Spotlight

Spotlight Date: 25-March-07
Spoiler Rating: High

Clash by Night (1952)

On the heels of "The Big Heat" and "Fury," I continue my foray into the oeuvre of Fritz Lang with the 1952 drama "Clash by Night." This movie is immediately differentiated from the director's other work by the opening credits rolling over images of pounding surf accompanied by schmaltzy music. Whereas many of Lang's stories deal with crime and punishment, this one initially appears to deal with sex.

This idea is bolstered as the film opens to a young Marilyn Monroe working in a cannery in a California fishing town. You get the sense that not much happens there, so it's understandable why such a girl would date a guy who treats her roughly and get excited when his long-lost sister turns up on his doorstep. The new arrival, Mae Doyle (Barbara Stanwyck), has been around the block several times and returned home for a bit of a breather. As soon as she presents her too-cool, chain-smoking, cynical-ass self, the plot seems to veer from sex to the sexes. Mae exudes a "can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em" attitude which soon spreads to almost every other character.

How does Stanwyck make it look so easy? Not even Bette Davis brings such naturalness to roles marked by hardness overlying vulnerability (or not). As Mae browses for a man to make her feel "confident," she epitomizes worldliness, weariness, and a candor impossible to resist. She does not shy from acknowledging her faults and destructive capabilities, so her decision to marry childlike fisherman Jerry D'Amato (Paul Douglas) is surprisingly optimistic. She knows that settling down could do her good and tries to let it do so. One obstacle to her happy homemaking, however, is the constant presence of Jerry's pal Earl (Robert Ryan, exhibiting the perfect degree of downward middle-age creep). He shares all Mae's faults and then some and is therefore a nettlesome fascination.

Once the heartbreaks and hormones are set in motion, "Clash by Night" again switches gears in a way that improves the movie's impact. The looming conclusion that a woman ought to let herself be tamed or suffer a lonesome fate (the apparent moral of the Monroe sub-story) gives way to a lesson learned by a restless soul who needs to grow up. Because of the child she shares with Jerry (a more realistic catalyst than his brand of manhood), Mae realizes the danger of the narcissism that passes for idealism, the hunger for passions that make her feel energized and larger-than-life. While Earl argues that responsibility is spelled T-R-A-P, she decides that it can be a potentially broadening restriction. This is not the ending suggested by the crashing waves and subsequent hallmarks of melodrama. Lang and his star deliver a mature tale which builds with progressive insight.

Copyright © 2007 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.