-man Ed Renard (Edward G. Robinson) is put on the case, and America can breathe easier. While Robinson is great -- I mean, what Nazi is gonna win out over Little Caesar? -- this also takes some of the wind out of the story, because Renard is so competent that the outcome is no longer in doubt. Plus, the last half hour becomes so predictable that the intriguing characters lose any dimension.In hindsight, the film would have worked better had the audience learned more about some of the characters. Why did they decide to become a spy? Why did they leave Germany in the first place? Giving them some dimension may have made the piece stronger rather than relying on black-and-white depictions of good and evil.But ultimately this film is about selling the goods, even if they are obvious. The title is a giveaway that the filmmakers are going for sensationalism. And, since this was the first film to go this route, why not? Unfortunately, 70 years l! ater, it's more of a curiosity piece than a classic with some good performance (George Sanders in particular, clearly showing the suave devil he would play so well in the future). "Confessions" is very watchable but not as daring as it once was.
Great classic films, best all time movies
1935 Julia Wells is born to Mrs. Barbara Wells in Surrey, England. Mr. Wells is not the father. Scandal! This bastard child will one day become the icon of squeaky clean family entertainment. She won't always enjoy it. At her christening the good fairy Fauna grants her the gift of song
One gift, the gif! t of song,Melody your whole life long!The nightingale her troubadour,Bringing his sweet serenade to her door.(We figure that's the only way you get a voice that lovely.)1940 Having already recognized the fairy's generous gift, non biological daddy Ted Wells sends Julia to live with mom's new man Ted Andrews (also not her biological father --- so confusing!) who is better equipped to give her the musical education she needs.
1947 Julia -- now "Julie Andrews" -- makes her professional debut at the London Hippodrome singing the aria "Je Suis Titania" (i.e. 'I am Titania' -referencing the Queen of the Fairies in A Midsummer Nights Dream, no doubt an homage to generous Fauna) from the opera Mignon. She blows the roof off the place.1951 Does not prick her finger and fall into an unnatural slumber but is, by now at ! 16, a British star of stage and radio. Waits impatiently, but ! sweetly, for love's first kiss total world domination.1954 Start at the top: Debuts on the American stage on Broadway in the lead role of The Boyfriend.
1956 Wouldn't it be loverly if she originated the plum role of Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady and concurrently became a superstar with the live television airing of the musical Cinderella? Statistics vary but her numbers are basically up their with the explosion of the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan show and the final episode of M*A*S*H. We're talking everyone... or roughly 10 times the numbers that even the biggest "event" nowadays. 1959 Love's first kiss: Marries set designer Tony Walton who she met on the stage in London many years prior whilst playing the Egg in Humpty-Dumpty. 1960 Her eggs produce first child, Emma. Also creates the original Guinevere in the smash hi! t Broadway musical Camelot. 1962/1963 Julie, already a household name in America, is passed over for the movie version of the role she created in My Fair Lady because Jack Warner, in a typically lazy movie industry move (that we still see every day in 2010) only wants someone "bankable." Never mind that her first two movies become enormous "all time" blockbusters, each outgrossing My Fair Lady (which was also a hit with "bankable" Audrey Hepburn). Nobody can see into the future and most people aren't willing to risk casting based on rightness for a role... even though anyone in the right role at the time can become bankable as Mary Poppins will soon prove.
1964 Kill Audrey, Vol 1: Julie's movie debut Mary Poppins outgrosses My Fair Lady. So much for not bankable. She also stars in the acclaimed adult-oriented drama The ! Americanization of Emily, a film which she reportedly loves, t! hough fe w notice in the enormous wake of that flying nanny. 1965 Kill Audrey Vol. 2: Julie wins the Oscar, besting Audrey Hepburn (who actually wasn't nominated but this isn't the way history remembers it. Shut up!).As follow up, Julie spins around on a mountain top; billions of people all over the world get dizzy, and thousands of fairies are born. The Sound of Music outgrosses every movie that's ever existed including Gone With the Wind (if you don't adjust for inflation).After defeating Audrey Hepburn, Julie targets Vivien Leigh. 'You can make one dress out of curtains? Amateur!'
Von Trapp play-clothes1966 Hitchcock, having worn on Tippi Hedren's last nerve, has to find a replacement blonde. He tries Julie out for Torn Curtain. Outcome: Not icy and anonymous enough for Hitch. They never work together again. The film is a big h! it. So is Hawaii that same year. Even outside of musicals Julie is beyond bankable.
1967 Julie stars as wannabe flapper Millie in Thoroughly Modern Millie. People remember it today as a misfire or flop but sorry: another huge hit, the biggest in Universal's history up till then. Julie + musicals = box office gold.1968 Except when it don't. Oops. Star, a bloated biopic of Gertrude Lawrence becomes her first failure. Julie divorces Tony Walton and...1969 ...marries Blake Edwards after filming Darling Lili (1970) for the director with Rock Hudson. 1970s After five years on the mountain top of global stardom, Julie bows out of the movies, making only two more films over the decade. She has two more children and then adopts two more still. She makes multiple television appearances.
