Wonderland Burlesque's Let's All Go To The Movies: Lies, All Lies! Edition, Part II

Wonderland Burlesque's 

Let's All Go To The Movies

Lies, All Lies! Edition, Part II

Living Lies

(1922)

(A reporter investigates a group of high financiers suspected of being involved in a number of illegal deals. The head of the crooked syndicate, in cahoots with two others are in the process of sealing a deal when the signed agreement blows out of the window and falls into the hands of the reporter! They try to bribe the reporter and his girlfriend and when that fails they resort to torture. The reporter evenually gives up the goods. When the crooks leave to retrieve the document, the reporter and his girl escape, and grab the contract before  the crooked businessmen can get their hands on it. The paper then prints the story and the scandal causes the syndicate head to hide out on a houseboat which is subsequently swept away at sea and destroyed.)

(Edmund Lowe's career included over 100 films. He is best remembered for his role as Sergeant Quirt in the 1926 silent movie classic, What Price Glory? He was cast opposite the likes of Jean Harlow, Mae West and Claudette Colbert. His second wife was actress Lilyan Tashman. The two were married until Tashman's death at the age of 37. Seventy years after Tashman's death, author E.J. Fleming claimed Lowe was a homosexual and Tashman was a lesbian - though the two escaped media scrutiny their entire lives.)

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The Tower Of Lies

(1925)

(A farmer's daughter goes to the city in order to pay off her father's debts. When letters from her become scarce and rumors swirl that she has resorted to prostitution to earn money, the poor farmer, wracked with guilt and shame, is driven mad.)

(This film marks the second time Chaney and Shearer worked together. Although there is thought to be copy in Denmark, this is now considered a lost film. The last verified copy was destroyed in the MGM vault fire of 1965.)

(The film also features William Haines, one of the first open homosexuals in Hollywood. His film career quickly ended after he came out, and he and his partner created a successful interior design company, catering to the needs of Hollywood's elite.)

 

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Figures Don't Lie

(1927)

(A beautiful secretary can't seem to get any work done due to her boss' jealous wife, who is constantly accusing the two of having an affair. When the new sales manager, whom the secretary has a crush on, asks her to the company picnic, she turns him down because of his flirty and fresh ways. To make her jealous, the sales manager takes the dowdy office stenographer instead. With two jealous women in the office; comedy ensues.)

(Esther Ralston was a popular, iconic silent film actress, who made the transition to talkies only to be relegated to supporting roles. She began her career as a child, in vaudeville. Her most famous role was in 1933's The Last Man, a western based on a Zane Grey novel.)

(Sadly, this film, too, is considered lost.)

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Her Wonderful Lie

(1949

AKA: Addio Mimí!

(An adaptation of Puccini's La Boheme, with a few songs from other operas thrown in for good measure, this Italian film is the story of a seamstress and an artist who live in an artist's colony, facing hardship, poverty, and tragedy as they try to retain their lofty ideals. The two leads are surrounded by familiar American actors: Sterling Holloway, Janis Paige, and choreographer Marc Platt.)

(Marta Eggerth was a Hungarian actress and singer from 'The Silver Age of Operetta'. Many of the 20th century's most famous operetta composers, including Franz Lehár, Fritz Kreisler, Robert Stolz, Oscar Straus, and Paul Abraham, composed works especially for her.)

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Sacred Lie

(1954)

AKA: Die heilige Lüge

(A young country maid joins the staff of a wealthy household. There, she meets and falls in love with the black sheep of the family. Finding herself pregnant, she has no one to turn to. Fortunately, her lover changes his ways, reforms and they get married.)

(The film features Liselotte Malkowsky, a German cabaret singer who released a number of recordings during the 1950's, one of which, a 1949 recording of Charles Trenet's song La Mer, enjoyed great popularity in Germany.)

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Tell Me Lies

(1968)

(A 1968 British drama film directed and produced by Peter Brook, based on a play by Denis Cannan called US. It offers a variety of British views on the United State's involvement in the Vietnam War and was highly controversial at the time of its release. It debuted on Valentine's Day, 1968 in New York City, on the 15th in London, and was originally to be shown at the Cannes Film Festival in 1968, but was declared inappropriate in the political climate of the time and pulled from consideration. At the Venice Film Festival, it received a special mention from the Jury and was awarded the Luis Buñuel prize.)

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The Man Who Lies

(1968)

AKA: L'homme qui ment

(A man assumes the identity of a slain soldier and returns to the soldier's small home town. Arriving at the soldier's former home, a decaying mansion, the imposter works to seduce the widow, the soldier's sister and the household maid. As he is about to complete his triple seduction, the slain soldier unexpectedly reappears and shoots the imposter dead!)

