Coward was admired and even idolised for his wit and writing skills but as an object of desire he left a lot to be desired. Short, balding, middle-aged, self-obsessed and less expressive than one of those large stone statues on Easter Island Coward was no-one's idea of a dreamboat - or at least, no one still in possession of their own teeth and hair and able to hear and walk unaided.
However, his allure is only one of the implausibilities undermining this story. The others include his wife's (Celia Johnson) incredible tolerance for his philandering and her friend's betrayal, and (spoiler alert!) the grand climax when a man who has just jumped off the roof of his apartment building in an attempt to commit suicide is not rushed to hospital but is scraped off the sidewalk and carried back inside to his apartment and put to bed where he lies, unattended by any medical professionals, while his nearest and dearest wait in the next room for him to die. I know Coward was an avid proponent of the British stiff upper lip but this seems to be taking things just a little too far.
The whole film and everyone in it are as stiff as a board and it's difficult to imagine just how much appeal the story would have had to a nation still recovering from the ravages of the Second World War. The lives of privilege and wealth lived by Dr Faber (Coward), his wife Barbara, and the temptress Leonora Veil (Margaret Leighton) must have seemed like relics from Edwardian England to audiences in 1950.
A little humour would have done much to make the story more palatable but Coward's occasional 'bon mots' come across as smug and self-satisfied. THE ASTONISHED HEART is a curate's egg gone bad.
No comments:
Post a Comment