In the interests of expanding my cinematic horizons, DH Jeff had me watch Duel in the Sun, a 1946 western/melodrama starring Gregory Peck, Lionel Barrymore, Joseph Cotten and Jennifer Jones. Jennifer Jones plays seventeen-year-old Pearl who has been orphaned and is taken in by a wealthy Texas family. She is immediately both repulsed and wildly attracted to the brash son Lewt (Peck) and dismisses the decent other son Jesse (Cotten). The story follows the tempestuous relationship of Lewt and Pearl. No good comes of it for them or anyone around them.
The good: beautiful cinematography. Yeh, in my mind that was about it. I guess you could say it was interesting to see Peck play a complete scumbag instead of “man of honor.”
The bad: Lewt can only be described as thoroughly loathsome, and in the parlance of our time, an emotionally abusive asshole. Did I also mention “rapist”? Jennifer Jones looks thirty not seventeen and she over-acts her little heart out. Her Pearl is a trampy big trouble. There are a few sympathetic characters, but neither Lewt nor Pearl fit that category. There are, however, more unsympathetic characters.
Well, there it is.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment