Elf

One of my favorite modern Christmas movies if Elf from 2003, starring Will Ferrell (b. 1967) as Buddy.  I don't particularly like Will Ferrell, but he pulled this one off well.

I do like most of the rest of the cast.  Who doesn't like Bob Newhart?  Zooey Deschanel (b. 1980) is always quirky, but she is endearing in Elf.  Plus, I like her as a blond!  Mary Steenbergen (b. 1953) is the perfect wife to James Caan (b. 1940), as she shows him that its OK to care about others.

In the smaller parts; Ed Asner (b. 1929) plays Santa.  I mentioned Faizon Love (b. 1968), who played the store manager, in one of my posts a few months ago.  His 45 roles will keep growing. 

Elf was the second movie for Daniel Tay (b. 1991) who played the son.  He was born in New York, so his accent was easy to come by.  He now has seven titles on IMDb, and today, Dec. 17, is his birthday.  Now he is 19, and I hope he uses his acting skills to create a long career. 

Peter Dinklage (b. 1969) stands 4' 5" and played a high-power writer, who is insulted by Buddy the Elf.  His size may limit the roles he is offered, but he has talent.  He can use that talent to create a character for himself.  He has 45 titles already on IMDb, so it must be working.

Let's not miss Ray Harryhausen (b. 1920) who was the voice of a polar bear cub in the animation.  Harryhausen is a well known name in classic fantasy film circles as the animator who made the stop-action sequences for the Sinbad movies in the 1960s.  One famous sword fight scene with skeletons was filmed at the rate of 13 frames (one half second of film) per DAY!

And finally, Leon Redbone (b. 1949) was the voice of Leon the Snowman.  Redbone has been popular for many years as a very stylish pop singer.  He has only worked in two movies, but in this one he is perfect.  Under the credits, he can be heard signing Baby its Cold Outside with co-star Zooey Deschanel.  Deschanel has a second career as a wonderful jazz singer.

See Elf again this year!

Prancer

I happened to catch what most classic movie fans would call a modern Christmas movie.  Prancer was released in 1989.  Modern is relative, this movie is 21 years old.  Perhaps some younger readers remember it as a classic.

Prancer has quite a good cast.  Sam Elliott (b. 1944) brings his deep voice and gruff character acting to bear as a down-on-his-luck apple farmer.  Cloris Leachman (b. 1926) is the mean old lady who hates kids and loves her plants.  And then there is Elliott's daughter who is about to be sent to live with her aunt because her mother died and her father has too much to worry about...

Well, I guess you can see how this story will end.  I didn't even get to the reindeer!  I didn't have to, it's a Christmas movie.

The daughter is played by newcomer Rebecca Harrell (b. 1980) in her first movie.  It's a big part for an eight year old, and her reviews were very complimentary.  Harrell has only made nine appearances in movies and TV, and is now a producer, mostly of environmental documentaries.

Harrell's friend in the movie is young Ariana Richards (b. 1979) who was already a veteran actress.  Prancer was her seventh role and third movie.  Richards' next movie was Tremors (1990) and then she went on to play Lex in Jurassic Park in 1993 and The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) the first sequel, in a much smaller role.  Richards is now a talented painter.  Visit her web site, Gallery Ariana.

Two other actors in Prancer had smaller roles, but are quite well known.  Abe Vigoda (b. 1921) has 92 titles on IMDb.  At almost 90 years old, he is still working. 

We also see Michael Constantine (b. 1927).  Constantine is famous for My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002), but he has 171 titles listed so far.  How many of you remember him as the principal on "Room 222" in the late 1960s?  Both of these guys are top notch Bit Actors.

Prancer may not be a blockbuster, but it is a well made, family movie that some call a classic.  The performance by Rebecca Harrell is excellent, and it is easy to see why she was cast.  Somehow I doubt that she did much acting in Prancer, it just came naturally.

Oh, by the way, the title role was played by a reindeer named Boo.

Letters to Juliet

So many movies, so little time!  I watched a few movies over the past week.  Some new, some old, and not all holiday themed.  Now we need to discuss some Bit Actors.

Letters to Juliet (2010) is a nice, light romance filmed in the Tuscany region of Italy.  Amanda Seyfried (b. 1985) stars, and she appears to be quite talented.  Her big movie break was in Mamma Mia! (2008).  I guess I like her because she is from Allentown, PA, not far from me. 

