FILMS. 4th EDItION THE KID Sight and Sound (London), Autumn 1936 to change. Beloin ny of history the significance of the film was soon Through Monthly Film Bulletin (London), October 1936. um was, in fact, invaded by a less charming enemy Motion Picture Herald (New York), 3 October 1936 than the Spanish Duke. Collaboration soon became a very ugly word Today's Cinema. 15 October 1936. indeed. But time was on Feyder's side, and today his masterpiece Greene, Graham, in Spectator (London), 30 October 1936 secure in the annals of film histoy Hommage a Jacques Feyder, in Ecran Francais(Paris), 8 June 1948. Feyder Issue" of Cine-Club(Paris), 2 November 1948 Auriol, J -G, and Mario Verdone, ""L Art du costume dans le filr -Liam OLeary in Revue du Cinema(Paris), Autumn 1949 Sadoul, Georges, Jouvet et le cinema, in Lettres francaise Paris), 25 August 1961 THE KID Avant-Scene du Cinema(Paris), May 1963 Skrien(Amsterdam ), December 1977 USA Dossier on Jacques Feyder, in Cahiers de la Cinematheque(Perpignan), no 40. Summer 1984 Director: Charles Chaplin Biro, G, in Filmkultura(Budapest), March 1985 Virmaux, Alain,“D’ Alfred machin a cinema belge(annees 1910-1930)(musee d'Orsay, mars-avril Production: Charles Chaplin Productions for First National; black 1997).in Jeme Cinema(Paris), no. 245, September-Octo- 6 reels.5300 feet. released 6 februarv 1921 Producer: Charles Chaplin; screenplay: Charles Chaplin; photog- raphy: Rollie Totheroh Jacques Feyder had already made two sound films in France; his creative skills were by no means diminished by the new dimension. Cast: Jackie Coogan(The Kid): Edna Purviance (The Woman); Carl His successful collaboration with Charles Spaak was to further Miller(The Man); Charles Chaplin(The Tramp); Tom Wilson(The oduce one of the wittiest, most colourful and amusing comedies to Policeman); Chuck Reisner (The Bully ); Thelbert Theustin(The each the screen, La kermesse heroique. Taking as his subject the Crook); Nellie Bly Baker(Slum Woman); Henry Ber period of the great Renaissance of Flemish painting and the le for of lodging house ) Lita Grey (Flirting angel) happy era of Spanish domination, Feyder made a major contribution to"women's lib. The film satirizes political, religious, and moral pretentiousness, and the men come off second best when a strong minded and realistic woman encounters a tricky diplomatic situation. Publications The little town of Booms fussy Burgomaster and his officials cannot cope with the threat to their town when the news comes of the Books approach of the Spanish army under the command of a Duke Cornelia, the Burgomaster's wife, has a plan. The Burgomaster will Tyler, Parker, Chaplin, Last of the Clowns, New York, 1947 pretend to be dead, and she will receive the Duke and hope that in the Huff, Theodore, Charlie Chaplin, New York, 1951 ad circumstances he will be gentleman enough not to overstay Bessy, Maurice, and Robert Florey, Monsieur Chaplin; ou, Le rire leave. The possibilities for comedy are wide open dans la Paris. 1952 From this situation Feyder fashioned a film full of sly and subtle Sadoul, Georges, Vie de Charlot, Paris, 1952 comment on human foibles, designed with lavish elegance, at Leprohon, Pierre, Charlot, Paris, 1957; revised edition, 1970 times a feast for the eye. Feyder, himself a Belgian, created a monu- Mitry, Jean, Charlot et la fabulation chaplinesque, Paris, 1957 ment to the great visual artists of his country. The film was a crown jewel in the great flowering of the French cinema of the 1930s. The Amengual, Barthelemy, Charles Chaplin, Paris, 1963 designs of lazare Meerson and the costumes of benda come alive Chaplin, Charles, My Autobiography, London, 1964 th the superb acting Feyder extracts from his players. The subtle McDonald, Gerald, and others, The Films of Charlie Chaplin, Secaucus, and delicate humour, the gentle implications of the dialogue New Jersey, 1965 epitomized in the sly performance of Louis Jouvet as the Duke's Martin, Marcel, Charlie Chaplin, Paris, 1966; third edition, 1983 haplain. Needless to say, the Flemish ladies thoroughly enjoy the McCaffrey, Donald, editor, Focus on Chaplin, Englewood Cliffs elegant manners of the Spaniards while their menfolk look helplessly New Jersey, 1971 on There is a little sadness in the air as the duke and his army leave. Mitry, Jean, Tour Chaplin: Tous les films, par le texte. par le gag, et One feels life in the little town of boom will be the same again. image, Paris, 1972. In making this film, of course Feyder trod on the toes of his fellow Chaplin, Charles, My Life in Pictures, London, 1974 countrymen. The reaction was much like that of the Irish to The Manvell, Roger, Chaplin, Boston, 1974 Playboy of the Western World and chauvinistic sensibilities were not Moss, Robert, Charlie Chaplin, New York, 1975 easily smoothed. But the success of the film was universal, and Sobel, Raoul, and David Francis, Chaplin: Genesis of a Clown, Feyder was established as a great director
