457 Magnificent Obsession

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Matt
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#101 Post by Matt » Sat Jan 31, 2009 11:08 pm

I'm coming in about two topics of discussion too late. I researched Agnes Moorehead's life with a view to writing her biography (someone has since beaten me to it), and there is positively no indication she carried on a single, even brief, affair with a woman in her life. She was a rather devout Christian, took her craft very seriously (she took copious notes in her college acting classes), and lived a very quiet married life.

Her on-screen roles, on the other hand...

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denti alligator
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#102 Post by denti alligator » Sun Feb 01, 2009 12:32 pm

David

I've seen Schlussakkord and it is indeed fantastic! "Pro-Nazi" is a bit much, though. I'm surprised it hasn't appeared in Germany, since it's one of those films you'll still see on television every now and then (if I'm not mistaken).

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Professional Tourist
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#103 Post by Professional Tourist » Sun Feb 01, 2009 1:32 pm

Matt wrote:I'm coming in about two topics of discussion too late. I researched Agnes Moorehead's life with a view to writing her biography (someone has since beaten me to it), and there is positively no indication she carried on a single, even brief, affair with a woman in her life. She was a rather devout Christian, took her craft very seriously (she took copious notes in her college acting classes), and lived a very quiet married life.

Her on-screen roles, on the other hand...
I, for one, feel that the definitive biography of Agnes Moorehead is yet to be published. Although "I Love the Illusion" contains much good information, and I do respect it as a resource, I think it is not particularly well written neither in terms of the writing mechanics nor as a biographical portrait -- it presents the information the author was able to find, but doesn't really "connect the dots" to create a true portrait of who she was.

I would not agree that Agnes lived a very quiet married life. She was single until age 29, and had many separations during her twenty-year marriage to Jack Lee, particularly during the 1940s when Jack's acting career had all but failed and he was managing Agnes' family farm in Ohio while Agnes continued to live and work in California. Her subsequent marriage to Robert Gist lasted a year and a half (although she did not legally divorce him for another four years) and Agnes was without a 'married life' for her final twenty years.

There has been much discussion of Agnes' sexual preference, and there is simply no documentary evidence one way or another, primarily because she was such a private person. Although some people will assume that someone is straight because there is no evidence otherwise and because the person has been married, it would still be an assumption and not evidence itself. There is a long discussion on this controversial issue on Agnes' board at the IMDB, which I think touches on nearly every aspect of subject. The discussion gets interesting, in my opinion, beginning with the posts made on June 18, 2008 and going forward from there. [There is also a quick summary in the posts from December 2008, at the end.]

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Matt
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#104 Post by Matt » Sun Feb 01, 2009 2:41 pm

Professional Tourist wrote:I would not agree that Agnes lived a very quiet married life.
It's been a long time since I did the research and I have not kept any notes. Didn't she have a long-term relationship during her last couple of decades with a man who was either a dentist or a chiropractor? I must be misremembering that as a marriage.

The main reason I gave up on researching the book (apart from laziness) was that I found Moorehead a difficult figure to pin down. I couldn't find a "hook" on which to hang a narrative. I suspect that's the same problem Mr. Tranberg ran into (though I haven't read the book).

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Professional Tourist
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#105 Post by Professional Tourist » Sun Feb 01, 2009 3:52 pm

Matt wrote:Didn't she have a long-term relationship during her last couple of decades with a man who was either a dentist or a chiropractor? I must be misremembering that as a marriage.
Did she? I read everything I can find about AM, both in print and on the net, and so far I have found no mention of any romantic relationships at all during the last twenty years of her life. In fact, I've found no mention of any romantic relationships at any time of her life, other than with Robert Gist during the couple of years before she married him. In fact, interviews Agnes gave during the sixties would seem to preclude that she was in any romantic relationships with men at that time. Also, there would probably be photos of this man escorting her to various events, such as to the 1965 Academy Awards and to the 1967 Emmy Awards, when she was actually escorted by male friends (Cesar Romero) and co-workers. If nothing else, I think her good friend Debbie Reynolds would have known of this relationship and would have mentioned him when interviewed about or when writing about Agnes (in her autobiography) and she never has; in fact she has stated the opposite, that Agnes had no emotional attachments during that final phase of her life.
Matt wrote:The main reason I gave up on researching the book (apart from laziness) was that I found Moorehead a difficult figure to pin down. I couldn't find a "hook" on which to hang a narrative.
Indeed she is difficult to pin down -- partly due to how private she was, even among her friends and associates, and partly because she was so complex and changeable. There are such gaps in our knowledge of her personal life that it makes rather difficult any non-fiction writing of her beyond her work -- and there are even gaps and uncertainties in our knowledge of her work, particularly on the stage. I've come to think that the easiest/most rewarding way to write about AM would probably be a sketch of one particular point in time where much in known -- something like Tim Robbins' "Cradle Will Rock" -- or else a biographical novel.

