Heat Lightning

In many ways, this film reminds me of another Warner Brothers film made just a few years later, "The Petrified Forest". Both are set at isolated gas stations in the desert and both involve gangsters who come there to seek shelter. However, the films are certainly different enough to make it worth seeing them both.

Olga (Aline MacMahon) is a world-weary soul who has chosen to move into the middle of nowhere because she's tired of people. Her sister, Myrna (Ann Dvorak), however, isn't tired of people and yearns for excitement and men-- and the pair couldn't be more different. Into their very dull and predictable lives come an assortment of folks to stay at their gas station/motor court. One pair are a couple of divorcées on their way from Reno after their latest conquest. Another are a pair of crooks on the run from the law. In a coincidence you'll only see in a play or movie, it turns out the boss (Preston Foster) was once Olga's lover! What's next? See the film.

There are two main things going for this film--Foster and MacMahon. Their characters are interesting and the final scene between them is something to see! Unfortunately, Dvorak's role is very whiny and annoying--and the character significantly impairs the film with her overwrought performance. Overall, it is worth seeing but is far from brilliant work from the studio.

After reading several reviews that enjoyed the film, I almost did not write a comment.

However, after reading the one comparing it to a poor man's Petrified Forest, I wanted to say that's just plain unfair.

I, was not around for the New York Times drab review in 1934, like the previous reviewer, but I can form my own opinion. I really liked the movie. Aline McMahon, pulled off the difficult character of playing a woman mechanic/business owner, and Preston Foster played the crook on the lam quite believable for the situation he was in.

I personally wish Ann Dvorak had more of a developed part, I always like her, but sadly hers was the least developed of the several interesting characters in the film. Obviously made on a small budget, it's just unfair to compare this to Petrified Forest. They are not the same film at all.

Heat Lightning is tied with The Adventure of Robins Hood as my favorite Warner's film. It's always a pleasure to watch Aline MacMahon, but here I think she gives an Oscar worthy performance. She and Preston Foster smolder! Aline's slowly changing attitude is wondrous to behold. Her final scene with Foster is memorable. A lot of the Warner's stock company come and go throughout the film, always giving freshness to their roles. The daytime location and cinematography perfectly capture the feel of the desert. (I live near Tucson.) The night time scenes, although well matched, are shot on a sound stage, and so, are not as effective. But I suppose they were necessary for the lightning effects. This a film that will stay with you. And make you want to watch it again.

If you like a subtle and mature superbly acted drama with just enough humour to keep it light, you should enjoy this. Although an awful lot happens, the action somehow manages to seem inconsequential compared with the oppressive mundanity of the desert.

This film has a very modern feel to it. Set in an isolated oasis in the Nevada desert there's little to tie it down to a particular time - were it not for the old cars, it could be now. The other thing which makes this timeless is the acting, specifically that of Aline MacMahon whose character is the focus of this film. Being from the 'method school' her characterisation is much more natural than was typical in the early thirties. It's an outstanding performance.

She plays Olga who runs this little 'service station' isolated from the outside world, isolated, as we'll discover, from something in her past. We never quite find out what led her here, dragging her reluctant and resentful sister along and that's one of the things which makes this so intriguing. Whatever it was, she's not going to let it happen to her sister whom she keeps a tight rain on which in her sister's mind means stopping her having any fun.

She's content hiding from the world where her only interaction with people is with the strangers passing through. She's content hiding from who she was, hiding from being a woman until a sinister face from the past re-enters her life. When her mask slips, we perhaps get an idea of why she abandoned that former life.

It's totally addictive viewing but at the time you're not sure why. When it's over you realise that it's one of those pictures that you will always remember. Although the skies are bright and clear, the atmosphere is as thick as soup infused with something undefined but dark and dangerous. Its unrelenting oppressive heat permeates through the screen into your own world, you can taste the desert yourself - such is the brilliance of LeRoy's direction.

A fine example of minimalist film-making, this Warners B-pic offers a proto-feminist scenario delivered with some swell precode attitude. Two sisters (one world-weary, the other innocent) run a service-station-cum-caravansary on an isolated desert highway. Every passerby kids them about how dull and lonely this existence must be, but in the space of one night they serve host to a pair of criminals on the run, a couple of gold-diggers on the way back from Reno with their swag (and with a wise-guy chauffeur), plus a large family of Mexicans on the way to a fiesta.

The main thrust of the film is melodramatic, as even in their isolation the women cannot avoid mistreatment by treacherous men. However, it's also filled with neat little comic bits and clever wisecracks. Director Mervyn Le Roy creates plenty of atmosphere with few resources, and the cheap-jack desert-palms backdrop (with the Mexican father tenderly serenading his family in the background) sticks in the memory. Le Roy uses an almost slow-motion tracking shot to great effect to show the hallucinatory influence of an ex-lover on the older sister as he intrudes into this sweaty environment. And it's pretty clear that there's a lot of casual sleeping around going on -- a lot of the jokes and situations probably wouldn't have survived the censors if this were a more prominent picture (and definitely not a year later). But the picture never flaunts its raciness -- sex is just part of the fabric of life.

Though consistently enjoyable, the movie never builds up enough intensity to be classed with the immortal second features like Detour (though the climax does pack a punch). Surprisingly, the two leads never really click. Aline MacMahon and Ann Dvorak were always marvelously idiosyncratic in supporting roles, but here the former's baroque style seems overdone for the milieu, and the latter doesn't have much opportunity to vent her repressed passion (maybe the censor trimmed that bit). Overall, though, the performances from the many familiar faces are excellent, my particular favorite occurring in the opening scene featuring Edgar Kennedy as the henpecked spouse of Jane Darwell.

Definitely worth seeking out for aficionados (but hard to find). Some might compare it to The Petrified Forest, but it gives me a bit of an offbeat Shack Out on 101 vibe, too.