The Yearling

The iconic image of this film is the little blond haired boy holding the real-life embodiment of baby Bambi.  This makes you think that the whole film will be centered around this tiny baby deer and there will be plenty of moments that could replace a trip to the petting zoo.  Spoiler Alert: If you have little kids who just want to coo over baby animals, you are better off springing for the petting zoo than dealing with the tears after the Old Yeller style ending.

The film, based on the book by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, is about the Baxter family who live in the wild woods of the south after the Civil War.  While making their land their home, Penny (Gregory Peck) and Orry (Jane Wyman) have faced the hardships of losing all but one of their children.  Jody (Claude Jarman Jr.) is about eleven years old and has a strong love for the animals around him.  He’s constantly asking his parents to let him keep a baby raccoon or other critters as a pet.

He’s just a lonely single child, his only other friend is a boy who broke his leg by jumping off the cabin in an attempt to fly, Fodderwing (Donn Gift).  While Fodderwing hobbles around on a crutch, he has a whole slew full of white rabbits, a raccoon and a tree house.  When he starts talking dreamily about how he will fly one day, it’s best to realize the euphemism and get the first batch of tissues ready for your little ones.  A boy on a crutch isn’t likely to last long in the old wild south anyway.

One day, as Jody and his Pa are out hunting, his Pa is bitten by a rattlesnake.  With luck and quick thinking, Penny tells Jody to shoot a nearby deer, cut out its heart and liver so that he can use them to pull out the poison.  After they have killed the deer, they see that it had a baby, only days old.  As Penny is recovering, Jody reasons that the fawn left with no mother will die on it’s own, and since that deer died to save him, they should take care of the orphaned fawn.  Now Jody’s got the cutest little baby deer in the world and we get to squeal with delight.

Unfortunately, that squealing only lasts for about five minutes before the deer turns from ultra cute baby fawn into young, but not so cute fawn.  Soon, he’s destroying crops and making life very hard for the Baxter family.  Over and over, Jody defends his fawn, but eventually it is going to have to go.

There seems to be a theme of using deer to explain death to children in the forties.  Some kids can handle these ideas with no problem.  My dad showed me a dead deer in the back of a pickup truck when I was only six and told me it was Bambi.  My mom had a fit, but from then on, Old Yeller was no problem.  But if you are one of those parents who fast forwards through the part in Bambi when his mom dies, your kids might not be ready for The Yearling.

“Walkin’ ain’t easy for me since I tried to fly.”

The Lost Weekend

In today’s society, people give the privilege of drinking many purposes.  You can learn to taste the subtle differences in fine wine or crafted beers, it can lighten the atmosphere of a party, provide liquid courage, lubricate celebration or just let you feel numb at a loss.  Sadly, there are many times when this privilege manifests inside people into a dark obsession.  The Lost Weekend is a story where the bottle has become ruler over a man’s life and serves only to destroy.

Wick (Phillip Terry) has planned to take a long weekend with his brother Don (Ray Milland) out of the city.  Lately, Don’s drinking has gotten out of control.  He has no job, financially depends on his brother and spends all his money on alcohol.  When Don tricks his girlfriend Helen (Jane Wyman) and Wick to leave him alone for the afternoon and then doesn’t show up in time to make the last train, Wick gives up on him and leaves Don alone for the weekend.  Helen tries to check in and keep an eye on Don, but his weekend binge takes him to darker places than the neighborhood bar, including a sanitarium, stealing booze and thoughts of suicide.

Don uses alcohol as a crutch, a way to deal with his failure as a writer, but he doesn’t realise it is the cause of his failure.  The intimidation of a blank sheet of paper pushes him to drink, hoping to become inspired and see the vision of his work.  But when one doesn’t do the trick, he reaches for another and again until he can’t see straight.  It’s a sad cycle, known to challenge many creative minds that the film illustrates perfectly.

Ray Milland pulls off an amazing Oscar winning performance.  It’s one simple task to act like a drunk, but to give a face to all the horrors of alcoholism is quite a feat.  We see him trashing his own apartment, scrambling like an animal searching for the bottle he’s hidden.  We pity him as he desperately beg his bartender for a drink.  At the brink of insanity, we see his hallucinations and his reaction makes the images exponentially frightening.  It takes an amazing actor to bring all those aspects of alcoholism to life in a realistic, scary and sympathetic way.

Except for in reading Stephen King’s The Shining, I don’t think I’ve ever been so frightened by a psychological profile of alcoholism.  Milland’s perfect performance is only one aspect that brings this frightening illness to life.  Under Billy Wilder’s Oscar winning direction, we’re shown some of the darkest places a man and his mind can go.  The camera work can transport us through an empty glass and at times there’s ominous music that reminds me of old episodes of The Twilight Zone.  At times, it feels like Don is living in a nightmare world, even when things are simply coincidence, but that’s how the mind works when under the influence.  Though it may not be a story everyone wants to see, The Lost Weekend is the best film of 1945.  Please drink responsibly.

“Of course you couldn’t write the beginning cause you didn’t know the ending.”

Johnny Belinda

The story of a deaf woman being raped sounds like a bad Helen Keller joke.  Now that we’ve cleared that air, let’s not go there.

Johnny Belinda takes place in a peaceful fishing town in Nova Scocia.  It’s your typical small town, where everyone knows everyone and newcomers, like Dr. Robert Richardson (Lew Ayres) are subject to idle gossip.  Right away we see he’s a kind and generous man, who even makes a house-call in the middle of the night to help birth a baby cow, for the McDonald family, who his secretary warns, might not be able to pay.  He discovers Mr. McDonald’s deaf-mute daughter, Belinda (Jane Wyman) and takes immediate interest.  He teaches her sign language and it turns out she’s a quick learner.  Before long, she’s able to read her family’s lips and communicate like never before.  How happily life changing.

Just because she’s learning, doesn’t mean she’s free from ridicule.  She’s referred to as “the dummy”, pitied and laughed at by most.  She becomes a lewd interest of the town’s good ol’ brute, Locky.  His girlfriend, Stella warns him to leave her alone, not realizing the extent of his ill intentions.  After getting drunk at a town party, Locky stumbles over to the McDonald residence and rapes poor Belinda.  It all would’ve gone unnoticed and quiet, but she ends up pregnant with his child.  Once this scandalous news hits the village, rumors arise about who they suspect the father is.  The whole family is avoided like lepers and business drops mixing financial struggles to their heartbreaks.

Jane Wyman won the Oscar for best leading actress, without saying a word.  She stares with big innocent eyes that light up with understanding and unforeseen intelligence.  She doesn’t try to overcompensate for lack of words, like a silent film star.  Her sign language isn’t flamboyant either, she’s calm, obedient, and understanding.  The only time we ever see fear or conflict is just before her attack and in the more climactic action.

I was surprised to see such daring themes of rape and disability vs intelligence in the forties.  I don’t mean to generalize, but this seemed to be the time period for rallying war films, sweeping romances and giddy comedies.  Hard subjects like this must’ve averted quite a few eyes.  But those daring the trip to the theater must’ve been enthralled.  Many times today we still question if a disabled person can take care of a child, and that comes up in the later part of the film.  I’ll let you witness the debate with fresh eyes.

This isn’t one of those great classics everyone talks about, but it is good.  If you’re interested in deaf issues, this is a great example with many edges.  If you’re looking for a lighter film, skip it.

“There’s only one shame, failing a human being who needs you.”