2026 Blind Spot Series: Suddenly, Last Summer
What I knew going in: That I keep mixing this up with Splendor in the Grass
I have no idea why I was getting the plot of this movie mixed up with Splendor in the Grass, a film that has NOTHING to do with this, but either way, when I started this film with a lobotomy, then was treated with a grand elevator entrance from Katherine Hepburn, I knew I was in good hands.
Hepburn and Elizabeth Taylor are chewing so much scenery in this. I loved every minute of their monologues. They were so good that poor Montgomery Cliff just didn't know what to do. He seemed stunned in every scene he had to interact with them. I found it unintentionally amusing how lost he looked. I know he was having some personal struggles around the time he made this, so I'm not saying this to be negative, but it was very noticeable for me who was really doing the heavy lifting here.
I should've expected this from a Tennessee Williams play, but I was SO caught off guard at what actually happened to Catherine's cousin. It was so much more dramatic than I was expecting.
I really enjoyed this. I do think it borders on camp a bit, and some scenes are staged very awkwardly, but I was hooked. I'm glad I finally checked this off the list.
Grade:B+
This is one of these old classic films that I have been dying to see as I might have to put it as a Blind Spot for next year's edition.
ReplyDeleteIt's on Tubi! lol. I remember trying to watch this years ago and it was never on any streaming service and now the free one has it readily available.
DeleteThis is Birgit…I still need to see this classic film. The 50s had many films that seemed play like if that makes sense. Interesting that you picked up on Clift’s anxiousness. This was made worse by the director who really bullied him. When everything was done, Hepburn asked him if she was done and didn’t need her any more. He said they were done nd that he was very happy to have been bled to work with her. She spat in his face! This was for the mistreatment he did to Clift.
ReplyDeleteYeah, the film's IMDb trivia page was really enlightening. lol
DeleteI know this is one that has bounced on and off your Blind Spot list for years because of availability, so I’m delighted you were finally able to catch up with it.
ReplyDeleteThis sucker is one demented whirlwind through Stangeland to be sure. For the time it was made it is quite shocking and Sebastian’s death horrifyingly ghoulish. I shudder to think how graphic a modern filmmaker would feel compelled to be for “truth”! Leaving it to the audience’s imagination is much worse.
I’m not sure who gleefully digs deeper into their role-Elizabeth Taylor or Katharine Hepburn. This came when Liz was in a weird place between megastar and pariah for stealing Eddie Fisher from Debbie Reynolds. But her popularity was such she still snagged a Best Actress nomination. Much as I love her, I’m not sure how she managed one for this and not for “Giant” where she’s better and more controlled. That being said I enjoy her performance enormously. She certainly makes a meal of her big scene!
However, of the two lead women I think Kate is the stronger, partly because the role is such an anomaly for her. She usually played women with at least a veneer of toughness but basically good-hearted and levelheaded. Violet Venable is neither, a dragon dripping with poison and ill will Kate’s class covers her worse attributes but makes sure you see they are always there. She stepped in at nearly the last minute when the originally cast Vivien Leigh had a nervous collapse and had to withdraw. Kate is tremendous but I actually think Vivien was more suited to the role and would have been fabulous as well.
Poor Monty Clift by this point was a mess, loaded up with drugs to deal with the physical damage done by the accident that disfigured him and psychologically fragile, it was Liz’s clout that got him cast. Even though he was deemed uninsurable she was having none of that and told the studio “If he goes, I go!.” He struggled throughout with his lines and performance but championed by both Elizabeth and Kate Hepburn who also took him under her wing. The director, Joe Mankiewicz, however, felt no such empathy and frustrated by his difficulties was extremely hard, boarding on cruel, to Clift. The two women pulled him through but Kate especially took umbrage and when she finished her final scene, after getting an assurance that she would not be called back, spat in Mankiewicz’s face then went to producer Sam Spiegel’s (who had failed to intervene and protect Monty) office and told him he was “a pig in a silk suit.” Needless to say, she never worked with either man again!
I’m at a loss with the mix-up of this and “Splendor in the Grass.” Outside of both women leads having a psychological issue the stories are radically different, though both Tennessee Williams and William Inge dealt with fragile women as linchpins in their work. Anyway, if you haven’t seen “Splendor” I recommend it highly! It is without question Natalie Wood’s career best performance.