Elizabeth Taylor is one of the only actresses to successfully make the transition from child star to grown up drama star. She was cute in films like National Velvet and Little Women, and she was also very good in Cleopatra,The V.I.Ps, and The Sandpiper. Unfortunately, she has been plagued with bad health throughout her life, and with eight marriages down the drain, she has had a tough emotional life to say the least. At the moment she is in hospital being treated for heart problems, but the doctors say that she is in a stable condition. Get well soon Elizabeth Taylor!
Plot: Twelve year old, Velvet Brown and her parents and three siblings live in a small village near Sussex and live a fairly normal life. Velvet dreams of having a horse of her own, and goes down to watch other horses run in the fields near her village most days after school.
It is there that she meets wanderer and handyman Mi Taylor, who is shocked when she manages to calm down a new horse called Pie. He also later realizes that Pie jumped the equivalent of the hardest jump at the Grand National, the biggest horse race in England.
Velvet's father takes Mi in because he claims that his late father had a connection with the village and their family. Velvet wins Pie in a lottery and tells her mum that she would like to enter him in the grand national. Her mother takes her to the attic and gives her the entry fee out of her reward for swimming the channel. Mi reluctantly agrees to train Pie for the national, after changing his mind about stealing money from the Brown family.
The day before the Grand National they meet the Jockey they have employed, and Velvet is disgusted to see that he doesn't care about the horse and doesn't even think he could win. Velvet asks Mi to cut all her hair off and dress her like a boy so she can race the horse in the National. She nearly wins but faints and falls of her horse just before the finish line. The doctors on the track realize she is a girl and there is a huge scandal but she becomes known throughout the country as "the girl who nearly won the Grand National".
Review: This is a really sweet film and it gives Mickey Rooney his best shot at a grown up role. He really does very well in it, too. I am definitely not a Mickey Rooney fan. He has a bad case of small-man syndrome. He has to act big and annoying to make up for his height. No offense. Elizabeth Taylor does an amazing job playing Velvet. She was only twelve at the time, just my age. Angela Lansbury is really funny as the "sophisticated" older sister. Donald Crisp and Anne Revere are great as Velvet's parents, and Anne Revere is amazing and really deserved the Best Supporting Actress award she received at the Oscars. The show stealer, though is the toddler who plays Velvet's younger brother. He is adorable!!!!
My family have plans to watch Mrs. Miniver (1942, Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, Teresa Wright) and then The Odd Couple (1967, Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau) tonight, which means starting with tears and ending with hysterical laughter. And my sister spending ages trying to say Greer Garson in a Scottish accent. It comes out "Grere Gaaason". It's hilarious :D!
I am wondering about how to set up my reviews. I usually do them like this, sectioned of into different parts, but I also have done them as one long post like in my My Fair Lady post. Which do you prefer?
Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961). Romantic comedy. Cast: Audrey Hepburn, George Peppard, Patricia Neal, Buddy Ebsen, Martin Balsam, and Mickey Rooney. The film was directed by Blake Edwards. It was loosely based on the novel of the same name by Truman Capote. Orangey as "Cat" (trained by Frank Inn). Hepburn's performance of "Moon River" helped composer Henry Mancini and lyricist Johnny Mercer win an Oscar for Best Song.
The story begins in the early morning hours, as a taxicab pulls up at Tiffany's and Holly Golightly, enjoys her "Breakfast at Tiffany's" while looking in the window. At her apartment building, Holly sneaks away from her date from the night before, who has been waiting in his car all night.
The next morning, Holly is awakened by her new neighbor Paul Varjak, ringing the door bell. After feeding her pet cat she calls "Cat", Holly visits with Paul, as she quickly dresses for her visit to Sing Sing prison. This is a weekly routine from which she earns $100 for a visit with mob boss, Sally Tomato.
Wealthy Emily Failenson, arrives at the apartment and is introduced as Paul's "decorator". Holly later drops by Paul's apartment to escape another date and sees Failenson leave money on a table.
Paul is invited to Holly's party, where he meets Jose da Silva Pereira, a rich Brazilian and Rusty Trawler, one of the richest American's under 50. Paul, also meets Holly's "agent" O. J. Berman who tells Paul that Holly is a "real phoney".
After becoming fast friends, Paul joins Holly when she visits Sally at Sing Sing. One afternoon, Paul hears Holly playing guitar and singing "Moon River" from her windowsill. This is when they first realize that they are attracted to each other. Unfortunately Holly, is a "free spirit" a independent, adventurous woman who lives for the moment. Will her love for Paul turn her life around?
These two actors performances are what make the film memorable. One of my favorite scenes is when, Holly and Paul agree to spend the day together, visiting the library and going to Tiffany's, where Paul has the ring from a box of Cracker Jacks engraved. Below is the movie trailer, Breakfast at Tiffany's .
Fun Facts:
In the novel, there is no mention of anything romantic going on between Holly Golightly and the character who is named Paul in the film (in the novel, he is nameless). The character of Paul's "decorator", Mrs Emily Eustace Failenson or Patricia Neal, does not feature in the book and was originated in the film.
In the novel, Mag Wildwood, a model with a stuttering problem, moves into Holly's apartment after Holly falls out with the novelist upstairs. In the film, Mag appears as a stuttering guest who arrives at Holly's party with Rusty Trawler.