FILMS, 4 THE KID th EDITION 629 Sight and Sound (London), Autumn 1936. Monthly Film Bulletin (London), October 1936. Motion Picture Herald (New York), 3 October 1936. Today’s Cinema, 15 October 1936. Greene, Graham, in Spectator (London), 30 October 1936. ‘‘Hommage a Jacques Feyder,’’ in Ecran Français (Paris), 8 June 1948. ‘‘Feyder Issue’’ of Ciné-Club (Paris), 2 November 1948. Auriol, J.-G., and Mario Verdone, ‘‘L’Art du costume dans le film,’’ in Revue du Cinéma (Paris), Autumn 1949. Today’s Cinema, 31 December 1952. Sadoul, Georges, ‘‘Jouvet et le cinema,’’ in Lettres Françaises (Paris), 25 August 1961. Avant-Scène du Cinéma (Paris), May 1963. Skrien (Amsterdam), December 1977. Dossier on Jacques Feyder, in Cahiers de la Cinémathèque (Perpignan), no. 40, Summer 1984. Bíró, G., in Filmkultura (Budapest), March 1985. Virmaux, Alain, ‘‘D’Alfred Machin à Jacques Feyder: Débuts du cinéma belge (années 1910–1930) (musée d’Orsay, mars-avril 1997),’’ in Jeune Cinéma (Paris), no. 245, September-October 1997. *** Jacques Feyder had already made two sound films in France; his creative skills were by no means diminished by the new dimension. His successful collaboration with Charles Spaak was to further produce one of the wittiest, most colourful and amusing comedies to reach the screen, La kermesse héroïque. Taking as his subject the period of the great Renaissance of Flemish painting and the less happy era of Spanish domination, Feyder made a major contribution to ‘‘women’s lib.’’ The film satirizes political, religious, and moral pretentiousness, and the men come off second best when a strongminded and realistic woman encounters a tricky diplomatic situation. The little town of Boom’s fussy Burgomaster and his officials cannot cope with the threat to their town when the news comes of the approach of the Spanish army under the command of a Duke. Cornelia, the Burgomaster’s wife, has a plan. The Burgomaster will pretend to be dead, and she will receive the Duke and hope that in the sad circumstances he will be gentleman enough not to overstay his leave. The possibilities for comedy are wide open. From this situation Feyder fashioned a film full of sly and subtle comment on human foibles, designed with lavish elegance, at all times a feast for the eye. Feyder, himself a Belgian, created a monument to the great visual artists of his country. The film was a crowning jewel in the great flowering of the French cinema of the 1930s. The designs of Lazare Meerson and the costumes of Benda come alive with the superb acting Feyder extracts from his players. The subtle and delicate humour, the gentle implications of the dialogue, are epitomized in the sly performance of Louis Jouvet as the Duke’s chaplain. Needless to say, the Flemish ladies thoroughly enjoy the elegant manners of the Spaniards while their menfolk look helplessly on. There is a little sadness in the air as the Duke and his army leave. One feels life in the little town of Boom will never be the same again. In making this film, of course Feyder trod on the toes of his fellow countrymen. The reaction was much like that of the Irish to The Playboy of the Western World and chauvinistic sensibilities were not easily smoothed. But the success of the film was universal, and Feyder was established as a great director. Through an irony of history the significance of the film was soon to change. Belgium was, in fact, invaded by a less charming enemy than the Spanish Duke. Collaboration soon became a very ugly word indeed. But time was on Feyder’s side, and today his masterpiece is secure in the annals of film history. —Liam O’Leary THE KID USA, 1921 Director: Charles Chaplin Production: Charles Chaplin Productions for First National; black and white, 35mm, silent; running time: about 52 minutes; length: 6 reels, 5300 feet. Released 6 February 1921. Producer: Charles Chaplin; screenplay: Charles Chaplin; photography: Rollie Totheroh. Cast: Jackie Coogan (The Kid); Edna Purviance (The Woman); Carl Miller (The Man); Charles Chaplin (The Tramp); Tom Wilson (The Policeman); Chuck Reisner (The Bully); Thelbert Theustin (The Crook); Nellie Bly Baker (Slum Woman); Henry Bergman (Proprietor of lodging house); Lita Grey (Flirting angel). Publications Books: Tyler, Parker, Chaplin, Last of the Clowns, New York, 1947. Huff, Theodore, Charlie Chaplin, New York, 1951. Bessy, Maurice, and Robert Florey, Monsieur Chaplin; ou, Le Rire dans la nuit, Paris, 1952. Sadoul, Georges, Vie de Charlot, Paris, 1952. Leprohon, Pierre, Charlot, Paris, 1957; revised edition, 1970. Mitry, Jean, Charlot et la fabulation chaplinesque, Paris, 1957. Amengual, Barthélemy, Charles Chaplin, Paris, 1963. Chaplin, Charles, My Autobiography, London, 1964. McDonald, Gerald, and others, The Films of Charlie Chaplin, Secaucus, New Jersey, 1965. Martin, Marcel, Charlie Chaplin, Paris, 1966; third edition, 1983. McCaffrey, Donald, editor, Focus on Chaplin, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1971. Mitry, Jean, Tout Chaplin: Tous les films, par le texte, par le gag, et par l’image, Paris, 1972. Chaplin, Charles, My Life in Pictures, London, 1974. Manvell, Roger, Chaplin, Boston, 1974. Moss, Robert, Charlie Chaplin, New York, 1975. Sobel, Raoul, and David Francis, Chaplin: Genesis of a Clown, London, 1977
