No Sad Songs for Me (1950)

No Sad Songs for Me is an atypical postwar Hollywood tearjerker. A woman learns she is dying of cancer and decides to withhold her prognosis from her family, while secretly encouraging the woman she hopes will eventually take her place.

What makes this movie so atypical is the presence of the leading lady, Margaret Sullavan, a sublime actress of exceptional skill, who has nevertheless been forgotten over the years by the general public. Her life was tempestuous: married four times (including a 60-day stint with Henry Fonda), torn between Los Angeles and Broadway, and often both severely physically ill and mentally depressed. Sullavan never enjoyed the stability of one able to choose a coast and settle there. She’d give birth to three children, two of whom would eventually commit suicide, though neither would do so while Sullavan herself was still living. The troubled and unhappy actress would die of a barbiturate overdose in 1960 at the age of fifty-one.

In spite of making only sixteen films, she was as highly regarded as any actress in the business. Unlike most, she left Hollywood on her own terms. Other aging actresses faded from the film scene for a variety of reasons, but Hollywood always had a part waiting for Sullavan. Her performances are nuanced and damned smart—and she was gifted with an extraordinary voice. She starred opposite Jimmy Stewart in three bona fide classics: The Shopworn Angel (1938), The Shop Around the Corner (1940), and The Mortal Storm (1940). Her best performance, in Three Comrades (1938), with Robert Taylor and Franchot Tone, earned her only Oscar nomination. She made No Sad Songs for Me after a seven-year breather, and it would end up being the final film of her career. For the remaining decade of her life, she confined her efforts to the stage and an occasional television appearance.

Although No Sad Songs for Me has the same melodramatic honeycomb as a Douglas Sirk picture, it’s saved by subtle and clever casting—and not just in Sullavan's case. Each of Columbia boss Harry Cohn and director Rudolph Maté’s choices keeps the film from straying into histrionics. Wendell Corey plays Sullavan’s husband. Most often utilized as a foil to a more charismatic and romantic male star, Corey’s sensitive, wry screen persona is perfect here. You could argue that his limited range mars the picture in one crucial moment, when he finally learns the truth about his wife’s condition, but on the whole his presence is a lesson in inspired, slow-burn restraint. The movie's other woman is Swedish actress Viveca Lindfors, who plays Corey’s co-worker, and isn’t so beautiful or glamorous that you can’t imagine her ending up with him. Little Natalie Wood plays the kid.

The film benefits from a well-constructed script, tight as a drum from start to finish. It favors the romantic triangle over Sullavan’s struggle to come to grips with her illness and her relationship with her daughter, but it’s entertaining enough that you won’t care. Although there are some routine elements of 1950s scandal / gossip present, the film doesn’t linger on them. No Sad Songs for Me is worthwhile for softening the tired Depression-era cliché of the dying wife and mother. Sullavan herself had already starred in one the preeminent such films of the 1930s, Three Comrades. It’s clear that by the early 1950s (and in the wake of the war) filmmakers were less concerned with Greek tragedy and more aware that life moves on the wake of death.

No Sad Songs for Me (1950)

Grade: B+

Directed by Rudolph Maté

Starring Margaret Sullavan, Wendell Corey, Natalie Wood

Released by Columbia Pictures

Running time: 88 minutes

Availability: Airs on TCM.

The Valiant (1929)

Thanks to TCM’s daylong celebration of the preservation efforts of the George Eastman House, I was able to view Paul Muni’s first film effort, The Valiant, directed by William K. Howard and released by Fox in 1929. The film would earn the Austrian born, New York bred Muni the first of his six Academy Award nominations, each and every one in the Best Actor category. He’d lose the second-ever Best Actor statuette to colossal movie star Warner Baxter (In Old Arizona), but Muni’s time in the sun was coming: he would be nominated four times between 1934 and 1938, winning the award in 1937 for his portrayal of Louis Pasteur. (Muni bookended nicely: his last nomination came in 1960, in his final film, The Last Angry Man.) Along with his rival at Warner Brothers, Edward G. Robinson, Muni dominated screens in the thirties — his star exploding after title roles in a pair of 1932 films, Scarface, and the astonishing I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang. All but forgotten by contemporary audiences, Muni was an actor’s actor and one of the biggest stars in the world. He was a chameleon, able to transform himself into whatever his role called for, whether it was suave gentility or brute physicality, regardless of age or nationality, and he could do any accent required — though he famously told Irving Thalberg that he was “about as Chinese as Herbert Hoover” when the boy wonder cast him in The Good Earth.