1981 Blake convinces his wife to bare her breasts, which he had undoubtedly seen thousands of times already but he's a sharer. Her boob flash in S.O.B totally scandalizes Mary Poppins fans and my parents (also Mary Poppins fans). I remember the fallout vividly from my youth. They were furious. 1982 Despite her "betrayal" of squeaky clean loving fans, Hollywood and pop culture reembrace the icon when Victor/Victoria hits. Her multi-octave slide in "Le Jazz Hot" shatters glass and thousands more fairies are born. Julie is nominated for another Oscar for her woman-pretending-to- be-a-man-pretending- to-be-a-woman nightclub act wherein she falls in love with gangster King Marchand (James Garner again) or "Fairy Marchand" as his arm-candy girlfriend rechristens him in a jealous rage. 1983 Julie Andrews loses the Oscar to Meryl Streep in Sophie's Choice as would anyone from any year in any film under any circumstance.! rest of the 1980s makes a few more movies with Blake Edwards but nothing ascends. Bares her breasts again opposite Rupert Everett in Duet For One (1986) but few notice. You only get a shock from that once.1990s-1999 returns to Broadway, eventually revives Victor/Victoria in new form, refuses a Tony nomination for their "egregious" snubbing of her fellow cast members. Vocal problems begin. Undergoes surgery for throat nodules and something goes wrong and she is unable to sing again. A special new circle of hell is created for whomever is to blame though...2000 ...here on earth the matter is settled in a malpractice lawsuit. Julie's Just Rewards: She becomes "Dame" Julie Andrews by order of the Queen.
2001 Speaking of Queens... The Princess Diaries opens, surprising virtually everyone by becoming a ! smash with non-bankable Anne Hathaway in the leading role of t! he Princ ess and non-singing no-longer bankable Julie as the Queen of Genovia. The hit film will win her a new generation of young fans and set in motion a new career in children's films, albeit usually just as voice work. As in...2010 Despicable Me wherein Julie Andrews plays the disapproving mother of super villain Gru. On October 1st, Julie Andrews celebrates her 75th birthday. Here's to her next quarter century as one of the great entertainers of all time!*or truthy, same diff. 
With 42nd Street and Gold Diggers of 1933 (both 1933), Warner Brothers studio had tapped into a treasure trove of entertainment for Depression weary audiences, longing for escapist fare of the highest caliber. With these fluffy film musicals, they had just that, lots of singing, lots of dancing and spectacular kaleidoscopic choreography by master showman Busby Berkley. Striking while the iron was red hot, Warners produced Footlight Parade, a cookie cutter copy of the previous shows, before the year was out. Although not exactly the same plot, the similarities were enough to continue the successful streak for Berkley and the studio.The plot, suc! h as it is, revolves around the flailing career of New York stage director Chester Kent (movie tough guy James Cagney), who, in an attempt to save his struggling production company, develops “prologuesâ€, live musical introductions to the newly popular talking pictures. As his financial woes mount, his shrewish, shallow wife demands a divorce, his competitor steals his ideas (with the help of an insider from his troupe), and his partners are swindling him of his share of the profits; add to this mix a gold-digging tootsie who latches on to his coattails when it appears he is on his way up again and you have a whirlwind of screen activity with Cagney chewing it up like it was a steak and baked potato. By his side the entire time and helping him at every turn, is his devoted and enamored secretary Nan (the incomparable Joan Blondell, at her cutest and wise-cracking snappiest).
Cagney had become a big star at Warners, along with Edward G. Robinson, as the resident grande gangster, after his breakthrough hit The Public Enemy two years earlier. But the actor had started out on the stage as a song and dance man and took this opportunity to flaunt his hoofing skills to great success. It is in this capacity and genre that he would win an Academy Award nine years later as George M. Cohan in Yankee Doodle Dandy. In Footlight Parade, Cagney is a firecracker of activity, shooting rapid fire dialogue as quickly as he does a machine gun in his gangster/hoodlum pictures.Blondell, also a Warners staple, is a scene stealer as Nan. Standing by her man throughout the whole film (even when Cagney doesn’t realize he’s her man), she sticks up for the underdog/good guy (encouraging Chester to hire ! talented dancer/stenographer Ruby Keeler) and protects those she loves from harm (ie: pretty but conniving Claire Dodd from bossman Cagney). Along with the two leads, Footlight Parade features the fresh faces of crooner Dick Powell and the afore mentioned Keeler, who made a dynamic duo in the year’s previous two Berkley hits.
The film is pre-Code, the time before Hollywood censorship took a stronghold, and some of its racier dialogue was sliced and diced from re-release dates after the Code took effect. However, it was restored in 1970, so today, we can enjoy a classic Blondell sniping to her gold-digging rival for Cagney’s affections: “Out countess…as l! ong as there are sidewalks, you’ll have a job.†Other elem! ents tha t post-Code films wouldn’t have gotten away with were scantily clad chorines in a the bathing beauty extravaganza “By a Waterfall.†As a matter of fact, all the musical numbers in the film’s finale have daring themes to say the least. The charming “Honeymoon Hotel†routine shows a newlywed couple (Powell and Keeler) trying to enjoy their matrimonial amour without the constant interruptions that ensue, including an odd and ribald baby played by dwarf Billy Barty. In the final number, “Shanghai Lilâ€, Cagney is a sailor, looking for his lost love in the bordellos and opium dens of the Orient. It is a bizarre and surreal concept and even more unusual is the introduction of Keeler’s Lil. Unlike the debauchery and wanton behavior going on around her, Keeler, as Cagney’s Asian gal pal, is cute and perky. From the rest of the performers in the bit, one would expect Marlene Dietrich to show up as the infamous Lil. However, it is nonetheless a fabulous piece of fil! m extravagance set to music.Fast, furious and complete fun, Footlight Parade, like its toe tapping cousins, 42nd Street and Gold Diggers, was a success and continued the trend at Warners fondly known as the “backstage musicalâ€. The string would continue the following year with another installment of the “Gold Diggers†films, Dames and Wonder Bar.Want to know more?Here are some recommendations regarding the article above:Footlight Parade (1933) DVDJoan Blondell: A Life Between Takes ~ Matthew KennedyIf you are interested in these or any other merchandise, please help support this blog by purchasing them through the Amazon portal at the top of this page. By accessing Amazon through this site, you help me maintain resource material and continue to share my love of classic film. Thank you very much.