I gave this movie four stars but feel I need to qualify it. Lets start with what's good about this.
Ingrid Bergman. When we first meet her, she's drunk and barefoot at a party. She plays drunk with a sad charm that still has a touch of the graceful woman she used to be. Coming down the stairs all dressed up But Ingrid combines a school girl's innocence with her more recent insecurity in a low key but beautiful way. Mainly her character is brought to life by remembering the past. We first see that twinge of remembrance when she realizes at the party that she knows Adare from long ago in Ireland. Her drunken whimsy is halted gently by her thinking about the past. Bergman shines when Adare makes an impromptu mirror to show her that she's still beautiful. When the servants play a cruel trick on her and she runs to her room, I felt truly sorry for her. Her final scene is wonderful. She's riveting, haunted by the past yet low key about it. She is the best thing about this movie.
The cinematography. Despite the bad quality of the print, we can see some of the unusual muted tones that mark the technicolor being made in Britain in the late 1940's.
The original story is great but the script, which I'll get to later, is not up to what's implied in the story. It's a story of class, and of role reversals. A high class woman like Henrietta (Bergman) becomes a prostitute and outcast in Australia. The well born gentleman Charles Adare (Wilding) finds himself to be useless in this new world. We even find out that the servant Winter was a gentleman back in Britain. Only the hardworking Flusky (Cotton) becomes successful. In an odd twist, his own working class servant Milly sees him not as the stable boy he was, but as the unreachable gentry that he's now becomes. Characters want to rise but can't while others fall socially yet become rich down under. This is all only spoken about. It's not done emotionally.
The script - first and foremost the problem is the script. Nothing happens. The action is all told in flashback. Now this sort of work had been done and done well - Jane Eyre, Dragonwick and Hitch's own Rebecca and Suspicion. The difference here is the script and the direction.
Low Budget - The costumes are great, and it looks like they spent some money on the set of the house, but that's about all we see in this. We see too much of the house. We see Bergman and Cotton in particular wearing the same clothing day after day.
The Long Takes - The long takes limit the impact of the film without adding much to it. It's an unneeded constraint that prevents the use of close ups and dramatic cuts.
Cotton and Wilding. Neither are any good. Wilding is stagey fop while Cotton doesn't even try other than to growl and simmer a bit. Neither even tries to seem Irish.
Overall a bad movie with one great performance, Bergman.
Ingrid Bergman. When we first meet her, she's drunk and barefoot at a party. She plays drunk with a sad charm that still has a touch of the graceful woman she used to be. Coming down the stairs all dressed up But Ingrid combines a school girl's innocence with her more recent insecurity in a low key but beautiful way. Mainly her character is brought to life by remembering the past. We first see that twinge of remembrance when she realizes at the party that she knows Adare from long ago in Ireland. Her drunken whimsy is halted gently by her thinking about the past. Bergman shines when Adare makes an impromptu mirror to show her that she's still beautiful. When the servants play a cruel trick on her and she runs to her room, I felt truly sorry for her. Her final scene is wonderful. She's riveting, haunted by the past yet low key about it. She is the best thing about this movie.
The cinematography. Despite the bad quality of the print, we can see some of the unusual muted tones that mark the technicolor being made in Britain in the late 1940's.
The original story is great but the script, which I'll get to later, is not up to what's implied in the story. It's a story of class, and of role reversals. A high class woman like Henrietta (Bergman) becomes a prostitute and outcast in Australia. The well born gentleman Charles Adare (Wilding) finds himself to be useless in this new world. We even find out that the servant Winter was a gentleman back in Britain. Only the hardworking Flusky (Cotton) becomes successful. In an odd twist, his own working class servant Milly sees him not as the stable boy he was, but as the unreachable gentry that he's now becomes. Characters want to rise but can't while others fall socially yet become rich down under. This is all only spoken about. It's not done emotionally.
The script - first and foremost the problem is the script. Nothing happens. The action is all told in flashback. Now this sort of work had been done and done well - Jane Eyre, Dragonwick and Hitch's own Rebecca and Suspicion. The difference here is the script and the direction.
Low Budget - The costumes are great, and it looks like they spent some money on the set of the house, but that's about all we see in this. We see too much of the house. We see Bergman and Cotton in particular wearing the same clothing day after day.
The Long Takes - The long takes limit the impact of the film without adding much to it. It's an unneeded constraint that prevents the use of close ups and dramatic cuts.
Cotton and Wilding. Neither are any good. Wilding is stagey fop while Cotton doesn't even try other than to growl and simmer a bit. Neither even tries to seem Irish.
Overall a bad movie with one great performance, Bergman.