American Dad (The Professor and the coach): Movies about Writing

American Dad is about a Republican CIA agent who lives in Langley with his perky housewife Francine, wanna-be hippy daughter Hayley, dork son Steve, stoner son-in-law Jeff, German skier trapped in a fish Klaus, and alien Roger. Roger’s favorite thing is creating personas to hide himself in plain sight.

Roger’s new persona is Professor Dickens LongBottom, a creative writing instructor at Hayley’s college. He greatly inspires her (“Me writers?”) and she decides to help him finish is novel. First, they try going to a coffee shop, but Roger finds faults with everything they do.

He confesses to being scared of his novel not being “universally beloved”, a both unrealistic and very truthful fear/goal. In order to avoid his block, Roger double dips with a second campus persona, the new football coach. Hayley keeps trying to push Roger to write because Longbottom is her favorite of his personas and she believes in him (the professor not Roger himself). Roger’s avoidance is so strong that he turns the coffee shop he he writes at into a sports bar.

Hayley insists that Roger needs to stop sabotaging himself to avoid failure. She tells him that all he needs is pen, paper, and adderall. However, the book is poorly reviewed and Roger instead writes a playbook/cookbook as the coach. Then, the coach reads the professor’s book and is touched by it. Therefore Roger decides art is worth it as long as it touches one person… even though the person touched in this case was himself. Okay, American Dad has gotten weirder over the years, but I’m sure there’s a lesson in there someplace.

In the words of Prof. Longbottom, “Writing is hard.”

A Cinderella Story: A Christmas Wish: Movies About Writing

I love a good Cinderella story . . . And this . . . How do I be diplomatic?

Let’s just dive in. The Cinderella is played by Laura Marano, an actress from one of those Disney Channel shows where the kids all have to sing and/or dance). Kat (nope, not Ella) is an aspiring songwriter who is working on a crappy Christmas pop tune. Sorry. Sorry. Anyone who knows me knows that 12 years of retail killed most “popular” Christmas songs for me. I generally just stick to the soundtrack from Muppet Christmas Carol and the classics preferably sung by Ella Fitzgerald. I should warn all the songs in this are unbelievably auto tuned Which surprised me since the main actress was on a show where all they did was make her sing. OK, deep breath, as we dive in even further.

Kat works at a Christmas Santaland as a dancing, singing elf with her best friend. She is trying to save up money to move out of her stepmother’s house, but knows realistically she can’t until she gets her inheritance at the age of 18 (which is still several months away). Also working at Santaland in secret is Dominic Wintergarden (Gregg Sulkin). Yes. That is his name. His dad (billionaire who, spoiler alert, used to be best friends with Kat’s philanthropist father) Insist that his son dresses as Santa (it is family tradition). Oh yeah. They also own Santaland.

Even though having an eighteen year old play Santa is already awkward, Kat’s best friend starts calling him “hot Santa” and “sexy Santa”. At one point he and Kat even do weird striptease, Removing hats and fake ears in order to reveal who they truly are under the costumes. And that is about the point when I sped up the speed of the movie So I didn’t have to torture myself through all 85 minutes.

Can’t hold it in anymore. I’m sure many people worked very hard on this movie, but I was in physical pain watching parts of it. It wasn’t even just the corn ball. It was scenes like scenes silly striptease with Santa (look how cute we are Even though she’s technically under age, and you’re making jokes about removing clothing - Yes, I know the actors are in their 20s; it’s the thought of it in a kid’s movie not the reality) and a random duet between Kat and “prince charming” when all of the other songs were performances/part of Kat’s songwriting process. And then at the end, she breaks the forth wall right before the “big kiss” and I suddenly felt very uncomfortable! Don’t look directly at the camera before you make out! It’s creepy!

What I did like was that she and her best friend were both creatives who supported each other (her songwriting and her friend’s aspirations to be a costume designer). Her step-mother is super wicked. She kept feeding on Kat’s insecurities and keeping her down by telling her she’s never survive as a songwriter. I kept expecting the woman to harm Kat’s disabled dog just to add to the wickedness. Also, the dog was named Bruno.

Rowing with the Wind: Movies about Writing

Have you ever said to yourself - gee, I wonder what it would be like if Hugh Grant played Lord Byron? What? You haven’t! Too bad. It happened. Rowing with the Wind was a 1988 Spanish film with a mostly English cast distributed by an American studio. “Too many cooks! Too many cooks!” Besides Grant as Bryon, the movie stars Lizzy McInnerny as Mary, Valentine Pelka as Shelley, Jose Luis Gomez as Polidori (making him way older than the rest of the group), and Elizabeth Hurley as Claire. Yes, children of the 90s, this when Grant and Hurley met. They also make William Fletcher, Byron’s valet, a major character played by Ronan Vibert.

The film opens with Mary on a ship in icy waters writing the same scene into Frankenstein. Then there’s an abrupt transition to Shelley asking Mary’s father for permission to make her his mistress while Mary, Claire, and their sister Fanny watch through a keyhole. Despite Mr. Godwin’s rejection of this plan leads to the group escaping to Lake Geneva so Claire can tell Lord Byron that she’s pregnant. Poor Fanny gets left behind. For those of you who don’t know, Fanny was Mary’s half-sister, the illegitimate child of famed writer Mary Wollstonecraft, who’d been adopted by Godwin when he became her step-father. She committed suicide the same year Mary ran off with Shelley which is thrown in as a random tragedy instead of being the senseless horror that it should have been in Mary’s life.

Byron is suffering from ennui when the group arrives so he accepts them as perverse entertainment with the usual cruelty to Claire and Polidori mixed in. Shelley starts freaking out before the drugs have even been passed around. There’s a lot of easy to look up facts that are inaccurate in this version, but at least it includes mention of the storytelling night. Still, not much is stated about how not just Frankenstein was developed that night. How about a little love for the Vampyre, movie makers! It deserves more love than Byron and Shelley’s philosophies that fill up half of these movies.

This film does go beyond that summer of creation, but in more of a creepy, supernatural way. Mary’s writing is a larger part of the actual story. She’s begun her novel and starts to feel like the creature is haunting her and those around her. After Polidori drunkenly attempts to talk to her in the middle of the night while she’s working, he hallucinates a scarred man in a coachman’s coat is playing pool with him. The next day he’s found hanged near the billiards table (THAT NEVER HAPPENED! The doctor died 6 years later).

Mary pauses the book as she and Claire each give birth to children, but she’s still followed by her creature. She begins to worry about curses and insists they go to Italy for both Shelley’s health and to try to stop her father from demanding money from them. In Italy, the creature kills Mary’s son William, Claire’s daughter is taken away by Byron and dies, Mary grows jealous of Claire, and (gasp) Mary receives poor reviews for her novel Frankenstein! Mary decides she must destroy the creature before it destroys her! Very dramatic.

This one is more of tragedy meeting art in an awkward, historically inaccurate way. There’s no mention of Mary’s other kids or other books. It’s all sadness and Frankenstein’s monster. It’s a little conceited to think every terrible thing to happen in the 19th century was the result of one book you wrote. C’mon Mary, get it together, girl.

