Moments perdus

'The Lost Moment' is worth watching - not too bad of a film. It's a romantic-drama (with a bit of a mystery and with a dash of thriller). I was hoping for a bit more with the ending I guess because I was left with a disappointed feeling at the end of the film.

Lewis Venable (Robert Cummings) is a publisher and he is after the love letters of an early-19th-century poet, Jeffrey Ashton, to his beloved Juliana Borderau (Agnes Moorehead). Lewis pretends to be a writer and rents a room from Juliana Borderau in hopes to gain the love letters. Juliana has a niece named Tina Bordereau (Susan Hayward). Tina has a split-personality: her real self, Tina, and that of her aunt Juliana. Tina thinks she is her aunt Juliana from time to time. Lewis finds himself in a mystery surround Juliana, Tina, and the love letters of Jeffrey Ashton.

I enjoyed the film - I was just disappointed with the ending because we never got a real explanation about Tina - an explanation for the split in her personality.

7/10

"The Lost Moment" is one of the strangest films of the 1940s I have seen. I am not saying it's bad--just very, very different. The film is based on a story by Henry James ("The Aspern Papers") although like MOST films they liberally change the story. One of the most obvious is the character played by Susan Hayward. In the original story, she's described as plain and unattractive--something you could never have said about Hayward. In this film, she is gorgeous and is paired with an odd choice for a leading man, Robert Cummings. Now I am not complaining or saying Cummings was a bad choice--just an odd one since he was a bit older and not the dashing leading man you'd normally expect in a movie.

The story was originally based on a notion that some love letters from Percy Shelley were hidden somewhere and literary folks were drooling to find them. Here in "The Lost Moment", they use a fictional name for a guy who was clearly modeled after Shelley. But, unlike Shelley, this poet was an American and he simply disappeared in his prime! The only possible clue to his disappearance is the same woman who was in love with this man--and who supposedly has these love letters. But, she's an ancient recluse and has thus far resisted talking about her old lover and has refused to allow people to read these letters....if they even still exist.

Cummings plays a newspaper writer and an opportunist. His plan is to somehow get into this home with the old lady (who is now 105--played by Agnes Moorehead under a ton of makeup). When he learns she is greatly in need of money, he offers to rent out one of her rooms. While they receive him VERY coolly, he is able to secure a room and soon notices just how oppressively dismal the place is. It's like a morgue and a strong brooding sense of doom is well conveyed in the film. I won't discuss the plot any more--it would ruin the suspense. However, to me the plot, though interesting, isn't as important as the mood--which is really excellently conveyed. An interesting film--as there just aren't many like it.

The Lost Moment is directed by Martin Gabel and adapted by Leonardo Bercovici from the Henry James novel, The Aspern Papers. It stars Robert Cummings, Susan Hayward, Agnes Moorehead and Eduardo Ciannelli. Music is by Daniele Amfitheatrof and cinematography by Hal Mohr.

Lewis Venable (Cummings) is a publisher who travels to Venice in search of love letters written by poet Jeffrey Ashton. Insinuating himself into the home of the poets lover and recipient of the letters, Juliana Bordereau (Moorehead), Venable finds himself transfixed by the strangeness of the place and its inhabitants, one of which is Juliana's off kilter niece, Tina (Hayward).

A splendid slice of Gothicana done up in film noir fancy dress, The Lost Moment is hauntingly romantic and ethereal in its weirdness. It's very talky, so the impatient should be advised, but the visuals and the frequent influx of dreamy like sequences hold the attention right to the denouement. The narrative is devilish by intent, with shifting identities, sexual tensions, intrigue and hidden secrets the orders of the day.

Cummings is a little awkward and his scenes with Hayward (very good in a tricky role) lacks an urgent spark, while old hands Moorehead (as a centenarian with an outstanding makeup job) and Ciannelli leave favourable marks in the smaller roles. Mohr's (The Phantom of the Opera) photography is gorgeous and bathes the pic in atmosphere, and Amfitheatrof's musical compositions are powerful in their subtleties. As for Gabel? With this being his only foray into directing, it stands as a shame he didn't venture further into the directing sphere. 7/10

The Lost Moment (1947)

A highly romanticized version of the dark and complex story by Henry James called the Aspern Papers. It's glorious in many ways, ultra moody and mysterious. It lacks some of the delirious gloss and superb acting of, say, "Rebecca" though the similarities are clear.

The leading actor, an American in Venice, is maybe the weakest link, because he comes off as more of a naive innocent than a slightly lost and duplicitous conniver, one who gets seduced by his own mission (a common James theme). But Robert Cummings has the advantage of letting the story and the scenes dominate. The leading woman, playing a complex role, is Susan Hayward, a better actor though the main side of her role is to be steely and lifeless, which she does very well. Agnes Moorehead plays the old woman, and you won't recognize her, she's so heavily made up.

It's 1947 and still the studio era, so the entire film was shot in Hollywood, but the sets are fabulous, and the photography and lighting makes the most of it. It's beautiful, above all.

But what about the story? A great and somewhat fantastic love story. Or is it so fantastic? It seems some of the time that there is something magical happening, a crossing of time zones. But our protagonist discovers the truth, and falls in love, and the problem gradually changes. The original goal, of discovering some key lover letters from fifty years earlier, seems secondary, though it rears its head (suddenly) at the climax.

Some people might find this film "old fashioned" or a little false, somehow, with the actors playing types rather than real people. I mean, they are convincing, and compelling for sure, but they only have the qualities needed for the plot. But other people will be able to buy into all this as style, which it is, and let it take over. It's a curious and beautiful enterprise, whatever its flaws.

This little film is bursting with atmosphere, brooding, wistful, corrupt, overflowing with decay, betrayal and regret. A studio better known for its westerns and horror movies is here responsible for a major gem of delicacy and suggestion.

What makes all this remarkable is that the screenplay is a classic example of Hollywood's idiotic dumbing-down of a major work of fiction, Henry James's novella "The Aspern Papers" (based in turn on the life of Lord Byron). To compare James's brief story with the film is so sad it's almost painful, yet the movie survives and succeeds through sensitive style and sturdy professionalism.

The studio sets are evocative of a time before Venice became an international theme park, and the director's experience in radio drama provides a more finely-judged soundtrack than was the norm.

If your nerve-endings are not already terminally blunted through today's cinematic overkill, this film will prove richly rewarding.