Laura (1944)

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Movie
German title Laura
Original title Laura
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1944
length 84 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director Otto Preminger
script Jay Dratler ,
Samuel Hoffenstein ,
Elizabeth Reinhardt
production Otto Preminger
for 20th Century Fox
music David Raksin
camera Joseph LaShelle
cut Louis R. Loeffler
occupation
synchronization

Laura is an American film noir by Otto Preminger from 1944. The film, produced by 20th Century Fox , is based on the novel of the same name by Vera Caspary . In the title role, Gene Tierney can be seen alongside Dana Andrews and Clifton Webb . Joseph LaShelle's camerawork won an Oscar , and the theme song composed by David Raksin became well known and has been copied many times.

action

On a hot weekend in New York City in 1941, successful businesswoman Laura Hunt was found dead in her apartment by her maid, Bessie. The murderer shot the beautiful young woman in the face with a rifle at close range when she unsuspectingly opened her apartment door. Waldo Lydecker, a well-known radio columnist and friend of the deceased, began to write her story a day later. He receives a visit from the detective Mark McPherson, who has been tasked with the investigation into the sensational murder. Laura had an appointment with Lydecker on Friday evening, but canceled him by phone. She wanted to leave the city and spend a few days in her house in the country. McPherson confronts Lydecker with a report the renowned journalist wrote two years ago about a murder case. In it he lets the murder victim, contrary to the findings of the forensic autopsy, be shot in the head with a rifle. Lydecker denies that his thesis at the time could have anything to do with the murder of Laura Hunt and provides information about his relationship with her. She saw him as one of the cleverest, funniest and most interesting people she knew. Lydecker, who is very interested in the testimony of Laura's other friends, accompanies Detective McPherson in his work.

The next suspect together they visit Mrs. Ann Treadwell, a wealthy aunt of Laura Hunt. Ann Treadwell is very fond of Shelby Carpenter, Laura's fiancé, who had planned to marry Laura in a few days. Mark McPherson inquires with Mrs. Treadwell about the financial assistance she has given Shelby. Lydecker and McPherson surprisingly also meet Shelby Carpenter himself, who has fled to Laura's aunt from the press. He protests his innocence and insists on his marriage intentions. Waldo Lydecker questions the wedding plans and announces that Laura had wanted to reconsider the wedding and that that was the real reason why she wanted to go to the country. Carpenter accompanies Lydecker and McPherson to Laura Hunt's apartment. There the detective reconstructs the crime again and can convict Carpenter of attempting to smuggle the key to Laura's country house into her bedside table. Lydecker sees in this act an indication of Carpenter's involvement in the murder. There is an argument between Laura's fiancé and Lydecker, which is nipped in the bud by McPherson.

In the evening, McPherson and Lydecker visit the restaurant where the journalist and the murder victim have often been guests and have made plans for the future. Here Lydecker remembers how he met the young Laura Hunt five years ago at the Algonquin Hotel and how, thanks to his help, she started a successful career at the advertising agency Bullitt & Company and even managed to rise to the board of the advertising agency. During this time Laura maintained a friendly relationship with her patron, but when she met the painter Jacoby, who portrayed her, Laura's visits to her patron ceased. Lydecker discovered the liaison and exposed Jacoby in a column, which led to the breakdown of the relationship. When Laura met Shelby Carpenter at an evening party of her aunt Ann Treadwell, she fell in love with him and gave the impoverished Playboy a job in the advertising agency. Lydecker observed the relationship with suspicion and collected evidence to convince Laura of Carpenter's unfair character and to inform her about his relationship with the photo model Diane Redfern and her aunt Ann Treadwell. When Laura and Lydecker surprised Shelby Carpenter at their aunt shortly afterwards, the career woman was insecure. She invited Diane Redfern to dinner and a short time later let Lydecker know by phone that she could not keep her appointment with him on Friday evening. That was the last time Lydecker heard her voice.

McPherson is soon fascinated by Laura Hunt. He spends more and more time in her apartment, reading her diary, going through her personal correspondence and wants to buy her portrait hanging over the fireplace. During his investigation, he comes across a bottle of cheap “Black Pony” whiskey in Laura's house bar. A conversation with Laura's maid Bessie Clary reveals that Bessie, out of concern for her mistress' reputation when she found her body, had the two glasses and the cheap scotch disappear from the bedroom. McPherson suspects that Laura was visited by a man on Friday evening. When the appointed Carpenter visits the detective in Laura's apartment together with Ann Treadwell and Lydecker, there is a dispute over the inheritance. McPherson secretly lets the murder suspects taste the cheap scotch. Only Carpenter refuses the drop for flimsy reasons.

