Cover of Libeled Lady

Financial disaster is always looming, for someone—in this way the screwball rom-comLibeled Lady (1936), directed by Jack Conway, is highly relevant to early 20th century America and other Western nations.  The disaster in  question will hit a city newspaper threatened by a staggering lawsuit unless a jobless fixer (William Powell)—he needs the money—can smoothly deceive Myrna Loy into dropping the suit.  Ah, but the hurdles arise because of a conflict between two traditional institutions.  Jean Harlow demands a marriage, right now, from the paper’s managing editor, Spencer Tracy, panicky over the business.  Powell, predictably, falls for Loy and refuses to see any real danger to the business.  There does come to be a danger to himself, though.

Like Noel Coward’s Hay Fever, Libeled Lady is (in my opinion) not all that funny, but it hardly matters since, again like Hay Fever, its plot and characters are supremely interesting.  This describes MANY of the Thirties screwballs.  The movie is based on a story and adapted by three writers—how could

 that many heads ruin it?—and its actors have no trouble with comedy or farce (albeit it’s a non-farcical role for Loy).  But hold it: Loy plays a party girl!? . . . Go ahead and suspend disbelief.  The only thing that will worry you slightly is the possibility of Hollywood remaking this notable confection.

Cinderella: From Fabletown with Love (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Cinderella in Cinderella (2010), a “graphic novel” by Chris Roberson (writer) and Shawn McManus (artist), is a fairy tale figure-cum-action heroine.  Sound bad?  Not quite.  In fact, it’s okay.  It’s a breezy, pleasantly drawn and colored page-turner with a cable-TV miniseries plot. . . Granted, Cinderella is too strong for a girl, but it must be remembered that she is what is called a “fable” and thus not human.  Nor is there any indication that she does what she does—spy stuff—to make a feminist point.  She is just the uncomplicated female spy we want her to be—in a comic book.

The second novel in the series is Cinderella In A Bikini.  Well, no, it’s Cinderella: Fables Are Forever (2012), but it’s more harmlessly sensual—for several pages Cindy is in a bikini, and so is her adversary: a grown-up Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz!—than the first book.  It’s better than viewing P***y Galore in an objectifying James Bond picture.

Cover of Chasing Papi

What a debacle Linda Mendoza’s Latino-dominated Chasing Papi (2003) is!  I wish Christian singer Jaci Velasquez, one of the stars here, could have been cast in a well-done screen musical with an intelligent director to work on her acting, instead of in this sloppy, stereotypical, insufficiently funny comedy.  Mendoza’s idea of wit is to have a toothsome but brainy young woman coo to her boyfriend, “The basis of our relationship is intellectual.”  Right.

In the early 60s Frank Meyer, a conservative, pointed out a number of good things that classical liberalism (different from contemporary liberalism) blessedly developed for the West, among them the belief in “limited state power” and “the free-market economy.”  But he also told us classical liberalism “sapped, by its utilitarianism, the foundations of belief in an organic moral order.”  That is, it settled for utilitarianism and that’s it.  “An organic moral order?” a lot of folks would have said.  “Is there such a thing?”

Of course this is still with us.  Everything from Medicaid to the granting of amnesty to masses of illegal immigrants to same-sex marriage serves a utilitarian purpose.  These things are supposed to have utility, they are supposed to work.  I am obliged to mention, however, that every year approximately 70 billion dollars of Medicaid and Medicare funds are lost to fraud and improper payments.  Which means every year 70 billion dollars are being poured into a rathole, an abyss, and shan’t be recovered.  Can this be described as something that works?

Naturally this is Meyer’s follow-up statement:  “But the only possible basis of respect for the integrity of the individual person and for the overriding value of his freedom is belief in an organic moral order.”

Frank Meyer (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

So far Jason Reitman’s only failure has been Young Adult.  His new movie version of Labor Day (2014), the Joyce Maynard novel (reviewed on this site), is a winner.

I’ve written that the novel is “endlessly compelling on the subject of isolation.”  That is not quite the case with the film, but no matter.  It is gripping and touching when concentrating on a woman’s two miscarriages and one stillbirth (those of Kate Winslet’s Adele).  Maynard’s plot is faithfully rendered and the film has plenty of heart.  The acting is usually satisfying, although young Gattlin Griffith, as the boy Henry, invariably wears the same facial expression.  Josh Brolin’s performance as the convict is mainly lived-in but slightly dull.  Better are Brooke Smith (Evelyn), who has verve, and young Brighid Fleming (Eleanor), who is coolly true as a girl contentedly aware of her slowly growing sophistication.  As for Winslet, she is movingly delicate, savvily good.

Labor Day was made in a felt, subdued manner, and its titles sequence is a wonder of editing.  You won’t have a problem with Eric Steelberg’s cinematography either.

English: English actress Kate Winslet. Español: Actriz inglesa Kate Winslet. Português: Atriz inglesa Kate Winslet. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)