Street Scene (film)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Street scene |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1931 |
| length | 80 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | King Vidor |
| script | Elmer Rice |
| production | Samuel Goldwyn |
| music | Alfred Newman |
| camera |
George Barnes , Gregg Toland |
| cut | Hugh Bennett |
| occupation | |
| |
Street Scene (in Germany occasionally also Der Engel der Straße ) is an American film drama directed by King Vidor from 1931. It is based on the Pulitzer Prize- winning play by Elmer Rice , who himself was made into a film adapted his work.
action
A doorway in a New York working-class neighborhood on a hot summer evening. The neighbors, mostly immigrants from different European countries, try to forget their dreary everyday life by talking about the weather and gossiping about their acquaintances. They have plenty of topics: the Buchanans have their first child, Laura Hildebrand can no longer pay her rent and are thrown out of the apartment with their three children. Politics is also discussed, with the house residents ranging from communism to fascism. The neighborly rounds are usually led by the curious Mrs. Emma Jones, who adamantly judges even minor offenses by the other neighbors - although Emma's own husband has a drinking problem and her children Vincent and Mae are anything but well.
At the center of the discussions, however, is the no longer young, but attractive neighbor Anna Maurrant, who leads a rather loveless marriage of convenience with her husband Frank. She is said to have started an affair with Steve Sankey, the married employee of a milk fund. Rose, the already grown up and sensible daughter of Anna and Frank, gets wind of the rumors: on the one hand, she tries to withhold the rumors from her father, on the other hand, she indicates to her mother that she knows about her affair with Steve and that she will end it should. She also dreams of moving out of the small rented apartment with her family to the countryside. In addition, Rose has to grapple with her own love problems: Her married supervisor Bert and Vincent, the son of Mrs. Jones, pursue her, but she rejects her sexual interest. She is only interested in her Jewish neighbor Sam Kaplan, who is also in love with her. However, Sam's parents are skeptical about the love affair, as the chaplains are not richer but more educated than the rest of the neighborhood. Your son should concentrate on his school education so that he can escape the tenements one day.
The next morning, Frank explains to his wife that he is going to Stamford on a business trip. Anna takes the opportunity to meet Sankey in her apartment. Frank returns home unexpectedly and notices the affair that he had previously heard about from the neighbors. You can hear gunshots from the apartment, Sankey tries to escape and is shot by Frank, then Frank runs out of the building. The onlookers gather in the street while the seriously injured Anna is being transported away and dies a little later.
Only a few hours later, Frank Maurrant is caught by the police and apologizes to his daughter, who will now also have to look after her younger brother Willie. Bert Easter offers Rose with the appropriate ulterior motive that he will get her an apartment, which she refuses. Then she meets Sam and explains to him that she wants to move to the country with her brother. Sam wants to come too, but she explains that he should finish his education first and only then can they become a couple. Rose leaves the neighborhood.
Production background
The film producer Samuel Goldwyn , one of the founders of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, who later opened his own film studio, bought the film rights to the successful Broadway play by Elmer Rice . The author adapted his play himself for the big screen. Many actors from the Broadway line-up were taken on, but not the leading actors Sylvia Sidney, William Collier Jr. and Estelle Taylor, who were already well-known film actors. For many of the actors coming off Broadway, Street Scene was their film debut and for some it was their only getaway to Hollywood. However, Beulah Bondi and John Qualen in particular were able to build long film careers after their film debut with Street Scene .
The director was King Vidor , for whom Street Scene is the third documentary. What is striking about his direction is that Vidor refuses to let the scenes play in the inner house, which is how he maintains the atmosphere of Rice's play. As with the theatrical performances of the play, the action always remains on the street in front of the tenement. At the same time, however, he wanted to use the camera as freely as possible to redesign the work cinematically:
“Then I happened to see a man sleeping on the lawn near my apartment. There was a fly on his face. I immediately thought: For a fly, a face is an infinitely interesting place with hills, mountains, tunnels, valleys and fields. In the world of a fly, you could film a western with all the necessary scenes on a man's head. So why not look at the facade of an apartment building like a fly at a man's face? The camera should be the fly. "
In order to make the camera movable and to be able to create many different perspectives, Vidor built an elaborate construction of rails and scaffolding. In some scenes, in contrast to the play, which was focused on the house entrance as a stage design, the crowds on New York Street are also included. The contrast between the individual and the collective shown here, especially in the big city, is typical of Vidor's melodramas and was previously the subject of his silent film masterpiece A Man of the Masses .
For the legendary film composer Alfred Newman , Street Scene was his first film as the chief composer and the first of his numerous collaborations with the director King Vidor. The jazzy , in George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue , reminiscent "Street Scene" theme of Newman heard at the movie beginning and end of the film, it tries the hustle and bustle of New York musically illustrate. Newman's film music became known beyond the street scene and also in other films such as Scream of the Big City , The Kiss of Death , Taboo of the Righteous and How Do You Get a Millionaire? used again.
Reviews
Mordaunt Hall wrote in The New York Times that Street Scene was a "good movie," although some actors would act a little over the top. Overall, the quality of the filming lags a bit behind the stage production, also because sentences are sometimes spoken too quickly. But the people who hadn't seen the stage production would enjoy the film without any problems, predicts Hall. Vidor saved a "large part of the human quality" of the play on the big screen and in particular the scenes following the murder were very well staged.
Leonard Maltin gave the film three and a half stars out of four, it was "heartbreakingly realistic" and offers "fine acting" as well as "remarkable camera work by George Barnes". Craig Butler of the All Movie Guide writes that the then novel " Slice of Life " effect of Rice's play is more normal today and that the stereotyping of the characters according to their countries of origin seems strange to 21st century viewers, which is possibly why Rice's work is something out of date. Nevertheless, Rice creates “poetry” and “memorable scenes”, from which the film also benefits. Vidor films from an impressive number of camera angles and thus brings "movement and diversity" into the staging of the stage play. He achieved the “maximum dramatic effect” at the climax of the film. The large cast is good overall, although some actors sometimes play "a little more empathy than necessary". But especially the very young Sylvia Sidney in the central role is “captivating”.
Web links
- Street Scene in the Internet Movie Database (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ The angel of the road | Film 1931. Retrieved March 19, 2020 .
- ↑ Hans Helmut Prinzler : King Vidor's view of reality . Ed .: Karin Herbst-Meßlinger, Rainer Rother . Bertz & Fischer, Berlin 2020, p. 81-82 .
- ↑ Hans Helmut Prinzler : King Vidor's view of reality . Ed .: Karin Herbst-Meßlinger, Rainer Rother . Bertz & Fischer, Berlin 2020, p. 81-82 .
- ^ Françoise Zimmer: King Vidor's view of reality . Ed .: Karin Herbst-Meßlinger, Rainer Rother . Bertz & Fischer, Berlin 2020, p. 118 .
- ^ Laurence E. MacDonald: The Invisible Art of Film Music: A Comprehensive History . Scarecrow Press, 1998, ISBN 978-1-880157-56-5 ( google.de [accessed March 19, 2020]).
- ^ Films with Alfred Newman's "Street Scene" music. Retrieved March 19, 2020 .
- ^ Mordaunt Hall: THE SCREEN; When Murder Is Done. In: The New York Times . August 27, 1931, ISSN 0362-4331 ( nytimes.com [accessed March 19, 2020]).
- ↑ Street Scene (1931) - Overview - TCM.com. Retrieved March 19, 2020 .
- ↑ Street Scene (1931) - King Vidor | Review. Retrieved March 19, 2020 (American English).