Ambre

Somewhat saucy romp has a ravishingly beautiful and amber haired Linda Darnell in the lead full of piquant carnality, lavish costumes and settings and a scene stealing George Sanders as Charles II. What it doesn't have is a lively pace and that to some extent is its undoing. Preminger was the wrong director for a piece of entertainment like this that required a florid touch, Michael Curtiz would have been much more at home at the helm.

The novel this is based on was a notorious but tremendously successful sensation of its day. That book while certainly not "A Great American Novel" is a highly enjoyable piece of pulp fiction full of sex, murder and double crosses in fancy clothes with a complex, very entertaining heroine at its center who has a good heart but is not overly burdened with morals. Unfortunately since they tried to film it in the forties when the Production Code was in full force the more salacious plot points had to be excised. What made it to the screen has its moments but shows the heavy hand of censors most evident in the abrupt ending but scattered throughout the movie. Still a fun romp with Linda giving a spirited performance and for those who haven't read the book a somewhat racy tone.

A troubled production from the beginning what with censorship problems, a recast leading lady, Linda Darnell stepped in after production had started when Peggy Cummings didn't work out and Lana Turner couldn't be borrowed from MGM and a martinet in the director's chair.

There are still a few amusing stories connected to the backstage upheaval that went on. Linda Darnell had worked with Preminger before on Fallen Angel and it had been rough going but she truly came to loathe him during production of Amber. Later while filming A Letter to Three Wives Joseph Mankiewicz needed her to throw a look of disgust at a picture unseen by the audience, to achieve that look he slipped a picture of Preminger into the frame without her knowledge, he got his look.

A small sampling of Preminger's directorial style: after acting out a scene for Linda and Cornel Wilde he screamed at them as they tried to do as he had instructed "Don't do it like I did it! Do it like I meant it!"

One peripheral story: when Ava Gardner was briefly married to Artie Shaw he flew into a rage and berated her when he caught her reading Forever Amber saying it was trash and she should be focusing her attention on things that would enrich her mind, he was that kind of husband. They divorced shortly after and within the year he had married Kathleen Winsor...the author of Forever Amber!

"You've done very well for yourself, Amber."

With this line, Cornell Wilde's character shows himself a master of understatement. It is delivered coldly, with neither criticism nor respect.

FOREVER AMBER is the portrait of a peasant girl who refused to be destroyed by her poverty and the hopeless prospects awaiting her. She used her sexuality and her brains to become the King's consort.

This film presents a vivid portrait of life in England before the Cromwellian revolution. It was an amoral, extremely cynical, heartlessly cruel society.

Linda Darnell's performance is a tour de force. She manages to play the strumpet, while letting the audience see her strength of character shining through all the while. Her love for the fickle Bruce Carlton/Cornell Wilde is too deep for him to ever understand.

One of the most haunting episodes in classic films is the depiction of London in the grip of the Black Plague. Amber risks her life by staying at Bruce's side through his delirium and personally performing the surgery that saves him.

Amber's tragedy is one that every woman who has ever had to fight for herself in this world can recognize. The movie is far more than a period soap opera. In fact, with David Raksin's incredible orchestral score, the production could have provided the framework for the composition of a real opera.... La Boheme, move over!

Back in the days when the Roman Catholic censorship body, the Legion of Decency, had an unwarranted share of influence over the major Hollywood studios and their product, Darryl F. Zanuck, head of production at 20th-Century Fox, found himself embroiled in plenty of hot water with the L. of D. militia over his plans to film Kathleen Winsor's wildly popular succes du scandale "Forever Amber." We can be grateful he braved the fulminations of the clerics and their cohorts and lavished class "A" production values on this entertaining spectacle. Of course the more salacious aspects of Miss Winsor's story are toned down and softened, but there's a rather bitterly astringent tone to the proceedings, nevertheless.

The cast performs ably under the legendarily tyrranical Otto Preminger, whose direction of some sequences does seem a bit perfunctory. Linda Darnell is gorgeously gowned and lovingly photographed in three-strip Technicolor by Leon Shamroy, at his professional best. (I will agree that some scenes, especially at the beginning, seem a bit underlit, possibly due to an inferior VHS video transfer...I have never seen this on a big screen.) Miss Darnell holds her own against the likes of George Sanders, giving one of his wittiest performances as King Charles II, and her line readings, spoken in that delicious speaking voice of hers, ring true for the most part. The always reliable Richard Haydn, as the loathsome Earl of Radcliffe, convinces us that his grisly fate is well-deserved. And even the usually laconic Cornel Wilde convinces as a suitable object of Amber's steadfastly unrequited passion.

