The Searching Wind

American diplomat Robert Young is married to wealthy Ann Richards but loves reporter Sylvia Sidney. The three react differently to the rise of fascism in Italy and Germany. Sidney opposes it, Richards is indifferent, and Young is torn between his dislike for it and his fear that opposition will involve America in war. A talky and dated melodrama.

And has anyone noticed the way the Sidney and Richards figures in this film anticipate Fonda and Redgrave in "Julia"?

The film itself is very handsome, in a less-than-dynamic sort of way. (How could any film with Robert Young and Ann Richards as 2/3rds of its central trio be described as "dynamic"?) The screenplay is good, though, and Sidney is first-rate.

The theatrical version of Hellman's story was notable for a flashy early appearance by Montgomery Clift (as the ambassador's son). Not a huge success, but acclaimed nonetheless. Frankly, the writing's better for the screenplay.

There's a lot, too, to be said for the sort of noir-flavored, female-centered drama that Hal Wallis and (frequently) William Dieterle produced in this era. "Love Letters," for instance, "The Accused" ... That plus the Hellman style make an intriguing (as well as intrigue-filled) combination.

Hal Wallis lays on a posh production, complete with tinkling crystal chandeliers, gilded ballrooms and wall-to-wall violin accompaniment, all so that journalist Sylvia Sidney can reproach diplomat Robert Young for his cowardice in not denouncing fascism [while they toy with rekindling their youthful affair]. Lillian Hellman's script boots them all across Europe, from Mussolini's takeover of Rome to the bombing of Madrid to the signing of the Munich Accord . Meanwhile, Young's wife [Ann Richards] entertains assorted brownshirts and blackshirts because she's a shallow socialite, while their war-wounded son [Douglas Dick, in Montgomery Clift's star-making Broadway role] stays home to sort out his own objections to the family's appeasement policies.

For mainstream Hollywood, this idea-driven story was an honorable attempt to dramatize issues of conscience and responsibility [though criticism of official silence about budding fascist regimes was surely a bit late by 1946]. However, everyone gets to face a moral crisis here, from crusty Grandpa [Dudley Digges] down to a waiter who pauses to deliver a lecture on Woodrow Wilson, and marrying its serious ideas with an uncompelling love triangle seems contrived.

Hellman writes literate but non-stop dialogue, making everyone mouth the same high-minded generalities ["Whenever people talk about not taking sides, they've already taken one," or "People who know what they want don't wait to get it."] After an hour of politely listening to such unlikely repartee, we gradually grow weary, then dismayed, and finally exasperated. Was Hellman paid by the word, like Dickens?

This torrent of talk leaves no room for the film to breathe, so all of William Dieterle's fluent staging produces only claustrophobia. Also, while Lee Garmes' exquisite lighting and Hans Dreier's cavernous interiors mark a high point in Hollywood gloss, the decor is so fancy that we in the audience can only goggle in awe at the dilemmas of these privileged power-brokers, surely not what Hellman intended. Still, as James Agee noted, "People as highly civilized as these are seldom seen in the movies, and are still more seldom played with understanding." True, but one is tempted to throw buckets of ice water on the cast to stop their debating.

If it weren't for Sylvia Sidney, and my love for her, I don't think I would've watch this film through to the end. What a group of miserable and unlikeable characters. Even Sidney herself doesn't go completely unscathed, with her ridiculous and illogical love for Robert Young's pathetic character. And it's this romantic angle that's realky tough to stomach. It seems completely out of place and inappropriate in this film of war, death and questionable motives. I couldn't be more disappointed in a film that I'd been dieing to see for quite some time.

This is an extremely fascinating discussion of vital issues of conscience and demands of reality. Robert Young as a trusted diplomat is faced with a reality he cannot handle as everything in it goes against him, but he cannot do anything about it. He marries the wrong wife while he continues to love the girl he never can get, who handles reality more straightly as a journalist seeing and writing the truth. Difficult issues of journalism also enter the discussion, as the diplomat's father-in-law (Dudley Digges, the best character in the context) runs the paper she is working for - and abandons it at the rise of fascism in Europe, refusing to take any further responsibility for reality.

Also the form of the film is a fascinating composition, starting at present time (1946) as all the protagonists gather for the first time in many years to enter a serious discussion none of them really desires, which brings them back to another day when they all were together in Rome as Mussolini took over power... and then comes an hour of flashbacks through all the traumatic convulsions of Europe between the two world wars, from the rise of German Nazism to the Spanish civil war and the controversial peace treaty of Munich.

I loved this film all through from the first moment to the last, the dialogue is replenished with intensive importance all the way, the characters couldn't have been acted better, there is no flaw anywhere, it flows organically on like taken directly out of reality, it's intelligent and important and well up to the same level as William Dieterle's other excellent films at the time. And through it all flows also Victor Young's gorgeous music, to make it even better...