1952, Year in Review: The Bad and the Beautiful

The Bad and the Beautiful

Directed by Vincente Minelli

Starring: Kirk Douglas, Lana Turner, Walter Pidgeon, Dick Powell, Gloria Grahame

Grade: C+

There's a moment in "The Bad and the Beautiful" where in the midst of a heated argument Lana Turner launches a glass bottle at Kirk Douglas, very nearly clocking him square on that famously-chiselled chin of his. I remain clueless as to the level of intent behind this moment; if it amounts to a bout of needless melodrama, a lesson in method acting, or some kind of meditation on life imitating art and vice versa. In short, that foible summarises my feelings about the sketchy extent of the film's satire, and whether Minelli is aware of the difference between brave filmmaking and savvy filmmaking. He certainly scores points for a deftly cynical attitude towards the film industry and its fickle, frivolous cultivation of disloyalty.

Dogulas' Jonathan Shields starts off as a reckless gambler, indebted to a Hollywood Producer who then gives him a job that a million guys would kill for. First blood to Minelli in the "be shameless to succeed" stakes, a point that's re-iterated later through promiscuity and betrayal of the highest order. "Beautiful" is also heavily critical of men and male-dominated big business in a way that was surely novel for the fifties, rarely encouraging empathy for Shields or his achievements. His stormy relationship with Actress Georgia Lorrison dominates as a makeshift connection that works wonders for both their careers but does nothing for their personal life. They're an engaging enough partnership, no doubt, but because Minelli is too keen to maintain a prehensile perspective Douglas and Turner often feel coldly demonstrative of his chastise. The succession of soap opera-esque tiffs, while aesthetically brutal and bare on the screen, don't give us enough of an insight into the pair and become a repetitive fixture.

After ninety minutes "Beautiful" hastily veers from Jonathan and Georgia to focus on Dick Powell as a screenwriter and Gloria Grahame as his neurotic wife, a move that confirmed to me that Minelli really isn't sure of how to manipulate his ideas into the film's narrative. Mirrored with the previous story strand this sudden attempt to introduce an alternative avenue feels tacked on to give the allusion that "Beautiful" is more of a rounded drama with Shields at its centre. Joseph L. Mankiewicz's The Barefoot Contessa, with all it had to say about the movie business, was made three years after this film, and works better by chronicling the rise of one particular Actress.

If you didn't already know that Hollywood is the haven of a ruthless juggernaut of commerce, you certainly will after watching "The Bad and the Beautiful". Yet, for all of the freshness in the approach towards its subject, the film is much too disjointed to achieve the impact as a sniping commentary that its dramatic title and glitzy cast-list might suggest. 

Academy Awards

Wins:

Best Actress in a Supporting Role: Gloria Grahame

Best Writing (Screenplay)

Best Art Direction, Black and White

Best Cinematography, Black and White

Best Costume Design, Black and White

Nominations:

Best Actor in a Leading Role: Kirk Douglas

Un Autre Project, aka Glutton For Punishment

Yes, it's true that I am barely a tenth of the way through a personal canon, and not even close to finishing my 2009 Addict awards. Still, I figure that more projects can surely only help to increase the frequency of posts on the blog.

Lately, I've been hearing the number 52 an awful lot. I have no idea why. It seems as if it has probably sub-consciously affected my film viewing though, since four of the last ten viewed flicks have been from that particular year. Thus, I've decided to turn this into a project, and am going to attempt to continue with '52 viewing, providing reviews for each film, inclusive of those four to which I earlier referred.

So watch this space for some serious retrospective action. Or better still, watch Gloria.

Caught in the Post-War Uproar

Crossfire (1947)

Directed by Edward Dmytryk

Starring: Robert Ryan, Gloria Grahame, Tom Keene, George Cooper, Robert Mitchum, William Phipps

Grade: B -

The actual prejudice depicted in Edward Dmytryk's Crossfire is buried underneath production code pandering and post-war guilt, the homophobic motivation of the killer in Richard Brooks' original novel consigned to the back-burner for a more contextually 'relevant' topic. As the aftermath of World War II highlighted the extent to which Jewish people had been persecuted by Hitler's Germany it comes as little surprise that RKO opted for a more socially-unifiable cause for Crossfire, and that the biggest film of 1947 was Elia Kazan's Gentleman's Agreement, an even more relentless study of anti-semitism in American society.

