Claudette Goes Mad

As Ellen Ewing (Claudette Colbert) is about to take her wedding vows to David McLean (Robert Ryan), a stranger accuses her of already being married to another man, Lucian Randall (Dave Barbour), a charge which Ellen denies.  Ellen and David attempt to disprove the charges, but a succession of people claim to have been a part of the so-called wedding.  Our film this time is The Secret Fury (1950).

This is a fun film, primarily because of the performances of Ms. Colbert and Mr. Ryan.  Though the script has more holes in it than a piece of Swiss cheese, it does have a decent mystery story, and you will be hard pressed to identify the villain until the very end.  Regardless, it is a lesser work of Ms. Colbert.

Despite that, she is very good as a woman being driven slowly mad for no apparent reason.  A gifted pianist, with a substantial inheritance from her father, Ellen seems rock solid. However, as more and more strangers contradict her beliefs, her mind deteriorates and she ends up institutionalized, giving Ms. Colbert the opportunity to play a character who has completely lost her place in the world. Ms. Colbert was interested in the part because Mel Ferrer was directing (TCM article).

One of the major attractions of this film is Robert Ryan, who gets to play a good guy.  David never loses faith in Ellen, despite the evidence piling up against her. He keeps digging to get at the truth. Mr. Ryan makes David a warm and engaging character. He's funny, he's loyal, and he is clearly in love with Ellen.

Also in the cast is Jane Cowl as Ellen's Aunt Clara. We're never quite sure of Aunt Clara. Like many of the other characters, she suspects that Ellen is either lying or has gone insane. Ms. Cowl manages to keep Aunt Clara ambiguous.  Likewise, Paul Kelly as DA Eric Lowell also questions Ellen's mental status and becomes suspect to the audience.  This, of course, keeps the audience guessing through the whole film. 

This was the film debuts for both Philip Ober (playing Ellen's lawyer Gregory Kent) and his then-wife Vivian Vance (playing Leah, the hotel maid) (AFI Catalog). Ms. Vance is quite interesting as the cagey maid.  The marriage to Mr. Ober would end nine years later; Ms. Vance would go on to play Ethel Mertz in I Love Lucy. One more actor to watch out for is Jose Ferrer in a cameo appearance.

As I've mentioned before, I'm always on the lookout for women playing physicians in films. We have one here - Elisabeth Risdon as Dr. Twining, Ellen's psychiatrist.  Dr. Twining is a competent physician and a kind person. As is often the case in these films, there is no questioning by the patient or their family of the presence of a female physician.

Bosley Crowther was unimpressed with the film in his New York Times review, puzzling as to why "a respectable cast...descends to such cheap and lurid twaddle."  While we would not quite call the film twaddle, we should note that it doesn't seem to be particularly film noir (it was advertised as such on the film channel), and the script IS inferior to the talents of the cast.  But we do recommend it to see Mr. Ryan and Ms. Colbert together.  We'll leave you with a scene from the film:

Charles Painted

Coast Guard officer Scott Burnett (Robert Ryan) can't shake the trauma of a shipwreck. He resists becoming involved with Eve Geddes (Nan Leslie), a local woman who loves him, and spends much of his free time riding his horse on the shore.  But when he happens upon Peggy Butler, The Woman on the Beach (1947),  he is captivated.  Peggy, however, is married to Tod Butler (Charles Bickford), a renowned painter who has completely lost his sight.

This film showed such promise - a great cast and what could have been an intriguing story. Sadly, it's not. The characters are undefined, the plot is haphazard, and the actors are given precious little with which to work  

Let's start with Robert Ryan.  The film opens with the reveal that Burnett is badly affected by post-traumatic stress.  He has a woman who loves him and who he claims to love. But one look at Peggy Butler, and Burnett is obsessed.  Does it have to do with his illness? It's hard to say - Joan Bennett is at her alluring best in this film; at the same time, Peggy is not particularly pleasant, and as we quickly discover, has a proclivity for taking strange men into her bed. It's pretty clear from even their first meeting that she's not a particularly nice person.  

It might have worked had there been any chemistry between Ms. Bennett and Mr. Ryan, but there isn't - he's stiff - even his "lovemaking" is uninterested.  Would the film have been better with the original actor slated for the role - George Brent (TCM article)?  It's hard to say.

The other side of the triangle is Charles Bickford as the blind painter.  Tod Butler is a nasty piece of work - his wife was the cause of the accident that blinded him, and he is making sure she pays for her sins. It's hard for the audience to sympathize with him - he's a brutal bully. And you should have some pity for this man who lost his livelihood and much of his identity because of his drunken carousing. But he (along with Scott) spend so much time brooding, you just don't really care.

Ms. Bennett was very involved with the project - it was she who recruited Jean Renoir as the director (Val Lewton was originally slated to direct). She and Mr. Renoir were friendly - that she could easily converse in French added a level of comfort to their relationship. But, bad previews led to rewrites and reshoots to the point where the film was probably lost in the shuffle.

There are a couple of other actors worth mentioning. Nan Leslie as Eve is a totally useless character. She's a cypher, and adds nothing to the story. We don't know very much about her, she's not really appealing, and so we don't really want her to be with Scott.  Irene Ryan (Mrs. Wernecke) is supposed to provide some comic relief, but as good an actress as she is, there just isn't any humor in her part. 

