The Long, Hot Summer (1958) / Twentieth Century FOX
Directed By: Martin Ritt
Starring: Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Anthony Franciosa, Orson Welles, Lee Remick, Angela Lansbury, & Richard Anderson.
Tagline: "NOTHING - BUT NOTHING !...WILL BE WITHHELD!...when this searing expose of this Southern family comes boldly to the screen!"
~ Paul Newman awarded Best Actor at the "Cannes Film Fesetival" for his role.
Cannes Film Festival
Year
Result
Award
Category/Recipient(s)
1958
Won
Best Actor
Paul Newman
Nominated
Palme d'Or
Martin Ritt
Plot:
This steamy southern story centers on a young handsome man named Ben Quick (Newman) who has no money and is simply living life with what he has on him and wondering. One thing is for sure Ben has ambitions to be a great and wealthy man and his current status just hitching rides here and there with an aimless life is simply not going to do for him. His latest stop brings him to Frenchman's Bend, Mississippi in a lovely convertible driven by a wealthy laady who lives in the town Clara Vaerner (Woodward) a school teacher and her sister-in-law Eula (Remick). Ben has struck gold with getting a ride with the wealthiest family in town and being close to them is the place to be and is starting to learn this quick.
Upon arriving to town the girls meet with the
head of the Varner family clan, Will (Welles) who also meets Ben and instantly likes him. What Will likes about Ben is that after talking to him he sees himself within him: the ambition and the eagerness to do whatever it takes to climb to the top. This makes the men instantly friends and the qualities he finds within Ben are exactly what he wants from his own son Jody (Franciosa) but is sorely lacking. At the same time Will is not happy with the choice of the boyfriend that Clara has chosen who is Alan Stewart (Anderson) who is nothing more that a well refined southern man and one big "Mama's Boy."
The plan Will has it to put Ben and his lovely daughter Clara together and move the fool in his mind Alan out of the picture. Will is needing new blood in the family that will keep the family and strong heirs and Ben is the man to do that. Ben spends a lot of time now at the Varner's mansion and finds this is exactly what he has been needing and does not want to leave again and will do what it takes to stay. Ben is truly attracted to Clara and is determined to charm her to wed and take the family's large portion of wealth and property to claim his own. The path one can see is already being layed out in his mind when spending time with the family each and every day becoming a permanent fixture which is perfection to Will. Clara now is seeing Ben more in the home and seems to be not enchanted nor smitten by his charm. Will offers the wealth that Ben could never dream of and wants that the most but then more time with Clara does find true affection.
The Varner family is not all perfection behind closed doors Will has had a long time mistress Minnie Littlejohn (Lansbury). Minnie has been for a long time been very unhappy with her situation within the family having to hide out of site and mind of all and finally is pressuring Will to make things proper and wed her and make her the real Mrs. Varner. Ben takes on more of a role within the family such as getting a position as clerk in the general sotre and then is invited to live with the Varner's at their large mansion for good. Jody knows what his father and also Ben is doing and hates it and mentions it to his father and to no veil is never heard nor is anything done.
Then there are some horrible questionable things done to Jody by Ben with coins to get him on his good side that horribly goes wrong. Jody is crushed and burns an entrance of a barn and the entire town thinks it was Ben who did this since his father they find was a barn-burning person. The town decides to get a rope and lynch when Clara comes driving and rescues Ben from this pending death. Will then takes the blame of starting the fire. From this experience Ben opens up candidly with Clara about being a young boy at ten and how he had to deal with his father burning barns and had to alert him each time. Clara fears now that Ben may leave the town that has been up and down with him as a reception and it looks like their is more in planned for them, we shall see......