THE KID FILMS. 4 EDITIoN The kid
THE KID FILMS, 4th EDITION 630 The Kid
FILMS. 4th EDItION THE KID Baldelli, P, Charlie Chaplin, Florence, 1977 The Kid was the first feature film that Charles Chaplin devised and Lyons, Timothy J, Charles Chaplin: A Guide to References and directed, the longest film in which he had appeared since Keystones Resources. Boston. 1979 Tillie's Punctured Romance seven years earlier, three times longer Eisenstein, Sergei, Film Essays and a Lecture, edited by Jay Leyda, than the typical two-reeler at which he had specialized for six years, and almost twice as long as his other major films produced for First Haining, Peter, editor, The Legend of Charlie Chaplin, London, 1982. National since 1918. The films greater length reveals Chaplins Gehring, Wes D, editor, Charlie Chaplin: A Bio-Bibliography expansion of his comic focus to include more powerful and more Westport, Connecticut, 1983 personal social, moral, and emotional material. At the centre of the Robinson, David, Chaplin: The Mirror of Opinion, London, 1983 film is the Tramp's relationship to Little Jackie (Jackie Coogan). Kamin, Dan, Charlie Chaplin's One- Man Show, Metuchen, New a five-year-old child who has been abandoned by his unwed mother, Jersey, 1984. found and raised by the Tramp as his own surrogate son. Like the Smith, Julian, Chaplin, Boston, 1984 mongrel, Scraps, of A Dog's Life(1918), Jackie is a smaller, alternate Robinson, David, Chaplin: His Life and Art, London, 1985 version of the Tramp himself-a social outcast, defined as illegiti Saint-Martin, Catherine, Charlot/Chaplin, ou, La Conscience du mate by the laws and conventions of organized society, able to mythe. Paris. 1987 survive because he is tough though small, mentally agile though Silver, Charles, Charles Chaplin: An Appreciation, New York, 1990 uneducated, alternately hard-headed and soft-hearted when it be- Lynn, Kenneth S. Charlie Chaplin and His Times, New York, 1997. comes necessary to be either Milton, Joyce, Tramp: The life of Charlie Chaplin, New York, 1998 Chaplin transferred many of the Tramp's traits, as well as many of Turk, Ruth, Charlie Chaplin: From Tears to Laughter, Minneapo- his own comedic skills, to little Jackie. Coogan's brilliant perform- ance, responsible for much of the success and popularity of the film Kimber, John, The Art of Charles Chaplin, Sheffield, 2000 was the first by another performer that Chaplin totally dominated and controlled, in effect creating an alternative Chaplin in a different Articles physical guise(Edna Purviance's performance in A Woman of Paris, Virginia Cherrill's in City Lights, and Paulette Goddards in Moder Variety(New York), 21 January 1921 Times would be three later such transmutations ). Beneath the fictio New York Times, 22 January 192 material in the film one can strongly sense the influence of Chaplins Charlie Chaplins Art Dissected, 'in Literary Digest(New York), own personal experiences-his own life as an abandoned child of the 8 October 1921 London slums, the death of his own first child, born prematurely, and Grein, J.T,"Chaplin as Film Producer, "in Illustrated London the collapse of his own first marriage, at least partially resulting from News. 15 March 1924 the child’ s death. Grace, Harry A, " Charlie Chaplins Films and American Culture Framing the serio-comic study of Charlie and Jackie's domestic Patterns, in Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism( Cleveland), bliss, their poor but tranquil existence vivified by love, is material of June 1952 an entirely different sort. The film begins with a sequence on the Brownlow,Kevin,""The Early Days of Charlie Chaplin, " in Film unwed mother's(Edna Purviance) difficult decision to abandon her London) Summer 1964. hild, depicting her relationship to the callous father (a painter who no yons, Timoth Roland H. Totheroh Interviewed: Chaplin longer thinks of the woman)and to the conventional societal defini Films, in Film Culture(New York), Spring 1972. tions of morality and legitimacy(fraught with explicit Christian Schickel, Richard, " Hail Chaplin-The Early in New York symbolism). Whereas the woman observes a socially"legitimate Times Biography Edition, 2 April 1972. marriage that pairs a young woman with an old, rich man, her own sort Carey, Gary, in Film Comment(New York), September-October 1972. of affair is considered illegitimate, even if the action resulted from Lefevre, Raymond, in Cinema(Paris), February 1974 love and not money. The Christian symbolism returns at the end of the Ferrari, A, in Telecine(Paris), March 1974 film when Charlie searching for the child who has been stolen from Monthly Film Bulletin(London), March 1975 him, falls asleep to dream of a more pleasant place where, as in so Salko, S, in Filmihullu(Helsinki), no. 2. 