Movie Review: The Pirate

The Pirate (1948) 
directed by Vincente Minnelli, starring Judy Garland, Gene Kelly

(Note: This post is an entry in the Gene Kelly Centennial Blogathon, hosted by the Classic Movie Blogs Association.)

In a small village named Calvados, a young orphan named Manuela (Judy Garland) daydreams about the famed pirate known as Macoco, the terror of the seas and the delight of women. But her aunt (Gladys Cooper) has other plans for her niece. Namely, marriage to Don Pedro (Walter Slezak), the town's pompous and thoroughly unexciting mayor. Being a dutiful girl, Manuela does her best to bury her hopes of romance. 

But as fate would have it, a dashing actor, Serafin (Gene Kelly), and his troupe of players happen to be traveling through a nearby town. And when Serafin claps eyes on Manuela, he knows she's the only one for him. After trying and failing to win her heart through words alone, he hypnotizes her at the troupe's performance. Under the spell, Manuela literally lets down her hair and sings about her passion for the pirate "Mack the Black" Macoco, astounding all with her performance. The next day, Manuela prepares to get married, with no memory of the night before. However, the lovesick Serafin is determined to win her and seizes upon a chance to impersonate the pirate. His plan turns out to have consequences he didn't expect, as the deceptions begin to pile up on each other. Lying is just another kind of performance, after all...

The Pirate is a film that is easy to summarize but hard to explain. On the surface, it's a straight-up musical parody of the old swashbuckler films, with music and dance substituted for swordplay. The romantic, valiant pirate of movies like Captain Blood and The Black Swan is ground to dust and glitter by Kelly and company. Kelly flashes a Barrymore-like profile as he romances Garland, but for most of the film, his Serafin is a clowning show-off whose flirtations play a bit like Errol Flynn on speed skates. "Senorita, don't marry that pumpkin...any man who lets you out of his sight is a pumpkin," he tells Garland, who looks back at him in pure disbelief. As for Garland, her hyperventilating responses to Kelly could be taken as a parody of all those bosom-heaving, "How-dare-you-ing" ladies of the adventure films. But on the other hand, for all its camp and silliness, the movie finds a very stylized but powerful sexuality in its two leads, giving Kelly and Garland an opportunity to heat things up to a level you don't expect from an MGM musical. It's mesmerizing. It's also kind of a mess.

This was the second film for Garland and Kelly, between the wartime musical For Me and My Gal in 1942 and the nostalgic Summer Stock in 1950. Behind the scenes was a warm working relationship that eerily mirrored A Star is Born. In 1942, Judy Garland was the experienced movie star who took the theater-trained Gene Kelly and taught him everything about film acting, how to move, how to emote, how to kiss. In the words of his widow Patricia Kelly, "(Gene) said she was the sexiest woman in Hollywood for him." Kelly never forgot the help.  When The Pirate went into production, however, Garland's personal problems were overtaking her talent, sending her into a drug-fueled nervous breakdown while her marriage to Minnelli fell apart. By 1950, Garland was an emotional wreck, who pulled herself through Summer Stock (and an immortal performance of "Get Happy") by sheer force of will. And the help of friends like Gene Kelly. Kelly, who could be a bullying, relentless taskmaster in the quest for perfection, was endlessly patient with Garland, enduring constant filming delays. In the words of Summer Stock's director Charles Walters, "Gene took her left arm and I took her right one, and between us, we literally tried to keep her on her feet." So The Pirate becomes the strange halfway point, before Kelly had reached the very pinnacle of his career and just as Garland was starting her descent. It's perhaps the closest they got to meeting onscreen as equals.

So what makes The Pirate such a strange film? I could point you to this little number (starting at 2:30) in which, Manuela, now convinced that Serafin is Macoco, watches him play around with a donkey. This for some reason, sets her imagination spiraling into a fantasy of him in tight black shorts, dancing a ballet in the flames and dominating a woman in a white headscarf. And well, just look at the imagery.

So Manuela thinks of herself as...oh, dear. Or how about the climax of the film in which Kelly escapes hanging by putting on a show? Granted this is a musical and putting on a show is the solution to every problem, but it's rare to see a plot-based musical throw character so completely out the window as The Pirate does when it chooses to end with its two lovers reprising "Be A Clown." I mean, is this the final image you would expect from a movie called The Pirate?

I suspect the reason The Pirate failed with the audiences of 1948 is because they came in expecting it to be a joke, but couldn't figure out just who was being kidded. Is director Vincente Minnelli just trying to make a parody swashbuckler? Or is he deliberately ragging on the audience, turning a familiar Hollywood fantasy into an arch meta-narrative of two stars ridiculing their own sexual roleplay before reminding us that they are, in fact, just actors? Or maybe it's a commentary on Minnelli's own obsession with performance and artifice? Honestly, I'm not sure myself. The film's intentions are so diverse that it's difficult to categorize.

