Jezebel (1938) ****

(This is my contribution to the William Wyler Blogathon.  Please check out all of the wonderful blogs participating in this great event, which is hosted by The Movie Projector and runs June 24-29.)

Of all the directors screen legend Bette Davis worked with in her storied Hollywood career William Wyler was her favorite.  They worked together three times: Jezebel (1938), The Letter (1940), and The Little Foxes (1941)—she received an Academy Award nomination for all three films.  No other director knew how to handle Davis like Wyler. As an actress Davis was known for her uncompromising dedication to her roles, no matter if she were playing a complete shrew in Of Human Bondage (1934) or an alcoholic actress in Dangerous (1935). She was also known for her ability to hijack a picture from a weak-willed director. And, this is the main reason she and Wyler worked so well together: he was anything but weak-willed.  He, like Davis, was a perfectionist.  The difference is he knew perfect when he saw it, while she had the habit of assumption.  What I mean by this is that she often thought if she held nothing back and gave the most honest and raw take that she could then it must have been perfect.  Yet, Wyler knew there was more to capturing cinematic greatness and that is what he taught Davis when they worked together on Jezebel. 

Based on the 1934 Owen Davis play of the same name, Jezebel, which was nominated for five Academy Awards, including Best Picture, tells the tragic story of headstrong New Orleans debutante, Julie Marsden (Davis, in a role that was originated on the stage by her not BFF Miriam Hopkins). When Julie decides to test the love and patience of her longtime on-and-off-again beau Preston Dillard (Henry Fonda) on the cusp of the announcement of their engagement by wearing a red dress to the Olympus Ball (where all unwed women wear white) she sets in motion a series of events that lead to her eventual downfall.  There are three things that make Jezebel such a memorable picture: the costume design, the Olympus ball scenes, and Davis’ performance. 

The story takes place in 1850s New Orleans, so when the first glance we get of our heroine is her riding a hellish horse and wearing a riding habit we should know she’s a bit progressive for the times in which she lives.  The fact that she would wear said riding habit into greet a roomful of “properly” dressed guests to a party she’s late for only compounds the fact that Julie Marsden is obviously a feminist.  Still, the riding habit is by far the least memorable of the costumes Davis wears in Jezebel when one remembers the infamous red dress and the virginal white gown she wears to beg Press to take her back.  Designed by Orry-Kelly, every costume Davis wears is perfectly matched to the scene in which it is worn.  The dress most remember is the red gown that gets poor Julie into all kinds of trouble.  To answer Julie’s question upon seeing it: yes, it was saucy!  What most people don’t know about the dress is that it was first made out of red satin but when photographed in black and white it looked dull, so the color had to be changed to rust-brown to appear red on film.  Still, it is a rather startling dress, especially when it is contrasted against all the white gowns at the Olympus Ball.  It fits Davis perfectly and matches Julie’s fiery personality at that point in the movie.  The other standout gown is the frilly, virginal white dress that Julie wears when she greets Press at Halycon Plantation.  At this juncture in the film Julie is filled with humility and repentance and is more than willing to lower herself before her beloved.  This is a key point, because when Orry-Kelly designed this dress he had to make sure it showed well when Julie literally kneels at Press’s feet and begs him to take her back. She is enveloped by the dress and it shows just how small Julie feels about the way she’s behaved. 

That bad behavior, of course, is on full display at the Olympus Ball.  After Julie refuses to change her red dress before going to the ball Press decides he’s going to teach her a lesson in humility. For a sequence that was originally scheduled for only a half-day of shooting the ball scenes turned out to be some of the best in the film.  A half-day soon turned into five excruciating days of extensive takes and camera movements.  The ballroom was huge and had a massive chandelier that hung oppressively overhead. Countless couples (all “properly” attired) are dancing as a full orchestra plays a waltz when Press and Julie enter the ballroom.  When Press removes Julie’s cloak to reveal her scandalous dress all eyes are shockingly focused on the young couple for a moment.  They literally walk the gauntlet as they slowly walk past a line of men who Press warningly glares at. It is at this moment that Wyler and Oscar-nominated cinematographer Ernest Haller focus in on Julie’s eyes, which go from defiant to humiliated in a matter of seconds. Things become even more intense when Press forces her to dance, even as the entire floor of dancers leave the floor, repulsed by the couple’s impropriety. The overhead shot of the empty dance floor, sans Press and Julie, is almost unbearable to watch. The scene itself is what I like to refer to as a theatre of tragedy.  Press and Julie are the actors, while the other attendants are the audience.  As his grip tightens around her waist while she begs him to take her home, you see them encircled by those white dresses in a domineering overhead shot. A spotlight literally shows the complete disintegration of their relationship.  It is one of the most powerful, almost completely non-verbal scenes I recall ever watching. 

