The Snubbed By the Oscars Awards...The Results Are In!

Earlier this month, the Cafe's staff selected twenty performers snubbed by the Oscars and placed them in categories based on one of their most famous performances. We then asked classic film fans to vote in an online poll to select the winners of our first-ever Snubbed By the Oscars Awards!

We'd like to thank everyone who took the time to complete their ballots. To our surprise, we reached the maximum number of votes allowed by our (free) survey software in less than two weeks. Our accountants tell us we can't provide the voting percentages for each performer in each category. However, we will state that Best Supporting Actor was by far the most competitive category.

Without further discussion, here are the winners:

Robert Mitchum showing "love."

Best Actor

Richard Burton, Becket

Kirk Douglas, Ace in the Hole

Cary Grant, Notorious

Robert Mitchum, Night of the Hunter

Peter O’Toole, Lawrence of Arabia

Best Actress

Greta Garbo, Ninotchka

Deborah Kerr, The Innocents

Marilyn Monroe, Some Like It Hot

Barbara Stanwyck, Double Indemnity

Gene Tierney, Leave Her to Heaven

Lansbury as cinema's worst mother.

Best Supporting Actress

Margaret Hamilton, The Wizard of Oz

Elsa Lanchester, Witness for the Prosecution

Angela Lansbury, The Manchurian Candidate

Agnes Moorehead, The Magnificent Ambersons 
Thelma Ritter, Rear Window

Best Supporting Actor

Sydney Greenstreet, The Maltese Falcon

Vincent Price, Laura

Edward G. Robinson, Double Indemnity

Peter Sellers, Dr. Strangelove

Eli Wallach, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Seven Things to Know About Barbara Stanwyck

1. Her real name was Ruby Catherine Stevens. Stanwyck's mother died from complications of a miscarriage, caused when a drunken stranger pushed her off a moving streetcar. Stanwyck's father disappeared while working on the Panama Canal.

2. Barbara's introduction to show business came courtesy of her sister, Mildred, who was nineteen years older. Mildred worked as a showgirl and Barbara followed suit in the early 1920s when she became a dancer in the Ziegfeld Follies.

As Victoria Barkley on The Big Valley.

3. Barbara Stanwyck never won an Oscar, despite being nominated for Best Actress for: Stella Dallas, Ball of Fire, Double Indemnity, and Sorry, Wrong Number. She did receive an Honorary Oscar in 1982. In contrast, she won three Emmys for her television work in The Barbara Stanwyck Show, The Big Valley, and The Thorn Birds.

4. Her only child, Dion Anthony "Tony" Fay, was adopted during her marriage to stage actor Frank Fay. After her divorce, she gained sole custody of Tony. Sadly, mother and son became estranged soon after he enlisted in the Army in 1952. Tony died in 2006 at age 74.

Stanwyck and Robert Taylor.

5. Barbara Stanwyck married Robert Taylor, who was four years younger, in 1939. Although they divorced in 1951, she supposedly claimed that Taylor was the love of her life. They starred together in three films: His Brother's Wife (1936); This Is My Affair (1937), and The Night Walker (1964)--which was made 13 years after their divorce.

6. In regard to acting, she once said: "Eyes are the greatest tool in film. Mr. Capra taught me that. Sure, it's nice to say very good dialogue, if you can get it. But great movie acting--watch the eyes!"

7. Barbara Stanwyck died in 1990 at age 82 of natural causes. Per her wishes, she did not have a funeral service and was cremated. Her ashes were scattered over Lone Pine, California, a popular location for filming Westerns for many years.

Barbara Stanwyck Is Stellar in Stella Dallas

Throughout her storied career Barbara Stanwyck played every female character produced by Hollywood: ingénue, seductress, bad girl, gangster moll, heroine, entertainer, con woman, socialite, etc. While she carried every role off like a true professional, it was the working class girl who wanted to make good role that she most excelled at.  This most probably had to do with her meager, but colorful, upbringing. Orphaned at the age of four, she spent time in foster homes, but was primarily raised by her showgirl sister, Mildred. It was on the vaudeville circuit with Mildred that Stanwyck learned what it took to get ahead in life: strength, determination, and ambition. These, of course, are the same characteristics that many of Stanwyck’s working class roles required—especially Stella Dallas.

