La strada dell'eternità

Rarely have I seen such uniformly bad reviews for a studio production with name stars as this one. No need to repeat many of the negative points already made. I am curious, nonetheless, how such a misfire not only got released but also how it got made in the first place. Director Raoul Walsh was one of Hollywood's most respected filmmakers, and deservedly so. Yet his direction of Meeker suggests that neither of them had a clear concept of the character of Socks who comes across like a grinning doofus instead of a tough-guy boxer (compare with Meeker's genuine tough guy in Kiss Me Deadly). In fact, Walsh's direction really comes alive only during the crowd scenes which do show some sparkle. My guess is he took one look at the screenplay and went for the payday. And who was it, I wonder, who gave final approval to a script (Art Cohn) that has all the coherence and plausibility of an Ed Wood creation. To me, the movie has too many earmarks of a rush-job that ended up doing nobody any favors. Cable should do viewers a favor and give this sorry concoction a belated burial, decent or otherwise.

IT HAS LONG been said that there is no such thing as strict fiction. The premise being that all writers are influenced by actual happenings involving real people, either by choice or subconsciously. Having just recently screened GLORY ALLEY years after seeing on the nightly TV movie series, we must say that it flies in the face of that adage.

THE FILM APPEARS to have been assembled using bits and pieces of other genres from previous periods in Hollywood history. Director Raoul Walsh, himself being if not exactly a sort of living anachronism, was a sort of living, breathing history of the film industry. His own career had begun in the Silents, but before the cameras as actor. (He famously portrayed John Wilkes Booth in D.W. Griffith's BIRTH OF A NATION.)*

SO, CALLING ON his many experience as actor and director to bring us a story that was both similar and yet unlike anything else. The story exists both in a period of time (Post World War II New Orleans, Louisiana) and yet is timeless. Its reference and involvement with the Korean War could just as easily have been World War II. This leads us to believe that the story had been around, sitting on the shelves, gathering dust before it finally got made.

IN MANY RESPECTS the production looks like a comic strip or comic book display of "sequential art". The manner in which the characters, both main and supporting, are made to fit neatly into conformity of their particular pigeon holes. The Judge, Pig and Shadow Johnson (Louis Armstrong) are all prime examples.

AND IN SPEAKING of the cast, we found it to be both well constructed , if just a trifle far ranging. Leslie Caron finds her way into a most unusual portrayal of a potentially gifted ballerina's being forced to perform in dance halls. Louis Armstrong does a fine job of being general purpose good guy and servant. His duties range from boxing corner man, musician and valet to the Judge.

IT IS PERHAPS the one role, odd as it may seem, to showcase the talents of Ralph Meeker as main character, Socks Barbarossa. Being a very complex man with great wisdom and many other eclectic talents. Making the hero a denizen of the gutter (Glory Alley) just adds to the drama.

WE MUST MENTION the role of narrator, retiring newspaper man, Gabr Jordan (John McIntyre), who adds a touch of authenticity to this convoluted, meandering, hybrid of a story.

WE ALSO MUST posit the question: Did John McIntyre ever look young or portray a younger type? NOTE: * As director Raoul Walsh had compiled a tremendous number of very memorable pictures, largely at Warner Brothers. They include: WHITE HEAT, GENTLEMAN JIM, THED STRTAWBERRY BLONDE, HIGH SIERRA, THE ROARING 20's,.......................

A thrown-together gumbo from, of all directors, Raoul Walsh, Glory Alley (named for a raffish stretch of Bourbon Street) can't decide what flavor should dominate: the sweet, the piquant, the bitter. It seems to have been assembled from ingredients on hand at MGM in 1952. They were:

Ralph Meeker. Best remembered as Mike Hammer in Kiss Me Deadly, he caught the studio's eye when he replaced Marlon Brando on Broadway as Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire. On the off-chance that the N'Awlins setting might work its voodoo once more, the brawny Meeker was cast as a prizefighter called Socks Barbarossa.

Leslie Caron. Fresh from An American in Paris, she was at best a dancer with a Gallic accent and gamine charm. Here, she supports her blind father (Kurt Kaszner) by kicking (en point, no less) in hoochie-koochie numbers in a dive called Chez Bozo; it's a cross between Harriet Hoctor and Mary Tyler Moore as Laura Petrie, dancing in Capris.

Louis Armstrong. Instead of turning him into a jazz-joint headliner, he's relegated to the part of a philosophizing guide for the sightless old grump; thankfully, he sings a few songs and blows his horn now and again.

All in all, Glory Alley is a Runyonesque slice of life set among the poor people of the Big Easy. Meeker, in love with Caron but hated by her father, sustains a none-too-plausible run of ups and downs (there's even an excursion to Korea). It's a pot-luck special, made (it seems) to clear out the studio's larders.

This film is a confused mess, but yet I can't write it off completely. Leslie Caron, Louis Armstrong, and Ralph Meeker do the best they can with this pointless mishmash. The judge character was utterly insufferable. I wanted one of those old-timey giant vaudeville hooks to pull this guy off the stage. Meeker's character has plenty of absurd and self-pitying lines. The plot twists at the end fell into complete hyperbolic absurdity. But there's just enough here to keep it together, somehow, and the glue is Caron and Armstrong and Meeker. Especially Leslie Caron. She seems to be having a great time and her scenes are delightful. So really, if you like these three, you might want to check it out.

This is one of the few movies I consider so bad they're interesting. The champion in this category is "The Guilt Of Janet Ames." "Glory Alley" is not that awful but it is a real mess. Yet, it is intriguing.

Ralph Meeker, the brilliant star of "Kiss Me Deadly" who did way too few movies, plays a boxer named Socks Barbarosa. Maybe Bill Clinton named his cat after this character.

Meeker is also very good in "Show In The Sky." He was generally underused ion movies, though.

"Glory Alley" is a kind of faux-Damon Runyon. Runyon gone South to New Orleans. We have Socks. We have a blind man called the Judge. His helper, played by Louis Armstrong, is named Shadow.

The Judge has an Italian accent; yet his daughter has a French accent. And no wonder: She is Leslie Caron. Caron and Meeker could have been a fantastic combination. She's appealing. It's hard, though, to believe that she is doing music hall numbers at a dive called Chez Bozo and her father doesn't know it. He seems to know everything else that's going on.

The movie is narrated by newspaper reporter John McIntire. It's a voice-over narration, looking back on the vents we're seeing. But this is no noir. McIntire tells us it's the most fascinating story he ever covered -- and he's never told the truth till now -- is that of Socks Barbarosa.

Well, it could have been a fascinating story. It's peopled with fine actors and a superb leading man. But it doesn't hold together. This is not to mention its preaching: Much of the dialogue, especially toward the end, sounds as if it came from a sampler on a wall. Nor what sounds like the MGM Chorale that accompanies some of Armstrong's trumpet playing and is sort of an uplifting Greek chorus.