Of Davis’ many great performances, Julie Marsden is most probably the most subtle.  Davis had Wyler to thank for this, as well as for her Best Actress Oscar statuette. Perhaps one of the reasons most people don’t remember Julie as a bitch is because of the way Wyler asked Davis to play her.  Instead of speaking aggressively and dealing death glances with her eyes, Davis was asked to play Julie with a smile on her face and a sweet lilt in her voice.  She may have been giving Press hell or inciting duels, but she did it with a sweet Southern smile and a coquettish twinkle in her eye. At first when Wyler asked Davis to play her character like this she didn’t understand and was very off-put, but after watching the rushes she soon realized that her director was right. I think that is what makes Julie one of her most memorable characters—she was so different from the roles Davis usually played.  I mean, really, who can ever forget how she looked as she knelt before Press—completely humble and innocent—begging for his forgiveness and love.  How often did Bette Davis kneel before any man?  And, then, of course, you have that indescribably baffled look on her face when Press introduces his new wife (Margaret Lindsay) to her.  As she takes a moment to take in what he’s said you can see her internal struggle to understand what has just taken place. Her only response, obviously dumbfounded, “Your wife?”  Priceless.

Oddly enough, Jezebel had as much drama happening behind the scenes as it did in front of the camera.  For one thing, Wyler and Davis started a torrid affair that reportedly resulted in a pregnancy. And, perhaps to fully encompass the role of Jezebel, who in the words of Aunt Belle (Best Supporting Actress winner Fay Bainter) was “a woman who did evil in the sight of God,” Davis also conducted an affair with Fonda after having a fight with Wyler.  It took a phone call from Fonda’s pregnant wife (she was carrying Jane) to make Davis end the fling.  In addition, at one point Jack Warner was seriously considering replacing Wyler with William Dieterle because Wyler was so far behind schedule and over budget. Davis had to plead with Warner to keep Wyler and promised to work until midnight every night if that’s what it took to finish the film with Wyler.  In the end, the film finished a month late and nearly $400,000 over budget.  Ah, but it was all worth it, as Jezebel made Bette Davis a superstar and William Wyler a top-tier director. 

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Black Swan (2010) **1/2

(Please be advised that there is no possible way of discussing this film without revealing spoilers. Consider the entire post one prolonged spoiler.)

I will never again watch Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s ballet Swan Lake without wondering whether the ballerina playing the Swan Queen is certifiably insane. I have Natalie Portman and her Oscar-winning turn in Black Swan (2010) to thank for this. Greatly aided by the deft direction of Darren Aronofsky and an outstanding production design, Portman’s complete metamorphosis into a gifted but mentally unstable ballerina is phenomenal.

Portman plays Nina Sayers, a sexually repressed ballerina in what I can only assume is supposed to be a company modeled on the New York City Ballet.  When the company’s director, Thomas Leroy (Vincent Cassel), chooses Nina to replace his former muse, Beth (Winona Ryder in an inspired but brief role), and play the Swan Queen in the season’s opening ballet, Nina believes all of her dreams have come true.  Technically precise and incapable of coming off as anything but innocent, Nina makes a wonderful White Swan.  The problem is that self-doubt begins to creep in when Thomas constantly berates her for her inability to lose her frigidness and dance with the passion that is required for the Black Swan.  Already suffering from mild hallucinations, the pressure to meet Thomas’ expectations and to fight off a would-be competitor in Lily (Mila Kunis), causes Nina to rapidly descend into a world of mental instability. 

Okay, I’m not ashamed to admit that I had to watch this film twice before I got it (at least, I think I did). Sometimes psychological thrillers need a second look—think the Sixth Sense (1999)—and when I wasn’t fully convinced that Nina and Lily were two separate people I had to re-watch it.  Think about it: Nina is almost always dressed in white, while Lily is always in black.  Then you have Lily’s creepy winged tattoo; plus, there is that now infamous lesbian love scene that didn’t really happen.  Oh, and let’s not forget the would-be dressing room catfight where Nina stabs Lily with a shard of broken mirror glass. Yes, I had a “WTF” moment when after delivering a scintillating Black Swan Pas de Deux Nina is congratulated by Lily.  This was my reaction: 1) If she was real and Nina stabbed her shouldn’t she be dead? 2) If she’s alive and unharmed, who got stabbed? If you were like me, you “got it” when Nina pulls that shard out of her own stomach.  But then you start wondering how she danced with it in her and then how she continued to dance the Coda after she pulled it out. Hence, why you might watch it again. This uncertainty is why I can’t convince myself this is an extremely good film.

