Few major actors of Hollywood’s Golden Era played as many newspapermen as Clark Gable — from “The Secret 6” through “It Happened One Night,” “Love on the Run” and “Somewhere I’ll Find You” — with two of these ink-stained efforts separated by 23 years newly arrived at the Warner Archive Collection.
In Robert Z. Leonard’s delightful screwball mystery “After Office Hours” (1935), Gable as a Manhattan managing editor is second billed to Constance Bennett, playing a high-society dilletante who he fires over a music review at the outset. But then he needs her to get the goods on her rich pal Harvey Stephens (sporting a moustache for the occasion), particularly after Harvey bumps off his married paramour (Katharine Alexander) in his very swank boat house and ingeniously tries to hide his guilt.
The mystery element in Herman Mankiewicz’ script isn’t bad, but this fast-moving film is more fun for the romantic repartee exchanged by the oddly matched stars, who get solid support from 19-years-senior Billie Burke as Bennett’s ditzy mother and Stuart Erwin as a photographer, one of many drunks he assayed in this era.
Journalism gets treated somewhat more realistically in “Teacher’s Pet” (1958), the most successful of Gable’s late films, which WAC has reissued as part of its deal with Paramount (along with the Sophia Loren co-starrer “It Happened in Naples”). Here the star, pushing 60 and looking every day of it, is toiling as the grumpy city editor of a Manhattan broadsheet, annoyed to be ordered by his boss to speak at Doris Day’s journalism class at Columbia University.
Old-school and proudly sexist, Gable doesn’t have much use for J-School, but is taken by the much younger Day. When he pretends to be a somewhat mature student, she attempts to educate him that newspapers need to look for the trends beyond breaking news. The sparkling script by Oscar-nominated Fay and Michael Kanin (“Woman of the Year”) provides a great supporting part for Gig Young, himself Academy Award nominated as Day’s boyfriend, and Mamie Van Doren is on hand as Gable’s dancer gal pal. The underrated George Seaton (“Miracle on 34th Street”) snagged a Director’s Guild award nod for his smooth work on this charmer, which opens with Doris’ perky rendition of Joe Lubin’s catchy title tune (which turned up in the end credits of an otherwise unrelated 2004 Disney animated feature of the same name).
For Gable at his absolute prime of two decades earlier, WAC has finally released Victor Fleming’s “Test Pilot” (1938), a huge hit of the era, on DVD in a nice restoration. The King has great chemistry with feisty Myrna Loy, on whose Kansas farm he makes an emergency landing — and they both make a great team with loyal mechanic Spencer Tracy, who later joked that this was the film “where Myrna and I are both in love with Clark.” This clocks in at two full hours and has its share of schmaltz, but is more than worth it for its sizzling star power (Lionel Barrymore is also on board) and aerial sequences. And for fans of vintage airplanes, by all means check out another recent WAC arrival, George Hill’s “Hell Divers” (1931) a rip-roaring service drama with a seven-years-younger Gable and top-billed Wallace Beery.
Speaking of Gable, Warner Home Video Tuesday announced a Sept. 30 release date for its long-anticipated “75th Anniversary Ultimate Collector’s Edition” of “Gone With The Wind,” as well as some details about extras. The new ones on the discs are “Old South/New South,” a featurette “revisiting the real-life locations depicted in ‘Gone With the Wind,’ from Gettysburg to Atlanta, to see how the world of the Old South — and the themes depicted in the film — continue to inform life in the cosmpolitan world of the New South.” Also promised is previously unseen footage of Gable and Vivien Leigh “attending the original movie premiere in Atlanta.”
There is also a new 36-page book on the film’s style, written by New York fashion designer and Project Runaway finalist Austin Scarlett, as well as a couple of pieces of swag: “a replica of Rhett Butler’s handkerchief and a music box paperweight playing Tara’s theme with an image on top of the Rhett-Scarlett kiss.” SRP is $50, likely steeply discounted at Amazon.
