Magnificent Ambersons (1942)

Stars:  Joseph Cotton, Tim Holt, Agnes Morehead, 

Plot:  Based on the prize winning novel by Booth Tarkington: the decline and fall of a well-to-do  Indiana family.

This film is loved by a large number of film sophisticates and you have to wonder why. Did any of them read the book? Because Welles took a best-selling, award winning, novel that was ironical, funny, and –at the end - uplifting and turned it into a funeral dirge.

I’m too sure how Tarkington’s novel, (which depends so much on irony, a lofty view of humanity, and 19th century Indiana Society) could be made into a successful movie, but Welles didn’t seem to know either and completely botched the job. As usual, all the Welles fans rave over his version of the story, especially the editing, the photography, the camera angles! “Oh, what narration and great acting by Morehead! If ONLY Welles had been in Hollywood to oversee the final cut, well, it would’ve been the greatest film of all time”

Well, allow me to disagree.  

Welles never made a popular movie, and the reason is quite simple. He was one of those directors who thought negative, sad stories were always superior to happy ones.  And he always believed that razzle-dazzle (the sizzle - not the steak) was the way to make movies. No doubt if Welles had his way, Scarlett would’ve fell to her death coming down that magnificent staircase,  and Dorothy would’ve  died in a balloon crash.  So sad, so tragic, so sophisticated!

Of course, sad tragic stories can be great (talk to Bill Shakespeare) but it’s much more difficult, and it takes a special talent/story to pull it off. Welles wanted to make a box-office hit, but seems not to have understood this.

But Its more than the Negative Story 

Obviously, the “Downer” quality is not the only problem with the film.  For example, Welles creates only two characters we can care about: Eugene (Joseph Cotton) and Isabell (Dolores Costello).  The two characters who hog the spotlight: Aunt Fanny and George ware quite unlikable.  In the Novel, Fanny is a silly but harmless woman, while George is shown through an ironic, distant lens.  Neither dominates the entire book, but are part of the overall narrative arc. But in the film, these two characters are constantly on-screen in the last 45 minutes, and we’re not supposed to smile at them, but identify with their suffering and downfall.  This is impossible.

The worst change is Welles' treatment of Fanny.  

In the novel,  Fanny is happier in the boarding house than before. She wants to live in the boardinghouse so much, that George goes to work in the dynamite factory.  In the film (and even more so in the cut ending) Fanny is bitter at her downfall.  In the novel Fanny is sheepishly ashamed about her stupidity, but otherwise doesn't care about the lost $$.  In the film, Morehead collapses in hysteria and screams like banshee. 

Summary:  This person put the static quality of the film this way:

 "...at the times when something is on the screen and Welles tells you what for. Meanwhile, for something to do, you count the shadows. Theatre-like is the inability to get the actors or story moving, which gives you a desire to push with your hands. There is really no living, moving or seeing to the movie; it is a series of static episodes connected by narration, as though someone sat you down and said "Here!" and gave you some postcards of the 1890's."

I think this is accurate. But the most significant error was doing nothing to make us root for George.  We don't need to root for George in the novel, because of the way Tarkington writes it.  And when George shows his generous and heroic nature at the end, we come to appreciate him.  But far too much of film is just Tim Holt being obnoxious. And we don't really care whether he gets his "comeuppance" or not.  You can have a dynamic anti-hero as the protagonist, but George isn't that either. So, there's a big hole in the middle of the film, especially the last part.