Native Son

Piere Chenal was a specialist of crime movies since the 30's but never directed a masterpiece (except "La Foire Aux Chimères, still not available on DVD) but all his movies were intelligently shot and "Le Dernier Tournant" (first movie adaptation of "The Postman Always Rings Twice") was admired by Orson Welles. During WWII and after, Pierre Chenal shot in Argentina some nice crime movies. "Native Son" was adapted and played by his author, Richard Wright, and shot first in Chicago then in Argentina. The movie had some success in south American countries but did nothing in USA where 40 minutes were cut. Richard Wright never saw the final cut. Pierre Chenal didn't want that cut print to be exploited in Europe. In the 80's, a 90 minutes print was found and exploited. If you want to know more about this very strange shooting, I advise you to read the six pages comments by Pierre Chenal in the book "Pierre Chenal" (collection 24 souvenirs / seconde). You will discover a very bright director and maybe want to discover his movies.

When Native Son was made in Argentina in 1950 some of the actors were not from the United States, thus they spoke English with accents not realistic for the characters they portrayed. Dialogue was then dubbed using the voices of local American residents of Buenos Aires. I was then a student at an American high school in BA; they came to the school looking for an American boy and girl to be the voices of Bigger Thomas' brother and sister. I did Vera Thomas' voice and a boy whose Dad was in the Navy did the voice of Bigger's brother. We got off school for two days and as I recall we were paid 300 pesos. Mr. Chanal drove us home afterwards. My big line was, "Eeek, eeek, a rat!". It's a long time ago but I seem to remember that some parts were actually played by non-actor local Americans. After 49 years, I saw this movie again in 1999 and couldn't believe how amateurish it is, but in many ways the making of this movie was Amateur Night, so that makes sense.

Imagine, if you will, J.D. Salinger playing Holden in a film adaptation of "Catcher In The Rye" or Lillian Hellman essaying Regina in "Little Foxes" instead of Bette Davis and you have some idea of the sheer awfulness of watching Richard Wright, actor, (as opposed to reading Richard Wright, writer), as he first hijacks and then smothers this film in a pillow of amateurishness. In this endeavor he is ably assisted by Gloria Madison as his girlfriend. Indeed the scenes featuring the two of them display the worst acting by a male/female duo, well, ever. Give it a D plus. PS...Little attempt is made to convince the viewer that he or she is not in Buenos Aires. How else to account for the plethora of palm trees in background shots?

Richard Wright's novels are famous in France.When he had to escape from his native land in the McCarthy years he lived in Sartre's and Camus' country .So it was only natural that the first version of his "native son" was filmed by a French.Pierre Chenal was not a beginner when he made "Native Son" aka " Sangre Negra"-it was actually made in Argentina- he considers his best work.But Chenal had already succeeded in the Film Noir genre:he was the first to adapt for the screen "the postman always rings twice" (Le Dernier Tournant) and "La Foire Aux Chimères " (starring Von Stroheim,one of his favorite actors) was his towering achievement.

Not only Wright adapted his own novel but he also played the part of Bigger.This is rather a mistake ,for Bigger is supposed to be about 25 and the novelist was in his forties and it shows.But it's interesting because it's very rare that a writer becomes an actor in one of his stories (another example is Erich Maria Remarque in Sirk's "a time to live and a time to die" ,but the German writer had a small supporting role).The budget was certainly rather low and the director is to be commanded for he made the best of it,particularly in the scene of Mary's "murder" and in the sequence of the nightmare (the cotton field and the building near decay where Bigger and his girlfriend are hiding). The movie is rather short (90min) and some of the aspects of the novel are botched : Mary and her boyfriend ,who are activist students ,want Bigger to join the union ,and the fiancé gives him "books" which are probably not politically correct,all this is only skimmed over.The Dalton family is a human one ,and Wright ,who was an "Uncle Tom"'s grandchild (his grandparents were slaves) does not make them the bad guys .Bigger is a victim of fate ,and of his condition:had he been white he would not have killed ,he never meant to do it.

As Leonard Maltin wrote ,it was defeated by its low budget.The 1986 remake,starring Victor Love,Elizabeth McGovern and Matt Dillon is pretty good .Both versions are worth a look.

... partially because the subject matter at the time it was made prevented it from being produced in the United States. Instead, much of it was shot in Argentina with Argentine actors and actresses who later had to be dubbed because you couldn't have people with South American accents in a film that was set in Chicago.

This is based on the novel by Richard Wright, and he adapted it for the screen and played the lead, African American Bigger Thomas, the oldest of three children of a widow woman whose husband was lynched in the South. The family fled to Chicago, and is living in squalor.

Bigger is a bitter fellow, considering the hopeless poverty the family is living in, and immediately he is established as a gray character. He procures a hand made gun and with his "gang", plans the armed robbery of a white owned establishment. This never goes off, basically because the group chickens out at the last minute. Yet when he is offered a job opportunity, chauffeur for the wealthy Dalton family, he accepts and shows up for the job.

But events overtake Bigger on the first day. He is supposed to drive the Daltons' college age daughter to the university library and wait for her, but she demands that he instead pick up her date, a labor leader and a radical, and drive them to black Chicago night spots. What is he to do? If he refused, Mary could get him fired. If he obeys, her dad could get him fired. He takes the path of least resistance and takes them to the night spots. When he returns home with Mary, she is so drunk she cannot stand up. If dad finds out what Bigger did, he is fired, so he carries her to her bedroom. Trying to get out of one bad situation leads to a worse situation which leads to Bigger accidentally killing Mary. He then disposes of her body in the most gruesome way possible. Her total disappearance the next morning has the wealthy parents believing she's been kidnapped. What happens from there? Watch and find out.

The point is, Bigger's behavior, at every turn, has been completely dominated by fear, and warranted fear at that - the fear of what happens to a black man if he is even suspected of having harmed a white girl at this point in history. He had my complete sympathy in this situation, but then he does some things that somewhat made me lose that sympathy. It really does take some unexpected turns.

The production values were actually quite good. Time was taken to make buildings, the mansion, and the nightclubs look authentic. Perhaps lots of it was shot on location or the equivalent of it in Argentina. One of the big problems is that Richard Wright is 43 years old and playing somebody 20 years younger. And although he does look young for his age he does not look like he is in his twenties. Another problem is that some of the actors are stiff and the dialogue a bit stilted. Yet it is very much worth seeing. Kino Lorber recently restored this film to its original length since almost half of it was missing from what was allowed to be seen in America because of the censorship of the era.