However, I am convinced that Portman deserved her Academy Award for Best Actress (although, the competition that year was lacking).  No doubt having a degree in psychology from Harvard University helped Portman wrap her mind around her mentally unstable character.  She never seems to overplay just how deranged Nina is, which is one of the reasons her performance is so visceral.  Still, she had to do more than understand her character’s motivations for this demanding part.  She spent over a year physically preparing for the role by studying ballet with Mary Helen Bowers and Benjamin Millepied (whom she later married) and she transformed her body into that of a ballerina’s.  Portman has said that at one point during filming she felt as though she might die from exhaustion.  While she may have been tired off the set, her complete embodiment of Nina is anything but tired.  I haven’t seen her give such a raw performance since Closer (2004).

The overall production is also memorable.  Costume designer Amy Westcott (with occasional help from Rodarte) does a splendid job of outfitting an entire ballet company. The Black Swan costume in particular is a standout design, but her choices of clothing for scenes between Nina and Lily are also creatively crafted.  I especially liked the dresses she designed for them to wear to the benefit party. 

The other shining element of Black Swan is Clint Mansell’s score. Not just anyone could take a canonical piece of music like Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake and completely rip it apart and then reshape it into their own vision, but Mansell did.  Known primarily for his work on Requiem for a Dream (2000), Mansell re-recorded his version of Swan Lake with an 80-piece orchestra and totally revamped a timeless classic.  It is unfortunate that his score was not eligible for the Academy Awards, because he truly deserved to be recognized.  His music expertly sets the tone throughout the entire film.

While Nina might have found her performance “perfect” (even though she said this as she lay bleeding to death, so how perfect could it really have been?), I can’t go so far as to categorize Black Swan as such.  Still, I enjoyed watching Portman’s powerful performance, and I really liked the music and costumes. 

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Ordinary People with Extraordinary Issues (1980) ***

 

Ordinary People (1980) was nominated for six Academy Awards; it won four. To this day, some people are still upset over the fact that Ordinary People won the Best Picture Oscar over Raging Bull (1980).  These same individuals will also debate you to death about how ridiculous it was that the film’s first-time director, Robert Redford, beat out Martin Scorsese as Best Director.  While I find Raging Bull mildly better than Ordinary People, I can’t bring myself to say that Scorsese’s film was robbed, either.  Each had its strengths; it just so happens that voters that year went for an understated drama over a powerful one.  Of course, there is one true issue to be had with the 1980 Academy Awards—how could Timothy Hutton be nominated (and win) Best Supporting Actor for a film in which he was without a doubt the primary lead?  That, to me at least, is the biggest head scratcher. 

Based on the 1976 novel of the same name by Judith Guest, the film tells the story of an upper-class Midwestern family’s gradual destruction following the death of a child.  Hutton plays Conrad Jarrett, a teenager dealing with survivor’s guilt.  Conrad is plagued with flashbacks of the horrible night in which he and his brother Buck (Scott Doebler), were involved in a sailing accident in which Buck drowned.  Having just been released from a mental hospital after attempting to slit his wrists, Conrad struggles to deal with his depression and his mother’s (Mary Tyler Moore) indifference.  The very shaky glue that attempts to bind mother and son is Conrad’s father, Calvin (Donald Sutherland).  The Oscar winning screenplay focuses on what happens when polite appearances are shattered by callous truths.  Of course, no one in the family is willing to admit what those harsh truths are, and so it takes a good psychiatrist (Oscar-nominated Judd Hirsh) to bring the Jarrett men to the conclusion that not everything is neat and easy.

Mary Tyler Moore was a complete revelation as Beth Jarrett. Primarily known as a comedic actress, who emitted warmth and enthusiasm in her famous sitcom roles, Moore plays a cold, unfeeling woman in this film.  Beth is always perfect—her hair, clothes, and house are always immaculate.  Yet, she has a dirty little secret: she despises weakness, especially if it involves emotions.  Her interactions with a son who is obviously begging for her love and compassion are almost too brutal to watch.  Mind you, she is not evil or malicious—she just refuses to connect with him.  The most painful scene in the entire film is when after having an emotional breakthrough of his own Conrad hugs her and she stiffly sits with a frozen look on her face. Moore was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar and she deserved it.  She makes you want to scream at the screen, “Wrap your arms around him you cold-hearted bitch!” Her scenes with Sutherland are just as powerful, especially the final one in which he tells her the truth about who she really is. 

