NFR Project: 'Cinderella' (1950)

 

NFR Project: “Cinderella”

Dir: Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske, Clyde Geronimi

Scr: William Peet, Ted Sears, Homer Brightman, Kenneth Anderson, Erdman Penner, Winston Hibler, Harry Reeves, Joe Rinaldi

Ed: Donald Halliday

Premiere: March 4, 1950

76 min.

As you may know from reading me, I hate Disney films. This is all due to me being traumatized at a young age by the likes of Bambi and Pinocchio (and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and Sleeping Beauty and on and on . . . ). Their nightmare-inducing fare was not for me.

That being said, Cinderella is one of their least offensive movies, primarily because nothing horribly villainous happens to the protagonist. We are given a straight-up transcription, by and large, of the original fairy tale. Cinderella is the poor put-upon young lady who’s dominated by her wicked stepmother (not too scary) and her mean old stepsisters.

She has a fairy godmother who grants her wish to go to the ball, and her clothes are magically transformed. She and her handsome prince fall in love – but then she must flee by midnight, when the spell is broken. Only one glass slipper remains.

The prince then sends out a comic-opera duke to fit all the maidens in the kingdom with the slipper, in order to find his beloved. Cinderella, almost thwarted, reveals that she possesses the other slipper. And they live happily ever after.

Unfortunately, there is much comic byplay here with the birds and the mice, who are Cinderella’s allies. This helps to move the plot forward, but it is not actually funny, so the effort on them seems wasted. The songs are OK. Lovers of voice actors will note that Verna Felton, Candy Candido, and June Foray lend their skills to the production.

There is a kind of plastic-y sheen to a Disney film that makes me resist it. It is polished, airtight, precocious, condescending, a perfectly machined mechanism to provide family entertainment. It is, at its base, soulless and manipulative. The studio made tons of money from it, and it remains a significant component of Disney’s intellectual property.

The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: All About Eve.

NFR Project: 'Outrage' (1950)

 

NFR Project: “Outrage”

Dir: Ida Lupino

Scr: Ida Lupino, Malvin Wald, Collier Young

Pho: Louis Clyde Stoumen, Archie Stout

Ed: Harvey Manger

Premiere: Oct. 14, 1950

75 min.

Ida Lupino (1918-1995) was a force of nature. She was a member of a long-lived, illustrious English theatrical family, and went to Hollywood as an early age to work as an actress. She quickly found success in films such as The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939), They Drive by Night (1940), and High Sierra (1941).

However, she wanted to do more. Learning about the job of directing as she continued to perform onscreen, she formed her own independent production company and began writing, producing, and directing low-budget films that focused on female protagonists dealing with contemporary problems. Her company, The Filmmakers Inc., created 12 films beginning in 1948. She directed six of them.

Outrage deals with rape and its consequences. Previously the subject had been tackled in mainstream American film only by Johnny Belinda (1948). Outrage starred Mala Powers, who had just been seen in Cyrano de Bergerac. In it, she plays Ann Walton, a young bookkeeper with plans for the future with her fiancé Jim.

She walks home alone one night. In a sequence shot in Expressionist style, she is stalked by a rapist, moving further and further into a nightmarish landscape of urban decay. Eventually, the man catches up to her and violates her (offscreen).

Her family, the police, and Jim all try to be supportive of her, but she feels guilty, that somehow she was responsible for her victimization. Paranoid, she thinks that everyone is staring at her and making comments about her. Lupino’s expert direction makes her impressions ambiguous – is she really an object of scorn, or is she just imagining it?

She abruptly leaves town on a bus, fleeing to Los Angeles to start a new life, she hopes. At a rest stop, she hears a radio report that everyone is looking for her. She leaves the bus, starts walking, and sprains her ankle. Lying pprone by the side of the road, she is picked up by a sympathetic and handsome minister, Bruce, who takes her to a nearby farm where she can find lodging and a job.

She changes her name and recovers slowly. Then, she attends a country dance where she is glommed onto by a horny male. He pushes her around, pins her down, tries to force himself on her. She nails him in the head with a handy pipe wrench.

She is put on trial. Bruce finds out about her earlier rape, and convinces the judge to commute her sentence. She spends a year under psychiatric supervision instead.

Ann is strongly attracted to Bruce, but he encourages her to return to her home and to Jim. She eventually agrees and leaves Bruce to his own musings.

The movie is as realistic as the censorial strictures of the time allow. The movie respects Ann and doesn’t trivialize her trauma. We see her go through a rocky process of healing, into a new and integrated sense of self. This kind of awareness was sorely lacking in films of the period. Lupino pushed for real-life stories about people with real-life problems, complex psyches, and ambiguous outcomes.