Take the scene where Manuela is hypnotized by Serafin into telling the audience her deepest desires. Serafin believes she will reveal her love for him and he is dumbstruck when she confesses, in the song "Mack the Black" that she's got the hots for the pirate Macoco. It's Garland's best moment in the film as she lets down her auburn hair, swinging her hips and leading the troupe in song. In essence, she turns the tables on Kelly, taking his fantasy of a helpless, "pure" maiden and turning it into a lusty anthem of her own desires. But even then, the Cole Porter lyrics ("Macoco leads a flaming trail of masculinity") are enough to make you wonder just whose fantasies are being recorded here. And then Kelly swings it back around again by passionately kissing the unaware Manuela, the placement of his hands dangerously skirting the MGM code of conduct. 

As Manuela, Judy Garland is sometimes brilliant, sometimes far-too hectic. Garland was a lovely comedienne with great timing, but I have to say that the fists-beating, foot-stamping, I'm-angry-routine should, nine times out of ten, only be done by Carole Lombard. Garland's greatest strength as an actress was that phenomenal voice, which she could use to heartbreaking affect in drama but could also throb quite effectively in comedy. In a scene where she mockingly insults Serafin, I had to rewind the DVD three times just to listen to Garland's delivery of the line, "I can't believe I thought you were nothing but a common actor...How unspeakably drab." For the most part, Garland's personal problems are invisible on screen and she's obviously relishing the chance to reveal a passionate, desirable woman underneath all that innocence, rattling the bars of her MGM persona. I did find it hard to get over the schizophrenic nature of Garland's costuming in this film, which at times makes her look ravishing, as in the above "Mack the Black" number.

Or makes her look like a mushroom, as per this inexplicable ensemble:

Minnelli usually had a peerless eye for what would make Garland look good on camera so unless he approved this one during one of their marital spats, I don't get it.

However, the film ultimately belongs more to Gene Kelly than it does to Judy Garland. He indulges in too much eye-popping in his early scenes but otherwise, he comes off as much more relaxed and in control than either his director or costar. It's worth the rental price just to watch the scene where he dips a woman, swallows his cigarette for a kiss and then chews it back up to exhale the smoke. It's the true test of a leading man: when you can make blowing smoke into a woman's face into something hilariously funny. He pitches the comedy to the point where you can get all the Barrymore and Fairbanks in-jokes and still enjoy him as a sexy lead in his own right.

For Kelly fans, The Pirate might count as one of the star's most homoerotic films as well. Minnelli's camerawork, Cole Porter's lyrics, and even the dialogue lavish attention on the man's physicality and appeal. When his character Serafin is caught by the Viceroy, who believes him to be Macoco, he looks him over with open interest. "I must say Macoco, you're very satisfying! The other members of your profession whom I've met officially looked more like bookkeepers than pirates, but you - ooo hooo hooo - you fill the eye." It's an assessment that Minnelli seems to agree with because while he films Garland romantically, as usual, Kelly is always the fantasy figure. He is always the centerpiece of attention.

The Pirate is a film whose greatness lies in its strangeness as much as in its two stars. It's never mediocre but it can be frustratingly flawed. The plot, such as it is, completely falls apart in the third act when characters just stop the story altogether so they can have sporadic musical numbers. If the songs were Cole Porter's best...but they're not. And yet, I can guarantee that you will be remembering this one long after other and better films have faded. It's a passionate, freewheeling bit of escapism and if its intentions are a little muddled, well, the ambition is strong. And that's something worth singing about.

Favorite Quote:

"You know, it's not essential to love me to be in the troupe. It helps but it's not essential."

Favorite Scene:

The "Nina" dance number. "Mack the Black" is a catchier song and "Be a Clown" has the Nicholas Brothers but "Nina" is the film's most complete and fully realized routine. Minnelli's camera follows Kelly's acrobatics around the village as he declares his love for every woman he meets, kissing them, dancing with them, and calling all of them by the name, "Nina." "Nina, Nina, I'll be having neurasthenia 'til I make you mine," croons Kelly, dipping one girl even as he's eying the next one. On an aesthetic level, it's a great-looking number, one of the few times the film's comic energy feels relaxed and fluid. But the true genius comes from the realization that even as Kelly is busily parodying the Don Juan-style swashbuckling of Barrymore, Fairbanks, and Flynn, the sexualization is not of the many gorgeous "Ninas" but of him. The song celebrates the desirability of women all while shamelessly offering you Kelly in the world's tightest pants (and his legs never looked better) in a celebration of himself that's so playfully narcissistic it begins to feel oddly generous. In his willingness to embrace the camp of the Fairbanks part, Kelly finds a very real honesty and sexiness. It's one of the reasons that this film, for all its flaws, is a must for Kelly fans.

