Category: 1958

Night of the Blood Beast (1958, Bernard L. Kowalski)

Not to be overly pedantic, but the title should be Nights of the Blood Beast. While the “Blood Beast” part is a little complicated, the film does take place over a couple nights. Two Nights and Four Days of the Blood Beast. The Beast is a space monster. Maybe. It’s definitely a space creature, but it’s unclear if it’s a monster. It might just be misunderstood while having a very discomforting physical presence around the homo sapiens. The Blood Beast looks a little like a giant scab, like a protruding one–with claws and (presumably) red eyes.
Even with the rather obvious budgetary limitations on the costume, it’s not a nice-looking space creature.

Blood Beast is a space movie, like a NASA space movie. Pilot Michael Emmet rides up in a satellite (off-screen), then rockets back to Earth. Emmet has to crashland, and the team assembles to get to the crash site. Who are the team? There’s Ed Nelson and John Baer (interchangeable, sturdy, not-too-smart sort of military guys), then there’s boss scientist Tyler McVey, and let’s not forget the ladies. Georgianna Carter is the team photographer and technically the hardest-working actor in the picture. Angela Greene is the other doctor, who McVey berates and bosses around; Greene’s also engaged to Emmet.
One might think that engagement would lead to some significant drama in the film, but it does not. Greene doesn’t give one of the film’s better performances, but she also has the worst part. She isn’t xenophobic, so Nelson and Baer don’t want to talk to her, and McVey’s performance can best be characterized as “patriarchal hack.” So she’s not getting much in those scenes.

For the first half or so, Carter makes the most impression, usually because of where she’s standing. Also because she’s constantly fiddling with her cameras while everyone else hangs in space if they’re not talking; maybe it’s because Carter’s never talking.

The first Night is the best. Alexander Laszlo’s weird score is threatening more than foreboding (except when it’s bad, which happens only a couple times but, wow, does it happen). John M. Nickolaus Jr.’s black-and-white cinematography is fantastic. The film knows how to get mileage out of the shadows and the fullness of the black. There aren’t any miracles, however; the day-for-night shooting is still fairly bad. Though brief, like they knew they were ruining the mood.

The mood is McVey and Greene inexplicably being able to nurse Emmet back to health. He came in without a heartbeat and started–seemingly–improving. The tension of this weird medical phenomenon is caused, no doubt, by gamma rays off Alpha Centauri while they’re cut off from communicating. It works. It’s an engaging science thriller.

Lots of the third act hinge on Emmet’s performance. Given he’s playing a medical condition of one sort or the other, he does okay. But he never really transcends the material to take it higher. He does all right. On par, in the end, with Baer and Nelson, who eventually team up and become even less distinct.
Beast runs just over sixty minutes, but director Kowalski knows how to keep things moving and how to slow them down. There are a few lengthy shots of the nature hike they take on the second day of their plight.

It could be a whole lot worse.

The Lineup (1958, Don Siegel)

The Lineup is a spin-off of a TV series, an adaptation of a radio show. What is the difference between spin-off and adaptation? The movie has some of the same actors as the TV show, while the radio show didn’t share stars with the TV series. The movie came out before the series was even done running. It went on for a whole other season after the movie. I’m guessing the show didn’t tie into the movie’s events, but maybe there was a whole fallout episode where lead Warner Anderson tracks down whoever hired psychopathic hitmen Eli Wallach and Robert Keith.

The movie runs about eighty-six minutes—so three episodes of the show (until the final season, which went to hour-long)—but the police procedural part barely figures in once Wallach shows up. The Lineup opens with a taxi driver bumping a truck, then running over the traffic cop who tries to flag him down—before the taxi driver dies, shot through the window by another cop. There’s a lot of noise about how a passenger liner porter threw a suitcase in the cab before it raced off—without the suitcase’s owner (an incredibly game Raymond Bailey). Coppers Anderson and Emile Meyer investigate (Meyer wasn’t on the show—and didn’t join after the movie). Lots and lots of talk about the line-up; if only Bailey can identify the porter, they’ll be able to solve the case.

Except Bailey can’t identify the porter, which complicates the investigation because Anderson and Meyer found a bunch of heroin in Bailey’s suitcase. It looks like he’s just an unintentional mule for the real criminals, but they’ve got to be sure.

The entire investigation into Bailey, which involves Anderson and Meyer not just interviewing him but also having plenty of procedural scenes and consultations (including a quick appearance from series co-star Marshall Reed), has absolutely nothing to do with the movie itself. In fact, it’s never definitive Bailey wasn’t involved because we never find out anything about the original smuggling bit. Wallach and Keith are in town for a day; they’re supposed to get the heroin the bad guy—The Man—has had put into their luggage without their knowledge. Their driver was supposed to be the cabbie, who’s dead, so instead, it’s new guy Richard Jaeckel.

Wallach and Keith are vicious and cruel. Keith eggs Wallach on for most of the film, directing Wallach’s violent rage, but there’s a give and take to it. Keith wants Wallach to be an erudite hitman, just to show he’s better than their colleagues. It’s underbaked, but at least it’s personality. They’ve got three targets—a sailor, a wealthy couple, and a mother and daughter. It’s eight hours of work for the pair, and the film follows them from start to finish. The cops get lucky tracking them down, showcasing the benefits of living in a police state—when the bad men kidnap your daughter for her doll, you can thank the omnipresent, occupying police force for her rescue.