When McPherson visits the scene again on Monday evening, three days after the murder, he falls asleep in the apartment. Then the supposedly dead Laura Hunt enters her apartment. Confused about meeting the detective there, she explains that she has spent the last few days in her country house. She did not go out and did not receive any visitors. Her radio was defective, so she didn't hear about the murder. For McPherson, Laura's lover Carpenter is becoming the focus of the investigation. Laura passionately defends Carpenter, but lets McPherson know that she will not marry him. The detective instructs Laura not to leave the house and not to use the phone, in order to keep the stranger's murderer, who is to be found in Laura's circle of friends, in the dark about his mistake. Shortly afterwards, McPherson learns of the result of the forensic medical examination: The dead woman is not Laura Hunt, but the photo model Diane Redfern.

Contrary to McPherson's instructions, Laura calls Carpenter to meet. Laura's phone is monitored, however, and McPherson and a colleague follow her and watch the meeting. When Laura and Carpenter split up, McPherson follows Carpenter to Laura's country house, where Carpenter fiddles with a shotgun. McPherson turns him on and finds out that the shotgun that Carpenter once gave Laura for her protection was recently fired. However, Carpenter claims to have hunted rabbits with the weapon a long time ago. He reports to McPherson about Friday evening and that he stole the key to Laura's apartment from her office so that he could talk to Diane Redfern undisturbed. In the course of the conversation, however, there was a knock on the door. Diane Redfern answered the door in the dark apartment with no lights on and was shot, Carpenter left the apartment headlong. In the country house, McPherson also comes across the radio, which is by no means defective.

After both Bessie and Lydecker see Laura Hunt and go into shock and faintness, Laura's resurrection is celebrated with a party. Laura and Carpenter treat each other there as if nothing had happened. Ann Tredwell then once again makes clear to her niece that she owns Carpenter. After a phone call received at the party, McPherson arrests Laura Hunt for the murder of Diane Redfern. During interrogation at the police station, Laura contradicts the thesis that the radio was never defective and claims that she will only continue the engagement and possible marriage with Carpenter in order not to cast suspicion on Carpenter. McPherson sees his suspicion confirmed: He never really suspected Laura Hunt, but wanted to sound out her relationship with her fiancé and dispel any last doubts.

Laura and McPherson grow closer while Lydecker tries to sabotage the developing relationship. Laura then announces her friendship with Lydecker, who leaves the apartment indignantly and reminds them of his radio column, which will be broadcast in a few minutes. While Lydecker is hiding in the house, McPherson and Laura discover the murder weapon in an antique watch that the respected columnist once gave his girlfriend. McPherson leaves Laura's apartment to arrest Lydecker, but Lydecker wants to undo his mistake and kill a second time the woman he doesn't want to see in the arms of anyone else. He sneaks into Laura's apartment, takes the shotgun out of the watch and tries to shoot her. However, Laura manages to escape to the apartment door, where Mark McPherson and his colleagues are already waiting for them. When Lydecker goes for Laura again, he is shot by one of McPherson's colleagues. The last shot hits the dial of the watch Lydecker once gave Laura.

History of origin

Pre-production

Gene Tierney on the cover of a US Army magazine

The film is based on the 1943 novel Laura by the writer Vera Caspary . The novel was first published under the title Ring Twice for Laura as a short story in Collier’s magazine (October / November 1942). Shortly after the release, the film rights to the short story were acquired by the film studio 20th Century Fox.

The owner of the film studio, Darryl F. Zanuck , entrusted Rouben Mamoulian with the direction, while Lucien Ballard was hired for the camera work. Otto Preminger played the role of producer, since Zanuck saw him as a film producer and not as a director. The hostility between the two had led to a ban on directing any film in which Preminger was the producer. Many directors who knew about the conflict had refused to direct Laura .

For the title role of Laura , Gene Tierney was engaged, who was considered one of the most beautiful women in Hollywood in the 1940s . She had already worked with Mamoulian on the romantic comedy The Big Game in 1942 . For Tierney it was the first role in a year after becoming a mother. Clifton Webb was hired for the role of the journalist Waldo Lydecker , who celebrated his debut in the sound film with Laura after a long abstinence from the screen . Darryl F. Zanuck was initially against his contribution because of the open secret of Webb's homosexuality , but Preminger insisted on him. Dana Andrews , who wasn't Zanuck's first choice for the role, was hired as Detective Mark McPherson . Vincent Price and Judith Anderson , who had shone as the mysterious Mrs. Danvers in Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca in 1940 , completed the ensemble.

production

Filming began on April 27, 1944. Contrary to expectations, Mamoulian's first pattern from Laura fell through, and other sources reported creative differences between Mamoulian and producer Otto Preminger. Mamoulian stopped working on production just eighteen days after filming began. Preminger slipped into the role of director and replaced Lucien Ballard with the cameraman Joseph LaShelle . The new director hired the screenwriter Samuel Hoffenstein, who changed the script according to his wishes. Preminger also had many of Mamoulian's scenes re-shot (other sources report that Preminger destroyed all of his predecessor's material), changed the film settings and advocated the new script. Darryl F. Zanuck had actually decided on an ending to the film, in which it turned out that everything had just been the detective's dream. When Zanuck watched the version of the film together with gossip columnist friend Walter Winchell, the ending fell through with Winchell because he did not understand it. So Otto Preminger received permission to give Laura the original ending back. Filming was finished in June 1944.

