Watch This offers movie recommendations inspired by new releases, premieres, current events, or occasionally just our own inscrutable whims. This week: It’s all disaster movies, in honor of Independence Day (the holiday and the movie) and also in light of the real-life disaster movie happening outside our windows.
San Francisco (1936)
From its inception, Hollywood has leaped at the opportunity to depict real-life tragedy and destruction. The first movie about the sinking of the Titanic, for example, starred an actual survivor, playing a fictionalized version of herself, and was released less than a month after the ship went down. That film is, sadly, now lost, but there have been numerous cinematic accounts of the disaster in the century since—perhaps you’ve seen one of them.
Oddly, though, the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, which occurred just as cinema was being formalized as entertainment, has been all but ignored by filmmakers, even though the disaster killed thousands and almost completely leveled the city. It’s not as if there’s no potential demand either—the one notable movie built around the quake, W.S. Van Dyke’s San Francisco, was the highest-grossing film of 1936 ($5.3 million then, the equivalent of about $100 million today) and was nominated for an Oscar for Best Picture. Indeed, in many ways, this combination of shameless melodrama and high-tech disaster flick created the template that James Cameron would later employ: Come for the romance; stay for the carnage.
San Francisco wastes no time conflating those two genres, opening with text that mourns the loss of a city described as “splendid and sensuous, vulgar and magnificent.” Set in the Barbary Coast—San Francisco’s red-light district, located in an area that today encompasses parts of Chinatown, North Beach, and Jackson Square—the film spends its first 90 minutes chronicling an epic battle between highbrow and lowbrow, the sacred and the profane. Gifted soprano Mary Blake (Jeanette MacDonald) wants nothing more than to become an opera star, and quickly gets discovered by a conductor at the famed Tivoli Opera House (which, ironically, had moved to a new location in 1903 because the original building was considered a fire trap). Trouble is, she’s just signed an exclusive contract with Blackie Norton (Clark Gable), the proprietor of a sleazy Barbary Coast dance hall. Blackie’s best friend since childhood—now a tough-guy priest, played by Spencer Tracy—calls him “as unscrupulous with women as he is ruthless with men.” Mary falls hard for the cad, and actually faints when Blackie initially offers her $75 per week (about $1,380 today) to headline his joint. But she still yearns to be respectable, both personally and professionally.
Odds are that San Francisco would have been fairly successful even had this tug-of-war taken place in 1903 or 1905. Gable and MacDonald were two of Hollywood’s biggest stars, with the public especially eager to hear the latter warble; in addition to performing the title song (written for the film, played after every 49ers touchdown and field goal to this day) and selections from Faust and La Traviata, MacDonald here introduces “Would You?”—now better remembered as the duet for which Kathy Selden dubs Lina Lamont’s vocals in Singin’ In The Rain. And there’s plenty of memorable friction between the two lovers, heightened by Gable’s unique ability to appear fundamentally sympathetic even as he mostly behaves like a smug asshole. (That Blackie has a priest constantly vouching for his fundamental decency helps, though friction eventually develops between them too.)
Still, the movie announces right up front that it’s building to April 18, 1906, and all hell does indeed break loose about 94 minutes in. Earthquakes are inconvenient, from a cinematic standpoint, in that they’re of such short duration; the 1906 quake provided San Francisco’s screenwriters with an additional hassle, having taken place at 5:12 a.m., when most of the city was asleep. (That’s probably why subsequent films like Earthquake and San Andreas invented their Richter-toppers.) A variety-show competition, the Chickens’ Ball (which did take place in the Barbary Coast at that time, if perhaps not on that date and continuing into that ungodly hour), is used to keep the characters awake until buildings constructed prior to U.S. earthquake codes start toppling like Jenga towers. Although the quaking itself occupies less than two minutes of screen time (a slight cheat, as the actual quake lasted 42 seconds; there are also an improbable number of people on the street), second-unit director John Hoffman’s rapid-fire montage of the immediate casualties is startlingly brutal, especially for the era. This is a movie that’s not afraid to show a cute little girl looking upward in alarm and then cut to a shot of falling bricks that presumably crush her into a fine paste. Countless extras get pulverized by masonry in almost subliminal images, intercut with the remarkably convincing destruction of miniatures. Most of the damage to San Francisco was caused by the resulting fires, through which an injured Blackie stumbles while searching for Mary. As in Robert Altman’s Short Cuts, the resolution of multiple unrelated dramatic issues via natural disaster feels a bit simplistic, but San Francisco remains a fascinating early example of Hollywood’s lust for rubble.
Availability: San Francisco is currently available for digital rental or purchase from Amazon, Google Play, iTunes, YouTube, VUDU, Fandango, Microsoft, and DirectTV.
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The first movie about the sinking of the Titanic, for example, starred an actual survivor, playing a fictionalized version of herself, and was released less than a month after the ship went down. It also featured her wearing the very same clothes she wore when she was rescued
UGH–OPERA SINGING.
UGH—OPERA SINGING.