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zedz
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#106 Post by zedz » Sun Feb 01, 2009 9:48 pm

david hare wrote:Denti I recall more than once during the early 80s the programmers at what was then the NFT(Australia) were trying to curate a season of 30s UFA cinema which would have roughly run from Jutzi's Berlin AlexanderPlatz to the Veit Harlan picture Verwehte Spuren (1938.)

YOu could hear a pin drop the silence from Germany was deafening. Later that decade David Stratton programming for SBS managed to score a number of titles from the period including the Harlan, and at least two Sirks, Zu Neuen Ufern and La Habanera. Schlussakord may have been among them as well - I never caught it - but the prints were very clearly sourced from UK television distributors as Habanera, fro instance has a number of censor cuts during the Buillfight scene.
By the late 90s at least, the Goethe Institut was quite forthcoming with Zu Neuen Ufern and La Habanera to augment a modest Hollywood Sirk retro, though during that period they were much more focussed on Weimar / Expressionist, New German Cinema and contemporary experimental programmes than the problematic 30s / 40s (for all of which I am eternally grateful, anyway).

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HerrSchreck
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#107 Post by HerrSchreck » Sun Feb 01, 2009 11:50 pm

As was Carne's run of Quai des brumes and Le jour se leve. This not counting films made under occupation.

The hypocricy is breathtaking-- Triumph of the Will and Birth of a Nation are celebrated for their formal qualities (rightly, I might add), yet someone like Sirk who didn't have a fascist molecule in him experiences the aforementioned, Gremillon is still awaiting rehab owing to Occupation filmmaking (though why Carne escapes this with Les enfants du is beyond me), not to mention the absurd panging of Clouzot (Corbeau in particular). If the critical establishment cannot detect a functional anti-occupation message they don't know how to create a functional narrative for the man who is making do, and moving forward with his life and work making the best of a bad situation and working under occupation (the square thru a circle squeezing wrought on behalf of something like Day of Wrath, for example, requires the bursting of blood vessels to come to an anti-occupation message; quite frankly, you could move to virtually any title in Dreyers canon, with tormented females fighting against persecution before meeting their martyrdom and come to the same conclusion.. imagine the field day you could have with someone like Mizoguchi if you wanted to attach meanings of specific political utilities that go beyond the general societal humanist message resident inthese texts).

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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#108 Post by accatone » Mon Feb 02, 2009 4:02 am

David - is there a source for the bashing online you can provide? If it was in the Filmkritik what i suppose, it would be interesting to read (actually i must have these around here in print - but not able to find a direct critique/bashing at the moment.) With these in hand someone/myself might be able to add something to this interseting discussion which could easliy make up its own thread. Thanks Herr Hare!

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HerrSchreck
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#109 Post by HerrSchreck » Mon Feb 02, 2009 11:10 am

Here's something to sink your choppers into from none other than Jan Christopher Horak, who renders the familiar pattern of guilt by seeming Existential Normality Under Tyranny...
Jan Christopher Horak wrote:On the other hand, Sirk's German films, for all their melodramatic excess, never failed to support and reaffirm the social order, and, as Eric Rentschler has convincingly demonstrated, contributed to the creation of normalcy in the Third Reich. The impression of normalcy in a time that was far from normal, given the elimination of all democratic rights, the smashing of trade unionism, and the use of murder and incarceration without due process as a political weapon, was in the interest of National Socialism. Furthermore, in their subtext, a number of films communicated racist and anti-American ideology

The article, called Sirk's Early Exile Films: Boefje and Hitler's Madman, is online, and broken into 9 pages.

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George Kaplan
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#110 Post by George Kaplan » Mon Feb 02, 2009 12:57 pm

Matt, Professional Tourist, et al,
For many, many years (perhaps someone else here remembers as well) there was a rather famous instance of graffiti in Los Angeles that read "Agnes Moorehead Is God." It was painted in blue/green (?) letters, quite large - so that anyone in a passing car could easily read it - on a brick wall that was set back from the street. It was right in the heart of Hollywood, immediately north of Hollywood Blvd., just off the "Walk Of Fame." If memory serves me right, it was very near or just across from Tick Tock Restaurant. One of the most fascinating aspects of it was that it remained untouched for many, many years.