Though not in this case because, again, the investigation doesn’t have any bearing on the resolution. Even after multiple related homicides, the best they come up with is a couple of tan white guys. Sure, they’re in Frisco, but maybe somebody’s up from L.A. with a tan. And there aren’t any people of color in the movie at all, so they’re just looking for two guys. Swell detective work. When Anderson and Meyer show up for the finish, the movie doesn’t even pretend they’re interesting. Director Siegel (who also directed the first episode of “The Lineup” TV show) is having way too much fun with Wallach, Keith, and Jaeckel. And the locations. Siegel loves shooting on location, all over San Francisco, with some gorgeous sequences–great black and white photography from Hal Mohr.

The Lineup’s a solid programmer. Wallach’s great, Keith’s great. Mary LaRoche’s good as the mom. The front stuff with Anderson and Meyer drags, with the locations doing the heavy lifting, but Wallach is captivating. Keith’s transfixing, but it’s one of those “what’s the bad guy going to do next” type pictures for Wallach. Siegel really leans into it.

It never made me curious about the show, however. And the resolution’s grandiose but a little pat, narratively speaking. Stirling Silliphant gets the sole writer credit, even though it feels very Many Hands. But it’s a solid programmer.

Bell, Book and Candle (1958, Richard Quine)

Bell, Book and Candle has three problems. The first involves Kim Novak and James Stewart’s May-September romance, which I’ll take couple jabs at in a bit. The second two problems are with the plotting, either in John Van Druten’s original stage play or Daniel Taradish’s screenplay. In the third act, Candle forgets its supporting cast had real arcs. Then there’s the matter of the pat romantic comedy ending, which isn’t a surprise but could definitely be better.

Other than those three problems, however, the film’s a charming Christmas movie. Literal Christmas movie—the present action starts on Christmas Eve, and the film came out on Christmas Day in 1958. It quickly jumps ahead a few months and then a few more months, so it ends somewhere in April, but Christmas kicks it off.

See, witches can’t go to church and listen to carols on Christmas Eve, so cultural art dealer Novak is in a mope. She’s sick of being a witch, something aunt Elsa Lanchester doesn’t understand—Novak could be a super-witch if only she’d try, but she’s been refusing to use her powers. Maybe because the other example is her brother, Jack Lemmon, who apparently uses them all the time for his love life. And to turn off street lights.

We never see anything about Lemmon’s love life. For a movie about witches and their powers, Candle’s very limited in the hijinks. No nose twitching here.

Novak watches new-to-the-building Stewart come home from work and muses—to her adorable cat, Pyewacket (who seems to have been tranquilized to achieve such filmic mellowness)—how she wishes she could meet a man like Stewart: just a normal, professional non-magic dude, twice her age.

Even for 1958, Stewart’s clearly too old for Novak or his fiancée, Janice Rule. My friend pointed out if they’d just dyed his hair from grey to brown, it would’ve been less constantly noticeable. Because Novak really gets interested in Stewart after discovering college rival Rule is going to marry him. Stewart’s got a line about watching Rule grow up and then—when she went off to Wesleyan and came back—really grow up.

Yuck.

But also, Novak can stop talking about Stewart being so hot, which is even more of a disconnect when it turns out he’s doing a silly physical comedy performance for the film’s second half. He mugs at the camera a bunch; does a great job of it, but it’s a strange romantic comedy lead.

It could be worse; they could specify he’s friends with Rule’s dad.

Anyway.

Novak casts a spell to make Stewart fall in love with her instead of Rule. So Novak’s got this very complicated arc—she likes Stewart, but as a witch, can only play with him naughty-like and wants something different; she hates Rule, which helps her get over the hesitation in playing with Stewart’s brain chemistry; she doesn’t want to be a witch anymore—magic folks like brother Lemmon and Greenwich Village witch society matron Hermione Gingold have made it cheap. So Novak’s got a lot going on, with no support from Lemmon or Lanchester.

Worse, Lemmon teams up with author Ernie Kovacs to write a book about the actual Greenwich Village witch scene. Without Lemmon, Kovacs would be writing a hack job, but Lemmon wants it real. In addition to not wanting the world to find out about witches, Novak doesn’t want Stewart to find out she magicked him in love with her (and out of love with Rule).

Stewart’s a book publisher, and Kovacs is writing the book for him, so it’s all neatly tied together.

Despite the age difference—or because of it—Stewart’s spellbound interest in Novak works, as does her growing (problematic) resentment of it. Lemmon and Kovacs are a great duo; Lemmon’s pretty good on his own, just a little thin since his apparently important Casanovaing is absent on screen, not to mention entirely losing his narrative arc at the finish.

But Kovacs is a revelation. He’s a fidgety, perpetually confused drunkard. Despite being brought to New York by magic, it’s just as believable he would’ve come on his own in the middle of a drunken musing. He’s great from his first scene, something the film seems to acknowledge and showcase, but then chucks him for the finish. He was just an excisable subplot, after all.

