Alluring Depth (1955)

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Movie
German title Alluring depth
Original title The Deep Blue Sea
Country of production United Kingdom
original language English
Publishing year 1955
length 100 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Anatole Litvak
script Terence Rattigan
production Anatole Litvak
music Malcolm Arnold
camera Jack Hildyard
cut AS Bates
occupation

Alluring Depth is a 1955 British melodrama directed by Anatole Litvak, starring Vivien Leigh and Kenneth More . The story is based on the play The Deep Blue Sea by Terence Rattigan , who also wrote the script.

Wrote the template for this film: Terence Rattigan

action

In a shabby London apartment building, the landlady Mrs. Elton and neighbors Dawn Maxwell and Ken Thompson notice the smell of gas pouring out from Hester Collyer's and Freddie Page's apartment. Mrs. Elton opens the apartment with her universal key and the three find Mrs. Collyer lying unconscious near the gas stove. She obviously tried to kill herself because the three neighbors also discover a bottle with sleeping pills. The neighbor Miller is then brought in, who once worked as a doctor before he was socially relegated through his own fault and who now keeps his head above water as a bookmaker. Miller tries to resuscitate Mrs. Collyer. Hester's attempt at suicide failed because she didn't put enough coins in the gas meter clock. While Miller takes care of Hester, it turns out in a conversation between Dawn Maxwell and Mrs. Elton that Hester Collyer and her roommate Freddy Paige are not married to each other - back in the 1950s, an absolute faux pas. Freddie is a bon vivant, sociable charmer and greyhound type who lives primarily for pleasure. While his lonely lover tried to take her own life, he is playing golf somewhere in the green. The elderly Hester is married to a prominent upper-class attorney, Sir William Collyer, which brings the matter close to a solid social scandal. Mrs. Maxwell, who likes to stick her nose into other people's affairs, can't wait to call Sir William and tell him that his cheating wife has had "an accident." When Lady Collyer is feeling a little better, she denies that there was an attempted suicide, but asks Mrs. Elton not to tell Freddie Page what happened if he returns. Mrs. Elton asks Hester what actually happened, and she replies sybillinically: "If you are caught between the devil and the deep blue sea", the sea, or the depth, as the German film title implies, sometimes seems tempting .

While Hester is standing in the stairwell, Hester's husband William appears, and Hester cannot avoid talking to him and telling him a story. Sir William, who still loves Hester even though she has left him for the much younger Freddie, sees on entering the apartment the poor conditions under which his wife and her lover live here. Hester explains to her husband that her Freddie, a former World War II Royal Air Force pilot - Freddie, is no longer a test pilot. Both of them live more badly on his income as a gambler and their attempts at painting. Hester refuses any help from William and assures her husband that she still loves Freddie. While William finally says goodbye and is being chauffeured to court by his driver, he remembers the last big row he once had with Hester: In his law firm, they had told William to leave him and followed suit with the young Hallodri Freddie Go to Canada, where this one got employment as a test pilot. His request not to destroy both marriage is not heard in Hester's ears. Back to the present: Freddie has arrived at his and Hester's apartment; it just occurred to him that he forgot Hester's birthday the day before. Hester starts crying and they discuss an interview that Freddie is invited to that afternoon. Hester would like to accompany him. Freddie discovers the suicide note from his loved one, reads it and then wraps the letter in her dressing gown. He does not respond to Hester about the shocking lines.

In the bar next door, Freddie calls his Canadian friend Jackie Jackson and asks him to come over. While waiting for Jackie, Freddie remembers the first time he saw Hester: Freddie met Sir William at a country club on the golf course and later Hester in the bar. Although fascinated by her beauty, Freddie told a friend that he would never get involved with married women. But the hunter-gatherer in Freddie soon makes him rethink: He arranges to get to know Hester better while she is skiing with friends. Soon Hester feels magically drawn to Freddie, who comes from a lower social class. They both become a couple and begin an affair. After a few months, Freddie is offered a ten-week job in Canada. Hester explains that she cannot bear to be separated from him and tells him that she wants to separate from her husband and accompany him, Freddie, to Canada. Back at the bar, Jackie arrives and Freddie reads him Hester's note, in which she explains that he will probably never be able to feel for her the same as she feels for him. When Hester arrives, Jackie immediately disappears.

