AniInterview Sorry, this movie sucks

NekoHomey Purely Joyful Movie!

InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Portia Hilton Blistering performances.

JohnHowardReid In 1934, there were only seven or eight people on the vast Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer lot, whom Mayer permitted to walk into his office any time of the day or night, without an appointment. These privileged few included his secretary, Ida Koverman; his executive producer, Irving G. Thalberg, and Thalberg's wife, Norma Shearer; film editor, Margaret Booth; and director, Woody Van Dyke. One day, Van Dyke approached Mayer with his idea of teaming Powell and Loy in "The Thin Man". Although he strongly disapproved of Van Dyke's suggestion – in fact he told him to his face that the whole idea of casting Powell and Loy was "insane" – Mayer compromised (as he often did in his dealings with "favorite sons"). Extracting a promise from Van Dyke that he would complete the whole picture in just 3 weeks, Mayer reluctantly gave him the go-ahead.Woody's first problem was to find a cameraman sufficiently speedy yet masterfully skillful to photograph an "A" picture in an unheard- of eighteen working days. Fellow-director Jack Conway recommended James Wong Howe."Van Dyke didn't cheat on his commitment to Mayer by working overtime on the picture," Wong Howe recalled in a 1969 interview. "He'd come in at nine. At twelve, we'd break for lunch. Back at one. Then leave at five. Van Dyke was a real expert. He'd rehearse the players and often as not, shoot just one take."The picture actually starts with a shadow effect – and very dramatic too – as the flickering shadow of the Thin Man is eerily cast on the wall of his warehouse as he works on some new invention. As colorfully played by Edward Ellis, the title character dominates the first quarter-hour or so of the action. He's not a nice man at all. Grumpy, short-tempered, dominating, cruel, sadistic – yet his daughter likes him. When he fails to turn up for a promised Christmas re-union, the action really starts, for at this point the film finally introduces us to Nora and Nick, both engaged in their favorite pastime – drinking.Prohibition had recently been repealed in the USA, so audiences were not accustomed to seeing people openly drinking on the screen in lush surroundings. Drinking was associated with gangsters, speakeasies and dives.Oh yes, the mystery side's very engrossing too. Impossible to pick the killer, though a few clues are fairly thrown our way. And there's one chilling sequence in a deserted warehouse which will raise goose bumps on even the most jaded flesh.Like some contemporary Warner Bros pictures, the script is very critical of the police. Nat Pendleton (usually cast as a moronic clown) plays the police inspector as not exactly dumb but certainly three or four shades removed from the sort of competence we might expect.The most telling scene occurs when Nick suggests to serio-comic crook Joe Morelli (played by Ed Brophy who specialized in aggressive but stupid henchmen) that he should ask the police some questions. "Me, walk into the police station and start asking questions?" Morelli snarls. "They'd like that – right down to the end of their blackjacks." – A prophecy fulfilled less than a minute later when a uniformed cop walks up to the now helpless little thug and, for no particular reason, smashes him in the face.The Thin Man was nominated for four of the prestigious annual awards voted by members of The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences: Best Picture, Best Actor (William Powell), Best Director (Woody Van Dyke), and Best Adapted Screenplay (husband and wife team, Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett). The movie also scored at the domestic box-office with a rentals gross of $1.2 million (which made it the 5th most popular release of the year).

Prismark10 William Powell and Myrna Loy star in this classic screwball comedy cum detective thriller which very much created its own genre. Its based on a book by Dashiell Hammett.They play Nick and Nora Charles. He is a retired detective, she is a wealthy socialite who now reside in LA. During a Christmas trip to New York, the rich and glamorous couple get caught up in the mystery of the disappearance of a wealthy workaholic engineer and factory owner. Added to this, dead bodies turn up and this missing Thin man is the prime suspect.There is a s lot of banter and red herrings with a greedy ex-wife, a greedy mistress, various relatives and hangers on related to the mystery of the missing Thin man.Keeping it all together is Powell and Roy plus their dog and plenty of rapid fire repartee casually mixed with high voltage alcohol. In fact I reckon the couple needed to attend AA meetings.I guess The Thin Man films were the inspiration for the 1980s TV series Hart to Hart.Its enjoyable stuff, some of the humour requires knowledge of the time period or else it will fly past your head such as the joke about the Mann Act.

