MAKSQUIBS CINEMATHEQUE: THE SECOND WOMAN (1951)

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Tuesday, January 13, 2009

THE SECOND WOMAN (1951)

It can be fun (and instructive) to see what could be done within the minuscule budgets of Hollywood’s Poverty Row. This one takes place in Daphne du Maurier territory (think REBECCA/’40: flashback structure, burning house & all, even Florence Bates) with Robert Young as a troubled widower architect (he lives in a knock-off of Falling Water!) who comes out of his shell when Betsy Drake moves next door. If only the unresolved 'accidental' death of his first wife wasn’t muddying the romance. Young gives a subtle and affecting perf in classic 'will-he-kiss-me-or-kill-me' mode and there’s a pretty good supporting cast, but Drake clearly shows why her career was so brief. Try to ignore the ludicrous background score assembled from Tchaikovsky’s Greatest Hits and the dreadful Public Domain copies that smear Hal Mohr’s handsome noir lensing.

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A last thought before we go.

Well, enough from me. But before we sign off, here's a great quote from Emile Zola's L'OEUVRE (THE MASTERPIECE), which is about painting rather than the yet to be invented medium of film, but which points a fine critical eye toward the whole idea of art criticism. It's a good, if chilly, thought to keep in mind, especially when you surf the net.

"Has it ever struck you that posterity may not be the fair, impartial judge we like to think it is?

"Suppose the artist's paradise turned out to be as nonexistent as the Catholics, and future generations prove just as misguided as the present one and persisted in liking pretty pretty dabbling better than honest to goodness painting. There are some accepted masterpieces for which I myself wouldn't give a twopenny damn.

"Classical training has given us a wrong view of everything and forces us to acclaim as geniuses a lot of fellows who are no more than well-balanced, facile painters, while what we might really prefer is the work of more emancipated but less even artists known only to an initiated few. Immortality at present depends entirely on the average, middle-class mind and is reserved only for the names that have been most forcibly impressed upon us while we were still unable to defend ourselves...

"Perhaps that's the sort of thing that's best left unsaid. It's certainly the sort of thing that gives me the shudders!"- Emile Zola

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Tuesday, January 13, 2009

THE SECOND WOMAN (1951)

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A last thought before we go.

DROP ME A LINE