The Big Night

From Losey's American feature films (a period which barely lasted four years, when he fell victim to political persecution) I had only previously watched his eccentric debut, THE BOY WITH GREEN HAIR (1948). The same year he made THE BIG NIGHT, a low-budget noir, he directed two other thrillers - THE PROWLER, Losey's own favorite from this early phase of his career and M, an Americanization of Fritz Lang's German masterpiece. Both these films promise to be a good deal more interesting than the ones I watched, and I hope I get the chance to view them someday...

Anyway, back to THE BIG NIGHT: in itself, it wasn't too bad but it didn't feel at all like a Losey film; perhaps that's because I'm not used to watching him dealing with an American setting - but it's still a minor film, not quite knowing where it's going and not even that compelling while it's on. The noir-ish atmosphere (courtesy of cinematographer Hal Mohr), however, is quite interestingly deployed - sometimes with an audacious psychological resonance, as in the nightclub scene where a riotous drum solo brings back to lead John Barrymore Jr. (looking more like Sean Penn than his matinée' idol father!) memories of his father's vicious beating at the hands of a crippled but influential sports columnist (an effectively sinister Howard St. John); the latter episode is actually a key scene, which sets the plot in motion and sends Barrymore - who witnessed father Preston Foster's humiliation and whom he idolized - seething with revenge in search of St. John.

The characters are largely stereotypes - caring bartender (Foster owns a bar), philosophical drunk pal, his bitter girlfriend (a rather spent Dorothy Comingore, who 10 years earlier had played Susan Alexander in CITIZEN KANE [1941]!), her good-girl sister who falls for and yearns to 'save' Barrymore, shady promoter Emil Meyer (a dry run for his memorable turn as a crooked cop in SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS [1957]), etc. - but the last act provides a couple of ironic twists involving the characters of Foster, St. John and the tragic fate of a woman they both loved in their own way.

The story here is revenge, more real-life based, a 1950's version of the crime of passion. A teenager's good-hearted father is beaten to a pulp by a gangster, so the kid invades the streets to get some payback. The father's not worried about the floor-wiping, which leads to a mystery behind the teen's mother, who skipped out on the family long ago, and a woman the father knows who has committed suicide.

Seeing this film, there's not much in terms of plot, but there are some notable scenes, particularly when the kid hears a beautiful night-club singer, becomes entranced, gets a chance to meet her on the street, and tells her how beautiful she is. Even though she's, you know,

black. The pain in the singer's face rends the poor kid, who was transported by her voice, but can't get beyond her skin color.

This film also has one of THE great lines ever in any film noir or any movie period, at least concerning the tragedy between a man and a woman, when there is love involved. There are no words more powerful or poignant, especially for a man who loves a woman beyond reason, who knows he has lost the love of his life. Unable to move on, to love or marry another woman after that one woman has destroyed him, and in fact still very much in love with his destroyer,

Preston Foster tells his son, "Sometimes a man loves one woman in the whole world. If she turns out to be the wrong one, well...that's just tough." Truly, the heart of noir is not blackness, but the white-hot scars of passion.

Joseph Losey's The Big Night is a film noir that's also, like Moonrise and Talk About A Stranger, a coming-of-age story. The young male undergoing his transformational journey is John Barrymore, Jr., son of the Great Profile and father of Drew. His film career was not high-profile, as he inherited the family disposition toward chemical dependency (blood will tell). But here, boasting a luxuriantly healthy crown of hair, he gives a surprisingly intense yet controlled performance. His big night happens to be his 16th or 17th birthday, when his barkeep father is brutally beaten and publicly humiliated by a local sportswriter (Losey's staging is unflinching). Frustrations about his own Hamlet-like ditherings and confusions impel him to seek revenge on his father's behalf, and, gun in pocket, he sets out into a nightscape of prize fights, gin mills and the walk-up flats of casually met strangers. While Losey's sympathies lie with Barrymore, it's always clear that the emergent man is still a callow stripling, incapable of apprehending the complex reality he crashes into, like a fatted calf in a china shop. Though the director refrains from pushing the conclusion to where it might logically go -- he retreats into sentimentality and sententiousness -- The Big Night still scores as a provocative, moodily shot film.

As previous reviewer wrote, saw this on TCM and the sound was terrible. Good story in need of a cleanup. I like hearing dialogue.

The tale is based on an obscure novel called The Dreadful Summit by author/screenplay-writer Stanley Ellin. The script for the film appears to be a jumbled mess, but each segment has great independent value that is the result of an intelligent Losey touch. The lovely remarkable scenes are the following:

A. Young bespectacled George bullied by friend to kiss a girl whom he likes B. A birthday cake with lighted candles given by his father that George is unable to blow out in full, One remains lit ominously. The cake serves as a reminder that the entire film deals with happenings of a single day. At the last scene the cake reappears to remind us of it. C. What appears to be real is proved unreal time and time again. D. The left-sympathizing Losey and friends made the film with a cleverness missing in other films of the day. Closure of the bars's curtains by the assistant to George's dad is a symbolic in an odd way. E. The small bitter role given to the enigmatic "2nd Mrs Citizen Kane" (Dorothy Comingore) as Julie Rostina, after she was hounded out in real life by Randolph Hearst and then the awful McCarthy witch hunt of alleged communists in Hollywood that followed states a story within a story. It is sad the way she died in real life. She had so much potential as an actress. F. The honest appreciation of beauty and talent of a black singer by George leads to so much bitterness of color-based prejudices. Losey adds a black poodle in chains in that scene. G The two kisses of George in the film are so different (the opening sequence and later one with Marion)

These sequences are all wonderful, though the film never comes together. Yet it is a notable statement of undying love by a husband for his wayward wife and also of a motherless young man trying to love women and eventually grow up to be a good husband.