The Tarnished Angels

The Tarnished Angels (Douglas Sirk, 1957)

Adapted from William Faulkner’s novel Pylon, Douglas Sirk’s lavish black and white film stars regular Rock Hudson, Robert Stack, and Dorothy Malone. Reunited two years after the making of the masterpiece, yes I said it, Written on the Wind, this trio does it again for another great Sirk film.

There’s Always Tomorrow

There’s Always Tomorrow (Douglas Sirk, 1956)

Of the many aspects of the films of Douglas Sirk’s that define his signature there’s obviously the colourful visuals, his use of few means, melodramas, plot lines scratching just enough the boundaries of moral conservatism in the American society, and deep symbolism in his mise en scène.

Imitation of Life (1959)

Imitation of Life (Douglas Sirk, 1959)

A woman, Lora Meredith (Lana Turner), has lost her daughter (Susie) while away at Coney Island for a day of leisure. In the meanwhile, a nice woman (Juanita Moore as Annie) took care of her along with her own daughter, Sarah-Jane. When Turner finds her daughter with Annie, she accepts to take the mother and child in their apartment. Annie, a black woman with a white child, becomes in the same time Lora’s maid and helps her raise Susie while she struggles to get into show-business and follow her ambitions. It is a story at first about a woman who’s ambitions leaded her to success but also to neglect her family and potential lover. It is also about how coloured people had to suffer in America in the 1950’s, it is unbelievable to actually witness intolerance and how director Douglas Sirk actually criticizes racism. The film can even be split in two halves because the second half is mostly about Annie and Sarah-Jane and the first half about Lora, Susie, and Steve (John Gavin).

All That Heaven Allows

All That Heaven Allows (Douglas Sirk, 1955)

An upper-class widow falls in love with a much younger, down-to-earth nurseryman, much to the disapproval of her children and criticism of her country club peers.

Melodrama, Technicolor, the 1950’s. Douglas Sirk! The formula is there and couldn’t get better. Remade in 1974 by Rainer Werner Fassbinder in his Ali: Fear Eats the Soul and in 2002 by Todd Haynes with his masterpiece Far From Heaven, Sirk’s All That Heaven Allows might be one of the most visually striking films that the German born director ever made. It’s a shame that I saw my first Sirk movie only two years ago, being such an enthusiast now. With recurrent lead actor Rock Hudson and Jane Wyman as a widow of the upper-middle-class who falls in love for her gardener who himself lives as a simple man living simply and growing trees. Their biggest problem is the disapproval of their relationship by Cary’s (Wyman) children and her circle of friends of the country club.

Written on the Wind

Written on the Wind (Douglas Sirk, 1956)

Alcoholic playboy Kyle Hadley marries the woman secretly loved by his poor but hard-working best friend, who in turn is pursued by Kyle's nymphomaniac sister.

Influencing some of the most respected directors (Jean-Luc Godard, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Todd Haynes, Pedro Almodovar) of the past and today, Douglas Sirk’s Melodrama Written on the Wind is one of the most brilliant masterpieces of the genre. Considered as the cornerstone of the soap opera, the sheer excesses of Sirk’s mise en scène, art direction, and his parentheticals to the actors are at their best in this movie. Having only seen The Magnificent Obsession and A Time to Love and a Time to Die prior to Written on the Wind, I did not knew much what to expect. Well, I had a slight idea but I wasn’t prepared to be impressed and charmed by the eccentric facets of Sirk’s once ridiculed film that regain its esteem into the cinephile circles. When one enters into a Sirk film he should be warned that the bright colors and the exuberant over the top acting won’t be an instant amazement.

A Time to Love and A Time to Die

A Time to Love and A Time to Die (Douglas Sirk, 1958)

It was the first time in 1958 that an American film presented the Second World War from the German side. Well, it took an immigrated German director, Douglas Sirk to get the nerves to produce and direct a film only fourteen years after the events of the film took place.

It was also the first time that German soldiers were represented as human as the different characters of this film. Without the uniforms it could be any army or any country. This is one of the strenght of the film. We can understand universally the events and the preoccupations of the main characters of A Time to love...

On a permission for three weeks a German soldier of the Russian front returns to his hometown to find his family. His discovers it has been bombed and starts on a quest to find his parents.

Like Douglas Sirk's other films, A Time to Love... falls into melodrama without falling completely into clichés or oversentimental. Every bad event is followed by a good one and every good one is followed by a bad one. The wheel keeps turning like that all along the story of the film.

A Time to Love and A Time to Die has a unique touch and feeling on World War II and it is an excellent and unforgettable film from one of the best director of the 1950's.

A Film Retrospective by Michaël Parent