The Second Woman (1950)

Directed by James V Kern; produced by Mort Briskin and Robert Smith

The images of a house, before and after a catastrophic fire, lead to flashbacks telling the story of Jeff Cohalan (Robert Young), a successful architect. A recent widower, it’s not clear if Cohalan mourns his wife or merely regrets her death; certainly the violent event has left its mark. A series of accidents and unexplained circumstances has followed the man for a year. What their cause might be, and to what it will lead involves Ellen Foster (Betsy Drake), Cohalan’s neighbour, who has begun to develop feelings for him.

If you’ve seen the 1940 screen adaptation of Rebecca, you will notice immediately The Second Woman’s resemblance to it. The plot diverges, eventually, but initially there is much in the later movie that is reminiscent of the earlier. It begins with a woman’s spoken and dreamy recollection of a residence, now destroyed, and continues to depict a dead wife’s influence on a reticent man. There are the stories about the late woman and her fatal accident, the indications of a hidden mystery, even a smug hanger-on who may or may not have knowledge of events. All that is missing is the sinister housekeeper.

The Second Woman’s story, written by the producers, does stand on its own after a while, and if the screenwriters saw the similarity between their work and Rebecca (and how could they not have done?), they may have hoped that the viewer would stick with the film long enough to see the difference. It may be why one of the first scenes shows what appears to be a major character’s suicide attempt, thus demonstrating that all is not identical. It’s almost as if, having seen Rebecca, Briskin and Smith – the screenwriters as well as the producers - wanted to re-write the classic, with more mystery.

For that, the mystery does have its admirable points. The solution is logical, though, like too many B-movie endings, is dependent upon what nearly amounts to a deus ex machina being sprung on the audience. As well, it doesn’t ‘play fair’ with the viewer, withholding certain events and facts that would have provided clues.

Also, the explanation of the pivotal accident may force the viewer to ask why a principal character would do something so foolish as he did. If so, it probably won’t be the only question pondered. Indeed, the characters tend to act in aid of the mystery, rather than as real people in such situations would; similar to, though not as annoying as, the soon-to-be-next-victim behaves in a more modern slasher film.

The direction is adequate. The Second Woman is likely Kern’s ‘biggest’ movie; he later turned to television. There is no scene that stands out, despite Kern’s struggle for atmosphere, crediting Peter Ilyitch Tschaikovsky with the musical themes (which don’t do much for the movie.)

The acting is good, though Young never strikes me as charismatic or even involving enough to be a strong leading man, despite the abilities he shows in numerous films. Nor does Drake have any particularly draw. Even so, both leads offer capable performances. Jason Robards Sr (listed among the cast without the qualifier, of course) has a bit part.

While mildly entertaining, nothing in The Second Woman is really commendable. The leads are not very sympathetic, the story is uninvolving, the direction ordinary: a film for a Saturday evening when you’ve watched everything else in your collection.

The Lives of Others (2006)

Directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck; produced by Quirin Berg and Max Wiedemann

 

It’s 1984, and Gerd Wiesler (Ulrich Mühe) is an officer in the East German State Security Service (the ‘Stasi’), experienced in surveillance and interrogation, and in teaching these techniques. His latest assignment is to spy on Georg Dreyman (Sebastian Koch), a playwright just on the legal side of censorship, and his girlfriend (Martina Gedeck). As the case progresses, Wiesler is disturbed by the reason for it, and the pressure he is under to produce results. Even more disturbing, however, is his growing sympathy for his subjects.

 

A combination of spy thriller, drama and character study, The Lives of Others offers an excellent picture of a police state at its height, when methods of oppression have become perfected, and tyranny routine. At the movie’s heart is the character of Wiesler and the performance of Mühe. Wiesler’s origins might be easy to guess: a typical ‘orphan’ of a dictatorship – whether he has family or not – he is someone who may have found meaning, belonging and importance, in a uniform, in privilege, in power. After twenty years, however, his fulfillment of his duties has become mechanical; he knows what to do, and does it well. Even so, the secret policeman is a human.