The Valiant opens auspiciously: Muni shoots an unseen man in some drab big city flat and wanders out onto the street, and eventually into the local precinct, where he confesses. In short order he’s thrown behind bars, tried, and sentenced to die in the electric chair at Sing Sing — a rapid-fire chain of events that Muni takes in stride. He seems resigned to his fate in moralistic, Old Testament sort of way. He tells his captors his victim deserved to die, and that he realizes that he too must be punished in accordance with the law.

The dramatic thrust of the film lies not in the identity of the victim or the motive for the crime, but in the real name of the killer himself, which Muni stubbornly refuses to divulge. Instead, he assembles the moniker “James Dyke” from a police station wall calendar. (The earliest instance of this particular film cliché I’m aware of.) Cut to the prison, where we learn that not only is Dyke a model inmate, but that his sensational case has even provided him the opportunity to write moralizing newspaper editorials, making his story and face known to a fascinated nation. In Ohio, the elderly Mrs. Douglas sees the condemned man in the paper and wonders if he could be her son Joe, gone without a trace these fifteen years. Her daughter Mary and Mary’s fiancé Robert (the popular Johnny Mack Brown) make the trip to New York in an effort to learn the truth, but although the film makes it abundantly clear to the audience that James Dyke certainly is Joe Douglas, Joe is able to convince the desperate young woman that he is not the loving older brother who used to read Romeo and Juliet to her when she was a little girl. Instead, in the sort of turn that could only happen in an early Hollywood tearjerker, “Dyke” claims to have known a man named Joe Douglas during the war, and to have seen the youth die heroically in the trenches. I’ll call it quits after this in order to spare as much of the ending as possible — Mary is then able to leave the prison with her chin up, believing that her brother died a hero and now able to return home to marry free and clear of any potential scandal.

This is an engaging movie, and thankfully it’s short enough (only 66 minutes) that one can get through it without ever feeling taxed. First is Muni: the abilities that would see him become the preeminent dramatic actor of the thirties are evident; he’s simply light years ahead of everyone else in the film in terms of ability and intuiting the medium. More than that though, Muni has that intangible something, the charisma, the screen presence, the “it” that has characterized actors such as Cagney, Dean, and De Niro throughout film history. The Valiant is a rudimentary early talkie, but Muni owns the thing.

Speaking of which, the film is notable for its technical accomplishment. While the cameras are static (there are a few close-ups), and the sets are theatrical, there are some fine “special effects” shots that appear during various flashback sequences, when a young Muni is superimposed over a medium shot of the character (usually his Whistler’s Mother-like ma) doing the remembering. And although it boasts no musical score, the sound in the Eastman print is crisp and clean, with all of the spoken dialogue easily understood. Part of that owes to the simplicity of the Oscar-nominated writing itself: a great many of the Fox theaters chains were rural (compared to those of Paramount and MGM), and consequently numerous Fox features were targeted at the uneducated or the unsophisticated, who nevertheless frequented American movie houses in droves. All of the characters deliver their lines deliberately, and with no small amount of silent-era pantomime, but it’s also apparent that the writing itself was been simplified in order to facilitate easy understanding. The narrative moral of the movie — and even its title — speak directly to rural audiences about the corruption of city life. A good mid-western boy was called to the war, and at its end was lured to the city instead of back to his home — and there he was obliged to do murder. Audiences are warned that even a young man worthy of the film’s title, The Valiant can still be ruined by the perils of the city, and that in forsaking his home and his family, he has sufficiently challenged the fates to destroy him.  

The Valiant (1929)
Directed by William K. Howard
Starring Paul Muni
Released by Fox Film Corporation (20th Century Fox) 
Running time: 66 minutes
Availability: Just aired on TCM, previously quite rare. Poor quality copies on ioffer.com. 
Grade: B, historically significant. 