Alex and Emma: Movies about Writing

I know this one is not everyone’s favorite movie, but I enjoyed the jokes about the writing process and maybe if you watch/re-watch you’ll agree after reading this blog.

Alex (Luke Wilson) is an in-debt author on a deadline who hires stenographer Emma (Kate Hudson) to take down his words and save him on the editing process for a his first draft. Rob Reiner upholds a tradition by both playing Alex’s publisher and is the director of the film (seriously, look at his movies. He acts in a lot of them).

Alex’s Gatsby-esque book becomes fantasy sequences throughout the film. He and Kate Hudson play literary counterparts of themselves and Sophia Marceau play’s the subject of the lovelorn Alex’s affection (both fictionally and in reality), Polina. Although, he lies to Emma and says Polina is a mixture of various women he’s known. The novel is about Adam, a tutor for a wealthy family who falls in love with the single mother of his young charges, but needs money in order to win her. Emma is turned into a series of characters that I will get to later.

First of all, I appreciate Alex’s apartment, a half-renovated mess full of books with a loft for a bed and bare wood all around. The sharks who come to collect money he borrowed from their boss did not age well, portrayed as Cuban stereotypes donning tank tops and neck tattoos. Alex has to confess to them that he’s blocked so they give him thirty days to get what he owes before they kill him. Yeah. I know. I feel like taking a penniless writer’s money was a bad idea on the Cuban boss’s part. I don’t think he would have done it in the first place, but then this movie wouldn’t have a plot, I guess.

It’s extreme NanoWrimo! Write 50,000 words in 30 days or DIE!!!!

Emma immediately dislikes Alex’s desperation and hypochondria, still she takes the job out of curiosity. Meanwhile, Alex is annoyed by Emma’s logic and how she always reads the end of a book first to decide if she will read it. In fact she does this with his previous novel right in front of me. Rude. Emma is confused that Alex has no idea where the new book will go and finds it strange when he explains to her that the characters decide where the story will go. This starts a first day of hours upon hours of Alex trying to write a grabbing first sentence. Yet, when Emma threatens to storm out, Alex’s brain starts to flow.

This becomes the norm between the two of them. He comes up with an idea and she argues it. Some of her arguments are super annoying like how he can’t claim that real explorer Cartier discovered the made-up setting of his book. Others make more sense as a reader, such as her objecting to descriptions of characters after they’ve spoken, ruining what she’s already imagined in her head. There are great jokes about word choice (“You introduced the bosom. I'm just asking if you want them to heave.”, plot holes, and character development. Most of the character development comes from him constantly changing the book’s Au-pair who he bases on Emma. She starts as Ylva, an awkward Swede, then becomes Elsa the bossy German, and finally Anna an American who embodies the truth of Emma in fictional form.

A good deal of the real writing process is in this movie. There is even a scene where a day’s work is ruined and Adam must re-write it.

The rest of the film is the usual rom-com fodder. He grows as a man. He gets the girl. He loses the girl. He learns a lesson. And so he gets the girl again.

American Dreamer: Movies about Writing

Did you know CBS tried to have a theatrical film company in the 80s? Yeah… I think it’s something most people have tried to block out. Either way, in 1984 CBS produced American Dreamer, a crime solving comedy about writing and book fandom.
Cathy Palmer (Jobeth Williams) is a neglected housewive whose 2 young sons even recognize their dad’s disinterest in what’s important to her. Seriously, the kid’s are both under 12 and actually lovingly tease their mom about the crap their father says (clearly, they would not pick him in a divorce). At the moment, Cathy has entered and won a dream trip to Paris by writing a few pages “in the style of” her favorite book series, Rebecca Ryan. The Rebecca Ryan novels are mystery thriller where the title character and her best friend Dimitri uncover devious acts among the upper classes. So, yeah. Cathy won a trip to Paris by writing fan fiction. I can’t think of a modern agent in the big 5 publishing companies allowing a publishing stunt like that today (too many lawsuits if the author accidentally writes anything close to a contest entry), but it’s the 80s. Fanfiction.net didn’t exist yet.
When Cathy wins, her husband “can’t” go with her and is sort of shocked when she chooses to go alone which he accuses her of being “childish” and “selfish” for doing. Free vacation, dude! Free vacation she won through hard work! The kids get it! They help her pack!

On her trip, Cathy is struck by a car and wakes up thinking she is Rebecca Ryan. She barges her way into the life of Alan McMann (Tom Conti), son of the Rebecca Ryan author, who she mistakes for Rebecca Ryan’s sidekick, Dimitri. Alan is intrigued by this bizarre woman who is determined to play espionage, only for the pair to end up in the midst of a real international incident.

Spoiler Alert: What Cathy/Rebecca doesn’t know is that Alan is secretly the writer of the series and his mother works to keep his secret by showing up at book signings. Cathy tells him that he shouldn’t be ashamed of his work.

What is so bizarre about the film is that Alan, a writer, knows all of these diplomats and politician. I get that the man is wealthy enough to live in a Parisian hotel, but that doesn’t exactly make him Henry Kissinger (thank goodness). Does James Patterson hang out with Angela Merkel? Come to think of it, that might not be a bad idea. She could convince him to include the environmental movement into his books.
Either way, there is this sense of responsibility he has to her since she thinks she’s a character he created. And there is a good balance between him being attracted to the woman he created and annoyed by her. We create characters who fit into a world built for a genre. They don’t always fit into OUR worlds.

Oh. . . and Cathy becomes a professional writer at the end of the film as well. Oh and her kids seems like Alan more than their birth dad.

Theme Month Time (again)

I have been told that in February there is holiday which many people celebrate. Therefore, I shall make the next three blogs for movies about writing all related to Presidents Day. Ha! I wish.

No, it’ll be that other one. Prepare for three rom-coms about writing. You’ve been warned.

Little Women (2019): Movies about Writing

FINALLY! A HOT PROFESSOR BHAER! I mean, writing. I’m blogging about the writing parts of this film.

This one is similar to the 94 version in that it’s closer to the book and tries to include details that make all five of the children into full-fledged characters as they grow up. Laura Dern is another fantastic, human Marmee. The sisters and Laurie are played by Emma Waston (Meg), Saoirse Ronan (Jo), Eliza Scanlen (Beth), Florence Pugh (Amy), and Timothee Chalemet. They got Meryl Streep to play Aunt March and Louis Garrel to play Professor Baher. That right. This time I find Baher so much hotter than Laurie. I mean, writing. Talking about writing. This film tells the events out of order though, giving their childhood in flashbacks related to the events of their young adulthood.

The opening reveals adult Jo attempting to sell a story to a New York publisher, at first telling him a “friend” wrote it. She watches him slash apart the passages which would have made her parents the most proud, yet still sells him the tale with his edits for $20 (which - hell ya that’s good money back then). It’s clear that the editor knows she wrote it. He advises her to keep her works “short and spicy” and that female characters need be to be wed or dead in the end. There is a direct statement that, because Meg married poor, Amy and Jo have decided that they are in charge of the family finances, Jo by writing and Amy by marrying rich. Both are especially worried about Beth whose illness has returned.

