Blog 7: His Girl Friday

This film was very interesting because I thought that the normal stereotype for women was flipped around. This movie was released in 1940. Looking back at that point in time, women didn’t have much opportunity to obtain a “good” job. During these times, most women felt their job was to stay home and take care of the children and the home. They completed many in-house chores to help support the family. In this film however, Hildy didn’t follow the norm, she was a career woman who wanted to end her career as a journalist and get married and become a housewife. Hildy wanted to start a family and settle down with her husband. She felt that her career was taking over her life. She was one of the rare women who was given the opportunity to excel in the work place and had a good paying job. She wanted to become a more typical female whose job was to be a domesticated housewife. Her ex-husband, Walter Burns, was a very dedicated and driven man who always put his job first. He rarely focused on his relationships and never made any sacrifices for his love, Hildy. His passion for work ruled over his desire to love Hildy. However, once he learned that his ex-wife was about to get married he began to realize what he was losing and how much he cared for her. He ultimately tricked her and her soon-to-be husband to stay in town while he hooked her to write about an intense story. Throughout this film he played tricks on her husband to land him in jail and delay their departure to Albany. Walter wins back her love by exposing her to a situation where she felt comfortable. Her love and passion was for writing and she had a perfect opportunity to do that with the circumstances that was presented to her by Walter. She ultimately chose to stay with Walter and sacrifice her desire to become a domesticated woman because she felt her passion was for journalism. She relived some old memories with her ex-husband Walter and she finally realized that was who she was and she would never be able to be what others thought she should be.

Blog 6: James Joyce- “Two Gallants” “The Boarding House” Grace Paley- “The Little Disturbances of Man”

Two Gallants- This story was about two young men who needed each other. Lenehan and Corley were two men who were poverty stricken. They both needed their friendships for different reasons. Lenehan needed Corley because he was the guy who could sweet-talk women and get their money. Lenehan used Corley for the money aspect because he was poor. Corley on the other hand needed Lenehan for his friendship. Lenehan gave Corley the attention that he needed to feel good about himself. Corley used his charm and smart wits to trick women to give him money. He used his male dominance to control women to get things he wanted, like money.
The Boarding House- This short story was about a woman who created a Boarding House. Mrs. Mooney had a daughter, Polly, who throughout the story developed strong feelings for one of their guests whose name was Mr. Doran. What started out as “puppy love” turned into a serious relationship. Their relationship is put on hold due to complications with Mr. Doran’s life. Mr. Doran, the dominant male, determines whether or not the relationship will go any further. The males throughout these stories have power over the women because of their status.
The Little Disturbances of Man- This reading was also about a female, Virginia, who gets controlled by a male. Her husband leaves Virginia and his children to “join the army.” Her husband has continually verbally abused and mistreated his wife. The story talked about their strong love over looks, but over time their loved diminished. The husband always expected a lot from his wife and ultimately decided to leave her to pursue other things. During the husbands’ absence, Virginia gets reunited with an old friend, John Raftery who helps to stabilize her family. They have a little fling, but when John wants more from Virginia she rationalizes and denies him the opportunity to continue their relationship. At the end of the story, Virginia’s husband ends up coming back to the family. Virginia, seeming a little brain-washed from his power and control ends up taking him back. She allows his power and control to manipulate her to obey his wants and needs.
Overall these stories all dealt with controlling men who used women through relationships. They oppressed women in different ways, but they all had some type of power over women. Ultimately, the men in all of these stories were able to influence women’s choices and decisions through their power and money.

