newcritics - Latest Comments in Meeting Kirk Douglas

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

phonecreditcards — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 08:22:58 -0000

Yeah, though a black and white 50s war yarn - that flick drips with sex and violence - south pacific war noir. And Wayne is excellent, you're right - it's in the portion of his films where his character has some depth. Douglas, though, with his twisted, represessed hatred in the movie steals the show.

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Sharon Miller — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 23:26:40 -0000

There will never be another as good as Kirk Douglas.. He has done well with his children.. I wish him well, and we were so glad to hear his interview on television.. what a great man.. You were so lucky to meet him. Wish we all had the opportunity to know him personally.

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Kit Stolz — Tue, 01 May 2007 14:29:29 -0000

In today's LATimes, a Tinseltown correspondent named Patrick Goldstein interviews a Hollywood veteran named Mel Shaverson, who happens to tell a wonderful anecdote about Kirk Douglas:

"Shavelson and Kirk Douglas fought so incessantly during the making of "Cast a Giant Shadow" that Shavelson at one point walked off the set, letting his assistant shoot the film for a day. After the film was released, Douglas sent Shavelson a letter, which still hangs on the wall of his office. "Mel, I think it was a good picture," it reads. "It could have been better if I had paid more attention to you."

Shavelson says he shares blame for their clashes. "It was very tough to argue with Kirk because he was very intelligent and very often he was right. He had to be the boss and I had to be the director, and there's no in-between ground.'"

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et...

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Tom Kissane — Tue, 01 May 2007 10:33:33 -0000

I should add, I didn't mean the charge to extend to all his career or work. I was focusing on that particular incident. I am agonstic as to the extent to which he functioned as a propogandist for Moscow apart from that: though I would argue that, having done so once, he fairly opened himself to inquiry, by those inclined to inquire about such things (particularly those outside of govt.), as to whether he was doing so subsequently.

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Tom Kissane — Tue, 01 May 2007 10:28:28 -0000

Try the sentence following the proposition in my post where the charge is made. I don't mean that he wasn't sincere in his pro-Moscow feeling: I mean he was insincere in using his gifts to summon powerful anti-war sentiments when that was the line from Mosocow, and doing a complete 180 on the subject when the Soviet line changed.

George Orwell has written a great deal on this phenomenon, which unfolded before his eyes to his obvious dismay. (Though, to my knowledge, he hasn't written about Trumbo specifically.)

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Tom Watson — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 13:29:55 -0000

Just to add a bit do the Trumbo story, here's the Wikipedia entry.

I'd like more substantation of this charge:

"Trumbo was ... and blatently insincere in using his gifts as propaganda for Moscow."

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Tom Kissane — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 13:23:17 -0000

Hmmmm. Come to think of it, that's four points, isn't it. Or more, if you look beyond the numbering.

You oughta have a preview/edit feature on this site, like on the Tom W blog, to protect people like me from themselves.

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Tom Kissane — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 13:21:59 -0000

Three points:

1. Kirk Douglas had a fine acting career: not the most versatile of actors, but forecful and distinctive.

2. He was right to insist on Trumbo getting the screen credit he deserved. Trumbo was a gifted writer, and there is no reason that anyone should be excluded from the entertainment industry based on their politics.

3. Trumbo was a communist, and blatently insincere in using his gifts as propaganda for Moscow. He wrote the famous anti-war book "Johnny Got his Gun", during the brief interval of the Russo-German pact, when the party line was anti-war. One Hitler invaded Russia, he was just as strenuously pro-war.

4. There was a disproportion of people like that in Hollywood at the time. The blacklist was wrong, I believe, but there was nothing wrong, in my view, in letting people know the agendas of those who are telling them their stories.

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Self Styled Siren — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 21:09:32 -0000

Don't forget A Letter to Three Wives (he got the biggest laugh of the picture, when I saw it, by correcting the grammar of a Philistine radio boss). And Two Weeks in Another Town, which film blogger Girish also admires. You can read that one as a sort of sequel to The Bad and the Beautiful.

He is such an intense actor that at times he is almost feral, and he occasionally would overdo it. (He was also famous for driving directors and costars batty.) But I look at the movies we're all listing here, and few actors can boast of such a wide-ranging and superlative filmography.

And kudos to him for still speaking out about the blacklist. There is a worrisome effort to rehabilitate the blacklist these days, and it is good that we still have people who, like Douglas, lived through it and are still willing to remind us of what it was.

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Dan Leo — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 16:52:44 -0000

Just about the last of the old school stars. One thing that makes a star: Is he or she one of a kind? Kirk was that, like Mitchum, like Wayne, like Stanwyck, like Bette Davis, like Glenn Ford for Christ's sake.

And by the way his autobio, "The Ragman's Son", totally rocks. He had a great anecdote in there about John Wayne taking him aside after a screening of "Lust For Life" and saying something like, "Kirk, what are ya doin' playing a weakling like Van Gogh? We're supposed to be tough guys!"

Some other good ones:

Seven Days in May
Last Train From Gun Hill
The Bad and the Beautiful
Man Without a Star
Champion
Out of the Past
The Strange Love of Martha Ivers

They don't even make titles like most of these any more.

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Viscount LaCarte — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 10:55:40 -0000

I have to echo BG's comments - what a great tribute. I already liked him, and hearing the story about him de-blacklisting Trumbo only increases my respect.

Paths of Glory is not only my favorite Kirk Douglas film - it also consistently makes my top 10 list of all-time favorites.

Excuse me while I go make some additions to my Neflix rental queue.

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Tom Watson — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 09:07:16 -0000

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

Canid — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 02:37:38 -0000

Tom, I'm so glad you listed *In Harm's Way*! One of my favorite Kirk Douglas movies, and it's too often dissed at a seagoing soap opera or whatever. Douglas is excellent, as is John Wayne, and Pat Neal is totally hot.

Re: Meeting Kirk Douglas

blue girl — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 20:24:31 -0000

Wow, that's great you got to meet him, Tom. And what a nice post you wrote here, in his honor. It's great.