Even considering mental health issues and stage tours with husband Laurence Olivier, it’s still surprising that Vivien Leigh, as big a screen star as you could be after GONE WITH THE WIND/’39, had only nine more feature films over the next twenty-five years. And most of them forgotten. This one, released between GWTW and her personal fave WATERLOO BRIDGE/’41, though actually shot in 1937*, one of the more forgotten. And that’s in spite of co-starring husband-to-be Olivier, popular Leslie Banks and Graham Greene adapting John Galsworthy’s moral dilemma novel. Let’s stick most of the blame on director/co-writer Basil Dean, more stage manager/theatre actor than movie man. His second to last try at film direction has a choppy/stop-start quality to it. And Czech cinematographer Jan Stallich (later a Soviet Block lenser) has little interest (or ability?) in helping Leigh sparkle or Olivier seem a bit less callow. These two lovers confronted by a husband who vanished three years ago. He’s there to blackmail them, pulls out a knife and is accidentally killed in a scuffle. What to do? Olivier, scapegrace kid brother of barrister Banks, is strongly advised by him to cover up the crime and leave the country, even though it was self-defense and accidental. Banks desperate to limit any scandal as he’s up for a High Court Judgeship. But Olivier refuses to let an innocent man take the blame and Banks has to keep him from doing the right thing. Not a bad set up though Galsworthy has a twist you’ll see coming that lets everyone (even himself) off the hook. A miss as a film, but also something that shouldn’t be missed.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID/LINK: *Note this was filmed two years before director William Wyler, according to a chastened Olivier, ‘taught’ him how to act for the screen while making WUTHERING HEIGHTS/’39. It shows. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2014/05/wuthering-heights-1939.html
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