Red Hollywood

If you are looking for a documentary about the Red Scare and the Hollywood Eight, then this film might just disappoint you. While it skims around the topics, "Red Hollywood" isn't a systematic discussion of communists within Hollywood or the studios' blacklists. So this is no history lesson and it's certainly not exhaustive. Instead, some of the surviving members of this infamous group talk about their films and you see a few clips. The problem with this is that the movies they show really aren't 'commie films' but are films with a left-wing bent-- and distinguishing between these cause films and the rest of the films of the era is indeed very vague in this documentary. Additionally, occasionally they trash wonderful films, such as "Intruder in the Dust"...and I have no idea why. Nor did I understand why the film HINTS at the Pre- Code era and how films changed because of the new Production Code...but never really explained it in any way.

The sum total effect of this documentary is that it comes off like the ramblings and musings of a couple guys...and that's really about it. Not systematic nor philosophical...just disjoint and confusing and a lousy history lesson. Where are the films of Jules Dassin, Dalton Trumbo and others?! It just seems woefully incomplete.

Red Hollywood is an engrossing bit of both history and cinematic history that starts with progressive-leftist-themed films in the 1930s and WW II years, and ends with the reaction to those films, especially the filmmakers associated with them, during the so-called "Red Scare" of the late 40s and early 50s. It seems that many creative sorts in Hollywood, especially screenwriters but some directors as well, were radicalized by the economic turmoil of the Depression-era 1930s, and moved to the left , or moved further to the left, politically. Many became card-carrying communists and many more became "fellow travelers." Their films had a collectivist slant, e.g., embracing communal sharing among working women during the housing shortage of WW II, or had a pro-labor slant (endorsing the strikers' position), or took the position of the Republicans during the Spanish Civil War, or generally took the side of the racially or economically oppressed. Their films also strove to reveal class cleavages in a presumably (ideologically) class-free America.

And then we come to the WW II films, particularly "Song of Russia" and "Mission to Moscow," which were propaganda vehicles, at FDR's request, to solidify American public opinion behind our Soviet ally. Mission, in particular, portrays Stalin as an avuncular, pipe-smoking good ally, and goes so far as to justify his Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact of 1939, even though (ironically enough) it drove many anti-fascist Communists to leave the party in 1939-1940. Unfortunately, many of the folks involved in these films were blacklisted after the war when HUAC and McCarthyism pressured the studios.

I understand that one of the producers of "The Best Years of our Lives" (1946) claimed a few years later that it couldn't have been made under the current anti-communist atmosphere. I'm assuming he was referring to: (1) the banker ready to lend money to returning GIs with no collateral but good character (too socialistic), and (2) the utter, and physical, refutation of the guy who claims "we fought on the wrong side," i.e., the real enemy was the Soviet Union. Thus, it was noteworthy for me to see how often "left-themes" crept into films during this later period, even through the early 50s , including films and scenes deploring racial and religious prejudice. Of course, deploring racial and religious prejudice shouldn't be a left-right "divider" but the left has taken the lead on these issues in our history, particularly on civil rights.

Some of these earnest leftists have apparently not discerned the sweep of economic history. The film ends with Abraham Polonsky, a blacklisted film director, saying near the end of his life that "capitalism is crime." What a silly remark; but I still love his "Force of Evil."

If not quite as brilliant as Andersen's 2003 masterpiece "Los Angeles Plays Itself" this is still an insightful, very smart and entertaining look at how Hollywood both reflects and changes society -- in this case how films with a leftist bent tried to get progressive social ideas across during the McCarthy era, as well as in the years just before and after.

Andersen divides his topics into areas like war, race, class and shows how communist and leftist writers tried to show their points of view, often views that while radical at the time, are seen as mainstream now (e.g. basic racial and sexual equality). Andersen also manages to be empathetic to the blacklist victims without making the film into a study of their martyrdom. That is worth exploring too, but here the focus is really on the attempt to add progressive ideas to Hollywood's then mostly mainstream-to-conservative bent.

Admirable, educational and enjoyable.

Follow note: It's thrilling that both this and "Los Angeles Plays…" have finally achieved a mainstream release on DVD and BR. For years their non-stop use of Hollywood film clips made licensing costs impossible. Bravo to those that put in the effort to get these films out there.

Essential viewing for anyone concerned with Hollywood's blacklist and the movies. Perhaps the chief asset are clips from films supposedly conveying communist messages. Among these are older features such as Blockade (1938), and Woman of the Year (1942), and newer ones like The Asphalt Jungle (1950), and Body and Soul (1947). Some passages were actually cited by HUAC, so you can make up your own mind as to the amount of leftist cant.

The format follows a roughly chronological order with film excerpts stretching from the late 1930's to the early 1950's. Themes are divided into categories, such as Class, Fear, Hate, et al. These follow in roughly the same chronological order, and I guess serve as a touchstone for which films and what passages are included. Occasionally the screenwriter in question comments, which furnishes some personal insight. But generally, it's the narration that provides context. If this sounds complicated, on screen, it's not. The narrative flows fairly smoothly. Then too, several of the excerpts pack real punch even though brief, viz. the alarming Force of Evil (1948), the scary Sound of Fury (1950). Also included for perspective are anti-Red films such as the unmitigated Iron Curtain (1948) and the prestigious On the Waterfront (1954). At the same time, it's interesting to see faces behind screenwriter names— mainly, Paul Jarrico and Abe Polonsky, who get interviews depending on the topic and film.

Of course, much of the text is fragmentary, so no decisive conclusions are offered. But there's no doubt that Hollywood's subject matter shifted in the 1950's away from traditional leftist genres to politically safer categories—Westerns, Biblical epics, Tennessee Williams, mammary goddesses, etc. Thus, the purges had their effect, at the same time the post-war economy took off making older, controversial themes seem obsolete. But whatever the historical arc, the documentary remains essential viewing for the culturally curious.