TCM Schedule for Thursday, November 5, 2020 -- TCM Spotlight: Bernard Herrmann

[Staph]

In the daylight hours, TCM seems to be giving us a day of blackmail and murder. I think... Then in prime time, TCM has a pair of films featuring the music of Bernard Herrmann. From the mini bio on IMDB:

The man behind the low woodwinds that open Citizen Kane (1941), the shrieking violins of Psycho (1960), and the plaintive saxophone of Taxi Driver (1976) was one of the most original and distinctive composers ever to work in film. He started early, winning a composition prize at the age of 13 and founding his own orchestra at the age of 20. After writing scores for Orson Welles's radio shows in the 1930s (including the notorious 1938 "The War of the Worlds" broadcast), he was the obvious choice to score Welles's film debut, Citizen Kane (1941), and, subsequently, The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), although he removed his name from the latter after additional music was added without his (or Welles's) consent when the film was mutilated by a panic-stricken studio. Herrmann was a prolific film composer, producing some of his most memorable work for Alfred Hitchcock, for whom he wrote nine scores. A notorious perfectionist and demanding (he once said that most directors didn't have a clue about music, and he blithely ignored their instructions--like Hitchcock's suggestion that Psycho (1960) have a jazz score and no music in the shower scene). He ended his partnership with Hitchcock after the latter rejected his score for Torn Curtain (1966) on studio advice. He was also an early experimenter in the sounds used in film scores, most famously The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), scored for two theremins, pianos, and a horn section; and was a consultant on the electronic sounds created by Oskar Sala on the mixtrautonium for The Birds (1963). His last score was for Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver (1976) and died just hours after recording it. He also wrote an opera, "Wuthering Heights", and a cantata, "Moby Dick".

Enjoy!


6:00 AM -- London by Night (1937)
1h 9m | Drama | TV-PG
A blackmailer holds the key to several murders.
Director: William Thiele
Cast: George Murphy, Rita Johnson, Virginia Field

Will Scott's play, "The Umbrella," was unpublished and possibly never performed.


7:15 AM -- Finger Of Guilt (1956)
1h 35m | Drama | TV-PG
Blackmail threatens an American filmmaker's attempts to rebuild his career in England.
Director: Joseph Losey
Cast: Richard Basehart, Mary Murphy, Constance Cummings

On this film's release, the director credit was given to producer Alec C. Snowden rather than to the (then) blacklisted Joseph Losey.


8:45 AM -- Nightmail (1936)
23m | Documentary | TV-G
Shows the special train on which mail is sorted, dropped and collected on the run, and delivered in Scotland overnight.
Director: Basil Wright
Cast: John Grierson

The shots of the interior of the carriage where the mail is sorted were filmed in a studio. An impression of movement was given by gently swinging the string that was hanging down from the top of the sorting boxes before each shot was filmed and telling the postal workers to walk with a rolling gait.


9:15 AM -- One Spy Too Many (1966)
1h 42m | Drama | TV-PG
U.N.C.L.E. agents Napoleon Solo and Ilya Kuryakin try to keep a madman from conquering the world.
Director: Joseph Sargent
Cast: Robert Vaughn, David Mccallum, Rip Torn

A sequence involving the parents of Alexander (Rip Torn), played by Madge Blake and Charles Seel, was deleted from the feature film version. The sequence involved him breaking the 5th Commandment by dishonoring his parents and making them work in a mine as slaves. The number 5 is quite visible over the mine, during the car chase through the rock quarry.


11:00 AM -- The Venetian Affair (1967)
1h 32m | Drama | TV-14
A reporter investigates an American diplomat's murder in Venice.
Director: Jerry Thorpe
Cast: Robert Vaughn, Elke Sommer, Felicia Farr

Actor Robert Vaughn was cast in the lead role in this picture by MGM in order to capitalize on his popular Napoleon Solo spy TV character from The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1964). This movie is actor Robert Vaughn's only other 60s spy film outside of playing 'The Man from U.N.C.L.E's Napoleon Solo in the series. Since the title of every episode ended with the word 'affair', this film could easily be mistaken for being an U.N.C.L.E. adventure, or for being one of the many theatrical version which were edited together from several episodes (however, none of the U.N.C.L.E. 'movies' used the word 'Affair' in it's title, only the episodes.)


12:45 PM -- How to Steal the World (1968)
1h 26m | Action | TV-PG
Secret agent Napoleon Solo fights to stop a top-secret plot to conquer the world.
Director: Sutton Roley
Cast: Robert Vaughn, David Mccallum, Barry Sullivan

This last U.N.C.L.E. motion picture was made up of both parts of "The Seven Wonders of the World Affair" (1/8 & 15/1968), the series finale to The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1964).