Final Six Words

Swashbuckler sent up as carnival entertainment

Blogs Rising from the Dead, Liebster Awards, Mass Hysteria

If you hear the sound of creaking hinges, that's because my poor, dear blog hasn't been open for over a month. I feel a bit like Christopher Lee up there (except less stylish, naturally), rising up out of my coffin. I have a good excuse for my absence in that I was using my summer vacation to travel in Malaysia. Most of my computer access was through my smartphone which is wonderful but not exactly conducive to blogging. I have no regrets because it was an excellent trip, full of sun, sights, and good food. But still, it's a relief to get back to this blog and the world of cinema.

While I was away, however, two lovely, gifted, and brilliant bloggers, Natalie from In the Mood and Laura from Who Can Turn the World Off With Her Smile? generously bestowed a Liebster Award on Me. You guys. Your kindness makes me want to rend my garments and vow, Scarlett-O'Hara-style, to never let this blog go hungry again. Alright, that was hardly a great metaphor, but you know what I mean. And if anyone out there isn't following these two great ladies' blogs, well, what are you waiting for? Natalie is a great blogger, funny, original, and a Barbara Stanwyck fan to put all others to shame. Laura is one of the most engaging writers I know; she has the ability to leap on pretty much any topic and pull at least ten different insights out of it.

Now, the Liebster has apparently had a makeover since the last time I saw it. They've expanded the rules to the following:
1. Tell 11 things about yourself.
2. Answer 11 questions from the person who nominated you.
3. Tag 11 bloggers.
4. And ask them 11 questions thought up by you.

The problem for me is, since I've been away, most of the people I might tag have already been honored. And trying to track down who has and hasn't been tagged...if I do that, this post might get postponed to next week and I'd rather not do that. So I'm just going to treat this like a regular meme and respond to parts 1 and 2.

Thanks again, guys and it's great to be back!

11 Things About Me

1. I find it impossible to travel without packing at least two books. Possibly three. Doesn't matter if the trip is two days or two weeks, I need my reading material. There's an 80%  chance that even then I will find an excuse to visit a bookstore while I'm abroad, regardless of whether said bookstore has English-language books or not.

2. I was an obsessive Tetris player as a kid and I still pine for my old-school Nintendo.

3. I am twenty years younger than my brother. We're not half-siblings.

4. Every year I tell myself that I will enter the Bulwer-Lytton Contest and every year I forget to send in an entry on time.

5. My favorite color is green.

6. If someone asked me which Hollywood star I would most want to look like, it would be Maureen O'Hara, no question. I've been hankering after that gorgeous flaming hair since I was seven.

7. Sometimes my taste in fictional men can be a little...offbeat. Louis Renault may be a corrupt captain who blackmails women into sex and is hopelessly in love with Humphrey Bogart--but I still find him madly attractive. Same goes for alcoholic James Mason in A Star is Born, who had my heart from the moment he wiped off Judy Garland's makeup. Oh and Orson Welles for the brief stretch of Citizen Kane where he's lounging around in his chair and joking about how to run a newspaper. I would chalk it up to an attraction to gorgeous voices but then, Alan Rickman does nothing for me.

8. I can't whistle.

9. I'm an early riser by choice. Sleeping in makes me feel uneasy, like I've been missing out on all the fun.

10. My favorite season is winter. Favorite kind of weather is the day after a snowfall when all the ice is melting off the tree branches and the sun is shining but the air is cold. It's the kind of weather that makes me feel anything is possible.

11. I love watching old clips of What's My Line on Youtube. And damn do I love Arlene Francis.

11 Questions from Natalie

1. In film do you prefer black&white or color?

Rather than state my answer in words, I will let these images speak for themselves.

2. In photographs do you prefer black&white or color?

I cannot imagine seeing the Aurora Borealis in black and white or the photos of Dorothea Lange in color so yeah, my answer is the same as before.

3. Your favorite era in music?

‘Fraid I don’t have one. I pick a little from each one.

4. Do you have a tumblr?

Nope. Sometimes I wish I did, but then, tumblr isn’t great for comments and I love the back-and-forth discussions on sites like Blogger and Livejournal.

5. Your second favorite actress?

Wow. Barbara Stanwyck is so obviously my number one that my other favorites are clustered pretty closely together. So, erm, I’ll say Joan Bennett, to pick one at random.

6. Your favorite movie starring your second favorite actress?

The Reckless Moment.

7. Your second favorite actor?

Life’s full of tough choices…I’ll pick Humphrey Bogart.

8. Your favorite movie starring your second favorite actor?

The Maltese Falcon.

9. Favorite foreign film?

Currently it’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.

10. Ice cream or French fries?

Finally an easy question! Ice cream.

11. If you could see your favorite actress in any movie role [real or imagined] what would it be?

I’m going to combine two of my answers here and say that I would love to have seen how Barbara Stanwyck would have tackled the Brigid O’Shaughnessy role in The Maltese Falcon. Just as an alternate version since I would never want to lose Mary Astor’s superb performance.

