The Shopworn Angel to air on TCM this Saturday

This Saturday, the Turner Classic Movies channel will be airing a little gem of a film called The Shopworn Angel (1938) starring Jimmy Stewart, Margaret Sullivan, Walter Pidgeon, and Hattie McDaniel. 

I wrote about this movie in the recent James Stewart Blogathon, and if you haven't seen the film, this Saturday's your chance!

The movie is scheduled to air at 7:30 AM (Eastern) / 4:30 AM (Pacific), which is kinda early. So you might want to set your DVRs or VCRs to record it.

Jimmy Stewart in The Shopworn Angel (1938)

The Shopworn Angel is one of my favorite movies because it's not a typical romantic comedy with a happy ending.

The year is 1917 and WWI is underway. Jimmy is a soldier stationed in New York before being sent overseas. We get a sense of his character's loneliness when he goes into a soda shop to write himself a few postcards. 

Margaret plays Daisy, a nightclub singer famous enough to get her picture in a magazine or two. How to describe her personality? Well, let me put it this way; from the first minute she appears onscreen in her high-rise apartment, you get a good idea of how she might treat someone like Jimmy if she ever had the chance.

Alas, they do meet-cute and Jimmy is instantly hit by cupid's arrow (bless his little heart) despite unreciprocated feelings from Daisy and sneers from her jealous boyfriend-manager, played by Walter Pidgeon (Mrs Miniver). Jealous of a country bumpkin, you might ask? It's true - in one scene, Mr. Miniver knocks over what appears to be a ceramic Statue of Liberty that Jimmy won at Coney Island (Ah, the days when they gave out fragile ceramic prizes).  

Jimmy is very good in this role. His character, Private Bill Pettigrew, has all the idealism that we love about Jimmy Stewart which makes the character so convincing. Pettigrew's sincere determination to win over Daisy before he leaves for the trenches will melt your heart. I swear, every time I watch this movie and see Jimmy with a box of chocolates in one hand and flowers in the other I ask myself will they or won't they? He and Margaret Sullivan had such great chemistry; it's hard for me to choose which movie with them I love more - this one or Shop Around the Corner.

All of the performances are top notch, including a very memorable performance by Hattie McDaniel who has to make a very brave decision toward the end of the film. If you have not seen this film, I highly recommend adding it to your must-see list. It's a beautiful, thought-provoking film.  Directed by HC Potter.

If you want to read more about the making of the film, check out the TCM full synopsis here, where you'll find trivia and more about the production (before she died, Jean Harlow was considered for the part of Daisy). 

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This post is part of the James Stewart Blogathon hosted by the Classic Film & TV Cafe. You can view the complete blogathon schedule here.

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Little Man, What Now? (1934)

An interesting episodic film from the early 1930s. Margaret Sullivan and Douglass Montgomery are a young couple in Weimar Germany. Margaret's expecting. Times are hard. Hitler is never mentioned by name, but there are scenes where we see people gathering for rallies.

Throughout the the film the two move from place to place and interact with some interesting characters who only appear in one or two scenes. These supporting characters (played by some great 1930s character actors) are either villainous or angelic, the latter helping them in desperate moments. An alternate title for this film might be "A Series of Unfortunate Events" (I made that up). I couldn't help cheering the couple on throughout; the are good decent people, and make such a cute, lovable couple.

There is one unforgettable moment in a department store with Douglass Montgomery and a character who is playing a famous actor. At the end, the baby is born (this is not a spoiler), and one character says to the newborn "Little man, what now?" (hence the title) which is an interesting thought, back then in 1934 and even today in 2011 with our hindsight. I left the theater thinking about what kind of life that child would have had; today he'd be almost 80 years old.

Directed by Frank Borzage.
Highly recommended.

So Ends Our Night (1941)

Glenn Ford and Margaret Sullivan

A two-hour epic tale of survival against Nazi forces in Eastern Europe, set in 1937.

The opening title card explains that in the present political climate, many political dissenters have been attempting to flee Nazi Germany without passports, including the characters played by Frederic March and - in one of his earliest film roles - Glenn Ford.

Erich Von Stroheim has a small but important part as a Nazi officer who interrogates March, a dissenter who refuses to answer any questions about his associates opposed to the regime. Stroheim - standing in a room with a huge Hitler poster...chilling - even asks him if he has a lover back home, and March still refuses to answer. But the truth is that March does - he's married to the love of his life - Frances Dee - whom he hasn't seen since he spent time in a concentration camp.

Francess Dee

March is later released and fends for himself on the streets, gambling to raise money to buy an illegal passport. Ford and some of the other refugees eventually make their way to Paris, where they find construction work. Several interesting sequences follow: one involves a character fulfilling a dream of eating several roasted chickens in one sitting; another takes place in an apartment where everyone struggles to get a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower out of a awkwardly placed window.

During the course of the film, young Glenn Ford meets college student Margaret Sullivan. The two of them go to the movies (I love it when characters in movies go to the movies!), fall in love, and for a time they are separated also, both facing persecution for being Jewish. We're left to wonder if the two pairs of lovers (including Frederic March & Francis Dee) will ever be reunited. I won't give it away, but what happens in the end is emotionally powerful.

The film was released in February 1941, 70 years ago

117 min. • Available to rent via NetFlix. • 1 Oscar nomination: Best Original Music Score

Directed by John Cromwell • Based on the 1939 novel "Flotsam" by Erich Maria Remarque

The Mortal Storm (1940)

This is a film that came out in 1940 and stars Jimmy Stewart and Margaret Sullivan.

It's a movie that I always remember as being one that stands out from many other films of 1940 because it talks about the politics in Germany at the time.

The film shows how a family breaks apart due to their political differences and affiliations.

Robert Stack co-stars as a relative who turns to the Nazi party, to the dismay of his relatives who align with the resistance. Frank Morgan plays a professor and the patriarch of the family.

Jacqueline of Another Old Movie Blog wrote a very good blog entry on this movie here.