|
The main forerunner is Kings Row, and Cocteau films Les Parents Terribles the following year. "What are you doing so close to civilization?" The young and the inquisitive urge, "a healthy lot," opposite them the adult world with its shadowy secrets. The isolated farmer (Edward G. Robinson) drags heavy memories along with a wooden leg, his sister (Judith Anderson) blurs the line between protecting and enabling, the adopted daughter (Allene Roberts) is his unsavory pride and joy. The questioning high-schooler (Lon McCallister) becomes their handyman, the forest beckons the lad with shuddering trees and Miklós Rózsa quivers. "You defy the woods, and you will hurt." Quite a curious rural Gothic, a mood piece modulated by Delmer Daves from the placid to the operatic. The titular abode lies dilapidated beyond the quarry, when near it the heroine is seized by a tinge of déjà vu, the camera isolates Roberts in a memorably sustained close-up. "What are we going to do with it when we find it?" "Bust it open, I guess, and let some light in." The boy has a clinging babe with big dreams (Julie London), she's easily scooped up by the shady beefcake with erect shotgun in hand (Rory Calhoun). The farmer meanwhile replays the old offense in his mind and his sister clutches at her sleeve to conceal the bleeding hand, candle light passes over Robinson's wide-eyed visage as madness accelerates. Adolescent sleuthing gets to the bottom of things, where quicksand engulfs the past at last. "Looking forward is much better than looking back." Daves wraps noir nerves in Technicolor gloss twelve years later, and suddenly A Summer Place makes sense. With Ona Munson, Harry Shannon, and Arthur Space. In black and white.
--- Fernando F. Croce |