Vanessa Redgrave (b. 1937) plays her role perfectly, and her real life husband, Franco Nero (b. 1941) shows how sexy you can be at 69 years old.

Seyfried's fiance in this movie was played by Mexican actor Gael Garcia Bernal (b. 1971).  We don't see much of him, and I am glad she called the wedding off.  She opted instead for Christopher Egan (b. 1984), who only has 14 titles on his list, but should do well in his career.  I think we will see much more of him.  He is quite handsome and has a nice voice for film.

All of the above are vying to be (or actually are) stars.  The only true Bit Actor, other than the list of Italians who filled in the smaller roles, was the New Yorker editor played by Oliver Platt (b. 1960).  Platt is talented, and appears to be happy playing supporting roles.  In this movie, his 58th (or so) role he is uncredited.

Platt's career started in the late 1980s on TV and he quickly got into some movies.  He was in Married to the Mob (1988) with Alec Baldwin; Working Girl (1988) with Harrison Ford and Melanie Griffith; Flatliners and Postcards from the Edge in 1990; Indecent Proposal and The Three Musketeers in 1993; Executive Decision and A Time to Kill in 1996; and he is also doing a few TV series.  That's a lot of work.

In the movies I have seen of his, he either blends into the background, or plays his part to the hilt.  A Time to Kill was an excellent courtroom drama with a perfect cast, including Sandra Bullock, Kevin Spacey and Samuel L. Jackson.  All talented actors.  Platt plays an assistant lawyer to Matthew McConaughey, and with a southern drawl, pulls it off beautifully.  But he never detracts from the story or the other characters.

Lastly, Ashley Lilley (b. 1986 in Scotland) plays one of Juliet's secretaries.  Lilley only has five titles on IMDb, and she also appeared in Mamma Mia! with Seyfried.  Small world.

Letters to Juliet is worth the rental.

Christmas is Coming!

I guess we should start talking about your movie list for the next two weeks.  I took a look at the keyword 'Christmas' at IMDb.  2,809 listings have Christmas written all over them.  Just to review, you can sort the list by rating or year, and it is littered with TV shows and TV Movies.  We'll skip TV for now.

If you go by ratings, and discount the anomalies like The Godfather (1972), the number one Christmas movie is A Jersey Christmas from 2008.  I have never head of it...or of anyone in the cast.  I guess when you have only a few reviews (mostly by cast members) anything can be at the top.  Jersey got 22 votes compared to The Godfather with 424,200 votes.  Let's look deeper, and only at Christmas movies.

It's a Wonderful Life (1946) came in at #52.  No contest.  It is one of the best Christmas movies.  A foreign film from 1961 called Placido came in at #82, just three places after a TV documentary called "The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show."  Placido sounds like a decent entry on the list, but will be difficult to find.  No doubt many men consider Victoria's Secret a gift from Santa.

After passing such Non-Christmas movies like The Apartment (1960 - which actually has some Christmas aspects, but wasn't really a Christmas movie) and Full Metal Jacket (1987), I think I will give up on IMDb's list.  It needs some housecleaning.

The MovieFanFare blog has voting going on now for favorite classic Christmas movies.  Take a look at it.  The top four as of this morning are It's a Wonderful Life, Miracle on 34th Street (1947), White Christmas (1954) and A Christmas Carol (1951).

I voted for the fourth place A Christmas Carol, originally titled Scrooge, starring Alastair Sim (1900 - 1976).  It is a movie that has the look of being ten years older than it was, and if you let yourself get into the mood of the film, you will be moved by Sim's performance on Christmas morning, after his three ghostly visits.  Plus he does a great polka.

Happy Christmas, and keep reading.  I will fill in the Bit Actors in the next week or two.

Angels and Demons

Tom Hanks (b. 1956) is one of my favorite actors and producers.  His body of work is diversified and immense.  He is equally at home in a rom-com (Sleepless in Seattle - 1993, or You've Got Mail  - 1998), or a heavy duty war drama (Saving Private Ryan - 1998).  He pulls off light comedy and serious roles equally well.
I watched Angels and Demons (2009) yesterday, and it was enjoyable.  This was Hanks' sixth collaboration with Ron Howard (b. 1954). Hanks and Howard work well together.

It is a big movie with a twisted story line and a huge cast, exactly what you'd expect from a big star and a big director.  It has some problems, such as Ewan McGregor's (b. 1971) Scottish accent, in his role as an Italian priest.  And, as in most action movies, I simply can't swallow the amount of punishment a character's body can withstand and manage to keep going.

