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The Fugitive Kind (1959)

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23 out of 36 people found the following comment useful :-
Extremely poignant and captivating!, 28 août 2000

Author: ironside (robertfrangie@hotmail.com) de Mexico

Tennessee Williams was a stunning writer for the theater... The impact of his plays can overwhelm an audience with its superior force...

Written in 1957, "Orpheus Descending" is a reconstruction of Williams' 1940 "Battle of Angels," filmed under Sidney Lumet's direction as "The Fugitive Kind."

Williams subtracted elements of the ancient myth of Orpheus and Euridice to examine the sadistically patriarchal Southern Gothic town and to create a violent plot, involving ruined love, weakness, sex, betrayal, vengeance and lingering hatreds... "Orpheus Descending" shows how social prejudice threatens the lives of identified outsiders...

This classic play is not quite his masterpiece... "A Streetcar Named Desire" is... It lacks some of the regretful charm of "The Glass Menagerie" and the entire impact of "Cat On a Hot Tin Roof." Nevertheless it is a deeply moving work of art...

Williams was known for his compelling dialog and themes that - for their time - often seemed strange or shocking... He vividly suggested the sexual tensions and prevented violence of his tormented character, usually with compassion as well as irony...

The film focuses on a handsome drifter from New Orleans, named Val Xavier, wearing a snake skin jacket - Williams' trademark of a rebel, non-conformist - Val is a "fugitive kind" who comes in off the highway... He is a rural Orpheus who descends to rescue his love, not in Hades precisely, but among the intrigue, chatter, and violence of the hot-tempered town of Two Rivers, Mississippi... He is a wandering guitar player who embarks on an affair with a lonely frustrated unhappy storekeeper's wife Lady Torrance...

Anna Magnani is intelligently sensual and charming as Lady... Joanne Woodward is the hungry grotesque drunken Carol who tries to seduce Val in a cemetery... Both women are so intense, that they force you to become involved with them...

The genuine community provides also interesting watching: Victor Jory, positively magnetic as the brutal oppressive husband Jabe Torrence; the vindictive sheriff R. G. Armstrong; and the soft-hearted Vee (Maureen Stapleton).

Lady Torrence is a study of the immigrant woman who has acquired a patina of resilient toughness but who slowly admits her sensuality... She catches perfectly contradictory emotions of one who is wary of the stranger but who longs for his healing touch...

With handsome magnetism, Brando is no less compelling... He is quite convincing avoiding all the clichés of the drifting Don Juan... With some kind of lucid intensity, he mixes his character's predatory and uncivil arrogance with flashes of sweet tenderness...

The film (definitely worth seeing) is extremely poignant and captivating... The direction is excellent and the action moves very smoothly, never allowing you to relax...

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12 out of 18 people found the following comment useful :-
Wordy, good-looking soaper for grown-ups, 6 mai 2002

Author: moonspinner55 de redlands, ca

Tennessee Williams and Meade Roberts co-adapted Williams' play "Orpheus Descending" about a reluctant stud drifting through backwater town, stirring up the passions of an Italian shopkeeper who's married to a cranky invalid. Eerie and fabulously atmospheric piece gives the women in particular (Anna Magnani, Joanne Woodward, Maureen Stapleton) great roles to play. Marlon Brando, well-cast as the guitar-strumming gadabout with the bedroom eyes, doesn't seem as fully involved, and his focus tends to wander. Overall, an intriguing soap opera for mature audiences, beautifully photographed by Boris Kaufman and nimbly directed by Sidney Lumet. *** from ****

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12 out of 20 people found the following comment useful :-
two superb performances, 15 janvier 2005

Author: tsbooks1 de United States

While The Fugitive Kind suffers from inconsistent pacing and some over-blown dialog, it is worth watching for the peerless performances delivered by Anna Magnani and Victor Jory. Magnani's desperate vulnerability and passionate need for love and vindication are so powerfully and truthfully portrayed that even the great Brando seems pale and insubstantial beside her. Without Jory's vilely hateful depiction of the dying husband, however, even Magnani's powerhouse performance couldn't save the film. Seldom has such wanton cruelty been so effectively captured on screen. Brando is a bit mannered at times but the sheer animal magnetism he possessed at this point in his career transcend the script's pretensions. Woodward wrings more than could rightfully be expected from her over-written part. R.G. Armstrong as the corrupt sheriff and Maureen Stapleton as his kind-hearted wife shine in supporting roles, but it is Magnani and Jory who transform the film into a riveting cinematic experience.

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3 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
A Bird With No Feet Can't Land Anywhere, 26 mai 2008

Author: bkoganbing de Buffalo, New York

I suspect that Tennessee Williams probably agreed to change the title of his classically sounding play Orpheus Descending to The Fugitive Kind in order to insure box office. Possibly some of Marlon Brando's fans garnered from The Wild One might pay their admissions thinking they were seeing something like that. I can think of worst ways to be exposed to one of America's most respected playwrights.