19 many other Chaplin dream sequences, the painful realities of earthly Papson, S, "The IBM Tramp, "in Jump Cut(Berkeley), April 1990. existence no longer exist. In this dream, considered irrelevant by Randisi, S, "The Flirting Angel and the Tramp, " "in Filmfax(Evans- some critics, Chaplin recreates a comic version of"the Fallas ton, Illinois), June-July 1993. a group of heavenly angel-people, including the Tramp and all his Rosi, F, ""Entre Le kid et La terre tremble, in Positif (Paris), no. other neighbors in the slum, fly through the now white-washed and 400,June1994 flower-garlanded streets of a utopian city. The dream collapses and Woal, M, and L K. Woal, ""Chaplin and the Comedy of Melo- the perfect peace turns to bitter chaos when the Satanic spirits of drama, " in Joumal of Film and Video(atlanta), voL 46, no 3, 1994 lechery and jealousy sneak through the gates of the heavenly city. Gunning, Tom, "Buster Keaton or the Work of Comedy in the Age of Although the sleeping Tramp is roused from this dream to be reunited Mechanical Reproduction, in Cineaste(New York), vol. 21, with Jackie and Edna, the dream sequence suggests Chaplin's sense 995 of the fragility and ce of the true moments of human love and Nysenholc, A, ""Chaplin: du reve au mythe vivant, 'in Revue Belge happiness, only temporary escapes from the sordid realities and du Cinema(Brussels), no 42, Summer 1997. painful necessities of earthly life
FILMS, 4 THE KID th EDITION 631 Baldelli, P., Charlie Chaplin, Florence, 1977. Lyons, Timothy J., Charles Chaplin: A Guide to References and Resources, Boston, 1979. Eisenstein, Sergei, Film Essays and a Lecture, edited by Jay Leyda, Princeton, 1982. Haining, Peter, editor, The Legend of Charlie Chaplin, London, 1982. Gehring, Wes D., editor, Charlie Chaplin: A Bio-Bibliography, Westport, Connecticut, 1983. Robinson, David, Chaplin: The Mirror of Opinion, London, 1983. Kamin, Dan, Charlie Chaplin’s One-Man Show, Metuchen, New Jersey, 1984. Smith, Julian, Chaplin, Boston, 1984. Robinson, David, Chaplin: His Life and Art, London, 1985. Saint-Martin, Catherine, Charlot/Chaplin; ou, La Conscience du mythe, Paris, 1987. Silver, Charles, Charles Chaplin: An Appreciation, New York, 1990. Lynn, Kenneth S., Charlie Chaplin and His Times, New York, 1997. Milton, Joyce, Tramp: The Life of Charlie Chaplin, New York, 1998. Turk, Ruth, Charlie Chaplin: From Tears to Laughter, Minneapolis, 1999. Kimber, John, The Art of Charles Chaplin, Sheffield, 2000. Articles: Variety (New York), 21 January 1921. New York Times, 22 January 1921. ‘‘Charlie Chaplin’s Art Dissected,’’ in Literary Digest (New York), 8 October 1921. Grein, J. T., ‘‘Chaplin as Film Producer,’’ in Illustrated London News, 15 March 1924. Grace, Harry A., ‘‘Charlie Chaplin’s Films and American Culture Patterns,’’ in Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism (Cleveland), June 1952. Brownlow, Kevin, ‘‘The Early Days of Charlie Chaplin,’’ in Film (London), Summer 1964. Lyons, Timothy J., ‘‘Roland H. Totheroh Interviewed: Chaplin Films,’’ in Film Culture (New York), Spring 1972. Schickel, Richard, ‘‘Hail Chaplin—The Early Chaplin,’’ in New York Times Biography Edition, 2 April 1972. Carey, Gary, in Film Comment (New York), September-October 1972. Lefèvre, Raymond, in Cinéma (Paris), February 1974. Ferrari, A., in Téléciné (Paris), March 1974. Monthly Film Bulletin (London), March 1975. Salko, S., in Filmihullu (Helsinki), no. 2, 1979. Papson, S., ‘‘The IBM Tramp,’’ in Jump Cut (Berkeley), April 1990. Randisi, S., ‘‘The Flirting Angel and the Tramp,’’ in Filmfax (Evanston, Illinois), June-July 1993. Rosi, F., ‘‘Entre Le kid et La terre tremble,’’ in Positif (Paris), no. 400, June 1994. Woal, M., and L.K. Woal, ‘‘Chaplin and the Comedy of Melodrama,’’ in Journal of Film and Video (Atlanta), vol. 46, no. 3, 1994. Gunning, Tom, ‘‘Buster Keaton or the Work of Comedy in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,’’ in Cineaste (New York), vol. 21, no. 3, 1995. Nysenholc, A., ‘‘Chaplin: du reve au mythe vivant,’’ in Revue Belge du Cinéma (Brussels), no. 42, Summer 1997. *** The Kid was