Hutton, for his part, gives an understated performance that is propped up by fine supporting turns by Sutherland and Hirsch. Like Moore, Hirsch was known primarily as a sitcom actor, and so his Dr. Berger’s crass language and matter-of-fact demeanor was a surprise to many.  Still a teenager himself, Hutton had to run the emotional gamut in this role: remorse, guilt, despair, love, fear, and happiness.  As I said earlier, he was the star of Ordinary People and to label him as a supporting actor was completely ridiculous.  And, Sutherland, does an admirable job of playing a man struggling to keep what’s left of his family together. 

Other than the gripping story and the fine acting, what most people remember about the film is its music, specifically the constant presence of Pachelbel’s Canon.  Baroque in style and so composed in such a way as to produce dramatic emotions, the Canon was an interesting choice of thematic music for Ordinary People. For those unfamiliar with it, the Canon employs three voices (or players) that engage in the same music (this is a canon in music) but then there is also a fourth voice (the bass) that plays an independent part.  Right about now you’re asking yourself what is the point of this music lesson, right?  Well, I believe the choice of the Canon has symbolic meaning in that Conrad, Beth, and Calvin play the canon voices, while Buck (or perhaps Dr. Berger) plays the bass voice. Still, whether there was symbolism behind its choice or not, the Canon is expertly used throughout the film. 

Overall, Ordinary People is a gut-wrenching family drama that examines the meaning of both guilt and disconnectedness.  For anyone who may have had a less than warm relationship with a parent or struggled with survivor’s guilt, it might provide some insight into the human condition.  While it may not be as emotionally packed as Raging Bull, it quietly makes a statement about the meaning of loss. 

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The Not So Magnificent Ambersons (1942) **1/2

 

(For a detailed examination of the now infamous saga of the making of this film please visit Jim Lane's Cinedrome—it is a long read but highly educational and entertaining.)

If you enjoyed the Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington you will be disappointed with the 1942 film version.  There, I got that out of the way right off the bat.  Dense and at times verbose, the novel is a nostalgic look at the end of the Nineteenth Century.  We read about a world on the cusp of urban sprawl and the advent of something called the horseless carriage (today we refer to it as the automobile).  One family, the Ambersons/Minafers, represents the antiquated Nineteenth Century viewpoint; while another family, the Morgans, symbolize the forward-looking progressiveness of the Twentieth Century. I can’t really fault Orson Welles’ adapted screenplay for falling short—the book is over 700 pages, so it was a monumental task—but I can’t deny that there is a big disconnect between the film and the novel.  Who knows, perhaps it was the absolute ludicrous happy ending that was tacked on at the film’s conclusion that makes me uncomfortable.  I suspect this is one of the many reasons so many people revere Gone with the Wind (1939)—it stays true to the book’s ending.  Nevertheless, while I’m not a huge fan of The Magnificent Ambersons narrative, I do believe the overall production has many things to admire.

The set designs, particularly the ones at the Amberson mansion, are spectacular. Rightly nominated for an Academy Award for Best Art Direction, the mansion set was constructed like a real house, where walls could be manipulated in such a way so that a camera could appear to seamlessly pass through them in one continuous take. The now famous ballroom sequence showcases the artistic brilliance of both the set designers’ and Welles’ virtuosity.  Employing his love of deep focus and high angles, Welles (along with his Oscar nominated cinematographer Stanley Cortez) did something unheard of in 1942—he attempted to capture one continuous scene for several minutes without a cut/edit.  Later filmmakers, such as Luchino Visconti and Alexander Sokurov would pay homage to Welles with their respective films The Leopard (1963) and Russian Ark (2002). In addition to the ballroom scene, there are countless ingenious shots captured on the mansion’s multi-tiered staircases and long hallways.  While Welles could never make up completely for the the film’s narrative deficiencies, his visual artistry is still a marvel to watch.

One of the many reasons The Magnificent Ambersons fails to completely deliver a rewarding cinematic experience is that there aren’t any likable characters (sans, perhaps, Lucy).  In the book, you root for Isabel (Dolores Costello) and Eugene (Joseph Cotton) and feel somewhat sorry for Lucy (Anne Baxter) and Fanny (Agnes Moorehead).  In the movie you find yourself searching for chemistry between Isabel and Eugene and you absolutely detest Fanny and George—of course, this is the one thing that Welles got right: George Minafer (Tim Holt) was an unlikable character in both the novel and in the film.  At least in the book he gets his true comeuppance, whereas in the film he is given a most undeserved happy ending.  Still, the strange maliciousness that Welles’ instills in Moorehead’s Fanny is hard to reconcile with how the character is portrayed in the novel, which is more pathetic than anything.  Somehow Moorehead received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress, but I can’t say why, except that she makes the viewer thoroughly loathe her character. Overall, most of the actors look like they are sleepwalking through the film.

