 |
William Wyler
|
Remembering William Wyler
Counsellor at Law
The Good Fairy
The Love Trap/Directed By William Wyler
Unrated
1933, 1935, 1929/1986, Kino
Average moviegoers might not recognize the name William Wyler anymore, but they certainly know his movies -- Ben Hur, The Best Years of Our Lives, Mrs. Miniver and Roman Holiday all remain popular films. Wyler's advocates, of whom there are many, point to Dodsworth, his 1936 adaptation of the Sinclair Lewis novel, and 1939's Wuthering Heights, starring Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon as Emily Bront's mismatched lovers, as proof of his directing talent.
Before Wyler earned a reputation with his 1937 social drama Dead End and partnered with producer Samuel Goldwyn and cinematographer Gregg Toland, he directed two-reel Westerns, silent features and small-budget movies at Universal Pictures. Like many early filmmakers, Wyler basically learned his craft through experience.
A trio of DVD releases brings newfound attention to three of Wyler's early films. The part-silent/part-talkie virtue drama The Love Trap and the romantic comedy The Good Fairy, starring Margaret Sullavan as a cinema usher who attracts a trio of wealthy admirers, aren't what I would call Wyler's preeminent pictures, but they're worth revisiting just the same.
In The Love Trap, Laura La Plante plays Evelyn, a down-and-out chorus girl whose newlywed happiness is jeopardized when the groom's uncle remembers her from a wild party. It's efficiently made but fails to make an emotional impact, mostly due to La Plante's transparent performance.
The Good Fairy is a bubbly comic drama thanks to Preston Sturges' clever screenplay and Sullavan's believable innocence, although it remains best known as the film where Wyler and Sullavan met before marrying.
The best film of the three Wyler reissues is Counsellor at Law (1933), starring John Barrymore as a successful Manhattan attorney in one of his best screen performances. As fast-paced as any screwball comedy, Wyler surrounds the film's wit and colorful characters with substantial themes about class bias, political corruption and anti-Semitism. Screenwriter Elmer Rice (adapting the story from his own play) keeps the subplots about infidelity, career scandal and unrequited office love affairs moving briskly. The Wyler "touch" in Counsellor at Law remains Barrymore's larger-than-life performance. The film reminds us what Wyler has always done best in his films -- get great work out of his leading actors.
The best bonus feature is Aviva Slesin's matter-of-fact 1986 documentary, Directed By William Wyler, found on The Love Trap DVD. Famous colleagues like John Huston and Lillian Hellman debate the origins of Wyler's directing skills. Bette Davis, who worked with him frequently, jokes about his fastidious directing style, which earned him the nickname "Ninety-Take Wyler."
"I have no signature," says Wyler, speaking late in Slesin's film. "Which is a big artistic demerit."
Watching the DVD reissue of Counsellor at Law leads to a different interpretation. The Wyler "touch" is his way with actors, and that's as important as anything to do with camera lenses, editing or genre.
Counsellor at Law grade: A.
The Good Fairy grade: B.
The Love Trap/Directed By William Wyler grade: C.
And the rest
Director Paul Justman captures the sounds and spirit behind the Funk Brothers, a group of studio musicians who worked together at Motown Records in the 1960s, in his rousing documentary film Standing in the Shadows of Motown (Artisan). The history surrounding these Motown musicians is fascinating, but Justman wisely allows their music to take center stage. ... The real-life confrontation between British troops and nonviolent marchers in Derry, Northern Ireland, comes to brutal life in writer/director Paul Greengrass' tense drama Bloody Sunday (Paramount). Greengrass strips the film of any nationalistic nostalgia, showing the mistakes made on both sides, and the film is grittier, bolder and more realistic for it.
Printer-friendly version