the first feature film that Charles Chaplin devised and directed, the longest film in which he had appeared since Keystone’s Tillie’s Punctured Romance seven years earlier, three times longer than the typical two-reeler at which he had specialized for six years, and almost twice as long as his other major films produced for First National since 1918. The film’s greater length reveals Chaplin’s expansion of his comic focus to include more powerful and more personal social, moral, and emotional material. At the centre of the film is the Tramp’s relationship to Little Jackie (Jackie Coogan), a five-year-old child who has been abandoned by his unwed mother, found and raised by the Tramp as his own surrogate son. Like the mongrel, Scraps, of A Dog’s Life (1918), Jackie is a smaller, alternate version of the Tramp himself—a social outcast, defined as illegitimate by the laws and conventions of organized society, able to survive because he is tough though small, mentally agile though uneducated, alternately hard-headed and soft-hearted when it becomes necessary to be either. Chaplin transferred many of the Tramp’s traits, as well as many of his own comedic skills, to little Jackie. Coogan’s brilliant performance, responsible for much of the success and popularity of the film, was the first by another performer that Chaplin totally dominated and controlled, in effect creating an alternative Chaplin in a different physical guise (Edna Purviance’s performance in A Woman of Paris, Virginia Cherrill’s in City Lights, and Paulette Goddard’s in Modern Times would be three later such transmutations). Beneath the fictional material in the film one can strongly sense the influence of Chaplin’s own personal experiences—his own life as an abandoned child of the London slums, the death of his own first child, born prematurely, and the collapse of his own first marriage, at least partially resulting from the child’s death. Framing the serio-comic study of Charlie and Jackie’s domestic bliss, their poor but tranquil existence vivified by love, is material of an entirely different sort. The film begins with a sequence on the unwed mother’s (Edna Purviance) difficult decision to abandon her child, depicting her relationship to the callous father (a painter who no longer thinks of the woman) and to the conventional societal definitions of morality and legitimacy (fraught with explicit Christian symbolism). Whereas the woman observes a socially ‘‘legitimate’’ marriage that pairs a young woman with an old, rich man, her own sort of affair is considered illegitimate, even if the action resulted from love and not money. The Christian symbolism returns at the end of the film when Charlie, searching for the child who has been stolen from him, falls asleep to dream of a more pleasant place where, as in so many other Chaplin dream sequences, the painful realities of earthly existence no longer exist. In this dream, considered irrelevant by some critics, Chaplin recreates a comic version of ‘‘the Fall’’ as a group of heavenly angel-people, including the Tramp and all his other neighbors in the slum, fly through the now white-washed and flower-garlanded streets of a utopian city. The dream collapses and the perfect peace turns to bitter chaos when the Satanic spirits of lechery and jealousy sneak through the gates of the heavenly city. Although the sleeping Tramp is roused from this dream to be reunited with Jackie and Edna, the dream sequence suggests Chaplin’s sense of the fragility and transience of the true moments of human love and happiness, only temporary escapes from the sordid realities and painful necessities of earthly life. —Gerald Mast
THE KILLERS FILMS. 4 EDITIoN THE KILLERS Taylor, John Russell, ""Encounter with Siodmak, in Sight and Sound (London), Summer-Autumn 1959 Siodmak, Robert, and richard wilson, " "Hoodlums: The Myths and USA,1946 Their Reality, in Films and Filming(London), June 1959 Sarris, Andrew, ""Esoterica, in Film Culture(New York), Spring 1963 Director: Robert Siodmak Nolan, Jack. ""Robert Siodmak, 'in Films in Review(New York) Production: Mark Hellinger Productions; black and white, 35mm; Flinn, Tom, "Three Faces of Film Noir, in Velvet Light Trap unning time: 105 minutes, some sources list 102 minutes. Released (Madison, Wisconsin ), Summer 1972 :8 August 1946 by Universal. Filming completed 28 June 1946 in Ecran(Paris), Summer 1972. Eyles, Allen,"Edmond O Brien, in Focus on Film (London), Autumn 1974 Producer: Mark Hellinger: screenplay: Anthony Kaminsky, Stuart M, "Hemingways The Killers, in Take One short story by Ernest Hemingway; photography y bedell; (Montreal), November 1974 special photography: David S. Horsely: editor Jenkins, Steve. in Monthly Film Bulletin(London ), October 1981 Bernard Brown and William