This year is the centenary of the birth of director
Frank Capra, and one of the highlights has been the rediscovery and
restoration of one of his silent films for Columbia that was previously
thought lost. The restored version of The Matinee Idol has been
shown theatrically, and was recently broadcast by Turner Classic Movies.
A review follows.
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The Matinee Idol (1928) |
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R E V I E W |
Columbia Pictures
Corporation presents Bessie Love in "The Matinee Idol" with Johnnie
Walker
From the story "Come Back to Aaron" by Robert Lord and Ernest S. Pagano. A Frank R. Capra Production. Produced by Harry Cohn. Direction, Frank R. Capra. Adaptation, Elmer Harris.
Continuity, Peter Milne. Photography, Philip Tannura. Editing, Arthur Roberts.
1997 Restoration credits: Frank Capra's The Matinee Idol, long considered a lost film, was rediscovered in the vaults of the Cinemateque Francais. This restoration of The Matinee Idol is the result of the collaboration between the Cinemateque Francais, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and Sony Pictures Entertainment. Motion picture laboratory services were provided by Immagine Ritrovato in Bologna, and Cinetech in Burbank. Digital restoration work was executed by Sony Pictures High Definition Center in Culver City. Musical Score Arranged and Conducted by Robert Israel.
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Unseen since its original release,
The Matinee Idol is no great rediscovery, but merely another film
in Frank Capra's apprenticeship at Columbia. This comedy-drama was released
at the height of the art of silent cinema, but you wouldn't know it from
this inexpensively produced program picture. Capra tries to refresh the
tired and familiar elements, and makes the best of the limited budget and
few sets. The characterizations lack the depth that Capra later brought
to equally superficial material; leading man Johnnie Walker is pleasant,
but a bit bland, while Bessie Love is charming the year before her comeback
in The Broadway Melody.
The story by Robert Lord and Ernest S. Pagano has few surprises. Johnnie Walker is a Broadway blackface comedian in the Al Jolson/Eddie Cantor mold. His car breaks down in a rural area, and while looking for a mechanic he is recruited by Bessie Love to fill a small part in a Civil War drama staged by her father's traveling company. The itinerant troupe is an easy target, and this one includes a gay stereotype (a recurring gag through the picture), while Bessie Love and her aged and ineffective father would not be out of place in a program western. Walker's intentional mistakes during the performance ruin the show as he tries to attract Love's attention. This extended sequence could have been the model for a remarkably similar scene in Buster Keaton's Spite Marriage, released the following year. Walker arranges for the troupe to be called to New York to recreate their play on Broadway. In a plot device that would only work in a voiceless medium, Bessie Love is wooed by Walker as the buffoon member of the troupe and by Walker as the Broadway star (always seen in blackface). The Civil War drama, played straight in the sticks, is taken as a farce by New York audiences leading to a confrontation between Walker and Love outside the theatre. As in many of his films, Capra stages the key emotional scene in a rainstorm. This fits as a story device (the rain washes off Walker's blackface) and intensifies the drama. Capra's trademark of indirectly expressed emotion is demonstrated by audition scenes between Walker and Love that bookend the story. When Love prompts Walker in the audition to say "I love you," the first time at the beginning of the picture the scene is played for laughs. At the conclusion it is truthful and the characters finally display some emotional depth. Long thought lost, the Cinemateque Francais found a nitrate print of The Matinee Idol, and made a safety negative. A master positive from that negative was scanned into Sony's High Definition System. Scratches, dirt and other damaged were electronically patched, and a new film negative was produced. Thanks to this effort, the result is reasonably sharp, and largely without blemishes. All of the titles were remade to appear as they did on the original release, complete with the Columbia logo at the opening. The effective period music score arranged and conducted by Robert Israel nicely complements the film. The Matinee Idol is not available on home video, but it is included in the touring Frank Capra festival from Columbia Pictures Repertory, and has been shown on the Turner Classic Movies cable channel. (Review © 1997 David Pierce) |
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Send additions, suggestions, comments or questions to David Pierce, prizma@onetel.com
© 1996, 1997 David Pierce