From these acknowledgments of art, personal goals, and femininity being brushed aside for the sake of earning a living the only way they can, the film jumps back to the past, starting with when Laurie entered their family.

Baher, besides being hot, gets to once again behave as one of the catalysts of how Jo changes her writing from tales of terror and suspense to stories of growing up. When he tells her out right that she is talented, but her stories are not good, she reacts the way any young author would although a little more dramatically than in the 1994 version.

The other catalyst is Beth as always, but this time more straight-forward. Instead of Beth’s death simply inspiring the novel that would be Jo’s first, Beth actually tells her straight out before her death that she doesn’t want Jo to stop writing. This is the start of the stories based on their childhood. Both are also the catalysts in Jo stopping her writing completely for a time

Amy’s burning of the novel is so much worse in the 2019 version. She actually destroys it page by page, then tries not to smirk when Jo is looking for it. That’s even worse than little kid tossing it in the fire in a moment of anger. She’s holding onto what she did with pride for HOURS!

This version also uses moments from the book to show that Laurie had a friendship with all four sister’s to an even greater extent than in the 1994 movie. Even though it establishes the change from childhood to adulthood, the way they react and express themselves stays the same among the main characters in adulthood.
There is a lot of borrowing from the Alcott life in order to add to the 2019 movie (which the 94 version also did with the mentions of civil rights and child labor) to add more intimacy and detail to the four little women. Not so much to Laurie since in reality he was based on two different male friends where as the March’s were all based on Alcott real family, right down to Amy being a well-known artist. At the same time, in a way that’s similar to the Coppola Marie Antoinette, there is a lot modern visual references like the way characters dress and dance.

A big part of this within the film is the ending in which she argues with her publisher. He declares that her main character must be married and you see the debate over contracts. Am I the only one who liked that part? Oh.

Overall, this one tries to be the version that gives the most insight to being a young women who wants to be an author or artist. It delves into the development of talent, the use of criticism, and how to balance your life, reality, and art.

Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus: Movies about Writing

Time for some Christmas legends. Why legends? Well, although the famed letter “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus” (which you can find a transcript of here) was really written and posted in the paper, the story this movie tells is not what really happened to produce such a heartfelt message of hope.

Made in 1991 for TV, this film tells the story of the famous letter from several points of view, none of which are based in fact. Virginia O’Hanlon (played by a young Katherine Isabelle long before the Ginger Snaps franchise) is the daughter of a struggling Irish immigrant (Richard Thomas) who is concerned in the midst of her father’s job loss and her best friend’s mother being sick that there may no Santa Claus. I’m pointing out all of these tragedies because it sort of amused me how over-the-top they tried to make the drama. While looking for a job, Virginia’s father gets a day old copy of his favorite paper, the Sun, from a local shop keep. So there’s where the newspaper Virginia will write to comes in.

But the real focus here is on Francis Pharcellus Church played by - oh hey Charles Bronson! What are you doing in this movie? Church is an alcoholic muckracker for the Sun who lost his wife and infant a year earlier. His editor, played by Ed Asner who I already miss, wants to keep him busy and employed in the midst of tragedy. Asner makes a big deal over how, even drunk, Church can still bring down all of Tammany Hall. They even give Church an antagonist, a man from a rival paper whose uncle is an evil industrialist. They throw a lot of random stuff from the time period in here.

“That’s the way I’d like to be able to write someday, Mr. Church! With both fists up,” an eager copy boy declares about thirty minutes in. A young female columnist expresses her gratitude to Church for lecturing at her college in a time when women were told to give up. They make him the star at the center of the print world, a star who knows that his words only last, as he puts it, “twenty-four hours”. The character grows suicidal as the movie goes on, as if such inspirational writing could only come from the very depths of despair.

But then Virginia’s letter comes, rescuing him from his internal torment. Don’t get me wrong, I still think this is one of the best pieces of writing in response to a little kid’s question. If you’ve never read it, you totally should.

*In reality, Virginia O’Hanlon was a middle class child from a comfortable family who could afford a daily newspaper. Francis P. Church was a war correspondent who started doing editorials when there were no wars to cover. He had no children and I couldn’t find anything about a deceased wife causing him to sink into depression. I get the impression he was surely though. Still, the letter is a wonderful thought and it’s reprinted every few years which shows just how well-written it was.

An Old Fashioned Christmas: Movies About Writing

Might as well do the sequel even though it’s a melodramatic love triangle staring English actress Catherine Steadman as Tilly (Tatiana Maslany was on a TV series at this point in her career).

The story picks up where it left off with Tilly’s grandmother Isabella (Jacqueline Bisset) wanting to end their European tour at an Irish castle which had been apart of their ancient family history (also the once home Tilly’s namesake). Our young authoress has returned to her love of Lord Byron, but now more as driving force than a deity (seriously, if you’re going to pray to a writer, pick one who didn’t lock away his own kid when he go bored with her. I have a James Baldwin saint candle. Might I suggest him? Or how about Louisa May Alcott who has no background in this story what-so-ever). Her grandmother has been introducing her to great poets and authors in hopes that by the end of the journey with Tilly’s first published work. This is the other reason they are going to Ireland. Isabella’s former flame, the Earl of Shannon, is a poet Laurette and she hopes he will help them.

Again, I’ll repeat that unlike An Old Fashion Thanksgiving, this story has nothing to do with any work by Alcott. It could almost feel like one of her early short stories if you threw in some aspects of Victorian “dread” - you know, ghosts, robbers, etc. But nope. It’s a love story with the “being published” plot line shoved to the side after about fifteen minutes. Also, for it taking place in Ireland, there are only 2 Irish actors and the British aristocracy have no accents. The exception to this is Leon Ockendan, an English actor brought in to play Cameron, the Earl’s no good drunken son, who is under strict orders to convince Tilly to marry him so his family can use Isabella’s fortune to revitalize their status. Also enter Gad (Kristopher Turner), the boy next door whose proposal she promised to consider at the end of the first movie.

Even though Tilly knows what Cameron is up to, the pair are attached to each other and Gad, sensing something is off, comes at the grandmother’s request. This sets Tilly in a battle for her hand. Hallmark formula blah blah blah. There is another side plot in which Tilly goes to meet her father’s relatives who live in town. Tilly’s grandfather Sean (Ian McElhinney) is a charming, warm, and loving man who is thrilled to see her. He works his charm on Isabella and they develop their own relationship.

As far as the love triangle goes, it does show how Gad understands Tilly. She is able to easily tell him everything she’s been worried about at the castle and he gives her support even when she pretty much complaining about him being there. And just like in the first film, he supports her as a writer. The other guy doesn’t even ask her about her talents. Of course, they also make him rather unrealistic. His only purpose is to be her childhood love. But either way, love triangle plots tend to bore me. I remember watch this the first time and I kept leaving the room to do other stuff. I wish the film had done more bonding between Tilly and the grandfather she’s meeting for the first time and how that helps them both remember her late father. But nope. That’s not how Hallmark movies work.