Lanchester’s delightful. No heavy lifting, but delightful.

Rule’s fine. It’s a tricky part from any angle. We never find out if we’re supposed to be at all sympathetic to her, but all signs point to no.

Stewart’s good. He’s better at the transfixed romance or the dad jokes. He’s supposed to be aloof the other times. Only he’s Maugham’s New York publisher; he can’t be too aloof. Plus, he’s hipper than Rule.

And then Novak. She’s terrific. It’s her movie (other than when Kovacs is onscreen), and it’s a solitary one. She’s got no real confidants, not even the cat. Everyone wants something from her. Great fodder for an arc. Not a great resolution for the character; it’s not necessarily a reductive one, but it’s also very potentially a reductive one. The film’s missing the right punchline.

Bell, Book and Candle’s cute, funny, well-acted, and well-produced. Quine’s direction is fine—he’s rather good with the actors—and James Wong Howe’s photography is fantastic. It’s an all right showcase for Novak (though it’s all about Kovacs, obviously), but it needed a bit more oomph in the third act.

This post is part of the Kim Novak Blogathon: A 90th Birthday Celebration hosted by Ari of The Classic Movie Muse.

Stage Struck (1958, Sidney Lumet)

Conservatively, Stage Struck has six endings. They start about fifty-eight minutes into the film, which runs ninety-five minutes. Actually, wait, there are probably—conservatively—seven. I forgot how many there are mid-third act before the actual (ending-laden) finale.

For a while, the false endings add to the film’s charm. Maybe if the third act hadn’t reduced lead Susan Strasberg to a glorified cameo… but by the end, Struck’s already had all its problems. It’s got a doozy—Strasberg’s in a love triangle with Broadway producer Henry Fonda and playwright Christopher Plummer. Strasberg was twenty at the time, Plummer twenty-nine, and Fonda was fifty-three. For context, Strasberg’s real-life dad was only three years older than Fonda. Strasberg’s character is eighteen-ish. They establish she left her hometown in Vermont, where she was in all her (now dead) uncle’s plays. Fonda presumably reminds her of her uncle (ick). She fawns over him, wanting him to Svengali her, and he can’t help but fall for her. It doesn’t hurt his regular girlfriend, younger but not “I’m only a few years shy of being old enough to be your grandpa” territory Joan Greenwood, likes to punish him for slights by withholding physical affections.

So, yeah. For a while, it seems like Struck’s going to be all about Fonda and Strasberg getting together. It’s not, thank goodness, and any threats to revisit the topic end up just being threats, which also get contextualized for Fonda’s character–rich white guys never have to grow up and think about things if they stay rich and white enough—it doesn’t ever stop being creepy (especially since Strasberg looks like a kid kid), but… I don’t know; it makes “sense.” And Fonda’s really good at playing this old creeper who does try to act responsibly. Somewhat.

Stage Struck is a remake of Morning Glory, which is based on an unproduced stage play. And Struck filmed entirely on location in New York City, as the opening title promises. Director Lumet and cinematographers Morris Hartzband and Franz Planer have some trouble with the location shooting, but Lumey’s instincts are all good, and when the shots look good, they look great. There’s an exterior location scene between Strasberg and Plummer—if it weren’t a late fifties studio remake of an early thirties studio picture—it’d be exceptional. Lumet and his photographers foreshadow seventies Hollywood New York movies by over a decade.

And there are some exceptional moments in the film. It’s all about Strasberg wanting to make it on Broadway but not wanting to go the regular route. She was in a play club in her hometown; she knows all the Shakespeare by heart, why should she go to the Actor’s Studio (did they consider having her real dad—Actors Studio coach Lee Strasberg—cameo); she wants to be a star now. It doesn’t work out for her in act one, but when she’s back in act two, she has this line about having to prove herself. Strasberg’s got to prove to the Broadway people in the movie she can be a major stage actor, which means she’s also got to prove it to Struck’s audience.

She does. It’s incredible. At first, it seems like Lumet doesn’t have the scene, then he does, while Strasberg keeps delivering great moment after the great moment, Lumet holding the shots. It echoes in the third act. It’s so good.

Sadly, it’s also when Fonda sees something he likes.

But it’s more Plummer’s movie than anyone else. He’s the new playwright who throws in with commercial success Fonda. The film starts with them going into production on one play and ends with their production on the next. Lumet and screenwriters Ruth and Augustus Gortz do a fine job opening the film up enough it never feels too stagy—Lumet loves the theater so much he bakes in acknowledging the stage—but none of these people exist outside their professions. Even when we see Fonda at home, it’s in the context of Broadway producer.

Lots of great acting. Strasberg has an unsteady first act, a knockout second then is missing from most of the third. Intentionally, which is a bad choice. Plummer’s great, and Fonda’s outstanding. Herbert Marshall is an older actor who thinks Strasberg’s swell, but since he’s in his sixties, he doesn’t have to be a pervert about it. Greenwood’s good, even though she’s reduced to foil. Nice small work from Daniel Ocko and John Fiedler. Struck’s got a lot of fine performances; given the subject, it’s got to have them.

