Review: "Johnny Belinda" is a Powerful Drama (Remembering Jane Wyman)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 236 (of 2006) by Leroy Douresseaux

Johnny Belinda (1948) – B&W
Running time: 102 minutes (1 hour, 42 minutes)
DIRECTOR: Jean Negulesco
WRITERS: Allan Vincent and Irmgard von Cube (based upon the play by Elmer Harris)
PRODUCER: Jerry Wald
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Ted McCord
EDITOR: David Weisbart
COMPOSER: Max Steiner
Academy Award winner

DRAMA

Starring: Jane Wyman, Lew Ayres, Charles Bickford, Agnes Moorhead, Stephen McNally, Jan Sterling, Dan Seymour, and Alan Napier

The subject of this review is Johnny Belinda, a 1948 American drama that earned a best picture Oscar nomination. The film is based on a play of the same name by Elmer Harris, and the play is based on a real-life incident that occurred in the area of Harris’ summer residence. The film focuses on a deaf young woman and the doctor who befriends and teaches her.

Cape Breton is a small island on the northeast corner of Nova Scotia, and the kindly Robert Richardson (Lew Ayres) is the new doctor in a small fishing village on the island. Dr. Richardson takes a professional interest in Belinda MacDonald (Jane Wyman), a deaf mute, whom most everyone calls “Dummy.” Using his past experience and some medical text, Dr. Richardson teaches Belinda to communicate through sign language and by reading people’s lips.

A whole new world unfolds before Belinda, and she even surprises her doubting father, Black MacDonald (Charles Bickford), who more or less uses his daughter as a common laborer, and her aunt, Aggie MacDonald (Agnes Moorhead). Things turn ugly, however, when the town bully, Laughlin “Locky” McCormick (Stephen McNally), rapes Belinda, and she ends up pregnant – turning the town against her, her family, and her dear friend Dr. Richardson, whom the town mistakenly believes to be the baby daddy.

Jane Wyman earned the “Best Actress” Oscar for her turn in Johnny Belinda as a young deaf woman who finds herself awakening to the world, both its best and worst, when she learns to communicate. It’s actually an amazing performance when considering how quiet and undemonstrative the character is, and Wyman captures it with equally soft grace. Hers, however, isn’t the only good performance. Lew Ayres is steadfast as Dr. Richardson, so convincing that Dr. Richardson seems to be a real person who somehow stepped into the film’s fictional setting. Charles Bickford as Belinda’s father and Agnes Moorhead as her aunt provide a solid counterbalance to the influence of Dr. Richardson in Belinda’s life.

Perhaps because director Jean Negulesco allows this quartet of brawny performances to breath and develop without melodrama, Johnny Belinda is a solid weepy, the kind of tear-jerker that doesn’t jerk tears out of the audience so much as it touches them in a profound way. Negulesco finds room in the script for the rest of the cast who aren’t so much characters as they are the backdrop to this little drama. The denizens of Cape Breton are insular, conservative, and oh-so set in their ways, and it’s a nifty move of directing that allows these people and the way they live to enhance the drama. Negulesco uses these obstacles and adversaries our protagonists face to make Belinda’s ultimate victory even sweeter.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1949 Academy Awards: 1 win: “Best Actress in a Leading Role” (Jane Wyman); 11 nominations: “Best Picture” (Warner Bros.), “Best Actor in a Leading Role” (Lew Ayres), “Best Actor in a Supporting Role” (Charles Bickford), “Best Actress in a Supporting Role” (Agnes Moorehead), “Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White” (Robert M. Haas and William Wallace), “Best Cinematography, Black-and-White” (Ted D. McCord), “Best Director” (Jean Negulesco), “Best Film Editing” (David Weisbart), “Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture” (Max Steiner), “Best Sound, Recording” ((Warner Bros. Sound Dept.), and “Best Writing, Screenplay” (Irma von Cube and Allen Vincent)

1949 Golden Globes, USA: 2 wins: “Best Motion Picture – Drama (shared with The Treasure of the Sierra Madre-1948) and “Best Motion Picture Actress” (Jane Wyman)

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

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Review: "Red River" is a Classic Western (Happy B'day, Duke)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 36 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux

Red River (1948)
Running time: 133 minutes (2 hours, 13 minutes)
DIRECTORS: Howard Hawks with Arthur Rosson
WRITERS: Charles Schnee and Borden Chase (from a story by Borden Chase)
PRODUCER: Howard Hawks
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Russell Harlan
EDITOR: Christian Nyby
Academy Award nominee

WESTERN with elements of action, adventure, romance

Starring: John Wayne, Montgomery Clift, Joanne Dru, Walter Brennan, Coleen Gray, Harry Carey, Sr., John Ireland, Noah Beery, Jr., and Harry Carey, Jr.