skoogs-3 I'm half-way through, approx. 45 minutes, watching this film and I've had to switch off for just now as I'm seriously worried about the stars of the film. Now don't get me wrong here, or jump to conclusions, for I think this is a very good film indeed and so well acted by the two main stars, William Powell and Myrna Loy. No, the reason of my concern is I'm very worried indeed about their health. And more to the point I'm VERY worried indeed about William Powell's health more than Myrna Loy's because he does it more than her, yet not that much. And what is it they both do that is so worrying? Drinking alcohol in such vast quantities that it would knock out an elephant! "Pass me a drink darling" William Powell would say to Myrna. "Of course darling" Myrna would answer, pouring about a half pint of scotch into a glass that he would swig off in a couple of gulps. Glass after glass after glass of liquor was consumed in this fashion and nobody battered an eyelid or fell over or even hiccupped. Fantastic!!

MisterWhiplash You couldn't make The Thin Man the way they did it back in 1934. For one thing, the book by Dashiell Hammett - which I have to imagine the filmmakers were faithful as could be within a 90 minute run time - has as its two main heroes characters who love their booze. There's only so many moments that you see Nick (William Powell) without a drink, or looking for one, and Nora is only so far behind (though Nick is certainly more the booze-hound). Nowadays, a producer would look at material like that and want to take it out. And yeah, in reality, being a drunk or the "A" word (alcoholic) isn't much fun. But this was the movies and Hollywood and 1934 after all! This is a world where a hangover isn't necessarily glossed over completely - see as Nick is in bed after the Christmas party and has to get another drink to make himself, uh, 'regular', and of course has to get Nora one right after he comes back to bed. But... yeah, it's a comedy after all.The Thin Man is a glorious escapist movie, and a riot at times. The story itself is fine enough, a solid, mostly serious yarn about an engineer (the 'Thin Man' of the title actually) who goes missing, and a woman he was seeing is found dead. Who killed her? Where is Clyde Wynant? Did he commit the murder and go off with money and skip town? There's a lot of questions to be answered, to be sure - it is Hammett, after all, the author of The Maltese Falcon and all those Continental Op thrillers. But that's not why the film is still fresh today, maybe even better by the passage of time like wine, because of the characters and the snappy dialog.By the 'characters' I do mean mostly our leads, Nick and Nora, though the supporting characters - played by the likes of Maureen O'Sullivan, Nathalie Moorehead and the original Joker himself Cesar Romero - are perfectly fine and acted memorably. They are a catty couple of people, and are constantly kidding themselves, though certainly are very seriously in love. They're the kind of couple who, when Nora walks in and sees Nick trying (little as he really can given his disposition) to give comfort to a sorrowful Dorothy, they make faces at one another to kill the tension. Outstanding comic timing. And speaking of not being able to do certain things today as in 1934, the moment where, to distract a heavy holding a gun on the two of them, Nick slugs Nora so he can then get HIS gun away! Whether this was right before the Code fully took effect, I'm not sure, but it wouldn't surprise me (the innuendo at the end is perfectly cute, though I'm sure rather scandalous also for 34).There are so many juicy and awesome moments between these two that it's little wonder they went on to make five more films over the course of fifteen years, and the public thought the actors were married in real life (!) The chemistry enough would make it a crackerjack semi-screwball comedy, though what levels it out as a great film of its year is that the director, WS Van Dyke, and the screenwriters, make some indelible set pieces. The Christmas dinner party, for one, really gets the audience fully immersed into the quick wit and here-to-there-and-again timing of a party where everybody wants a drink, one guy really wants to call home to his mother, and everyone keeps hounding Nick Charles to take on a case after being away from the sleuthing for years. This alone would make the movie a must see - but that ending, where everybody involved with the case is brought in so that Nick can crack it (he even admits, you know, he isn't entirely sure to Nora, who can do nothing but make spectacular quips) pushes it over into classic territory.When The Thin Man wants to be suspenseful, it can be as well. When Nick has to go looking in a dark place after hours and someone is coming in, all the lights go off and it takes on the air of an early noir. This, again, really is necessary though, and Van Dyke really makes sure that the more dramatic elements work in their vein, the comedy in its own, but that the two sides can meet, rather deliriously and uproariously into a charming package of a Hollywood movie. It's the kind of movie that I'm sure inspired Hitchcock, too, with the younger brother obsessed with morbid crimes and bodies; notice the reaction of the police when he offers to help them with forensics work. Again, 1934 people.