Chance Wayne (Newman) was to get out of St. Cloud, Florida and make it to huge stardom as a leading man in the movies. His name in bright lights, his face on the silver screen, adoring fans trying to fight for his autograph....sadly he tried his luck in Hollywood and lost. There were no big time stardom in films no nothing for Chance. With his dreams of hitting th big time dashed he decides to head back into his hometown with new lady on his arm: Alexandra Del Lago (Page) whose dreams of film stardom came to reality and hit it big. All the dreams that Chance was hoping for Alexandra had and big glorious ways with blockbuster films and adoring fans all of it. Unfortunately, time has not been so kind to Alexandra nor was she to herself so that funny and crazy thing called celebrity came and gone for her. Though her name still carried something and prior to leaving together to Florida she assisted Chance with obtaining an actual screen test which did not result in much but was something.
Chance's real reason to head back to his hometown with a lady on his arm was to see his flame named Heavenly Finley (Knight) who unlike himself was born into wealth and with the luxary of having a father as a politician who could make things happened if he so chose to. The father "Boss" Thomas J. Finley (Begley) did not take kindly about in the past of his daughter seeing Chance and the both dating so that had to end and fast! "Boss" manages with his power to run Chance out of town the first time and to never see his daughter again, so enters Hollywood, the shot for stardom and Alexandra.
With luck not being on his side in Hollywood we see why Chance decides to gamble and head back to Florida since he has nothing to loose. Chance still loves Heavenly and always will and vows to try and find a way around her father to make the union happen. He enjoys Alexandra's company and her beliefe in him but love for her is very differnt.
In Florida Chance sees Heavenly and finds that she too still loves him though will not do anything against her powerful father that can do hurtful things to others and has. For the sake of Chance and the well being of everyone in the situation she tries to have him leave her alone. This does not work and "Boss" quickly gets wind of the new entanglement going on and needs to put the fire out on this flame yet again before anything ignites. This time it is not going to as easy to run Chance out of town since he has Alexandra the famed actress by his side so it will take a lot more clever wit and time. What we then learn is that there might be information on both Chance and Heavenly that will affect all in both of these people's paths, you will have to watch to see what it is and if things will bring them together at whatever cost it may or may not be.
Starring: Paul Newman, Melvyn Douglas, Patricia Neal
Costumes: Edith Head
~ Won 3 Academy Awards in 1964:
Won
Oscar
Best
Actor in a Supporting Role - Melvyn Douglas
Best
Actress in a Leading Role - Patricia Neal
Best Cinematography,
Black-and-White -
James Wong Howe
~ Tagline: The man with the barbed wire soul!
Plot:
The rude and self indulgent man Hud Bannon (Newman) loves only himmself and the bottle and being with beautiful women and not doing work. Being very lucky to be part of a wealthy ranch family in a small Texas town this does not help Hud with any of his ambition since everything is given to him by his father Homer (Douglas). Homer is a principled man with strong ethics that is very opposite of his son but it is his lavish gifts and not having his son apply himself an issue in the past. While Hommer is facing being elderly and perhaps wanting to pass the familt business along to an heir he still has to work very hard at the ranch while his youngest son Homer is dricing around in a pink Cadillac and seeing women married or not he does not care.
Hud is emerging into his mid 30's and is finding himself actucally surprisingly unhappy where he is in life unfullfilled and wanting more. There seems to be many limits that cap him in anything regarding to do with his father and the family. Homer is fine with Hud doing something but to seek it out elsewhere from the Bannon Ranch and community. This brings Hud to a quandry where he never knew anything other than the posh and lovely lifestyle on the ranch and within the community, so what to do?
Meanwhile, living on the ranch is Hud's teenage nephew Lonnie (Brandon De Wilde) whose father the eldest son of Homer has passed away in a car crash from the wrecklessness of Hud. Hud wrongfully has always felt since there is no real open an honest communication that evern occurs in the household and family that this whole time that his father has always put a lot of anger and resentment towards him for the loss of Norman. There is such an age cap between the brothers that actually Hud and Lonnie are closer in age to one another and can relate to one another as brothers much more and do so more than uncle and nephew. There is a great bond between Hud and Lonnie which is not there at first but eventually happens over time. We actually see that Hud uses the bond in an evil way to use the strong bond that Lonnie has with him against Homer.
