Tom Jones 1963

The Film:

My response to "what are you watching next then?" has inevitably needed to be "Tom Jones - not that one, Albert Finney!" And most people are none the wiser. This is one of the winners that needs to go into the "forgotten" category, along with the likes of Lost Weekend and All The King's Men. Those two were both superb films - so it's got a lot to live up to.

I know very little about the film except that it's very "British" - a period piece based on a Henry Fielding novel. It's also very "bawdy", so I'm sort of expecting a Carry On film with some literary clout. It's a Tony Richardson film, which gives even more clout - British acting royalty and all that. The Tony Richardson films I'm familiar with are all pretty gritty kitchen-sink type things. So I am intrigued.....

It's also absolutely rife with women, which is such a relief after the last film. And they are not just the ones that our titular hero encounters intimately in his "bawdy adventures" but several other character actors - leading to three of the five Supporting Actress nominees going its way.

I have the generational disadvantage of always thinking of Albert Finney as either Scrooge or Daddy Warbucks. I'm slightly apprehensive, but generally looking forward to sexy-Finney. And interesting characters, comedy, women with actual dialogue and the lush greenery of the English countryside couldn't come soon enough after the camels and sand of last week!

The Ceremony:

The 36th Academy Awards were held at Santa Monica Auditorium on 13th April 1964. The host was Jack Lemmon and the whole thing was broadcast by ABC.

There was a bit of an envelope mix up (not of 2017 proportions!) when Sammy Davis Jnr had the wrong type of musical score award envelope in his hand and, therefore, read out the wrong winner.

There was a new category this year, for Best Sound Effects - which shows how things were changing and developing in movie making. It was won by "It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad world".


Other Notable Winners That Night:

Despite the nonsense that won the big two awards, it was otherwise a landmark year for the Oscars. Twenty four years after Hattie McDaniel, Sidney Poitier became the first Black man to win a competitive acting award. Best Actress went to Patricia Neal for "Hud" (despite the part technically being a supporting role!). Best Supporting Actor was also from Hud (Melvin Douglas) and - despite three nominations for Tom Jones, the Best Supporting Actress award went to another strong British character actress, Margaret Rutherford.

In fact, none of the nominees for Best Supporting Actress were American. And the Foreign Language Film winner, Fellini's "8 and a half" was also a contender for Best Director along with three other nominations (it also won for Best Costume, black and white). The Oscars were starting to get more colourful (in more ways than one) and more international.


Best Song:

A song I know - "Call Me Irresponsible". A film I've never heard of (Papa's Delicate Condition). A quick check on IMDb and a look at this clip and I think I'd quite like to watch the whole thing.

What We Could/Should Have Been Watching:

Yes, of course this is just a shameless excuse
to post up a picture of this beautiful man again!

Having now watched the thing, I think the response to this category is "anything but Tom Jones"!

The other nominees were Kazan's "America America" (which I've only just heard of and read about, and surely deserves more recognition?), "Lilies of the Field", Ford's epic "How The West Was Won" and the ultra-epic mega-flop "Cleopatra". Out of those films I am completely baffled as to why the award went to a stupid bit of sub-CarryOn nonsense. It should probably have gone to How The West Was Won - extraordinary cast, great critical reviews and massive box office.

Two other bona fide classics were among the wider nominees - Fellini's "8 and a half" and "Hud" one of Paul Newman's best films. As ever, I am biased towards Newman for several reasons (some more spurious than others). But Hud is a great film and it's a while since I've seen it. I would far rather have been sitting through it again than wasting my time on the nonsense we ended up watching.

Our Verdict:

"What a lovely pair!"

I think my first response to this film has to be "What?????" closely followed by "Why?????" (and yes, all those question marks are justified). I still don't think it's quite as bad as Gigi (Andy disagrees) but at least I can sort of see why people at the time thought Gigi was award-worthy. I have absolutely no idea what on earth was going on at the Academy when this pile of nonsense won Best Picture. I was expecting something a bit quirky, a bit clever, a bit different - but in a good way. It was definitely at least two out of those three, but in a bad way!

"What a lovely pair!"

The plot, for what it's worth, is as follows. Tom Jones is a foundling, parents suspected but unknown, who is brought up by the kindly Squire Allworthy. He turns out to be handsome (and, actually, a young Albert Finney is rather nice to look at in 18th Century attire!), kind and rather fond of women. He falls in love with Sophie (Susanna York, also looking lovely) but the course of true love doesn't run smoothly - partly due to the Squire's sneaky snivelling nephew and partly due to Sophie's overbearing aunt (the splendid Edith Evans - by far the best thing in the film!). Things take a dodgy turn for young Tom and he heads to London. He has various japes and scrapes along the way, including a stupidly filmed Benny Hill-esque escape out of a window after possibly-nearly shagging someone who may or may not turn out to be his mum (thankfully not, as it turns out). Some other stuff happens (I'd lost the will to care by this point), David Tomlinson does something unseemly to Sophie which may have now ruined Mary Poppins for me. And Tom Jones gets arrested and sent off to be hanged. But its ok, it turns out that he's not a low life foundling after all and is actually quite rich, so he gets off and can marry Sophie after all - and all is well.

"Fancy a bit of leg?"

Along the way there are some ridiculous farcical scenes that were already being done much better on a smaller budget by Sid and Kenneth and co. There are several scenes that are way too long and self-indulgent: a long, long sequence with Tom and Sophie mooning all over each other was just about bearable, but the equally as long hunt scene was needlessly violent and realistic (and long) for a bawdy romp in the English countryside. As was most of the over the top "realism" that involved several chickens and dogs getting kicked by drunken yokels at different points. In fact, the over-laboured realism of the sights, sounds and smells of the countryside reminded me of early Paul Verhoeven, particularly Flesh and Blood (which I still swear I could smell!) - but at least Flesh and Blood was meant to be visceral and repulsive (and it had Rutger Hauer in it...). This was a comedy - why hurt horses and cover everyone in mud??

Thank heavens for Edith Evans!

The breaking of the fourth wall, with various winks to camera etc would have been clever and endearing if there hadn't been an air of trying too hard. When the comedy came it was generally either too broad for my tastes or too wrapped up in something tasteless or unnecessary in a different sense.

I liked one or two things about the film. Albert Finney was good, there were some nice bits of dialogue in there (which were probably Henry Fielding's rather than John Osborne's) and Edith Evans was superb! But otherwise the whole thing was nonsense. Pretentious and pointless nonsense. And I don't intend to ever watch it again!