Gilda, and Classic Hollywood OT3s
Jul. 19th, 2020 01:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerEarlier this year I realized that I had never seen a Rita Hayworth film, so yesterday Julie and I watched Gilda to rectify this fact, and OH MY GOD you guys, THIS MOVIE, there’s a scene near the beginning where Gilda (Hayworth) is looking at her new husband Mundson’s right hand man Johnny and that’s all she’s doing, just looking, and the raw sexual energy as the two of them stand there fully clothed and look at each other is more powerful than many actual sex scenes I have seen.
Here’s the story: Johnny is a gambler who nearly gets stabbed in an alley in Buenos Aires, but is saved when Mundson intervenes with his sword cane. They have banter, Mundson gives Johnny the card to an illegal casino across town, Johnny shows up and cheats his way into a lot of money… and then he’s taken up to see the boss, who turns out to be Mundson, who hires him as head of security.
Then Mundson heads off on a trip, and gets married, and the girl... turns out to be Gilda. Who has a history with Johnny, which ended in a spectacular break-up for reasons we never do learn.
There’s some other stuff going on with this film (a side plot with Nazis, a tungsten monopoly), but the main driving engine of this film is the tangle of passion and hatred and jealousy and affection that tie Johnny and Gilda and Mundson together in one twisted, torturous “I can see this going in an OT3 direction, but only in a hatesex way.”
I realize that I have an affinity for OT3s, which is possibly why I keep stubbing my toe on them in classic Hollywood, but also there are just so many. So many. Examples include:
Singin’ in the Rain
The Philadelphia Story
The Talk of the Town (okay, yes, this one is comparatively obscure, but I have loved it ever sinceskygiants introduced me to it, and it DOES star Cary Grant, and also I believe strongly that every single pairing in this movie would dissolve without the third leg of the trio to prop it up)
Every single freaking Road movie with Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Dorothy Lamour.
If only these films had come out in the era of the internet fandom I’m sure they all would have a couple thousand fics (estimate based on the 2015 Man from U.N.C.L.E’s three thousand odd fics on AO3), but ALAS, their decades-too-early release dates doomed them.
Here’s the story: Johnny is a gambler who nearly gets stabbed in an alley in Buenos Aires, but is saved when Mundson intervenes with his sword cane. They have banter, Mundson gives Johnny the card to an illegal casino across town, Johnny shows up and cheats his way into a lot of money… and then he’s taken up to see the boss, who turns out to be Mundson, who hires him as head of security.
Then Mundson heads off on a trip, and gets married, and the girl... turns out to be Gilda. Who has a history with Johnny, which ended in a spectacular break-up for reasons we never do learn.
There’s some other stuff going on with this film (a side plot with Nazis, a tungsten monopoly), but the main driving engine of this film is the tangle of passion and hatred and jealousy and affection that tie Johnny and Gilda and Mundson together in one twisted, torturous “I can see this going in an OT3 direction, but only in a hatesex way.”
I realize that I have an affinity for OT3s, which is possibly why I keep stubbing my toe on them in classic Hollywood, but also there are just so many. So many. Examples include:
Singin’ in the Rain
The Philadelphia Story
The Talk of the Town (okay, yes, this one is comparatively obscure, but I have loved it ever since
skygiants introduced me to it, and it DOES star Cary Grant, and also I believe strongly that every single pairing in this movie would dissolve without the third leg of the trio to prop it up) Every single freaking Road movie with Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Dorothy Lamour.
If only these films had come out in the era of the internet fandom I’m sure they all would have a couple thousand fics (estimate based on the 2015 Man from U.N.C.L.E’s three thousand odd fics on AO3), but ALAS, their decades-too-early release dates doomed them.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 06:52 pm (UTC)There does not seem to be any fic for Kid/Geoff/Bonnie in Ony Angels Have Wings (1939) and I frankly don't understand it.
and also I believe strongly that every single pairing in this movie would dissolve without the third leg of the trio to prop it up
Agreed.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-20 05:12 pm (UTC)The tragedy of classic movies is that, while lots of people love them and want fic for them, it seems to be hard to get a bunch of people all together loving and wanting fic for the same movie at the same time. Maybe if there was a classic movie fic fest, like, "This month we're all going to watch Only Angels Have Wings and talk about it and make fanworks," it could create a sort of mini-fandom phenomenon.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-20 03:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-20 05:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-20 05:38 pm (UTC)This is true.