Bringing Up Baby

Bringing Up Baby is a screwball comedy that I thought was very comical. This movie contained a lot of funny one-liners that at times were a little inappropriate. Although, at times this movie just seemed to be simple fun, there were some hidden connotations and attention grabbing scenes that kept the movie interesting! The theme that stuck out to me while watching this movie was the idea of mistaken identities. There were several situations where one character’s identity was mixed up with another characters, but what was really interesting was the film didn’t stop at mistaking character’s identities – props were mixed up and even Susan’s pet leopard had his identity mistaken for an escaped leopard from the zoo!
Starting at the very beginning of the movie, Susan mistakes her golf ball and plays David’s actual ball. This leads into the next scene where she is trying to move her car from a parking spot. She misidentifies her car and accidently gets in David’s car and ends up scratching and damaging his car. These two blunders are just the tip of the iceberg of “mistaken identities” which occur throughout the entire movie. Another funny scene was when David had the psychiatrists wife’s’ purse, which he was told to hang onto until Susan returned, but argued with him over whose purse it was. Susan came back to them arguing only to show David that she had her purse making it look like he took her purse. Here he was wrongly identified as stealing or taking the psychiatrists’ wife’s purse. Another mistaken identity, which I thought was interesting, was that Susan believed that David was a zoologist rather than a paleontologist. It was weird because she called him a zoologist almost the entire movie, but she knew he worked with dinosaurs and was collecting that final “intercostals clavicle bone.” Another scene where props/identities are swapped is when David and Susan traveled to Connecticut. They stopped to get 30 lbs of meat for Baby, but while David was inside purchasing the meat, Susan was outside waiting in her car. At the same time a police man was about to write her a ticket for illegal parking when she told him it wasn’t her car, which it actually was, but then lied and stole the car next to hers. The police officer believed her until the actual owner of the car ran out as they were driving off. Another example of this prominent theme was when Susan’s Aunt Elizabeth first met David. Throughout the entire movie David was trying to get a $1 million loan for his museum and when he first met Susan’s Aunt he acted like a real jerk. He made a horrible first impression, but that was because he didn’t realize it was the Aunt who was donating all of the money. David then told Susan to introduce him as someone different because David didn’t want her to know his real identity. Susan then told her Aunt that David’s name was “Mr. Bone”. David had first mistaken her identity as a different woman, which ultimately made him lie about his identity to her. This was also funny because it led Susan to tell other lies about David, saying that he was crazy and a big game hunter. This leads into the next funny mistaken identity, which was from Major Applegate. Over dinner he talked a lot about his previous experiences of big game hunting, but when they heard the leopard call outside during dinner he acknowledged it as a loon call. Major Applegate kept saying he would never forget the sound of a leopard, which he was sure it wasn’t, he kept saying that it had to be a loon. The next scenario of mistaken identities was when everyone mixed up leopards. There were two leopards on the loose and one was the tame pet of Susan’s and the other was the vicious leopard from the circus. One of the final scenes in this movie, the jail scene, was probably the biggest case of mistaken identities. Constable Slocum, the Sherriff, got everyone mixed up. It was a pretty crazy and confusing scene, one full of mistaken identities. Sometimes accidental and other times intentional – mistaken identities were the stepping stones from scene to scene throughout the movie. It is what made this movie funny, crazy and times unbelievable, but in the end it was what made the movie work and tied it all together!

It Happened One Night

Blog :4 It Happened One Night

It Happened One Night was a story about two people, Ellie and Peter who desperately needed each other. Peter was a journalist whose career had plummeted after being fired, and needed a story to make money and restart his career. Ellie was looking to escape the control of her rich father. The two needed each other to get what they wanted. Ellie was Peter’s story and Peter was Ellie’s way to get back to New York to reunite with her husband. What they didn’t realize is what they thought they needed would lead them to what they really wanted. Ellie had always had someone telling her what to do and making decisions for her, Peter had always tried to find his worth and happiness in his career. While they were on the run, Ellie discovered many things about herself. She realized that not only could she make it on her own (without the help of money) but she liked being able to make decisions for herself! Peter learned how to care for someone else and to care about something other than his career. Through their adventure together, hiding from Ellie’s father and trying to get from Miami to New York, they discover each other and fall in love.
I thought that this movie was fun and very enjoyable! It Happened One Night cleverly weaves its’ theme of social and economic class differences into its story line. From the start of the movie it was easy to pick up that Ellie Andrews was a rich, spoiled daughter who wanted freedom from her father and Peter was the rugged, tough news reporter living paycheck to paycheck. The movie starts with both Ellie and her father on a yacht off the coast of Miami. They are fighting because Ellie’s father disagreed with her daughter’s choice of husband, King Westley. The first scene in the movie made it apparent that they were a high class family and that her father had kidnapped her from wherever she was and took her hostage onto his yacht. It showed their relationship was about control, obedience and money. Peter’s first scene comes a bit later in the bus station. He is in a phone booth and is yelling into the phone at his boss. He has just lost his job. From the beginning it is obvious that Peter and Ellie have led very different lives both socially and financially! Another difference between the two is the fact that Peter is very street wise and able to handle almost any situation that comes his way. On the other hand, it’s very obvious that Ellie has led a very sheltered life! Throughout the movie you can tell that Ellie was raised with no real exposure to the real world. She had trouble making decisions and it didn’t seem like she could fend for herself. A funny example was when she got her bag stolen at the bus stop. Later, she told Peter, “I can take of myself thank you” and so he asked her where her bus ticket was and she thought she had her bus ticket, but had really left it on the bus for Peter to find. These examples led me to think that although she was smart and clever she was used to having her farther take care of her. Another entertaining part in the movie was when she learned to hitchhike. When Peter was walking he first brought up the term “hitchhike” to her and she had never heard of it. There were numerous examples like this that demonstrated to me that Ellie lived in a very different world than Peters. Ellie, a part of the upper class, enjoyed many of its perks, but when she had to travel like most people did back in the 1930s she looked very confused and lost. I blame most of this on her upbringing and on parenting. Ellie was used to being catered too and when she had to do things on her own she couldn’t. There were also times in this movie that Peter called her out about her inexperience of living like a normal human being. An example that stood out to me was when she was trying to buy chocolates on the bus, but Peter wouldn’t let her. She didn’t have much money to begin with, but still had trouble spending it wisely. Ellie was used to living the lifestyle where she probably didn’t worry about being on a budget and she probably bought things based on wants vs. needs. Peter went off on her at the bus station about how money can’t buy you everything and about how money just creates problems for rich people. This put it into perspective for Ellie about her living habits. Another part that led me to think that she took her lifestyle for granted was when she was forced to not ride on the bus. Peter wanted to hide Ellie’s identity so he forced her to walk with him to go somewhere else. She was complaining the entire time that her feet hurt while they were walking. Another part was when she whined about having to sleep outside on the hay. She was more worried about her clothes getting wrinkled then about sleeping. That same scene reminds me of when she was complaining about being hungry and Peter leaves for a couple minutes and she freaks out and is scared. As much as she tried to be tough and act like she could make it on her own, it showed her insecurity and that the reality was that she was used to being surrounded by people who took care of her.
In the end, I thought this movie had a great plot for its era. Looking back, it was produced in the early 1930s, which was during the depression. Movies back then were meant for people to “get away” - escape - and enjoy life in a fantasy world , yet also make it real enough that the audience could relate! This move did a great job of taking people away from their world and making them laugh and cry while also reminding them that what’s really important doesn’t cost anything!