Okay, enough of the sappy stuff. Let’s get to the writing stuff. They still give Tilly lines such as “a writer knows the meaning behind words”. She has a wooden writing desk she carries on her travels. Cameron’s mother also tries to use Tilly’s want of publication as another way to manipulate her and her grandmother into marrying him. There is also an argument about Tilly wanting to be published when she feels she is ready, not her grandmother. A good quote is when she says, “I don’t want to be a famous writer. I want to be a good one. I’ll get published when I get published". Her other good quote is when she says “words must be taken seriously’ and asks the early if he agrees, one writer to another. He also gives her good advice about having more confidence in her writing. She also finally stops quoting Lord Byron but for the reason of she wants to use her own words. Still, no one ever bothers to tell her that Byron was a terrible person. Sigh.

One cool piece of trivia: Catherine Steadman, besides being an actress, is a published thriller author.

Tilly looks like a young authoress here.

An Old Fashioned Thanksgiving: Movies about Writing

2008 - Hallmark put a little extra money into a made-for-TV film and decided to adapt a Louisa May Alcott short story. By adapt I mean they took the title and the fact that it was about Thanksgiving and then added a bunch of elements stolen from other Alcott books. The original tale was a just a description of a middle class family attempting to celebrate on a budget. At the time the story was written, Thanksgiving had only been a national holiday for about 20 years, but as a New England-er, Alcott would’ve been an old hand at the festivities. I should also point out that this has small historical inaccuracies that I decided to nit-pick, but I won’t expose you to my pretentious irks.

A quick synopsis of this Little Women/Jack and Jill/Eight Cousins rip off. Tilly (Tatiana Maslany - yes, Orphan Black herself starred in this as a teenager and stands out) is the eldest ins a lower-middle class New England family. Her father has died within the last year and her mother (Helene Joy) has been making ends meet as a midwife and unofficial town healer. Tilly worries about her two younger siblings and thinks it’s her job to save the family from poverty. When her wealthy best friend/love interest Gideon “Gad” (Kristopher Turner as a Theodore Laurence/Jack Minot substitute) runs into her estranged grandmother while in Europe, she begs him to delivery a letter she forges from her mother. You know the letter - all about starvation, a father kidnapped by gypsies, and a beg for help.

At first, Gad reports how her Grandmother (Jacqueline Bisset) threw out the letter, but then the snobbish woman shows up at their farm. Tilly discovers that she is both drawn to the life her grandmother can offer, but is also appalled by how this well-bred woman constantly berates her late father as an Irish vagrant who stole Tilly’s mother from her fancy life. Tilly does stand up to her Grandmother and the two find common ground yet Tilly still has to school her grandmother in how to be a kind human. Grandmother is also a subtle advocate of women’s rights, secretly admiring her own daughter for being a survivor.

Tilly, like the famous Jo of Little Women, is an aspiring writer. She records every part of her grandmother’s visit and turns it in a novella. Unlike in Little Women, Gad is supportive of this and encourages her by bringing her a bust of Lord Byron from Europe. He finds no strangeness in the way she speaks to the statue and asks for writing writing advise. A strange choice for a young woman in the mid-1800s - I mean, Bryon really? Hardly appropriate. He was such a dick to everyone he claimed to love. Get better heroes, kid. Still, when Tilly wants her life to change for the better, it’s Byron she begs for help from, declaring she’ll give up “comfort” for a dedication of truth and beauty through writing if he will help save her family. Give up comfort? Truth? Beauty? Yep. She has no idea what sort of man Lord Byron was. Of course, when I was a kids I was heart broken to find out that Charles Dickens left his wife in such a jerk way and I still kinda idolize him. We all need better heroes.

Despite having a day job, Tilly stays up late writing short stories and had difficulty getting up in the morning. That sound pretty much like me age 13 to 21. She’s horrified when her grandmother reads some of her work without her permission, but the uptight matriarch gives her constructive criticism and declares that she should travel to help her writing. I did like this part of the story especially because (SPOILER ALERT) that’s what she chooses to do at the end of the film, giving Gad a promise she’ll rethink he marriage proposal when she comes back. That’s right - this Hallmark movies ends with the boy not getting the girl. Instead, the girl gets a trip to Europe in order to improve her writing. Let’s end more Hallmark movies like this!

Haunted Honeymoon (1940): Movies about Writing

And back into the 1940s we go with a silly bit of spookier - Haunted Honeymoon. Robert Montgomery is a British nobleman who likes to play detective and his wife is a moderately successful mystery author played by Constance Cummings. Oh, and the guy who was famous for playing Disney’s 1950 Long John Silver (Robert Newton) is in there too. That’s right, this is campy AND British. So British, the couple brings their butler on their honeymoon. Buckle in, folks.

Just to give this some dignity, it’s actually based on a series of popular mysteries by Dorothy L. Sayers, who apparently lived in Kingston Upon Hull. There’s a blue heritage plaque and everything! I lived there for 10 months in college and there was a history plaque I missed! It must’ve been near the sports arena. I didn’t go over there.

The couple are a bit like a sober Nick and Nora Charles who are a go-to consultant team for the local law enforcement. Both Peter (Montgomery) and Harriet (Cummings) have declared to give up murder and mayhem (fact and fiction) in their new life together. Naturally, a murder occurs while at their honeymoon cottage, one of those “everyone hated him so there’s a long list of suspects” murders.

The mystery naturally pulls the true crime couple back into old habits, but I will not give away the murderer. I will give away some of the more English hi-jinx which are meant to cause hilarity. For one, the dinner is not prepared upon their arrival and the butler (named Bunter which is very confusing to my stuffed up ears) is nearly smoked out by using the old stove of the cottage. For another, the chimney sweep has 7 layers of jumpers on and plans on clearing the flue while wearing a tie. A local offers them wine made of local vegetation. A parson keeps waving a dead stote at them. The same parson then shoots upward into their chimney. With all of these shenanigans, they don’t even find the body until act three of the film.

One of the aspects of Harriet being a writer is how her new upper class in-laws are rather mystified that she is a woman who makes money on such a droll little hobby. When she gives up crime novels, she says she could write about anything in the world which we all know as authors is a total lie. She’ll write what the voices in her head tell her to write. But it’s also just simply and clearly shown that deductive reasoning is how her and her husband’s minds work. They breakdown the real murder using the same questions Harriet uses to create a fictional murder. Eat your heart out, Jessica Fletcher!

Dick Van Dyke Show (The Meershatz Pipe): Movies about Writing

Let me take you back in time to where it was shocking that woman wore trousers on television and a man was expected to be the only breadwinner in this strange post-World War II United States known as the 60s.

The “Dick Van Dyke Show” starred the title’s namesake as Rob Petrie, a comedy writer for a popular evening TV show. Yes. The was named after the actor playing the lead character NOT the actual character. Early TV basically got as far as figuring out laugh tracks and then didn’t put too much thought into the shows beyond that. Rob lives with his wife, Laura (subtle feminist icon Mary Tyler Moore) and son Ritchie (Larry Matthews) in the suburbs complete with twin beds for the married couple. Not to be crass, but how did sitcom characters have children when the never slept in the same bed. Is this a reality where the stork is actually a thing?