This was Brando's second time doing Williams for the screen, the first time being A Streetcar Named Desire. Curiously enough this was Anna Magnani's second time doing Tennessee Williams for the screen as well, she won an Oscar in 1955 for The Rose Tattoo. So the combination of Brando and Magnani seemed a natural for the screen. I don't think The Fugitive Kind is as good as Streetcar or The Rose Tattoo, but the parts are meaty enough roles for both these honored players.

Characters seem to drift in to The Fugitive Kind from other Williams work. Brando's Val Xavier is quite like Chance Wayne in Sweet Bird of Youth, in fact in the review's title is the illusion Brando himself makes of his character. He's an early 30 something drifter with a talent for sex and music, the former probably more than the latter.

Unlike Chance, Xavier doesn't have a female keeper, but he'd like to find one. He passes up liaison with the town trollop played by a third Oscar winner in the cast, Joanne Woodward for the older and married Anna Magnani.

Magnani is trapped in a loveless marriage to a dying Victor Jory, a petty tyrant who runs the town general store. Like Big Daddy in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Jory is dying of cancer at a much more advanced stage of the disease than Burl Ives had. Picture Big Mama from that play hot to trot for Chance Wayne and you've got the essence of The Fugitive Kind.

Joanne Woodward has an interesting part. Part of her loose behavior is in rebellion against the time honored tradition of institutional racism that is the south that Tennessee Williams grew up in. I'm not an expert on Tennessee Williams, but of the works I've seen that are revived frequently, this is the only one where Williams directly brings up racism.

Orpheus Descending on Broadway only ran 68 performances in 1957. Two members from the Broadway cast made it to the screen, R.G. Armstrong as the sheriff repeating his role and Maureen Stapleton who had Joanne Woodward's part on stage, essays the part of the sheriff's wife who also is married to another middle aged tyrant. Considered a lesser work of Williams at first, Orpheus Descending is now revived frequently by stock theater companies everywhere. A critically acclaimed revival on Broadway in 1989 with Vanessa Redgrave and Tammy Grimes and Kevin Anderson helped bring Orpheus Descending into its proper place in the sun.

Maybe if a remake is ever done, it will even be done under its proper original title. Till then we can be well satisfied with this version.

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3 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
neither Williams, Lumet, or Brando's best, but it's still pretty damn good!, 14 novembre 2007

Author: Filmjack3 de United States

The Fugitive Kind is a hot story of desire and loss and craving and heartbreak between a man and two women set in the deep south. Sounds like quintessential Tenessee Williams, and it is in spurts. Sometimes Williams leans towards being a little preachy, however true (little moments like when Brando and Stapleton have a quiet back and forth about racism via her painting kind of nails it on the head much), but it's his skills at doing melodrama that strike up the coolest beats. In fact, this is one of those super-cool movies of the late 50s that could have only starred someone like Brando, who looks at times disinterested in the scene but at the same time completely engaged, curious, smooth, harsh, and knowing of what life can bring with his trusty Ledbelly-signed guitar. It's not necessarily a towering work for the ages ala Williams collaboration 1 Streetcar Named Desire. But that doesn't mean it should be much under-looked either.

As an early effort for Lumet it's also a scorcher dramatically; he's so good with the actors that whatever little missteps the script might take in pouring on the poetic prose in how some of the characters talk (there's a scene between Brando and Anna Magnani's characters by some ruin of a spot where she says people used to make love that is actually quite boring) can be usually forgiven. Magnani especially is interesting because she should be a case of miscasting, which, apparently in later years, Lumet admitted to. She seems low-key at first, but her strengths bloom out tenfold when it comes time to act like the hard-knock-life kind of woman she is, who's in a crap marriage and had a horrible affair with a man who didn't do anything after the summer they spent together. Now she's put into a situation where she does and doesn't want this drifter, and vice versa, and she's sometimes just as cool (though also quite tough and demanding in that big Italian mama way) as her counterpart.

Meanwhile there's also Joanne Woodard, who has the kind of part many actresses love to chew on; feisty, outspoken, loud but also emotionally moody to the point that she admirably tries (and doesn't quite get to) the heights of Vivien Leigh with her classic Blanche Dubois. Overall, Lumet gets a good feel for the period- and shot in New York state no less- while working with good material and an even better cast. It won't ever be as revered as his other work, and at the same time it's much better than some would give it credit for, where the tragedy acts like another sweaty Southern caricature bemoaning existence and fitting on a bad pair of shoes.