Also, per the interest in Agnes' sexual preference, it is worth checking out Boze Hadleigh's "Hollywood Lesbians" in which he interviews Moorehead, along with Stanwyck, Judith Anderson, Dorothy Arzner, etc. It has been many years since I've read it but I recall that few of the interviewees acknowledge themselves as lesbian - perhaps only Patsy Kelly. What I remember most about the Moorehead piece was her somewhat wounded pride when asked about various other "stars" (Davis, Stanwyck, etc.), most of whom were name above the title players, and her wishing not to be too forthcoming with anecdotes because she didn't want her story to be merely a footnote to that of bigger stars, and a certainty that her story was worth telling for its own sake. More is the pity that she was such a private person and never published a memoir.

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Professional Tourist
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#111 Post by Professional Tourist » Mon Feb 02, 2009 3:10 pm

George Kaplan wrote:Matt, Professional Tourist, et al,
For many, many years (perhaps someone else here remembers as well) there was a rather famous instance of graffiti in Los Angeles that read "Agnes Moorehead Is God." It was painted in blue/green (?) letters, quite large - so that anyone in a passing car could easily read it - on a brick wall that was set back from the street. It was right in the heart of Hollywood, immediately north of Hollywood Blvd., just off the "Walk Of Fame." If memory serves me right, it was very near or just across from Tick Tock Restaurant. One of the most fascinating aspects of it was that it remained untouched for many, many years.
Must be this one:

Image

:D :D
George Kaplan wrote:More is the pity that she was such a private person and never published a memoir.
I don't think that would ever have happened, even if she had lived to see the semi-retirement she had been planning for the mid-seventies. There is a possibility that AM kept a journal/diary since she did like to write, but in thirty-four years one has yet to surface. I think if she did keep a journal, she may have destroyed it before her final illness. But who knows, perhaps as with Kay Francis one will turn up eventually -- that would be an incredible find. Biographer Charles Tranberg went through her archives at Wisconsin State Historical Society, but I don't think he went through her personal library and papers at Muskingum College in Ohio -- if there's a diary still in existence anywhere, it's probably either at Muskingum or hidden away somewhere at her old farm (which now also belongs to Muskingum).

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HerrSchreck
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#112 Post by HerrSchreck » Mon Feb 02, 2009 6:50 pm

It's more than just bullshit, thought you're of course correct. It's a suppressive ideological agenda.

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George Kaplan
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#113 Post by George Kaplan » Mon Feb 02, 2009 10:24 pm

Professional Tourist wrote:Must be this one:

Image
I'd say so. Thanks.

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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#114 Post by accatone » Tue Feb 03, 2009 7:47 am

HerrSchreck wrote:Here's something to sink your choppers …
Thanks Schreck! I was looking for further info/dismissals of Sirk from Patalas and (J.M.?) Straub but was unfortunatly not able to find anything - in fact i only read about Patalas Sirk retrospective in Munich http://www.zeit.de/1973/45/Die-Melodramen-kommen-wieder" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;. Your Horak quote points out quite clear what could be the bottom line of what i found online (rather quick research and i am in not really a Sirk aficinade) that is the reactionary tone of Sirks work. (to put it very short!)

What are David Hares thoughts on the religious undertones of Sirks work? ;)

Edit: Many posts in before this one…just to make it clear, i am neutral to the different readings at this point but am interested in the reception and in how far 50s audiences were able to seperate the reactionary/relegious/melodramatical parts of the film from the rest that might be considered quite the "opposite".

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GringoTex
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#115 Post by GringoTex » Tue Feb 03, 2009 11:46 am

david hare wrote:Italy and Spain were also Fascist countries after 1936 so you also get a certain amount of proselytizing about Rossellini and his allegedly "fascist" wartime films - the whole thing is totally ludicrous.
On a related side note- I'm reading The Adventures of Roberto Rossellini right now and Gallagher argues that Italian cinema under Mussolini suffered less censorship than Hollywood cinema at the time. Apparently, Mussolini didn't believe in the effectiveness of propaganda films and hardly ever interfered.

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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#116 Post by accatone » Tue Feb 03, 2009 1:14 pm

Rossellini is a good "side note" as far as his early postwar films are quite different, nevertheless melodramatic, to Sirks "beautiful" formal palette. Is there a sirkian Edmund anywhere? And wasn't the effect of Magnani on my mother quite different than say Sirks womens? However this might be comparing Aepfel mit Birnen...