The episode entitled “The Meershatz Pipe” opens with Rob in the writers room with his co-workers Buddy (Morey Amsterdam as a character based on Mel Brooks) and Sally (Rose Marie). “We’re writing a comedy show, we’ve got no time for jokes,” Buddy states as the team realizes they are stuck on the ending for that night’s show. He shows off his gaudy pipe made by a man named Lazlo Meershatz which was given to him by their boss without any reason. This makes Rob jealous and worried as he realizes he’s not the favored employee despite being the head writer. In a moment of frustration, Rob goes home, leaving his co-workers to finish on their own.

Of course, Rob gets home and Ritchie demands hearing a politically incorrect story about a peace pipe. This pushes Rob’s buttons further and he falls into a state of exhaustion which leads to a cold. Laura makes him stay home the next day and rest. Literally makes him. She holds him down in bed until he gives up. He tries to still be a part of work by calling Buddy and Sally over the phone.

Beyond being upset by the boss giving Buddy so much attention, Rob is driven to sneak into work with a fever when he finds out that there seems to be no trouble on the show without him there. Rob wants to prove himself and Laura wants him back in bed.

One of the best parts is when Laura is trying to explain to Ritchie what’s wrong with Daddy and Ritchie bluntly asks if Daddy is “unsecure”. Laura asks how he know that word and the small child reveals it was the topic of an episode of Popeye. “And who says television isn’t educational?” Laura responds.

SPOILER ALERT:

Rob’s boss sends Rob home instantly where he’s forced to watch the show HE DIDN’T WRITE on TV and declares that he’s “not needed”. Just as he’s about to call the show and quit, the show’s host calls Rob at home telling him live on the air to get better and that his fellow writers send the message, “Help!”

Once again feeling appreciated, Rob returns to work recuperated and Buddy gives him a pipe. As it turns out, the fellow writer made up the story about their boss giving him the pipe just to mess with Rob and Sally.

I don’t have much to say about this episode. I thought it was a good one to blog about because it is about the fragility of a writer’s ego and how some people work together.

It Chapter Two: Movies about Writing

I am going to focus on the career of a single character mainly for this blog, but first a few notes about the It story by Stephen King in general. Spoilers ahead. Also, no troll comments about how Bill Skarsgard is a better Pennywise monster than Tim Curry. Both are magnificent and I love them equally.

For those of you unfamiliar, the It franchise is based on the book about seven people who reunited in their hometown to fight an ancient, shape-shifting, murderous monster they battle 27 years earlier as a group of children. The group is made up of Bill, Beverly, Ritchie (who is my favorite character), Eddie, Mike, Ben, and Stan. For the recent films, they split the story in half, so their kid moments make up one very excellent film and their adult moments (still with kid flashbacks) create a less excellent but still pretty good sequel. I’m going to be talking just about the sequel today.

As a kid, I grew up with the Tim Curry version and I watched it pretty much every time I caught it on TV. Just like most of my generation who watched that made-for-television masterpiece (which my boyfriend says is cheesy, but that can be correct), the scenes featuring them as kids are always so much better than the grownups. It made me sad as a child to think that the seven main characters barely spoke after high school. And that they forgot how close they had been. The parts of the story where they are young really do play out like an extreme adventure movie - seven friends who can send a supernatural killer clown into hibernation with the power of friendship. I couldn’t understand how a bond that strong could possibly be destroyed, even by time and poor memory. As an adult, it makes sense. It’s no-less sad, but it’s realistic. And that in it-self is a tragedy. Understanding why that is just the way life goes even when a killer clown is involved is pretty bleak.

Still, the the second movie’s character that I will be focusing on is Bill, the group’s leader, played by James MacAvoy. Bill grew up to be an author and screenwriter. His wife is an actress who is starring the adaptation of his latest book. One of the earliest scenes in the film involve Bill on set being asked by both his wife Audra and Peter Bogdanovich (as “director”) to rewrite the ending before they shoot it. This is of course given Bill block and becomes a running theme in the movie. One of the things I objected to in this film was that they minimized Audra’s part (and before anyone argues, yes, I have read the book not just watched the TV Curry mini-series) which I feel is important to Bill’s adult life as a writer. His abilities directly impact Audra’s career and so she is both supportive, but tough. Her having a larger part in the original story is a part of what gives Bill a chance at closure and continuing his career at the end of the story. But instead, she just sort of fades out in this version. By the time she shows up again, you’ve kinda forgotten who she is.

Bill argues that his endings are the way they are because real life doesn’t give nicely wrapped closure. However, as a reader sometimes a form of closure is needed to get a book out of your head when you’re done.

When the Losers Club as the group is called reunites, Beverly (Jessica Chastain) even mentions to Bill how scary the movies he writes are, but that the ending sucks. But the greatest scene to bring this up involves Bill in a thrift shop trying to buy his childhood bike. The shop owner is none other than Stephen King (remember in the 90s/early 00s when King had cameos in all of those crappy TV movies like Langoleiers and The Stand? This is better than those. No pizza delivery or pretending to be a professional in a suit. In fact, I kinda wonder if King’s costume was something his wife Tabitha found in the back of their closet.

Bill notices that King as the shopkeeper has a copy of his book. When asked if King would like a signature, he responds, “No thanks. Didn’t like the ending.” Ba dum dum.

In the end, Bill is more confident in his writing (although he wife doesn’t even get to make an appearance at the end) partially because he now has complete memories of his childhood. The ironic part is the changes the made to the end of It for this film weren’t that great either. So go figure.

Sinister: Movies about Writing

I always find it strange to watch Ethan Hawke in a mainstream role that’s not from the 90s. Therefore, it throws my whole world out of wack to see him in a Jason Blum film.

In Sinister, Hawke plays Ellison Oswalt (how’s that for a made up pen name), a true crime author and failed novelist who also writes college textbooks to help pay the bills. He moves into the previous scene of a child disappearance with his wife Tracy (Juliet Rylance), daughter Ashley (Clare Foley), and son Trevor (Michael Hall D’Addario) so he can write his next bestseller. His hope is to make enough off this next book that he won’t have to write boring textbooks any longer. I’ve never thought about it before, but how much of that hundred of dollars that universities charge for textbooks do the writers actually see? I’m assuming not much. This would explain why the instructor for an economics of piracy class I took sold us the textbook directly for a cheaper price. That way he saw all of the profit. Economics of piracy - heh. Smart man.

Anyway, local authorizes try to convince Ellison to leave (except one officer who brought a book to be signed and gets scolded for it). The sheriff (played by Fred Thompson, a character actor typecast as law enforcement and politicians because he actually served as a senator for a time - seriously! I just learned that!) states that he does not appreciate the way police are portrayed by Ellison or the media circus that follows the books he publishes.

Tracy gives Ellison some good writing advice. She says how she misses his fiction writing, even if it didn’t sell, and that he’s chasing after another bestseller instead of writing what he wants to write. And she’s totally right! He actually spend several minutes of the movie re-watching his TV appearances from bestseller’s publicity tour. He wants the “fame and money”. Oh damn, Tracy, you called it. He dragged you to a lot of writing workshops, didn’t he? Of course, there is the whole trying to make a living thing.