Best of all David Raksin's score achieves near-operatic grandeur, lending a sensual sweep that underscores one of Twentieth's really memorable costumers. Alfred Newman, head of Twentieth's music department, masterfully conducted Raksin's music, back in the days when the major studios employed full-time orchestras of musicians whose talents rivalled the players of the best symphony orchestras of the day and, perhaps, even now. Of course the video's audio track doesn't do the musical score the justice it deserves and it may be that in the late Forties when this was made, only the Warner Brothers studio sound technicians achieved full sonority on the optical tracks on which were recorded the scores of Korngold and Steiner and the other masters who worked at that rival studio.

I tried reading Kathleen Windsor's famous novel but found it too long and full of excess baggage. It didn't capture my attention the way that other famous historical novel, "Gone with the Wind" did.

And while I can't say I liked this film as much as GWTW, it was nevertheless very entertaining and held my interest the way the book couldn't. There was enough history, drama, romance and intrigue to make it worthwhile, without going overboard and getting bogged down with unnecessary detail and incidents.

What was most interesting about Amber (Linda Darnell at her best) was how you can understand her motives without having to agree with them, like her unwillingness to give up on Bruce, who had more than one opportunity to make an "honest woman" of her but didn't want to take them. At times, she does what she has to do, at others, she chooses her options. Her ambitions and schemes never get her what she truly wants, despite her rise in social position and material wealth.

Cornell Wilde gives a good performance as Bruce Carlton, the love of Amber's life, who prefers his freedom, at least where she's concerned.

I also liked George Sanders as King Charles II, who falls for Amber's charms, yet won't be anyone's fool.

Very entertaining!

The novel "Forever Amber" was wildly popular after debuting in 1944. But it also was banned in 16 states as well as abroad! Why? Because it was essentially a historical where the leading lady, Amber, sleeps her way from obscurity to the mistress of some of the most important men in the land. Today, it would be seen as somewhat tame...but in the 1940s it caused a sensation.

Now this brings up a serious problem In the Hollywood of 1947, the Production Code made it virtually impossible to film the script unless huge changes were made in the story. Well, apparently Twentieth Century-Fox STILL didn't sanitize the story enough...and the Catholic Legion of Decency condemned the film. The movie was quickly withdrawn from theaters, scenes were re-shot and it returned to theaters....where it was wildly successful. Despite a huge price tag of $6,000,000, it went on to be the top grossing film of the year. I wonder how much of the Catholic Legion of Decency hubbub actually ended up HELPING the film!

Linda Darnell stars as Amber St. Clair, a young girl from a good middleclass English family who lived during the Restoration period (when the monarchy was invited back to rule after the death of Cromwell in 1660). Amber is NOT a normal lady by any standard of the day and her family shocked when she not only refuses to marry the man they picked out for her but she then runs away to make her fortune. This essentially consists of sleeping her way up through the English gentry....with a brief period in which she slummed it with a highwayman. Throughout all her many affairs, she is most devoted to Bruce Carlton (Cornel Wilde)...though they never seem to connect up for long.

When I watched the movie, I could tell some cuts had been made in a few places. One was odd, as she suddenly ended up pregnant...and you really weren't sure what happened there and it remained that way through much of the picture! Well, she obviously slept with a guy....but who? And, after the baby was born you don't hear any more about the baby until late in the story. Was the tike misplaced somewhere or perhaps taken by aliens and then returned? Who knows?!

As far as the film goes, in many ways it's like a reworking of the Pre-Code film, "Red-Headed Woman"...in which Jean Harlow's character sleeps her way up through the social ranks. But of the two, "Red-Headed Woman" is the better film in many ways....mostly because it was much more open about the character's sexuality and the movie ended with the character receiving neither punishment nor learning a thing along the way! But with bowing to the Legion of Decency's demand for cuts, the film comes off as more episodic and confusing about Amber's sex life! Plus, let's be honest, the film is a lot less entertaining when it's less sleazy. As far as the production goes, it looks nice in rich Technicolor...but is also a tad stilted and dull after a while.