Now Voyager
Hello Dear Luminary Reader, I have picked six of my favourite iconic films with wonderful leading ladies - Ginger Rogers Diane Keaton, Wendy Hiller, Bette Davies and Greta Gerwig to inspire you, make you laugh and give you courage to face any challenge and to realise that girls can do anything. Watch any of these exhilarating, unforgettable film masterpieces to transport, inspire and uplift you. I hope you enjoy the films and do email me if you would like to come to our first online community movie and supper night in the autumn - Alison Jane, Founder and Editor - theluminariesmagazine@gmail.com
Now Voyager
Now Voyager, is a wondrous story of female empowerment, love and reaching for the stars no matter what. This golden age, vintage film masterpiece stars Bette Davies in her element as the downtrodden and abused daughter of a Boston wasp matriarch played with convincing venom and monstrous cruelty by Gladys Cooper at her icy best.
The Art of Slow Travel
Charlotte Vale is a member of one of the most powerful, wasp Boston families and lives in a mansion, and yet she is treated like a servant. Her mother's servant. With the help of Claude Raines, as a pioneering doctor, Davies escapes her mother's despotic realm and she expands her horizons and repairs her mind through the art of slow travel. She also meets a great man! As a result, she rises from abused child to glittering, picture hat wearing swan. As she flourishes, Charlotte becomes the devoted mentor for another little girl, the daughter of her lover, played with equal passion by Paul Henreid.
Fashion and Philanthropy and the Fun to be had With Great Wealth
What a movie! Now Voyager is a poem to an age of glamour, elegance, fun and the joy of culture and adventure. It is also a film brimming with longing, love making, the art of slow travel by boat and plane, coupled with a tragic story of forbidden love and it is told with an exquisite sense of drama and intense vitality that is irresistible, along with Bette Davies's ravishing couture wardrobe and the fun and good you can do with fabulous wealth. Fashion and philanthropy has never looked so empowering.
Watch Now Voyager and cultivate your own invincibility!
Now Voyager or Buy the DVD to Keep and Treasure
Frances Ha
Greta Gerwig, isn't just the director of Little Women and Barbie, she is a marvellous, sensitive and intuitive actress and I long to see her act again as she does in Frances Ha, a charming, deliciously goofy, authentic love letter to Woody Allen that speaks volumes about loyalty, the lottery of success, privilege and real talent.
Talent Over Privilege
Like Bette Davies in Now Voyager, Gerwig plays the quietly downtrodden character of Frances, a talented ballet dancer and teacher who is ruthlessly and carelessly discarded (for a man) by her spoilt best friend, played with careless brilliance by Mickey Sumner. Frances is overlooked for the breaks she deserves at the ballet school where she is an aspiring dancer and her peers don't cheer her on either.
Frances's life spirals downwards until the point she can't pay her rent and she takes a job waiting tables at her old college and moves into a college room. The joy comes in seeing Frances come back from the bottom and get the break she deserves by simply being herself and finding the confidence to believe in her own talent.
Watch Frances Ha on the BFI
I Know Where I Am Going
In I Know Where I Am Going, Powell and Pressburger's whimsical WW2 Scottish love fantasy, Dame Wendy Hiller, is a marvellous force of nature as Joan, a feisty, leopard pill box hat wearing heroine who has set her cap at the richest industrialist in England. He's almost the same age as her delightful bank manger father, but Joan declares what is wrong with that? Well, let's find out.
Joan arrives on Mull, en route to the fictional island of Kiloran to marry her wealthy fiancee, only to have her plans foiled by the weather and an enigmatic navel officer hell bent on stopping her from marrying a rich old man! Grounded by a huge storm, Joan constantly collides with Roger Livesey's magnetic laird and gradually comes to learn that money isn't everything, but not before she learns some tough lessons.
Hiller is perfect as the heroine who is not afraid to change her mind, as she falls for Torquil and the island community that swirls around him, where life feels elemental and thrilling from curses, deadly whirlpools and golden eagles to wild Scottish country, dancing and living off the land in the midst of war.
I Know Where I Am Going is the other film to rival Brief Encounter and the ending is far more joyful!
Watch I Know Where I Am Going on ITVX
Kitty Foyle
Do you think Ginger Rogers is just the celluloid dream partner to Fred Astaire in Top Hat and Flying Down to Rio? Think again. In Kitty Foyle, for which Rodgers garnered an Oscar, Ginger Rogers flexes her shining talent as a dramatic actress as she embodies the spirit of the sassy, intelligent, independent American girl who can take care of herself, even in the Depression. As she declares, " No one takes care of Kitty Foyle, except Kitty Foyle."
Don't Expect Prince Charming
Kitty Foyle came out in 1940, and it is the poster film every woman needs to watch about self determination. The story fizzes with a great script, black comedy and moments of profound loss and heartbreak. Roger's dominates every frame and by Judas Priest, she is a fighter. Dalton Trumbo wrote the fizzing script for Kitty Foyle. The film is fierce, tragic, sweetly romantic and tackles the divide between rich and poor with humour, wit and intelligence. I wanted Kitty to end up with Winn, but I get that the story isn't a fairytale, and so Kitty makes a choice based on life and pragmatic thriving, not Prince Charming and Cinderella. Damn it!
Watch Kitty Foyle on BBC iPlayer
Annie Hall
Annie Hall starring Diane Keaton and Woody Allen, is really a story about a woman, Keaton, finding her wings and ditching Allen's hilarious, posturing pseudo intellectual who is far too book-smart and exquisitely anxious to be happy. Allen's script is a cracker. There are so many delicious barbs in the film, you need to savour it over and over and let it all sink in. The film garnered the Oscar in 1977 for best picture and picks brilliantly at the dynamics in human relationships, social stereotypes and exposes our foibles, shortcomings and vanities whilst also capturing the seventies zeitgeist. The film also explores women behaving more like men and grabbing the opportunities men have taken for granted for centuries.
How I love Keaton's wardrobe. I bought my first tuxedo after watching the film. Keaton blazes a trail in her kooky, masculine meets feminine trousers, braces and cool hats as she leaves Woody gazing in her wake. Look out for Paul Simon playing himself as a rock star using his status as a babe magnet, shamelessly.
Diane Keaton is completely ageless, fun and forever au courant. Follow her adventures on Instagram - Diane Keaton
Copyright Alison Jane Reid/ The Luminaries Magazine August 2024.
All Rights Reserved. No Copying Whatsoever in any Format.
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