Lonelyhearts (1958) User Reviews

Loneliness and the power of forgiveness

[blanche-2 · 6/10 · 4 March 2006]

Montgomery Clift is a writer hired to be "Miss Lonelyhearts" for a newspaper in "Lonelyhearts," a 1958 film also starring Robert Ryan, Myrna Loy, Delores Hart, and Maureen Stapleton in her film debut.

About 30 years ago - yes, 30 - I saw the play "Miss Lonelyhearts" with none other than Kelsey Grammar, who had not yet gone to Hollywood. The play, as well as the book, are quite different from what ended up on the screen. In the film, the ending was changed to a more upbeat one.

This is a great film if you're contemplating suicide because this will take you right over the edge. It is relentlessly depressing with some pathetic characters and some unlikeable ones. Adam (Clift)is a man with a hidden past that he keeps even from his girlfriend (Delores Hart). All the viewer really knows at first is that he was raised in an orphanage and has a father in prison. The paper on which Adam works is owned by William Shrike, an abusive, cynical man (Ryan) who is horrible not only to his employees but to his wife (Myrna Loy) because of her infidelity 10 years before. This is a man who carries a grudge. When he meets Adam, he thinks his sincerity is fake and becomes determined to wear him down. His first step is to hire him as Miss Lonelyhearts. Adam becomes very bothered by the problems his readers send to him, especially because he can't help anyone. When Shrike dares him to meet one of the letter-writers, he does so. It's Maureen Stapleton, a needy woman with a crippled husband who can't make love to her.

The performances in this film are very good, but the film isn't. Clift apparently was very disappointed in it because it lacked none of the bite of the novel and none of the symbolism of Adam as a Christlike figure bearing the sins of others. Robert Ryan is very convincing as the hateful Shrike, and Myrna Loy is beautiful and sad as his wife. Stapleton received an Oscar nomination for her effective performance. An accomplished stage actress, Stapleton evokes the desperation of this lonely woman.

Montgomery Clift by this time was almost at a point where he was dependent upon the kindness of strangers. He was too much of a risk for Hollywood to be interested. Like so many people who are victims of horrible accidents, he had become addicted to painkillers and alcohol. If not for Elizabeth Taylor making a case for him, he would not have been cast in "Suddenly, Last Summer." As it was, Mankiewicz almost stopped shooting on the film. He is fragile and glassy-eyed here, in obvious pain, and his voice slurs. The fragility works well in this role as does the sensitivity he brings to the part. He still had a beautiful smile, which unfortunately he doesn't get to use much here.

It's always wonderful to see Montgomery Clift perform, even toward the end of his career. That interesting voice of his, the intelligence and sensitivity of his work, and the tenderness with which he approached a love scene were unmatched. His film career was relatively short, but he left a powerful legacy. "Lonelyhearts" is not a great film, but it stars Montgomery Clift, so it's worth seeing.

M. Clift was still great post-accident!

[shepardjessica-1 · 7/10 · 11 December 2004]

Interesting newspaper tale with Montgomery Clift as interesting as ever, even though he'd had his car accident which changed his face. One of the best actors ever (along with Brando). He was great for the last 10 years of his life after his tragedy. Maureen Stapleton was heartbreakingly ignorant. Robert Ryan tough as nails. Myrna Loy beautiful and sensitive in a strange marriage and Mike Kellin adds authenticity. A great book by Nathaniel West who wrote DAY OF THE LOCUST.

I know this film bombed in '58..who cares? Too hip for the room. Definitely in the top ten of that year and Clift added another great character, even though he must have been in pain. Best performance = Maureen Stapleton (nominated).

Stapleton's sizzling debut best thing in faint-hearted Lonelyhearts

[bmacv · 6/10 · 9 March 2001]

Dore Schary introduced modest films noirs into MGM's technicolor pantheon, and he wrote and produced this late (1957) entry. While Nathanael West's satire was exhilaratingly brutal, just about everything about this movie seems weary and faint-hearted. Montgomery Clift, fresh from the accident which just about scuttled his career, is the cub reporter shoved into the Miss Lonelyhearts column; he's so passive and tentative -- sometimes so hard to understand -- that it's not clear whether it's method acting or the aftermath of his car smashup. Robert Ryan, usually a stalwart of these mean S.O.B. roles, delivers the lines written for the cynical editor but you have the sense he was interested only in his paycheck. Myrna Loy is trashed as Ryan's long-suffering wife, emotionally abused because of some breach of marital fidelity in the distant past. (Why doesn't she just hurl her Cinzano in his face and stalk out?) But the film starts to smoulder when Maureen Stapleton arrives (she received an Academy Award nomination for this, her debut). As Edna Doyle, frustrated wife who starts an affair with Clift, she's unforgettable without ever lurching into one-dimensional parody. She's both sympathetic and repulsive, vindictive yet confused, victim and avenger. Too bad this movie was made at a time when they thought all Nathanael West's teeth had to be pulled for public consumption; the movie vanishes with a whimper. But West is hard to film; John Schlesinger's Day of the Locust, some 20 years later, didn't do a much better job.

