Talking Pictures

[poliphilo]

We have my mother watching Talking Pictures most of the time now. It makes no difference to her what she's sat in front of- and I like the sound it makes- each film a little different- better than I like the noise of the daytime TV shows on the mainstream channels- the reality shows and the quiz shows- which sound essentially the same day after day. Mostly we don't watch with her but going in and out with cups of tea I get little glimpses of fascinating things- the images of a London that no longer exists in an Ealing comedy, the extraordinary expressionist visuals in an obscure film directed by Cameron Menzies, the outback landscapes in an otherwise tedious movie about bushwhackers, Kenneth More and Charles Hawtrey doing an unlikely double act in a mild comedy about mild criminality. Every so often- tall trees among the cinematic scrub- they'll show a bone fide classic. Yesterday we had Rene Clement's version of Shaw's Pygmalion- with Leslie Howard and Wendy Hiller- which is a delight- and I watched it all the way through.

Comments

[poliphilo]

I do love Audrey Hepburn but- no- she doesn't do nearly as much with the part as Hiller.

Shaw would also have hated the way Cecil Beaton smothered his work in frocks.