The film’s a little too experimental for its own good (with the location shooting), and the third act’s a mess, but Stage Struck’s pretty darn good. A tad too pervy, even if muted, but it’s not a factually inaccurate representation of how Broadway producers behave… and the acting’s superb. Strasberg’s a marvel, and Plummer’s a great lead (in his first theatrical film).

Oh, the Alex North music.

It’s a tad much; chalk it in the experimental column, especially when it plays over the actors.

This post is part of the Charismatic Christopher Plummer Blogathon hosted by Gabriela of Pale Writer and Gill of Realweegiemidget Reviews.

Frankenstein’s Daughter (1958, Richard E. Cunha)

Frankenstein’s Daughter ought to be good camp. If the rest of the movie could keep up with Donald Murphy (as Doctor “Frank”), it’d be something to behold. Because Murphy gives it his all opening to close, seemingly more aware of the picture than the picture’s aware of itself. Though he’s never quite good—he’s better than anyone else, except maybe Wolfe Barzell as his assistant—but he’s captivating.

Unfortunately, he’s captivating in the wrong movie.

Because while this movie does a pretty good riff on modernizing old Frankenstein movies—modernizing to the late fifties—it’s also a late fifties teen movie, so literal rapist Murphy comes off less creepy than regular gaslighting fifties boyfriend John Ashley. Ashley gives the film’s worst performance, which is saying something because there are lots of terrible performances. Even the better performances have some terrible stretches, like damsel-in-distress Sandra Knight and slutty-girl-who-deserves-it-for-dressing-that-way Sally Todd. If H.E. Barrie’s script were better, it’d all be about Ashley having forced Todd while they were dating, then dumped her for good girl Knight, because even though that story’s not in the script… it’s unintentionally in the performances when you try to imagine the character relationships.

Sadly Ashley figures into the third act a bunch and drags it down a bit. The movie misses the one way it could do the right thing as far as comeuppance, and it completely fails.

Though it’s hard to imagine director Cunha ever having a good idea. He’s never got any ideas. The camera stays in medium long shot outside a couple reveal close-ups. Cunha can’t even direct over-the-shoulder shots. Then again, editor Everett Dodd wouldn’t be able to cut them, but still. Oddly, Meredith M. Nicholson’s photography is fine. Frankenstein’s Daughter looks like a movie shot in and around someone’s suburban Los Angeles house and whatever sets were still up at the rental studio, but the lighting’s always solid.

The story has Murphy posing as a lab assistant to lovable old scientist Felix Locher (who’s not unlikeable but gives a lousy performance). Locher has a fetching young niece, Knight, and a lab in his house. Apparently, Murphy gets him to hire Barzell to be the live-in gardener but really to help Murphy with his monster-making. Murphy keeps trying to force himself on Knight, which is expected in the fifties, so she never really complains—besides, he’s a bookworm and not a my-daddy’s-a-lawyer regular guy like Ashley. Daughter unintentionally says a whole lot about its cultural norms.

The movie kicks off after Murphy starts knocking Knight out when Locher goes out. Not for anything rapey, but rather to inject her with experimental serum to turn her into a monster. Albeit a bulletproof one. Knight’s ostensible friend Todd sees her and tries to tell people, but she’s one of those girls who’ll say anything for attention, so why listen to her says ex-boyfriend Ashley and his bro, her current beau, Harold Lloyd Jr. Junior’s terrible but much better than Ashley.

Though Ashley at least wants Knight to wed and obey him, it turns out Lloyd Jr. could give a shit about Todd.

Todd starts flirting with Murphy to get back at Knight for stealing Ashley away. Things go atrociously for all involved. John Zaremba and Robert Dix are the credulous but still unhelpful cops. Who shoot first and ask questions later, even with white kids, so… they could be worse? Dix seems like he’d be better with direction, something Cunha doesn’t provide.

Competent music from Nicholas Carras. Indescribable shoehorned music numbers from The Page Cavanaugh Trio—if you’ve only ever heard good white kid music from the fifties, they’re an experience.

Frankenstein’s Daughter probably plays better with people talking over it, so you can’t be so horrified at its actual content. It seems like it was made with the express purpose of being mocked on “Mystery Science Theatre.” Concerningly, of course, it was not.

so you can’t be so horrified at its actual content. It seems like it was made with the express purpose of being mocked on “Mystery Science Theatre.” Concerningly, of course, it was not.

Les surmenés (1958, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze)

Les surmenés answers the burning question: What if the French New Wave directors made a sitcom? In this sitcom, country girl Yane Barry comes to Paris. She’s won a typing contest, so she’s able to be a… typist, but she’s also engaged to her sister’s boss (Jean-Pierre Cassel), which is funny since they have no chemistry. Of course, she also doesn’t have any chemistry with Jean-Claude Brialy, who plays the other guy. She meets Brialy in the first scene, on the train ride in. Now, it’s not clear if Barry doesn’t have any chemistry with Cassel or Brialy because of some acting deficit because the short is committed to not letting her have any actual scenes. Either there’s narration explaining everything or Barry’s getting chastised for not being serious enough. Any scenes where she seems to have agency quickly turn into montage sequences.

