Post by rmichaelpyle on Jul 18, 2009 6:18:15 GMT -6
Thanks to a friend who got me a copy of this very, very rare early British talkie, I watched "I Lived With You" (1933), which starred Ivor Novello, Ursula Jeans, a young, blond, and pretty Ida Lupino, Minnie Rayner, Eliot Makeham, Cicely Oates (who steals the film, in my opinion), and an incredibly young Jack Hawkins (whom my wife didn't even recognise, though I could see him in the future, so it was a surety!). The film would have been far too sophisticated for Hollywood to make, and possibly too risque in some of its comments, although this was a year before the code went into effect. Not only did Ivor Novello star in the film, but he also wrote the play upon which the film is based. I know Novello from his silents, and I like his silents. In sound he reminds me a lot of Ramon Novarro, to whom I think he can be compared in many ways. Now the connection of Ursula Jeans, the leading lady, is interesting. First of all, Novello worked with both she and her sister, Isabel. Isabel Jeans had appeared in "Downhill" and "Easy Virtue", both early silents directed by Alfred Hitchcock, a director Novello worked with in "The Lodger". Isabel had appeared in two of "The Rat" films with Novello, a series of three films which were very popular in Europe in the late twenties. Isabel went on to appear in other well known films, including playing Aunt Alicia in "Gigi". Her sister Ursula, again, the leading lady of this film, was very pretty, and played her part well, albeit slightly more as if she were on stage. Ida Lupino, playing the bratty and high maintenance sister, flirty, and one who would do anything to further her own interests, is quite good in the part. Overall, the theme, one of a Russian prince who is out of sorts because of the Russian revolution, one whose father had been Russian upper crust and is now dead, who had come to England fortuitously before the revolution had begun, but who had been forced to stay as a result - the theme is quite ridiculous, although such things did occur. But the way Novello pulls off the rest of the film, going to live with Jeans in her house, along with the sister, an aunt, and her parents, is on the border of ridiculous. Nevertheless, the cast pulls all off until near the end, when the improbability makes credulity stretch a little too far. The production is definitely done on the cheap, although the director was none other than the great British director Maurice Elwey. His similarities to Hitchcock in style was nearly startling! The show reminded me constantly of a stage play put directly on film, and it showed the early remnants of being shot with sound, newly, that is, from the silent era. I think older (maybe two, three year old equipment) equipment was used so that a money issue could be resolved. If Novello produced this he did it on the cheap, as opposed to a major British studio, none of which did what Hollywood was doing in those days. All in all, this was very interesting to watch, a fun film, well done, of its day, sophisticated, but possibly beyond many modern American tastes which would need to stretch a bit to understand all of beginnings of sound pictures, let alone the British subtle humor which pervaded the show wonderfully, and the marvelously Noel Cowardish mind of Ivor Novello.
