Ripping melodramas!

Thanks for the link, LightWizard. Must get hold of a copy of the Lana T version. Looks like a lot of fun!

Msolga,that quote of Donats is a trifle ambiguous.He´s HAD thousands of children and they were ALL boys??What could he possibly have meant by that?
Nothing to be crying about and that´s the truth.

hebba

If you were a teacher these days (AND taught in my school - about which I won't go into details here, but trust me ...) The idea of thousands of students just thinking you're the ants pants after endless years of teaching .... AND you thinking of them as your "children" ... Well, it's so far from the reality that kind of puts a lump in your throat for dear old, doddery Mr Chips, leaving it all in such a genteel fashion.
Hey, I can fantacize can't ?
(Oh, Mr Chips taught in a very proper boys' school, which might explain why he had no girl "children".)

Hebba

You think maybe there was something a trifle kinky there?

Downright illegal msolga!

But hold on.That quote...was it from the movie?If so I have no argument.If it was the ACTUAL death bed of Donat then I´m concerned.

Kinky? That quote was from the movie with Robert Donat (1939). I saw it when it was re-released. It was remade as a musical in 1969 with Peter O'Toole in the title role. On his deathbed Mr. Chips also spoke of his idyllic courtship and marriage that transformed his life. His wife lost a child during childbirth. James Hilton wrote the novel on which it was based.

It's really amusing, though, because I just looked up the Peter O'Toole quote and he said ,when asked if he regretted not having any children,: "Oh, but I have. Thousands of them. All boys." (Note the omission of the word "had".) I wonder if the scriptwriter of the O'Toole version was thinking along the same lines as Hebba.

Ms. Olga: Which version did you see - Donat or O'Toole? Donat got the Oscar for Best Actor in 1939, and what surprises me is that two of his contenders were Clark Gable for Gone With the Wind and Laurence Olivier for Wuthering Heights. I wouldn't have been able to choose between those two. Maybe, the Academy of Motion Pictures couldn't either.

The Donat version is the superior film and with all the news being more recent than the O'Toole version, it is even funny that they would think of changing the line so subtly!

"Written on the Wind" happens to be one of the films on Ebert's Great Movies list which will probably pop up sometime next year. But here's the opening paragraph of his essay:


Opinion on the melodramas of Douglas Sirk has flip-flopped since his key films were released in the 1950s. At the time, critics ridiculed them and the public lapped them up. Today most viewers dismiss them as pop trash, but in serious film circles Sirk is considered a great filmmaker--a German who fled Hitler to become the sly subverter of American postwar materialism.

Rebecca with Sir Larry always gets to me. Every time I watch it I need the tissues.

Raggedy aggie

I've only seen the Donat version. That was nostalgic bliss!

msolga: I'm glad you saw the Donat version. I was so disappointed in the O'Toole remake. And speaking of nostalgia bliss, another tug-at-your heartstrings movie about a teacher was "Remember the Day" (1941.) The story is told in flashback about the effect a teacher (Claudette Colbert) has on a student who grows up to be a presidential nominee. Colbert was great, but I may be partial to her, because she reminded me so much of my mother. I don't know if it is on video, but it showed up on TV here in Pennsylvania a few months ago.

Favorite melodrama?

Hmmm...does 'Zulu' count as a melodrama?

Although "Zulu" is definitely ripping (in the British venacular), I'm not sure if it would qualify in the melodrama -- I'd have to see it again. Melodramas usually are in the scripting and play up the historonics and angst -- soap operas are melodramas. It's really difficult to bring it off as the actors are really tempted to ham it up -- keeping it from going over the top is really a feat.

Msolga, I just found your thread and can't add anything, but thanks for the memories.

Raggedyaggie

Remember the Day sounds just the thing for a teacher in despair. (Any day now!) And I love Claudette! Will definitely keep an eye out for it at the video shop.

Diane

A pleasure! But everyone else seems to know more about these fabulous old movies than me! What's your VERY favourite oldie?

LightWizard

But sometimes it makes it more amusing when the actors do ham it up & almost go over the top!

Ah, MsOlga: See what you've done. I can't stay away. "The Corn Is Green" (1945) with teacher Bette Davis in a Welsh town coming to terms with student John Dall. It was remade for TV in 1979 with Katharine Hepburn in the teacher role.

Msolga, my favorite is All About Eve. Bette Davis has always been one of my all time favorite actresses and I saw that movie just as I was becoming aware of and appreciative of true sophistication.

I go with Joanne Dorel, Rebecca was a great melodrama.

Sidney Lumet said, "In drama the characters determine the story. In Melodrama the story determines the characters."

Diane

Yes, Bette is dynamite in All About Eve, isn't she? Bold as brass, witty & sophisticated, gorgeous .... And human & vulnerable! Wotta role, wotta woman!

Has anyone ever seen "Dead Ringer" with Bette Davis, Karl Malden and Peter Lawford as her younger lover? She plays twins and it is truly melodrama at it's best.