Let the spooky research begin! Ellison is investigating the murder of the house’s previous family, all hung from a tree in the back yard, and disappearance of one child. He finds a box of snuff films in the attic which feature not only the death of the family he’s investigating, but several other families throughout the decades. Personally, my first thought would have been, “Oh crap! Serial killer left his trophy box in my house! Better call the cops and get the heck outta Dodge!” But no. For being a true crime writer, Ellison decides NOT to call police apparently not making the same connection I did. I mean, he does finally tell the deputy (James Ransone - adult Eddie from It: Chapter Two) after strange drawings appear in the attic and he falls through a floorboard, but by then his children are already being subtly haunted.

Also, how did he, a writer with only one bestseller, get the money for such nice video enhancement equipment. I can’t bring myself to spend money on Adobe! But in classic horror film fashion, the more creepy shit he sees on his fancy video program from the old home movies, the more research he does. You know, instead of GETTING OUT OF THE HOUSE! As true crime writer, has he ever actually read any true crime?

But Ellison wants the movie deal and the fame. He insists that this could be his In Cold Blood. Does he not know that 1) Truman Capote wrote a fictionalize version of the true events to sell as book and 2) that book was a first of it’s kind. You can’t be Truman Capote, Ethan Hawke. You don’t even have the lisp.

Eventually, he notices a figure in the films along with a symbol. He get helps from a post - “Law and Order”, but pre - “Daredevil” Vincent D’Onofrio as an occult professor. He tells Ellison that the symbol is associated with a demon called Bughuul who uses children to do dark deeds. This demon is completely made up for the film and has no roots in any mythology. If you want to do legit research after being utterly disturbed watch Hereditary.

I’m not going to spoil the ending (although this movie came out in 2012, so I’m sure someone has spoiled it for you by now). I am going to say this - If creepy shit is happening it’s time to let the writing project go! Maybe take a break, move to a new house, and write a happy story for your kids to enjoy. But that’s just me.

Secret Window: Movies about Writing

Let’s do one more Stephen King adaptation this October. I know I watched Secret Window once before (probably around 2005 or 2006 when it would have been played on TV), but I remember not being all that impressed with it. Not that it’s a full out bad film, just that I didn’t feel like I really needed to hold onto it in my memory or ever watch it again. Yet here I am, watching it again.

Since this is another based on a Stephen King short story about a writer - it is very much a movie about writing. Johnny Depp plays Mort Rainey, a depressed novelist who is in the midst of a divorce and writing a book based on his experiences of his wife (Maria Bello) cheating on him. He decides to do this in a remote cabin by a lake. So imagine his surprise when a man dressed like an Amish reject shows up at his door claiming that Rainey “stole his story”. Mort ignores the man named John Shooter (John Turturro), yet does end up reading the original manuscript and realizes it’s almost identical to something he wrote called “Secret Window”.

Shooter starts to terrorize Mort and Mort starts collecting evidence that he wrote the story first. However, Shooter continues to threaten him with murders and arson, wanting Mort to republish the story with Shooter ending and name. All of this causes Mort to constantly flashback to the time leading up to his wife’s infidelity and lose his grip on reality. There is also some guilt there being pushed down by a haze of cigarette smoke and Doritos. Mmm. Product placement.

Oh! I remember why I blocked this movie out! IMPORTANT SPOILER ALERT: The dog dies! The cute, personality-full dog dies!

Other SPOILER ALERT: Shooter and Mort are the same person. Oh come on! This movie came out in 2004. You can’t tell me someone didn’t spoil the ending by now. But I’m bringing it up for a reason. The best scene is when the audience discovers that when Mort talks to himself, it’s a moral version trying to get him to admit to doing wrong and protect people. That Mort apparently is the weakest of his personalities because when Shooter shows up, everything becomes a full blown horror story. It all stems back to Mort’s anger at his wife, his own writer’s block, and the fact that he actually DID plagiarize a story early in his career (this is hinted at throughout the movie, but stated outright in the original King story). If anxiety ever caused me to have Dissociative Identity Disorder, I would hope my other personality would have a better accent.

I do like the scenes where Mort is actually trying to write. He talk to himself the way we all do (admit it, you do) with the usual distractions around him like a slinky and comfy couch. I especially like when he re-reads a paragraph and tells himself, “Bad writing”. He then deletes the little bit he’s actually written. I can’t help agreeing with him on this. I’m constantly told that the important part is to get it on the page then go back and edit, but that drives me insane! Clearly (SPOILER ALERT), it was something else that drove Mort insane in the film, but maybe bad writing was a factor.

Okay, let’s talk about the John Turturro - shaped elephant in the room - plagiarism. King’s story is actually based on the unfounded accusations that he stole some of his story ideas. Here’s the problem: some authors get so hung up on the nit-picks of plot development and character creation that they forget that time their English teacher told them that there are finite types of stories. Look at Shakespeare! He was a great wordsmith, but all of his plots came from mythology and history. What drives me nuts are the writers who try to copyright a common word, a phrase, or a genre. You can’t stop people from having ideas and coincidences happen. Even King found out after he published Under the Dome that it was the plot of The Simpsons Movie.

1408: Movies about Writing

It’s October! Time for some more Stephen King! I never actually watched this all the way through before, but I’ve read the short story.

Mike Enslin (broody John Cusack) is a writer of paranormal investigation books. The movie opens with him doing a sad looking book signing (I say sad looking from the perspective of a movie watcher not from the point of view of another writer - as long as someone shows up you’ve got something). He’s disillusioned about both his current career as he’s never seen a ghost and about his past aspirations to be a serious dramatic novelist. Like anything about a writer based on something by King, this is fairly authentic involving the process of research, struggles, and just the basic need to have a good enough selling point. The paranormal research pays the bills and Enslin needs a new angle. He’s sent an anonymous postcard of a New York hotel with the cryptic message, “Don’t go in 1408”. His publisher played by Tony Shalhoub helps get Mike into the room when the hotel’s manager Gerald Olin (Samuel L. Jackson - yay!) refused to book it. The room has a history of suicides and madness therefore Olin has kept it vacant as long as possible.

He discusses this in his office with Mike, first asking if he drinks.

Mike responds, “Of course! I just said I was a writer.”

Where does this stereotype come from that writers drink to help them create? I know there is a history of alcoholic creatives in the world, but the only times I’ve tired to drink and write I got through a paragraph before being distracted by a music box. It was shiny and the music was so soothing.

Still, Mike insists on staying in the room with his trusty tape recorder, a device I’ve never tried myself because it means listening to your own voice to actually type stuff later. But I guess if you’re John Cusack, you don’t mind the sound of yourself. From there things get freaky (I don’t want to give away the scares). At first, Mike decides he’s “losing the plot” and thinks he’s being drugged. Then, the ghostly events begin to reveal his self-tragedies, his relationship with his father (who never liked his writing), and why he started to write about ghosts in the first place. His character arch involves his cynicism, his grief, and this idea that his writing stems from a place of giving up. It’s an interesting change from the original short story.