Considered one of the best female character roles of all time, Stella Dallas earned Stanwyck the first of her four Academy Award nominations for Best Actress. The daughter of a mill worker, Stella schemes to marry her father’s boss, Stephen (John Boles).  Although they are from two very different backgrounds—he is reserved and refined, while she is loud and crass—they find themselves married and raising a daughter. As Stella finds herself bored with Stephen’s ways, she begins to revert to her tacky ways.  Eventually Stephen leaves her, but leaves their daughter Lollie (Anne Shirley) with Stella because he knows that she is a good mother. As time passes, Stephen finds a much more suitable (and wealthy) woman (Barbara O’Neil) to marry, but Stella doesn’t want to give him a divorce because she’s afraid she’ll lose Lollie. In the end, when she realizes that she cannot give Lollie the life she wants her to have, she makes the ultimate sacrifice.
Of all her roles, and there were many to choose from, this was Stanwyck’s favorite. What’s interesting about this is that Samuel Goldwyn didn’t want to give her the part. He thought she lacked the necessary sex appeal for Stella and wanted Ruth Chatterton for the role. All I can say is: Really? Thankfully director King Vidor and hunky Zeppo Marx (her agent—yes, really) finally convinced Goldwyn that Stanwyck was the right woman for the role.

Based on the Olive Higgins Prouty’s popular novel of the same name, Stella Dallas is considered one of the greatest tearjerkers ever produced. It is a melodramatic film, but it isn’t schmaltzy. This, of course, has to do with Stanwyck’s multifaceted performance. At times, she plays her character as a conniving shrew and you just want to slap some sense of decency into her. Then, she plays Stella as a loving and devoted mother and you just want to wrap your arms around her and give her a hug.  I suppose the scene where she convinces Lollie that she wants to get rid of her so she can run off to South America with her salesman boyfriend is my favorite because Stanwyck plays it with such raw emotion.  Knowing that the only way she can get Lollie to leave her is to convince her that she doesn’t want or need her, Stella is almost ruthless in the act she puts on for Lollie. Not every actress could pull this off, but Stanwyck does a wonderful job of having the audience both hate and admire her at the same time in this scene. It is difficult to watch this, but at least the final scene in the film heals some of the hurt that the audience has endured by Stella’s sacrifice.

This is a film ruled by women---the men are totally forgettable.  Besides Stanwyck’s great performance, the audience is treated to two standout offerings by Shirley and O’Neil. Nominated for Best Supporting Actress, Shirley does a nice job of playing a young woman who loves her mother but is conflicted by her desire to live a more respectable life.  This may have been the finest performance of her career (I do like her in Murder, My Sweet though), but sometimes it is difficult for me to suspend my belief that Stanwyck was old enough to play her mother (they were only eleven years apart in age). That said, she does give a touching performance. An interesting aside about the Stanwyck/Shirley connection is that Shirley played Stanwyck’s younger self in So Big (1932). In addition to Stanwyck and Shirley, O’Neil also does a fine turn as Stella’s polar opposite. I enjoyed watching her scene with Stanwyck.  It was one of those only another mother could understand moments that pull at your heartstrings.

In the end, Stella Dallas is a film you don’t want to watch without a box of tissues.  It is a prime piece of evidence that Stanwyck was one of the greatest actresses to grace the silver screen.

Double Indemnity: There Is No Insurance for Murder

When it comes to the ultimate femme fatale you need only think of one name: Phyllis Dietrichson. Many have tried to surpass her—many have failed. In her first unsympathetic villainess role, Barbara Stanwyck set the bar so high that you can’t even measure how short other actresses have fallen trying to be as good a femme fatale as she was in Double Indemnity (1944). One of the great travesties in Academy Award history is that Stanwyck, who was nominated four times for Best Actress, never won an Oscar. She was nominated for this film in 1944, but lost to Ingrid Bergman in Gaslight. Many film critics believe this was a glaring oversight by the Academy, citing the outright nastiness and amoral nature of her character as the reason she was snubbed. Quite frankly, Hollywood wasn’t ready for Phyllis Dietrichson. And, when you think about it, who could ever be ready for such an evil force of nature?