The American David Raksin was hired for the film music . At Otto Preminger's request, he was to create a theme based on Duke Ellington's Sophisticated Lady or George Gershwin's Summertime . But Raksin decided to develop his own film music. His wife's letters, which always began with the words Dear David , served as inspiration for Laura's theme song . He composed the haunting theme within a weekend.

Remarks

  • The famous portrait of Laura above the fireplace is a photograph by Gene Tierney that has been transformed into an oil painting.
  • The role of Waldo Lydecker is believed to be based on the New Yorker's well-known columnist, radio reporter, and theater critic , Alexander Woollcott . Like the film character, Woollcott was fascinated by murders and always dined at the Algonquin Hotel, the place where Laura and Waldo Lydecker first met.
  • The final scene was originally shot from a different perspective, but Otto Preminger decided to shoot it again.
  • The restored version of the film, which is available on DVD, contains a scene that was originally cut from the original version. In it, Clifton Webb aka Waldo Lydecker advises the title character on her hairstyle and dress style, a scene that was ultimately viewed as too feminine for the character.
  • Actor Vincent Price, who was 32 years old at the beginning of the shooting, escaped entry into the Navy due to the passed law on age restrictions and was thus able to continue to participate in the ongoing film production.
  • Price reported how he asked Otto Preminger why he got along so much better with the material than Rouben Mamoulian. Preminger replied that Mamoulian only knew beautiful and pleasant people, but that he understood the characters in Laura better because they were bastards, just like his friends.

reception

publication

Laura premiered at New York's Roxy Theater on October 11, 1944 , when Hollywood censorship, known as the Hays Code , was at its peak and insisted strictly on the morally acceptable portrayal of crime and sexual issues in American films. The film ran nationwide in US cinemas a month later. The psychological thriller, with its many unexpected twists and turns, was well received by the US audience. Critics praised Preminger's elegant staging, the acting performance of Clifton Webb, who revived his film career as a cynical columnist, and the camera work by Joseph LaShelle.

In Germany, the film was released on May 9, 1947, almost two and a half years after its premiere. In Finland and France Otto Preminger celebrated its seventh directorial work, decades after the regular cinema release, on July 24, 1959 and March 16, 2005 respectively, re-releases .

Today, Laura is one of the masterpieces of film noir, along with films such as John Huston's The Trail of the Falcon (1941) and Howard Hawks ' Dead Sleep tight (1946), which is also due to the haunting and often copied theme song by David Raksin, which was later published by Johnny Mercer was turned into a successful song.

Reviews

Variety wrote at the time that the “deceptively leisurely pace at the beginning and the light, carefree atmosphereonly add tothe suspense ” without the audience being aware of it. The plot with its "coordinated situations" and surprising phrases is "always believable" and "logical", the dialogues are also "honest, realistic and mature". The actors are also convincing.

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film four stars out of four and stated that it was Clifton Webb's acting as Waldo Lydecker that made "the heart of the film," along with Vincent Price in the role of Laura's fiancé Shelby, who nibble at the hem of her dress "like an eager cocker spaniel ". Chicago Reader's Dave Kehr praised the “masterful narrative” that, along with “a cool, matter-of-fact mood,” turned this 1940s standard melodrama into something that was “as memorable as the famous theme song”. The film is "one of those classic works that leave the subject matter of their plot behind and live from the strength of their captivating design".

For the lexicon of international film , Laura was a “[r] well-structured psychological thriller in a chamber drama tone; carried by excellent actors and excellent camera work ”. Preminger's film "captivates with its exciting mix of styles - black psychodrama, melodrama, and crime thriller - and reaches immortal greatness in short moments", praised Murray Pommerance in 1001 Films - The Best Films of All Time . Cinema called the film a “legendary crime drama” and attested it “elegant camera work”.

Awards

Laura was nominated for five Academy Awards at the 1945 Academy Awards, including director Otto Preminger and supporting actor Clifton Webb. However, they had to admit defeat to director Leo McCarey and actor Barry Fitzgerald , both of whom won awards for the comedy The Path to Happiness , which also won an Oscar for Best Picture . However, Joseph LaShelle's camera work was awarded. The film received further nominations in the categories of Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Production Design / Black and White Film .

