A world at your feet

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Movie
German title A world at your feet
Original title The Foxes of Harrow
Country of production United States
original language English , French
Publishing year 1947
length 108 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director John M. Stahl
script Wanda Tuchock
production William A. Bacher
music David Buttolph
camera Joseph LaShelle
cut James B. Clark
occupation

A world at your feet (original title The Foxes of Harrow ) is an American film drama from 1947 by John M. Stahl . The main roles are played by Rex Harrison and Maureen O'Hara . The film is based on the novel The Foxes of Harrow (1946) by Frank Yerby .

action

Ireland in 1795. The Lord of the House of Harrow asks his servants Sean and Sara Fox to raise their daughter's illegitimate baby. The Fox couple are well paid for this, and although the Master of Harrow admonishes Sean to raise the boy to be a humble man, Sara asks her husband to give the boy enough strength to leave Ireland one day. 1827, the baby matured into a grown man named Stephen. The young man has actually left Ireland and now lives in the United States, a young nation that has drawn many hopeless Irish people. The charismatic Stephen is completely committed to gambling. His good looks fascinated Odalie D'Arceneaux, an aristocratic Creole . However, she is shocked by the fact that Stephen is accused of cheating during a steamboat trip on the Mississippi , unceremoniously thrown from the boat and abandoned on a sandbank. Stephen finds a lift from the cocky Captain Mike Farrell that will take him to New Orleans. There he befriends Andre LeBlanc, an upper-class Creole who tells him about a charity ball hosted by Odalie, her sister Aurore, and her father, the Viscount D'Arceneaux. Odalie is impressed again by Stephen when he generously donates $ 1,000 to her charity. Nevertheless, she refuses Stephen a dance, whereupon the latter turns to Aurore and glides with her across the parquet.

Later Andre takes Stephen to La Bourse de Maspero, a mixture of slave market, stock exchange, amusement arcade and restaurant. Stephen joins a blackjack game led by Otto Ludenbach, a German-American crook who once starved his family and slaves to buy his feudal plantation. Stephen licks Ludenbach from this plantation while gambling and then challenges him to a duel when he makes an insulting comment about Odalie. Ludenbach shoots too early and injures the inattentive Stephen, who shoots back and kills Ludenbach. When Odalie learns about the duel, the proud Southern Belle is furious that Stephen has linked his name to hers. However, her anger fades when she learns that Stephen Ludenbach's widow has given money to help her start a new life. Stephen is soon working hard to spruce up the plantation, which he is renaming "Harrow". He can also set up a financial empire. Meanwhile, Odalie is going to Paris for a year. When she returns, he invites the attractive, spirited woman and her family to the reopening of “Harrow”. During the celebration, Odalie worries about Stephen's general obsession that drives him in many of the things he does. But when he speaks of his origins and the humble childhood in Ireland and Odalie explains that he only did all of this for her in order to put a world at her feet, Odalie is touched. She goes to her father and tells him that she will marry Stephen. On their wedding night, Stephen and Odalie are interrupted during foreplay by the good wishes of a noisy group led by the always bramar-based Captain Farrell. While Odalie wants to spend her night of love undisturbed with Stephen, her husband is fascinated by the idea of ​​going on a drinking spree with his buddies. Odalie remains stunned. When her husband returns, he finds the bedroom door locked. Odalie won't let him in anymore, whereupon the drunk man breaks down the door.

Given this stormy and violent start to their marriage, Odalie declares that she will wear Stephen's jewelry and sit by his side at the table, but no more. Stephen's pride prevents him from apologizing to Odalie for his misconduct last night. Instead, he lapses into his old behavior and starts playing cards again. He loses a lot of money, begins to drink heavily, and then throws himself even more into work. When Stephen comes home one night, he sees Odalie attending a voodoo ceremony held by slaves to ensure the trouble-free birth of Odalie's child. Stephen didn't know until then that his wife was pregnant. He is overjoyed, but is coldly rejected by Odalie. When Odalie is about to give birth, the slave Achille comes to Stephen with the news that his wife, called La Belle Sauvage, who recently arrived from Africa, has also given birth to a son. Stephen wants the boy to be his son's personal companion. The proud Belle is against it and claims that her son is a prince and by no means a slave. She tries to drown her baby to save him a life of white bondage. Stephen and Achille save the baby, but Belle drowns in the river. Back in the plantation villa, Stephen and Odalie admire their new son Etienne. Stephen is furious when the doctor tells him that the boy will become disabled due to a twisted foot.

