How am I supposed to get any work done when Channel Four decides to broadcast not one, but two early Doris Day musicals in a row this afternoon? Right now it is By the Light of the Silvery Moon, the 1953 sequel to On Moonlight Bay. It's not very good, but I really like the male lead, Gordon MacRae. He was Curly in the film version of Oklahoma!, and is much fun. Much preferable to that dour Howard Keel in Calamity Jane.
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update:
The second one was Caprice, from 1967, starring Doris and Richard Harrison as dueling spies for major cosmetic companies, in a race to find a special hair spray that keeps one's hair dry even underwater. I didn't watch the whole thing, but I tuned in briefly to an exciting gun battle between Doris and a mysterious man in black while both were skiing down a mountain in Switzerland. Luckily, Rex rescued Doris in a helicopter before she plunged off a cliff.
2 comments:
it was really quite spectacular. Every time I tuned back in there was something even more improbable going on. And there was amazing use of color. In this one scene, Richard Harrison was waiting for Doris in a cafe. In the wide shots the whole cafe was brown, except for the chairs, which were little splotches of yellow. Then the camera shifted to Doris walking down the street--and again, everything behind her was brown, in contrast to her bright yellow raincoat. Then the camera pulled further back, and the two fields of brown with yellow spots merged into one. Brilliant.
That sounds awesome! We must see it. I'm totally excited about the hairspray bit. Also, I'm currently watching Sex and the Single Girl on TV. It also has a very strong relationship to Down With Love. It stars Tony Curtis, Natalie Wood, Henry Fonda, and Lauren Bacall. I tuned in in the middle, so I'm not entirely sure what's going on but Natalie Wood seems to play a sex psychologist and a newspaper reporter (Curtis) is investigating her and poses as a stocking manufacturer (Henry Fonda) married to Lauren Bacall. Fonda gets arrested for bigamy when Curtis convinces several people to pose as his wife; It's quite fun, although utterly lacking in Doris Day.
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