Dame Elizabeth TAYLOR is superb as the archetypal woman who desires men's desire somewhat more than the men themselves. She completely inhabits her role as a woman whose sense of her own femininity lies in fierce, passionate loyalty to one man. (Seeing this excellent [& beautiful] performer makes you wonder what went wrong in her later, less interesting, acting years). Paul NEWMAN is also very good in the more muted role of a physically injured man who also possesses psychological issues he runs away from via alcohol. His use of crutches provides an ideal visual counterpart to his need of an emotional crutch.
The supporting cast also excel, particularly Burl IVES as the unloving family patriarch and (another Dame) Judith ANDERSON as his self deluded wife. IVES' character is more of a boss than a father and rather more concerned to pass his seed on to the next generation than deal maturely with the present. He showers people with gifts rather than truly love.
there is a palpable sense of heat in this movie – both meteorological and sensual - symbolized by Taylor's prickly (cat on a hot tin roof) performance. Her sex starvation and childlessness eat away at her wife in love with a man who cannot bear to even touch her because he is still overwrought by the death of his best (male) friend (or perhaps lover). All this before the sub tropical rainstorm that will inevitably follow as part of the denouement.
Where things go a little awry is in the implicit gayness of NEWMAN's character being evaded to the detriment of this cinema version of Tennessee WILLIAM's stage play of the same name. Even though the emotional intensity remains. The basic theme is one of both private and public mendacity. The kind of lying caused by not wishing to hurt others' feelings (& expose ones own); making it more likely that they (& you) will be hurt even more in the long run. This somewhat compromised film - by the Hollywood censorship standards of 1958 – reveals a paradoxical flaw: A film about lies that is partly a lie itself.
Nevertheless, this is the kind of intense, dysfunctional family gothic melodrama that made so many old style Hollywood movies worth watching. The actors used to tear up the scenery for our entertainment – but not any more though.
Copyright © 2009 Frank TALKER. Permission granted to reproduce and distribute it in any format; provided that mention of the author’s Weblog (http://franktalker5.blogspot.com/) is included: E-mail notification requested. All other rights reserved.
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