Back in the present: On the way home, Freddie meets Miller and tells him that he feels like a near-murderer because of Hester's attempted suicide. With a touch of sarcasm, Freddie throws a shilling on the table so that Hester has enough money at least the next time she should feed the gas meter to kill herself. After Freddie leaves, Hester meets William for tea and he tells her it is not too late to return to him and save their marriage. Hester refuses. Back in her battered dump, Hester is pissed off that Freddie, who promised her that he would never fly again, wanted to look for a new test pilot job and not a job in management. Freddie has a hard time telling Hester that he loves her as much as he can love - even if it shouldn't be enough for her. But he also makes it clear to Hester that he could no longer live with her if he, as he is, drove her to suicide. Hester breaks into a hysterical crying fit when Freddie says he wants to leave her immediately. When her young lover leaves, she breaks down crying.

That evening, when Hester is desperately hoping for Freddie's feedback, Miller advises her to finally forget him. But Hester is in a panic and instead begins to frantically search the London clubs for him. However, she keeps missing out on Freddie, who goes on a pub crawl with Jackie. William, who has been informed by a letter from Freddie's that he has left Hester, finds his exhausted wife and brings her to his house. Hester again makes it clear to her husband that she will not return to him, even though he claims that he would love her more than ever. Hester returns to her apartment, where Jackie is packing Freddie's clothes. When Freddie calls, Hester asks him to pick up his things himself and assures him that she only wants to see him one more time. However, Freddie refuses this request. After Jackie leaves, Hester puts Freddie's shilling in the gas meter and tries to kill herself again when she is disturbed by Miller. Miller calmly says that she must face the fact that Freddie needs her more than she needs him, and that it is up to her to end the relationship if they are both to be saved. Miller's prediction that Freddie will return turns out to be correct. But Freddie only makes small talk and hopes that Hester will ask him to stay. Now Hester realizes that she must have the courage to let him go. Hester says a quiet goodbye to Freddie, and after he leaves she stands alone in her dreary apartment and stares at the closed door.

Production notes

Alluring Depth was written in Great Britain in March 1955 and premiered in London on 23 or 25 August 1955. The German premiere took place on April 13, 1956.

Hugh Perceval took over the production management. Vincent Korda designed the film structures, Anna Duse the costumes. Peter Newbrook served chief cinematographer Jack Hildyard as a simple cinematographer, Gerry Fisher was camera assistant. Peter Mullins and Tony Woollard worked in Vincent Korda's drawing department.

Muir Mathieson conducted the orchestral recording of Malcolm Arnold's composition.

Awards / nominations

useful information

  • Kenneth More had played Freddie Page in the London stage version of the play as early as 1952. His partner there was Peggy Ashcroft , who appeared more believable than Vivien Leigh due to the slightly larger age difference compared to More.
  • Production manager Alexander Korda is said to have originally preferred Marlene Dietrich for the part of Hester Collyer.

synchronization

role actor Voice actor
Hester Collyer Vivien Leigh Ursula Traun
Freddie Paige Kenneth More Dietrich Haugk
Miller Eric Portman Hans Paetsch
Sir William Collyer Emlyn Williams Fritz Tillmann
Dawn Maxwell Moira Lister Dagmar Altrichter
Ken Thompson Alec McCowen Holger Hagen

Reviews

The reviews unanimously praised More's performance as the windy Playboy bully Freddie, while Leigh's portrayal of Hester was met with divided echo. Here are a few examples:

The Los Angeles Times ran the headline "Leigh stunned with a Chaney-like portrait."

During the time the following was to be read: “In this English film Vivien Leigh plays a psychologically disturbed lady with virtuosity. (...) She masters the scene even more confidently than Elisabeth Bergner , who appeared in the same role for us in the play of the same name. Even in a breakdown it keeps cool. As an undifferentiated man, her partner Kenneth Moore is exactly the opposite pole to unleash such storms that break all conventions. In addition to its main actors, the film shines with the imaginative staging by Anatole Litvak. "

The lexicon of international films judges: "Melodramatic, well-acted film adaptation of a successful stage play."

The Movie & Video Guide called the film "slowly but carefully presented".

Halliwell's Film Guide found that alluring depth was an "average adaptation of a very good play, inhibited by wide screen and cloudy color, but supported by a well-considered cast".

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Deep Blue Sea at AFI.
  2. ^ The Deep Blue Sea at the British Film Institute.
  3. ↑ Enticing depth in the German dubbing index .
  4. ↑ The Los Angeles Times, August 18, 1957.
  5. ^ Review in: The time of July 5, 1956.
  6. ↑ Enticing depth. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2020 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  7. ^ Leonard Maltin : Movie & Video Guide, 1996 edition, p. 319.
  8. ^ Leslie Halliwell : Halliwell's Film Guide, Seventh Edition, New York 1989, p. 261.

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