I was also surprised how many people are in this who I recognize from other movies and shows - Isiah Whitlock Jr., Drew Powell who was on Gotham, Andrew Lee Potts (who I think is just nice to look at), and even the woman who played the TV reporter in Princess Diaries 2. Yes, I happen to like Princess Diaries 2. I can like Stephen King and Princess Diaries.

The Bird with the Crystal Plumage: Movies about Writing

I’ve never seen this one before, but it’s a Dario Argento film so I’m sure I’ll have just as much understanding of the plot after watching as I will before watching. But at least it will be pretty.

I ended up watching a badly dubbed version, poorly transferred version I found on a Roku movie app that I’m not entirely sure had the legal rights to run this movie. But I was told it was a horror movie about a writer so I found it. Of course, I got about twenty minutes into the film before I realized that the dubbing is the original dubbing and then remembered that it’s a Dario Argento film. For those of you unfamiliar with Italian horror of the 70s, think of it like Spaghetti westerns, but with a lot more bright orange blood.

The writer in the main role is American Sam Dalmas (Tony Musante) who came to Italy for relaxation to cure his writer’s block. He’s rather disillusioned with being an author, happier for the paycheck then being able to see his latest work published. One night he witnesses the attempted murder of an art gallery owner’s wife. Sam is then is forbidden from leaving the country because he’s the first witness to see the dark figure that has been killing beautiful women throughout the city.

Now stuck in the city, Sam and his girlfriend Julia (Suzy Kendall) become important and a part of the investigation led by Inspector Morosini (Enrico Maria Salerno). Someone attempts to kill Sam on the same day as the attack of the gallery owner’s wife, but he doesn’t bother to tell the inspector about it. I guess nearly having his head lopped off by strangers on the street is a daily occurrence for him. He must not be a very good writer.

Sam is brought in to hear the evidence collected and see if any of the usual perverts the police pick up could be the murderer. This is an odd moment of what I assume was supposed to be comedy when a trans-woman is placed in the lineup and the inspector objects that she belongs with the transvestites not the perverts. To this, the person in the line-up replies, “Well, I should hope so!” I - Um - What’s going on in this movie?

Sam, who acts more annoyed by being haunted by these gruesome events than concerned, tries to perform his own hunt. He goes to visit the gallery owner (Umberto Raho) and his wife (Eva Renzi), but receives a cold welcome despite having saved the wife’s life. Julia and Sam start to have a lovely time taking notes and dissecting clues as if they are collecting ideas for a novel. Oh domestic bliss in the midst of serial killings.

The inspector is super cool with Sam holding his own amateur sleuth session (because that’s how the world works). The writer has a passion for this beyond anything he has penned recently and even interviews people related to the case which includes a pimp who is very concerned about his poor sex workers. Aww the pimp with a heart of gold. That's new. Overall, I hope Sam wasn’t a crime novelist because he was a lousy detective. He touches everything, he trusts the wrong people, he ignores obvious clues, and he invites suspicious characters into his home.

From all of this Sam does start to write again. He does 40 pages in just a few days, feeling inspired by all of the mayhem surrounding him. My question, when did he find time to write 40 pages while having his and his girlfriend’s lives threatened?

I won’t give away the ending, just I will repeat - it was neat to look at.

The Bat: Movies about Writing

Hey there, Vincent Price! Fancy finding another of your movies I can put on this list!

I’m kidding! I already know I’d do this movie a long while ago because it’s one of the few of his starring roles I’ve - GASP - NEVER SEEN! Then I got about a quarter of the way in and realized I have the book it’s based on. It just had a different title. Hollywood, you tricked me [shakes fist].

Of course, I can also understand why this movie is in the public domain after watching. It’s . . . low budget to say the least.

Mystery author Cornelia Van Gorder (Agnes Moorehead) is staying in a secluded country house with her gossipy maid Lizzie which was rented from a relative of the local bank president. The problem - a local killer of women is on the loose known as the Bat and this is scaring off the help. Van Gorder is a logical woman who does not fear rumors and has a wonderfully dry sense of human. This comes in handy as, besides a murderer, the bank discovers that their president John Fleming (Harvey Stephens) embezzled a million dollars in securities and threatens his doctor/friend Malcolm Wells (oh - there’s Vincent Price) to fake Fleming’s death.

SPOILER ALERT - (although this is in the first 15 minutes of film)!

Instead of faking it, Wells just flat out murders Fleming and decides to look for the hidden million dollars. And where else would he hide it than in his old family home full which Van Gorder is currently renting. You see where this is going, right?

Lizzie worries that the ghost of Fleming will haunt the house, but worries more about the inconvenience it creates as “ghosts are allergic” to her. Van Gorder takes all of Lizzie’s comments with fun, sarcastic comments (seriously, Agnes Moorehead is quite good in this). Lizzie reads about how the Bat slashes women to death with steel claws and Van Gorder responds, “Well, that’s a charming little caper. I’ll have to try it some time.” Lizzie looks horrified and the author adds, “In a book!” There is another moment where Vincent Price asks about her aim with a pistol. Van Gorder tells him that there is a gun in every book she’s ever written and she never writes about anything she’s not familiar with. As I always say, never check an author’s browser history or library checkout list. You won’t like what you find.

However, this leaves you wondering if you’re watching a comedy or thriller. The part where Lizzie is bitten by a bat (played by some fur and wire) is silly not scary. As opposed to a scene where Dr. Wells is experimenting with rabies cures and is trying to get some bat saliva on a microscope slide. There’s a real bat there and he’s so little and cute and I was more anxious for that little guy on set then I was for all of the characters in the film.

As another man from the bank is put on trial for the embezzlement and Van Gorder plans to use her author insight to help prove his innocence, especially since the man’s wife and her friend are fans of her books. In exchange for helping with the investigation, she hires the man’s wife as her secretary so she can write everything down as a story. Love the multitasking!

From there, the usual murder mystery fodder ensues. Despite the Lt. of the police protecting them, murders happen and the mysterious pasts of Van Gorder’s butler and new housekeeper are revealed. I won’t give away who done it, but I’m sure the author made a better tale of it. The end of the movie is told from her point of view as she finishes the book.

I am going to point out that if you look for this movie, it’s easy find streaming. However, it might not be easy to watch. It’s in the public domain so any copy you find is painfully difficult to look at, especially if you own a giant HD TV. If you’re lucky, you’ll find a transfer like I did that just makes the B-movie look like a long episode of the “Twilight Zone”. Although, the sound went out of sync for about 10 minutes. That did not make the movie easier to watch.

I Remember Mama: Movies about Writing

I’m not going to go into all of this 1948 family drama, because not all of it is about writing. It is based on a real writer though. Kathyrn Forbes wrote the series of short stories about her mother and their Norwegian -American family in turn-of-the-century San Fransisco. The movie is a further fictionalized version of these stories.

The movie opens with the narrator, eldest daughter Katrin (Barbara Bel Geddes), finishing typing her first novel on a 1910s typewriter. She then sits down an immediately and starts editing with a pencil. Editing directly after writing! I wish I had that kind of discipline!!!

Besides dramatic Katrin, the immediate family includes Mama (Irene Dunn in an Oscar nominated performance), Papa, and three other children (kind Nels, stubborn Christine, and animal loving Dagmar). The patriarch of the whole clan is Mama’s loud and alcoholic Uncle Chris (Oscar Homolka) who is the only person that can put Mama’s three silly sisters in their place.