Legendary auteur Billy Wilder directed this penultimate film noir, which was nominated for seven Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Actress, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Cinematography (black and white), Best Sound, and Best Score. It won none. Perhaps a film about an adulterous murder plot to collect insurance money was just too much for a country at war.

With the help of the great detective novelist Raymond Chandler, Wilder adapted the James M. Cain novella Three of a Kind into one of the greatest screenplays of the Golden Age of Hollywood. Chandler and Wilder’s dialogue is searing and sharp and the overall storyline is a taut, thrilling ride down a boulevard of betrayal. In a film noir staple, the film is told in the past tense, via voiceover. The story involves a very unsatisfied (I suspect mostly in the Biblical sense) housewife (Stanwyck) and an easily enticed insurance salesman. While carrying on a licentious affair, the couple kill the husband to claim a double indemnity clause in his accidental death policy. What follows the murder is suspicion, guilt, double-crosses and bullets.

Aided by the deft cinematography of John Seitz (whom Wilder worked with on several films), Wilder captured the unseemly nature of Hollywood, incorporating several locales into the film—most notably the Hollywood Bowl and the Glendale train station. Roger Ebert has said that Seitz’s photography in this film “helped develop the noir style of sharp-edged shadows and shots, strange angles and lonely settings." Countless “venetian blind” shots are used.

The film opens with injured, Pacific All-Risk Insurance Company salesman Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray in a rare bad-guy role) staggering into the company’s building one early Los Angeles morning to record, via Dictaphone, how and why he committed the “perfect crime” for a woman wearing blonde bangs, honeysuckle perfume and an anklet. It all started innocently enough when he accidentally met bored housewife Phyllis Dietrichson at her faux-Spanish mansion while stopping by to get her husband to renew his car insurance. In one of the more memorable film entrances, Stanwyck enters the screen wearing only a towel and a flirtatious smile. When she emerges next to “properly” meet Neff she’s wearing a revealing dress and her signature anklet. For those of you who don’t know, the old theory was that women who wore anklets were loose women. Her use of her legs as a diversionary tactic in this scene is something that Sharon Stone would use in Basic Instinct—of course Stanwyck was wearing panties…I hope. A double-entendre conversation ensues between them about speeding cars, where Neff makes it clear he’s interested in insuring he sees her again. That is soon arranged, as Phyllis asks him to come back the next evening to speak to her husband about the policy.

Later that day Neff introduces us to by-the-book claims investigator Baton Keyes (Edward G. Robinson), a man consumed with getting every detail right and uncovering shady insurance claims. (Keyes is the man for whom Neff is recording his crimes.) While in his office, Phyllis calls and changes their appointment for the next afternoon. Strangely enough when he arrives the next day, Mr. Dietrichson (Tom Powers) is not at home again and it’s the maid’s day off. In addition, Phyllis seems very concerned about the dangerous nature of her husband’s work (he spends a lot of time in his oil fields). So much so, that she asks about buying an accident policy without her husband knowing about it. Shocked by the suggestion and angry that she thought he was so stupid that he couldn’t see what she was planning, Walter huffily walks out on the blonde bombshell.

Yet, later that night when he finds Phyllis standing in his doorway (returning a hat she doesn’t seem to have) he doesn’t exactly slam the door in her face. Perhaps it was the clingy sweater she was wearing, or even the scent of wafting honeysuckle in the air. After explaining she doesn’t want him to get the wrong impression about her and that her life with Mr. Dietrichson is horrible, Walter grabs her and plants a “red-hot” kiss on her lips. Later, Phyllis explains that she often fantasizes about killing her husband with carbon monoxide poisoning in the garage. To Neff there are three bonuses to this plan: $1000,000, beating the insurance game, and having Phyllis all to himself. Presumably after they have consummated their newfound relationship (he smokes a cigarette and she reapplies her makeup), Neff agrees to help her kill her husband and make it look like an accident, but everything had to be “straight down the line” as he doesn’t want there to be any mistakes for Keyes to find.