Homer is now making very bad business decisions and purchases cheap Mexican cattle that then come to hurt him fast. The newly bought cattle have foot and mouth disease which Homer has no idea about. He did not follow laws to quarantine them since they were boutht from out of the country and other matters and simply made hasty decisions and through them right into the ranch with the rest of the cattle which is a death sentence for the rest of the cattle. More and more of the cattle are now getting ill and dying and now Homer calls his son Hud into the situation to see what they should do. Hud suspects what the problem is and says to sell off the original cattle that he just bought before word got out but is ignored by his father. The state veterinarian (Whit Bissell) is called in. The vet now orders a binding order that legally states that the Bannon racnh is now quarantined. This means no livestock can move back and forth from the family's ranch and a huge loss of innvestment will occur. On top of this the vet is required to after test results to destroy the entire herd and bury them under the state supervision to wipe out the infection. This will surely bankrupt the Bannons
Hud is angry at all the wrong decisions his father has made as of recent and before any further damage is done for his inheritance there is a big step to be done, to declare Homer legally incompetent. This means Hud will then take control of the ranch and try to save his money.
We find out between some brutal sparring matches of words between father and son the real reasons why Homer has the true hatred for his son. There is true disgust for Hud that he truly only cares for himself and that it is soo wrong that he is unfit to live with. Hud really truly feels the only person that loved him and wanted to be wit him was his mama that past away.
In the Bannons ranch we meet the lovely and middle aged house keeper named Alma (Neal). Both Hud and Lonnie are vying for her affection in different ways. Hud is crude while Lonnie is protective. Since being middle aged Alma has dated and seen many men alike of Hud so she at first shares some affection for Hud which quickly goes away. Hud while drunk forces himself upon Alma and she tries to pull him off and Lonnie comes to her aid. Alma can not deal with this family and dealing with the crude Hud any longer so she leaves after this issue. Alma is brought to a bus station by Lonnie and while waiting Hud stops by and apologizes to her for his actions but still is attracted to her. On the drive back Hud sees his father slumped over from his horse and is not getting up. Hud goes over and Lonnie in his car is going over and Homer then accuses Hud being way too eager of him to die. There are new views that Lonnie never had before of Hud which are not favorable of the mean person hurting Alma and driving her away and then driving his grandfather to death. A very deep an emotional drama worthy of watching.
It is that time of year again to get out the champaign, balloons, good food, party favors and be with the one's you love to bring in 2012!!!! Here is our first look at how our classic stars celebrated New Year's Eve through photos, songs and movie clips.
Hope you enjoy this fun look at our classic celebrities having fun and along with them "Love Those Classic Movies!!!" wishes you all a: "HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!"
Janis Page
Leslie Howard, Norma Shearer, Gary Cooper & Lionel Barrymore!
Love Those Classic Movies!!! had an outstanding 2011 with highlighting great leading actresses, actors, costume designers, photographers, and topical themes. We also introcued this year new articles such as: "Classic Radioland," "Spotlight On" & our interview series.
We had fun bringing topics such as looking as Summer Films and Holiday Classics. This year also brought us our: "2nd Annual Classic Mr. & Mrs. Clause" who was the fantastic Robert Mitchum & Ginger Rogers.
Our interviews were started with a great kick-off featuring two hot actors/recording artists: Howard Tonkin & DiSanto Diaz. Both gentleman spoke about their acting background and their love for classic cinema - thank you gentlemen for your time and the great itnerviews!!
We had a a terriffic special correspondent (Christina Stewart) who reported on the: "2011 TCM Classic Film Festvial." Christina gave us special inside information on the red carpet events, movie screenings, gala events and many other events. This we are looking to keep and expand with other special reporters clocking in with special articles from all over the world!!
Finally, here are our FANTASTIC classic stars we highlighted in 2011!!!!