Let's look at some of the smaller roles.  Stellan Skarsgard (b. 1951) was intense, as usual in a dramatic role.  But I keep seeing him in Mamma Mia! (2008) and that always shakes my impression of him.  I must learn to watch the movie at hand and not connect it to every other role the actor has played.  In fact, I think I drive my wife crazy when I mention other movies an actor has done.

Skarsgard has done 108 so far, and his portrayal of Bootstrap Bill Turner in the Pirates of the Caribbean series was spooky!  In 1997 he was in Good Will Hunting, and brought out his intense face as a math professor. 

The female lead was played well by an Israeli actress, Ayelet Zurer (b. 1969).  With only 26 titles, most of them foreign, I think we can expect to see more of her.  Look for her in Munich (2005) and Vantage Point (2008). 

One of the cardinals was played by Armin Mueller-Stahl (b. 1930).  Again, Stahl was outstanding.  His role was as the cardinal in charge of the voting procedure for a new Pope.  He subtly shows the internal conflict between his personal ambition to possibly become the next Pope, and the duty to God he holds close to his heart. 

Stahl first came to my attention on TV in "Twelve Angry Men" (1997) starring Jack Lemmon, and then in The Game (1997) starring Michael Douglas (b. 1944).  If you haven't seen The Game, what's stopping you?!?!?  It is another great, twisted story.  And Stahl may be one of my favorite Bit Actors.

The assassin is played by Nikolaj Lie Kaas (b. 1973) from Denmark.  Kaas has 47 titles on IMDb, most of them foreign.  My guess is that his voice was dubbed, since he had no accent in this film.  He is a handsome man, so I would expect larger roles for him in the future.

Angels and Demons is worth watching.  If you like action films, pick it up and make sure you have The Da Vinci Code (2006) as well.  It's a good pair to have on a winter weekend.

Poor Little Rich Girl

The year was 1936 and Shirley Temple (b. 1928) had already won an Oscar.  Poor Little Rich Girl was her 34th movie role...that was in only five years of acting!

Poor Little Rich Girl was a pretty good movie, but maybe not as good as some of her bigger hits.  Watching it made me think that you certainly won't see movies like this being made these days.  The message she gave was that it is OK for an eight year old to wander off at a train station, and everyone will take you in and feed you, etc.  No one checked to see if she made it to her new school safely.  It was a different era, the depression, and I guess they wanted people to take care of each other.

But, I digress.  Temple was the star and this blog isn't about stars, no matter how cute.  Let's dig into the wealth of Bit Actors chosen for this movie.  (And everyone else was a Bit Actor when Shirley Temple made a movie.)

Jack Haley (1898 - 1979) who played The Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz (1939) was a song and dance man who took Shirley in, so he could put her in the act.  Haley also made Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm with Shirley in 1938.  Alice Faye (1915 - 1998) played Haley's wife.  A wonderful singer, her voice added a lot to the act, and the movie.

Gloria Stuart (1910 - 2010) played the love interest of Shirley's father.  A beautiful woman who went on to make 77 appearances in the movies and on TV.  You will remember her as Old Rose on the mega hit Titanic in 1997.  She was even beautiful at 87.

Shirley's father was played by Michael Whelan (1902 - 1974).  This was his fifth film.  In the 1950s he was in quite a few westerns on TV, but even with 80 titles in his filmography, none appeared to be big hits.  (I'd say, Bit Actor.)

In a small part you can find Jane Darwell (1879 - 1967).  I think my favorite Darwell role is Ma Joad in The Grapes of Wrath (1940).  With 202 roles, it would take a long time to see everything she did, from 1913 to 1964.  Her last film was Mary Poppins (1964).  She played The Bird Woman...tuppence a bag.

In an even smaller part, Fred "Snowflake" Toones (1906 - 1962) plays a porter at the train station, being type cast as usual.  With 214 acting roles, Snowflake had quite a career.  Billy Gilbert (1894 - 1971) gets to do a double take as a waiter, but he has no lines, and no sneezes.  He does have 220 titles listed on IMDb, from 1929 to 1962.

Lastly, let's mention Tony Martin (b. 1912) who had a song and a closeup.  Tony went on to marry Alice Faye the next year.  Not bad, Tony!  That marriage only lasted four years, but then he married Cyd Charisse (1921 - 2008), and that one lasted 60 years.  Faye went on to marry band leader Phil Harris (1904 - 1995) and that marriage lasted 54 years.