This is a surprisingly entertaining movie. The usual disaster movie thumb-twiddling is more engaging than usual and the actual earthquake is pretty rollicking. By all means give it a shot.Cedar Point, an amusement park in Sandusky, Ohio, used to have a San Francisco earthquake ride. It was like your classic horror ride, you’d get in a little car on a track and ride through a set of doors into a darkened building through an unsuspecting streetscape where crude animatronic figures danced and dined unsuspectingly. Then the quake kicked in with styrofoam building facades trembling and leaning down toward you as the sound system rumbled away. You ended the ride by rolling past ruins with cutout cloth “flames” flapping to flickering light. Great fun. It was of course, like everything else charming about the park, torn down to make room for more roller coasters.
I’ll always take dark rides over roller coasters.
I like that you bring up Cedar Point. I grew up going to Sea World, but never C.P. The amusement park of choice was Kings’ Island for some reason, even though I think I never went there more than twice. Growing up in central OH and having more family be Reds/Bengals fans than Indians/Browns fans, I guess it makes sense?I always preferred the Browns over the Bengals, personally, but no one goes against their grandmother on Sunday afternoon.
Wow. Thank you for that memory. We used to to Cedar Point every summer and I’d totally forgotten about that attraction. Also, I remember it always feeling very cool in there. Then I’d eat salt water taffy, take on the spin on the Rotor and throw up. Now I’m going to cry.
I can’t find it, but there’s a video they play on TCM a lot that says most of the extras had no idea what was about to happen during the earthquake scene before the set starts coming apart, so some of the action is genuine panic.They must’ve had some idea, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t think something had gone very very wrong.
Maybe they told the extras they were going to be in a movie about the Johnstown flood… That’d be kind of surprising…
Actually, that was the subject of an earlier silent disaster movie. I recall seeing part of it at the Johnstown flood museum, but having to leave because my toddler daughter found it distressing. In fairness to her, it was kind of creepily staged. I recall a scene where an old guy opens the door of his shack, apparently having heard something outside, only to be swamped by the flood waters — kind of silly in the description, but unsettling to see, especially after seeing multiple exhibits of the horrors of the day.
How is there movie about the Great Molasses Flood of 1919?Why the Great Molasses Flood Was So DeadlyIt was like a perfect—if bizarre, terrifying and very sticky—storm. Around lunchtime on the afternoon of January 15, 1919, a giant tank of molasses burst open in Boston’s North End. More than two million gallons of thick liquid poured out like a tsunami wave, reaching speeds of up to 35 miles per hour. The molasses flooded streets, crushed buildings and trapped horses in an event that ultimately killed 21 people and injured 150 more. The smell of molasses lingered for decades.[…]“First you kind of laugh at it, then you read about it, and it was just horrible,”-History.com
Coming this Summer — a movie about the worst thing molasses has been involved in since the end of the Triangular Trade!
Protest the Hero just released a song about this called “All Hands” on their latest album. it’s really fucking good, and the album is surprisingly informative
I checked it out on YouTube, and I never would have guessed what it’s about, even after reading the lyrics, if not for this comment from DETRUCTOBLOG“And today I learned about the Molassacre.” -DETRUCTOBLOG
to be fair, it kind of sits better in the overall album. every song deals with an event from American history and most of them show how the events are more tragic or darker than they initially seem. it’s a really clever and well-written critique on the idea of the country’s unimpeachable “greatness”
As I’ve noted before, when some old-timer calls something “As slow as molasses in January”, you can point out that’s really about 35 miles per hour.
Also a great segment on Drunk History.
This got me wondering about movies about the Great Chicago Fire, and I found In Old Chicago.Spoiler alert, pretty much everybody dies.
the Johnstown floodThe lives of working people being put at risk for the benefit of plutocrats? Warnings about neglected infrastructure going unheeded? Legal arguments to dodge liability? Legislative inaction failing to prevent future such problems? Naah, nobody’d buy that one today…A book about it was influential on me as a kid. Just now realized that it was the start of an illustrious career in historical and biographical nonfiction for author David McCullough.
If they knew that the setting was San Francisco in 1906, that’s kind of Chekov’s gun. Then again, if we’re talking about extras rather than credited actors with speaking roles, maybe they’d been told nothing more than “put on these already vaguely funny looking old clothes and go stand over there”…
This film doesn’t share very much in common with “Titanic” or for that matter later films in the “disaster movie” genre, because in this one the disaster doesn’t happen until 20 minutes before the end. Most of the film is dedicated to the love triangle between Macdonald, Clark Gable, and Not Clark Gable. And of course Macdonald’s songs. It really is a marvelous moment when she gets up on stage and belts out “San Francisco” and gets the audience on their feet.Spencer Tracy’s character in this film always made me wonder. He keeps sticking his nose into Macdonald’s romance with Gable for no goddamn reason. Of course there is a reason—the whole point is for Gable, whom TV Tropes would call a “Straw Atheist” in this film, to see the light and have a religious conversion which will finally make him worthy of Macdonald’s love. But from a latter-day perspective it’s so odd to see Tracy butting in with his “she’s too pure for you” nonsense.The earthquake scene is justly famous. They quite obviously went all-out on the 1936 special effects and it shows. Put whole buildings up on platforms and shook them.One bit I liked was how, by 1936, you couldn’t just spell out that hookers were hookers anymore, because the Hays Code had been imposed. So there’s one scene where Tracy is giving some sermon on redemption and whatever, and there’s hardly anyone in the audience, except for these two very attractive young women in fancy dresses, looking sad and weepy.Reportedly, Macdonald and Gable hated each other. Legend has it that he had spaghetti for lunch before a kissing scene with Macdonald, and he loaded it up with garlic to make his breath particularly bad.And speaking of the use of the song “San Francisco” at sporting events, one of the most moving things I have ever seen was when they sang it before Game 3 of the 1989 World Series, postponed nearly two weeks due to the Loma Prieta earthquake.And as for movies about the 1906 quake, a Brad Bird project titled, well, “1906″ has been in development hell for over ten years. Too expensive, it seems.I got put back in the grays. No one will ever read this post! Waaaaaah…..
