ye gods! there's another one!

a safe space for old movie enjoyers

[hotvintagepoll]

Question for you but also for any follower who has an answer

If you had to pick one Hollywood celeb for each occasion (as in different people each time unless there's an intentional repeat)

- eat dinner with

- go on a date with (whatever a date might be is up to you)

- party with

- travel with

- work with (on movie set or otherwise)

- fight (as in by their side)

- fight (as in against. get their ass etc etc)

dinner: pearl bailey. i want to eat her mac and cheese and then i want to eat her o[redacted]

date: pearl bailey again?? i'm down bad. i know she's a republican i can fix her

party: norma shearer

travel: i think katharine hepburn could be very fun and very ruthless to travel with.

work: walter plunkett

fight with: hazel scott

fight against: rex harrison. i'm going to kill that man

put yours in the replies

[ckdexterhavennn]

ooh, I'm going to get in on this one.

dinner: audrey hepburn. she would charm me so thoroughly I would just listen to her and forget that I was supposed to be eating something.

date: lauren bacall. have you seen her??

party: peter lorre, because I'm a little awkward and out of place until I get to know people, and I get the feeling he'd have some wild conversation starters so we could just find a corner and keep talking all night.

travel with: buster keaton. I hate the process of travelling, so I think it might be more fun with someone who could make me laugh, or at least make that face of resigned suffering at me.

work with: mae west would be such a fun coworker. she'd have all the gossip about who did what when and she'd pull it out whenever she thought someone was getting to high on themselves, and she'd do it in a way that you couldn't even be mad at her because it was funny. either her or raymond burr, because he would show up, be pleasant, do his job, and leave, and I would never have any idea what the hell was happening in his personal life.

fight with: elizabeth taylor. I feel like she'd be in it to kill.

fight against: jerry lewis. both for what he did to comedy and his creepy "womanizing" behaviour and what it did to his wives, children, and coworkers. (same goes for a lot of male actors obviously but he annoyed me even as a kid and looking him up more recently was Bad. wtf do you mean he divorced someone and explicitly disinherited all his children from that marriage so he could start over?? I will fight both him and john lennon.)

[hotvintagepoll]

Ask night ask night! Thanks to you, my partner and I have started oldie movie nights--but we could use some direction! Do you have some movie recs that are not the obvious choices, but you think newbie classic movie watchers like ourselves should see?

YIPPEE YAY

here are some hot old movies that I think newbies will enjoy

the rage of paris (danielle darrieux, douglas fairbanks jr.)—this is a cute, deeply underrated romcom about an accidental conwoman, her judgmental best friend, a silly little waiter at a hotel and a bunch of rich guys. mood is cute and sweet

the talk of the town (ronald colman, jean arthur, cary grant)—longtime followers of the blog are rolling their eyes but THIS ONE IS GOOD. the less you know about it going in the better tbh, but uhh it's about what if you sublet your house to a hot judge and there was also a hot criminal hiding in the attic. and you yourself are hot. and there's borchst. trust me on this one please

key largo or the big sleep (lauren bacall, humphrey bogart)—I think the big sleep is the better of these two, but key largo is also a good example of a bogey & bacall noir (plus you get edward g. robinson!). the tension keeps ratcheting up, the two leads are so hot together, and the big sleep in particular is one of the best ensemble casts i've ever seen—a fully built seedy world of tricksters, femme fatales, gangsters, and fog.

flower drum song (nancy kwan, james shigeta, miyoshi umeki)—ok this one is bad! i'm just going to say it off the bat. i have so many complex emotions about it because the cast is killer, the production design is gorgeous, this is a classic 50s-60s big studio musical. writing is racist garbage written by white people and there is one egregious example of yellowface. but if you want to see a nearly all-asian cast absolutely knock it out of the park, I love suggesting this.