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4 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
The Quiet Kind, 11 avril 2008
Author: The_Vegetarian_Cannibal de Fraggle Rock

Though it does have its flaws, Williams beautifully directs 'The Fugitive Kind' and he cleverly casts Marlon Brando and Anna Magnani in the lead roles. Williams portrays the small town and tells the violent story of two star-crossed lovers using themes of love, hate, desire, loneliness, revenge, betrayal and belonging very well. He very smartly displays the sexual tension and torment between the characters (the actors deserve credit for this too) and brilliantly brings out Val and Lady Torrence's denied vulnerable side. The scenes are brought out by some fine (and provocative for it's time) dialogue.

Marlon Brando as a wandering guitar player fits his part like a glove. He gives a very restrained natural performance. I cannot picture anyone else who would have better suited the part. Magnani's Lady Torrence is quite the opposite of Brando's Val Xavier but it is their loneliness that attracts them towards each other and the actress does an excellent job in delivering an intense multidimensional performance. She expresses the conflicting emotions with complete grace. The scenes with Val and Lady Torrence are clearly the highlight of the movie. The supporting cast, especially Maureen Stapleton, are also good.

There are a few loud melodramatic moments which could have been toned down. The story moves on a slow but smooth pace until its explosive ending. Nonetheless, 'The Fugitive Kind' wonderfully tells the delicate, moving, poetic and tragic tale of two very different people who are in love.

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10 out of 17 people found the following comment useful :-
Top Notch Acting, 7 février 2005

Author: MoreLord de United States

This is not a well-written film, but the acting is phenomenal. Brando and Magnani have really great chemistry and that's what carries the film. It is the acting of these two that make me want to watch this film time and time again. I didn't necessarily like Joanne Woodward in her role, it just didn't seem to fit her. It seemed like she was trying too hard or something, so I just tuned her out. But I was always tuned into Brando--its just something about him that just pulls you in--wondering what he'll do next in the scene. Anyway, The cinematography is great and adds to the moodiness of the film. Overall, the movie isn't necessarily Brando's greatest film, but it's by no means one of his worst. Unfortunately, there wasn't much to work with as far as the script, so the acting had to carry the film.

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10 out of 17 people found the following comment useful :-
the best movie ever made, 22 mai 2004

Author: red34birds de brooklyn, ny

i cannot believe that i had never heard of this movie. the only possible explanation is that it was spun out of a play that bombed. that said, Sidney lumet does an amazing Job of lithely sprinkling the classical over northern Mississippi (without screaming 'look were being classical now') from a historical perspective the themes dealt with here are amazing both for their envelope pushing and their subtle overlay. the acting is the best I've seen. Brando is third best, Anna M. is next. both are outdone by Woodward. The character actors Jorie and Stapleton are better than all of them.

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2 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
play's moving impact is not communicated by this film, 7 avril 2008

Author: verbumctf de Lower Normandy, France

Peter Hall's 1990 film of a stage version of 'Orpheus Descending' revealed unsuspected dimensions of Williams' play. Dimensions, that is, that my viewing 'The Fugitive Kind' left unsuspected. After seeing the Peter Hall film, I went to Williams' text, then re-visited 'The Fugitive Kind', which had impressed me at first, many years ago, as having brilliant moments but ultimately as unsatisfying.

I found a great difference of impact between Lumet's film and the stage version: incidents mentioned in a line or less of dialogue, get acted out with (too) much variety of settings in the film; apart from expected cuts, lines are transposed in different sequence in the film script with the result that the play's pinpoint progression of human relations is largely lost in the film.

The film has star credits: Williams helped prepare the screen adaptation. Sidney Lumet directed highly successful film adaptations of 'Long Day's Journey into Night' and other plays. Brando and Magnini were great screen presences. I don't know what went on in behind the scene colaborations; somehow more turned out to be less in 'The Fugitive Kind'.

Williams felt this play to be 'special' among his works. Some critics have thought that his endless labor perfecting it over many years was an obsession that got him nowhere. I think the 1990 film helps us see otherwise. The two main characters have a vulnerability (absent from the Brando/Magnani version) which opens our receptiveness to the play. The bit of ballad Brando sings to no one is a banal filler. Kevin Anderson/Valentine's songs send a haunting beauty to us the viewers and to other characters in the drama: he is Orpheus descending--to the Hell of our world!

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1 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
Outrageous, 28 novembre 2007

Author: pljewkes de Boston, MA

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

If David Lynch were making movies in the early 1960s, it might look something like THE FUGITIVE KIND. Marlon Brando drifts into the life of storekeeper Anna Magnani and sparks ignite...a lot. They make a really combustible pair. Brando is electrifying (for the last time in quite a while) and Magnani is earthy as all get out. They don't exactly like one another and then again, they can't stay away from each other. Complicating things even further is the arrival of crackpot Joanne Woodward (in a truly outrageous performance). Director Sidney Lumet gets a lot out this cast! Maureen Stapleton appears as one of the few kind characters in the film and it's heartening to see her share the screen with Brando. A stunning and very off-kilter movie. Film flub enthusiasts will note the shadow of the boom mic in one scene!

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