Daily Archives: January 14, 2023

The Woman on the Beach
Directed by Jean Renoir
Written by Frank Davis and Jean Renoir from a novel by Mitchell Wilson
1947/US
RKO Radio Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

Tod: Don’t try to get away. I can sense every move you make. I can sense you like an animal. My eyes don’t see, but I have hands and ears and a nose. I can even smell your hate!

The cast makes this movie watchable. The script and editing not so much.

Scott (Robert Ryan) is a Coast Guard officer. He has been suffering from PTSD since a cruiser he was on was hit by a torpedeo. He is engaged to a sweet young thing and has begged her to get married that very night. She wants to carry on with her wedding plans.

That same day, he meets Peggy (Joan Bennett) who is collecting firewood on a beach. It is definitely lust at first sight and the fiancee is unceremoniously dumped.  Peggy is married to blind painter Tod (Charles Bickford). He was famous in his painting days and has held on to all his unsold paintings which are now quite valuable. Peggy tells Scott she hates her husband. The movie explores how the evil Peggy plays one man off the other.

This was the last film Renoir made in Hollywood. The studio meddled extensively and and it was a big flop. I thought it was watchable but not up to the high standards I expect from Renoir. I would watch this cast in anything and it is quite good. They should have radically simplified the script.

Dust Be My Destiny
Directed by Lewis Seiler
Written by Robert Rossen from a novel by Jerome Odlum
1939/US
Warner Bros.
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Criterion Channel

Joe Bell: [defiantly] You’re sorry? You didn’t serve time. I did. I’m sorry I was chump enough to think the cops would believe a nobody like me when I told them I was only trying to help the guy who was shot. I should have kept my nose out of trouble. Don’t worry, warden. I’m wised up now, ’cause no matter what happens or who gets hurt, from now on, Joe Bell runs the other way.

This is a very solid Depression era story about two young people who simply can’t catch a break.

Joe Bell (Garfield) has been in prison for 16 months for a burglary he did not commit. He is released when the real burglar is found. He starts riding the rails. He is given several breaks by kind people who recognize Joe’s essential decency and talent. But for one reason or another he must keep moving on.

Along the way, he gets a job and falls in love with his foreman’s daughter, Mabel (Priscilla Lane). They have an argument and during it her father drops dead of a heart attack. Joe believes that he will be wrongly convicted again and goes on the run. Mabel insists on joining him and eventually they marry. The law hounds them on every step of their journey.

Garfield is dynamite in one of his early films. I always enjoy Priscilla Lane – she is so wholesome and funny. I enjoyed this and my husband thought it was one of the best films we have watched lately.