Cary Grant will forever be known as one of Hollywood's most seductive and fascinating stars. Even twenty years after his death, Grant still owns the imaginations of film lovers. This week, the Modern Pea Pod celebrates this consummate icon with reviews of five of his classic films, as compiled on Sony's new DVD box set. Day by day, we'll show you some of the best and some of the worst of Grant's canon. So bust out a nicely tailored suit, make yourself a nice drink, and drop some acid. It's time to remember our man Archie Leach.
Only Angels Have Wings
(Director: Howard Hawks, 1939)
Not too long ago I was doing a bit of work at an archive. During a break, I began to have a long discussion with one of the reference staff members, and, as so often happens, the topic of classic films crept its way into our conversation. Casually, I mentioned that in the course of just a few days, my fellow Pea Pod staff members and I had watched the five Cary Grant films for this piece. I watched as this sweet little librarian's eyes lit up while she revealed to me that she had, for years, been a huge Cary Grant fan--madly and secretly in love with him as, of course, all of us are. She inquired as to what would be on this fabulous new box set, and when I got to Only Angels Have Wings, she asked what I had thought of it. "Well," I said, "It doesn't really have a plot."
This is a slight exaggeration, of course. In fact, the movie has several plots. The problem is that none of them can be reasonably identified as a main storyline - something we as an audience have typically come to expect from our films. What we have instead is a loose string of stories that would usually be considered subplots, and lots of filler in between. But not a single one of these subplots is capable of carrying the movie on its own; and as a result, you're left furrowing your brow for two hours while asking your neighbor, "Wait, what is this about?"
The 1939 film takes place in a small coastal village located behind a mountain range in South America. We open with Bonnie Lee (Jean Arthur) waiting around for her boat back to New York, and exploring the sites of the native people. She then bumps into a couple of American pilots who fly the treacherous and frequent journey over the mountains to deliver freight and mail. They introduce her to their boss, Geoff Carter (Grant), and of course, she immediately falls madly in love with him. And then she vanishes from the film for about a half hour. What follows is a random assortment of conflicts that never quite come together to form a cohesive story. There's Carter's inability to love a woman more than he loves the thrill of flight; the pilot who bailed on his plane, allowing his engineer to die, and the dead man's brother - hungry for revenge; the return of Carter's old flame, who is now married to the cowardly pilot; and of course, the uncertain future of the freight company's ability to survive. While some of these are interesting and compelling stories, there's just far too many of them going on, and nothing is fleshed out enough to really grab the audience's attention.
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