See, Barry doesn’t want to live in Paris and not have any fun. She wants to live it up, all night, every night. Just like her brother-in-law (Jean Juillard) does. Excerpt Juillard is just working (he works nights and he’s addicted to that work). Barry’s addicted to partying. Cassel doesn’t want to party because he works. Will horny guy Brialy want to party with her?

Throw in a lot about Juillard working and his wife—Barry’s sister—Chantal de Rieux not liking him working all night and there’s the short. There’s not a lot to it. Certainly nothing dramatic and not much filmic either. The most creative thing in the film is the animated opening titles. I guess Jacques Letellier’s photography is fine, but director Doniol-Valcroze’s composition is (apparently intentionally) boring. Got to have the boring shots to make the montages work with the narration. But none of it actually works so… Les surmenés is just tedious. It doesn’t help the script—by François Truffaut, Michel Fermaud, and Doniol-Valcroze—is really hostile to Barry for some reason. Well, not some reason. It’s because Barry’s a young woman who wants to have fun in the big city. They could tell the exact same story, hit the same beats, same “emotional resonances” (quotations because no), and not be jerks about it.

I suppose the attitude does give the short some personality. Unpleasant personality, but personality; nothing else in it has any.

Wait—except Georges Delerue’s music, which starts fun and ends up being a sitcom score.

Run Silent Run Deep (1958, Robert Wise)

Run Silent Run Deep runs a little short. Just when the film has the most potential does it sort of shrug and finish up real quick. There’s a third act reveal and it’s a good one, but it’s not good enough the movie can end on it. Especially not after it’s just had such a strong second act.

Burt Lancaster has just had a big character development moment, there’s just been an awesome special effects sequence, it’s right when Run Silent Run Deep has its most potential. The film’s never bad, though it occasionally feels a little claustrophobic, narratively speaking, but it’s been on this “can’t believe no one calls him Ahab” arc with Clark Gable for about an hour. The second act shake-up comes at just the right moment and sets up a great third arc. And the third arc is not great. It’s perfunctory, inventively so, but perfunctory. The finale lacks any impact. The big action finale doesn’t have much action, certainly not of the level in the second act set piece; Lancaster’s arc ends up going nowhere. He really had just been support for Gable the whole time.

So, Run Deep takes place during World War II. It opens with sub commander Gable’s sub getting sunk; he survives, along with some other guys but not everyone. A year later, he’s pushing pencils and playing “Battleship” with new sidekick Jack Warden. All of a sudden Warden lets it slip three other ships have gone down just where Gable’s did. A man possessed he storms over to the brass, demands a ship, gets one, which pauses executive officer Lancaster’s promotion to captain. His captain… died on their previous mission? It doesn’t come up.

Once onboard it soon becomes clear Gable’s going to hunt down Japanese ship sinking all the U.S. submarines. Run Deep teaches the sound moral, “you’ve got to be willing to die to kill.” For a brief few minutes, the film’s about the inherent righteousness of Ahab-ing. Gable’s got Lancaster convinced—though Lancaster doesn’t want to admit it. The crew doesn’t get that perk of command, however, so they’re ready to mutiny.

Lancaster and Gable are great together because they don’t like one another but Gable’s exploiting Lancaster’s ability. It’s kind of awesome, even when it’s just to kill time with montage sequences. Run Deep impresses with its special effects. The other stuff? It doesn’t worry too much. The submarine set is fine; not great. The editing—supervised by George Boemler—is awesome. The editing makes Run Deep until that end of the second act uptick.

Gable’s good. Warden’s good. Lancaster’s almost great. He’s great for a while, then his character arc falls out from under him. Worse, the third act is set to be where Gable finally gets some great material and never does. It’s a bummer. It needs to go longer. And there are places where it could’ve, but it really could have used a better action set piece in the third act than the second. If the dramatics were stronger, it’d be fine. But the dramatics aren’t stronger.

Nice supporting cast, particularly Brad Dexter, Don Rickles (in a totally straight part), and Joe Maross.

Decent Franz Waxman score. Solid Russell Harlan photography. The composite shots don’t really impress but Harlan does fine with the submarine suspense stuff and it’s more important.

Wise’s direction is fine. He does really well with the action. He does better with the supporting cast than his stars, which is a problem. But there’s already that too short script. So fine.

But Run Silent Run Deep ought to be better than fine. It wastes Lancaster and Gable separately and it wastes them together.

This post is part of the Second Clark Gable Blogathon hosted by Michaela of Love Letters to Old Hollywood.

Lonelyhearts (1958, Vincent J. Donehue)

The most frustrating thing about Lonelyhearts is Donehue’s direction. While not a television production, Donehue directs it like one. He’ll have these shots of star Montgomery Clift baring his soul to girlfriend Dolores Hart and Donehue will stick with Clift, no reaction shot on Hart much less letting her hear the whole thing. Of course, less reaction shots in Lonelyhearts isn’t a bad thing. Donehue shoots them terribly. The first scene has one, while Clift is sitting in a booth with Myrna Loy and Robert Ryan and cuts from the three shot to a medium shot of Clift in his seat… obviously alone at the table. Coverage isn’t Donehue’s strong suit. Nothing is Donehue’s strong suit.