In 1999 Laura was inducted into the National Film Registry .

synchronization

By Laura two German exist dubbed versions . The first was created in 1948 under the dubbing direction of Hans Grimm , the second was made in 1975 for television.

role actor Voice actor 1948 Voice actor 1975
Laura Hunt Gene Tierney Ilse Werner Ilse Pagé
Mark McPherson Dana Andrews Hans Christian Blech Joachim Ansorge
Waldo Lydecker Clifton Webb Rudolf Vogel Helmo Kindermann
Shelby Carpenter Vincent Price Manfred Schott
Ann Treadwell Judith Anderson Eva Pflug

Remakes

In 1962 the material was filmed again in Germany by the director Franz Josef Wild . The 115-minute remake of the same name , starring Hildegard Knef as Laura Hunt, Adolf Wohlbrück as Waldo Lydecker, Hellmut Lange as Mark McPherson and John Van Dreelen as Shelby Carpenter, was broadcast on television on July 26, 1962. The version of Vera Caspary's novel, adapted by the screenwriter George Sklar , was just as unable to build on the great success of Otto Preminger's film as a US remake.

In 1968, John Llewellyn Moxey dedicated himself to a television film of the same name based on a screenplay by Truman Capote with Lee Radziwill in the role of Laura and George Sanders as Lydecker. George Sanders had already played the same role in a one-hour version of Laura in 1955 , which was realized as part of The 20th Century Fox Hour by John Brahm . The film roles for the first remake are now considered lost . In 2005 the story was remade with its own script as a Hindi film under the title Rog - When love makes you sick . The film had only moderate international success and is part of a series of Indian film noir adaptations.

media

DVD publications

Soundtrack

  • David Raksin : The Laura Suite. Theme and Variations , on: Laura - Jane Eyre. The Classic Series Vol. 1 . Fox Records / BMG 1993, sound carrier no. 07822-11006-2 - Original recording of the soundtrack by the Twentieth Century-Fox Studio Orchestra conducted by Alfred Newman from 1944.
  • ders .: Laura. Themes , on: Laura - Forever Amber - The Bad and the Beautiful. David Raksin Conducts His Great Film Scores . RCA Victor (BMG) undated, sound carrier no. GD81490 - New recording of excerpts from the film music by the New Philharmonia Orchestra under the direction of the composer from 1975.

literature

Literary template

Secondary literature

  • Odile Bächler: Laura. Otto Preminger . Nathan, Paris 1995, ISBN 2-09-190972-6 (French).
  • Kerstin-Luise Neumann: Laura. In: Classic Movies - Descriptions and Commentaries . Thomas Koebner (Ed.), 5th edition, Reclam junior, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 978-3-15-030033-6 ; Volume 1: 1913-1945, pp. 536-538.
  • Hopeanne Pendleton: American Animas of the War Years - 1941 to 1945 - in Selected Works of Raymond Chandler, Otto Preminger, and Edward Hopper. Dissertation. University of South Florida, 1998 (English).
  • Otto Preminger, Vera Caspary, Jay Dratler, Samuel Hoffenstein, Betty Reinhardt: Laura. Screen play. Twentieth Century-Fox, 1944 (English).
  • Special Preminger . In: L'Avant-scene du cinéma. 211/212. Avant-Scène, Paris 1978 (French).
  • Antonio R. Santamaría: Laura = Laura: Otto Preminger. (Paidós películas, 17.) Ediciones Paidós, Barcelona 2001, ISBN 84-493-1162-4 (Spanish).

Web links

Commons : Laura  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ “The film's deceptively leisurely pace at the start, and its light, careless air, only heighten the suspense without the audience being conscious of the buildup. […] Situations neatly dovetail and are always credible. Developments, surprising as they come, are logical. The dialog is honest, real and adult. " See Laura . In: Variety , 1944.
  2. ↑ "It is Clifton Webb's performance as Waldo Lydecker that stands at the heart of the film, with Vincent Price, as Laura's fiancee Shelby Carpenter, nibbling at the edges like an eager spaniel." Roger Ebert : Laura . In: Chicago Sun-Times , January 20, 2002.
  3. ↑ “It reveals a coldly objective temperament and a masterful narrative sense, which combine to turn this standard 40s melodrama into something as haunting as its famous theme. [...] Laura is one of those classic works that leave their subject matter behind and live on the strength of their seductive style. " Dave Kehr: Laura . In: Chicago Reader , October 23, 2007.
  4. ↑ Laura. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed September 25, 2018 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  5. ↑ Murray Pommerance: Laura . In: 1001 Films: The Best Films of All Time . Steven Jay Schneider (Ed.), 2nd edition, Edition Olms AG, Zurich 2004, p. 201.
  6. ↑ See cinema.de
  7. ↑ Laura. In: synchronkartei.de. German dubbing file , accessed on September 25, 2018 .
  8. ↑ Laura. In: synchronkartei.de. German dubbing file , accessed on September 25, 2018 .