(Alain Robbe-Grillet was a French writer and filmmaker. He was one of the figures most associated with the Nouveau Roman (new novel) trend of the 1960's. Nouveau Roman refers to a type of 1950's French novel that diverged from classical literary genres and used to describe writers who experimented with style in each novel, creating an essentially new style each time.)

(Award-winning actor Jean-Louis Xavier Trintignant made his theatrical debut in 1951, going on to become regarded as one of the best French dramatic actors of the post-war era. He starred in many classic European films and worked with many prominent directors, including Roger Vadim, Costa-Gavras, Claude Lelouch, Claude Chabrol, Bernardo Bertolucci, Éric Rohmer, François Truffaut, Krzysztof Kieślowski, and Michael Haneke. He garnered national attention immediately, starring opposite Brigitte Bardot in Vadim's And God Created Women.)

(Trintignant came from a wealthy family. His daughter, Marie, performed alongside her father and later became a successful actress. She was killed at the age of 41 by her boyfriend, rock musician Bertrand Cantat, in a hotel room in Vilnius, Lithuania.)

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Lions Love (...And Lies)

(1969)

(A director from New York comes to Hollywood to make a film about actors. She begins to follow the lives of three actors who all live and love together in a rented house in the sun-soaked Hollywood Hills. There, for the camera, they delight in one another’s bodies while musing on love, stardom, and politics.)

 

(Starring Warhol Superstar Viva with James Rado and Gerome Ragni. Rado and Ragni are the stars and creators of the revolutionary Broadway musical, Hair.)

(Shirley Clarke serves as proxy for director Agnes Varda, who also appears in the film along with entertainer Eddie Constantine, director Peter Bogdanovich, film historian Carlos Clarens,  and lead singer of The Doors, Jim Morrison.)  

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Lies My Father Told Me

(1975)

(Based on Ted Allan's 1949 short story, this film tells the story of an orthodox Jewish boy growing up in 1920's Montreal with a grandfather full of tall tales and a father who refuses to get a job.)

 

(Filmed entirely in Montreal, this picturesque Canadian drama won a Golden Globe for best foreign picture in 1975. Since it was the highest-grossing Canadian film in Canada for that year, it earned the inaugural Golden Reel Award. And, in addition to winning awards for Film of the Year, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Sound and Best Actress for Marilyn Lightstone at the Canadian Film Awards, its screenplay was nominated for an Academy Award.)

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Why Would I Lie?

(1980)

"Lies, lies, lies. What a funny way to begin a love afair."

"The most contagious comedy of the year."

(A compulsive liar finds employment as a social worker. As such, he tries to find the perfect home for a young boy named Jorge and, in the process, ends up falling in love with a social worker, who just happens to be Jorge's birth mother.)

(Shot completely in Spokane, Washington and based on the novel The Fabricator by Hollis Hodges, this romantic comedy stars hunk Treat Williams who would melt hearts in the film version of Hair, and two-time Golden Globe winner, Lisa Eichhorn.) 

(Gabriel Macht, who would later go on to star in the series Suits and the superhero film, The Spirit, was only eight when he made his screen debut as Jorge, winning several awards in the process. The film also features a personal favorite of mine, Valerie Curtain.)

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Love And Lies 

(1981)

AKA: Could One Imagine

(Two high school students meet in class and fall head over heels for each other. However, they soon learn that his father and her mother at one time had a romantic history together, which gives them both pause. The boy's mother quickly grows very jealous and schemes to divide the young couple. Their only recourse is to turn to a sympathetic teacher for help. Unfortunately, she is mired in relationship problems of her own.)

(A Soviet drama directed by Ilya Frez based on a novella by Galina Shcherbakova.)

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Pack Of Lies

(1987)

"Keep friends close... and enemies closer."

(Set in London in the early 1960's, life in idyllic neighborhood is upset when a British Secret Service Agent moves in across the street and the people next door are are arrested and charged with espionage!)

(Pack of Lies is a 1987 mini series based on the 1983 play by English writer Hugh Whitemore, which, in turn, is based on a true story. On stage, Judith Dench and Rosemary Harris both originated the role played by Ellen Burstyn in the mini series.)

(The mini series received three Emmy Award nominations; for Outstanding Drama/Comedy Special, Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Special (Burstyn), and Outstanding Writing in a Miniseries or a Special.)

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And that's all for now!

Tune in next week.

Same time, same channel.

Love Lies - Khalid & Normani