The Scoundrel

In 1934 Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur made an independent film starring Claude Rains and Margo called CRIME WITHOUT PASSION. The results were moderately interesting, so the two creators returned to movie production in 1935 with THE SCOUNDREL. Now their star was not just a great actor like Rains, but the leading British playwrite (except for Bernard Shaw) of the first half of the 20th Century - Noel Coward. Coward plays a book editor who is brilliant, brittle, witty, and totally amoral. He has many literary acquaintances, but no friends. Not that these literary figures (Alexander Woolcott, Lionel Stander, Eduardo Cianelli) are really likeable enough to merit having friends of their own. Indeed these people are so self-centered that one wonders how they can relate to humanity enough to have good taste in writing, publishing, or even playing music (Coward's second girlfriend is a pianist who is as cold as he is).

The wit of the lines of dialogue, no matter how hard Coward can give them, is not on par with the lines of witty dialogue from Coward's PRIVATE LIVES or BLYTHE SPIRIT. Hecht and MacArthur could write funny material in a farce like THE FRONT PAGE or TWENTIETH CENTURY (or Hecht's solo work, in say NOTHING SACRED), but they were not brittle or delicate. So that Coward's amoral attitude starts to drag after awhile. Then the film turns into a search for emotional catharsis. Coward dies in an airplane crash in the Caribbean, but his unhappy spirit returns to earth. His acquaintances do not heed his warnings about the emptiness of their lives (Coward sort of becomes the equivelent of Jacob Marley here), but he does find some sorrow for his lost soul from his first girlfriend. So he finds salvation in this drop of sadness.

The total film must be considered an interesting failure, and leads one to another point - Coward's name lives today because of the continuous strength of those major plays of his (PRIVATE LIVES, BLYTHE SPIRIT, HAY FEVER). His movies are another matter. Few of his performances were so well done on celluloid as to bear comparison to Olivier, Richardson, Guilgud, Guinness, Redgrave, Mills, Burton, and Sim. His best performances are probably in his own film IN WHICH WE SERVE or in later films where he was in supporting parts (OUR MAN IN HAVANAH and BUNNY LAKE IS MISSING). But how to explain a serious attempt at film making like THE ASTONISHED HEART which failed so badly (the story doesn't quite make sense). Of all his best plays, the only one to gain an Oscar was the dated CAVALCADE (in 1934), now best recalled for a brief scene when a young couple on a honeymoon turn out to be onboard the R.M.S. Titanic. Why Coward, a master of theatre, a gifted cabaret performer, a good actor, turned up so maladroit a film career is one of the mysteries of 20th Century films.

Unlike children, "The Scoundrel" should be heard and not seen. This very disappointing movie has a terrific script, containing dialogue delivered the way only Noel Coward could deliver it. Those familiar with his witty, supercilious delivery are in for a treat, and the team of Hecht-MacArthur have spread enough to go around to the entire cast.

Having said that, the acting in this picture was so bad as to be almost embarrassing, overwrought to the point of ham. Coward himself seems uncomfortable when not reciting his lines and seems to say them unnaturally, as though from memory and not as an actor would. The rest of the cast follows suit and seems bedazzled by his presence.

I find it astounding that this picture won an Academy Award (Worst Idea For A Motion Picture?) as the film starts out OK but quickly descends into goofy fantasy and ultimately into maudlin burlesque. Several actors are miscast and flounder about, except for Stanley Ridges, who plays the boyfriend of the girlfriend. "The Voice", Lionel Stander, as a poet? Come on. A hit-man, maybe, but not a poet. Ditto Eduardo Ciannelli. The best that can be said, apart from the dialogue, is that it is mercifully short at 76 minutes - but bring a blindfold.

Because so many talented people worked on "The Scoundrel", it pains me to say that this film doesn't work and some parts of it are laughably bad.

Noël Coward plays a character based on Horace Liveright, a (real-life) New York publisher and playboy who was a vicious S.O.B. and an inept businessman; Liveright died broke and friendless. That's not quite what happens to Coward in this movie.

"The Scoundrel" is a fantasy, but we don't find this out until about halfway through the film ... and in a flashback, worse luck. Coward dies and comes back as a ghost, and (unlike in "The Sixth Sense") he KNOWS he's a ghost. After returning from the dead, the first thing he does is go back to his office and perform a long dull dialogue scene with his employees, without bothering to tell them that he's dead. I haven't given away any spoilers here, because this film has very little worth spoiling. Coward delivers all of his dialogue in a slow lugubrious tone. He spends the second half of the movie as a ghost, but he's equally lifeless in the first half.

"The Scoundrel" has a low budget and several continuity errors. It was filmed in New York City (at the Astoria studio) but there are no vintage shots of NYC locations; one street scene is a painfully obvious interior set.

The notorious drama critic Alexander Woollcott appears in a tiny role (basically playing himself), but he's on screen just long enough to prove he's no actor. Lionel Stander (better known as Max from "Hart to Hart") shows up briefly to sip champagne with Coward. This makes Lionel Stander the only actor who worked with both Noël Coward and Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle. I don't recommend "The Scoundrel" unless you're intensely interested in any of the actors or writers who worked on this film ... all of whom did better work in other films.

This film is very old style; early days of the talkies. In the beginning of what we now think of as the film industry there was a good deal of holdover from stage work. D. W. Griffith had shown film makers what was possible but it hadn't really taken hold yet. MacArthur, Hecht and Coward were playwrights experimenting with film making. This film was essentially a platform for clever dialog, such as could be expected in one of their stage plays. You can't judge it by modern cinema narrative standards. You can only appreciate it for itself. The emotions are rather raw and the characterizations are somewhat simplistic but that's because it's all just backdrop for the dialog. Speaking of which, at one point Coward's character is speaking to the girl whom he has seduced and abandoned. She is sobbing her heart out and he says, "Tears always make me crueler than I really am." He then goes on to say, "I can't cry for my sins. If I could I would now. I don't particularly like myself." Truly cruel people are forever saying how much they dislike being cruel. Characters in Coward's plays always come off as being flip and shallow but somewhere down deep, they are sincere. I've read that in real life Coward was one of the nicest people you could know. Perhaps he was simply afraid of emotion, afraid of being hurt.

The Scoundrel is a fantastic film which takes the viewer on an emotional and linguistic journey that reminds one of the power of the film medium. Everything from costumes to sets and lighting changes for the darker in a brilliant way. The whole film shifts in tone radically and boldly. The character MALLARE, whom Noel Coward plays, expresses the psychology of the dark side of humanity in times of love. He articulates what few rarely say, and this makes the dialog exceptional. The perception of human nature. Hecht wrote the pseudo-decadent Huysmans homage FANTAZIUS MALLARE some years before, hence the character's name, I'd imagine. The movie dialog is rich, baroque and sardonic as well. The poet's works were clearly inspired by maxwell Bodenheim's poetry and persona and are hilarious. A real treat.