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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#117 Post by accatone » Wed Feb 04, 2009 5:43 am

Thanks David! Believe me i was not able to find anything in german language…however, as pointed out earlier i am still neutral so this was an interesting read. Actually i am not as much interested in his 30s films but the 50s and its reception so i better look out for some discussion in the next weeks off line…(Including old Daddy Wayne and Mama Magnani). The difference between humanism and religion/mysticism is too difficult for me to discuss online nevertheless i can see where you are coming from in terms of "broad literal tropes" - but do not feel good with "wishy washy"…

As for the Italien Cinema here is Godards praise / 3a - Histoire(s) du Cinema.

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Michael
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#118 Post by Michael » Wed Feb 04, 2009 10:44 am

I can’t put a finger on what is that makes Sirk’s films stand out of all Hollywood melodramas/weepies. I think every Sirk’s Hunter-produced Technicolor is a masterpiece and yes, that counts Magnificent Obsession too. (I've watched it three times in one week already).While MO’s crazy plot prevents itself from topping All That Heaven Allows and Imitation of Life, MO is still a masterpiece in various areas: lush and brilliant mise en scene, shadings of emotions, the unique rhythym of its editing of images and sounds: there are stretches of silence between hilarious chorus ahhhhings that are really smoldering, making the images burn deeper. And of course, the divine tailoring of a nervous gay man into a Hollywood star. I’ve seen so many melos, Davies, Minnelli, Visconti, etc and none of them matches the zenith of Sirk’s. Every year I sit down with the marathon of his Technicolors at least twice and why is that I find his films remain so watchable after so many years?

It’s no question that his films are the most beautiful of 1950s cinema.

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Napier
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#119 Post by Napier » Wed Feb 04, 2009 11:18 am

Michael, your wonderful posts keep making me want to see this more and more. I love Sirk films but have not seen this yet. It is still out of stock on my Baker & Taylor order. But the way you speak of this film the anticipation of finally being able to stoke my wood stove up and sit back and watch and digest MO is killing me. ](*,)

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mfunk9786
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#120 Post by mfunk9786 » Wed Feb 04, 2009 12:15 pm

I enjoyed every minute of this one, and I'm still trying to talk the missus into giving it a try. It's not going well.

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Michael
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#121 Post by Michael » Wed Feb 04, 2009 1:03 pm

mfunk9786 wrote:I enjoyed every minute of this one, and I'm still trying to talk the missus into giving it a try. It's not going well.
LQ? She's probably being bewitched by the magic and charm of New Orleans. Give her some time.

Is that your first Sirk?

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LQ
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#122 Post by LQ » Wed Feb 04, 2009 1:26 pm

We don't leave 'til Friday, so that's no excuse ;) Now that I've been called out though, I suppose I have to watch it. Someone a few pages back deemed it a "soppy melodrama" and unlike that poster, I typically do not enjoy such films!

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mfunk9786
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#123 Post by mfunk9786 » Wed Feb 04, 2009 3:12 pm

Oh LQ. You love melodrama when it's bitchy and French, give schmaltzy and American a try.

And yes, it was my first Sirk, so I had no real idea what to expect going in. What I found was a visually spectacular, soapy mess of a movie that somehow, despite the absurd plot, knew exactly what it wanted to be. I've never really seen such a film with such an absurd storyline keep its focus so effortlessly. I was riveted even if I knew what was coming.

Would I be well-served by going for All That Heaven Allows next?

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swo17
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#124 Post by swo17 » Wed Feb 04, 2009 3:27 pm

mfunk9786 wrote:Would I be well-served by going for All That Heaven Allows next?
Does the pope wear a funny hat?

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HerrSchreck
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Re: 457 Magnificent Obsession

#125 Post by HerrSchreck » Wed Feb 04, 2009 3:38 pm

mfunk9786 wrote:Oh LQ. You love melodrama when it's bitchy and French, give schmaltzy and American a try.

And yes, it was my first Sirk, so I had no real idea what to expect going in. What I found was a visually spectacular, soapy mess of a movie that somehow, despite the absurd plot, knew exactly what it wanted to be. I've never really seen such a film with such an absurd storyline keep its focus so effortlessly. I was riveted even if I knew what was coming.

Would I be well-served by going for All That Heaven Allows next?
Don't even think of having a complete collection of Essential Cinema without it, or ponder the mise en scene of Fassbinder or Haynes.

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