Perhaps I’m being a bit harsh when it comes to the acting. What actor could be viewed as at the top of their game when more than an hour of the original film was edited out and additional scenes were inserted and tacked on to pull everything together?  It also doesn’t help that the actors found themselves shot in what can only be described as uneven lighting.  It is obvious what shots Welles and Cortez are responsible for and what scenes were reshoots helmed by stand-in director Robert Wise.  There is a subtle way to use light and shadow and then there is an overbearing (but still flat) way of using these devices.  There are several scenes where you just ask yourself why is the picture shot in such dark tones—are they trying to cover something up? 

Overall, The Magnificent Ambersons is a study in conflicting styles.  Its would-be greatness is dramatically diminished by haphazard editing—you just can’t cut 131 minutes down to 88 minutes and expect it to work.  Still, there are glimmers of cinematic brilliance in the production design, and these alone save the film from complete infamy.

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My Left Foot (1989) ***1/2

Many years ago I came to the conclusion that Daniel Day-Lewis is the best actor of his generation.  His ability to fully immerse himself in whatever role he is playing is legendary.  When watching one of his films I don’t see Day-Lewis, I see his character.  The sheer intensity of his portrayals is gripping and spellbinding—and without a doubt unmatched by any other actor today. I suspect Leonardo DiCaprio learned many things when he worked with Day-Lewis on The Gangs of New York (2002), but I think the most important was the idea that you should only do quality work.  DiCaprio took a page out of Day-Lewis’ book and stopped making one inane film after another and concentrated on picking films for which he could be proud.  Day-Lewis has made less than twenty-five feature films in his career (most highly regarded), which only goes to prove that quality is always more important than quantity.

I have a difficult time deciding which of his two Academy Award wins for Best Actor (he has been nominated four times) is the best.  His menacing portrayal of Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood (2007) is powerfully mesmerizing, and his turn as Irish artist and writer Christy Brown in My Left Foot (1989) is inspiring.  Of the two, Christy Brown is the embodiment of a controlled performance. Not just any actor could have played a character born with cerebral palsy and who was unable to speak clearly throughout most of the film, but Day-Lewis does it beautifully.  While Day-Lewis could never master using his left foot as Christy Brown did to write and paint (Day-Lewis used his right foot instead and the scenes were shot through a mirror), he nailed the body rigidness and facial expressions. Although the performance is completely controlled, it also appears natural and believable. 

Of course, Day-Lewis (and the film) greatly benefitted from working with two accomplished actresses. Brenda Fricker won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role as Christy’s devoted mother, Bridget Brown.  The real Mrs. Brown gave birth twenty-one times (ah, to be an Irish Catholic!), so she was an often harried woman but she did as much for Christy as possible.  Fricker does a nice job of showcasing Mrs. Brown’s resilient nature and her unabashed love for her special son. She and Day-Lewis really do a sensational job of exposing just how deep and abiding their two characters love and respect one another.

Oddly enough, Fiona Shaw is often overlooked in My Left Foot, which is a shame because this is one of her better film roles (she is primarily known for her stage work).  She doesn’t have as much screen time as one might like, but she makes her character, Dr. Eileen Cole, memorable in her few scenes.  Dr. Cole plays a much more significant role in the book than the film, but I think that screenwriter and director Jim Sheridan wanted to focus more on the mother-son relationship than that of the patient-doctor one. Still, Shaw does get to shine in her brief appearances; one of which is in the memorable restaurant tantrum scene.   

Besides the overall fine acting, the film itself is inspirational.  To watch a young boy (played beautifully by Hugh O’Connor) struggle with an almost paralyzing disease struggle to matter in the world is life-affirming.  Here we have a boy who everyone thinks is mentally handicapped but who is really a brilliant individual—his determination to persevere and be recognized by both his family and society is beyond admirable.  When he first writes “Mother” on the family floor and his entire family realizes he’s not “retarded” you get a little catch in your throat.  When you watch him descend into despair (and alcoholism) as a young man when he realizes that romantic love is beyond his reach (at least until the end of the film), you feel truly sorry for him.  And, seeing him learn how to control his impaired speech by reciting Hamlet’s soliloquy “To Be Or not To Be” is a testament to the human spirit. I think most people enjoy films about overcoming obstacles and the fact that this is a true story only makes it even more compelling.

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