Gefangen

"Caught" isn't really a film noir notwithstanding the dramatic scenes in a darkened mansion. It's more a psychological exploration of a gold digger's conversion from pursuit of the rich to love of the pure. Barbara Bel Geddes is very effective as an attractive but poor working class girl not blessed with beauty but guided by a desire for opulence.

Before she can meet the love of her life she allows herself to be swept off her proletarian clods by Robert Ryan who once again is nearly perfect as a character exhibiting crass ruthlessness topped off by a nice dollop of madness. James Mason is a very human M.D., far more likable than the saccharine-sweet screen doctors of the past. He's a pediatrician I wouldn't have minded having when I was a kid.

What is surprising is the ending of this film, one that would be inconceivable today and must have seemed weird to many, particularly women, even then. Of course I won't reveal the resolution but "Caught" is a film very available for rental and well worth the less than ninety minutes it takes to watch an excellent cast tell a good story.

The film contains noirish elements rather actually being of the genre but it is still a most beautifully photographed b/w movie. Some Ophuls trademark shooting, particularly with regard to the wonderfully shot staircase sequences and the dance club scenes where the camera seems to glide with a life its own. Great performances are central to the film's success because we do get close to melodrama and the horrific portrayal by Robert Ryan as the ruthless, almost psychotic millionaire and the highly effective playing by Barbara Bel Geddes, keep this morality tale from becoming too sentimental. James Mason does well enough as the barely believable doctor with a heart of gold and other bit parts all help hold this raging beast together.

In 1947, in Los Angeles, an ambitious waitress from Denver dreams on marrying a millionaire. She joins the Dorothy Dale's School of Charm with financial difficulties and after the conclusion of the course, she changes her name to Leonora Eames (Barbara Bel Geddes) and starts modeling in a fancy shop. She is invited by Franzi Kartos (Curt Bois), who is the assistant of the wealthy Smith Ohlrig (Robert Ryan), to go to a party in the Ohlrig's yacht and she meets him in the harbor by chance. She refuses a one-night stand with Ohlrig and the powerful man decides to get married with her to have her. Sooner Leonora learns that money does not necessarily bring happiness and love and she unsuccessfully asks the divorce, but Ohlrig refuses. Leonora leaves Ohlrig and the luxury life in Long Island and finds a job of receptionist of the obstetrician Dr. Hoffman (Frank Ferguson) and the pediatrician Larry Quinada (James Mason) in the East Side. Leonora does not work well and she quits her job. Meanwhile Ohlrig visits her and tells that he misses her and Leonora returns to the mansion in Long Island. Sooner she finds that the invitation was just a notion of Ohlrig and she returns to the East Side. Dr. Quinada and she fall in love for each other, but Leonora finds that she is pregnant from Ohlrig. She feels divided between her love for Quinada and the security of her baby with Ohlrigand she needs to take a decision.

"Caught" is a melodramatic story about a woman whose dream is to get married with a wealthy man that finds that she has been bought by her husband to live as a decorative wife living like a prisoner in a golden cage. Robert Ryan performs another villain, as usual, and the cinematography in black and white and framing follow the usual standard of Max Ophüls. This film is wrongly classified as film-noir. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "Coração Prisioneiro" ("Prisoner Heart")

Barbara Bel Geddes is perfect as a starry-eyes young woman who wants to make something of herself. She goes to charm school. Who would ever dream that a young lady in such a cloistered setting would meet and be wooed by a fabulously wealthy eccentric!

"Caught" is cast in a unique manner. Maybe it was the director's lack of familiarity with American performers. More likely, these are the people who were most eager to work under him. Whatever the reason for his choosing Robert Ryan to play the millionaire, it was brilliant casting: Ryan was a superb actor. He was tall and intense. In his most famous noirs, he plays cops or military men. Yet the character he plays here is withdrawn, well-spoken, and even a bit effete. He's in analysis, to boot! It's an exceptionally good performance that today would win an actor all sorts of awards.

James Mason is also cast very much against type: He plays a doctor who treats poor people for little or no pay. (Light years, not just a bit more than a decade, away from his Humbert Humbert!) And Ryan has a manservant who plays piano and calls everyone, male or female, "darling!" He is played to perfection by Curt Bois.

"Letter from an Unknown Woman" is a lovely film and probably Ophuls' most famous American work. It'd dreamy, romantic, heartbreaking. "Caught" is very different -- I would place it squarely as film noir. However, it does not lack for his famous shots of people ascending staircases and doing other graceful things beautifully.

If only for Ryan's performance, "Caught" is a must. And there is far more to it than that one performance.

Caught is directed by Max Ophüls and adapted to screenplay by Arthur Laurents from the novel Wild Calendar written by Libbie Block. It stars Barbara Bel Geddes, Robert Ryan, James Mason, Frank Ferguson and Curt Bois. Music is by Frederick Hollander and cinematography by Lee Garmes.

Seeking to make a comfy nest by marrying a rich man, Leonora Eames (Geddes) snags more than she bargained for when Smith Ohlrig (Ryan) becomes the man of her life. And then circumstance brings Doctor Larry Quinada (Mason) in to her life and things will never be the same again...

Psychological swirls a go go in this fine piece of work. Story was changed somewhat by Ophüls after he was brought in as a last directing throw of the dice. Softening the harsh edges of Leonora's original persona on the page, he brings about a sort of piggy in the middle scenario. On one side she has a tyrant control freak of a husband, on the other she has a good honest gentleman doctor keen to impart his love to her life. It sounds an easy choice to make, but circumstance, the vagaries of noirish fate - of life affirming decisions, doesn't make this a straight forward narrative piece.

Smith Ohlrig is based on Howard Hughes, who surprisingly didn't kick up too much of a fuss once the word got out. This is one troubled character, mean and controlling, superbly portrayed by a chilling Robert Ryan, it's just a pity there isn't time in the piece for more of Ryan's forceful nastiness. The best scenes feature Ryan, the shamble of the marriage is adroitly filmed by Ophüls around the gloomy Ohlrig mansion, with reverse shots, perception tinkerings and isolated shadow play emphasising the relationship from hell - the impact of Lee Garmes' (Nightmare Alley) photography and the art direction of Frank Paul Sylos (The Great Flamarion) also not to be under estimated.

Leonora is a well written character, it would have been easy to have her as weak willed and spineless, but there's a strong feminist bent afforded her by the makers, giving her some guts and intelligence to off set the desperate situation she will find herself in later in the play. Geddes ticks all the right boxes for the emotional requirements of the role, never over doing the histrionics. Mason saunters into the pic with a grace and elegance that made the American market sit up and take notice, a class act and he fits the role perfectly. Ophüls steers this one admirably throughout, arriving at a culminating finale that's guaranteed to make you have conflicting feelings. 8/10