his girl friday (cary grant, rosalind russell)—rosalind wants to quit both her ex and the newspaper business; unfortunately she's maybe not over either as much as she thought. mood is snappy reporters yelling into telephones, lovers to enemies to lovers, arguments that read as foreplay. cw for an offscreen subplot that mentions the murder of a Black cop, and one racist slur.

sherlock jr. (buster keaton)—if you're new to silent films, I think Buster is a great way to start. this is maybe his best, but the general and the navigator are also technically good, though require heavy content warnings for being about the idealized confederacy (the general) and having a racist "island savages" section near the end (the navigator).

to be or not to be (carole lombard, jack benny)—a little story about resistance that makes me cry and laugh and cry. this takes place in poland during wwii so big tw for nazi imagery and mentions. (don’t worry. this movie fucking hates nazis.)

the mortal storm (james stewart, margaret sullavan, frank morgan)—this also made me cry. this movie will not be escapism at the present moment which also makes me cry. fuck nazis.

you can find many more recs here.

[normasshearer]

IT'S LOVE I'M AFTER 1937, dir. Archie L. Mayo

[stesichoreanpalinode]

tagging @hotvintagepoll for many reasons

[hotvintagepoll]

#olivia is all of us moving from hot guys to scrungly guys

i genuinely thought you were tagging me in this because of patric knowles' flop acting in the background <3 that's MY actor who's only ever been good in 1 thing

[cardassian-tails]

cinematographers need to stop being so afraid of lighting. like i get it your movie is grim and serious, but i promise it would be even more grim and serious if i could actually see what was happening

[lizardsfromspace]

Watching silent movies will leave you wondering how they were able to do all those death-defying, and sometimes death-not-defying, stunts on a daily basis. How were they able to get away with just having live big cats and elephants hanging out in the middle of scenes, or all those crazy stunt scenes? Anyway the answer is that none of the Hollywood unions were formed until the mid 1930s

[lizardsfromspace]

The ideal amount of practical effects is somewhere in between "none" and "flood sequence so realistic it literally drowned several actors" and they hadn't quite figured that out yet

[idlesuperstar]

 - Very good. 

[txf-tarras]

This is the type of film that the phrase “glorious technicolor” was invented for - look at the richness of the colours!

[petermorwood]

To say nothing of a phrase that gets used in this house a bit too often…

[quousque]

ok so this is The Court Jester with Danny Kaye and it is the best fucking movie i swear. It’s a comedy musical robin hood parody thing about an incompetent moron and his extremely competent ass-kicking girlfriend taking down a tyrannical king and restoring the throne to the rightful heir

-the rightful heir is a baby and they can tell it’s the right baby because of a giant birthmark on his asscheek

-the main character’s only talent is singing and the rest of the pseudo robin-hood group just kinda tolerate him because he repeatedly fucks up

-he gets hypnotized into believing he is this amazing swashbuckling sword fighting hero along the lines of Wesley from the Princess Bride and ends up fighting the villain while snapping in and out of hypnosis

-the vessel with the pestle has the pellet with the poison, the chalice with the palace has the brew that is true “what”

-he stumbles his way through the entire plot and never knows what the hell is going on

-Danny Kaye is the funniest motherfucker you’ve never heard of

-seriously go watch it you wan’t regret it

[oldshrewsburyian]

#yea verily yea ( @lessthansix)

[whatevercomestomymind]

And a fun tidbit from the filming was that Danny Kaye had never fenced before this film, so he was trained by Basil Rathbone’s stunt double who was also the fight coordinator. Kaye got so proficient so quickly, that Rathbone himself had to do most of the duel scenes between them as the fight coordinator eventually couldnt keep up with him on the more technical parts of the fight. If you watch closely, you can see that Rathbone stays on camera doing the fencing for a much larger percentage of time than he normally did by that point in his career, and Kaye does all but a couple of shots of his own fencing, because HIS double couldnt keep up and make it believable.

[hotvintagepoll]

Since you just reblogged that gifset of Arthur Jurado, do you know of any other disabled vintage stars? It's rare to see people like myself in today's film landscape, so it's even more of a pleasant surprise to see we could still sometimes get a chance back then. Look up Esmond Knight!