Hedgecock; art directors: Jack Goldschmidt, D, in Cinematographe(Paris), July 1985 on and Martin Obzina; music: Miklos Rozsa; costume de- Slater, Thomas, "" Anthony Veiller, "in American Screenwriters, 2nd Vera West Series, edited by Randall Clark, Detroit, 1986 Review, in EPD Film(frankfurt), vol 7, no 8, August 1990. Cast: Edmond OBrien(Riordan); Ava Gardner(Kitty Collins): Wald, Marvin, ""Richard Brooks and Me, "in Creative Screenwriting Albert Dekker(Colfax); Sam Levene(Lubinsky); John Miljan (Jake); (Washington, D.C. ) vol. 1, no 2, Summer 1994 Virginia Christine (Lilly): Vince Barnett( Charleston); Burt Lancaster Aachen, G, in Reids Film Index(Wyong), no. 23, 1996 (Swede ): Charles D. Brown(Packy): Donald Mac Bride(Kenyon): Lucas, Tim, "The Killers, Criss Cross, The Undemeath, Brute Force, Phil Brown(Nick); Charles McGraw(Al: William Conrad (Max) The Naked City, in Video Watchdog( Cincinnati), no 32, Queenie Smith(Queenie): Garry Owen(oe); Harry Hayden(George): Mumby, J, "The'Un-American'Film Art: Robert Siodmak and the Bill Walker(Sam); Jack Lambert(DumDum); Jeff Corey(Blinky); Political Significance of Film Noirs German Connection, in Wally Scott(Charlie ): Gabrielle Windsor(Ginny); Rex Dale(Man) Iris, no 21, Spring 1996 Telotte, J.P., "" Fatal Capers: Strategy and Enigma in Film noir, in Journal of Popular Film and Television(Washington, D. C ) vol Publications 23. no. 4. Winter 1996 Brierly, D,"Robert Siodmak, in Filmfax(Evanston), no. 62 Books August/September 1997 McArthur. Colin Underworld U.S.A. London. 1972. Kaminsky, Stuart M, American Film Genres, Dayton, Ohio, 1974: revised edition. Chicago, 1985 The Killers begins with literature and ends with film noir. The Silver, Alain, and Elizabeth Ward, editors, Film Noir, Woodstock, unlikely death of a filling station attendant prompts an insurance New York. 1979 investigator to solve a puzzle of events that leads him to the cause of Phillips, Gene D Hemingway and Film, New York, 1980 the murder and then envelops him in a plot ending with the murderers Laurence, Frank M, Hemingway and the Movies, Jackson, Missis- death. After staging Ernest Hemingway's story in the opening se- sippi, 1981 quence, the plot follows a structure that prevails in the convention of Dumont, Herve, Robert Siodmak: Le Maitre du film noir, the 1940s: a man utters his last words, i did something wrong, nne,1981 once, ' to avow his fatal mistake of falling in love with a woman who Alpi, Deborah Lazaroff, Robert Siodmak: A Biography, with Critical doublecrosses him. His relentless passion and blindness lead the two Analyses of His Films Noirs and a Filmography of All His Works nd to their demise ferson. 1998 Director robert Siodmak makes filmic innovation from a model Greco, Joseph, The File on Robert Siodmak in Hollywood: 1941-1951, anticipated in Renoir's La bete humaine(1938)and standardized Parkland. 1999. since Double Indemniry (1944). The opening shots afford visual plendor in deep-focus shots taken in the confines of an empty cafe Articles Hemingways narrative is translated into a tense volley of words and Variety(New York), 7 August 1946 11 major flashbacks-and flashbacks within flashbacks-before the New York Times, 29 August 1946. insurance agent(Edmond O Brien) witnesses the dying Marshman, D," Mister Siodmak, in Life(New York confession inculpating his attendant spouse. Something of August 1947. nouveau roman, the script has the narrative cross over an o a potos Lillich, Richard, " "Hemingway on the Screen, in Films in Review abyss of time-the amnesia of the Second World War-in ways that (New York), April 1959. determine the absolute immobility of the present. Recent history, as if
THE KILLERS FILMS, 4th EDITION 632 THE KILLERS USA, 1946 Director: Robert Siodmak Production: Mark Hellinger Productions; black and white, 35mm; running time: 105 minutes, some sources list 102 minutes. Released 28 August 1946 by Universal. Filming completed 28 June 1946 in Universal studios. Producer: Mark Hellinger; screenplay: Anthony Veiller, from the short story by Ernest Hemingway; photography: Woody Bredell; special photography: David S. Horsely; editor: Arthur Hilton; sound: Bernard Brown and William Hedgecock; art directors: Jack Otterson and Martin Obzina; music: Miklos Rozsa; costume designer: Vera West. Cast: Edmond O’Brien (Riordan); Ava Gardner (Kitty Collins); Albert Dekker (Colfax); Sam Levene (Lubinsky); John Miljan (Jake); Virginia Christine (Lilly); Vince Barnett (Charleston); Burt Lancaster (Swede); Charles D. Brown (Packy); Donald MacBride (Kenyon); Phil Brown (Nick); Charles McGraw (Al); William Conrad (Max); Queenie Smith (Queenie); Garry Owen (Joe); Harry Hayden (George); Bill Walker (Sam); Jack Lambert (Dum Dum); Jeff Corey (Blinky); Wally Scott (Charlie); Gabrielle Windsor (Ginny); Rex