Ernst Lubitsch’s “Angel” (1937, starring Marlene Dietrich, Herbert Marshall and Melvyn Douglas) has belatedly and quietly made its belated U.S. DVD debut via the Universal Vault Series, that studio’s manufacture-on-demand program distributed through Amazon. Other vintage Paramount titles bowing on DVD this way are John Cromwell’s ultra-rare “For the Defense” (1930) with William Powell and Kay Francis; Norman Taurog’s “Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch” (1934) with Pauline Lord and W.C. Fields; Frank Lloyd’s “If I Were King” (1938) starring Ronald Colman and Basil Rathbone; and George Marshall’s “Variety Girl” (1937) with Olga San Juan, Mary Hatcher and a bevy of Paramount guest stars, including Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, Dorothy Lamour, Gary Cooper, Burt Lancaster, Alan Ladd, Barbara Stanwyck and Paulette Goddard.
The Universal Vault is also reissuing a couple of notable titles previously licensed to Kino Lon DVD: Rouben Mamoulian’s musical masterpiece “Love Me Tonight” (1932) starring Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald, and William Wyler’s “The Good Fairy” (1935), starring then-wife Margaret Sullivan and Herbert Marshall.
The sporadic Vault has also released some Universal rareties as part of its latest wave: Douglas Sirk’s “No Room for the Groom” (1952), a comedy starring Tony Curtis and Piper Laurie; Rudolph Mate’s period adventure “The Missisippi Gambler” (1953) with Tyrone Power and Laurie; and Arthur Lubin’s quasi-historical “Lady Godiva of Coventry” (1955) starring Maureen O’Hara, George Nader and Victor McLaglen, with young Lubin protege Clint Eastwood unbilled in his third screen appearance as “First Saxon.”
Speaking of rareties, the Sony Pictures Choice Collection MOD program will next week release Lothar Mendes’ “The Walls Came Tumbling Down” (1948) with Lee Bowman and Marguerite Chapman, as well as John Hoffman’s “The Wreck of the Hesperus” (1948) starring Willard Parker.
Kino has just announced release dates for its first wave of titles licensed from MGM, beginning with the Blu-ray debut of Billy Wilder’s “Witness for the Prosecution” (1957) starring Tyrone Power and Marlene Dietrich, on June 22.
A week later, there will be Blu-ray upgrades for Delbert Mann’s Oscar-winning “Marty” (1955) with Ernest Borgnine; Mann’s “Separate Tables” (1958) starring Rita Hayworth, Deborah Kerr and David Niven; and Ralph Nelson’s “Duel at Diablo” (1966) with James Garner and Sidney Poitier. Also on that date, Martin Ritt’s “Paris Blues” (1961) will be making its DVD and Blu-ray debut. Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Poitier, Diahann Carroll and Louis Armstrong star in this jazz-themed romantic drama.
The limited-edition boutique label Twilight Time, which began licensing from MGM earlier this year to compliment the films it’s leased from Sony and Fox, will be releasing Blu-ray upgrades of John Frankenheimer’s “The Train” (1965) with Burt Lancaster and Michael Winner’s “The Mechanic” (1972) strarring Charles Bronson next week, along with John Huston’s “Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison” (1957) with Robert Mitchum and Deborah Kerr.
Twilight Time’s July 8 Blu-ray releases: George Cukor’s “Born Yesterday” (1950) starring Judy Holliday and Broderick Crawford; Anthony Mann’s “The Man From Laramie” (1955) with James Stewart and Arthur Kennedy; Douglas Hickock’s “Brannigan” (1975) with John Wayne; and Woody Allen’s “Radio Days” (1987) with Mia Farrow; plus a welcome Blu-ray upgrade of Richard Fleischer’s wonderful Technicolor-CinemaScope noir “Violent Saturday” (1955), which TT released as a non-anamorphic widescreen DVD back near its launch. Victor Mature, Lee Marvin and Borgnine star.
Set for Aug. 12 release are Blu-ray upgrades of Gordon Douglas’ “Follow that Dream” (1962) starring Elvis Presley; Stanley Kramer’s “The Secret of Santa Vittoria” (1969) with Anthony Quinn and Anna Magnani; and Steve Rash’s “The Buddy Holly Story” (1978) starring Gary Busey and Charles Martin Smith
MGM is (somewhat improbably) disputing legendary film restoration expert Robert Harris’ recent statement that John Wayne’s “The Alamo” (1960) is in perilous shape and in immediate need of rescue. Here’s a report from The Digital Bits, which broke the story last week.