The film changed the novella's unresolved, open ending to a more conventional "Hollywood" romantic happy ending.
Capote, who sold the film rights of his novella to Paramount Studios, wanted Marilyn Monroe to play the role of Holly Golightly in the film. Barry Paris references a quote by Capote: "Marilyn was always my first choice to play the girl, Holly Golightly." Screenwriter Axelrod was hired to "tailor the screenplay for Monroe." When Lee Strasberg advised Monroe that playing a prostitute would be bad for her image, she turned it down. When Hepburn was cast instead of Monroe, Capote remarked: "Paramount double-crossed me in every way and cast Audrey."
Kim Novak was asked to play the role of Holly Golightly, but she turned it down, for fear of being typecast as a scared sex kitten.
Originally producers Martin Jurow and Richard Shepherd had picked John Frankenheimer as the director, but Hepburn said: "I've never heard of him" and he was replaced on her request.
Most of the exteriors were filmed in New York City, except the fire escape scenes and the alley scene at the end in the rain where Holly puts Cat out of the cab and then Paul and Holly look for Cat. All of the interiors, except for portions of the scene inside Tiffany's, were filmed on the Paramount Studios lot in Hollywood.
It was rumored that the film's on-location opening sequence, in which Holly looks into a Tiffany's display window, was extremely difficult for director Blake Edwards to shoot. Crowd control, Hepburn's dislike of pastries, and an accident that nearly electrocuted a crew member are all said to have made filming the scene a challenge.
Audrey Hepburn said the scene where she throws Cat into the rainy street was the most distasteful thing she ever had to do on film.
George Peppard was a student of Method acting, a style Hepburn found difficult to work with. Nonetheless, the two actors remained close friends until her death.
Holly's couch is really an old-fashioned bathtub split in half. In some scenes, you can still see the gold handles at one end and the legs on the bottom.
Hepburn as Holly, carrying an over sized cigarette holder, is considered one of the most iconic images of 20th century American cinema.
Orangey, a red tabby cat, was owned and trained by animal trainer, Frank Inn. Orangey (credited under various names) performed in film and television in the 1950s and early 1960s and was the only cat to win two Patsy Awards (Picture Animal Top Star of the Year, an animal actor's version of an Oscar) - the first for the title role in Rhubarb (1951), a story about a cat who inherits a fortune, and the second for his performance in, Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961). Other appearances included a regular role as "Minerva" on the television series, Our Miss Brooks (1952-1958). The cat was also credited as "Jimmy" and "Rhubarb".
Filmography:
Rhubarb (1951) (uncredited) .... Rhubarb This Island Earth (1955) (uncredited) .... Neutron The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957) (uncredited) .... Cat Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961) (as Cat) Gigot (1962) (uncredited) The Comedy of Terrors (1964) (as Rhubarb the Cat) .... Cleopatra Village of the Giants (1965) (uncredited) .... Giant Cat
Mickey Rooney, was born September 23, 1920. His parents, were vaudeville performers. At 17 months old, in a Chicago theatre, he let out a sneeze. The noise caused a spotlight to find him in the crowd. Not knowing what to do he stood up and blew on his tiny toy mouth organ. The shows manager got him a little tuxedo and Mickey began performing his act on stage.
Shortly after Mickey's parents divorced his mother decided he would be perfect for the, "Our Gang" series. After they arrived in Hollywood, they found out the pay was not enough to live on and hey moved back to Kansas City, to live with his aunt. They returned to California again in 1926, where Mickey landed his first film role in the movie "Not To Be Trusted," in which he played a midget.
His big break came in 1927 when he was cast for a series based on a comic strip. His mother wanted to legally change his name to Mickey McGuire for publicity reasons, but the comics creator did not agree. Instead she renamed him Mickey Rooney. In 1934, Mickey was competing in a table tennis tournament in Los Angles when MGM producer David O. Selznick noticed him. He told MGM studio chief Louis Mayer that he had found a kid that was a "goldmine" and begged him to sign Mickey to MGM. Selznick made a role for Mickey in the film "Manhattan Melodrama," which was later made famous when gangster John Dillinger was shot and killed while leaving the theater where he had been watching it. Mickey was the number one box office actor in the United States from 1939-41. He became known for his work on films: A Midsummer Night's Dream(1935). Directed by Max Reinhardt and William Dieterle, produced by Henry Blanke and Hal Wallis, and adapted by Charles Kenyon and Mary C. McCall Jr. from the play by William Shakespeare.
Boys Town(1938), is a biographical drama film based on Father Edward J. Flanagan's work with a group of delinquent boys in a home that he founded and named "Boys Town". Cast: Spencer Tracy as Father Edward J. Flanagan, and Mickey Rooney, Henry Hull, Gene Reynolds, Edward Norris, and Addison Richards.
Babes in Arms(1939). Film version of the 1937 Broadway musical of the same name. Cast: Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, Charles Winninger, Guy Kibbee, June Preisser, Grace Hayes and Betty Jaynes.
Also the "Andy Hardy" series. He starred with many Hollywood leading ladies including Lana Turner, Anne Rutherford and Judy Garland. Mickey made over 200 films. He earned an Honorary Oscar for Lifetime Achievement, a special Juvenile Oscar he shared with Deana Durbin in 1939, five Oscar nominations, one Emmy Award, five Emmy Nominations and two Golden Globes.