Lonelyhearts- Something Even Beyond Dear Abbey **1/2

[edwagreen · 6/10 · 20 October 2006]

This film is based on the play "Miss Lonelyhearts."

Montgomery Clift, the brooding loner of many films, is at it again as a man who is hiding a terrible secret from his fiancée-his father killed his mother when he was age 3 and is prison for this crime.

A chance meeting with Myrna Loy leads Clift to a job as a newspaper writer writing an advice column to people in difficulty.

A much older looking Ryan portrays a cynical newspaper head who never forgave his wife, Myrna Loy, for an affair that she had 10 years ago. Loy's character is never fully realized in that it's not allowed to develop in the film. She gives a good performance but it seems as if she is cut off.

Maureen Stapleton makes a wonderful impression in her first movie and received an Oscar nomination as best supporting actress for it. She is a mentally ill woman who meets up with Clift and her story telling leads to a near tragedy. She makes the most of the 3 scenes she is in. Her performance sets the stage for the career that was ahead of her-a troubled woman seeking understanding in a world beyond her.

Delores Hart portrays Clift's understanding girlfriend. Miss Hart, who abandoned Hollywood in the early 1960s to become a nun, shows sympathy in the role of almost being in the wrong place at the wrong time as well.

An interesting film showing that we can't necessarily laugh at the predicaments of all people.

Ambitious but unsuccesful film version of a great novel.

[misterjones · 8 September 2002]

Nathaniel West's "Lonelyhearts" is a haunting novella about how an idealistic young man is affected by his job as an advice-giving columnist for his town's newspaper. It was intelligently adapted for the stage in the mid-50's, and the film version plainly uses that adaptation as a reference point as much as the novel itself. In ways, the film expands on the play's success, opening it up to reveal an idealized 50's picture-postcard town on the surface before centering on the insensitivity lying just underneath. Writer/Producer Schary and Director Donohue are to be commended for the atmosphere they have successfully created. It is unfortunate that they did not have enough faith in the material to resist the temptation to give it a happy ending, an ending which really is not in keeping with the events which precede it.

It must have seemed like a great idea to cast Montgomery Clift in the lead role of Adam, and a few years earlier it would have been, but this compelling actor's personal demons had so impacted upon him by this time that it is impossible not to be distracted by his unhealthy state of being. His slurred speech, unsteady gait and jerky mannerisms are entirely at odds with this character, who is said to have never had a stronger drink than a coca-cola. He is too good of an actor not to have effective moments - he works beautifully with Onslow Stevens, who plays his father - but this is a performance that holds our attention largely for unintentional reasons. Maureen Stapleton is sensational in her film debut as a writer to the column who manipulates Adam, and her performance would be right at home in a more faithful and successful version of this novel. Otherwise, this is a well-intended film which fails both to adequately reflect the novel on which it is based and to succeed on it's own terms.

Well-done film

[brodbrad · 7/10 · 9 March 2008]

In view of some of the comments categorizing this film as unsatisfying soap opera, it all depends on what you're looking for. If what you want are excellent performances from a superior cast, then this is your kind of movie. Robert Ryan gives his typical outstanding performance as an extremely cynical newspaper editor who inflicts his particular brand of misery to the full on his long-suffering wife, beautifully portrayed by Myrna Loy. Maureen Stapleton is electrifying in her movie debut and received a well-deserved Oscar nomination for her riveting performance. Montomgery Clift's fragility works to his advantage here as an advice columnist whose sensitivity runs a little too deep. The haunted eyes and pained expressions perfectly match what the character in this situation would realistically feel and express. Overall, a nicely done, well-photographed film that is sure to hold the attention and is definitely worth the time to find and view.

It was a tough movie to watch...

[AlsExGal · 7/10 · 10 July 2023]

... because of its cynicism and brutal honesty portrayed by the characters. However, at the end of it, I felt the men and women who worked on the film put forth a very good product. The underlying moral tones in the film got a little preachy to me, but it was from 1958, and adultery was still pretty big deal back then.

Montgomery Clift has the lead in this one, and while he does his usual good work, I thought his delivery of lines was quite similar to the way he played characters in "Judgment at Nuremburg", "A Place in the Sun", and "From Here to Eternity"--it seemed halted or deliberately tentative. If that's what the role called for, then he did well. If not, well, it just seemed hackneyed (to me anyway). I much rather like Clift in roles like he had in "The Search".

Robert Ryan was verbally sadistic in this one, and I thought he gave a fine performance, although admittedly, I haven't seen too many of his films. Myrna Loy played his wife and had a really emotional scene with Ryan in their apartment...and I absolutely loved it...it's not something you see from her all the time! Jackie Coogan and Dolores Hart provide good supporting roles, as does Maureen Stapleton as a sensuous psycho! Too bad for moviegoers that Hart answered a higher calling. I thought she was really good in this.

Parts of this are very good, but all the parts together don't add up to a great film...