A few days later Neff arrives at the Dietrichson house to have Mr. Dietrichson renew his auto insurance policy. Leading the unknowing husband to believe he must sign duplicate forms, Neff gets him to sign his own death warrant. The next part of the plan concerns having Mr. Dietrichson take the train instead of his car on his next trip to Stanford. The double indemnity clause pays twice as much for a death that occurs on a train. They use the local grocery store as their clandestine meeting place to plan their crime. A monkey wrench is thrown into their plan when Mr. Dietrichson breaks his leg, but only temporarily. When Mr. Dietrichson decides to take his trip after all, using crutches to get around, Neff and Phyllis hatch a plan where he takes the place of the injured husband on the train. Disguised as the soon- to-be dead husband, Neff hides in the back of the Dietrichson car while Phyllis drives Mr. Dietrichson to the Glendale train station. When she honks the horn three times he pops up from the back seat and breaks the husband’s neck. While the murder isn’t shown on screen, Wilder uses a close-up of the unflinching face of Phyllis staring straight ahead as her husband is being murdered on the seat beside her to convey the vileness of the murder. Taking the husband’s place on the train, Neff later jumps from the train when it slows down and he and Phyllis put Mr. Dietrichson’s body on the tracks. Now they just had to wait.

Although the police don’t suspect foul play, the insurance company wants to investigate to see if they can get out of paying the double indemnity clause. Keyes is assigned the case and told by the company president that they want him to find out if Mr. Dietrichson killed himself. In a meeting with Phyllis, the company president explains the situation and offers to make a smaller settlement to her. Pretending to be unaware of the policy, Phyllis feigns fury and storms out. Meanwhile, Keyes doesn’t think suicide by slow-moving train is very likely and tells Neff that the case seems like a legitimate one.

Later, with Phyllis on her way to his apartment, Neff opens the door and finds Keyes. Something just popped into his head about the case: why hadn’t Mr.Dietrichson filed an accident claim when he broke his leg? Perhaps, Keyes believes, because he didn’t know about the policy but that Phyllis did. Luckily for the dastardly duo Phyllis can overhear Keyes from the hallway and she hides behind the door until he leaves. Cracks begin to appear in their relationship as Phyllis is angry that Neff suggests they not see each other while the investigation is taking place. In addition, Mr. Dietrichson’s daughter, Lola (Jean Heather), suggests to Neff that Phyllis not only killed her father but her own mother as well when she was her nurse. Oh, and by the way, step-mommy is sleeping with her ex-boyfriend, Zachetti (Byron Barr), as well. Feeling sorry for the girl and wanting to keep her quiet, Neff begins spending time with her as a substitute for Phyllis.

After putting the pieces of his investigation together, Keyes reveals to Neff what really happened in the Dietrichson case: the husband was killed by his wife and her lover. He explains to Neff every step of the crime correctly, but he doesn’t suspect Neff. Nervous, Neff and Phyllis meet yet again at the supermarket. Phyllis is highly suspicious when Neff suggest she not sue for the insurance claim and is even more suspicious about the time he has been spending with Lola. She coldly reminds Neff that their in it “straight down the line.” Neff starts to think that things would be better if Phyllis were dead, especially after Keyes determines that Zachetti was Phyllis’ accomplice. And, so the fateful 11 'o’clock meeting is set at the mansion.

With Zachetti as his fall guy, Neff determines to rid himself of the one person who can connect him to the murder: Phyllis. Shadowed by venetian blind slats, a living room of death awaits the final showdown between Phyllis and Neff. Oh, but Phyllis has her own suspicions that the double-cross is on. So, after unlocking the door for her accomplice, she sits down in a chair with her pearl-handled gun hidden under the cushion. When Neff arrives he informs Phyllis of his plan to off-her and frame Zachetti for everything. Really? How stupid can you be? Phyllis informs him she has her own plans and they don’t involve her death but his own. In an excellent climatic scene, Neff closes the living room blinds and when the room goes black a shot rings out. The next thing we see is Neff staggered by a bullet and Phyllis standing over him hesitating to finish him off. In a strange twist, Phyllis surrenders to her love for Neff and allows him to take the gun from her. While vulnerably embracing him some form of intelligence returns to her brain when she feels the barrel of the gun pointing at her chest. Two point blank shots to the chest and it’s “goodbye baby”. Really? I don’t like this ending at all, but it was Hollywood 1944, so what can I expect?

The final scene of the film finds Neff in his office with Keyes, who is shocked by what his friend has done. When Neff asks him to give him four hours before calling the police, Robinson delivers the great line: “You’ll never make the border…you’ll never even make the elevator.” He was right.