I just did! What a cool guy to know about.

Esmond Knight

Here are a few other vintage hotties with disabilities:

Susan Peters (paraplegic)

Peter Falk (right eye surgically removed due to retinoblastoma)

Claude Rains (permanently blinded in one eye due to gas attack in WWI)

Rondo Hatton (acromegalic)

If I got any of the phrasing wrong, or forgot somebody we should talk about, please let me know!

[jeffreycombs]

“In a hundred years of movies, homosexuality has only rarely been depicted on the screen. When it did appear, it was there as something to laugh at, or something to pity, or even something to fear. These were fleeting images, but they were unforgettable, and they left a lasting legacy. Hollywood, that great maker of myths, taught straight people what to think about gay people… and gay people what to think about themselves.” (The Celluloid Closet, 1996)

[hotvintagepoll]

if they made Arsenic & Old Lace today, who do you think could play the role of Mortimer Brewster ?

i'm so bad at modern actors i cannot do this at all

[ckdexterhavennn]

I know it's been forever but I'm looking through stuff from my main blog to reblog here and I stand by this cast list!

[ckdexterhavennn]

*drunk jimmy stewart voice* OH CK DEXTER HAAVENNNN!!

Lol first, love the new name. Second, just wanted to reassure you with the new direction for the blog. If you do plan to post the research you did for the stunt polls I'd love to see it! And if not whatever fun movie stuff you share on here will be great as well :)

thank you!! I've posted some of my drafts tonight, and I just finished reading george masters's book where he talks about doing hair and makeup for celebrities, so I'll be posting some bits and pieces from that as well!

[ckdexterhavennn]

I saw your new username and Jimmy Stewart's voice shouted it at me.

OH CK DEXTER HAAAAVEEENNNNNN!!

I'm SO glad. when I was thinking about movie quotes I could use, this was the first one I thought of.

[ckdexterhavennn]

Bob Simmons and Bond:

Doubling for Connery, Simmons agreed to have a real tarantula spider crawl across his body and shoulder: ‘I tried to close my mind to what was going on. I lay there, petrified…’. But what made it worse was that the director, Terence Young, insisted that one more shot was taken, so Simmons had to do it all over again. Needless to say, Simmons was not very pleased, especially as he realised he had not negotiated any extra fee for the dangerous work.

Simmons regarded the duel between James Bond and ‘Red’ Grant (Robert Shaw) on the Orient Express in From Russia With Love as ‘one of the most realistic examples of hand-to-hand combat ever filmed’. Working as Connery’s double on the now famous From Russia fight sequence, with Jack Cooper doubling for Robert Shaw, Simmons said ‘it was a peach of a fight’, helped by editor Peter Hunt’s suggestion that a third free camera be used.

Source for above quote is this Bond fan site.

You may know Bob Simmons better from the iconic gun barrel scene.

He also played the widow in this fight scene. Skip to 1:40 if you want to get to the fighting.

Here's a photo of Simmons and Sean Connery chilling on set while filming that sequence.

bts photo source

also fun: this behind the scenes look at filming a scene in Diamonds Are Forever with Simmons working as stunt coordinator!

[ckdexterhavennn]

Calgary Herald article on stunt men who have been deemed "good risks" by insurance brokers. Transcript under the cut.

Stunt Men --- 'Good Risks'

Hollywood (UP) - Motion picture stunt men, who risk their lives to provide moviegoers with thrills, received a thrill themselves when Lloyds of London, famous insurance brokers, agreed to accept stunt performers as good risks.

By insuring themselves, the stunt men lowered the financial risk of the studios, many of which were cutting out difficult stunts because of insurance costs.

After months of investigating every stunt man and woman in the movie business, Lloyds selected a list of 25 daredevils and offered them yearly insurance against death and dismemberment in the course of their work. No others will be accepted unless they measure up to the standards set by Lloyds.

