The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)
A perfect high drama--tight, tragic, tender
Lewis Milestone is a director with much earlier roots, and famous partly for two Steinbeck adaptations, the first rate Of Mice and Men and a decent The Red Pony, as well as the superb All Quiet on the Western Front. This strange soap opera/film noir rates with the best of his work--he pulls off a complicated and rich drama with a sense of ease that belies the disparate elements involved, including making the opening scenes in the 1920s mesh with the main plot in the 1940s. It works beautifully, with great writing and acting, and a rich mise-en-scene. I wouldn't miss this for the world.
Martha Ivers presents a peculiar plot, tightly constructed, with cross purposes throwing you and reinterpretations of events needed on the fly. We have powerful woman, played by already legendary Barbara Stanwyck, in the kind of role that she was best at, and about a weak man with a heart, her husband, Kirk Douglas, the really sympathetic side of the actor in his first movie role. These two seem to be the stable core of the movie. But far more involving and impressive is the main character in the role of his life, Van Heflin as Sam Masterson. His likable ease with a hidden, disturbing past, and an inquiring open mind about the future, define the best of the film noir archetypes. An ordinary man with depth, someone we can relate to, or want to be friends with. In the movie he becomes friends with the fourth leading role played by a noir fixture, Lizabeth Scott, and though she is the stiffest of the four, she fills out the group with great balance. She is, after all, the reality that our main man prefers, whatever the temptations of high life in the small city of Iverstown.
What else is there? A great script, great acting, great visuals, well paced and intelligently edited with economy and continuity. Does it have great social meaning? Is there a disturbing or revelatory core here? No, maybe not. But then again, just being thoroughly drawn in, moved, and made to consider this kind of situation from Masterson's point of view is a thrill of great cinematic fiction.
A perfect high drama--tight, tragic, tender
Lewis Milestone is a director with much earlier roots, and famous partly for two Steinbeck adaptations, the first rate Of Mice and Men and a decent The Red Pony, as well as the superb All Quiet on the Western Front. This strange soap opera/film noir rates with the best of his work--he pulls off a complicated and rich drama with a sense of ease that belies the disparate elements involved, including making the opening scenes in the 1920s mesh with the main plot in the 1940s. It works beautifully, with great writing and acting, and a rich mise-en-scene. I wouldn't miss this for the world.
Martha Ivers presents a peculiar plot, tightly constructed, with cross purposes throwing you and reinterpretations of events needed on the fly. We have powerful woman, played by already legendary Barbara Stanwyck, in the kind of role that she was best at, and about a weak man with a heart, her husband, Kirk Douglas, the really sympathetic side of the actor in his first movie role. These two seem to be the stable core of the movie. But far more involving and impressive is the main character in the role of his life, Van Heflin as Sam Masterson. His likable ease with a hidden, disturbing past, and an inquiring open mind about the future, define the best of the film noir archetypes. An ordinary man with depth, someone we can relate to, or want to be friends with. In the movie he becomes friends with the fourth leading role played by a noir fixture, Lizabeth Scott, and though she is the stiffest of the four, she fills out the group with great balance. She is, after all, the reality that our main man prefers, whatever the temptations of high life in the small city of Iverstown.
What else is there? A great script, great acting, great visuals, well paced and intelligently edited with economy and continuity. Does it have great social meaning? Is there a disturbing or revelatory core here? No, maybe not. But then again, just being thoroughly drawn in, moved, and made to consider this kind of situation from Masterson's point of view is a thrill of great cinematic fiction.