[planktonrules · 6/10 · 11 December 2009]

Much of this film is easy to like...it's just too bad that the sum of these parts don't add up to make a great film. However, despite its many flaws, the film is often interesting and nearly earns a 7.

The film begins with Montgomery Clift sitting in a bar--talking with Myrna Loy. It seems that she is the wife of a newspaper editor and Clift wants a job--so he's cultivated her friendship. However, so far, all his attempts to meet with her husband to talk about a job have come to naught--until the husband, Robert Ryan, enters the bar. During this initial meeting, it's soon obvious that Ryan is an abrasive man--and one of the most contemptibly cynical men I've ever seen in film. Each and every word he spoke dripped with disdain and sarcasm--and he was a very easy person to hate. One reviewer felt this was too easy a role for Ryan, as he did play quite a few characters similar to this. However, none were ever this horrible and it still didn't change the fact that his character was electrifying and created a strong visceral hatred within the audience--now THAT'S effective.

Despite Ryan being a jerk, he decides to give Clift a chance on the paper. At first, it's inexplicable--why would such a nasty piece of work do something nice? However, later you learn that he's given Clift a job partly to mess with his mind and partly to make sure that this happy and optimistic man (Clift) could be ruined--made into a cynic as well. How he intended to do it is to give Clift the "lonelyhearts" column to do--figuring all the hard-luck stories he'll read about will crush his optimism. While this doesn't exactly happen, Clift does take the job very seriously...too seriously. He is torn apart and tormented by the stories and his inability to solve these problems---and Ryan has a ball watching him suffer! And, if you've seen many Clift films, you'll know that he was an actor who seemed to love to suffer--playing similar characters in quite a few films. There's a lot more to the story than that this, but I don't want to ruin it by saying a lot more.

Some aspects of the film worked very well. Ryan and Loy made for a fascinating couple--despite their age difference (which was handled well by powdering Ryan's hair a bit). His nastiness and her quiet misery was something to see! Clift, also, was quite good. However, there was a huge casting problem in the film. Clift's girlfriend (Delored Hart) was completely wrong for the film. Part of it was just bad casting. Ms. Hart appeared to be only about 17 years-old (though she was actually 20) and with Clift looking significantly older (particularly since this film was made after his serious car accident which took away much of his boyish good looks--and looking at least 35), they were a strange couple. It's made a lot worse by the writing for her character, as, at times, she acts like a 17 year-old and is a very weak person in the film--way too weak to have possibly been the partner of a strong but quiet Clift. He was simply too bright, too strong-willed and too deep for such a shallow girlfriend.

Another problem with the film is that although it often seemed gritty and cynical (especially when it came to the plot involving the vicious and manipulative lady played by Maureen Stapleton) and at other times the film seemed way too idealistic and silly--such as at the end, when the horrible Ryan inexplicably changes character. This simply would not happen in real life--especially with so little provocation. It seemed more like a plot device than a realistic portrait.

Overall, while the film has many shortcomings, it also is quite intriguing and worth seeing--if you can look past its limitations.

..life is often this way..

[fimimix · 10/10 · 18 August 2007]

I was so impressed (and depressed) by this movie, I wanted to comment on it immediately. Guess what? I had to contact IMDb so they could re-post it to their site. So, this is written a couple of weeks prior to TCM's broadcast. I didn't know the film existed, as most of today's general public most likely doesn't.

I agree that Montgomery Cliff ("Adam") was hard-put to get through his work. I have always been aware of the miseries in his life and the pain he experienced. On the other hand, it is perhaps because of these difficulties that he could project such a great range of "emotions" this movie required. One user didn't think he deserved his reputation of having been one of the talented actors of early film, because he hadn't made a 1,000 of them. A great performance is a great performance, even if it were the only one given. To view a variety of different roles by an actor/actress is wonderful; however, you can't deny the reality of a single, great performance. How many actors/actresses we've watched grow-up in movies who didn't change from novice to a skilled performer? Studio politics....

Montgmery Cliff was exactly what this role called-for: his role detailed minutely the emotions of true life many people experience. The fabulous comparison of the absolutely "normal" life-style of "The Sargeants" (Dolores Hart and Frank Overton, and the family's young boys) to the misery - and total drabness- of "Adam's" life was well done by screen-writer Dore Schary and director Vincent Donahue. This IS a soap-opera, but a good done.

Robert Ryan ("William Shrike") was masterful: his role was intended to be cynical, and he was cruelly so. Myrna Loy ("Florence Shrike") was a picture of a long-suffering, verbally-abused-but-loving wife. T'ain't fun! Dolores Hart ("Justy Sargeant") gave a skillful performance as a young woman craving a happy marriage - and attempting to support a confused lover - while raising her father's children. Maureen Stapleton ("Fay Doyle") was superb in a tortured wife's dilemma. Her mean-but-loving husband (Frank Maxwell) didn't miss a beat. I still can't recognize what character Jackie Coogan played.

