A few words about... Ryan's Daughter - Page 2

This is, of course, a matter of opinion. I have just seen Ryan's Daughter for the first time ever, on this new DVD. There is much to recommend it, splendid visuals above all, and at least 2 delightful performances, from Trevor Howard and Robert Mitchum.

There is also, much to dislike, particularly scenes that seem endless, and culled together from many takes, ruinous "fantasy" sequences with an actor that simply wasn't up to the task (Christopher Jones), and a quality of predictability that almost ruins the movie in the first third. There's a good movie there, perhaps trimmed to 95 minutes.

And finally, I pretty much hated the music. The melody became a song which Liza Minnelli performed in her act. But I have never enjoyed Jarre, not in Zhivago, and not in Lawrence, either. So, all of this is my simple opinion, nothing more.

Does anyone have any direct quotes by Kael for D.Z. or Ryan's Daughter? I'm interested in exactly what she wrote. Kael was a more perceptive critic than someone like Louella Parsons. Parsons' reviews read now like advertisments. Kael argued that mainstream Hollywood cinema could and should be an art for the masses, but it required audiences to be discerning and be critical of what they saw. What about Parsons in the 40s and 50s? She got in more arguments with film makers and stars than Kael ever did. More likely film criticism is just a different type of doing.

I'd love to see some contemporary film makers write film criticism; especially those whose understanding of film history goes back no further than The Godfather.

What is being forgotten is that film critics like the French New Wave writers, and others like V F Perkins, Andrew Sarris and Robin Wood brought to attention the artistry present in Hollywood. Before that Hollywood was considered purely entertainment, it was the thing you went to when you weren't going to the theatre.

If critics like Robin Wood hadn't championed Hitchcock during the 1970s. Vertigo, would be still sitting in a vault, unrestored, and we would all still be waiting for it to be released on DVD.
I agree that film criticism, and academic film studies, has been too heavily influenced by post-modernist, Lacanian/Freudian nonsense. But I reject the assertion that film studies as a whole is a worthless enterprise.

When someone discusses films by director, genre, studio, technologies, or (my favourite) aesthetics, they are indirectly engaging with contemporary film studies. Such approaches have enhanced our understanding of how film operates as an industrial, economic and artistic practice. I'm completely uninterested in applying some untested or unprovable Freudian/Lacanian/Metzian doctrine to something they have nothing to do with. I disagree. If it wasn't for film academics most of D. W. Griffith's Biograph films would be lost. If we didn't have those films we wouldn't realise that Griffith is an important figure in terms of the formulation of continuity approach to editing, and his experimentation and development with narrative form. For every piece of meaingless academic mumbo jumbo, I can point to multiple instances where academics have broadened our understanding of film.

The average film viewer has a pretty superficial understanding of film history, I don't think critics, or academics in particular are to blame for that. What period was this? During the mid to late 1970s there was a lot of money around. How else could U.A. bankrupt itself funding Heaven's Gate? I think the late 60s and 70s was a period when Hollywood didn't really know what to make. The audiences was fragmenting, but generally becoming younger. Film viewers were more easily able to see European films that contrasted greatly with the Epic style of Lean's later films. My guess is that the students felt his films did not fit with the trends of the time. Lower budget films made with light weight equipment on real locations. The hip thing during that period was the French New Wave, and the young film brat film makers. I like both films for completely different reasons. Is that OK?

This thread has become a film discussion and if that's the direction it's going to continue then I will move the thread to the appropriate forum area which is Movies.






Crawdaddy

Just a quick note (no matter which forum it actually ends up in) to say that I agree completely with Jonathan-S position on the way that Lean was regarded in the UK at that time - I very much remember the articles and books I read on cinema in the 70s and early 80s and the references to Lean were, for the most part, dismissive as to his current critical standing. I don't think, considering the massive critical drubbing RYAN'S DAUGHTER (and to a lesser extent DOCTOR ZHIVAGO as well) received at the time, that this is much of a surprise, since it was clearly a style of filmmaking that was well of of kilter with the work of the more feted directors of the day, particularly for its comparative lack of political resonance. There is clearly a big difference between how Lean's work was seen in the US and Europe at the time - this may still be true in a way, as BRIEF ENCOUNTER may well be the film which gets the most critical recognition here rather than the later epics

The last time I saw the film in 70mm was a few years ago in London at the Barbican cinema and it was indeed very pink. The recent television screening here during Christmas however was of exceptional quality and I assume was based on the restoration used for the DVD, which I for one am awaiting with bated breath.

Incidentally, the quote alluded to above about a director becoming a great photographer when he runs out of things to say was by John Grierson, but was used by Roy Armes to describe Lean's later work in his A CRITICAL HISTORY OF BRITISH CINEMA.

A Note to Robert Harris:

I've been skimming through the screenplay Mr. Bligh (which I bought years ago at a book store on Hollywood Boulevard -- you know the one?) by Bolt and Lean and you're absolutely right, it's alive. It's highly developed drama with a discerning historical intelligence. It's also acutely visual.

This screenplay will never get made, of course.

It should be published, and illustrated with Lean's story-boards. At the very least, it's an entertaining read and a viable drama. Let everyone see the film that might have been. Securing the rights is a routine matter for a publisher.

