Slander

Plot—Family man Scott is about to hit the TV big time with his engaging puppet show. Trouble is a scandal magazine run by the unscrupulous Manley threatens to publish a damaging article on Scott's past unless he spills the beans about the indiscretion of a celebrity much bigger than he that only he knows about. Thus Scott faces a moral dilemma—should he make the trade-off or not.

Back in the mid-50's, a lot of folks were tired of Photoplay, Screen Stars, and their like. In short, they wanted insider stories, real low downs on the seamy side of the air-brushed celebs of show biz. Thus Confidential magazine hit the stands with a splash that shook up the whole industry. Hollywood, in particular, quaked in fear; after all, they had big money invested in their carefully molded stars, and any hint of scandal could mean ruin for their investment. Rumors circulated that lesser figures could be sacrificed to the scandal sheets to protect bigger ones, e.g. George Nader to protect Rock Hudson. Of course, public morals were much more stringent in those days. Homosexuality and infidelity, for example, were strictly forbidden, and, if exposed, could wreck a career.

Clearly, Slander is a Hollywood attempt to strike back at the scandal purveyors. Just as clearly, the deck has been loaded by casting choices. Cochran's dark good looks usually translated into tough hoods. Here he still carries a dark appearance and a sinister reputation, but executes the oily slick Manley in expert non-thuggish fashion. It's the most tightly controlled turn I've seen from the fine actor. On the other hand, who embodied All-American virtue more solidly than sandy-haired freckle-faced Van Johnson. Add the sweet innocence of actress Blythe and the boyish appeal of moppet Eyer, and the deck is loaded from the outset.

Nonetheless, the movie's first part setting up Scott's (Johnson) moral dilemma is quite well- done, tight and economical. The second half, however, descends into heavy-handed melodrama, contrived and far-fetched. I take the latter as MGM's effort at hyping the price the magazine and Manley (Cochran) must pay for their unscrupulous acts. Too bad that the screenplay over-hyped this second part since the trade-off's sleaze factor is enough to discredit the magazine's shady enterprise. At the same time, the contrivances not only overdo the worthy message, but work to remind us that this is only a movie, after all.

Of course, changes in public morals have dated the movie. Nonetheless, with a less contrived second half, the film might succeed on its own merits, even now.

A curious period piece not without interest, Slander was made in the heyday of guttersnipe periodicals like "Confidential," that ruined show-biz careers and blackmailed victims into spilling dirt on bigger prey. Steve Cochran portrays the oily gossip publisher, a bachelor with a strangely solicitous relationship with his alcoholic mother (Marjorie Rambeau). In trying to dig up the goods on a beloved Broadway star, he zeros in on Van Johnson as a boyhood pal, a third-rate puppeteer who has finally got his big break in the new medium of television. Alas, the puppeteer once served four years in the hoosegow for armed robbery, despite the fact that he's now a devoted family man with wife (Ann Blyth) and son (Richard Eyer) in tow. Van Johnson refuses to knuckle under to the blackmail demands, and much melodrama ensues. Today, with a no-holds-barred press with almost non-existent restraints when it comes to public figures, Slander looks a bit quaint. But in the 50s, these tactics -- which probably wouldn't have been tolerated except for the parallel phenomenon of McCarthyism -- were seen as a deadly threat to the studios and their stars. Scandal, made at MGM under Dory Schary, is Hollywood's overwrought (and none too good) response. The following year, Alexander Mackendrick's chillingly dark Sweet Smell of Success (with Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis)trod much the same ground in a far more memorable way.

Though Van Johnson is the subject of the Slander, the driving force behind this film is Steve Cochran as the cynical publisher of a supermarket tabloid magazine. He's one scary dude who has no feelings and no one can reach him, not even his mother Marjorie Rambeau.

Back in 1957 Confidential Magazine which was the prototype of things like the National Enquirer of today was publishing all kinds of exposes on celebrities. Cochran's rag is also looking to do an expose on Van Johnson who is a newly popular host of a kid's show. Back during the Depression he committed a holdup and did his time and Cochran wants an to expose him. Cochran though will back off if he will give him some dirt on another girl who grew up on his block who became a big movie star.

Cochran is such a rat that he approaches Johnson through his wife Ann Blyth. This raises all kinds of issues in their marriage.

Slander also makes some subtle references to the tactics of the House Un American Activities Committee and how they would 'trade up' with immunity if someone would give them a bigger prize.

Johnson and Blyth turn in some good performances, but it's really Cochran you have to watch. He will thoroughly creep you out.

Not without interest and surely applicable Today, this expose of Tabloid Journalism and what used to be called "Scandal Sheets/Rags" is cold and overly sentimental at the same time. It never seems to find its groove and what is left is a noble, cheap looking misfire.

Van Johnson's Character is sugary sweet, His Wife is barely memorable, and the Son is used for a most overwrought and ludicrous ending. There is some edge to the Movie but it wavers sometimes, with some stiff situations and the look of a TV Production.

Worth a view for its B-Movie effort done by a Major Studio that couldn't seem to go all the way with anything more than the weakest and predictable of conclusions. It is Melodramatic when it should have been darkly cynical. The TV appearance by the Star, unintentional or not, is eerily reminiscent of Nixon's Checkers Speech.

By the way, Slander is Spoken...Libel is Written.

A tabloid magazine threatens to ruin a television performer's career in "Slander," a 1956 film starring Van Johnson, Steve Cochran, Ann Blyth and Marjorie Rambeau.

Well, first of all, it should have been called "Libel" which refers to the printed word; slander refers to the spoken. You'd think after years of dealing with both, someone at MGM would have known the difference.

Steve Cochran plays the head of this trash magazine, a type of periodical nowadays so common one doesn't even blink. In the film, his magazine was the pioneer, probably modeled after the real-life "Confidential." As in the film, a host of me-toos followed - in the '50s, this included "Whisper" and "Quick" magazines. These mags released Rory Calhoun's criminal record, accused Lisabeth Scott of using the services of call girls, that sort of thing. Something about the black and white format of the early tabloids made them even sleazier than "The Enquirer" types today, which deal mostly with gossip, hospital records sold to them by the hospital staff, and outing of celebrities. Eventually celebrities fought back by breaking their news first on talk shows.

H.R. Manley (Cochran) believes that everybody has some dirt in their past, and he's after a huge female film star. He knows that a children's TV performer, Scott Martin (Johnson) grew up with her and knows about a problem in her past. He finds out that Martin himself spent four years in prison for armed robbery and intends to print that story and ruin his career if Martin doesn't tell him what happened to his childhood friend. Does he save himself and let her career be sacrificed? His decision leads to tragedy.

Cochran is cold as ice as Manley and handsome in a George Clooney-Tyrone Power kind of way. His facial expression never changes, nor does his smooth voice. He's a man with a dead soul. His mother, played by Marjorie Rambeau, is against what he does to make a living. Rambeau, a favorite actress of mine, is excellent. Van Johnson and Ann Blyth are the Martins; Blyth is really more suited for society women - she's very pretty and also not the warmest person to stand before a camera. But she does a good job, as does Johnson, who is very well cast as a family man and children's entertainer.

The story is dramatized in a somewhat extreme way. It will definitely hold your interest, though the ending could have been better.