NOW, VOYAGER (1942)

After losing her contract fight in the U.K. courts, Bette Davis, forced to return to Warners, found she’d lost the battle, but won the war.  Two dozen pics over the next decade, half of them classics; the greatest run an actress ever had in Hollywood.  Putting aside ‘historicals’ and bitches, this and DARK VICTORY/’39 long considered the best of her sympathetic roles.  But where VICTORY, Oscar nom’d for Best Pic, long held first position and VOYAGER was condescended to as ‘merely’ a Woman’s Film,’ current reputations have flipped.  (Note it’s VOYAGER with Criterion DVD status.)  Quite rightly too, as this Ugly Duckling fable (Davis’s spinster aunt grows into a beautiful caring woman; rejects two likely suitors; thrives as surrogate mom to her lover’s once-troubled child) may well be fool’s gold, but it’s ten carat fool’s gold.  Strongly cast: Claude Rains’ interventionist shrink; Paul Henreid’s unavailable lover, Gladys Cooper’s starchy/controlling mother; John Loder’s nice boring beau; Mary Wickes take-charge nurse; Bonita Granville’s thoughtlessly cruel niece; literally a dozen more memorable players.  Listen for a remarkable exchange after Granville apologizes for past behavior, asks forgiveness, and Davis’s simple reply: ‘Never.’  A line meant six different ways.  (Davis hitting all six.)  Loaded with famous touches (not just the twin cigarette lighting & Max Steiner’s famous theme music), along with a few comic-relief duds, Irving Rapper brings more visual pizzaz than you expect.  More importantly, the film feels all-of-a-piece in the best major Hollywood studio manner.  Paradigmatic, essential.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY:  More screwy story from back in the day.  Pre-streaming, pre-DVD; pre-VHS, during the hard fought ERA wars of the ‘70s, a group of women’s rights activists requested a 16mm screening and I had the projector.  They’d heard of, but not seen the film and thought its mix of proto-feminism and Golden Age Hollywood manner might be fun, or at least good for a laugh.  But while a few stock & process shots caused a giggle, halfway in the tears started up.  By the end, everyone positively sobbing.

DOUBLE-BILL: See if you too now find this a considerably better film than DARK VICTORY.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: The intro shot of a stylish Davis in the third reel, designed to match the first reel intro of dowdy Davis: close shot on fashionable shoes coming down the stairs; the face half-hidden by a  wide-brimmed hat, a thick slash of lipstick eradicating any hint of a bow; the birth of an icon, still a thrill.  Later, Davis will even explain the transformation in an intensely moving little speech on what beauty (or rather a kind of beauty) is and what it can mean, to the troubled little girl she takes under her wing.  (Oops, starting to sob again.)