"The story" - lots of them in here - of this plot is the star. John Alton's dreary cinematography was perfect for the unhappy tale. Not one user mentioned the great scene between "Justy" and "dad Sargeant", when he told her she had to make her own life and let her family do the best it could without her. The scene in which "Adam" 'fessed-up to "Justy" about his dad having killed his mother - and his trips were to prison, not for business - was stellar.

I wouldn't want an iota of "LonelyHearts" changed - most great films come from great novels (or stage-plays), so one has to expect changes to evolve. Judgment on THE MOVIE is what we're discussing here, and "LonelyHearts" delivered its message diamond-cut clearly. I am so glad the obstacles which kept people from forgiving (or being forgiven) to achieve happiness came at the end of this movie.......actual life is not always so kind. If you missed any of these miseries, count yourself to be lucky.

You cannot buy "LonelyHearts" on any media, so far as I know. I'll be first-in-line for the DVD. Do yourself a favor and view it whenever you can. Every individual should know the pitfalls of all-too-often lives. I rate it a 20 - Bravo !

A Clift-hanger.

[Film Dog · 7/10 · 31 March 1999]

A very fragile Montgomery Clift (the first film after his car accident) plays an aspiring newspaper writer. He ends up working for a very cynical Robert Ryan, and ends up getting involved with a very desperate Maureen Stapleton. Ryan puts him to work writing an advice column, & Clift ends up getting too emotionally involved. A good performance by Clift, but Ryan is the scene-stealer, in part because it seems he was given the best lines. A sub-par performance by Myrna Loy. Also Jackie Coogan.

Interesting but depressing...sad to see Montgomery Clift's frailty...

[Doylenf · 5/10 · 17 October 2006]

LONELYHEARTS is the story of a "Dear Abby" sort of columnist, unwillingly assigned to the job of helping the helpless losers who write to him (MONTGOMERY CLIFT) by a cynical newspaper editor (ROBERT RYAN). Ryan is so despicable that you have to wonder if he patented these roles during the heyday of his career. Clift looks alarmingly frail and disconcerted, his posture like a question mark, his face obviously given careful cosmetic treatment after an accident that almost took his life.

He's also distracting to watch as he plays the vulnerable man with so much obvious pity for his character. DOLORES HART is the loyal girlfriend who almost walks out on him when things get too rough and she misunderstands a crucial situation.

MYRNA LOY has a rather peripheral role as Ryan's long suffering wife who sits on the sidelines and murmurs disapproval of his tactics and tearfully gazes at the distraught Clift. MAUREEN STAPLETON has a pivotal supporting role (in her film debut), as a woman unhappily married to a cripple and badly in need of advice for the lovelorn. She's excellent.

It works, up to a point, but seems more a dated curiosity piece than anything else. Taken from a Nathaniel West novel and a play, it suffers from too many speeches from Robert Ryan as he preaches his cynical hatred for mankind in a pretentious style similar to Ayn Rand's characters. Ultimately, the verdict has to be interesting but depressing.

Lonelyhearts

[dlwlou · 8/10 · 1 January 2017]

I have been a Clift fan for years reading his biographies and having seen all of his films numerous times. The only exception was the 1958 film Lonelyhearts; for some reason I couldn't locate a DVD and had missed it when shown on TCM. I finally caught up with it on the network this week and all what I heard about the film to my perspective was misdirected. I had read/heard it was a soap opera, meandering and somewhat lifeless. As I saw this movie almost a week ago I can't help in not thinking about it from time to time. To me this was a moving film with amazing performances topped by Stapleton, Ryan and of course Clift. Monty Clift...what a gift of an actor who in this role after his major auto accident plays his character with such intensity and emotion. Incredible. There are scenes where you can see the emotion in his eyes that are so moving and the thought processes of the impact of his actions are so simple but awe inspiring and transparent. He was truly an artist and the shame of it was because of all the pain and ups and downs in his personal life we never got to see his full potential. The amazing Robert Ryan is incredible as well as he plays a cynical character with variation and depth that you have to marvel at the dexterity he uses in communicating the pain and mistrust of anyone he comes into contact with. Great actor. Maureen Stapleton is brilliant with her longing for connecting to something she is missing in her life and right when you begin to feel sympathy she changes on a dime. Brilliant! The only reason I gave it an 8 was the structure of the script and the backstory of Clift's character was a bit weak and rushed. Never the less...very good film that is a near not to be missed because of the performances. Must see for Clift fans.

Her screen debut, Maureen Stapleton earns her first of 4 Oscar noms opposite Montgomery Clift

[jacobs-greenwood · 6/10 · 4 December 2016]

Directed by Vincent J. Donehue (his first and one of his only), and based on the Howard Teichmann play and Nathanael West novel with a screenplay by its producer Dore Schary, this slightly above average drama is notable for providing character actress and eventual 4-time Academy Award nominee Maureen Stapleton with her first Supporting Actress Oscar nomination in her screen debut. The rest of the cast, which is outstanding, includes Montgomery Clift, Robert Ryan, Myrna Loy, Dolores Hart, Jackie Coogan, Mike Kellin, Frank Maxwell, and Frank Overton (among others).