The twists and turns of this thrilling film noir are enough to make your pulse race. You pair the stellar storyline to the raw sexuality that Stanwyck brought to her role as Phyllis and this is a wonderful film to just sit and absorb. While both Fred MacMurray and Edward G. Robinson do great jobs with their respective characters, this film belongs to Stanwyck. This was, without a doubt, her greatest dramatic role. She was so good in this role that countless male fans who had loved her before seeing this film actually started to dislike her after seeing it. She and Double Indemnity are a “straight down the line” treat to watch.

Clash by Night (1952) - Noir or Noir-ish

There is an ongoing debate regarding the status of Clash by Night as a true representative of the film noir genre. It does not have a crime at its core; however there is the lingering threat of an explosion of violence from one or more of the characters. It is effectively filmed in black and white by noir veteran cinematographer Nicholas Mucurasa, and directed by the legendary Fritz Lang, who took three superb actors and drew from them performances crackling with frustration, self-loathing, disappointment, desperation, the aching need for and the paralyzing fear of love. The film is based on a play by Clifford Odets, which appeared on Broadway in 1941.






This story centers around the character of Mae Doyle (Barbara Stanwyck), who has come home to the small fishing village of Monterey California after years on the East Coast where she was involved with a married politician until his death. He provided for her in his will, but it was successfully contested by his family and she returns reluctantly to what essentially is the only place she can go. She is not exactly welcomed with open arms by her fisherman brother (Keith Andes), but is warmly accepted by his girlfriend Peggy (Marilyn Monroe). Mae has escaped the asphyxiating and restrictive bonds of her hometown, seeking a more independent and perhaps unacceptable existence where she could follow her own instincts and desires. Happiness is not part of her vocabulary, but confidence is a major factor in her search for security. She needs a man who will give her confidence in herself and love does not necessarily play a part in this equation.

Still beautiful and alluring, Mae is courted by the simple, kind, goodhearted fisherman, Jerry who has fallen in love with her. He wants to marry her, although she warns him off, telling him that she will be no good for him and will ultimately hurt him. But Jerry is persistent and Mae starts to imagine that she could change, that domestic life would not be the locked cage that she imagines it to be. At the same time she's introduced to Jerry's best friend Earl, a drunken, woman hating, sexually charged and potentially violent man who works as a projectionist in the local theater. When they meet, the chemistry starts percolating immediately. Jerry is totally oblivious to this attraction between Mae and his best friend and he continues to have Earl in his life not knowing how combustible the situation is. Mae realizes she's made a mistake almost from the beginning and that Jerry's bearlike physical appearance of strength does not guarantee that he will be the one to keep her safe and inspire her with confidence. Mae has a child with Jerry, but this does not solidify the relationship and she is once again beset by a sense of imprisonment in the domestic life she has chosen with Jerry. It is almost painful to watch Mae conforming to the domestic duties of a housewife, hanging sheets. washing blouses, even her interaction with her child. Clearly she is not ready for this way of life.

Ultimately there is an eruption of violent passion between Mae and Earl. The intensity of their kisses seems almost brutal in their need to satisfy the raging sensual hunger that consumes them both, most particularly when Mae places her hand beneath Earl's undershirt, flesh against flesh, in an attempt to intensify the electric current coursing through them. Earl begs Mae to run off with him, declaring that he can't live without her and vowing to become whatever she wants him to be in order to please her; however, these entreaties have a sinister undertone of power and control not associated with the love that he professes. Jerry still pathetically unaware of the betrayal going on around him is finally enlightened by the innuendos of his uncle Vince, a man who bears a grudge against Mae. in a manner eerily reminiscent of Iago's deadly whispers to Othello about Desdemona. Jerry confronts the couple and Mae admits that she is going away with Earl. Jerry is profoundly disgusted by their actions, referring to them as animals who should be kept in cages away from human beings. Emotionally devastated, he storms out of the room. Vince continues his vitriolic rantings about Mae to a drunken and vulnerable Jerry, whose gentle demeanor is ruptured by an uncontrollable rage that leads him to nearly strangle Earl, in another reference to Othello.