Thomas Dunson (John Wayne) is a powerful cattle baron who is on the precipice of bankruptcy, when he decided to take his nearly 10,000 head of cattle to Missouri for sale. However, Dunson chooses a trail to Missouri that is fraught with peril, and along the journey he begins to take out his frustrations on his men. Midway through the trip, Dunson’s foster son Matthew “Matt” Garth (Montgomery Clift) overthrows Dunson and takes the cattle along the Chisholm Trail to Kansas. As Garth and the men approach their destination, Dunson is hot on their trail and hungry for revenge.

Many film historians, critics, and fans consider Red River to be one of the greatest western films of all time, and it is indeed a rousing adventure filled with wonderful characters and engaging drama. I found a lot of the interplay between the characters quite exciting, and some of their disputes were stimulating. I felt like I was in the film, right in the middle of one of many fights.

In addition to the strong story and script, viewers will love the characters. The story is intense and certainly holds the attention, but the characters really sell it. The John Wayne of Red River is the classic American icon – a stoic, no-nonsense, Alpha male who gives commands and demands no questions. However, he is not without a sentimental side; his pride may be overwhelming, but his decency does show through his stubbornness.

Montgomery Clift was only supposed to be the film’s looker and matinee idol that gets the girl, but he also gives a performance that gives more depth to the character than even the story allowed. Perennial movie sidekick Walter Brennan is not only the film’s comic relief, but his Nadine Groot is essentially a moral compass. A frustrating fault of the film is John Ireland who plays the intriguing character Cherry Valance; Valance is a very good character that Ford chose to under-utilized. All said, fans of westerns should not miss this film, a great western and one of the best John Wayne movies.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1949 Academy Awards: 2 nominations: “Best Film Editing” (Christian Nyby) and “Best Writing, Motion Picture Story” (Borden Chase)

1990 National Film Preservation Board, USA – National Film Registry

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Review: "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein" is Still Fun

 

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 217 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

Bud Abbott & Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948) Black and White
Running time: 83 minutes
DIRECTOR: Charles T. Barton
WRITERS: Robert Lees, Frederic I. Rinaldo, and John Grant
PRODUCER: Robert Arthur
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Charles Van Enger
EDITOR: Frank Gross

COMEDY/HORROR

Starring: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Lon Chaney, Jr., Bela Lugosi, Glenn Strange, Lenore Aubert, Jane Randolph, Frank Ferguson, and Charles Bradstreet with (uncredited voice) Vincent Price

Bud Abbot and Lou Costello are hapless railroad baggage clerks Chick Young (Abbott) and Wilbur Grey (Costello). They receive a strange shipment meant for a local attraction called the House of Horrors, two crates allegedly supposedly containing the last remains of Dracula (Bela Lugosi) and Frankenstein’s monster (Glenn Strange). However, the infamous creatures are very much alive, and they leave their crates and slip quietly away to a secret island hideaway. Meanwhile, the House of Horrors owner, Mr. McDougal (Frank Ferguson), blames Chick and Wilbur for the disappearance of the crates’ contents, so the duo follows Dracula and the monster’s trail to the secret hideaway island. They discover that Dracula has also joined forces with a mad scientist, Dr. Sondra Mornay (Lenore Aubert), who is determined to transplant Costello’s brain into monster. The problem is that Mornay had been pretending to be in love with Wilbur.

In the intervening time, a strange man named Lawrence “Larry” Talbot (Lon Chaney, Jr.) showed up looking for the crates. Larry Talbot is really the Wolfman, and he joins Chick and Wilbur’s search for Dracula, Dr. Mornay, and Frankenstein’s monster, all the while fighting his transformations into the Wolfman every time the full moon appears (coincidentally several times in this film). Can Chick, Wilbur, and the Wolfman stop Dracula and the scientist before they remove Costello’s brain?

Many people consider Bud Abbott & Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein (also well known as Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein) to be the comedy team’s best film outing. The film was a huge hit when it opened in 1948, and it has retained an international cult following. The other thing that the film has going for it is that frequent Abbott & Costello helmsman Charles Barton directed it.

Besides the presence of Barton and one of the 20th century’s finest comedic duos of the stage, film, and television, the other element makes the film a favorite is the fact that the film monsters, Dracula, Frankenstein’s monster, and the Wolfman, are played straight, and the actors: Bela Lugosi as Dracula, Glenn Strange as the monster, and Lon Chaney, Jr. as the Wolfman give inspired performances. They obviously take their roles and performances damn seriously, and it shows. The three classic creatures of Universal Studios’ film line, Universal Horror, are in top form and are as menacing as they ever were in straight horror films.

The blend of Abbott & Costello’s timeless comedy and the Universal Monsters horror creates a peculiar film. The union does show its seams; the flick is more odd than very good. The black and white photography gives it a gentle supernatural aura and lightly spooky atmosphere. Still, that only makes Abbott & Costello Meets Frankenstein unique, which might be the reason it has never grown old or less funny.

6 of 10
B

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