Questions by Laura

1. Ever written about something you changed your mind about later?

Oh sure. I don't know if I've ever had a direct 180 on a movie or performer. More often, I'll make a flippant comment on somebody else's blog and then think later, "Man, I was way too hard on Stanley Kramer." I usually agonize so long over my blog posts that it gives me time to tear apart my opinions and see what they're made of. But of course I'm going to rewatch films and change my mind, that's what it's all about. I think I did mention in one post that I change my mind about Marnie every single time I watch it.

2. Favorite photograph of your favorite actor/actress?

3. Favorite film critic?

The Self-Styled Siren.

4. Least favorite film by favorite director?

I’ve actually managed to put off seeing a large number of Alfred Hitchcock’s misfires. And what’s the point really in picking on a minor little film like Jamaica Inn? Or a film I can barely remember like The Paradine Case? So I’ll say the one that actually manages to irritate me the most: Torn Curtain. I’d love to play contrarian on that one but here’s the thing. That movie managed to make Paul Newman dull. Some things should not be forgiven.

5. Do you prefer foreign films dubbed or subtitled?

Subtitled, of course.

6. What common feature in classic Hollywood films would you have changed? (Racism, sexism, all the smoking, etc.)

Well, if you’re giving me the option, naturally I’d want to dismantle the racism and sexism.  But then, doesn’t that imply that I think racism and sexism aren’t still running rampant in current Hollywood film? Which, no, I don’t. So I guess I’d go after the Production Code, one of the single greatest factors in ensuring that Hollywood stuck to those eye-rolling black servants, tragic mulattos, unhappy career women, and sloppy, forced endings.

7. Most misleading trailer/poster/overall marketing for a movie?

I'm sure there are much more egregious examples out there but posters like this and trailers like this, along with critics calling it "the feel-good movie of the year," had me telling my friends, "Oh let's go see Slumdog Millionaire, that'll be a nice one." And after two hours of poverty, cruelty, child abuse, mutilation, rape, and torture, my friends turned around and solemnly informed me that I would not get to pick the next movie.

8. Which actors around today (if any) do you think will be considered true immortals fifty years from now, in the tradition of Garbo or Bogart?

I think we do have some acting immortals although the ones that come to mind are mostly longtime legends like Meryl Streep and Michael Caine. But I find it hard to imagine the same kind of actor cults and glamor that follow someone like Garbo. I just think that kind of aloof, semi-divine celebrity has been replaced with a more casual yet even more invasive popularity.

9. Have you ever been put off by an actor, director, or producer's work by their obnoxious or offensive offscreen shenanigans, or do you think that's irrelevant to their body of work?

I'd like to say it's irrelevant, but no, I do think that real life can infect the work. Mel Gibson comes to mind as the most obvious example. But then, if I really loved, loved Gibson's work as an actor, would I feel differently? I can still enjoy Rex Harrison's acting even if the real man was egocentric, anti-Semitic, and a supremely obnoxious personality. Of course Harrison has the advantage over Gibson in that his screen personality never depended on being liked.

10. Marry, boff, or kill (men): Clark Gable, Cary Grant, Humphrey Bogart?

I guess I’d kill Clark Gable on the condition that this would immediately send him to a happy afterlife with Carole Lombard. I can’t wrap my head around the idea of marrying Bogart (there is only Lauren Bacall) so I guess I’d nip into my time machine and boff Bogie while he was still in his “Tennis, anyone?” stage. And then I’d tie the knot with Cary Grant, asking him to teach me the proper way to drink cocktails, lounge in chairs, and do backward somersaults. Then we’d amicably divorce.

( ladies): Audrey Hepburn, Marilyn Monroe, Louise Brooks?

I can’t imagine killing Hepburn or Monroe so sorry, Louise Brooks gets it. But then, she’s tough and smart, maybe she’ll find a way out of the situation. Then I guess I’d have to be friends with benefits with Marilyn for a short, happy interlude before I married Audrey.

11. Pet obscure actor/actress?

I have a wellspring of love in my heart for Theresa Harris, Helen Walker, Doris Dowling, and Florence Bates. And others, besides.

And on that note of love, this is Rachel (who really should have taken her own advice and carried a parasol in Malaysia).

Movie Review: The Collector

The Collector (1965)

directed by William Wyler, starring Terence Stamp, Samantha Eggar

(Note: This is my entry for the The Best Hitchcock Movies (That Hitchcock Never Made) Blogathon, hosted by Dorian from Tales of the Easily Distracted and Becky from ClassicBecky's Brain Food)

This is the tale of Miranda Grey, the art student, (Samantha Eggar) and Freddie Clegg (Terence Stamp), the butterfly collector. She's beautiful, ambitious, and naive. Freddie is shy, poor, and utterly obsessed with her. When Freddie wins a fortune in the football pools, he devises the perfect use for his newfound wealth. He buys a remote house and converts the basement into a comfortable prison for Miranda. He furnishes it with everything she could possibly want: art supplies, books, clothes, and cosmetics. Surely if he brings her here and keeps her for awhile, she will learn to love him. Freddie follows through by chloroforming Miranda and dragging her to the basement. When Miranda wakes she discovers, not a brave new world, but a strange, servile man. He apologizes for the use of force, promises to respect her boundaries, but refuses to let her go. Baffled and angry, Miranda soon realizes that escape won't be easy. She strikes a bargain with Freddie, promising to stay a month. At the end of a month, he must let her go. Freddie agrees, confident that she will soon love him. But Miranda's imprisonment will end up changing them both, in strange and brutal ways.