James Joyce “Araby” and “Eveline”

Blog 3: “Araby” and “Eveline”

These were two short stories written by James Joyce that were based in Ireland. Ireland at the time was poverty stricken and had many economical and social problems. These times really seemed to influence the author’s writings. Both stories were very dreary and somber in tone. Araby was a story about a boy who was obsessed with his love and passion for a girl. Throughout the story, the boy fantasized about loving this girl and wanting to buy something for her to show her his affection towards her. He felt this obligation to buy something and when he found out about the bazaar he wanted to go to see what it had to offer. To me it seemed as though that the bazaar was a flee market and a new experience to him. It was a fantasy world where he could go and escape. It was a place of options where he could buy new things that he had never seen before. However, in the end he got all caught up with the notion that buying something would bring him love. At the end of the story he is left in darkness, which to me symbolizes his realization that he can’t buy love. He knows he will not win his love through a gift, so he is left to sit in the darkness and to feel anger and hatred towards reality. The darkness signifies his hope being distinguished. The next short story, Eveline, is story about a girl who is stuck living in a dysfunctional family. She wants to escape to another world where she can be happy. However, on her mother’s death bed she promises to look after her trouble-stricken family, which included her father and brother. She fights over these moral dilemmas and promises made, whether or not to leave her family for her personal happiness and love. Her promise to her mother rules over her conscience and she forces herself to support the family by caring for the father who suffers greatly from alcoholism, yet he is abusive and violent towards her. She is guilted by her memories of her deceased mother who wanted her to keep the family together. Throughout the story she is tempted to leave and join her love, Frank, in Buenos Ayres where she fantasizes about a new beginning. In the end, she stays and sacrifices her happiness to fulfill the commitment she made to her mother. She indeed does the best she can to support the family, but through those times she suffers great anxiety and pain from her father’s behavior. Her love for Frank was second to that of her mother and she chose to stay and give up her dream for the promise that she made to her mother.

