Yet Another Hungarian Actor Makes it Big

Did you know this?  I sure didn't, but the great English actor Leslie Howard -- the dreamy Ashley Wilkes from Gone With the Wind -- had a Hungarian father.  OLGS thought that ol' Leslie was a Hungarian immigrant, and could not believe that the quintessential gent could have mastered the King's English so beautifully.  However, Leslie was born in England with the last name of Stainer (changed from Steiner so it wouldn't sound so German during WWI).

Peter Lorre, Hungarian Actor

Want a somewhat obscure movie that is actually pretty good? Try Rope of Sand, made in 1949, starring Burt Lancaster, Paul Henried, Claude Rains and Peter Lorre. Lorre, born Laszlo Lowenstein in a part of Slovakia that was in Hungary when he was born, specialized in playing sleazy or villianous characters whose moral weaknesses usually put a spanner in the works for the hero. However in Rope of Sand, his role is more that of a narrator or chorus, but still with his trademark Hungarian-German accent.

That Hamilton Woman

Vivien Leigh, playing the same role she played in Gone with the Wind and many other films -- bad girl with a cute smile and knowing eyes. Fiddle-dee-dee. Anyway, the movie, released in 1941, sets Scarlet -- sorry, Lady Hamilton -- against the backdrop of the Napoleonic wars. Really, however, it's about resistence to dictators, wherever they are, and the need to fight on, despite all odds. Unsurprisingly, this was one of Churchill's favorite movies.

The real Lady Hamilton, painted by George Romney

Vivien and real life husband Laurence Olivier smoke up the screen in retelling the adulterous affair between Lady Emma Hamilton and Horatio Nelson, the admiral who finally beat Napoleon's navy at Trafalgar. This film followed Korda's Thief of Bagdhad and was filmed on a limited budget. It did not, however, prevent Vivien from wearing amazing dresses.

Vivien Leigh as Lady Hamilton

South Pacific

Did you know that the 1958 musical, South Pacific, starred a Hungarian-American? Mitzi Gaynor is allegedly of Hungarian descent, and has referred to herself as a "Hungarian Virgo". Her performance in the film made her an icon, and to this day she appears in events celebrating the film.

There are some great songs in the film. But what is really interesting is the race-relations sermon that is part of the story. Stationed on a South Pacific island as a nurse during WWII, Mitzi falls in love with a French resident of the island. However, Mitzi's Arkansas upbringing makes her reject him when she learns that he was previously married to a Polynesian woman and has two children by her--children that Mitzi cannot accept. And Mitzi's difficulty is not that Frenchy had another woman (who died, of course), but that Mom and the children are "colored". However, as is inevitable in musicals, Mitzi comes to her senses and love triumphs over prejudice.

The filmmakers did not do all their homework, however. The group of Sea Bees who make up the chorus of the musical includes a black sailor. The film was made after Harry Truman integrated the Armed Services in 1948. However, it is supposed to be about WWII, when there were no integrated units. So having a black sailor is incongruous. However, given the theme of the story, it's probably OK -- if integration is good enough for the Navy, it should be good enough for the girl from Arkansas.

F.I.S.T.

Want an obscure Sly Stallone movie? Try F.I.S.T., starring Rocky as a thinly disguised Jimmy Hoffa, who, in this movie, is a Hungarian-American, or hunky, named Johnny Kovak. This is a legit entry into the Hungarian movie pantheon because it was written by Joe Eszterhas, a Hungarian immigrant and Cleveland reporter who went on to write the screenplays for more famous films, such as Basic Instinct.

The reason we watched this otherwise forgettable movie was the presence in the cast -- and credited, too -- of Rev. Alphonse Skerl, pastor of Holy Trinity Roman Catholic (Hungarian) church in East Chicago, Indiana. OLGS has met Father Skerl, who was very helpful when OLGS visited the parish in search of records for his current project studying Hungarian immigrants to the U.S.

Father Skerl appears in F.I.S.T. (Federation of Interstate Truckers) at least three times as the family priest. However, the time period of the movie being primarily pre-Vatican II, the good father speaks Latin rather than Hungarian during Mass. OLGS reports that Father Skerl still speaks Hungarian, despite his being in the U.S. since 1956.

People watch movies for the strangest reasons.

Thief of Bagdhad

A deviation from the plan of watching the films of Pressburger-Powell, the Archers. The Thief of Bagdhad, released in 1940, was produced by Alexander Korda, who left what is now Hungary in 1919. After working in the film industry in Vienna, Berlin and Hollywood, he began producing movies in England. His first, The Private Life of Henry VIII, was a big hit and has been credited with turning the moribund British film industry around.

The designers of the 1992 Disney film Aladdin watched the Thief of Bagdhad very carefully. The thief is cute and cunning, the Princess'father is a fat, dithering fool who nevertheless loves his daughter deeply, and Jaffar has very long fingers. The genie is not as benign as Robin Williams, and the Prince and the thief are two different characters, but both differences seem inconsequential. Chases through the market, playing hide and seek with the guards and stealing food were shamelessly copied by the 1992 version, and a good thing, too. They are funny.

Hungarian Exodus to Hollywood

Now that winter, more specifically ice and snow, are settling in, it's time to devise a way to amuse myself but still feel productive. Those Puritan genes are coming to the surface.

Emeric Pressburger

So, to support OLGS in his ongoing efforts to master all things Hungarian, I have resolved to watch films involving Hungarian emigres in Hollywood. The list is vast, with a seemingly endless supply of directors, screenwriters, producers, actors, musicians and others becoming part of the US film scene from the silent film era to post-1956. And the US was not the only landing spot for Hungarians who turned out to have remarkable talent for all aspects of film-making; many of them headed for England, adding to the richness of British movies.

I am starting my odyssey with the films of Emeric Pressburger, who on his own and with Michael Powell wrote, directed and produced movies in England from the 1930s to the 1960s in England. Probably the most famous result of the Powell-Pressburger collaboration was the 1948 film, The Red Shoes, based on the tale by Hans Christian Andersen.

A lot has been written about The Red Shoes, which was recently restored and re-released by the Criterion Collection. I'm not equipped to judge it as a ballet movie, but it had its charms, nevertheless. A couple of interesting things to watch: the behavior and recreation of the corps de ballet, the set designers and others foreshadows later beatniks. Lots of late night drinking and partying, something that I didn't think dancers did much of, not that I know many dancers, but...

The other thing is the color. Everything has a sunset glow, and the colors are intense. Really intense. OLGS noted that perhaps they hadn't quite gotten technicolor right. Or it could be the remastering. For whatever reason, it's kind of hard on the eyes, although the dancing is nice. Credit Moira Shearer for that.