The Collector, based on John Fowles' novel, came to the screen in 1965, during the last years of the studio era. Standards had started to loosen up though, and this darkly twisted tale, which surely would have given Mayer or Goldwyn heart palpitations, was kept faithful to the book, right up to the diabolical ending. William Wyler turned down The Sound of Music to make this film, intrigued by the subject matter. It was really the first proper suspense thriller he'd ever done.

Comparing this film to Wyler's others give it an interest factor beyond the original story. Wyler had tackled dark obsession and villainy before (The Letter, The Little Foxes) but this was more visceral and explicitly sexual. Now, the distinctive mood in a Wyler film is compassion, but at a distance. He will bring you close to characters and then let the camera stand back, as we helplessly watch them suffer, love, self-destruct, or redeem themselves. Wyler invites sympathy for these people and yet there's a conscious restraint, as if he's allowing us to only see so much. So you take that Wyler quality and then look at The Collector. For example, in a scene where Miranda and Freddie struggle in the rain, Wyler holds the camera back from them, letting us see their fight as if from far away, as if we were witnesses to a crime. Then the camera goes down low and we see the tactile reality of the fight, their bodies slipping on the wet grass, the blood mixing in with the rain. The camera is at that same low angle when they return to the basement, Miranda's body flung brutally on the floor. The two gasp for breath, exhausted from the effort and because we are kept so close to them, we can feel it as if we were part of it. Anyone who wants to accuse Wyler of being staid should take a look at that moment again.

When I think about a word to describe Terence Stamp, the first one that always comes to mind is "presence." The man just has remarkable confidence onscreen and he had it right from the beginning. Billy Budd was his screen debut. Stamp took the role of a young man whose sensual beauty and angelic goodness is enough to drive men to destruction and tragedy. And he portrayed it so completely that I can't imagine any other actor in the part.  

The Collector was his third film and it's almost a photo-negative reversal of Billy Budd. Instead of a pure-hearted Christ figure, he's a cold, kidnapping psychopath. Instead of being the object of desire, he's a prudish, probably-impotent loner who obsesses over a woman he can't have. Where Billy is the innocent center in a chaotic world, Freddie is that chaos unleashed. That Stamp was able to take two such disparate roles at the beginning of his career and inhabit them, with no self-consciousness, is amazing. Try as I might, I never catch the man trying to protect himself. As Billy, the otherworldly ideal, Stamp offers himself up for the camera's gaze in a way that makes the villain's obsession with him clear. But for the role of Freddie, Stamp closes himself up, shutting out any hint of charm, slyness, or campy appeal. It's as deliberately uncharismatic a villain as you can get.

In the annals of cinematic psychopaths, you'd think Freddie Clegg would have a thriving fanbase. I mean, he's lonely, despised, romantic, and kidnaps a woman to make her love him. Surely, the fans who obsess over the Phantom of the Opera and Frollo would adore this guy. But nope, in spite of a few Youtube videos. While that can partly be attributed to the relative obscurity of this film, I think it has a lot to do with Stamp's performance. He's awkward onscreen, in a way that evokes discomfort rather than sympathy. He wears his suits like the coat hanger was still inside. His gaze is flat, even when professing love. We've all met people who gave off that same unnerving dissonance. These are the people we move away from on the subway, the people we look away from even if we don't know why. Stamp's performance gives the film that extra shudder of plausibility.

Now prior to this film, the only Samantha Eggar film I knew was Doctor Dolittle, in which she's about as obligatory a female character as you can get. In the scenes where Eggar has to regard Rex Harrison with romantic yearning, Eggar mostly looks puzzled or irritated by turn (which, knowing what an utter debacle the making of that film was, you can hardly blame her). But in The Collector, Eggar is wonderful, taking the naive but resourceful Miranda and making her someone to root for. She's so innocently pretentious at times that you cringe for her (for example, telling Freddie that his obsession is "the kind of dream young boys have once they hit puberty"), but underneath it, you can see a woman fighting tooth and nail to keep her sense of self. When Eggar crumples to the ground at one point, sobbing, "Let me be free," your heart truly aches for her. Actually, considering all that Eggar has to undergo in this film, from nude shots to violent struggles with Stamp, I did wonder if Cronenberg saw The Collector and thought, "Now how could I torture this woman more?"