 

Mühe’s portrayal is masterful. His Wiesler has become the epitome of both proponent and victim of oppression: his expression almost never changes, his voice is always the same. Even his questions have the flat monotone of dull statements. A secret policeman never gives anything away; those who live under his rule cannot afford to. Yet he manages to convey the growing feelings of a man who has stumbled by accident upon something worth fighting for.

 

The plot does indeed involve a fight. There are no gun-battles, chases or explosions. But there is tension. Slowly, deed by deed, Wiesler begins to back himself into a corner. Ironically, his worst moments are caused by the people for whom he grows concerned. He must hide his changing attitudes not only from his superiors and his colleagues, but he must make sure his subjects are unaware of his actions – both those for them, and those for the Stasi.

 

Hiding the truth is practiced by every character. Thomas Thieme, as a loathsome government minister, and Ulrich Tukur, as a Stasi colonel, give very good performances; their characters seek personal gratification and professional advancement, respectively, all the while disguising their actions as necessary for the country. The viewer feels for Koch’s writer, a man hoping to stay on the inside of the machine, in order to effect its destruction; Gedeck’s character, on the other hand, is involved with two men, for quite different reasons.

 

Watching The Lives of Others made me think of Stander, a film I reviewed in November, 2019. Though a contrast in many ways, that film too was about how the oppression and degradation of an entire country can corrode even those in power. In both movies, the central character, in different ways, is forced by his humanity to act out against the authority he represents.

The Lives of Others also highlights the fact that it is the coöperation of the majority of a population that allows tyranny to flourish. It need not be active participation; it need only be acquiescence. There is a sad scene in which Wiesler blackmails Dreyman’s neighbour into keeping silent about the policeman’s visit to the writer’s flat. Wiesler has taken the precaution of learning about the neighbours, and has a simple expedient at hand – probably for each one – to ensure passivity. There is also a psychologically horrible moment when Wiesler almost turns a child into an informant.

 

The Lives of Others works on several levels, and may be seen as a straight, tense thriller, a drama of conflict, even an historical document; or a combination of these. In any case, it is an entertaining, thoughtful movie, the ending of which will likely be unpredictable to most viewers.

The Holly and the Ivy (1952)

Directed by George More O’Ferrall; produced by Anatole de Grunwald

The Reverend Martin Gregory is a rural vicar who seems to exist slightly detached from the rest of the world; absent-minded and good-humoured, he appears to prefer the abstract to the practical. His children, however, have to deal with the concrete: Jenny (Celia Johnson) longs to marry her boyfriend (John Gregson), but feels she must stay and take care of her father. Margaret (Margaret Leighton) lives in London with no desire to come home. Michael (Denholm Elliott) doesn’t take anything seriously but his desire to enjoy himself. This Christmas, however, will be different than any other for this loving but distant family.

A fine drama of personalities, The Holly and the Ivy benefits from very good performances from the four actors who portray the Gregory family, in particular Richardson, as the gentle and amiable patriarch. Support is capably given by Margaret Halstan and Maureen Delaney (credited as ‘Maureen Delany’) as two contrasting aunts, and Hugh Williams as a cousin. If there is a flaw in the casting it is that Johnson is too old for her rôle. Jenny is 31, while Johnson looks very much the 44 she was at the time. Her performance, however, makes up for any visual incongruity.

The script, by the producer, from a play by Wynyard Browne, is excellent. Initially, it gives the impression of a modern young generation a little exasperated with – though caring greatly for – the old fogey who is their father. But slowly, the viewer realises that Martin Gregory is rather sharp, and not the stereotypical country parson. If he is blind to his children’s worries, they are no more perspicacious about him.

Gregory’s vocation as a priest is at the centre of the plot, really, in that his children have grown up thinking that their parent is like someone from a story-book, an otherworldly pastor made of glass, that the whiff of indiscretion or scandal in the family might shatter. How they arrived at this conclusion, having lived with him for most of their lives, may only be guessed at. It may have something to do with their late mother. One can imagine that she took on the practical elements of the household, while her husband concerned himself with the spiritual.