Crossfire's story of religious prejudice is situated within a similarly domestic arrangement, the murder of an American soldier sparking an investigation and the eventual discovery of bigotry and infidelity among the nation's supposed elite. It's interesting that both films target the upper hierarchy, and both feel completely "responsible" for helping its nation handle issues at the top, where it matters. Gentleman's Agreement in particular reveals its burdened sense of responsibility through stuffy, trepidated exchanges; Crossfire's problems arise from not having a complete handle on the subject, understandable given that the book was never about anti-semitism in the first place.

As Gaspar Noe circled around the events of Irreversible with the swooping intent of a hungry vulture, Dmytryk navigates the darkness in his suspect set of characters with a less dizzying but damningly effective fervour, the opening shot of the film a haunting silhouette of a clunking, clumsy murder, succeeded by vignettes of interviews and flashbacks of the kind where you're expecting a wavy transition. Dmytryk doesn't beat around the bush, delivering the noir setup and raising questions, and for the first half it works well. Gloria Grahame in particular delivers a delicious performance as a 'woman of the night'.

At times it feels like a lesser prologue to Welles' Touch of Evil, with its wannabe denseness and evening chaos, but as a mystery/thriller Crossfire has an engaging but hardly rousing plot, and so when it comes to introducing the anti-semitism we're into a distinct anti-climax. The promise of earlier dissipates into a "How will we hoodwink the killer into revealing himself?", (aided considerably by a brilliant turn from Tom Keene as the adamant detective) but the final act flounders with the absence of violence, mystery, and the captivating Grahame. Howard Hawks' Scarface had similar stumbling blocks; Crossfire becomes less impacting and more matter-of-fact when too conscious of delivering its issue, and sadly that plagues the latter half of this otherwise intriguing venture.

Like To Tell You 'Bout My Baby

In a Lonely Place (1950)

Directed by Nicholas Ray

Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Gloria Grahame, Martha Stewart, Frank Lovejoy

Grade: B+

Joan Fontaine's Best Actress vehicle, Suspicion, bowed nine years before Nicholas Ray's In a Lonely Place, a film that articulates much the same feeling in its leading lady. Gloria Grahame is Laurel, that wary female protagonist, who after meeting and falling for screenwriter Dix (Bogart) gives him a false alibi when suspected of the murder of hat-check girl Mildred Atkinson. As she gets to know him more, however, she begins to see underlying darker aspects to his character that makes murder seem well within his capabilities.

In a Lonely Place is mainly a succcess because of its honest development of a very impulsively formed relationship between two people who wrongly believe what they're going to get from each other. In their first meeting a rather daring Dix proposes that Laurel accompany him to his house, on the false pretense of reading a script to him. This is foreplay at its finest for the fifties; she 'reluctantly' agrees to the exchange knowing his intentions and then proceeds to bow out early, delaying the inevitable climax of attraction. In this way Laurel shows her esteem and sexual power, and as the two eventually form a relationship Grahame charts the incremental abandonment of an initially self-effacing figure in favour of her true desire to take control of her man with the kind of stringent, wildfire sexuality that makes Rita Hayworth's flirting with Glenn Ford in Gilda seem comparatively tame. When it becomes clear that Dix cannot be controlled, and could even threaten her in a physical sense, Grahame retreats into the old damsel routine with such convincing nuance that you could almost feel sorry for her complete lack of faith in a man she thought she had sussed.

I had heard from many people that this was one of Bogart's best performances. It's a very different turn from the "on his game" nature of The Big Sleep and Key Largo as he doesn't have the sustained self-assurance and bravado of Marlowe et al. To see Bogey as mentally weak is strange to say the least, yet (and this is not largely down to him) the question of whether this man is a killer is a lingering but rather limp one. The anti-climactic nature of In a Lonely Place is by far its weakest element, but like the standard modern biopic there are often gems to be found elsewhere. Rather like Walk the Line the reason to see this is not for the character study but for the central relationship, and the Humphrey/Gloria partnership is one of those steamy pairings that leaves you itching to discover if their rocky romance can have a tender resolution. Rent it and see.