The worst flaw in The Collector is Maurice Jarre's harpsichord-driven, aggressively-quirky score. Now, readers of my blog might point out that I just finished trashing the music in Wyler's Friendly Persuasion. But that film's music was just sentimental. The Collector score on the other hand, is downright horrible, knocking the mood askew in nearly every scene. It's tinkly, dischordant, and whimsical. Inviting whimsy into your tale of dark romantic obsession is like inviting Christopher Walken into Ophelia's mad scene. I was happy to find out that the author John Fowles was on my side about the music, saying, "Surely silence would be better."

Now, when I listed The Collector among my "fascination films," I also put Hitchock's Marnie on that list. And when you think of it, these two films are close cinematic cousins. Released with a year of each other, they both tell the story of men who wish to posses women, whatever the cost. When Sean Connery mockingly talks about his interest in taming wildlife to Tippi Hedren, it's hard not to think of Terence Stamp showing his butterfly collection to Samantha Eggar, saying, "What difference does one specimen make to a whole species?" But where Marnie was lurid, messy, and deeply personal, The Collector is polished, cool, and cerebral. While certain scenes in The Collector feel like they could have come straight out of the Hitchcock playbook (for example, a moment where Miranda tries to alert an oblivious neighbor by overflowing the bathtub), the overall mood is entirely different. Wyler's matter-of-fact approach to The Collector is both a strength and a weakness. It makes the film consistently uncomfortable to watch; Wyler refuses to make moral judgments or tell us what to think. But at the same time, while The Collector has ample chills and surprises, it's never obsessive or romantic in the way that Marnie was.

And yet I keep coming back to The Collector. Its characters, its direction, its strange, steady-handed storytelling. And the look in Terence Stamp's eyes when his last vestige of sanity snaps and he tells Miranda, "I can do what I like!"

Favorite Quote:

"Marry me. Please marry me. I don't expect anything. I don't expect you to do anything you don't want. You can do what you like...study art...I won't ask anything. Anything of you. Except you live in the same house and be my wife in name. You can have your own bedroom. You can lock it every night."

Favorite Scene:

For me, the film crystallizes in a single perfect scene where Miranda and Freddie discuss The Catcher in the Rye. Freddie's frustration with Miranda and her "la-dee-da" ways has begun to boil over. Angry at what he considers her class superiority, he insists on reading her favorite book and finding out why she thinks it special. When he returns, he tells her flatly that he didn't see much point in it. Miranda tries haltingly to explain, describing her love for Holden Caulfield's character. "The boy, he's so aware...the way he hates everything that's false." Freddie responds, "He sounds a mess to me." The tension builds unbearably as Freddie grows angrier and the increasingly terrified Miranda blunders on. Finally, frustrated with Freddie's determined incomprehension of the book, she snaps, "You don't understand, you're not trying to see how much like... like all of us he is." Freddie immediately knows the meaning of her stumble and says icily, "Like me? That's what you meant, isn't it?" And he's right. 

It's a brilliant moment that turns over our expectations as well as Miranda's. Because we might have believed, as Miranda does, that this awkward loner will gravitate to Holden Caulfield, but when Freddie turns the tables on her, it makes perfect sense. Of course this man, with his suits and class consciousness and "proper respect" would think that Caulfield was a spoiled whiner. On top of that, the scene just works perfectly as the moment in which we can see Freddie finally tipping over the edge into murderous rage, as Miranda tries frantically to say or do the right thing. But there is no right thing. She's alone with a madman. And this time, he's got her pegged.

Final Six Words:

Cold and clammy tale of obsession

Farewell, Ernest Borgnine

Pike? I wouldn't have it any other way either.

Ernest Borgnine (1917-2012)

First Griffith, now Borgnine. My heart can't take it.

Farewell, Andy Griffith

I put my whole self into everything I do.

Andy Griffith (1926-2012)

Movie Review: Friendly Persuasion

Friendly Persuasion (1956)
directed by William Wyler, starring Gary Cooper, Dorothy McGuire

(Note: This is my entry for the William Wyler Blogathon, hosted by R.D. Finch at The Movie Projector)

The year is 1862. The Civil War has taken hold of the American people and all across the nation, people are hearing the call to take up arms and fight. And even for a family of devout Quakers, the choice is not an easy one. Jess Birdwell (Gary Cooper) is a peace-loving farmer and his wife Eliza (Dorothy McGuire) is a Quaker minister. They are happy with their quiet life in Indiana. Jess's attractions to music and horse racing and Eliza's insistence on following Quaker tradition may cause friction but their love remains true. Their children Josh (Anthony Perkins), Mattie (Phyllis Love), and Little Jess (Richard Eyers) are likewise content. But the War draws ever closer, as Mattie falls in love with a Union soldier (Peter Mark Richman) and Josh struggles to reconcile faith and the desire to fight. It's a decision that all of them must face.