Clift plays Adam White (nee Lassiter), an idealistic writer who gets his first job working as a Dear Abby-Ann Landers type responder at a newspaper run by a cynical editor William Shrike (Ryan), who hires Adam to see if exposure to reality will make the 'young' (actor Clift was 37-38 years old!) man crash and burn. Stapleton plays a key role in Adam's education.

Ambitious unemployed writer Adam meets and then uses Florence Shrike (Loy) to get an introduction to her husband William in hopes of securing a job at the editor's newspaper. Shrike, who believes all people are fakes, is surprised at Adam's naiveté, but hires him to be the paper's anonymous "Miss Lonelyheart" columnist, who answers the letters of people that write asking for advice in personal matters.

The editor wants to test the mettle of his newly hired writer, whom he somewhat openly hopes is corrupted by the experience (e.g. to prove his own personal beliefs). Apparently his wife was unfaithful to him with a young man 10 years earlier and Shrike wants to break Adam to make an example of him. Coogan and Kellin plays Adam's co- workers, entertainment writer Ned Gates who actually wanted the job (Adam was hired for) and sportswriter Frank Goldsmith, respectively.

As it turns out, Adam is secretly already a fake because he lies to everyone, including his girlfriend Justy Sargent (Hart), that his parents are dead when in fact his father (played by Onslow Stevens) is actually in prison serving time for murdering his wife and her lover when Adam was three. Overton plays Justy's understanding father, presumably a widower who also has two sons; his daughter takes care of all of them.

Adam 'feels' for everyone whose letters he reads, getting more and more involved in their lives from a distance such that he thinks he's unworthy for the job. Shrike, who notices that it's taking Adam longer and longer to complete the column, encourages him to find out if indeed all the letter writers are fakes. So Adam contacts Fay Doyle (Stapleton), who'd written that her husband Pat (Maxwell) suffers from an injury that hasn't allowed them to have sexual relations for the past eight years of their eleven year marriage.

Miss Lonelyheart (Adam) and the letter writer meet, and one things leads to another, causing (allergic to alcohol) Adam to experience getting drunk for the first time in his life; he'd learned that Fay had manipulated him into the affair and wants it to continue!

Unfortunately, two contrivances - the fact that Fay had previously seen Adam and that Adam later meets Pat, who's aware of the affair but not Miss Lonelyheart identity, during the column writer's bar hopping binge - are responsible for making the story less credible. However, there is still some compelling dialog in the film's final scenes which include Shrike learning as much (or more) from Adam, and partly Justy too, as the 'young' writer eventually does.

Cries for Tennessee Williams

[bkoganbing · 5/10 · 15 May 2005]

This film is sad waste of some very talented people here. But I think the script was bad and it was probably butchered in the editing department.

This has a Tennessee Williams feel to it. Give these people some southern accents and it could pass superficially for something Tennessee Williams might have done. I wish he had done it.

Monty Clift is a young writer hired by newspaper editor Robert Ryan on a recommendation by his wife Myrna Loy. But Loy and Ryan have a tempestuous marriage. Ryan assigns him a new lonelyhearts column, so he can be a local Ann Landers. Unfortunately Clift gets way too involved in his work both emotionally and physically.

There was obviously some footage missing at least to my eye that would have explained exactly what Loy's and Clift's relationship was. The film opens in a bar hangout for newspapermen and it is there Clift is introduced to Ryan.

Ryan's antipathy to Clift is also not well explained. We know he's a cynic and he's got some great lines in the script, but his motivation for tormenting Clift who he recognizes as a sensitive soul are really not fathomable.

Monty Clift oozed sensitivity from his very pores. So this role is one he can act with no stretch of his marvelous talent. But he should have been given something better to work with.

Maureen Stapleton made her screen debut as a sad sack writer to the Lonelyheart column. She's very good indeed along with her husband Frank Maxwell. There relationship eerily parallels Loy's and Ryan's.

For fans of the cast members see it, but for others it will be disappointing.

A dissenting View

[rsternesq · 20 August 2011]

I liked the movie and the one thing about it that I didn't like was Monty. He was too old by at least 15 years for the part, the girl and the hurt. The hurt was a young man's hurt. Robert Ryan had the lock on the mature man's regret and Monty was supposed to be at the front end of the voyage but having been acting and living in bathos for all his life,he was too well seasoned. Instead of a boy whose dad had left him wounded and who was going to emerge from this transformed and transforming, he was Monty front and center and always. I loved Ms. Hart's Justy. Now there's a characterization who developed and a person who was and became. Ryan was once a boy, became a hard and then a bitter man and perhaps regained a bit of himself at the end. Ms. Loy, well-faded but true, a lodestar who was beyond much but hope, the inverse of Ms. Stapleton but in some ways more than that and the true core of the film in that she was a Lonelyheart even though she had material comfort. I'll admit it, I liked Monty in some of his roles but in this,he is terribly miscast. He might have pulled it off before we learned too much about him and his self-pity but alas, the part and the actor met too late. At bottom, his compassion for others here, as in in almost every other role, was just self-pity writ large.

