....sister Mary comes to me ,speaking words of wisdom:"don't let it be".
The director was famous for his extravagant (and brilliant ) melodramas ,not only as Douglas Sirk ("Written on the wind" "Imitation of live" "there's always tomorrow ),but also as Detlef Sierck (his real name in Germany)("Das Mädchen vom Moorhof" "La Habanera" ;he also tried his hand at thrillers ,as "Lured " (a remake of Robert Siodmak's "Pièges" (=traps),another exiled director who used to work in France before the war)and "sleep my love" attest.In "Thunder on the hill" ,Sirk combined both genres in a single classy movie.
Some will say it's full of implausibilities : all these people who have got something to hide in a case of murder,all gathered in a convent/hospital,because of the flood which prevent them from leaving the place:it's the rule of many an Agatha Christie book;and like in the famous writer's books ,it's a non-professional who investigates : a nun playing the role of Miss Marple.
Implausibilities are all in the game of melodrama too :there are more of them in the first twenty minutes of "the magnificent obsession" than in any thriller you can think of!And melodramatic,"thunder on the hill" is .It's a tear-jerker (not meant pejoratively) of the first order,with great scenes:
-The first scene between Claudette Colbert and Ann Blyth,and the sudden revelation:it packs a real wallop.
-Willie and sister Mary in the fog on their boat ,trying to get to Norwich where "the only person who cares for the condemned woman lives".Willie destroying the boat.
-The scene where Sister Mary desperately rings the bell,a sequence to rival the best of Alfred Hitchcock or Robert Siodmak.
People cry rivers in "thunder of the hill" but anyway Sirk is one of those rare directors who CAN make you cry effortlessly:a person who did not cry when he saw the final of "imitation of life" is a liar.
Religion plays a prominent part in this work ,and the convict who laughed at a "divine intervention" was proved wrong.The last scene is an affirmation of the faith in God;a subject which would emerge again in Sirk's final melodramas (Someone tells Rock Hudson in "magnificent obsession" that a man -Jesus Christ- spent his whole life to help his fellow men and Annie ,the black servant's only dream in "imitation of life" is a great funeral and to be with the Lord).
There are numerous characters and Sirk succeeds in making all of them interesting,with the exception of the nasty nurse,a character we have seen too many times on the screen .Willie,for instance,was probably inspired by Victor Hugo's "Hunchback of Notre Dame"-Quasimodo-.Claudette Colbert shines in her part of a nun with a strong guilt feeling ,because she feels responsible for her sister's death;the rest of the cast is up to scratch ,and "thunder on the hill" is one of Sirk's sleepers.Do not miss it.
The director was famous for his extravagant (and brilliant ) melodramas ,not only as Douglas Sirk ("Written on the wind" "Imitation of live" "there's always tomorrow ),but also as Detlef Sierck (his real name in Germany)("Das Mädchen vom Moorhof" "La Habanera" ;he also tried his hand at thrillers ,as "Lured " (a remake of Robert Siodmak's "Pièges" (=traps),another exiled director who used to work in France before the war)and "sleep my love" attest.In "Thunder on the hill" ,Sirk combined both genres in a single classy movie.
Some will say it's full of implausibilities : all these people who have got something to hide in a case of murder,all gathered in a convent/hospital,because of the flood which prevent them from leaving the place:it's the rule of many an Agatha Christie book;and like in the famous writer's books ,it's a non-professional who investigates : a nun playing the role of Miss Marple.
Implausibilities are all in the game of melodrama too :there are more of them in the first twenty minutes of "the magnificent obsession" than in any thriller you can think of!And melodramatic,"thunder on the hill" is .It's a tear-jerker (not meant pejoratively) of the first order,with great scenes:
-The first scene between Claudette Colbert and Ann Blyth,and the sudden revelation:it packs a real wallop.
-Willie and sister Mary in the fog on their boat ,trying to get to Norwich where "the only person who cares for the condemned woman lives".Willie destroying the boat.
-The scene where Sister Mary desperately rings the bell,a sequence to rival the best of Alfred Hitchcock or Robert Siodmak.
People cry rivers in "thunder of the hill" but anyway Sirk is one of those rare directors who CAN make you cry effortlessly:a person who did not cry when he saw the final of "imitation of life" is a liar.
Religion plays a prominent part in this work ,and the convict who laughed at a "divine intervention" was proved wrong.The last scene is an affirmation of the faith in God;a subject which would emerge again in Sirk's final melodramas (Someone tells Rock Hudson in "magnificent obsession" that a man -Jesus Christ- spent his whole life to help his fellow men and Annie ,the black servant's only dream in "imitation of life" is a great funeral and to be with the Lord).
There are numerous characters and Sirk succeeds in making all of them interesting,with the exception of the nasty nurse,a character we have seen too many times on the screen .Willie,for instance,was probably inspired by Victor Hugo's "Hunchback of Notre Dame"-Quasimodo-.Claudette Colbert shines in her part of a nun with a strong guilt feeling ,because she feels responsible for her sister's death;the rest of the cast is up to scratch ,and "thunder on the hill" is one of Sirk's sleepers.Do not miss it.