Hollywood doesn't like pacifism. I feel comfortable making such a broad generalization because well, how many pacifist cinematic heroes can you name? There's Atticus Finch, of course, and Gandhi and the many versions of Christ. But compared to the vast sea of bullet-plugging, sword-swinging fighters cutting a swath through our movie screens, those guys are a drop in the bucket. I don't think this is a comment on morality so much as the idea of what carries the forward momentum onscreen. A hero who decides to take direct action against evil registers more forcefully on film than a hero who's willing to be passive and restrained. When Gary Cooper was asked to take the lead role of the Quaker farmer in Friendly Persuasion, he was uneasy about the expectations of his fans, knowing that they would want him to pick up his gun in the final reel. He said as much to Jessamyn West, author of the original novel. She encouraged him to resist, telling him it would mean just as much for his audience to see a "strong man refraining."

I'll admit that when I decided to revisit Friendly Persuasion for the William Wyler Blogathon, that was the vague memory I had of this film: a Quaker family struggling through the Civil War until the father goes all Gary Cooper in the finale and finally picks up his gun. I remembered enjoying the film, but I thought of it as very simple and morally muddled product. But the surprise of Friendly Persuasion is that it isn't really about the will-he-or-won't-he of Gary Cooper. Instead, it's shockingly mellow and funny, a portrait of a family whose lives are taken up by problems like a violent goose, the purchase of an organ, and the father's desire to beat his neighbor in a race to church. The Civil War's there of course, but it's more of a distant rumble than a thundering climax. The themes of violence versus restraint call Witness to mind, but in fact, this film is a closer cousin to Meet Me in St. Louis. It's focused on incidents, on the rhythms of daily life. How much you like this film depends on your willingness to follow along with that, to spend time getting to know this Quaker family and see how they live. For myself, I enjoyed nearly every minute of it.

Wyler isn't normally thought of as a very funny or relaxed director, in spite of great romantic comedies like Roman Holiday and How to Steal a Million. But I think Friendly Persuasion shows that all that charm can't be placed on Audrey Hepburn's shoulders alone. Wyler manages to take what are, in essence very simple jokes (Jess's attempts to hide his organ from the visiting leaders of his church, for example) and make them work, simply by taking the time to set them up. He knows the rhythm of his situations. In the scene with the organ, he's already shown us Jess's hidden desires for music, his wife's desire to behave like a proper Quaker minister, the physical reality of trying to hide this damn thing, and the parallel situation of his daughter and her flirtatious suitor. All of it come together in a comic scene with the daughter and her lover playfully tinkering with the organ upstairs while Jess frantically tries to pray loud enough downstairs to drown out the music. All while the ministers of his church are praying very seriously for a solution to the Civil War. The longer it goes on, the louder and more incoherent Gary Cooper's prayer gets. When it's over, the ministers turn to him with great respect. "Thy prayer carried me so near to Heaven's gates, I thought I heard the choiring of angel voices," one tells him.

Gary Cooper responds to the relaxed nature of this film with a performance that feels very casual and warm; you'd have to really squint to see the actor's backstage fears over his age and character. The dramatic weight of the film falls not so much on Cooper as it does on Anthony Perkins, playing his troubled teenage son Josh. Josh is loyal to his family and church but feels the need to fight in the war. It was Perkins' first major role and while I think giving him a Supporting Actor nomination for it was a bit much, he does rise to the challenge, giving us the image of a boy who doesn't really want to fight but can't bear the thought that he might secretly be a coward. The moment when Josh finally kills a Confederate soldier is perfectly rendered by Perkins who squeezes the gun, his whole body racked with a silent sob, before blindly reaching to fire again.

However, good as Perkins and Cooper are, it's Dorothy McGuire who's the standout to me. The role of straight-laced, devout Eliza Birdwell was originally meant for Katharine Hepburn, who turned it down, and Wyler went through several possibilities, even saying to Jessamyn West, "How about Jane Russell? She's a very pious girl." Yet it's hard for me to imagine anyone handling this role as well as McGuire. She takes a character who could so easily have come across as the killjoy nag and makes her seem passionate and kind. Much as I love Hepburn, I can't help thinking that she would have been too inflexible as Eliza, playing up the sterner aspects of her character. McGuire is more evasive, more inclined to lead by gentleness than sharp lectures. It makes Eliza's relationship with her husband Jess into something that rises above a sitcom-style dynamic of "strict wife, boyish husband."

Few directors are as warm and perceptive on the subject of marriage as Wyler. You could put the relationship of Jess and Eliza Birdwell in a triptych with the disintegrating marriage of Sam and Fran in Dodsworth and the complex but loving Stephensons in The Best Years of Our Lives. Wyler's great ability with actors is revealed in how real these couples look onscreen, from Myrna Loy leaning in to kiss a snoring, hungover Fredric March to Ruth Chatterton tentatively trying to reassure the husband she is abandoning. And because Wyler always stressed nuance and ambiguity, the relationships in his films don't feel etched in stone. If the Stephensons tried to evade their problems, maybe they could one day become like the unhappy Dodsworths. And if the Dodsworths had been more patient and understanding, their relationship could have endured and improved into something like the contentious but happy Birdwell marriage.