The movie focuses on the many trials of an immigrant family attempting to financially and culturally survive in a big city. Everyone works odd jobs, but Mama and Papa also has a great deal of focus on making sure their children are well educated. Katrin tells of how one lodger the family had, Mr. Hyde, would read to them every night from great works of literature and it made her want to be a writer. She tried writing an honest story about Uncle Chris, but her teacher scolds her about writing a rude story. Still, these books are what inspire her to want to write, even after Mr. Hyde abandons the house without paying his rent leaving the book collection as the only compensation he has to give.

If I was Katrin, I would have written about Uncle Chris too. He is very much larger than life and yet a very realistic character. While all the children are afraid of him, he’s actually one of the nicest people in the family. He also breaks with tradition and does good for the sake of doing good not for praise. Beyond Chris, Mama is the only logical and open minded member of the clan. When the rest of the aunts want to snub “the woman”, Uncle Chris’s live-in housekeeper, Mama is the one who is still kind to this unmarried lady.

Most stories are about how the actions of the adults around her, especially Mama, effect Katrin as she grows up. Her mantra is, “If I’m going to be a writer then I have to experience everything.” My favorite is when everyone thinks little Dagmar’s beloved cat is going to die from a brawl and the girl begs her mama to make him better. Spoiler alert: Mama and Papa gives the cat chloroform to put him down peacefully, but accidentally don’t use enough. Instead, the cat gets enough rest that he heals and Dagmar grows up believing that Mama can fix anything. I’m not crying! You’re crying!

Alright, let’s get to the parts about Katrin wanting to be writer. At first, she is convinced that someday she will be rich and famous. But as she gets older and her first attempts at selling her work go as they usually do for first time authors, Katrin loses confidence. She tells her mother that writing isn’t like following a recipe - you have to have a gift. Mama responds that you have to have a talent for cooking too and that’s what she uses to get her daughter some good advice. When a celebrity writer arrives in San Francisco and Mama finds out that she’s also a celebrated chef, she makes a trade with the woman - allow the woman to have her recipe for Norwegian meatballs in exchange for the lady reading some of Katrin’s stories. The famed authoress sends usual words of wisdom “write what you know.” She also says that Katrin has the gift of writing and will be a good writer someday even encouraging her to send her first “good story” to the authoress’s agent. That’s a huge deal for a published author to do!

Mama, of course, tells Katrin to write about Papa as her first topic so naturally, Katrin writes her first story about Mama. It’s published and she gets her first paycheck. In reality, Kathryn Forbes wrote for the radio and did not sell her stories until much later in life, but it’s a nice ending.

Leave Her to Heaven: Movies about Writing

I’ve never read the book this 1945 film is based on, but I bet it’s even a little more sinister since books didn’t have to follow the movie censorship code.

This is another one about muses and obsession, but it’s also about finding happiness and trying to overcome something that was not well understood in the 40s.

So strap in in for Daddy issues meets fiction writing and warning SPOILERS BE AHEAD!!!

Writer Richard Harland (Cornel Wilde) has just been released after 2 years in prison. His friend and lawyer, Glen (Ray Collins) recalls the tragedy that landed a once famed citizen in the slammer. It started when Harlan met Ellen (Gene Tierney) on a trip to New Mexico. Glen introduces Richard to Ellen’s family who are made up of her mother, younger siblings, and a cousin Ruth (Jeanne Crain) raised along Ellen in a strange and strained sisterhood.

Richard is instantly taken with Ellen’s beauty, poise, and how she manages to insult his work not realizing he was the author. And Ellen is fascinated by his resemblance to her beloved and recently departed father. She starts to analyze him based on his novels. “Every book is a confession, my father used to say.” However, he is so swept up in falling in love with Ellen, he sees beyond her unhealthy obsession with her late dad and all of the warnings others in the house try to hint at about her personality. Oh, what a complex Electra she is.

Ellen breaks her engagement with Russell Quinton, a politically minded go-getter who admits he will always be in love with her even when she announces that she’s marrying Richard. Russell is played by Vincent Price, my favorite character actor! If you come to my house you can see my Vincent Price fancy bluray sets, Funko Pops, doll dressed as Dr. Craven from The Raven, and a photo of him choking Alfred Hitchcock. Despite his popularity in horror films, Price used to be a fantastic and debonair “other man” in movies, but my favorites of these are the three he me made with Gene Tierney - Dragonwyck, Laura, and this one. Marathon them, I tell you! Marathon them now! Okay, maybe finish reading this blog first.

After they are married, Richard wants his invalid teenage brother to come live with them and although Ellen has a fondness for Danny, she’s determined to keep the house just between her and Richard. She won’t even hire help for the house, stating that she wants to do it all herself, including helping “Dick” in his writing (mostly because helping him in his writing still puts attention on her). She even suggests that he give up writing and live off her allowance so they can be together all of the time. Dick laughs off the suggestion born of the lovey-dovey early phase of their relationship. They visit Danny and Dick’s family cabin “Back of the Moon” in Maine, bring in Ruth and Ellen’s mother as a surprise. Ellen hates the surprise, especially as Ruth shows more interest in Dick’s writing, and is only somewhat happy when her mother and Ruth leave again, and starts to resent Danny being there on what would be essentially her Honeymoon. Instead of telling Dick this as he’s trying to meet the deadline for his new novel, she quietly lets the feelings fester into a dark anger that leads to tragedy.

After Danny’s Death, Dick and Ellen move back in with Ellen’s mother and Ruth and Dick stops writing for a while due to depression. Only the announcement of a baby bring Dick out of his despair, leading to him and Ruth happily planning for the bundle while the pregnant Ellen scours and pouts, throwing tantrums when they turn her father’s lab into a playroom and growing jealous of the the time her sister gets to spend with Dick while she’s bedridden. Feeling Richard’s love for her slipping away, Ellen purposely loses the baby and going into a spiral of jealousy when she discovers that his latest book is dedicated to Ruth. By the way, the scene where she plans to “accidentally” miscarry proves why Dick was so attracted to her. She is a character out of a novel, all drama and pageantry. She dresses in her best nightgown and makes herself look gorgeous before throwing herself down the stairs. A part of me watches that scene and thinks, “Well she just ruined that nightgown. She’ll never get the blood out of that blue silk.” Maybe my priorities are out of whack, but it was a really pretty outfit.

I’m not going to give away the complete ending, but I will tell you there is a death, a trial, and Vincent Price. Understand that is a story of an author who thinks he marrying the muse he always wanted. Instead, her obsession and passion for him hinders his writing and ruins his life. She interrupts him, takes away all other happiness that is not her, and hates the long hours writing a book takes. Where as in Ruth, he finds a collaborator and friend, despite Ruth being the practical and quiet of the pair of adoptive sisters. Where he thought happiness came from living with an exciting mysterious woman like a character in his books,

Second spoiler alert: The author gets his happy ending, but that’s a part of it. He gets to be happy. He doesn’t HAVE to be a tortured writer to be good.