Thursday Movie Picks: the Stage.

Just so all of you know...my mom is back to her "norm" and has no recollection that she was in the hospital nor that she had pneumonia. Dementia, in this case, is a blessing as who wants to remember this crap. Everyone is back to work so I can breathe and try and catch up on my own work. Thank you so very, very much for all your kind words, prayers and best wishes, I was very deeply moved. Now that life is back to norm( Ha!), the eclipse is done, and the freaks have hid themselves away, I can talk about the stage because we all know the world's a stage. This week at Wandering Through The Shelves, it is about the stage and I picked 3 films that, I believe, is a theme within a theme and I wasn't even going for that. It will be interesting what the other film nuts have chosen so head on over and check it out. Here are my 3....

1. THE BLUE ANGEL-1930

This is the film that made Marlene Dietrich famous but it was not her first film as she always liked to say. It stars the leggy Dietrich with Emil Jennings( he won the first actor Oscar) as the hapless professor who falls under her spell. The professor is angered by his male students being captivated by this cabaret star rather than wanting to study. He finally goes to the Blue Angel to catch the boys and over a few visits falls for Lola Lola. You see his slow decay as he succumbs to her, um, charms. It is directed by Joseph Von Sternberg who was Dietrich's Svengali. A great expressionist German film showing the decadence of Berlin. It is worth seeing how this decadence and a place that looks like garbage( what his students call him) seduces and ruins a man. Great film.

2. CABARET-1972

I love this film that has the Kit Kat Club as the centre for all that is going on in the lives of the people involved. You have Sally Bowles, played by Liza Minnelli, who loves to wear shocking nail polish, as the main headliner at the club. She meets the young student/writer, played by Michael York, who rents a room from the same place she is living at. They become romantically entwined and meet a rich Jewish lady, a young German man who falls for the Jewish lady and comes out as also being Jewish and a rich German playboy who likes to swing both ways. Decadent Berlin has never been shown better than by the MC of the Kit Kat Club, played by Joel Grey who showcases life that is happening outside the club. You not only have romance but horror. Bob Fosse brought horror with 2 musical pieces that I found shocking. The Gorilla skit and the young boy singing in a beer garden. The Nazi party is gaining ground and there is no way to stop it.

3. MRS. HENDERSON PRESENTS-2005

I just watched this a few months ago and thoroughly enjoyed it. It take place during WW2 with Mrs. Henderson, played by the great Judi Dench, as a widow who is very, very wealthy. On a whim she buys a derelict theatre, fixes it up and starts having round the clock shows. It becomes such a success that other theatres adopt this which brings her finances for the club down so she starts having shows with women...naked. People are aghast and upset but she pulls it off and it becomes a hit. She loves the theatre, the girls and the people who work there. It is a thoughtful, fun and an entertaining film based on a true story.

What films would you choose?