Based on the novel None So Blind by Mitchell Wilson, the movie was filmed with the working titles of None So Blind and Desirable Woman (AFI catalog). The New York Times review by A, H. Weiler (A.W.) wanted to like the film, but felt it needed "a mite more clarity."

We can't recommend this film at all, but we'll still leave you with a clip from the film's opening:

Barbara STILL Hates Housework

The fishing town of Monterey, California is the setting of Clash by Night (1952), a film noir that features Barbara Stanwyck as Mae Doyle.  Mae's been living in New York, the mistress of a wealthy married man.  Though they were deeply in love, he was unable to divorce, and when he died, the small settlement he left her was taken back by her lover's family.  Broke and depressed, May returns to her childhood home, now occupied by her brother Joe (Keith Andes).  Mae's beauty and strength of character attracts a gentle fisherman Jerry D'Amato (Paul Douglas), as well as his friend, the cynical and callous Earl Pfeiffer (Robert Ryan).  Though frightened of marriage, Mae decides that Jerry might be her salvation, even though she is dangerously attracted to Earl.

Clash by Night  is very intense film, and as such, it is hard to actually LIKE it.  We have characters we can understand, but many of whom are terribly hard to admire.  Stanwyck's Mae Doyle is at the top of the list.  She was born in Monterey, but left because she hated it there.  Now she's back, but she still hates the place.  Why does she return? Wasn't there somewhere else she could go? And strong as she is, was it so impossible to stick it out in New York City, where it seemed she was happy?  Stanwyck, in a sense, creates a character that is a cypher.  We never really know Mae, a woman who wants to be happy, but can't seem to find real contentment.  Her marriage to Jerry seems an act of desperation. And though she loves her child, her sorrow and pain after her daughter's birth hint at the least of post-partum depression - or perhaps we are just looking for an excuse for her misery.

Jerry, as played by Paul Douglas is a sympathetic character, but also a weak, and sometimes pathetic, man.  His love for Mae is genuine.  He is a good and loving father to their daughter, Gloria, but he is manipulated by everyone. Earl, who is supposedly his friend, ridicules him.  His Uncle  Vince (J. Carrol Naish) uses him as a source of money, and as a tool for vengeance on Mae (Uncle Vince's predilection for pornographic poster art, and his constant "requests" for money put Mae in the position of asking her husband to get Vince out of the house.  You can't blame her for that). And Mae, who cares for him but has no love for him, consents to marry him - with his knowledge that there is no love - in order to have a caretaker and provider.  So, while you feel for Jerry, it's difficult to like him, he is such a patsy. 

Robert Ryan, who played the part of Joe (Mae's brother) in the original Broadway cast of the play, was the only cast member to appear in the movie (the play featured Tallulah Bankhead as Mae and Lee J. Cobb as Jerry).  Ryan, as Earl, gives us a portrait of a man who is a lost soul.  Too intelligent for his job as a movie projectionist but too unambitious to do anything else,  Earl spends his life drinking too much and ridiculing everyone and everything around him.  Mae, who is initially repulsed by Earl's negativity, finally responds both to his sexuality and to his intellect.  But in the final analysis, Earl is not someone who can even take care of himself, much less a wife and child.  Should Mae leave with him, we wondered how long it would be before he abandoned her and the child for which he has no regard or affection.

Perhaps the most attractive characters in the story are Joe and Peggy (Marilyn Monroe).  Peggy deeply loves Joe - and he loves her - but she is no victim.  Their love ultimately is one of equals, and will succeed because of their commitment to one another.  Ms. Monroe was really breaking through in this small, but pivotal role.  And while her relationship with Stanwyck was cordial, the seeds of her later problems had already begun.  According to this TCM article, director Fritz Lang was frustrated by her lateness and inability to remember her lines.  Stanwyck, however, never lost her cool, and would do repeated takes when Monroe forgot her lines.  Ultimately, Stanwyck would comment, after Monroe's death that Monroe "drove Bob Ryan, Paul Douglas, and myself out of our minds."  However, "she didn't do it viciously, and there was a sort of magic about her which we all recognized at once."

The film, not surprisingly, changed a great deal of the play (by Clifford Odets).  The setting is changed from Depression-era Staten Island, New York (which, of course, makes Mae's return far less drastic).  And the endings of the play and film are far different (no spoilers, should you want more information take a look at this article in the AFI Catalog).  Joan Crawford, Jeff Chandler, and Mala Powers were considered at one point for the parts of Mae, Earl and Peggy, all interesting choices.  Regardless, without Stanwyck's powerful and layered performance, this film would likely have fallen apart (this New York  Times review comments on the strength of the performances in a film that they don't necessarily think holds together).

As we've said before, any Stanwyck movie is worth a look, and this certainly is, not only for her, but also for strong performances from Robert Ryan and Paul Douglas.  And the opportunity to see Marilyn Monroe before she became a love goddess is a treat.  We will leave you with this clip from the film, in which Mae returns to her brother's home, and meets the woman he wants to marry.