Both Clint and Don were drawn to Thomas Cullinan's dark Gothic novel, committed to it eagerly and enlisted Albert Maltz to write the screenplay. He did, but bizarrely insisted it have a happy, romantic ending, wouldn't be swayed, and was consequently fired. Going back to the source novel, it was rewritten by Claude Traverse, the film's associate producer, uncredited. The film's credits read 'John B Sherry' (Maltz's pseudonym) and 'Grimes Grice' (Irene Kamp, who had written two rejected drafts). What a fucking mess! What does this tell us? Like Chaplin, don't believe the credits.
We thought the film was particularly well edited, by Carl Pingitore, with some excellent montage sequences, though we should remember that Siegel was originally a montage editor at Warner Bros. Pingitore was a veteran TV editor, one of several editors interviewed for the project. When Siegel asked him for his resume he snapped back "I've survived for thirty years" which chimed with Siegel and got him the job.
Bruce Surtees' lighting on Ted Haworth's sets is also notable - OK, the candlelit scenes are obviously lit, but in a sympathetic way. Siegel's doing some interesting blocking too in which actors' faces are often half obscured, almost like a Bergman shot.
It's very well acted, and you can see why Clint was drawn to it - it was his first real opportunity not to shoot people but to play a fully rounded character who is wily and trying to manipulate everyone around him, a coward and liar, a drunk and angry cripple... with just a flash of goodness in him too. Geraldine Page led the way for the women, arriving on set with no makeup and no agenda, finding the other actresses followed in her suit. I would single out Mae Mercer particularly as the slave / maid, but also good are Elizabeth Hartman, Jo Ann Harris and young Pamelyn Ferdin, who provides the film's wonderful circularity - she finds and saves the soldier at the outset, then kills him at the conclusion.
Sexual undercurrents - including Page's incest back-story - are interesting. The film was of course a flop - Universal had no idea how to promote it, even turned down the idea that the film should have its initial release at the Cannes Film Festival. (It was a big hit in France.) It contributed to the deterioration of Clint's relationship with the studio.
I enjoyed it much more than I remembered.
A Malpaso production.
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| Clint and Bob at the premiere |
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