I couldn't find Poor Little Rich Girl on DVD.  Maybe it will eventually show up.  In any case, every classic film collection should have some early Shirley included.  Mine does.

Some Blog Notes

Hi all!  I need to take a posting space and cover some details with you.
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I finally found out what the Labels are for on the bottom of my posting screen!  I have added a "Label Cloud" on the right.  It will automatically add links to previous posts as I add the labels.  It will take a while, but I will eventually go through all of my older posts and add labels for everything. 

With such a ripe topic as Bit Actors and Actresses, I expect the Label Cloud to loom quite large!  I hope it helps you find a post on your favorite movie or performer.
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Recently I have been having some discussion with other bloggers, and that has been most enjoyable.  I joined a group called the Classic Movie Blog Association a while ago.  Please take a look at that web site when you have a chance.  There are some very talented and knowledgeable people who write their own blogs about movies, and I am sure you will find great information and enjoy your time there.

Topics are varied and can be on a specific star, genre, or simply a collection of movies the writer enjoys.  There are youngsters as well as OFs like myself.  I find it refreshing to hear what the younger set has to say about classic movies I have enjoyed for years.
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Lastly, I will be leaving the Blogosphere for a week, starting tomorrow.  We will be traveling to Florida to visit my father-in-law, and get some much needed rest.  Use that time to browse my archives and leave some comments.  After you have read everything, check out CMBA.  

Never fear, I will return on Sunday, December 12, 2010.

TRON

The new movie TRON: Legacy is about to be released, so I thought we should look at the original, TRON (1982).  Both are from Walt Disney Pictures, of course.

Jeff Bridges (b. 1949) and Bruce Boxleitner (b. 1950) reprise their roles from 28 years ago.  They were in their thirties when they made the first one, and they are still playing computer games!  I wonder if the younger stars discussed the fact that many weren't even born when the original was released.

Back to 1982.  Barnard Hughes (1915 - 2006) appears in TRON and 94 other titles on IMDb.  He also had quite a long stage career.  He started in film in the 1954 movie, Playgirl with Shelley Winters (1920 - 2006).  In 1961 he was in The Young Doctors, with Dick Clark (b. 1929).

Other highlights in Hughes' career include Midnight Cowboy (1969); his own TV series called "Doc" in the mid 1970s; Oh, God! in 1977; Da in 1988, based on the play in which he also starred; Doc Hollywood (1991); and Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit (1993).

David Warner (b. 1941) also had a bit part.  He made 195 movies and TV shows in the past 48 years.  Look for him in:
Tom Jones - 1963
The Omen - 1976
The Thirty Nine Steps (remake 1978)
Time Bandits - 1981
Star Trek V: The Final Frontier - 1989
Star Trek IV: The Undiscovered Country - 1991

And he appears in large parts in the two top money making films of all time, Titanic (1997) and Avatar (2004).   Quite a career, and a very important supporting actor.  He has such a forceful personality, at least on screen. 

There are other Bit Actors in TRON who are just as important, especially when creating a stark, unearthly place to present a story.  My guess is that the stunt actors also had some extra screen time.  People like Tony Brubaker, who has 148 stunt credits and 48 acting credits.  Being a stunt actor is not an easy job.

Charlie Picerni is another stunt man with 319 stunt credits and 61 acting credits.  These guys were in movies like Die Hard (1988) and True Lies (1994).  Now that's action...and hard work.

Now for the bad news.  TRON is available at Amazon, but the DVD is $84.  The funny thing is the VHS tape is listed at $129!  You really should see the original before seeing the remake.  Then you get the full picture.  Maybe other sites, like Movies Unlimited or half.com have better deals, or you can get it from Netflix.

BTW, make sure you check out the Movie Fanfare blog.  They just posted another of my previous blog posts.  I am very happy they enjoy my stuff!  This one is on Robby the Robot.

More Moonstruck

I just mentioned Moonstruck (1987) in a comment, and that got me thinking again.  I really like that movie.  A wonderful cast, a great script, and good direction.  The movie works.

But it doesn't work without Bit Actors.  Two that come to mind are Loretta Castorini's aunt and uncle who run a grocery store.  Of course Loretta is played by Cher (b. 1946).  Julie Bovasso plays Rita Cappomaggi, and Louis Guss plays Raymond Cappomaggi. 

