Die Straße der Erfolgreichen

Trying to pass off Joan Crawford, then heading toward her mid-'40s, as a plausible nautch-dancer in the side-show of an itinerant carnival proves a misstep from which Michael Curtiz' Flamingo Road barely recovers. But, once the layers of accrued campiness that cling to it are peeled back (and once Crawford discards her Salome-like veils), the movie, far-fetched as it is, generates some interest.

Owing to unpaid bills or some such, the traveling show, in which Crawford was a steamy if not entirely fresh attraction, blows town. Sheriff's deputy Zachary Scott, sent across the tracks to make sure the whole unsavory business has packed up, finds only Crawford, listening to her radio in a mildewed tent. Sparks are struck; he invites her back to town for the blue-plate special in the local beanery and finagles a job for her there as a waitress.

His superior, corrupt sheriff Sydney Greenstreet, sniffs out the burgeoning romance and vows to quash it; he has plans to run Scott for the senate of their anonymous Gulf state (its capital is Olympic City and its capitol a lovingly detailed piece of scenery painting), prerequisite to which is a proper marriage to a bona-fide local girl. Scott glumly acquiesces to the plan, drowning his doubts in drink ("I crawled into a bottle and can't get out"), while Greenstreet frames Crawford on a morals charge and runs her out of town.

New to the mix is David Brian, boss of the state political machine, whose eye is caught by Crawford (now back in town working in the obligatory "roadhouse" operated by Gladys George). He has a whopper of a hangover ("A party's like insurance – the older you are, the more it costs," he says), which Crawford assuages with an eye-opening whiskey sour followed by a home-cooked breakfast. Never underestimate the power of a well-scrambled egg. Next thing, they're married and living in a mansion on high-toned Flamingo Road (complete with a housemaid with the voice and the brain of a parakeet, as in the earlier Curtiz/Crawford Mildred Pierce, except that this time she's not Butterfly McQueen and is, amazingly for the era, white). But Greenstreet starts pulling even filthier strings than Brian – for once, a passably good egg – can countenance. Whereupon, after a drastic development involving the besotted Scott, Crawford slips a handgun into her clutch-bag and pays Greenstreet an amicable visit....

With at least two sensational movies behind him (Casablanca and Mildred Pierce), and one ahead of him (The Unsuspected), Curtiz can be forgiven for Flamingo Road. He brings it some verve, but its identity as yet another of Crawford's rags-to-riches vehicles gets the better of him. While his star supplies some startlingly naturalistic acting (and while the uncharacteristically clean-shaven Scott and the characteristically portly Greenstreet are dependably professional), Flamingo Road has fallen, rather unarguably, into the disreputable if transfixing gulch called camp. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

"Flamingo Road" is one of those Joan from the other side of the tracks ending up living large film, and it's great. After how many years of doing these roles, at 45, Crawford still pulled them off with aplomb. She's wonderful to watch in this.

I remember seeing this at a revival cinema, on a big screen, and it was the first time I realized how petite a woman she was - but she always seemed so tall!

In this film, Crawford plays a ex-carny girl who takes up with Zachary Scott. Scott is the protégé of a ruthless political boss, played by Sydney Greenstreet. He turns out to be too weak-willed to do anything but stay under Greenstreet's thumb. He marries someone more proper while Greenstreet does everything he can to drive Crawford out of town.

When Crawford winds up married to an even more powerful man than Greenstreet, he seeks to destroy both her and her husband.

David Brian is excellent as Crawford's husband, as is Gladys George as a roadhouse owner for whom Crawford works briefly. Scott does register as a wimp, stripped of his romantic underpinnings in "Mildred Pierce."

And then we come to Sydney Greenstreet. You're telling me he lived five years after this film? I would have easier believed he dropped dead immediately afterward.

He looks pasty and horrendous as he downs pitchers of milk, slurs his dialogue, and laughs in a very unworldly way - kind of a hah-hah, a sharp intake of breath, and then a higher pitched laugh that sounds like a hiccup. Always a sinister presence on the screen, Greenstreet comes off as evil, all right, but also ill in this production.

"Flamingo Road" became a television series in the '80s. I'll take the original.

