Johnny Guitar (1954) - Nicholas Ray

As I sit in my kitchen writing this review two days after catching Johnny Guitar at the cinema, I still can't make up my mind about what I thought of it. On the down side I thought it a little overlong and very over dramatic, however I was absolutely shattered and felt like I needed to have a sleep, not watch a film. So not the best conditions to watch a slow burning drama under. The plus side far outweighs the negative though, seeing Crawford rip through everything in sight like a barely restrained pit bull is the sort of thing that would bring me back for more. The same goes for the supporting cast (i.e. everyone else), who are all acting in Crawford's formidable shadow. Special mention in particular to both Mercedes McCambridge who gives as good as she gets and stops the film from becoming lopsided, and Sterling Hayden who gets some juicy lines and as one of the greats is always watchable.

I get the feeling that maybe Nicholas Ray's films are always better on second viewing, after all that was definitely the case with In a Lonely Place for me, so maybe it's the same with this. The thing is I've never been a huge fan of melodramas, and if Johnny Guitar is one thing it's a melodrama. It's also one of the strangest films to ever have a western tag hoisted upon it, all those usual things that one comes to expect from a western are either absent or shoved way into the backround. If anything this is an anti western, or a western turned inside out. For a start the whole film centers around the power struggle between Joan Crawford's Vienna and Mercedes McCambridge's Emma. The men in the film only exist as part of the females stories. Now that's quite odd for a start. Back in the dark ages of the 50's women were homemakers, wives, mothers or sex symbols, very rarely would they be portrayed as anything else, especially in films, where they only really existed as a crutch for the male characters. Well that's all turned on it's head here, along with quite a bit else.

This isn't your gunslinging, set 'em up at the bar, head 'em off at the pass style western. No-sir-ree-Bob. Ray chooses to keep the majority of the action firmly out of the audiences view. The robbing of the stagecoach at the start of the film is shown from way up high, so that you can't really see what is going on. The same goes for the bank robbery in the middle of the film, we cut to two characters talking outside rather than stay with the action inside. The real action in this film comes via the friction between Vienna and those around her. Vienna is as feisty as any female character I can think of. She's saved from a hanging by Sterling Hayden (the Johnny of the title), but within five minutes has returned the favour by hiding them both in a silver mine.

Crawford is wonderful, she has the dramatic poise of a silent era star, for most of the film she is in the dead center of the frame. She also hardly gets any profile shots, almost all of her dialogue is spoken facing the audience. It's kind of weird, but this isn't a film that feels in any way steeped in realism. I don't really know enough about Ray nor feel that I've seen anywhere near enough of his work to be able to pick out themes and suchlike. There seems to be a love of outsiders and stubborn loners though, along with vivid splashes of colour. He's good at starting and ending films too, this one begins with a huge explosion and ends like all the other Ray films I've seen, rather ambiguously. He doesn't seem to deal in absolutes, and it feels as if his films continue long after the credits have rolled.

I was struck by the similarity between this film and Sergio Leone's epic Once Upon a Time in the West. The idea of a new town waiting for the arrival of the railroad so that it can spark into life, and the obvious strong leading lady. I'll probably have more to say after I've watched this for a second time, with a cup of coffee and a bit more of an idea of what awaits me.

In a Lonely Place (1950) - Nicholas Ray

Bit of strange one this, it's noir but not as we know it. There's no guns, gangsters, running from the cops, heists, no huge shadows even, in fact it's none of the things we come to expect from a noir flick. But then this isn't just a film noir, it's got touches of melodrama and has a murder mystery running through the background to boot. At it's heart though it's a guy meets gal film, romantic in a dark smokey twisted sort of way.

Bogart plays screenwriter (see I told you it wasn't your run of the mill noir, didn't I), Dixon Steele. Dix has a temper on him, the opening scene alone see's Bogie offering to lamp someone when he stops his car at a traffic light, he ends giving just about every person that he runs into a slap at some point or other in the film. He's not a likable guy, yet played by Bogart you can't help but feel for him. Those hangdog features, the sad eyes, the downcast looks they almost make you forget just what a heel the guy is, almost. Gloria Grahame is Laurel Gray, newly moved in across the courtyard from Dix. You know those women that only seem to exist in American films from the 50's, all pointy bras and sassy in a way that no person on earth could be? Well that's Gloria. She's no dumb broad, she's independent and a great foil for Bogart. You wouldn't call her a dame, not to her face at any rate. Well of course Dix falls for her and that's really what the film is about. There is a murder in there but that's kind of secondary (it happens off screen), it pushes our lovers together and then pulls them back apart. It keeps the pressure on the relationship, since both the cops and the audience are uncertain whether Dix did the bad deed or not. Gloria first meets Dix when she provides him with an alibi. It's one of the many great scenes in the film between the two leads, not great in the way it's lit, directed or edited, great in the way the dialogue is delivered by Grahame and Bogart. The two policemen in the room with them melt into the background, I think it's around here that it becomes obvious that Ray is going to focus on the relationship between these two, and not the murder that had been the focal point up to now.

Any film that is going to put a screenwriter under a microscope had better be well written, and In a Lonely Place is just that, and then some. The plot is as tight as a seventies footballers perm, the dialogue is the sort that you wished you'd said, yet know that if you cribbed it people would think you a right wally. 'I was born when she kissed me. I died when she left me. I lived a few weeks while she loved me.' Wonderful stuff, Bogart does this kind of thing in his sleep. The timbre of his voice is perfect for these kind of lines, he really sells them. He even makes smoking seem cool, you can see why a generation took him to their hearts. He may have only had three expressions when acting, but he uses them so devastatingly. I really don't know what more to say about this film, since I don't want to give away any plot. It really is one of those films that deserves to be praised to the heavens. Put it this way, from now on if I read a list of great films from the 50's and this isn't on it, then I'll know just how clueless said list is. Convinced yet? What is the lonely place that the title eludes to? Is it the the site of the murder, Hollywood itself or Dixon's heart? I know what I think, I'll be surprised if you can guess how it all pans out, now there's something you can't write about every film.

I've seen this twice, this time the way God intended (at the cinema) and the print was beautiful. There are a couple of great lighting moments when Bogart's eyes are highlighted as he goes into a frenzy telling a story, which are the sort of touches I adore in these older films. I'm not really all that au fait with Nicholas Ray (hey that rhymes, maybe I should make a hipster T with that on it), but that's all going to change this year. He's someone who I'm determined to see a few films by before 2011 becomes 2012.