Films/DVD Asylum

Posted by tinear (A) on May 04, 2010 at 13:47:57

"The Furies," starring Barbara Stanwyck, Wendell Corey, and a rapidly fading (his last role) and miscast Walter Huston.
Be forewarned, I am a major Stanwyck fan and in this film she does what she does best: project both vulnerability and toughness as few other stars could. Perhaps it's because when she portrays a woman born on the wrong side of the tracks or a woman driven to succeed by all means, it mimicks her own life with its rags-to-riches story.
At any rate, this film, as the title betrays, has Greek tragedy allusions. It has some rather ridiculous, utterly unbelievable scenes but the passions are so raw, the bravura storytelling and acting so astounding, that it works within the crazy world the writer and director create--- like a terrible fight in a public place, the viewer just cannot look away.
Corey surprisingly is adequate, a multi-dimensional character who is neither all greed nor all good--- in short, a complex character.
Huston is the only disappointment: he seems far too theatrical, in an Eastern sense, to be a hard-bitten Western cattle baron. His histrionics belonged to an already departed theater tradition and Mann made a serious mistake in allowing him so much rope. Still, the film survives him and avoids clichés as if they were cholera.