Like a dry Martini with just a tad too much vermouth, garnished with an olive that hasn't been washed of its brine, this one can leave a nasty taste if you're looking for something that goes down smoothly. But if you're not too fastidious, this Crawford star vehicle is almost ridiculously entertaining. Joan might have been just a little long in the tooth to be playing a hoochy-coochy carnival girl in the film's opening sequence but it isn't long before she's on her way up, constantly being tripped on that inexorable climb by one of the slimiest villains that Sydney Greenstreet ever played. Warners trowels on the class "A" production values (except for some glaring back projections at a construction site) and Michael Curtiz's direction is, as usual, briskly efficient, getting the best from everyone in the cast, principal and supporting players alike, except perhaps for Greenstreet who really doesn't look well at all and seems to be struggling against imminent collapse in some scenes. (He made only one picture after this one and died from complications of diabetes about five years later.)

Max Steiner contributes his usual melodically overwrought score (with heavy reliance on the popular song, "If I Could Be One Hour With You [Tonight]"), lushly orchestrated by Murray Cutter, under the musical direction of that Warners stalwart, Ray Heindorf. It's almost too distracting but the frequently crackling dialogue keeps the audience's attention focused on the pulpy proceedings. Ted McCord's black-and-white cinematography is an outstanding example of why not every picture should be in color and I suspect that it was Travilla who was given the task of gowning Crawford once she'd finally crossed over to the right side of the tracks. (Sheila O'Brien, also credited, probably ran up those nifty waitress uniforms and the prison garb Crawford gets to wear not once, but twice!)

They really, REALLY don't make 'em like this anymore, and thank goodness Turner Classic Movies, for instance, trundles a tasty morsel like this out of their archives every once in a while for us to savor once again.

Flamingo Road is not the best Joan Crawford film ever done. But it surely is one of the most entertaining with a few unforgettable characters in the film. No wonder it got picked to be the basis for a night time soap opera in the Eighties.

Sydney Greenstreet is one of those larger than life characters in every sense of the word. His southern county sheriff dominates this film. I would have to say it is my third favorite Greenstreet role, next to The Maltese Falcon and The Hucksters. Joan Crawford good as she is loses all the joint scenes when she's on the screen with Greenstreet.

Joan's a carnival girl stranded in Greenstreet's town and picked up by Greenstreet's deputy Zachary Scott. Greenstreet has big political plans for Scott which include a proper marriage with some modern version of Melanie Hamilton. Virginia Huston's the girl he has in mind.

After Crawford doesn't take Greenstreet's advice and leave town, he has her framed on a prostitution rap. After doing a six month stretch Crawford is understandably wanting vengeance. She takes a job at a road house run by Gladys George where a lot of the state bigwigs meet and enjoy all forms of pleasurable relaxation.

The characters in Flamingo Road jump right out at you, they really were made for a night time soap opera. Of course Crawford is great as she and new husband and ally David Brian gives her a new found respectability. The best portrayal in the film besides Crawford and Greenstreet goes to Gladys George. She's a southern version of the Texas Guinan like character she played in The Roaring Twenties.

If you like soap opera and revenge this is the film for you.

This film is a joy to watch, even if defies logic. The narrative is convoluted, to put it mildly. Joan Crawford as a carnival girl? That's a stretch of the imagination. From the very beginning, watching Ms Crawford and the two other dancing women, the viewer realizes that he has to be kind to this film. Her take on Lane Bellamy is vintage Crawford!

This must have been a vehicle for the star right after her star turn in Mildred Pierce. It has some of the same people behind it, like director Michael Curtiz and Zachary Scott. The dialogue is something to be treasured. They don't make films like this anymore. Just imagine what panache Ms Crawford brought to anything she appeared in.

The cast that was assembled for this film is probably impossible to match. The great Sydney Greenstreet is so good as the evil sheriff Titus Semple, that we stay riveted looking at his every move. David Brian as the man who loves Lane and rescues her from poverty is also an asset. The minor players, Gladys George, Fred Clark and Virginia Huston, among others fit right into the story.

But this is a Joan Crawford's film. She dominates every scene in which she appears. What power she conveys with only an economy of gestures. No one working in films these days can come near to this actress, who left her own imprint in the canon of American cinema, not to be equaled by anyone any time soon.