The years go by. Stephen is doing everything to secure his and Odalie's child financially. Odalie is not happy that her husband is teaching the boy fencing and show jumping. One night the couple argued violently over the different educational attitudes. When the two of them are overheard by their son, he falls down the stairs due to a small carelessness and falls very unhappy into the depths. Etienne dies that same night. Stephen is almost mad with pain and yells at the assembled slaves. He publicly declares that "Harrow" died for him. The years go by and a severe economic crisis followed by a wave of strikes destroys Stephen's financial cushion. He's nearly bankrupt. Determined to save "Harrow", Odalie decides to sell the precious furniture and its jewels. Stephen made off to his mistress Desiree, a half-breed. Here Odalie confronts him with her wish to have another child with him. But unlike his strong wife, Stephen has given up; Odalie's desire to hold "Harrow" by all means met with no reaction. Returning to the plantation, Odalie finds that selling the furnishings and jewelry is not enough for her rescue plan. Now only the immediate harvest and the sale of the plantation's own sugar cane can save the dramatic situation. When a storm approaches, the slaves hide in the fields and listen to the voodoo drums that announce that Stephen is dead. Odalie tries to persuade the slaves to resume their work in the fields, but is unsuccessful. Dejected, she returns to the plantation property and sees her husband who has returned home. He has gathered his last strength and demonstrated his organizational talent towards the workers. After the storm is over and the harvest has been brought in, Odalie finds Stephen mourning at Etienne's grave. She hugs him when he explains that at least the ground in which Etienne is buried will always be his.

Production notes

A World at Your Feet was created within three months between mid-April and July 18, 1947 in Sherwood Forest, Northern California (exterior shoots) and was premiered on September 24, 1947. The German premiere took place on September 7, 1951. Gregory Peck was originally supposed to play Stephen Fox.

Lyle R. Wheeler and Maurice Ransford (Buildings) and Thomas Little and Paul S. Fox (Set) received an Oscar nomination in 1948 for the best movie set and set in a black and white film .

Centfox production manager Darryl F. Zanuck acted here as production manager. René Hubert and Charles Le Maire were responsible for the extensive historical costumes of the 19th century. Ben Nye was a makeup artist. Alfred Newman took over the musical direction. The special effects are from Fred Sersen .

That production cost about $ 2.75 million and grossed about $ 3.15 million in the US box office alone

Background and interesting facts

The yerby novel The Foxes of Harrow had proven to be a bestseller in 1946, whereupon Zanuck instantly secured the film rights and paid $ 150,000 for it. The colored master author, who also touched on the racial conflict in the USA with his book, insisted, as he revealed to Ebony magazine in an interview, that his black characters should not look like the typical Hollywood black slave stereotypes (for example in Gone with the Wind ) should be created, but that their humanity must be preserved. However, the film studio tried to soften Yerby's request by, for example, Harrison's multiracial lover Desiree was played by a white woman, the Englishwoman Patricia Medina .

Reviews

Bosley Crowther wrote in the New York Times after the premiere: “'Obese' is the word a reviewer used for this newspaper to describe Frank Yerby's 'The Foxes of Harrow' in its original novel form. This gentleman was extremely polite - since the film is only a shadow of the book. Because even though this puffy movie seems to be lacking ... some potbellied sections of the book, it still manifests itself as stuffing with the thickest, romantic clichés. (...) Call us impolite if you want. But how else can you describe a two-hour costume film in which a dashing renegade woos and wins a New Orleans beauty, argues with her on her wedding night, and doesn't step back into her bedchamber until her young son is killed and the couple is financially ruined ? (...) We strongly suspect that Mr. Yerby spent a lot of time reading 'Anthony Adverse' and of course 'Gone With the Wind'. And we suspect similar attention from Twentieth Century-Fox. (...) But unfortunately in this socially and historically vacuum-packed canvas charade there is nothing of the substance or splendor of these earlier works. The script is simple-minded, the dialogue pompous, the locations conspicuously fake and the appearances - including those of the good actors - are irritatingly stilted. Rex Harrison plays the top fox with a somber and somewhat irritable vibe that's slightly sardonic and intriguing but doesn't reveal anything. And Maureen O'Hara plays the lady at his side by presenting her beautiful facade, from which her gentle voice emerges from behind, proud and plaintive - and that's all. "

The Movie & Video Guide called the film a "lavish but cumbersome story" and stated: "Pretty stale despite all the effort."

The lexicon of international films states that this is: "The film adaptation of a historical social novel of considerable entertainment value, which borrows heavily from 'Gone with the Wind'."

Halliwell's Film Guide noted that the film was an "decent but rather shallow adaptation of a bestseller," and eventually decreed, "Embarrassed because of a fundamentally bad cast."

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Production dates in the American Film Institute catalog
  2. ↑ Background on tcm.turner.com
  3. ^ The Foxes of Harrow in Turner Classic Movies
  4. ^ Review in: The New York Times , September 25, 1947. Retrieved January 8, 2020.
  5. ^ Leonard Maltin : Movie & Video Guide, 1996 edition, p. 457
  6. ↑ A world at your feet. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed January 8, 2020 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  7. ^ Leslie Halliwell : Halliwell's Film Guide, Seventh Edition, New York 1989, p. 374