August 14 movie: All That Heaven Will Allow. I confess, I didn't pay that close attention to this movie because I was going through my tax receipts while it was on. Why, you ask, was I doing my taxes now, in the middle of August? Well I'll tell you, it's because I filed for an extension back in April, and just remembered this afternoon that the extended deadline is tomorrow. And the post office isn't open late like it is on April 15. Eek!
My taxes are pretty complicated, what with salary income, self-employment income, royalty income, and "cost of goods sold" inventory to keep track of. Each of which requires a different schedule. But it could be worse, I don't have any dividends to report. And it all turned out fine, I didn't owe anything and I didn't even claim all the deductions I could have.
But anyway, the movie. This was another Douglas Sirk melodrama starring Jane Wyman as a widow who falls in love with younger man Rock Hudson. Sounds a lot like Magnificent Obsession, doesn't it? Unfortunately I think it seems a bit that this movie was put together to cash in on the success of the previous one. The plot isn't as baroque, and the characters aren't as complex. Sirk is best when he's wallowing in shades of grey, with people doing the right thing for the wrong reason, the wrong thing for the right reason, and all possible variations. All That Heaven Will Allow was just too straightforward. They fall in love, the narrow-minded town disapproves, they separate but eventually reunite and tell the neighbors to get stuffed. End of story.
It was all worth it though, for the final scene. I hate to give away final moments like this, but Wyman goes to visit injured Hudson and tell him she still loves him, and there's this humongous deer standing right outside the window staring at them the whole time. And they just ignore it! It's hilarious. If it were me, I'd be all, "Oh honey I love you t-- What the hell is up with that deer? Shoo! Stop staring at us!"
I liked this movie a lot, and I thought the characters and their motives did have some complexity to them. But I haven't seen Magnificent Obsession yet, so I can't compare it to that. My TiVo cut off the final scene of this movie and I was so upset, I was beside myself. I finally saw it the next time it came on TCM, but I had lost the momentum of the emotion I felt while I was watching the whole thing.
I do remember that freaky deer, though.
I probably didn't give the movie a fair chance because of my taxes. Doing your taxes could put you off any movie!
I hate losing the last few minutes a movie! I blame TCM for that, not the DVR. They stick a 1:58 movie into a two hour slot, with 3 minutes of promos on the front end, and then we lose the ending. That happened to me the first time I watched the Norma Shearer movie about Marie Antoinette. I finally got to see the ending about a year later, but it just wasn't the same.
When it happened to me the second time, I routinely started adding time before and after the record times on both TCM and IFC, particularly in the middle of thenight. And then I always check the end of the recording before I start watching, to make sure the whole movie has recorded. It's kind of annoying to do all that, but not as annoying as having the last minutes cut off.