Warning... this is an adult site. If reading or viewing things about what gay men do sexually with one another bothers you - you should not read this blog. This blog is a reflection of my adventures and thoughts. Some are fun, some not so pretty. I won't name names, or kiss and tell... but I will live to tell. And baby, trust me - I am gonna spill it all over your pretty little party dress. Enjoy!
That appears to be the question. And these are the men with the all the answers.
Or so these films would have us believe.
Let's take a peek at what the world of cinema has to offer when it comes to the haves and have not.
Either way? It's movie magic!
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Young Man With A Horn
(1950)
AKA: Young Man With A Trumpet, Young Man With Music
Aimless youth Rick Martin learns he has a gift for music and falls in love with the trumpet. Legendary trumpeter Art Hazzard takes Rick under his wing and teaches him all he knows about playing. To the exclusion of anything else in life, Rick becomes a star trumpeter, but his volatile personality and desire to play jazz rather than the restricted tunes of the bands he works for lands him in trouble.
Based on the 1938 novel of the same name by Dorothy Baker which was loosely based on the life and music of Bix Beiderbecke, this American musical drama was directed by Michael Curtiz and stars Kirk Douglas, Lauren Bacall, Doris Day, Hoagy Carmichael, and Juano Hernandez.
In the novel by Dorothy Baker, upon which this film is based, the characters played by Hoagy Carmichael and Doris Day are African-Americans.
The film contains a reference to homosexuality, although the Hays Office--the industry's censor--required any mention of it be subtle. The character of Amy (Lauren Bacall) is lesbian, which is why Rick (Kirk Douglas) walks out on her, telling her that she is "a very sick girl." The exchange between Amy North and Miss Carson (Katharine Kurasch) after Amy's party, and their facial expressions, indicate this: Amy North: "I'm dying to see the rest of your sketches." Miss Carson then says, "We'll have dinner out and then go back to my place." Decades later, Bacall told as interviewer that the reference was so subtle (and she was then so young and naïve) that she didn't understand until years later that the character she played was supposed to be lesbian.
Kirk Douglas's trumpet licks were performed by Harry James, who also taught Douglas the correct fingering of the instrument. Even while married to pinup-girl Betty Grable, Harry James was notorious for his womanizing. During the filming of this movie, James contacted Doris Day's manager to ask what he thought were James' chances of "nailing" Day.
Hoagy Carmichael was a friend of the real-life Bix Beiderbecke and helped Douglas with his role. Carmichael received a thank-you letter from director Michael Curtiz for his valuable input in several areas of this film's production. The film was a reunion of sorts for Lauren Bacall and Carmichael, who co-starred six years previously in her first film, To Have and Have Not (1944).
This film's odd, upbeat ending, in stark contrast to the agonizing early death of Bix Beiderbecke, was solely due to the will of studio boss Jack L. Warner. Kirk Douglas and Michael Curtiz lobbied for a more downbeat and true-to-life ending. In real life, Bix Beiderbecke died of alcoholism at the age of 28.
While making this film, Kirk Douglas tried to warn Doris Day about taking financial advice from her then manager Martin Melcher. Douglas had gotten burned by Melcher, and thought Day naïve to be so trusting of him. Not only did Day ignore Douglas' advice, she later married Melcher and, after his death in 1968, discovered that he had squandered the fortune she had earned during her 20-year film career, signed her up for film and television projects she had no interest in, and left her seriously in debt to the IRS.
This was the third of four times that Michael Curtiz directed Doris Day, whom he had discovered and cast in her very first film Romance on the High Seas (1948). The seven-year contract Day signed upon accepting that first role was with Curtiz personally, but was later bought out by Warner Brothers. The other two collaborations between Curtiz and Day were My Dream Is Yours (1949) and I'll See You in My Dreams (1951).
This was only the fourth film in which Doris Day appeared, and the first role to challenge her dramatic abilities. Director Michael Curtiz was impressed enough with her work to recommend that Warner Brothers consider casting her in a straight dramatic role. His suggestion won Day her meatiest part yet, that of Ginger Rogers' younger sister (who dies at the hands of the KKK) in Storm Warning (1950).
Doris Day wrote that she was unhappy making this film, which brought back stressful memories of her early career as a band singer (and an abusive relationship), and also because Kirk Douglas and Lauren Bacall (having dated at one time in real life) seemed to intentionally shut her out, making her feel unwelcome. Day described her experience making the film as "utterly joyless". She found Douglas very difficult to work with. According to her, Douglas wrote off her ever-cheerful persona as only a "mask" that had kept him from ever being able to get to know the real person underneath. She countered that while Douglas had been "civil", he was too self-centered to make any real attempt to get to know either her or anyone else.
The Columbia 10-inch studio LP featuring Doris Day and Harry James hit the top spot on "Billboard's" popular albums chart.
According to the contemporary The New York Times, "banalities of the script are quite effectively glossed over in the slick pictorial smoothness of Michael Curtiz's direction and the exciting quality of the score. The result is that there is considerable good entertainment in Young Man With a Horn despite the production's lack of balance."