What Can You Say About A Girl With No Nose?

[rmax304823 · 7/10 · 15 January 2014]

There is some clever dialog in this screenplay. Editor Robert Ryan to reporter Jacky Cooper: "You're as important to this newspaper as my tonsils, which I lost some forty years ago." And to his wife, Myrna Loy, "Sleep dwell upon thy breast, for I shall not." Sounds like the Bard but it's original. He does insinuate a phrase from "As You Like It" later on, about readers "mewling and puking". He sneaks in Pope too: "Hope springs eternal," and even paraphrases Pliny the Elder, "Dreams are the pillars that hold up our lives." But then Ryan's character speaks this way throughout, acidic, witty, faux elegant, cheerfully cynical. It's the kind of speech usually reserved for Clifton Webb or other supercilious poufs. However, Ryan's character is far from a self-satisfied snob. He's angry beyond imagining. He can't forgive his wife's brief affair of ten years ago. He drinks too much. He's about to pop like a zit. Ryan's intense performances gives the editor's character almost more bitterness than the viewer can handle.

Not all the dialog is so ornate. Maureen Stapleton to Clift, whom she has just aggressively seduced but who now is so guilt-ridden that he doesn't want to meet her again: "Listen! What did you call me up for? What did you want? You wanted some ACTION -- and so did I!" Or so original. Clift's girl friend, Dolores Hart: "I want to know your every thought. I love you." "Has anybody ever figured out how many tears you cry in a lifetime?" Clift: "I know I can never run away from myself."

But back to the movie. It's not at all bad if it's approach as a morality play. Ryan hires novice Clift to write the "Miss Lonelyhearts" column for the Gazette or the Chronicle or the Picayune or whatever it is. At first, Clift and the rest of the staff ridicule the agony in the letters but Clift begins to be affected by what he sees as genuine misery and Ryan sees as just so much fakery. The editor challenges Clift. Go out and meet one of these whiners. It's Maureen Stapleton in a fine performance and she makes mincemeat out of Clift's principles. Clift's bourgeois girl friend, Dolores Hart, shuns his company and Ryan gloats. There is a nearly lethal confrontation at the end and everything is resolved, more or less.

Clift by this time was pounding a lot of booze, carrying around a thermos bottle of grapefruit juice and vodka, but he does well enough by the role of the naive reporter, hunched over, blinking, heaving his body slowly up and down. Dolores Hart is beautiful in a perfectly conventional way. She was to become a nun shortly. It may have been a good move because she looks and sounds more like television than feature films. A little gratuitous nudity wouldn't have hurt before her departure. Mike Kellin adds a lot as a relaxed, chipper, stoic reporter.

If the movie has a problem it's that it's over-written. It sounds like the stage play it was. Nobody talks like Robert Ryan's character. Nobody even knows who the hell Pliny the Elder was. It's schematic, full of episodic lessons about empathy and treachery, a sour movie overall. Nothing is wasted. In this respect it's different from a more naturalistic movie about newspapers. See "All The President's Men" for a convincing portrait of journalistic dynamics and character development.

I don't mean to sound too harsh. It's a good movie, and portrays no more dismal a view of human nature than Nathaniel West's other works. West was like a grown-up Holden Caulfield. For what it's worth, the sociologist Erving Goffman quoted the line about a girl having no nose in his book dealing with deformities, "Stigma."

Dear Adam

[jotix100 · 7/10 · 9 December 2010]

Adam White, an earnest young man, tries to get a position at the local newspaper, The Gazette. For that, he goes right to William Shrike, the editor, meeting him at a lounge favored by writers of the paper. When Shrike asks him to write something for him on the spot, he gets impressed by White's prompt response. Adam is asked to report next day to the editor.

There are some things Adam White would like to keep secret. All he has revealed to Justy, his girlfriend, is that his parents were killed in a tragic accident and he spent most of his youth in an orphanage. Justy believes him. What she does not know is that Adam is hiding the truth about his early life. His father is in prison serving time for having killed his wife and a lover.

At The Gazette, Adam is offered a job dealing with the correspondence to the column "Miss Lonelyhearts", where people ask for help in coping with whatever is troubling them at the moment. William Shrike has problems of his own. Life with Florence, his wife, has never been the same after he found out about her deceit, something he cannot forget.

Adam is asked to select a letter and go see for himself about what makes the person seek to have the problem solved by a total stranger. He picks a lady whose husband is crippled and she is facing hard times. The woman turns out to be a fake, which was Shrike's suggestion, who turns out to want Adam for an illicit affair.

The film was written by Dore Schary, the man that had a long career in Hollywood in other capacities. It was based on a play written by Howard Teichmann, which was inspired in a Nathanael West novel. Directed by Vincent Donehue, "Lonelyhearts" tries to cover a lot of territory without finally satisfying. Perhaps the problem is in the staging of this theatrical piece. At times it feels static. It was painful to watch a Montgomery Clift's return to the movies after his almost fatal accident and new looks.

