This is a 1954 film from the Ealing Studios that seems to have disappointed its viewers, then and now, perhaps because all of us who came upon the work of Sir Michael Balcon, surely one of the world's best producers, expected another wry comedy in the style of his studio's other international successes. But THE MAGGIE is not a comedy in the classic Ealing style despite its many comic moments. It is the classic drama about a rich man, in this case simply called The American, who comes to understand something about himself and life by encountering simpler and often devious folk. The film is brilliantly cast and directed by Alexander Mckendrick, a Scotsman born in America, one of the many British directors of small films who would go on to make bigger ones in the United States, among them SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS, one of the best views of American self-corruption ever filmed. In addition, the film has a first-rate comic/dramatic script by the expatriated American screenwriter, William Rose, who wrote GENEVIEVE and would go on to do Stanley Kramer's IT'S A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD. Mckendrick's film, shot mostly on location on the island of Islay in Scotland, has an air of reality rarely captured in non-Italian or French films of the time. Mckendrick must have been a difficult man, constantly quitting or being fired by his employees, perhaps because he fought too hard for the integrity of his films. He ended up with a prestigious post as the Dean of the Film Department of the California Institure of the Arts, but made no feature films after 1967. He died in 1993. A director of exceptional talent.
Review of High and Dry