2:30 PM -- Zigzag (1970)
1h 45m | Drama | TV-14
A dying man frames himself for murder so his widow can collect the reward.
Director: Richard A. Colla
Cast: George Kennedy, Anne Jackson, Eli Wallach

The only acting credit for legendary jazz singer Anita O'Day (Sheila Mangan). Ms. O'Day died at the age of eighty-seven in 2006.


4:15 PM -- Cat O'Nine Tails (1971)
1h 52m | Action | TV-14
A blind man and a reporter investigate a break-in at a center for genetic research.
Director: Dario Argento
Cast: James Franciscus, Karl Malden, Catherine Spaak

The scene where Giordani meets Anna Terzi at her father's house is a reference to the scene in the novel The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler where Marlowe first meets Vivian Regan at her father's house. Portions of the dialogue are verbatim.


6:15 PM -- The Pack (1977)
1h 30m | Horror | TV-PG
Abandoned dogs join together to take on human enemies.
Director: Robert Clouse
Cast: Richard O'Brien, Rob Narke, Eric Knight

This film's initial "PG" rating was successfully appealed to the MPAA, strangely, to acquire the more restrictive "R" rating.


8:00 PM -- The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947)
1h 44m | Romance | TV-G
A spirited widow rents a haunted cottage and builds an emotional bond with the resident ghost.
Director: Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Cast: Gene Tierney, Rex Harrison, George Sanders

Nominee for an Oscar for Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Charles Lang

Bernard Herrmann considered his musical score for this movie to have been his best.


10:00 PM -- Vertigo (1958)
2h 8m | Romance | TV-PG
A detective falls for the mysterious woman he's been hired to tail.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: James Stewart, Kim Novak, Barbara Bel Geddes

Nominee for Oscars for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White or Color -- Hal Pereira, Henry Bumstead, Sam Comer and Frank R. McKelvy, and Best Sound -- George Dutton (Paramount SSD)

Bernard Herrmann's score is largely inspired by Richard Wagner's "Tristan und Isolde" which, like this movie, is also about doomed love.


12:15 AM -- Twentieth Century (1934)
1h 31m | Comedy | TV-PG
A tempestuous theatrical director tries to win back the star he created and then drove away.
Director: Howard Hawks
Cast: John Barrymore, Carole Lombard, Walter Connolly

Howard Hawks was concerned when Carole Lombard could not perform the kicking scene very well. Hawks took her out for a walk and recalls, "I asked her how much money she was getting for this picture. She told me and I said, 'What would you say if I told you you'd earned your whole salary this morning and didn't have to act anymore?' And she was stunned. So I said, 'Now forget about the scene. What would you do if someone said such and such to you?' And she said, 'I'd kick him in the balls.' And I said, 'Well, he (John Barrymore) said something like that - why don't you kick him?' She said, 'Are you kidding?' And I said, 'No.'" Hawks ended the conversation with, "Now we're going back in and make this scene and you kick, and you do any damn thing that comes into your mind that's natural, and quit acting. If you don't quit, I'm going to fire you this afternoon." Hawks' white lies did the trick, and the scene was filmed. In addition, Hawks claimed that after that, Lombard never began another movie without sending him a telegram that read, "I'm gonna start kicking him."


2:00 AM -- Cat People (1942)
1h 11m | Romance | TV-PG
A newlywed fears that an ancient curse will turn her into a bloodthirsty beast.
Director: Jacques Tourneur
Cast: Simone Simon, Tom Conway, Jane Randolph

The horror movie technique of slowly building tension to a jarring shock which turns out to be something completely harmless and benign became known as a "Lewton bus" after a famous scene in this movie created by producer Val Lewton. The technique is also referred to as a "cat scare," as off-screen noises are often revealed to be a startled harmless cat.


3:30 AM -- The Curse of the Cat People (1944)
1h 10m | Drama | TV-PG
A child explores her late mother's life and discovers her maternal bloodline is cursed.
Director: Gunther V. Fritsch
Cast: Simone Simon, Kent Smith, Jane Randolph

Although this sequel to Cat People (1942) is said to have nothing to do with the original film, in reality it is a continuation in the sense that the same actors (Kent Smith & Jane Randolph) play the same characters (Oliver Reed & Alice Moore) who fell in love at the end of the previous film. They are here married and have a daughter. Also, Irina (Simone Simon), who was the first Mrs. Reed, plays a prominent part in this story. However, this film has nothing whatsoever to do with the "cat people" of the original movie, nor with any curse.


4:45 AM -- Youth Runs Wild (1944)
1h 7m | Drama | TV-PG
During World War II, neglected teens on the home front turn to delinquency.
Director: Mark Robson
Cast: Bonita Granville, Kent Smith, Jean Brooks

RKO tested two versions of the film - the one completed by producer Val Lewton and one where several controversial and violent scenes were cut. The final film is the latter version, causing Lewton to disavow the film and tried to have his name removed from the credits.