Personal Affair (1953)

Ah … scandal, that old time religion of the classic melodrama. The driving force behind so many of the silver screen’s great and not-so-great films, scandal is, almost undoubtedly, the most significant narrative theme abandoned by contemporary filmmakers. Yet scandal enjoyed its heyday in the 1950s, and it’s the driving force behind the 1953 British film Personal Affair.

Leo Genn stars as Mr. Barlow, a Latin teacher in an “experimental” (co-ed) British seconday school. He has a beautiful — but jealous — American wife, Kay (Gene Tierney), who can’t seen to adjust to English society and consequently wastes her days imagining all the ways in which her good looking and popular husband might be untrue. When he invites shy Barbara (Glynis Johns) to his home for extra tutoring, Kay recognizes what her husband doesn’t — that the young woman is carrying a torch for her teacher. In a fit of jealousy Kay accuses the confused young girl of making a play, and Barbara flees. When Mr. Barlow learns of this, he arranges to meet Barbara later in hopes of making things right. When Barbara fails to return home that night, or the following day, the small town becomes a hive of gossip, innuendo, and yes — scandal.

The movie offers a different, yet equally fascinating exploration of the same themes and academic setting of The Children’s Hour (and the equally wonderful earlier version, These Three); though Personal Affair explores the husband-wife relationship and exists almost entirely with the spaces of domesticity. There are moments where Barbara’s school friends spread rumors, and even go to the police, but it only serves to develop the theme of rampant gossip — and everyone in the town chips in. A woman’s picture from top to bottom, the film is nevertheless unkind to its female characters, possibly with the exception of Barbara. Gene Tierney is quite good as the disturbed wife whose emotions run the gamut from jealousy to fear to rage. Only Tierney, however unfortunately, could have played the part so well.

Personal Affair is a thoughtful drama, though it may be marred by an ending that cops out to the positive — somewhat surprising considering it isn’t a Hollywood production.

Personal Affair (1953)

Grade B+

Directed by Anthony Pellisier

Starring Gene Tierney, Leo Genn, Glynis Johns

Released by Two Cities Films

Running time: 82 minutes

Availabilty: VHS, has aired on TCM.

Our Very Own (1950)

It has been famously said that the basis for all Hollywood pictures is melodrama. While this is certainly true — after all, melodrama in general is characterized by the emotional crisis of the main character — one of the challenges of the filmmaker is the extent to which the subject matter is allowed to become … overtly melodramatic. As a viewer I always am struck by movies in which the authors recognize the inherent dramatic potential of the subject matter and then move forward with restraint. This approach often results in films described as small, quiet … and powerful. One such picture is 1950's Our Very Own, a domestic drama infused with a little comedy and healthy dose of Americana. It tells the story of a popular girl who discovers, in the days leading up to her high school graduation, that she was adopted. The film explores the repercussions of this discovery within an idealized nuclear American family.

The girl is played by Anne Blyth, who proves to be a better actress than I had previously given her credit for. She's an absolute knockout, but her performance in this film is one that comes across with great subtlety, despite the heavy studio trappings. Blyth is matched by mom Jane Wyatt in a big role (this is a mother / daughter picture), as well as a universally strong cast that includes beau Farley Granger, dad Donald Cook, and sisters Joan Evans and Natalie Wood. All of the performers are strong, but Ann Dvorak absolutely steals the show as Blyth's “real” mother.

In 1950 the term birth mother had not yet entered the vernacular, so the awkward and mildly insulting term real is used in its place. I actually thought the term was worked into the script as a set-up — meaning that after repeatedly hearing Blyth refer to Dvorak as her real mother there would be a moment of payoff when Blyth recognizes Wyatt as the only true mom she's ever had. Being that the term real is in fact utilized as the functional term of the era, the payoff never materializes, though the film's ending certainly delivers the goods.

The strength of the film lies in its script, which places real emotion and small moments over that most common of mid-century dramatic stand-bys: scandal. Time and again throughout, the characters react believably to all of the film's potentially melodramatic moments — saying as much with quiet facial expressions and body language as with words. Furthermore, and much to my surprise, everyone around this popular girl takes the news of her adoption in stride. She's not heckled at school or whispered about as she walks down the street. Blyth's Gail gets all the support and understanding that anyone could hope for. The main thrust of the drama is in Gail's disillusionment with her place in this carefully constructed family, and how in the wake of this emotional slap in the face she has to recapture her seemingly lost identity and consequently, her place in the world. This is an authentic and knowing film.