Julie Bovasso (1930 - 1991) only has 29 title on IMDb, released from 1958 to 1992.  She spent most of her career on the stage and doing other work, such as writing.  She was also the dialog coach on Moonstruck, which was more important than you would think.  She was able to blend the Italian and New York accents into something truly believable.  Bovasso also did this for Prizzi's Honor (1985).

Perhaps her most famous role was as John Travolta's (b. 1954) mother in Saturday Night Fever (1977).  A few other movies she was in are The Verdict (1982) with Paul Newman, and Betsy's Wedding (1990) with Alan Alda (b. 1936).

Louis Guss (1918 - 2008) has 102 titles starting in 1957.  Born in New York, his accent came easy.  He did a lot of TV throughout his career.  We see him in The Godfather (1972), and he is in The Laughing Policeman (1973) which was a strange movie starring Walter Matthau (1920 - 2000) as a cop.  Matthau should never be cast as a cop.

Here are some of his better titles -
Harry and Tonto (1974)
Fun with Dick and Jane and New York, New York in 1977
Highlander (1986)
Used People (1992)
The Cemetery Club (1993)

But he also made movies like -
H.O.T.S. (1979)
Girlfight (2000)
A Tale of Two Pizzas (2003)

The fact is that he didn't do much on the large screen, but what he did was good.  I only counted 31 movies, the rest was television work, but I think Bovasso had better titles. 

Moonstruck has many Bit Actors in the mix.  Think of the waiters in the little Italian restaurant, and the bakery girls.  Add them up and you have a great way to spend an evening.  Champagne cocktails, anyone?

Holiday Nightmare

After writing about Thanksgiving movies, I got to thinking about other holiday themed movies over the years.

Under the IMDb keyword 'Christmas' there are 2807 titles listed.  Not all of them really say Christmas to me, including The Godfather (1972), but IMDb is really a Wiki.  My guess is that Christmas has more movies than any other holiday, by a long margin.

Now try to think of an Easter movie.  Easter Parade (1948) starring Judy Garland and Fred Astaire is the only one for my money.  There are 137 titles under that keyword, including Annie Hall (1977) and American Psycho (2000).  Not movies I think of while eating my butter cream egg.

My vote for the most ambitious holiday movie goes to...are you ready?...Nightmare Before Christmas from 1993.  Think about it.  Here is a movie you can run all the way from Halloween through Christmas, that's a three month audience, and it's not a bad movie!

Tim Burton's (b. 1958) story works very well.  The original music was written by Danny Elfman (b. 1953).  The stop-motion filming of real models give it a retro quality that is missing from computer generated animation.  And the voice cast is wonderful.

Elfman did the singing for the the main character, Jack Skellington, and Chris Sarandon (b. 1942) was his speaking voice.  Sarandon's first wife was named Susan, and I believe she is now a bigger star than he, although Chris has 90 titles on IMDb.  Chris is a Bit Actor all the way.


Catherine O'Hara (b. 1954) was the female lead, Sally.  Look for her in 80 more titles, including Beetle Juice (1988).

William Hickey (1927 - 1997) has been one of my favorite Bit Actors for years.  He has 86 titles and played the villain, Dr. Finklestein.  His early movies go back to 1957 when he was in Operation Mad Ball with Jack Lemmon (1925 - 2001), Ernie Kovacs (1919 - 1962) and Mickey Rooney.

Hickey was also in Little Big Man (1970) with Dustin Hoffman, because of his wonderful voice.  In 1986 he worked with Sean Connery in The Name of the Rose, a medieval detective story that is so moody, it earned a place in my collection.  (That's not very hard, though.  I have hundreds of DVDs and VHS tapes.)

Hickey made another Christmas movie, Christmas Vacation in 1989 with Chevy Chase (b. 1943).  He was hilarious as Arthur in Forget Paris (1995) starring Billy Crystal (b.1948) and Debra Winger (b. 1955), constantly singing, "You asked for it, you got it. Toyota." in that droll voice, until they put him in a home.

Back to Nightmare, Paul Reubens (b. 1952) also had a part.  I should have recognized his voice as Pee Wee Herman.  Reubens isn't famous for much, other than Pee Wee and a run in with the law, but he has 76 titles on IMDb, and is doing quite a bit of voice work.

I will work on a Christmas movie list.  One with some great Bit Actors.  But maybe some that are less well known.  It's a Wonderful Life is TOO EASY!