Gentleman’s Agreement
1949, Elia Kazan (dir)
Gregory Peck
This film was pretty good, which is saying something when one considers the horrifically stilted opening scene with Peck and his son. “How are you son?” “just swell dad”. One felt, right from that opening moment, that this film concerning anti-Semitism was going to attack the problem with all the same levels of subtlety and trite condescension that Hollywood has managed to maintain for many generations.
However things did improve. Anne Revere, as Peck’s mother, is stern and magnetic, and Peck’s brash friend played by Celeste Holm left many a viewer (if the viewers are anything like me) feeling that in the end, he certainly made the wrong choice. His wife is the supposed pivot-point of the film, as she progresses to ‘show through action’ how she has converted from a passive country club anti-Semite to an active supporter in the cause to crush the anti-Semites through vocal public action! Yes, the ending is served with a generous helping of cheese.
That is perhaps what makes the film so pathetic. It is working, ostensibly, to show the latent anti-Semitism of the more sophisticated elements of society (rather than just the most vocal and obvious advocates of prejudice). It is intended to be subtle, and works to justify it’s re-hashing of a familiar topic by going beyond the obvious. But the final scene is as unconvincing and transparently shallow as the opening interaction between father and son. Kazan’s ‘solution’ is clearly artifice, designed for mass consumption (and academy awards, which it won for best picture). It is not genuine. It is a moral film, which presents itself as deep and studied, but is, in the end, plastic and cheap. So in terms of message, it is a poor film. If one reads up on Kazan, one sees that he himself was not settled in his fundamental ideas (he says so himself), and so could be considered as one who ‘runs with the tides’. And that is the only way the contrived ending of this film could be considered a success – if one were preaching to the already converted. Therefore, it may be considered in some ways a groundbreaking film, but in terms of simple quality, it is a film with some very good character depth, well filmed, but with a poorly executed plot.
Still, a fair film. Three excellent performances. The girlfriend (soon to be wife), played by Kathy Lacy, is one would presume exactly as written and directed. We are supposed, I think, to be hoping for her – she is the ‘incumbent’ love interest. The final triumph (over casual anti-Semitism) is tied to her final victory of the love interest. But it is a dangerous game. If the viewer should happen to feel that Holm was the far better choice, than where does that leave our blatant moral choice? It is as if – and this hurts to say – her ‘victory’ over her own anti-Semitism became in the end a tool for a staid Hollywood 1949 advocacy of conservatism in the choice of one’s spouse. Not so good. But still, an all right film to see.
Jacques Demy
Lola and Model Shop (the ‘sequel’)
Lola- 1961, B&W, french w/subtitles, Anouk Aimee, set in Nantes
This was Demy’s debut film. A note – the version I saw had bad subtitling, so that by the end of the film the subtitles often did not match the person speaking, it was very disconcerting by the end, however an excellent movie. 1.5H.
Model Shop- 1963, Colour, English, Set in low-rise 1960’s LA. Anouk Aimee and Gary
Lockwood, who was in 2001 A Space Odyssey. A surprise – colour and America, and pop music. 1.5H.
Viewed at Cinematheque Ontario, Aug 11/05, a double-header. Alone for the first film. I had thought Rosalind would come – she had wanted to when She, Darren and I saw Une Femme Est Une Femme on Tuesday PM and went over to ‘The Village Idiot’ for a couple glasses of wine afterwords. However I could not reach her and she did not call.
Pierre and Georg from Knox (Pierre: from Montreal, philosophy PhD studying Federalism, Georg from Frankfurt, last evening of his 2 month stay in Canada as placement from his Medical degree). Very pleased to see that Pierre and Georg both very much liked the film (Georg: Gay-org). See review below. Afterwords the three boys went and had a drink at the Idiot and than finished off Georg’s Molson Canadian and peanuts while playing cutthroat three-man elimination billiards in the basement of Knox. See photo.
(In Canada, we explained to Georg, all one needs for a good time is a six pack of Molson’s, a poorly lit basement and a pool table. We are a simple country, and this, for us, is the height of luxury).
Lola –
The attractive and almost frail Aimee is in Nantes, I think, although one might think it was Paris. She is in a Cabaret, chased by a straightforward and disarming sailor. He likes her very much, and must be leaving for America, so they are having a ‘romance’ while the other sailors visit the cabaret to dance with the leggy women ‘on demand’ (it is not a whorehouse). Lola has a young boy, blond hair, and 7 years ago her man left, without marriage. And yet – faithful Lola waits for his return expectantly, with a stringent yearning. Her childhood friend is a sort of cynical intellectual who gets fired for not caring about his work, for not liking his city or his time: he is an interesting disillusioned young man. Lola – her stage name, she is Celine, I think – and he are charmed to see one another again. He wants to take her away with him. But at the last moment, who shows up? and so she drives off, seeing her childhood friend on the street, walking, not knowing that he will not see her and that his suddenly declaration of love, out of nowhere, will be just as suddenly unrequited.
A very nice little film, with a sort of sedate enigmatic quality to Lola especially, but to the other characters as well. It is like the ‘gap’ in life is being filed, the spot between what we know and what we feel, and what we don’t know and what we don’t know we are feeling. Something like that, in any case. These characters do not ‘know’ what they want, as a business manager does: however they have a longing, and they go directly after whatever it is when it presents itself before them in circumstance.
A lovely musical score and footage.
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Model Shop.
1969
Pierre, Georg and I all admired the driving sequences as we follow the American around, for the whole movie. It’s like we see everything he does, and the music kicks in while he drives his little convertible MG through old LA. The pop music, by some band called ‘Spirit’ (featured as friends in the film) is rested from with classical sections, a great relief from the turgid swirl of 1960.
And Lo! There is Lola, from Paris, her son left behind her, and it has been, I believe, another 7 years. The young man is about 24, an architect, who has just quit his job as he cannot be bothered to wok on ‘plumbing’ when he wants to make something real, something definitive.