Lonelyhearts is based on a novel and a play, but producer and writer Dore Schary’s screenplay seems to favor the play. Unless the Robert Ryan character spoke in incessant monologue in the novel too. Not to complain about Ryan, who kind of gives the film’s best performance as a cruel newspaper editor who enjoys torturing his discontented staff almost as much as he likes torturing suffering wife Loy. She cheated on him once ten years ago, as a response to his multiple affairs, and has been waiting for him to forgive her since.

Yeah, Lonelyhearts has a lot of misogyny issues, even when it tries not to have them. While Ryan’s not a good guy because his cruelty, Loy’s only sympathetic because so she’s so contrite (and has been for so long).

Ryan gives the best performance throughout–he’s incredibly believable in his cynicism and loathing and self-loathing–and occasionally steals scenes from Clift. Only Ryan and Clift are guaranteed close-ups. They’re not the two top-billed for nothing. But once Clift’s story gets going and he starts collapsing in on himself, once he gets to make that self-loathing Ryan wants to engender in him physical, Clift’s got some great scenes. But he’s also got a somewhat crappy part.

Clift’s a young man with gumption (clearly not playing his thirty-eight years) who gets stuck writing the advice column because Ryan thinks he’s an idealist and Ryan likes breaking idealists. Clift’s also attractive and nice to Loy, so it gives Ryan a chance to be cruel to her about something else. Hart–Clift’s girlfriend and de facto fiancée–is twenty. Clift looks too old for her as the movie starts and he always looks older than her, but once he starts getting broken down, it’s like it takes the years off him.

The first half of the movie is everyone telling Clift he cares too much about the people writing to the advice column. It’s most effective when it’s Hart telling him he’s too empathetic because it just seems like Clift’s life is lose-lose. Then we find out he’s an orphan, then we find out he’s not really an orphan, his dad (Onslow Stevens) is just in jail for killing his mom for she cheating on him. The scene with Clift and Stevens facing off ought to be a lot better. It’s poorly directed and paced, but at that moment Clift looks way too old for the scene, even though Stevens actually is old enough to be his father.

Lonelyhearts has some terribly bland lighting from John Alton. It’s visually tedious, with these occasional moments when–somehow–Donehue manages to hold the shot on Clift or Ryan and get something good. Then it’ll cut away and Alton won’t match the lighting. But still, the actors are there to work. So it’s really unfortunate Loy gets squat and poorly directed squat at that. And it’s even more unfortunate Hart gets the “faithful girlfriend” role, only for Donehue to avoid her during her character development scenes, and her most frequent costars–Frank Overton (two years Clift’s senior) as her dad, Don and Johnny Washbrook as her brothers–give shockingly inept performances. Particularly bad writing for them as well. Schary’s not comfortable with silences, but he also doesn’t write background chatter well.

And the film’s use of sound effects to suggest they’re not shooting on a sound stage or an empty bar set? Inept. If Lonelyhearts were a television production upgraded to feature, it’d have some excuses. But as a feature made with television production standards? It’s got none.

The real drama in the film involves Maureen Stapleton and Frnak Maxwell. She writes to the column, devastated about the state of her marriage to handicapped Maxwell. Clift feels sympathy for her. Ryan says she’s a tramp wife on the make and demands he meet her in person. Things get complicated.

All Lonelyhearts needs is better direction. The script, albeit problematic, is more than passable–it doesn’t seem likely a film of its era would be able to get rid of the undercurrent of passive misogyny, given the subject matter–maybe some awareness of it would be nice. Though Hart getting a reasonable character arc and Clift or Ryan showing some real self-awareness instead of just implied future self-awareness would do a lot too. But Donehue’s direction sinks it.

The film starts low and claws its way up through its stagy production, poor technical efforts, wonky screenplay, all thanks to the cast. Ryan’s outstanding, Clift’s is occasionally but usually excellent. Both Stapleton and Maxwell have great moments; it’s unfortunate higher billed Hart and Loy don’t get the same courtesy.

A real musical score might’ve helped too. Conrad Salinger’s credited with one but it’s beyond sparse.

For having so many problems, Lonelyhearts is a kind of achievement. Acting-wise, anyway.

2/4★★

CREDITS

Directed by Vincent J. Donehue; screenplay by Dore Schary, based on a play by Howard Teichmann and a novel by Nathanael West; director of photography, John Alton; edited by John Faure and Aaron Stell; music by Conrad Salinger; produced by Schary; released by United Artists.

Starring Montgomery Clift (Adam White), Robert Ryan (William Shrike), Myrna Loy (Florence Shrike), Dolores Hart (Justy Sargeant), Maureen Stapleton (Fay Doyle), Frank Maxwell (Pat Doyle), Frank Overton (Mr. Sargeant), Jackie Coogan (Ned Gates), Mike Kellin (Frank Goldsmith), and Onslow Stevens (Mr. Lassiter).