Yet one sees, from Martin’s words and actions – and reactions – that he is not as unworldly as people may believe. (For instance, on Christmas Eve, Michael and Margaret, bored at the vicarage, go to the cinema; their aunts are appalled but the reverend expresses surprise at there being anything interesting showing.)

It becomes clear that the children are the short-sighted ones. The aunts both know that Martin could cope on his own, if he retired, and the cousin, half-way between one generation and the next, also sees the truth. There is a key line that might be a cri de cœur uttered by clergymen of every faith: “Why do you think I became a parson in the first place? Because I saw what life is like. Not because I didn't.”

Like the casting, the script has one fault, and that is that it ends a bit too abruptly. One cares about the Gregory family and their issues, and would like to see a wider resolution. This is a small quibble, though. The movie does not suffer for it.

The Holly and the Ivy is not the usual Christmas story, nor does it have the angst-laden, loud tableau of unlikeable creatures that normally populate a tale of dysfunctional families. This is a quiet film of secrets kept not from shame but from concern for others, and of revelation that makes a Yuletide merry.

It Happened on Fifth Avenue (1947)

Directed and produced by Roy Del Ruth

While multi-millionaire Michael O’Connor (Charlie Ruggles) spends the winter in the country, homeless Aloysius T McKeever (Victor Moore) moves into his vacant New York townhouse. A conscientious squatter, careful not to damage anything and leave all as it was when he departs in the spring, McKeever feels compelled to offer evicted veteran Jim Bullock (Don DeFore) a room in ‘his’ mansion. Before long, there are two families of former soldiers and, incognito, O’Connor’s own daughter, Trudy (Gale Storm) residing there, too. And when O’Connor himself shows up, things become complicated.

It Happened on Fifth Avenue has the premise of a frantic farce, perhaps even the sort that the Marx Brothers could have concocted in their prime. Instead, it is a gentle but mediocre comedy with a few good laughs and a few more smiles. There are a number of elements that are vaguely connected and that by themselves would have made for a satisfying shorter film; together, they create a meandering story that is far too long.

One of the problems is that it has several characters on which it could have concentrated to make a more cohesive whole. Moore’s McKeever is an interesting philosopher, a den-mother of sorts to those whom he shelters under ‘his’ roof, strict on proprieties and careful of others’ property (except cigars and waistcoats). Ruggles, by 1947 a bona fide star – if a little faded and nowhere as big as some – gives a thoughtful portrayal as the millionaire, trying to sort out the relationships with his daughter and estranged wife (Ann Harding).

Character actors lend good support, including Edward Brophy as a good-natured watchman and Charles Lane in his usual killjoy rôle.

What doesn’t work is the romance between the characters of DeFore and Storm. Neither is an involving person, and though there is a legitimate attraction between them, the actual love affair is flimsier than anything you might have seen on The Love Boat. It would have been far better to have scrapped their participation, and made it a straight comedy, pairing Ruggles and Moore. Divested of the lackluster romance, It Happened on Fifth Avenue would have been a leaner, funnier film. (For some reason, Storm’s voice is obviously dubbed in the songs she sings; pointlessly, as she was a singer.)

And it would have been better made in the 1930s. The plot has the feel of a film from ’32 or ’33, when the Great Depression was at its height. The transients, the homeless soldiers, the ultra-rich; certainly they existed in 1947, but they fit less in that prosperous year. Indeed, many of the palatial mansions along New York’s Fifth Avenue were already gone by the Second World War, Gilded Age opulence giving way to a more streamlined wealth.

Streamlined is, perhaps, what the movie should have been. At almost two hours, it seems too long, the story too attenuated. O’Connor’s redemption – and you know it’s coming – suffers at least two set-backs that needlessly prolong the film.

While It Happened on Fifth Avenue is spottily amusing, with a number of good lines, it needs a better screenwriter and a ruthless though talented editor. It felt like it tries to be a jack-of-all-trades, and masters none.