The Wings of Eagles (1957)

I could not finish watching this movie about a Navy pilot played by John Wayne. He's a maverick who likes to take risks and drive his wife crazy. There's a lot of stuff about the need to fund the Navy's airplanes and pilots and the politics surrounding that which I didn't care enough about to follow.

I plan to come back and finish it, but I might not. John Wayne is ALWAYS playing John Wayne and I guess I'm not as interested in how the Navy learned to land planes on boats as I thought I might be.
UPDATE: Well I did go back to this and skipped to the end to see what happens. Seems he ends up a big hero (surprise) and retiring with some impressive war wounds. At least I thought they were war wounds until I skipped around and discovered they were caused by a domestic accident. Also his long suffering wife is LONG-suffering.
I guess bio-pics tend to be like this: long and rambling and not making much sense or necessarily paying off the way you think they will.
One star, not planning to watch again.

Flying Down to Rio (1933)

Ah, movies from the thirties. This is what I should be watching more of. Roger (Gene Raymond) is the conductor of a band and quite a player. When he spots Belinha (Delores Del Rio) winking at him from her table during a performance, it doesn't take him very long to leave the conducting to Fred (played by Fred Astaire) and sweep her up into his arms for a dance. News travels fast throughout the hotel. When the first comment, that Belinha, the niece of a wealthy Brazilian woman, is dancing with a musician, eventually reaches Belinha's aunt, the comment has run through the rumor mill and turned into "Belinha is dancing with a gigolo." The aunt rushes down to the dining room to put an end to the dance, and a romance/battle of words has begun. I was loving the movie... the first pairing of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, funny banter, amazing hats...

I was so happy... until I got to the spanking and the racism, all of which happened within a span of about five minutes. I will explain:

The spanking: Belinha needs to get home to Brazil fast. Her father needs her. It just so happens that Roger is a pilot, and that he and the band already happen to be going to Rio to play at the opening of a new hotel there. Roger convinces Belinha to fly in his two person plane (although he at first doesn't tell her he is the pilot and disguises himself in his flying gear so her aunt will let her go with him). Belinha is perfectly happy to discover that Roger is the pilot, but when Roger has to make an emergency landing on what they believe to be a remote desert island, all turns sour between them. Roger makes his engine trouble last by purposely losing an essential hose. Then he plays romantic music to get Belinha to make out with him. And then... she says something along the lines of, "No no no...I cannot do this...My family has arranged a marriage for me...I am engaged...We must never see each other again." Roger doesn't take well to Belinha's protest, Belinha slaps him, and then he throws her over his knee and spanks her a whole bunch of times reprimanding her for telling him off. Needless to say, when they have to spend the night on the island, she stays far away from him.

The racism: The morning after the spanking, Belinha looks into the trees and sees four or five black men looking back at her. She runs into Roger's arms screaming about wild men and cannibals. When Roger goes back to investigate, he finds out that she was not seeing cannibals, she was just seeing resort employees. They are in Haiti right next to a golf resort. This was supposed to be a funny joke.

The rest of the movie did have more entertaining moments, though. The hotel happens to be owned by Belinha's father, Roger happens to be friends with the fiance, and Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dance, all while Roger and Belinha spar and can't take their eyes off of each other.

The best part of the movie was definitely when the band saves the hotel by creating the most spectacular opener ever: scantily clad girls dancing and doing acrobatics on the wings of planes in flight. At one point some of their clothes are even carried off by parachutes. At one point one girl almost plummets to her death and has to be caught by people on the plane below. Video below:

I also love the way in which Belinha's fiance finally gives her up...a parachute is involved. Two stars for silly acrobatics and fun. I could see myself watching this again, despite the horrifying parts.

Wings in the Dark (1935)

Favorite actor... favorite actress... yet another movie I had a hard time paying attention to without rolling my eyes.

Myrna Loy plays a stunt pilot.  Cary Grant plays a daring pilot who wants to be one of the first pilots to fly blind (the first?  I can't remember!)  Of course Loy has long admired Grant before she even gets to meet him.  And of course Grant is blinded by a freak accident with a stove.    What will become of Grant's budding relationship with Loy?  What will become of his ambitious plan to... fly blind?

Devastated Grant secludes himself in a cabin in the woods until Loy and a helper sneak up on him and make him accept a seeing eye dog into his life.  Before the dog he has to wander around with his arms outstretched.  More touching scenes and tragedy ensue.
One star for the seeing eye dog.

That Touch of Mink (1962)

One Star. Will not watch again.


Oh my. Doris Day Day on TCM, or so it seems, and this has no dancing or singing, so it was hard to bear.

Cary Grant was by far the best part. Sexually frustrated CG is one of my favorite CGs to watch. He has his comedy down pat by '62 and he seems to be trying very hard to do his bit without ever being in the same scene with Doris Day.

Maybe that's because they were apparently intent on putting vaseline on the lens every time she appeared on screen since she had reached the ripe old age of - gasp - 38! Meanwhile, Cary Grant was - get this - 58 - and wasn't considered old enough to merit vaseline. A perfect example of Hollywood's age problem. A problem that it only seems to have with women.

Truth be told, though, DD's bit I'm not so fond of - Mary Tyler Moore does daffy better, in my opinion. Even Sally Field does indignant virgin better. But it's DD's schtick so if you love her, then here you go!

Costumes are mildly entertaining and the fashion show sequence is a nice touch.

Again, the same as in Yours Mine and Ours there is something vaguely Brady to these clean-clean comedies that try to be "romantic" comedies. You'd get more play taking your date to Shrek than you would watching this at the drive-in.