Lupino’s reputation has grown over the past few decades, and today she is seen as an essential proto-feminist filmmaker.

The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: Cinderella.

NFR Project: 'Cyrano de Bergerac' (1950)

 

NFR Project: “Cyrano de Bergerac”

Dir: Michael Gordon

Scr: Carl Foreman, Brian Hooker

Pho: Franz Planer

Ed: Harry W. Gerstad

Premiere: Nov. 16, 1950

113 min.

This immortal story is largely fiction, but it has its roots in reality. Cyrano de Bergerac (1619-1655) was a real person – a writer, poet, playwright, and soldier of France. He was witty and daring. He created science fiction long before anyone else ventured into it. His brief life was studded with achievements. And, yes, he had an unnaturally large nose.

French playwright Edmond Rostand created the legendary figure of Cyrano de Bergerac in his dramatic work of the same name in 1897. He extrapolated the facts of Cyrano’s life and built what he termed an “heroic comedy” out of them. His play, wildly successful, received an extraordinary English translation by Brian Hooker, which proved to be a starring vehicle for the American actor Walter Hampden.

A revival of the play in 1947 led to a Tony win for Best Actor for Jose Ferrer. It was deemed worthwhile to capture his performance on film. This performance led to Ferrer winning an Oscar for Best Actor for the role in 1950. It was well-deserved.

In the play, Cyrano is highly regarded as a duelist and writer, someone not to be trifled with. He is proudly independent, consistently making powerful enemies that attempt to thwart him. He routinely wipes the floor with detractors who make fun of his nose, skewering them with his sword.

He has one weakness – he is madly and secretly in love with his cousin Roxanne, who sees him only as a brotherly figure. He fears that she will despise him due to his grotesque appearance. She confides to him that she is in love – he thinks excitedly at first it is with himself, but then sadly realizes that the object of her affection is a young and handsome new recruit to his fighting unit, Christian. Cyrano befriends Christian, and tells him of Roxanne’s attraction to him.

However, Christian is in despair. He has no gift for words, and Roxanne demands poetic love-talk from him. Cyrano hits upon a plan. He will write love letters to Roxanne and attribute them to Christian, so that the young cadet can win her love. In this way, Cyrano can unburden his heart to her in disguise.

In the famous nighttime balcony scene, Cyrano feeds Christian romantic lines to recite to Roxanne as she stands above him in the darkness. Christian is too hesitant, so Cyrano thrusts him aside and delivers a heartfelt romantic speech to her, which wins her heart – for Christian. The two are married, but their honeymoon is thwarted by the antagonistic Comte de Guiche, who orders Christian and Cyrano off to war.

Later, in the trenches, Cyrano writes and mails letters in Christian’s name to Roxanne, even when surrounded by enemy Spanish troops. Roxanne makes it through the lines with supplies for the cadets, and finally sees Christian again. She tells him of her delight at receiving love letters from him daily – and Christian realizes Cyrano loves her as well. Roxanne declares that she loves him for his soul, and would love him even if he were ugly.

Christian confronts Cyrano, and declares that Cyrano must reveal his love for her – that she must choose between them. This Cyrano is about to do when Christian is fatally wounded. Before dying, Cyrano lies to him, saying that Roxanne has chosen him. As Roxanne mourns, “My love weeps for me, and does not know!” Cyrano exclaims.

We move forward several years. Roxanne is now ensconced in a convent. Cyrano, as her old friend, visits her weekly, bringing with him amusing bits of court gossip. However, on this day, he has been attacked by his enemies and is fatally wounded. Hiding the bandages around his head, he goes to see her, though it means his death. The truth is finally revealed, and Roxanne declares her love for him. But it is too late. Sword in hand, Cyrano defies death and proclaims his triumph over it in the form of his panache, his vibrant spirit, his “white plume.” And he dies.

Ferrer’s performance is extraordinary. He is alert, intelligent, intense, not letting his cumbersome nose prevent him from fleshing out his heroic character. Whether he is dueling and rhyming simultaneously, or pretending to be a lunar traveler, his hearty spirit dominates the proceedings. The film follows the play faithfully, with minimal cuts to the original script. The settings and costumes are lavish, and the ensemble of actors is ideal.

Rostand’s Cyrano is the Cyrano we know today. Rarely has a fictional elaboration so completely eclipsed an actual historical figure.

The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: Ida Lupino’s Outrage.