Jess and Eliza rarely speak of their love in Friendly Persuasion but we're never in doubt. It's in the way they lean towards each other, the way he teases her, the way she graciously tries to ignore his little weaknesses. It's all there. Along with a strong sexual attraction that the movie is surprisingly open about. In one of the film's best scenes, Jess and Eliza quarrel over an organ that Jess has purchased. Eliza takes herself off to the barn to spend the night. But as she tries to make herself comfortable in the straw, Jess shambles in, clutching blankets and pillows. "Cooling down a bit, isn't it?" "I find it quite pleasant," Eliza responds. "So do I," he says, testing the straw with his foot as Eliza tries not to smile. They emerge the next morning, disheveled and grinning, holding hands and trying not to laugh. It's a brilliant romantic moment that makes the film's actual pair of young lovers look like paper dolls by comparison.

I'll admit here, to the likely horror of some of my readers, that I've never found Gary Cooper that sexy. Handsome sure, but he so rarely achieves chemistry with his leading ladies. His characters always seem to be gazing off into the distance, like they'd rather think about love than react to the woman in their arms. But that's not the case with Dorothy McGuire here. They look great together. 

 
There's a fly in every ointment and for Friendly Persuasion, it's the music. The worst part of this movie, hands-down, is that horrible, sugary theme by Dimitri Tiomkin that pops up periodically like an unwelcome shower of Hallmark cards. Pat Boone sings the pop version across the credits and all I can say for him is that he can take a lyric like "Thee pleasures me in a hundred ways," and starch it pure white. You can't even giggle at the innuendo. But more importantly, the sentimentality of the music jars with a film that takes great pains to show its characters as mature and wise.

On a more serious note, I do think there's a case to be made that Friendly Persuasion, in its focus on gentle comedy and slice-of-life storytelling, fails to reconcile the Civil War plot with the rest of the film. Not that the wartime scenes aren't good, because they are. Josh's decision to fight, the invasion of the home by a Confederate raiding party, the death of a beloved friend, everything's handled very well. Even the question of whether to fight or not to fight is done well; Friendly Persuasion doesn't judge these people on whether or not they choose to fight but simply shows them to us, free of prejudice. But I do think the film can't quite make the two elements cohere. The film is so bluntly comedic for over an hour that Anthony Perkins' stark question, "I wonder what it feels like to die?" just splits it in two. Either you've been getting tired of the farm life and praying for this interruption or you've been enjoying the humor and now feel blindsided. And the movie's ending, with its all's-well-that-ends-well tone, just can't stitch it all together.  I feel that if Wyler had been able to explore the wartime aspect as well as he does the Quaker lifestyle, he might have had a truly great film on his hands rather than one that's just very good.

In spite of its nomination for Best Picture, I feel like Friendly Persuasion is a film that's been unfairly forgotten over the years. Partly because it's overshadowed by the inordinate number of great films that William Wyler made, but I think more due to the public's terror of "wholesome" entertainment. That Pat Boone song, the enthusiastic Bosley Crowther review ("loaded with sweetness and warmth and... cracker-barrel Americana"), the threat of piety and sermons and Oscar-bait...it's no wonder classic film fans have given it a wide berth. Critic David Thomson dismissed it as "one of the dreariest pictures (Gary) Cooper ever made." But this film is far smarter than it's given credit for. It's more interested in characters than in preaching. There are no pat answers, just people enjoying their lives and wanting to hang onto that. In the hands of a sentimentalist, maybe that would have been dreary. But as it stands, it's a testament to the skill of William Wyler, a director who could find just as much to value in a carriage race as he could in a battle scene.

Favorite Quote:

"I want you to know, sir, I honor your prejudices--um, uh, convictions." 

Favorite Scene:

My favorite scene has to be the final race to church between Jess and Sam Jordan. It's such a simple scenario and the stakes are small but the buildup to it has been perfect. For the sake of propriety, Jess can't admit that he wants to beat Sam on the way to church, but everybody in town knows it. Even Eliza knows it deep-down but (Dorothy McGuire's performance is pitch-perfect), she is trying so hard to pretend as if everything is normal and proper. The tension between Jess and Eliza, Jess's purchase of the butt-ugly but feisty Lady, the sly winks of his sons when they hand him the reins. All of it leads into a great race scene with the rickety carriages roaring down the road as the participants choke and cough from the dust. And as they round the corner, everyone in town cranes their heads to watch for the winner. All for a race that nobody wants to come out and actually acknowledge is happening. It's a scene that makes me laugh every time.

Final Six Words:

Conflict and love rise up together

First image credited to the Gary Cooper Scrapbook

Farewell, Ray Bradbury

We were put here as witnesses to the miracle of life. We see the stars and we want them. We are beholden to give back to the universe.

Ray Bradbury (1920-2012)