[Quick Summary: After an elderly couple lose their home, they are separated between their five children, who aren't able to take both of them in.]
I think it says something that director Leo McCarey (An Affair to Remember, The Awful Truth) thought that this was one of his best films.*
It is sad,** but don't be fooled by its simplicity.
To write emotion this well requires a high level of craft. ***
What makes this story so powerful? Roger Ebert said it best:
What's so powerful about the film is its level gaze. It calmly, almost dispassionately, regards the situation and how it plays out. No spin.
In the scene below:
- Father and Mother had to sell the house. Father isn't in the best of health.
- None of their five children could support two additional mouths to feed, so they were split up between children's households.
- Mother is staying with her son George, his wife, and granddaughter Rhonda.
- Mother has already heard that a friend, who is at the Cadwallader Home, is very unhappy there.
- Notice how the writer shows Mother spying the letter (she KNOWS what is up) --> then later, she requests to be placed at Cadwallader Home --> we know she has taken the emotional hit and sacrificed her own comfort.
- Also note the tone that Ebert speaks about. It is calm, real, without spin, i.e., TRUTHFUL.
RHONDA (without letting up in her dancing): I'm sorry Grandma, did I wake you up?
MOTHER: That's all right...any mail?
Rhonda, still dancing, points tot he table on which there is some mail, and Mother goes to it. A close-up shows Mother at the table, looking over the mail, rather casually, until she comes to a certain letter. She looks at it for quite a long time. We see the LETTER, which is addressed to GEORGE COOPER, and in the left-hand upper corner is printed the place from which it came, in bold type: CADWALLADER HOME FOR THE AGED.
Mother shakes her head in sober thought. It is all she can do not to open the letter. She finally puts it back on the pile unopened but all too well she senses its contents. All the while out of sight, the radio has been "jazzing it up" and RHONDA can be heard chiming in with the music of the radio. Then Mother mechanically goes over to a chair, sits down, and starts to knit. Her mind is still on the letter...
[George tells Mother that her daughter Addie can't take her and Father, so he is going to live with Cora, another daughter in California, because of his declining health. Mother is ok, as long as she can see him to say goodbye.]
[George] turns to an ashtray to put out his cigarette, then lights another one immediately. He gets up and starts to pace the floor, puffing nervously at his cigarette.
Mother, seen alone, suddenly know that the hour of doom has struck. Everything has become painfully, blindingly clear to her. For a moment she looks frightened and heartsick - but while GEORGE smokes, she gets herself under control. Then they are seen together, Mother watching him closely. She is ready.
GEORGE (sitting beside her on the couch): Mother, I've something else to tell you, too.
MOTHER (after studying his unhappy face): There's something I'd like to tell you first.
GEORGE: Let me while I can, Ma. Tell me later.
MOTHER: It's simply this. I don't want to hurt your feelings, but I haven't been too happy here. It's lonesome in this apartment all day with everyone gone. Would you mind terribly if I decided to leave you and go to the Cadwallader Home?
GEORGE (thunderstruck): Mother!
MOTHER: It's a fine place and I'd make friends my own age --
GEORGE: Mother, I--
MOTHER: Let me finish, dear. Once I thought your father and I would be able to get together again. I see that it's never going to turn out that way. And so I want to go to the home. (He looks at her with his heart in his eyes - as Mother smiles bravely.) I'm glad that's over. I hated to tell you as much as you would have hated to tel me anything like that. (After a pause) Oh, there's just one thing more, dear. I'd like to stay here till your father's on his way to California. He's funny about some things, you know. He'd never believe that the home's a grand place. He's a little old-fashioned, your father is. Those places seem terrible to him. (After pausing) Don't let him know I'm going. Tell Nellie and Cora and the others that he must never know. This is one thing that has to be handled my way.
GEORGE: Yes, Ma. Anything you say.
MOTHER: Let him think I'm staying on with you and Anita. You can always forward my letters to the home. It'll be the first secret I've ever had from him and it'll seem mighty funny. (She looks at George but he does not meet her gaze. He is too miserable. Mother is silent for a time, but when she speaks it is with the same lightness she has used throughout the scene.) I think I'll go to bed now if you don't mind, dear. I'm very tired. (She stands up and stoops to kiss him on the forehead.) Here's another secret just between us two. You were always my favorite child. Goodnight. George, weak and looking beaten, stares up at her.)
Mother stands, straight and strong, with courage in her eyes and on her smiling mouth. She turns and starts from the room. But she sways a little as she reaches the archway. George sees this - leaps to her side and puts an arm about her. Mother smiles a little apologetically.
MOTHER: Floor's a little slippery, I guess.
In the hallway, George leads her gently to her room, and she goes in without a word.
WHAT I'VE LEARNED: Because it was opposite of what I expected, Mother's calm, dispassionate reaction showed me more about her emotions than if she'd spoken them.
Make Way for Tomorrow (1937)
by Vina Delmar
Based on the novel, The Years Are So Long, by Josephine Lawrence, and a play by Helen and Nolan Leary
* When director Leo McCarey received his Oscar for The Awful Truth (1937), he reportedly said he had gotten it for the wrong film, i.e., it should've been for this film.
**Orson Welles gave this film the highest compliments: "that [it] would make a stone cry," and “the saddest movie ever made."
*** I want to note that this story was battle tested and worked on by THREE sets of writers (play, novel, script) before it reached the screen.
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