We Were Strangers

Thanks to the local cable provider's high quality product, the three movies I taped off of TCM Monday night turned into one and a half movies. With about 5 minutes to go in 1979's Cuba, the screen freezes so I sit it out for a minute or two. Then onto the fast forward and next thing I know I'm 45 minutes into the next movie. Great, grand, awesome, but in looking for that bright spot the third movie, 1949's We Were Strangers, made it all the way through without any freezes...thankfully.

The theme for TCM's Monday schedule was Cuba so the common thread among the three movies I attempted to record was assassination, murder, coups, and generally death and mayhem around every corner. Cuba has never been a real model for stability, especially in the 20th Century beginning with the Spanish American war through several revolutions after that and then Fidel Castro's dictatorship dominating the country from 1959 and on. All this political instability provides some interesting storylines and settings, often told directly and frankly, politically correct feelings be damned.

It's 1933 in Cuba and the senate has ruled that any congregation of more than three people is illegal because those folks must be plotting some evil revolutionary plans. Following her brother's murder at the hands of the Porra (the secret police like the SS or KGB), China Valdez (Jennifer Jones), pronounced Chee-na, seeks out the resistance movement. She hopes to find a way to kill the man, Ariete (Pedro Armendariz), who shot her brother in cold blood. Instead, she is set up with Tony Fenner (John Garfield), a mysterious American, involved with the resistance.

Fenner concocts a detailed plan that could bring about the end of the current dictatorship. Using China's house that stands near a cemetery, Fenner and his small crew of revolutionaries will dig a tunnel under the street into the cemetery until they reach the tomb of Vicente Contreras, a local higher-up and businessman. His plan calls for the group to murder Contreras, and when all of the government powers that be -- including the president -- show up, they will set the bomb off and hopefully knock out the Cuban power structure. But as Fenner's crew works, Ariete stays on their trail, suspicious of what they're up to.

Released just four years after the end of WWII, 'Strangers' is incredibly frank in dealing with its subject matter. China, Fenner and the group believe they are in the right in attempting to assassinate Cuba's president and his cabinet. As presented, it is a rather nasty government that callously murders its citizens believed to be working against them so that makes it easier to side with the revolutionaries. Still, it is about as straightforward as possible. The collateral damage of innocents is mentioned but considered worth the death toll that a bomb will produce. But whether the group is in the right or not is beyond the point. 'Strangers' tells the story of a group of assassins which is a difficult subject to handle. Credit to tough-guy director John Huston for pulling it off so well.

This was the first Jennifer Jones part that I actually thought was pretty good although to be fair I've only seen two others. Jones was not a classical Hollywood beauty with her somewhat exotic look so she was often cast as minorities, Spanish, Asian, Native American, and here, Cuban. Her China is a strong female character looking for revenge. She's believable and completely sympathetic in the part. As the tough guy lead, Garfield is a good choice to play Fenner. Before his sudden death in 1952, Garfield made himself quite a name as a star, and it's easy to see why here. With little in the way of backstory or even in lines, Garfield's Fenner is a tough, no-nonsense leader. Typically playing good guys in a trio of John Ford westerns, Armendariz pulls off the villain perfectly, the secret policeman with little to no scruples. The rest of Fenner's team includes Gilbert Roland as Guillermo, a dock worker, Wally Cassell as Miguel, a bike mechanic, David Bond as Ramon, a law student, and Jose Perez as Toto.

With some rather obvious green screen efforts filling in for outdoor scenes in Havana, some scenes have a fake look to them as Jones and Garfield 'walk' through the downtown area. Other than those studio-manufactured backdrops, 'Strangers' looks like a typically dark, shadowy film noir. Filmed on soundstages for China's house and cellar, the characters are always half in shadow with faces covered and those shadows dancing around the floors and walls. It's a great looking movie -- not a surprise with Huston directing -- and an interesting time capsule of how a movie from the late 1940s handles the touchy subject of assassination. Well worth a watch.

We Were Strangers (1949): ***/****

Duel in the Sun

After the huge success of Gone With the Wind in 1939, movie studios spent years looking for the next big epic to springboard off that epic's success. Ah, who am I kidding, they're still doing that now. GWtW producer David O. Selznick tried to duplicate the success with 1946's Duel in the Sun, a western with a feel of a Greek tragedy that has some interesting cast choices, good and bad, but never amounts to much.

Two key roles show the positive and negative in casting. Jennifer Jones, very white Jennifer Jones, plays a young woman who's father was Mexican and mother an Indian so she has to live with some prejudices against her simply because she's of mixed blood. Jones is doused in skin-darkening makeup to make her look like a Mexican/Indian which looks odd. As for her acting, this is one of those roles that critical fans can point to as being too theatrical. She's over-the-top from the start, and yes, the role requires emotion but it's too much and not believable.

The other interesting casting is rising star Gregory Peck who typically played the resolute, heroic good guy in his career. In 'Duel,' it's just the opposite as he plays the bad guy. And to be fair, Peck nails the part. He's the bad guy you love to hate who can spin a story so quickly and smoothly that you forget what a nasty guy is. This development builds from a cowboy who lives his own life and doesn't think much of what others see in him to a raging, psychopathic killer by the end of the movie. It was refreshing to see Peck in such an atypical role.

On to the story now, which begins with Pearl Chavez (Jones) moving to her distant relatives' sprawling ranch in Texas, the Spanish Bit, after her father is hung for murdering his cheating wife and the unlucky fellow she was with. Pearl, half Mexican/half Indian, finds quite the dysfunctional family at the ranch, starting with the family patriarch, Senator Jackson McCanles (Lionel Barrymore), a racist, crippled old man who refuses to admit the times are changing. Pearl falls for Jackson's son Jesse (Joseph Cotten), a lawyer changing with those times, but ends up with loutish Lewton (Peck), a freewheeling type who lives life how he wants it.

It's the years after the Civil War and the United States are developing and moving further west. The Senator wants nothing to do with the expansion, even when Jesse tries to explain it to him. Pearl is dropped into this perilous situation as the family is torn apart and go their separate ways. Trying to hold it all together, Laura Belle McCanles (Lillian Gish) is seemingly the one good person in the house along with her son Jesse.

This movie had issues from the start, especially when it came to the director's chair, just check out the bevy of directors who were at the helm at one point or another. I couldn't help watching the whole thing is that everyone is trying too hard. Some of my friends dislike pre-1960 movies because they are too theatrical, too stiff, and this is the type of movie where I agree with them. Cotten is good as the angelic brother, Barrymore is playing Barrymore, and Gish makes the most of a smaller part. Also Walter Huston has a small but solid supporting part.  But all in all, something doesn't connect. It feels like a Greek tragedy with family rivalries and disagreements, but there's no one to root for.

By the last 30 minutes or so, decisions are made that serve no real purpose or are even vaguely believable other than to drive the movie along. Pearl loves and hates Lewt, and their ever-so normal relationship starts to turn into listening to nails on the chalkboard. I wanted to say 'just let him go! He's messing with your head!' And then the ending, which is too much on any number of levels.

All this is disappointing because money was clearly spent on this big budget western. One scene with Barrymore and Cotten riding to stop the railroad tracks being built on their land has hundreds of men on horseback. They ride over a far-off hill and approach the rail camp, and it's great to watch. It's a gorgeous movie with some shots where you could freeze the DVD and swear it was a painting. But really it tries too hard to be an epic movie but never quite gets there.

Duel in the Sun (1946): **/****