The expenses of hospitalizing injured stunt men was paid by the state from its compensation insurance funds, but the rates paid by the studios on the stunt men were so high that studios preferred not to use them.

By carrying their own insurance stunt men expect to lower the state compensation rate to the studios and thus create more work for themselves.

Among the first to take out the new policies were Paul Mantz, noted stunt flier and aerial advisor to the late Amelia Earhart: Frank Clark and Tex Rankin, also prominent stunt men in the air. They signed for $15,000 accident policies preparatory to going into the new Richard Dix aviation film, "Ground Crew." Lloyds also will offer policies to the following selected list of daredevils:

Mary Wiggins, Betty Danko, Ione Reed, Duke Green, Wesley Hopper, Allen Pomeroy, Jimmy Dundee, Otto Metzetti, Johnny Sinclair, Jack Woody, Billy Jones, Yakima Canutt, Cliff Lyons, Bob Rose, Harvey Parry, Chick Collins, Victor Metzetti, Matt Gilman and Gordon Carveth.

[ckdexterhavennn]

Betty Danko for the South Bend Tribune. Transcript under the cut.

ONE of the most frightening of all close calls that stunt girls have had was that of Betty Danko, formerly of Newark, N. J., nine years in films. Doubling for Patsy Kelly at Hal Roach's studio, Miss Danko, an attractive brunet, was called upon to work with a puma, or mountain lion. No animal trainer herself, she had to rely on the puma's owner. After she apparently had made friends with the big cat, it suddenly struck out with its paw at a bright beaded moccasin she was wearing.

"I knew then I might be in for trouble," she said later, "so later I went over to talk with the trainer and asked him what to do. The lion was lying quietly on the floor of the stage, and the trainer suggested I stick my foot out again where he could see it. At this he started to whisk his tail back and forth. The trainer told me not to be afraid but to put my foot nearer. Almost before I could move, the lion was upon me."

The beast got Miss Danko's left leg in his two front paws, the claws sinking deep into the flesh. Then he clamped down with his jaws, starting to chew.

"The pain was incredible," Miss Danko said. "Each bite was torture. I wanted to pass out but I couldn't."

Before they could pry Miss Danko and the puma apart, the creature had bitten her 13 times, so deeply that most of the scars, doctors tell her, can never be erased.

Miss Danko's specialty in stunts is not animal work but falls.

"I have fallen," she said, "into ditches, lakes, pools, through trap doors, from piano tops, over chairs and tables, down laundry chutes and stairs. I have fallen over backwards from a height of 25 feet into 32 inches of water and into a pool fully clothed though I can barely swim. I've been yanked around wires, had pies and knives thrown at me, have lain amid flames of gasoline - all for the sake of Art and a pay check. But I still like it and it enables me to support my mother and myself."

[ckdexterhavennn]

vintagestuntpoll -> ckdexterhavennn

[hotvintagepoll]

i am trying to keep up with all your hot vintage matchmaking but 1) I keep getting distracted with how cute you all are, and 2) I'm researching all of these hotties as we go so I (hopefully) don't set any of you up with a complete dumpster fire of a person

also i found an archive of old photoplay magazines because I wanted to include fun facts but now I can't stop reading them . fuck

[ckdexterhavennn]

hey! so it's been a while. I have a lot of life stuff going on (starting a career and trying to have a personal life at the same time is not for the weak) and it's only going to get more intense over the next year. researching for this poll is a big job because I'm trying to get it right, and as fun as it is, it's been feeling more like homework as life gets busier. I think I have to abandon the idea of the poll indefinitely.

however! I would like a place to make and reblog silly or informative posts about classic movies, and if you're up for that then stick around. no worries about unfollowing either, do whatever you feel like. I'll be changing my username and profile pic and everything, so I'll make another post about it when that happens.

in the meantime, I'll publish the drafts I've made so far about stunt performers I've researched, so you can all appreciate them!