There a few moments worth sitting up for in Our Very Own, both narrative and filmic. In one scene Gail stays out all night, despondent after learning of her adoption. When she arrives home, on the bad side of three in the morning, she says the wrong thing to her worried father, who responds with one of the most surprising, yet appropriate, slaps in film history. The scene is so raw that I suspect even Blyth didn't know what hit her. Another great sequence depicts Gail's first meeting with Dvorak. It's a rather involved series of cuts, but suffice it to say that I viewed the scene multiple times — for acting, cutting, and music. Themes of disillusionment, cynicism, heartbreak, and regret collide as these two women encounter each other for the first, make that the second, time in their lives.

Circling back around to the notion of melodrama, the climactic scene in Our Very Own plays almost entirely without music. Considering the etymology of the word melodrama: melos (music) and drama — it's impressive to see fifties studio filmmakers recognize that the movie's most emotional scene was strong enough to unfold in near-silence. Yet another moment of calculated restraint in marvelously subdued picture.

Our Very Own (1950)

Grade: B

Directed by David Miller

Starring Ann Blyth, Jane Wyatt, Natalie Wood, Farley Granger

Released by RKO Pictures

Running time: 93 minutes

Availability: VHS, airs on TCM.

Oscar and Lucinda (1997)

Certainly one of the more original films I’ve viewed in some time, Gillian Armstrong’s 1997 film Oscar and Lucinda tells the story of two lost souls who find each other through a shared obsession with gambling. Although in the decade-plus since this was released, gambling, specifically poker, has enjoyed a colossal resurgence in popular culture, this film is highly character driven and gambling plays no role beyond establishing character distinctions. Besides, this is particularly unusual in that it’s a period piece—taking place in mid-nineteenth-century England and Australia.

Although one could argue that at the time of this writing Oscar winner Cate Blanchett’s star is brighter than that of Ralph Fiennes, that certainly wasn’t the case in 1997 when Oscar and Lucinda was in theaters. The pair shared a similar amount of feature film experience and years in front of the camera, but by 1997 Fiennes had already headlined two Best Picture winners (Schindler's List and The English Patient) and had achieved household name status in the United States via other Hollywood films such as Quiz Show and Strange Days. Blanchett was an unknown at the time, with her breakout performance in Elizabeth a year away. Consequently, and in spite of the pair of first names in the title, this treatment of Peter Carey’s novel focuses on Fienne’s character Oscar, with Blanchett’s Lucinda in a featured supporting role. In a nutshell, the movie concentrates much more of its running time on what Oscar does and thinks and shares much less about Lucinda, beyond how her actions serve to inspire Oscar’s.

I began with the originality of the film and it’s worth discussing. Although this is a character study the circumstances of the plot are quite novel and do much to keep moving forward. I want to be careful to not give anything away, because even though gambling is a significant element of the narrative, one wager in particular defines the second half of the movie and it shouldn’t be spoiled. Suffice it to say that the movie goes places (as literary adaptations often do) that are atypical of Hollywood narratives—and then some. It’s occasionally tender, often unsettling, and in at least one instance abhorrent—all played out within constructs of love: platonic, religious, and obsessive.

Perhaps what’s most astonishing about Oscar and Lucinda is that all of its drama is brought to life through Fienne’s performance, which may be his best—he’s sublime in a role so difficult most actors wouldn’t go near it. Oscar and Lucinda was released with the Academy Awards in mind: it hit theaters on December 31, 1997, the last day of eligibility. This was the year defined by the competition between Titanic, As Good as it Gets, and L.A. Confidential, with the comedy film The Full Monty also garnering a Best Picture nomination. I certainly would have argued for this instead. Yet in spite of broad critical acclaim this garnered only a single nomination in the Best Costume category. Get your hands on a copy and decide for yourself.

Oscar and Lucinda (1997)

Grade: B+

Directed by Gillian Armstrong

Starring Ralph Fiennes and Cate Blanchett

Released by Fox Searchlight

Running time: 132 minutes

Availability: DVD, Netflix, Fox Movie Channel