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Applause
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by Kino Video
Sales Rank: 97119
Price: $26.99
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A "tear-jerker" (before the Hayes office took effect), but surprisingly well-done,with some unexpected storylines Helen Morgan must be one of the most under-utilized talents in movie history. A natural.Simple, affecting. A small gem. <br />The film is worth seeing , even 'tho it's a bit hurky-jerky in it's editing, for its subject matter and the way in which much of it was dealt with at the earlier part of "talkie" history. Unexpectedly complex, for the time.
Viewer Reviews
Made in 1929, this film was directed by Robert Mamoulian and features some pioneering camera work. Specifically, the static camera of other 1929 films is absent here. Mamoulian does some of this by shooting part of the picture silent with sound dubbed over it, such as in the scene where Kitty first arrives in New York and the camera follows her line of sight as she looks around the hustle and bustle of Grand Central Station. In scenes with lots of motion that have dialogue, Mamoulian has the players walking away from the camera so he can dub in the dialogue unsynchronized to the players' actual speech. If you didn't know how he did this, you wouldn't notice it.
If you are expecting to see Helen Morgan the torch singer doing the same type of act she did for Ziegfeld in his Follies, you'll be disappointed. Instead, be prepared to see Helen Morgan the actress in this one. Here Helen Morgan plays Kitty Darling, a woman of burlesque whose husband is sent to the electric chair for killing a man in a fit of jealousy. Kitty gives birth to their daughter, April, at about the same time. Convinced by a friend that the burlesque backstage is no place for a child to grow up, Kitty sends April to a convent school in Wisconsin. She remains there from age 5 to age 17.
When April returns home she finds her mother's world in sharp contrast to the peace of the convent. Plus, Kitty has taken up with a younger man. He is a parasite who is two and three timing her and soaking up what money she has. He tries to put the moves on April, but with no success. Kitty dealing with the end of her career and both her private and professional humiliation is hard to watch. Morgan gained weight and donned an unkempt blonde wig just for this part, and her acting is superb. Do realize that much of the film focuses on April, Kitty's daughter. Joan Peers was the actress playing April, and this was her first credited screen role. She handles the part quite well, but by 1931 her career in films was over.
There are a few extra features on the DVD:
* An interview with Helen Morgan after her 1933 marriage.
* A short speech by Mamoulian from 1986 on the 50th anniversary of the Director's Guild of America which he helped found.
* An excerpt from 1929's "Glorifying the American Girl" in which Helen Morgan sings.
* Some text entries on the correlation of the novel "Applause" and the film.
* A newspaper article from 1929 in which the author has interviewed director Robert Mamoulian entitled "The Camera is the Thing".
* An image gallery
By the way, the video quality is excellent and the audio is fine too. It is necessary to turn up the volume a little during some outdoor or crowd scenes that have dialogue. However, there is no hissing and crackling in the audio, nor is the sound of shoes clomping around and jewelry clanging in competion with speech as in many other early sound films.
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Applause
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