There are good ensemble playing all around, but the most interesting performances come from unexpected sources. Maureen Stapleton surprised with her Fay Doyle, for which she received an Oscar nomination. Robert Ryan does a fine Shrike, and Myrna Loy appears as his wife, Florence. There are other good character actors in the cast of the stature of Mike Kellin, Frank Overtone, Frank Maxwell and Onslow Stevens among others.

Everyone has a problem and makes things worse

[cbmd-37352 · 7/10 · 20 January 2023]

The first time I saw this film I was repelled by terrible way people treated each other, and saw no point in it. After reading some reviews I watched it again and made more sense of it. The Lonely hearts column gets letters from people with all kinds of troubles, but most of the newspaper staff make fun of then. They do not realize they have unresolved problems too. One reporter whines incessantly about not getting the assignment he wanted, unaware that attitude will never get him anywhere. Shrike had his expectations dashed after a sports injury, then his wife got drunk and had a one night stand. Despite his own infidelities he continues to emotionally abuse her. Adam made contact with Shrike though his wife and breaking him becomes part of Shrikes way of hurting his wife. Pat Doyle has a war injury and can't perform as a husband, so he beats his wife because she seeks action elsewhere. Adams own father is in prison for killing his wife and her lover. These 3 couples all had problems, but instead of trying to solve them or even just break up they chose actions that prolong the hurt and make it worse. All three men literally feel their manhood was threatened.

Despite being too old for the role of young writer, Clift's frailty makes him believable .It'snot surprising his character is breaking down under all the suffering in the Lonelyhearts letters. Physicians have a higher rate of suicide than the general public, and psychiatrists the highest. Theres a limit to how much suffering you can deal with. Justy gets all the credit for saving Adam, but she wouldn't have been able to do that if it were not for her father.

This is a man who has lost his wife and has to raise three children on his own. He doesn't take to booze or sex with random women or complain about the burden or loss. He gets up everyday, gets his boys off to school goes to work, comes home and mows the lawn and takes the whole family out to the movies. Then he tells his daughter if she really Loves Adam to forgive him his lies and go live her life. Thats real manhood. That scene could come off as soap opera, but Frank Overton has the ability to underplay scenes where there is strong emotion, coming across as real and heartfelt. Although Ryan and Stapleton are very effective in their roles, this restrained one is much more difficult.

Only later did I find out how much art had imitated life. When Frank Overton was 14 his father died, and his mother who had been the mayor's wife and a member of the Board of Education became just a widow raising 3 boys on her own and an employee of the school district.

The Hollywood Lonelyhearts

[akoaytao1234 · 7/10 · 16 February 2023]

A very loose adaptation of Nathaniel West book about a scrummy writer who gives advice to sad women. When one sender gets a bit too close, the lines gets tangled to mixed result.

Less dour than its original text, this version of the film puts a bent to the loss of innocence of the titular Lonelyheart. It personifies him and give him a chance to make things better but not necessarily improving the original book.

I think the most interesting thing about this is that it actually did not give Clift's character into some Code mandated repercussion. In fact, the ending was quite a change of pace for the film from this era. It left him off and give him a pass, a rarity of the time.

Other than that, nothing really to write about. The stars here are competent but did better films in general (especially the likes of Myrna Loy, Clift, Stapleton and Robert Ryan). The direction and cinematography was fine.

A very competent fim AND an interesting take of the material.

Fantastic Montgomery Clift Film!

[whpratt1 · 10/10 · 10 July 2004]

Have not seen this film in many years and was able to view it on late late late night TV. Montgomery Clift,(Adam White),"Wild River",'60 gave forth a deep power from within his very soul and cried out through out the entire picture as a frustrated writer in his love relations and the conflict with his own father. Adam encounters a woman who seeks his help through a column in the local newspaper and she complains about her husband's performance in bed after so many years and then all things break loose. Robert Ryan,(William Shrike),"The Outfit",'74 is a very bitter man who heads the newspaper and is constantly beating down his wife,Myrna Loy,(Florence Shrike),"Song of the Thin Man",'47 for having an affair with a man ten years in the past. Maureen Stampleton,(Fay Doyle),"Cocoon",'85 gave a great supporting role and spins a close web around Adam. Montgomery Clift showed a great deal of physical and mental pain in this film, but it seemed to make his performance a MASTER PIECE of great acting for all generations to view.