The Lady Eve

Blog 2: The Lady Eve

The Lady Eve, like The Philadelphia Story, was a comedy about the idea of remarriage. I thought that this movie was very humorous and entertaining. There were some very funny one-liners and a lot of interesting symbolism that kept me interested and attentive throughout the movie. The writer’s use of symbolism and the themes created through the character’s actions and relationships really caught my attention while watching this movie. For example, the use of “horns,” the relationship between fathers and siblings, and how society viewed people of wealth. However, the theme that stuck out most to me was the one surrounding deceit. I felt that the act of being deceitful was depicted by so many of the characters and involved so many relationships that it was one of the most prevalent points made in the movie.
First, I thought it was interesting that each character went by two different names – two different identities. The use of different names and sometimes different personalities for a character plays into the theme of deceitfulness. Each character had a different name and each name was significant to one person or the situation they were in. Meaning, when they were called one name – they tended to act differently than when called by their other name. For example, when Jean was around Charlie she would always call him Hopsie. When Charlie was around Jean’s father she would always call her father Colonel or Colonel Harrington, but when she was just by herself she would refer to him as Harry. Also when Jean came back to Connecticut to see Charlie she introduced herself as an English women named Eve. She also said she was the niece of her actual friend. I thought it was funny to that they both lied about how she had gotten to America on a battleship/submarine. I also thought that it was interesting that Charlie’s friend Muggsy was referred to at some points as Ambrose. The main idea here was that people had different names and identities which could be very misleading at times to the other characters in the story. This idea of different names, different identities symbolize how complex people are and how deceitful people can be.
The writers also used deceit to manipulate relationships of friendship and love. Jean misled, deceived, Charlie about who she was and what their relationship meant to her. It seemed to me that she was interested in him, but acted like she didn’t like him. She played hard to get and at times seemed disinterested. An example would be when she took him back to her room and massaged his head and got all close to him and then told him he should leave. First, Jean acted like she was interested in Charlie and then changed her actions to say that she was not interested in Charlie and sent him away. Another example was when Jean came back and remarried Charlie as an English lady named Lady Eve Sidwich, however she only remarried him to get back and have revenge on him and so that she could crush his heart. She made him fall in love with her as “Eve,” but she didn’t want his love so she played him. This was another example of how deceit and lies were used throughout the story to manipulate love and friendship.
Finally, I saw the theme of deceit being very prominent in the scenes involving gambling and playing cards. Jean and Harry had always meant to steal money from people. They were con artists at their best, losing money one night only to take away much more money the next night. They were obviously known for doing this because they had previously been caught for cheating someone out of their money. It was this creating friendships, then losing their own money, but then cheating someone out of more money that made them so deceitful.
Overall, I thought this was an amusing and enjoyable movie. There were many funny lines and scenes that kept me engaged through this movie. There was a funny plot, but throughout this plot there were many lies told and tricks used to deceive people. People were very deceitful throughout this movie whether it was their identity, the friendships they made, in their love relationships, or just being cheated out of their own money. This made me believe that people are not always who they say they are!

The Philadelphia Story

Blog 1: The Philadelphia Story

I thought that this movie was very well done. The Philadelphia Story was a very comical movie about love and relationships. There were many reoccurring themes and aspects that to me were very interesting. I thought that the major themes were the role of women in society, the role of class seen within society and the role of men in relationships.
First, I saw that there were many references throughout this movie about how women should act. There were a couple scenes where the little girl was corrected by her mother because she said, “smell” instead of “stink” or “sock” instead of “strike.” I thought that this was very interesting because during these earlier times, women were expected to act very proper in public. The mother’s job was to make certain that her daughters were always “behaving like ladies” in public. Another scene that reminds me of this pre-conceived notion of women was when Tracy was reading one of the books written by Mike Connor and he asked, “what happens to girls like you that read my books, they think.” It was quite a surprising remark because he of what he intended it to mean. What it said to me was that a woman was not supposed to have a brain that actually thought about anything other than housework or being a good wife. I just thought that this movie had some interesting insight about what a woman’s role in society was supposed to be in that era.
Another theme that I took away from this movie was the necessity for the upper class to live up to a certain lifestyle. They were expected to live extravagantly and as if money was of no concern. There was a funny saying in this movie that was used to describe the upper class, “the privileged class enjoys its privileges.” It was really funny to see how the family acted when the reporters came into their house. To me, they put on a show and they were really fake about their lifestyle and how they acted towards each other. It was funny to see them put on this act, trying to look like a “normal” and “functional” family. This family really valued their “high class” reputation so they put on quite an act to pretend to be this lovely and happy family.
Finally, the last theme that I saw throughout this movie was the interesting role that men played in their relationships with of women. It seemed to have all the stereotypes of how men treated women back in the old days. There were a couple scenes of domestic violence, when women got physically and verbally abused. It made me realize how some men treated women with so little respect back then. The father also has a negative relationship with his daughter, which I found very interesting. It reinforced my belief that a woman was more susceptible to divorce or unhealthy relationships with men if she grew up with an abusive or unstable father figure. It was also interesting to see that the father and mother were divorced similarly to the daughter.
Overall, I thought that this movie not only entertaining but had some interesting perspectives. I have never watched old movies and it was a nice change. It was very fascinating to watch an older movie like this one because not only could you get a real sense of what our culture was like back then, but it also helped me to appreciate how far our society has come today!