Juarez 1939 - Entertaining historical epic with some flaws

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0031516/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
IMDB rating: 7,3

Director: William Dieterle
Main Cast: Paul Muni, Bette Davis, Brian Aherne, Claude Rains, John Garfield, Donald Crisp, Gale Sondergaard, Gilbert Roland

"Juarez manages to be a very entertaining and effective historical epic, despite some enormous flaws. Part of its success lies in the fact that - unlike so many Hollywood attempts to film history - a great deal of what ends up on the screen is accurate. It helps also, of course, that the historical situation being explored is one that is in and of itself exciting and intriguing. The screenplay doesn't always succeed in capturing this excitement and intrigue totally, due in no small part to the fact that too many people had a hand in writing and shaping it, but individual sequences are excellent and director William Dieterle does a fine job of pulling together its disparate parts and camouflaging the gaps and faults. He is helped greatly by Brian Aherne's excellent performance, which makes Maximilian into a sympathetic and complicated character, as well as by Bette Davis, who sinks her teeth into her juicy mad scene and plays it for all she is worth. Gale Sondergaard and Claude Rains are also effective, both smoothly villainous, but John Garfield is quite miscast. More damaging, however, is Paul Muni whose decision to underplay his role in order to contrast with Davis' histrionics renders Juarez distant, remote, uninvolving, and quite dull. This leaden anchor at its center weakens Juarez, but the film fortunately has enough assets to mitigate the damage." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/juarez-v26648/

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Merrily we live 1938 - Basically a cute, charming remake of My man Godfrey

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030442/?ref_=nv_sr_1
IMDB rating: 7,4

Director: Norman Z. McLeod
Main Cast: Constance Bennett, Brian Aherne, Alan Mowbray, Billie Burke, Patsy Kelly, Ann Dvorak, Tom Brown, Bonita Granville

"It's hard to argue that Merrily We Live doesn't owe a huge debt to My Man Godfrey, with which it has a great deal in common. Normally, copycats of classics are pale imitations that provide, at best, a few moments of diversion but are in no real way memorable. So it's quite a surprise that Merrily is actually quite a scintillating little screwball comedy, in spite of its Xerox-like origins. Merrily lives up to its title, being one of the most delightfully madcap comedies of the era. While the screenplay that Jack Jevne and Eddie Moran cooked up isn't high on originality, it's quite skillfully put together and very well structured. Yes, we often can see that a particular gag is coming, yet when it arrives we welcome it as a friend whom we haven't seen in so long that his familiarity seems fresh. Credit is also very much due to Norman Z. McLeod's lightning fast direction, which keeps everything going at a crisp pace yet never allows things to get so frenetic that the audience loses track of things. The cast is also a delight, with lovely Constance Bennett a joy and Brian Aherne turning in a perfectly calibrated comic performance. Best of all, though, is Billie Burke, having found the part that she was always meant to play and one which takes thorough advantage of her very distinctive personality and even more distinctive way with a phrase." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/merrily-we-live-v102162/

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(flv, 1 GB):

http://filenuke.com/sxdtpyi0w095

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The song of songs 1933 - One of Dietrich's best performances

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0024598/
IMDB rating: 6,8

Director: Rouben Mamoulian
Main Cast: Marlene Dietrich, Brian Aherne, Lionel Atwill, Alison Skipworth, Helen Freeman

"Those who feel that Marlene Dietrich was merely a beautiful figure whose performances were molded only by director Josef von Sternberg should take a look at Song of Songs, which contains some of Dietrich's finest (if often overlooked) work. Granted, she was once again working with a strong director (Rouben Mamoulian in this case), but it's clear that this was a woman who not only had abundant talent but had a clear sense of how to act specifically for the camera. Observe the many ways she looks at the camera, always embracing it, but doing so with a tremendous variety - sometimes tenderly, sometimes angrily, sometimes teasingly, sometimes aloofly. Dietrich also gets a chance to show some range here, creating a character who changes from naïve and trusting to one who is cynical and world weary - and making all aspects of the character quite believable. For his part, Mamoulian's direction is a bit more 'conventional' than usual but enormously effective nonetheless. If he's not able to draw a very lively performance from Brian Aherne, he compensates with his work from Lionel Atwill, Alison Skipworth, and Helen Freeman. Add in some evocative Victor Milner cinematography and some stunning sculptures, buttressing a sturdy screenplay, and the result is an enormously entertaining drama in the Dietrich manner.
Song of Songs was based on a Herman Sudermann novel, previously adapted into a stage play and then filmed twice during the silent era." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/song-of-songs-v111040

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