Cynacism and Journalism

[sol- · 5/10 · 28 February 2017]

Disappointed to learn that the newspaper vacancy he has landed involves writing relationship advice for a 'Miss Lonelyhearts' column, a young journalist starts to doubt his own effectiveness as a writer in this sobering drama starring Montgomery Clift. The film opens on a memorable note with a dynamite first scene in which Clift is made to impromptu audition for the job by Robert Ryan - a cynical newspaper editor who later reveals that he is only interested in employing Clift to break his spirit. We never quite find out why Ryan is so cruel and cynical (beyond learning that his wife once had an affair) but he is characteristically solid in the role, describing everyone who responds to Clift's column as "fakers" and slyly stating that he is only against Clift telling his reads to commit suicide "for purely commercial reasons". The plot here is, however, too complex for its own good. Not only does Clift have to deal with Ryan's taunts and his own doubts about his career, it turns out that he has a secret checkered family past that may be factoring into his ability to give out relationship advice. Any of these angles (why Ryan hates the world; Ryan and Clift clashing; Clift's hidden past) could have made for a good film of its own, but thrown into the mix together, none of the angles are given enough attention to resonate. With this in mind, it is hardly surprising that the film is best remembered nowadays for Maureen Stapleton's debut performance as a lonely housewife after "some action" - a sympathetic turn that justly won her an Oscar nomination.

Clift & Company at Their Best!

[JLRMovieReviews · 9/10 · 9 August 2016]

Montgomery Clift is a thoughtful soul and a writer looking for a job. He goes to great lengths to meet Robert Ryan who owns a newspaper, but learns Bob is a hard cynic and not very likable, therefore Bob has a very certain opinion about people like Monty. He hires him as a dare to make good, placing him in charge of a new column, "Miss Lonelyhearts." At first, one thinks this is ideal for someone with Monty's characterization, but soon it becomes apparent that his affection and empathy for his readers are too much for him to bear, when he knows he can't really help them. In a rare case, he actually meets one such poor soul (Maureen Stapleton, who gives a very memorable performance), but finds there is more to the story then her letter. Bob's wife Myrna Loy takes a liking to Monty right away, this sentimental and sensitive young man, and Bob's treatment of Myrna is awful and Bob is a complete jerk. (Unfortunately, Ryan was always typecast as these types of short-tempered bigots, and his performance is too convincing, despite the fact he was a sweetheart in real life, as Ida Lupino says.) What becomes of those he can't help? What becomes of Monty and his fiancée, when he feels inferior and inadequate to his job and life? This is a very intelligent and deep study of people. People are three-dimensional and complex. All the stars give outstanding performances, making this worthy of your time to see over and over. It needs more than one viewing to understand and enjoy, much like most people.

Cinematic Parsley

[michle53 · 2/10 · 9 October 2022]

This is a tough one to get through. It's not anchored in a familiar locale. Is it a city? Small city? Roanoke? Hartford? Chattanooga? I kept looking for clues.

Then there's the Myrna Loy character. She hangs out in back alley pubs to pick up young men? Check. Her husband shows up and they all sit there drinking? Sure, why not?

And the husband! Played by Robert Ryan, this guy will not shut up. He just yips on and on about what a drag everything is, his wife is a cheating monster, where's the gin, yak yak yak. I was waiting for someone to throw a drink in his face. Or a chair at his head. I'm thinking Dore Shary wrote these monologues, because nobody would've had the guts to edit him.

And poor Montgomery Clift, cast here as a young career man just starting out. He was in his late thirties, and an auto accident had accelerated the aging of his appearance. He's in some sort of relationship with a woman who appears to be married to a group of men and boys. Or maybe she's the sister? It was never made clear. She and Clift carry on like youthful lovers, but it's just not convincing.

And finally we have Maureen Stapleton as the drunken pludge.

Like I said, this is a tough film to get through. If I found myself interacting with any of these people in real life, I would be looking for a conversational escape hatch within minutes. Maybe I'll try to finish the movie tonight.

Surprisingly Great

[portobellobelle · 10/10 · 6 June 2001]

I didn't think it possible to make an effective film adaptation of Miss Lonelyhearts, one of the finest American novels. Though certain of the novel's darker aspects are lightened slightly in this film, overall it conveys the novel's brilliance while putting some of the moral quandaries into sharper focus. Ryan and Clift are unbelievable. Unbelievable.

Montgomery Clift in a far reach from 'Red River'

[alicecbr · 28 September 1999]

To display his acting prowess, you could not find two more different roles for this excellent actor. Knowing the sadness of his personal life will give you even more perspective into this movie. I am not a soap opera fan, so I can't say how close to sentimental melodrama this gets, but it is saved from 'B-ness' (as in B-movie) by the sensitivity that Montgomery Clift puts into this movie. Having seen Robert Ryan in many war movies, I was not as impressed by his dry, cynical newspaper editor role. Not as routine as John Wayne playing himself (or what he would have LIKED to be) throughout all his movies, but close.

The last scene was well written, as was much of the dialogue. I liked the real sturm-und-drang that Clift's girlfriend has to go through after his lies are confessed to her. To watch Jean Stapleton go from victim to witch was quite interesting, and the plot has some interesting twists.

The suffering in Montgomery Clift's eyes, as he portrays an 'Advice to the Lovelorn' writer who gets too close to his 'clients' was not all acting. An automobile accident left him permanently marred and brought about his early death several years after this movie was made.

You will not erase his haunted eyes from your brain soon. And don't think too long about the issues here: How close can we 'civilized human beings' get to another's suffering without being swept away by it? It will hurt your brain.