Fun fact: San Francisco has brass markers embedded in the sidewalk in North Beach to commemorate the Barbary Coast, and the one at Broadway and Columbus (IIRC) across from the Condor Club is dedicated to Cliff Burton, the bassist from Metallica. It’s not fussy or anything, I just noticed it when I was waiting to cross the street. It’s one of the only times I’d call something Metallica-related both sweet and charming.
the 1906 quake provided San Francisco’s screenwriters with an additional hassle, having taken place at 5:12 a.m., when most of the city was asleep.
There were perhaps a few more early risers in those days. Official sunrise was apparently at 5:31AM, so there’d have been usefully advanced twilight by that hour. Famously Enrico Caruso was getting a shave when the earthquake hit, and ran out to the street in shock still draped with the shaving bib.
I think that any historical monetary conversion misses that fact that the further back you go the less there is to buy. It’s one thing to say that, in 1920, an apartment cost x and now it costs y, so multiply everything by y/x. But in 1920 they didn’t even have AC or air fryers or security cameras. My folks got married in the early 50s and I don’t think my dad was making $3000 a year yet, but they had everything they wanted, which was like 6 things.
I don’t think it’s so much that there is so much less to buy, it’s that people today feel the need to spend more. I’m late Gen-X, and I did well without having a TV for many years. I had my laptop and Wi-Fi. I’m a professional chef so if I knew I needed to grind something down for dinner that night I’d bring it into work and use the Robot-Coupe. It kills me that people think they need “stuff”. I’m not saying go completely wilderness, but seriously, when you own a coffee grinder and only use it once a year, do you really need that thing because you’re buying Starbucks?My perfect example is this: When my grandmother moved out of her house of 50-some years, I discovered that she had a kitchen blender from every decade from 1930-1980. They all still worked perfectly. But she had to have the new model.I took the one from the 1940’s. It was awesome.
The inflation calculation is more sophisticated than you’re giving it credit. They don’t just pick one asset as a benchmark. They use wage data and a basket of assets that shifts over time to represent consumer spending at a time point. I’m sure it’s still not perfect, but they did think it through.
This is a movie that’s not afraid to show a cute little girl looking
upward in alarm and then cut to a shot of falling bricks that presumably
crush her into a fine paste
*Sigh*Sold.
Didn’t Brad Bird want to make a similar film? Is that project still officially stuck in developmental hell, or has he officially abandoned the idea?
I can vaguely recall an old movie I saw as a kid on one of those Old Movie shows which used the earthquake as a plot element. I can’t recall the name or who was in it, but it involved the story of three sisters, opened at the Republican convention of 1904, ended at the Republican convention of 1908. The one sister ended up San Fracisco and her no-good husband walked out on her that night and she was distraught in her home when the shaking started and later had to be rousted out by city workers dynamiting the place as a firebreak.
Although the quaking itself occupies less than two minutes of screen time (a slight cheat, as the actual quake lasted 42 seconds…
Well, not exactly. From historynet.com:
At
5:12 a.m., Wednesday, April 18, 1906, San Franciscans were rudely
awakened by a sharp jolt that lasted about 45 seconds. This was a
foreshock, an overture to a terrible symphony of destruction. About 10
or 12 seconds after the shaking subsided, the city was rocked by a far
more powerful temblor that lasted some 45 to 60 seconds.
It is true that most of the subsequent damage was caused by the fire, rather than the quake itself. There is speculation that some of the fires were deliberately set by property owners, for the simple reason that commercial insurance policies tended to cover fire damage but exclude earthquake damage.
Also, with the water system damaged by the earthquake, desperate city officials and the Army (which mostly took over the disaster response from the inept and corrupt civilian government) took to blowing up buildings in an attempt to create fire breaks. Unfortunately, demolitions experts were in short supply. One man who did present himself as an expert turned out to be a habitual drunkard.
A combination of inexperience and improper techniques likely spread the fire, and resulted in total destruction of property that had suffered repairable damage during the earthquake.Sorry to go off on a tangent, but I find this sort of thing fascinating in light of the debate over our government’s handling or mishandling of present disasters.