Dale (Man). Publications Books: McArthur, Colin, Underworld U.S.A., London, 1972. Kaminsky, Stuart M., American Film Genres, Dayton, Ohio, 1974; revised edition, Chicago, 1985. Silver, Alain, and Elizabeth Ward, editors, Film Noir, Woodstock, New York, 1979. Phillips, Gene D., Hemingway and Film, New York, 1980. Laurence, Frank M., Hemingway and the Movies, Jackson, Mississippi, 1981. Dumont, Hervé, Robert Siodmak: Le Maître du film noir, Lausanne, 1981. Alpi, Deborah Lazaroff, Robert Siodmak: A Biography, with Critical Analyses of His Films Noirs and a Filmography of All His Works, Jefferson, 1998. Greco, Joseph, The File on Robert Siodmak in Hollywood: 1941–1951, Parkland, 1999. Articles: Variety (New York), 7 August 1946. New York Times, 29 August 1946. Marshman, D., ‘‘Mister Siodmak,’’ in Life (New York), 25 August 1947. Lillich, Richard, ‘‘Hemingway on the Screen,’’ in Films in Review (New York), April 1959. Taylor, John Russell, ‘‘Encounter with Siodmak,’’ in Sight and Sound (London), Summer-Autumn 1959. Siodmak, Robert, and Richard Wilson, ‘‘Hoodlums: The Myths and Their Reality,’’ in Films and Filming (London), June 1959. Sarris, Andrew, ‘‘Esoterica,’’ in Film Culture (New York), Spring 1963. Nolan, Jack, ‘‘Robert Siodmak,’’ in Films in Review (New York), April 1969. Flinn, Tom, ‘‘Three Faces of Film Noir,’’ in Velvet Light Trap (Madison, Wisconsin), Summer 1972. Ecran (Paris), Summer 1972. Eyles, Allen, ‘‘Edmond O’Brien,’’ in Focus on Film (London), Autumn 1974. Kaminsky, Stuart M., ‘‘Hemingway’s The Killers,’’ in Take One (Montreal), November 1974. Jenkins, Steve, in Monthly Film Bulletin (London), October 1981. Goldschmidt, D., in Cinématographe (Paris), July 1985. Slater, Thomas, ‘‘Anthony Veiller,’’ in American Screenwriters, 2nd Series, edited by Randall Clark, Detroit, 1986. Review, in EPD Film (Frankfurt), vol. 7, no. 8, August 1990. Wald, Marvin, ‘‘Richard Brooks and Me,’’ in Creative Screenwriting (Washington, D.C.), vol. 1, no. 2, Summer 1994. Aachen, G., in Reid’s Film Index (Wyong), no. 23, 1996. Lucas, Tim, ‘‘The Killers, Criss Cross, The Underneath, Brute Force, The Naked City,’’ in Video Watchdog (Cincinnati), no. 32, 1996. Mumby, J., ‘‘The ‘Un-American’ Film Art: Robert Siodmak and the Political Significance of Film Noir’s German Connection,’’ in Iris, no. 21, Spring 1996. Telotte, J.P., ‘‘Fatal Capers: Strategy and Enigma in Film Noir,’’ in Journal of Popular Film and Television (Washington, D.C.), vol. 23, no. 4, Winter 1996. Brierly, D., ‘‘Robert Siodmak,’’ in Filmfax (Evanston), no. 62, August/September 1997. *** The Killers begins with literature and ends with film noir. The unlikely death of a filling station attendant prompts an insurance investigator to solve a puzzle of events that leads him to the cause of the murder and then envelops him in a plot ending with the murderer’s death. After staging Ernest Hemingway’s story in the opening sequence, the plot follows a structure that prevails in the convention of the 1940s: a man utters his last words, ‘‘I did something wrong, once,’’ to avow his fatal mistake of falling in love with a woman who doublecrosses him. His relentless passion and blindness lead the two of them and her husband to their demise. Director Robert Siodmak makes filmic innovation from a model anticipated in Renoir’s La bête humaine (1938) and standardized since Double Indemnity (1944). The opening shots afford visual splendor in deep-focus shots taken in the confines of an empty café. Hemingway’s narrative is translated into a tense volley of words and images. The rest of the film ‘‘catches up’’ with the initial murder after 11 major flashbacks—and flashbacks within flashbacks—before the insurance agent (Edmond O’Brien) witnesses the dying culprit’s confession inculpating his attendant spouse. Something of a protonouveau roman, the script has the narrative cross over an unnamed abyss of time—the amnesia of the Second World War—in ways that determine the absolute immobility of the present. Recent history, as if
FILMS. 4th EDItION THE KILLERS The killers it were a memory too traumatic to be named, figures as a central abyss gunmen at the other end of the counter, bewildered by what he sees, of violence gnawing at the surrounding fiction. 