Lauren Bacall
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The Man With A Cloak
(1951)
In 1848, young Frenchwoman Madeline Minot goes to New York City to see Thevenet, the grandfather of her fiance'. Thevenet had been with Napoleon and might be sympathetic to the political aims of his grandson. She finds the old man in very bad spirits, living in a large house with a housekeeper and a butler who are just waiting for him to die (and perhaps helping him along a bit) so they can inherit his fortune. They see Madeline as a threat to their plans. She is aided in her dealings with these strange people by a mysterious man in a cloak.
Based on the short story The Gentleman from Paris by John Dickson Carr, this American film noir crime-thriller-drama was directed by Fletcher Markle and stars Joseph Cotten, Barbara Stanwyck, Louis Calhern, and Leslie Caron
The film's working title was The Gentleman from Paris.
Lionel Barrymore was originally cast in the role of the codger 'Thevenet' and Marlene Dietrich as the housekeeper, but Barrymore was too ill at the time and Dietrich wasn't interested. So the roles went to Louis Calhern and Barbara Stanwyck.
Another Yesterday, the song performed onscreen by Barbara Stanwyck, was written by Earl K. Brent. Stanwyck's singing voice was dubbed by Harriet Lee.
During filming of this picture Barbara Stanwyck was in the difficult process of her divorce from Robert Taylor after she discovered he had been unfaithful while he was making Quo Vadis (1951).
Small world: Louis Calhern (who plays Charles Thevenet) was married to character actress Natalie Schafer from 1933-1942. One of his co-stars is Jim Backus, who went on to play opposite Schafer in the popular television comedy series, Gilligan's Island.
Although the film suggests that Poe's name would have meant nothing to the other characters, in 1848 he was already well known.
This film bombed at the box office, resulting in a loss to MGM of $455,000 It did not even make back its negative cost, let alone expenses for duplication, distribution and advertising.
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The Tall Blonde Man With One Black Shoe
(1972)
AKA: Le Grand Blond avec une chaussure noire
A hapless orchestra player becomes an unwitting pawn of rival factions within the French secret service after he is chosen as a decoy by being identified as a super secret agent. Soon, agents are popping out of the woodwork and one of them, Christine, is sent to seduce Francois. Meanwhile, Francois has his own problems, tangled up in an affair with his best friend's wife.
This French spy comedy was directed by Yves Robert and stars Pierre Richard, Bernard Blier, Jean Rochefort and Mireille Darc.
Actress Mireille Darc wears a distinctive dress opened in the back which, for many critics and audience members, severed as the trademark of the film. Her co-star, Pierre Richard was not warned about the dress and when the scene was shot where Mireille Darc turns her back to him, his authentic reaction was captured by the camera.
The film won the Silver Bear award at the 23rd Berlin International Film Festival in 1973 and grossed $4.3 million in West Germany.. It was also nominated for Best Foreign Language Film by the U.S. National Board of Review.
Richard reprised his role as François Perrin in the sequel, The Return of the Tall Blond Man with One Black Shoe.
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The Man With The Carnation
(1980)
AKA: Ο άνθρωπος με το γαρύφαλλο
The story of Nikos Belogiannis, member of the Communist Party and officer of ELAS, that has come back to Greece only to get arrested, tried for espionage on behalf of the USSR and executed. A photograph of his bearing a carnation has circulated internationally and gives the name of the film.
Greek drama film written and directed by Nikos Tzimas and stars Foivos Gikopoulos, Alekos Alexandrakis, Kostas Kazakos, and Vangelis Kazan.
This film was entered into the 12th Moscow International Film Festival where it won a Special Diploma. The film was also selected as the Greek entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 54th Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee. In Greece, the film was screened during 1980-1981 and sold 618,533 tickets. It was the most popular out of 25 movies that year.
You can see this film in its entirety for free on YouTube.
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The Man With One Red Shoe
(1985)
Cooper, the deputy director of the CIA, wants to be the director. To accomplish this, he tries to make it appear that the director is corrupt. The director appears before a committee and asks for some time to prepare his defense. The director knows that Cooper is bugging him and decides to turn the tables on him by feeding him some false information; that there's a man able to clear the director of all the charges against him who will be arriving at the airport. The Director then sends an assistant to pick someone (anyone) who is arriving at the airport - thus making Cooper believe it's all true. The assistant picks a man wearing mismatched shoes, one of which is red. Cooper then sets up surveillance on 'the man with one red shoe' and sends his femme fatale, Maddy to seduce him in order to learn all he knows. While Maddy is working her magic, the man with one red shoe falls hopelessly in love with her.
A remake of the 1972 French film The Tall Blond Man with One Black Shoe this American comedy was directed by Stan Dragoti and stars Tom Hanks, Lori Singer, Carrie Fisher, Charles Durning, Edward Herrmann, Jim Belushi, and Dabney Coleman.
Tom Hanks has disavowed this film, declaring it "Not a very good movie. It doesn't have any real, clear focus to it. It isn't about anything in particular that you can honestly understand. It made no money at all."
Composer Michael Masser wrote the love theme for the film.
Two of the films stars actually have experience working with orchestras. David Ogden Stiers, who plays the conductor of the symphony orchestra in the film, has served as a guest conductor with several real-life symphony orchestras. And Lori Singer is a musical child prodigy (cello), making her debut as a soloist at the age of thirteen, then being accepted into Julliard the following year and becoming the youngest-ever graduate of Julliard.
The film was a box office disappointment domestically and was released as a direct-to-video film overseas.