When Mae returns to her home she finds her baby girl missing from her crib and realizes that Jerry has taken her. The shock of this situation forces Mae to acknowledge that the intensity of her relationship with Earl would burn out quickly and she opts for a safe life with Jerry. She seeks him out in an attempt to gain his forgiveness and redeem herself in his eyes. In spite of all the pain Mae has inflicted on him, Jerry is willing to take her back and thus offers her the redemption she seeks.

Barbara Stanwyck gives one of her finest performances as Mae, delivering lines in the natural and unadulterated fashion that made her one of the great screen actresses. Odets' dialogue becomes on-target, rapid machine-gun fire in the hands of this most talented actress. Robert Ryan, one of our great underrated film actors, perfectly embodies the brutal code of life by which Earl lives. As Jerry, Paul Douglas, an experienced stage actor, is a revelation capturing all aspects of Jerry's emotional roller coaster, from naive and trusting soul to a murderous husband scorned. Director Fritz Lang utilized the elements of film noir in his dazzling camerawork and lighting and guides his actors to believably natural performances, never removing them from the realities of the emotional anguish that permeates their everday lives.

Defining this film as genuine or faux noir does not diminish my reaction to its honest portrayal of complex characters trying to find a way to defeat the various demons that possess them and still manage to emerge from that battle with enough strength and hope to continue the search for that elusive defense tactic that will finally give them peace.

Forget the noir debate and see one of the finest films of the fifties, compelling, brilliantly directed and photographed, with superb unflinching performances which lay bare the self-inflicted wounds of failed attempts to live life according to one's own rules, no matter whose "throat is cut" during the process.

12 Days of Christmas: When Fred Met Barbara - "Remember the Night" (1940)

In my family Now Voyager has long been the movie that we could sit and watch for 24 hours a day; we all know the dialogue and we compete to see who does the best Bette Davis impression. However, another film is poised to take the place of the iconic Warner Bros. romance. Remember the Night stars Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray, the future murderous lovers of Double Indemnity, in very different roles as improbable soul mates who find the gift of love at Christmas. Although written by Preston Sturges, this is not one of his screwball comedies, but rather a comedy drama laced with darker moments; the bittersweet ending is a still a subject of debate to this day. It is well documented that director Mitchell Leisen ( Midnight, Frenchman's Creek, Hold Back the Dawn, To Each His Own ) made many changes to Sturges' screenplay. He cut scenes out completely, pared down others, and switched the emphasis from Fred MacMurray to Barbara Stanwyck. Although understandably unhappy with Leisen's script tampering, Sturges showed up every day on the set during shooting. He spent a lot of time with Barbara Stanwyck and promised to write a screwball comedy for her, which he did one year later with The Lady Eve. But his negative experience on this film led him to finally fulfill his dream of directing his own scripts; his first film as writer-director was The Great McGinty. Even though Remember the Night opened to favorable reviews, Sturges dismissed it summarily as unadulterated schmaltz

You were wrong Mr. Sturges! The greatness of this film lies in the fact that every moment that could have turned into a melodramatic cliché was transformed into a quietly believable interaction between characters. The growing love between Stanwyck and MacMurray is presented as a series of revelatory exchanges and actions which surprise both of them by creating feelings of affection and attraction which neither had expected. Barbara Stanwyck is magnificent in her portrayal of a petty criminal, cynical and initially unsympathetic, whose view of the world is softened by a holiday visit with MacMurray's family.