22 lap dissolves thro Nick Adams directs his words both to the killers and the spectator the narrative into a configuration of overlapping surfaces. Astonished, he exclaims, ""What's the idea? To which the hefty thug Narrative intricacy aside, the film is a masterful exercise in the (william Conrad) snarls (off) in the direction of Adams and the creation of subjectivity that political scientists call"interpellation, viewer, " There isnt any idea. The riposte orients the eye away from the forces that determine the human being as a social subject. No metaphysics or invisibility of language to a richer play of prismatic other film noir-save Siodmaks Phantom Lady ( 1944)or Crisscross form. The moment also shows how, second, the violence of history (1949)makes such sustained use of voice-off as instances of will be scripted onto the surface of the tale. In the first flashback that interpellation. Figures on frame are continually"marked by depicts Nick Adams's reconstruction of the victims last days, told to operatives, off, having no discernible visual origin. They leave an the insurance investigator, the camera frames the protagonist(Burt eerie effect matched by back lighting that makes the characters Lancaster), standing in front of the Tristate Station. He is visibly ill shadows more revealing than their persons. The resulting fragmenta- at the sight of the return of his repressed, the gangster Jim Colfax, who tion and doubling of figures, along with rifts of voice and image, show will now set a price on his life. Standing under the marquee above where the film theorizes the conventions its narrative seems to him, Lancaster nods and puts his hands to his stomach. His head shifts develop so patently. The films broken synchronies not only give position over the letters STATE STATIC (the O of"statio evidence of what film noir is and how it is effected; like Citizen Kane carefully cut in half by a pole). His head blocks and iodmak's film anticipates future experiment in European and Ameri- letters"ATE STATIC. The wording scripts the fate of a character as can cinema it figures a global malaise of narrative and political stasis in 1946. Three sequences are noteworthy. In the re-enactment of Heming. Adjacent to a sign that spells tires in acrostic to his left, Lancaster is ways tale, script and deep focus are used to truncate cinematic a figure worn down-fatigued-by history and fate. He is not only illusion and ideation. Seated in contrapuntal relation to the two
FILMS, 4 THE KILLERS th EDITION 633 The Killers it were a memory too traumatic to be named, figures as a central abyss of violence gnawing at the surrounding fiction. 22 lap dissolves throw the narrative into a configuration of overlapping surfaces. Narrative intricacy aside, the film is a masterful exercise in the creation of subjectivity that political scientists call ‘‘interpellation,’’ or the forces that determine the human being as a social subject. No other film noir—save Siodmak’s Phantom Lady (1944) or Crisscross (1949)—makes such sustained use of voice-off as instances of interpellation. Figures on frame are continually ‘‘marked’’ by imperatives, off, having no discernible visual origin. They leave an eerie effect matched by back lighting that makes the characters’ shadows more revealing than their persons. The resulting fragmentation and doubling of figures, along with rifts of voice and image, show where the film theorizes the conventions its narrative seems to develop so patently. The film’s broken synchronies not only give evidence of what film noir is and how it is effected; like Citizen Kane, Siodmak’s film anticipates future experiment in European and American cinema. Three sequences are noteworthy. In the re-enactment of Hemingway’s tale, script and deep focus are used to truncate cinematic illusion and ideation. Seated in contrapuntal relation to the two gunmen at the other end of the counter, bewildered by what he sees, Nick Adams directs his words both to the killers and the spectator. Astonished, he exclaims, ‘‘What’s the idea?’’ To which the hefty thug (William Conrad) snarls (off) in the direction of Adams and the viewer, ‘‘There isn’t any idea.’’ The riposte orients the eye away from metaphysics or invisibility of language to a richer play of prismatic form. The moment also shows how, second, the violence of history will be scripted onto the surface of the tale. In the first flashback that depicts Nick Adams’s reconstruction of the victim’s last days, told to the insurance investigator, the camera frames the protagonist (Burt Lancaster), standing in front of the ‘‘Tristate Station.’’ He is visibly ill at the sight of the return of his repressed, the gangster Jim Colfax, who will now set a price on his life. Standing under the marquee above him, Lancaster nods and puts his hands to his stomach. His head shifts position over the letters STATE STATIC (the O of ‘‘station’’ carefully cut in half by a pole). His head blocks and uncovers the letters ‘‘ATE STATIC.’’ The wording scripts the fate of a character as it figures a global malaise of narrative and political stasis in 1946. Adjacent to a sign that spells TIRES in acrostic to his left, Lancaster is a figure worn down—fatigued—by history and fate. He is not only a victim of a tri-state tryst, but also of a political atmosphere, a cold