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A cannon rests on the lawn as a reminder of the war, business is the preferred combat in the Deep South ca. 1900. "Sometimes it's difficult to learn new ways." Lillian Hellman's predatory menagerie, not foxes with Biblical roots but "high-toned" jackals and vultures under a deep-focus microscope. Owning the town is not enough for aristocratic siblings (Charles Dingle and Carl Benton Reid), riches from a potential cotton mill depend on the feeble-hearted stockholder (Herbert Marshall) married to the formidable sister (Bette Davis), a family affair. The nephew (Dan Duryea) has his hand in the safe deposit box, the aunt (Patricia Collinge) can voice her misery only after a drink or two. The heiress (Teresa Wright) is the tenuous hope for escape, aided by her progressive journalist beau (Richard Carlson). "That's cynical. But cynicism is an unpleasant way of telling the truth." William Wyler gilds this ingrown coven, his technique (with Gregg Toland fresh off Citizen Kane) is at its most baroque. Composed in depth as well as verticality, the visual embroidery gives rot a burnish—gleaming candelabras and ornate wallpaper add to the pointillistic detail at the dining room, further amplified by a vast mirror. "A fine little scandal" laid out in implacable long takes, to the delight of Bazin and the jealousy of Mizoguchi. (Davis on the couch while Marshall crawls up the staircase is the locus classicus, before that there's a three-way conversation that continues unabated after Duryea gets a cigar smacked out of his mouth.) "Maybe it's easy for the dying to be honest." Corseted, blanched, her disdain concentrated like a laser beam, the doyenne contemplates her empty nest with the cold comfort of her brother's words: "We'll own this country someday." With Jessica Grayson, John Marriott, Russell Hicks, Virginia Brissac, Lucien Littlefield, and Charles R. Moore. In black and white.
--- Fernando F. Croce |