THIS POST IS PART OF FROM THE STARS TO A STAR: CELEBRATING DOLORES HART HOSTED BY VIRGINIE OF THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF CINEMA.

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Separate Tables (1958, Delbert Mann)

Despite taking place in a very English hotel with very English residents–all of them long-term residents, not temporary guests–Separate Tables hinges almost entirely on the Americans. Burt Lancaster is one such American. He’s a regular resident (even ostensibly engaged to manager Wendy Hiller; they’re definitely carrying on illicitly anyway). And Rita Hayworth is the other American. She’s one of the two inciting incidents. Though, arguably, Hiller and Lancaster’s engagement is the root inciter on that one.

The other inciting incident is retired British Army major David Niven getting into a bit of scandal. Niven is a blowhard, genially annoying to all his fellow residents–except Deborah Kerr. She’s there with her mother, Gladys Cooper. Cooper’s a nasty upper class widow, Kerr’s her terrorized, utterly controlled daughter. Cooper browbeats her, while Kerr resents her own day dreams. Only with Niven does she get a little bit of relief.

Cooper disapproves, of course, and is very glad to manipulate Niven’s scandal to hurt both him and Kerr. In a very British upper class sort of way. Cooper’s the film’s villain, but of course she’s a villain. Her behavior can’t be anything but reprehensible, given her character. Hard to feel malice towards her.

The Niven scandal–and Kerr’s reaction to it–is half the story. The other half is Hayworth and Lancaster. They used to be married. She’s a former fashion model, he’s an author of some renown. Their marriage ended with Lancaster in prison for assaulting her. But now she’s heard he’s fallen on hard times and was in London meeting her fiancé’s family and thought she’d look him up. To provide moral support. And, you know, seduce him. Because brute working class guys made good is the only thing ever to do it for her.

Except Lancaster still resents her for forcing him into the assault–she denied him his conjugal rights. Hearing Lancaster complain she didn’t let him treat her as property kind of undermines his sympathetic potential. Though, as it turns out, even though the Americans keep Separate Tables moving, they’re not really supposed to be the sympathetic ones.

They’re an extreme. Cooper (and Cooper’s way of thinking, which influences Kerr and even Niven) is another extreme. Tables is all about finding the balance.

The film takes place over a particularly eventful sixteen or so hours. Just before dinner to breakfast the next day. Tables runs a couple minutes under a hundred minutes, with the first act establishing a bunch of characters. The other residents include Cathleen Nesbitt as Cooper’s partner-in-crime, Felix Aylmer as a stuck-up retired public school teacher, May Hallatt as a horse better, and Rod Taylor and Audrey Dalton as two indiscreet lovers. Taylor’s studying for his surgical exams. Dalton’s ostensibly there to help, but she mostly just seduces him–literally–away from them. Initially, it’s through Taylor and Dalton the implied activity of sexual congress–which Cooper, Nesbitt, and Alymer–all find so distasteful, gets mentioned.

Cooper and Lancaster have just been doing it in secret for years before the engagement, which is still tentative and super-hush hush.

Separate Tables is a lot of talking, a lot of listening, a lot of silent, pained emoting. Once Niven breaks down in the first fifteen minutes–see, he knows the scandal is about to become known–it’s obvious the film’s tone is going to be somewhat peculiar. Director Mann relies entirely on the performances. He’s got a handful of showy moves, which all work beautifully, but it’s almost entirely shot to facilitate the performances. With Charles Lang’s gorgeous black and white photography. The film’s technically stunning–great music from David Raksin, great production design (it’s all on sound stages, including the exquisite exteriors) by Harry Horner. Except the editing. Every once in a while, Charles Ennis and Marjorie Fowler’s cuts will be jarringly bad. And even when they’re not jarringly bad, they’re never fully in sync with the performances. It never ruins a scene or really hurts one overall, but the editing causes some stumbles. It’s worst when it’s in a Hayworth and Lancaster scene, because they’re already a little rocky.

Hayworth’s cold, shallow, calculating former fashion model is kind of perfect counter for the cold, calculating, but repressed Brits around her. Hayworth’s best when she shows humanity, which rarely happens around Lancaster. Lancaster’s best when he’s opposite Hiller, just because his scenes with Hayworth are usually a combination of silent rage, silent lust, or noisy exposition dumps. While both Lancaster and Hayworth are good, they’re the weakest parts of the film. Especially when they’re together.

Meanwhile, the trouble brewing over Niven is positively enthralling, as Cooper musters her fellow residents in a revolt and each of them works through their personal feelings about the situation. Only Kerr gets to explode. And the movie–through Cooper–has been promising Kerr will explode since their first scene together (which is the second or third scene in the picture), so there’s a lot of anticipation.

Kerr doesn’t disappoint. Not once in the picture, even though much of her performance is just sitting looking upset. Niven never disappoints either. He’s got the biggest character arc and kind of two parts to play. One and a half at least.

Hiller’s great too, sort of better than the film deserves. It only makes it because of her. She’s able to support her costars enough to get them through their sometimes perfunctory or abbreviated character development.