The basic story of Remember the Night involves a shoplifter, Lee Leander (Barbara Stanwyck) arrested on Christmas Eve trying to steal a diamond bracelet, facing prosecution by an assistant district attorney, John Sargent (Fred MacMurray) who knows he won't get a conviction from a jury on Christmas Eve and motions to postpone the trial until after the holiday. He feels bad about Lee's spending Christmas in jail and bails her out. She is brought to his apartment believing that he wants her to spend the night as repayment for posting bail. But that is not the case, and John tells her to go home but not before he takes her out to dinner. They are seen together at the restaurant by the judge in the case and leave quickly. Sargent is on his way home to Indiana to spend the holidays with his family and finds out that Lee also is a Hoosier, and offers to drop her off on the way home and pick her up on the return trip. Lee's attempt to reconcile with her estranged mother proves disastrous when the callous and unforgiving woman turns her own daughter out of her childhood home. John takes pity on her, inviting her to spend the holidays with his family. It is during this time that Lee's proximity to a loving family and the joy they share with each other breaks down the barriers she has set up for protection against the harsh world she inhabits. The affection that develops between her and John is depicted in small increments with unexpected outcomes. It is in this nurturing setting that Stanwyck begins to glow, exuding a brilliance, almost an inner light, perhaps reflecting a new found hope for the future. There are scenes in which Lee Leander is no longer a character played by Barbara Stanwyck, but a young woman with a troubled past accepting the kindness she is offered, and taking a new interest in changing the direction of her life. In one scene, while vigorously brushing her hair, Stanwyck seems to acknowledge the possibility that she could establish a better life for herself; with every stroke one more strand of her past falls away. She continues to engage in family-oriented activities; playing the piano and singing on Christmas Eve; and going to the annual barn dance, dressed in an old-fashioned party gown, with corset and layers of undergarments. With a bow in her hair and looking as lovely as a photograph from another era, she weakens John's resistance to his growing affection for her and he professes his love. They embrace and share their first meaningful kiss and John seems to be willing to forsake his burgeoning career in order to be with Lee. This change is not lost on John's mother; she approaches Lee and wistfully explains the hardships that her son endured in order to become a lawyer, intimating that a relationship with her would be detrimental to his future. John however is aware of his mother's objections and will not end his relationship with Lee. On the return trip for the court date John offers Lee a chance for freedom in Canada; with Niagara Falls as the backdrop Lee chooses to continue on to her trial.
















Still determined to prevent Lee from going to prison, John badgers and bullies Lee on the witness stand, until Lee realizes he is trying to throw the case. She interrupts his questioning and declares to the judge that she wants to plead guilty much to John's dismay. He follows her as she is led out of the courtroom and agonizingly questions her decision. For Lee the only way to redeem herself and make herself worthy of John's love is to pay for the crime that she committed. She refuses John's proposal of marriage but tells him that if he feels the same way when she's released she will marry him.


The most poignant moment in this scene however occurs when Lee asks John to hold her hand during her sentencing, indicating that she is frightened by the prospect of prison, but still determined to do the right thing. The ending of this film is written and performed in a way that leaves the audience without a definite idea of what will happen in the future. There is no guarantee that John's love will survive introspection or that Lee's rehabilitation will be successful. The darkness attributed to this ending is another way of saying that the outcome is uncertain as it is in real life.

Remember the Night is essentially a movie for all seasons. It doesn't hammer you over the head with lessons in morality, but rather gently and effectively depicts how love can heal a wounded spirit and change the course of one's life.

12 Days of Christmas: Barbara Stanwyck Hosts a Christmas in Connecticut

Happily married housewife,

Mother of one precious baby,

Loves to cook with a passion

In a beautiful Connecticut farmhouse

Author of Smart Housekeeping column

The above profile of Elizabeth Lane, smartly played by Barbara Stanwyck, sounds pretty awesome. Yet the only elements of truth are contained in the last line and even this is fraught with lies because every recipe published in Lane’s column is taken from her friend, professional chef Felix Bassenak, delightfully portrayed by S. Z. “Cuddles” Sakall.

The problem with building an existence on deception is that it can catch up to you at the most inopportune moment. For Lane, this happens when the magazine owner decides that she should play hostess to both a war hero and himself for Christmas in her fantastic farmhouse, with her fabulous family, and delectable dining.

The comedy of errors begins with a frenzy here! The hero, Jefferson Jones, played by Dennis Morgan, turns out to be a handsome and caring young man who finds himself attracted to what he thinks is a married woman with a young baby while Lane is equally smitten with Jones.

Some humorous scenes include when different babies are dropped off at the farmhouse to pass for Lane’s made-up child, one a blonde boy and the other a brunette girl. There are a number of attempts at a marriage between Lane and John Sloane (Reginald Gardiner)--a fellow who does care for her, is hosting the farce at his Connecticut farm, and is acting as the husband/father--but something always interrupts the effort.

Barbara Stanwyck is quite fun in this role, though it bears a strong resemblance to her work as Ann Mitchell, in Capra’s Meet John Doe. Christmas in Connecticut ends predictably but fans would expect and want nothing less.

Again, this movie was disastrously remade in 1992 and is reported to being remade even as I write, this time with Jennifer Garner.