SECONDS (The Criterion Collection)
THE EARRINGS OF MADAME DE... (The Criterion Collection)
SCARY SECONDS AND JEWEL-LADEN IRONY
By Raymond
Benson
Among the
new releases this month from The Criterion Collection, that Cadillac of Blu-Ray/DVD
labels, are two oldies-but-goodies—and very different ones—that will impress
both the average film lover and the hardcore art house enthusiast. For me, the
most anticipated title was Seconds,
the 1966 paranoia-science fiction-mystery-thriller directed by John
Frankenheimer, and starring Rock Hudson in a cast-against-type role. There’s no
question that the picture was ahead of its time. The circumstances sound familiar—it
was a very intelligent, well-made, strikingly photographed genre movie that audiences
found too strange or unpleasant, and it flopped... but later, because it really
was good, it became a cult classic.
Seconds is a shocking film today; in 1966,
it was radical. It was considered an “adults-only†movie, even though its
release was prior to the implementation of the American rating system (besides
some disturbing violence, there is an extended scene of Bacchus rite
enthusiasts stomping grapes in the nude). Filmed in black and white by James
Wong Howe—and his work on the picture is arguably the most impressive aspect of
this complex film—Seconds tells the
story of a middle-aged, successful, married-with-grown-daughter, man who
desperately wants a different life. He finds it through a mysterious
organization called the Company, which—for a fee—will fake the man’s death,
help him disappear, give him a new face and body through means of elaborate
plastic surgery, and plop him into the identity of someone else. If, however,
the man is not happy with his new life, then his body becomes the faked corpse
for the next client.
Thus, the
first third of the movie stars the actor John Randolph, whose features, in
retrospect, didn’t change all that much over the next forty years. Randolph is
terrific—he displays the character’s inner turmoil over his decision with “calm
nervousnessâ€; this is who will eventually be housed inside of Rock Hudson, also
poignantly wonderful as a sad, frustrated man... and this is the key to the
movie. The character that both actors play is not a happy person to begin with...he
is destined to be dissatisfied with
his second life, too, even though on the surface it seems more ideal.
Criterion’s
Blu-ray is gorgeous—the new, restored 4K digital film transfer, with
uncompressed monaural soundtrack, provides the best possible presentation of
this remarkable film. Also of note is the audio commentary by the late
Frankenheimer himself, an auteur whose oeuvre
is perhaps not as widely respected as it should be. Extras include a new
interview with Alec Bladwin (huh?), and the more relevant features such as Hollywood on the Hudson, a 1965 TV
program featuring on-set footage and an interview with Rock Hudson. There’s a
very good new program on the making of the film, featuring interviews with
Frankenheimer’s widow and actress Salome Jens. Plus more. In short, it’s the
usual first-class treatment from Criterion.
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Also
released this month is Max Ophüls’ acclaimed 1953 French drama, The Earrings of Madame De... (also known
as simply Madame De...). For those
unfamiliar with Ophüls, you need to be. A German Jew, he escaped Nazi Germany,
worked in France, came to America in the late forties and made a few highly
regarded Hollywood pictures, then went back to France and made the four movies
that cemented his reputation, and Madame
De... is one of these. Ophüls was a pioneer in the tracking shot—in his
films, the camera moves like a fluid dancer, following actors through sets and
along streets. In fact, Stanley Kubrick often stated that Ophüls was one of his
favorite directors, and one can see Ophüls’ influence on Kubrick, especially in
the latter’s early work.
Madame De...starts off as a comedy, but it soon
becomes not a love story, but a tale in which love brings about the characters’
downfalls. It’s an ironic fable adapted from a novella by Louise de Vilmorin
about an upper class military couple (Charles Boyer and Danielle Darrieux),
their affairs, and the trust vs. mistrust that exists in marriages in 19th
Century France. Mostly, though, the picture is about pride, and how that
emotion can dominate that of love. Vittorio de Sica, the famed director, also
appears in a large supporting role as Darrieux’s paramour, and he is quite
charismatic.
The usual
high standard of extras include a commentary by film scholars Susan White and
Gaylyn Studlar, and especially the excellent “visual essay†on Ophüls’ tracking
techniques, narrated by film scholar Tag Gallagher. The booklet includes the
complete novella by de Vilmorin, and another extra is an interview with the
author, circa mid-sixties, in which she lambasts the film version, never
realizing that her own pride is also ironic. Recommended.
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