Separate Tables is deliberate, careful, thoughtful. Mann and screenwriters Terence Rattigan (adapting his play) and John Gay pace it all perfectly. It never feels stagy, never feels confined, never feels perfunctory. At least not in the plotting or events. Sure, sometimes the character development is a little too slick, but it is only a hundred minutes and the present action is only sixteen or seventeen hours. The performances are sublime, the production (save the editing) is sublime. It’s a lovely, often impeccable film.

3/4★★★

CREDITS

Directed by Delbert Mann; screenplay by Terence Rattigan and John Gay, based on the play by Rattigan; director of photography, Charles Lang; edited by Charles Ennis and Marjorie Fowler; music by David Raksin; production designer, Harry Horner; produced by Harold Hecht; released by United Artists.

Starring Burt Lancaster (John Malcolm), Rita Hayworth (Ann Shankland), Deborah Kerr (Sibyl Railton-Bell), David Niven (Major Angus Pollock), Wendy Hiller (Pat Cooper), Gladys Cooper (Mrs. Railton-Bell), Cathleen Nesbitt (Lady Matheson), Felix Aylmer (Mr. Fowler), Rod Taylor (Charles), Audrey Dalton (Jean), Priscilla Morgan (Doreen), and May Hallatt (Miss Meacham).

THIS POST IS PART OF THE DEBORAH KERR BLOGATHON HOSTED BY MADDY OF MADDY LOVES HER CLASSIC FILMS.

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The Great Monster Varan (1958, Honda Ishirô)

The only thing more tedious and lethargic than the first half of Varan is the second half of Varan. The first half has a motley crew of lepidopterologists awakening a giant monster. The second half has these lepidopterologists consulting with the military to destroy said monster.

Not sure why the military thinks a bunch of butterfly scientists will have good ideas about how to kill a giant monster. Eventually Hirata Akihiko shows up with the solution. Hirata killed the original Godzilla, which is only appropriate in Varan, since the monster has the exact same roar as Godzilla. Varan is done on the cheap. The real cheap.

The film has its share of behind-the-scenes drama. It was originally for television–a coproduction between Toho and an American company, but then the American company went bankrupt. So the two-part TV movie became a single eighty-six minute feature, in “TohoPanScope,” which had them cropping the television framing. I suppose that cropping is why a lot of director Honda’s shots are so bad. Even still, it doesn’t explain away the bad acting or godawful pace.

Or the lousy giant monster suit, which always seems in danger of coming apart onscreen.

There are numerous… well, they’re not exactly plot holes but narrative skips. Like when there’s a forest fire all of a sudden, or how–in the second half–the military attacks have nothing to do with what the Secretary of Defense orders. It makes sense as the Secretary of Defense (Yamada Minosuke) is utterly out of his depth. Yamada’s acting is bad, the script is bad, but even so, when he listens intently to the ideas of chief lepidopterologist Senda Koreya, there’s no plausible reason for Yamada to be listening to Senda. Senda’s writing is probably better, but his performance is so much worse. It’s a risible performance amid some decidedly unimpressive ones. Senda comes up with the solution at the last minute for saving the day, which is another of the film’s narrative skips. He all of a sudden remembers something–which the film doesn’t actually show, but should’ve–as the deus ex.

The first half makes Nomura Kôzô the hero for a while. He’s the intrepid lepidopterologist who dares to return to the giant monster’s territory after it kills two of his colleagues. He brings along Sonoda Ayumi; she’s a reporter and sister of one of the dead lepidopterologists. Varan has so little character establishing, her job is never important. There’s some stuff with newspapers reporting the monster, but it’s before she even shows up.

Bad editing from Taira Kazuji, piddly photography from Koizumi Hajime–though, really, who knows how Varan is really supposed to look (Toho apparently destroyed the original aspect ratio version of the film). But what remains isn’t adequately, much less impressively, photographed. The constant use of stock footage makes the experience even worse.

Ifukube Akira’s score is bad. Though he revised some of the music for later Toho kaiju movies to far better effect. Taira doesn’t really cut with the music in mind. Or sound. Maybe it’s because there are supposed to be commercial breaks. Seeing Varan cut into with commercials might help the overall viewing experience.

It’s an awful film. Especially when it refuses to end; the second half just goes on and on and on. There’s one single good miniature effects shot–and one good composite shot–but otherwise all the effects are bad. I suppose some of the matte backgrounds at the beginning are good. They aren’t godawful at least.

0/4ⓏⒺⓇⓄ

CREDITS

Directed by Honda Ishirô; screenplay by Sekizawa Shin’ichi, based on a story by Kuronuma Ken; director of photography, Koizumi Hajime; edited by Taira Kazuji; music by Ifukube Akira; production designer, Shimizu Kiyoshi; produced by Tanaka Tomoyuki; released by Toho Company Ltd.

Starring Nomura Kôzô (Kenji), Sonoda Ayumi (Yuriko), Senda Koreya (Dr. Sugimoto), Matsuo Fumindo (Horiguchi), Hirata Akihiko (Dr. Fujimora), Murakami Fuyuki (Dr. Majima), Tsuchiya Yoshio (Katsumoto), Yamada Minosuke (Secretary of Defense), and Sera Akira (High Priest).

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