If you know anyone with clout in the Lean camp, you might suggest this idea to them.

The version of the Algonquin ambush that I heard was that Lean made a comment along the lines of "You people won't be happy unless I make my next movie in 16mm and black and white", to which Kael snarkily responded along the lines of "We'll let you have color".

It was basically, the kind of disrespect that established artists can not get today unless they log onto an internet forum as themselves.

Regards,

Absolutely! As I said, I'm not trying to put down Last Tango in Paris -- just trying to find a graphic example of the fact that, as another poster stated, Lean's I suppose I could just have said that "claustrophobic pictures like The Parallax View were the order of the day", but I thought it needed a hook.

Hm, based on the critical reception back in the day I've never made any effort to see this, on the assumption that it was the utter disaster everyone always said it was. But I may need to seek the DVD out, especially since I've grown much more skeptical about criticism (a necessary side effect of becoming a critic one's self).

I know this thread has been changed into a discussion of David Lean, but if anyone is interested, DVDBeaver has posted screenshots of Ryan's Daughter.

Juat a quick note- Vincent Canby's scathing review of HEAVEN'S GATE almost directly led to it being withdrawn and extensively recut after its premiere enganements in New York City and Toronto in 1980.

Vincent

I'm sure that Canby was very influential, as far as reviewers go, and perhaps he was seen as "leading the charge" against Heaven's Gate. But if audiences and/or other reviewers had been responding positively to the movie, there's no way that any one critic's negative review would have had that much effect, all on its own.

Is this a remake? I thought I had heard a remake of Ryand Daughter was coming out. But it sounds like this thread is about the original.

Haggai:

There really was no chance for audiences to respond to the long cut of HEAVEN'S GATE, because the decision was made the weekend it was put into limited release (in New York and Toronto- the scheduled opening in Los Angeles was cancelled) to withdraw it after one week and recut it. And if you read Steven Bach's excellent book FINAL CUT: DREAMS AND DISASTER IN MAKING 'HEAVEN'S GATE', he makes it pretty clear that the Canby review was the one that set all that in motion. After Canby trashed the film, just about every other reviewer went out of their way to try and one-up him with their own trashings of the flick. By the time the short version came out, reviewers who hadn't yet seen the film (a lot of them) were so poisoned against it that the film simply didn't have a fair chance.

Vincent

I saw RYAN"S DAUGHTER several times in San Diego where it played at a Cinerama theater in 70mm. It was a breathtaking memorable experience and has remained as one of the seminal moviegoing experiences in my life. The 1000 seat theater had many "sold out" performances and had a very successful "Reserved Seat Engagement."
I have just seen the new DVD and the transfer is phenomenal!
It is the best DVD transfer of a film I have ever seen.
Todays films are virtually all rapid fire editing and CGI for an audience with short attention spans.
How wonderful it was to watch "Ryans Daughter" again. I was enveloped and transported into another time and place allowing the film to unfold in its own unhurried pace. I felt richly rewarded.
David Lean was a master!
If there ever is another 70mm showing ......wherever it is....I'll be there.

LOL...amen to that.

The greatest photo I've seen is in a David Lean book where David Lean and Akira Kurosawa shared a photo op.

Well, there is some truth in Kael's quip. Big budget film making during that period was dying. European productions were made with lower budgets, on location with lighter equipment. The antithesis of Lean's epic style of the later films.

I wish some of that philosophy would return to Hollywood film making now.

No, it didn't. While DAUGHTER wasn't as successful as Lean's previous epics especially ZHIVAGO, it still was a succesful picture and made a profit. For 1970 it's the eight highest grossing film in North America.
I think DAUGHTER will always be considered the weakest of all five epics and deservedly so. It's interesting to read the thoughts of Lean who intended to make a MADAME BOVARY version, but on the other hand automatically thought it necessary to give the material historical scope. The result is that the personal stories of the characters and the history surrounding them are much more weakly connected than in all three previous epics. To be frank the Irish revolution is quite unnecessary and not much helped by the very mediocre performance of Christopher Jones. Lean essentially continued a favourite theme of his films, the situation of women in bourgeois environments and their desires. That's what BRIEF ENCOUNTER, THE PASSIONATE FRIENDS, MADELEINE and SUMMERTIME are about and what reappears again in PASSAGE TO INDIA. It would have been wiser to focus on this.
On the other hand what is there is still marvelously done and we don't need to bother with the appalingly aggressive criticism of these times. It surely wasn't in tune with the times, but 35 years later that's of no interest to us anymore. Its still a very good movie and a sensitive portrait of a dreamy young woman in conflict with her surroundings.

Nothing that I've read showed Ryan's Daughter as profitable. Do you have a source for that? It may have been the eighth highest grossing film in North America in 1970, but it might also have been the very most expensive film that year.

According to IMDB (admittedly, not always correct):

Budget
$15,000,000 (estimated)

Rentals
$14,600,000 (USA)

By Variety's formula of 2.5 x movie budget = profitability, Ryan's Daughter was a failure, a large one.

Many hold the opinion that the movie didn't deserve its criticism. But I maintain, it was too expensive, too bloated, and too long (meaning, fewer showings) and the slender story didn't support the length.

Admittedly my memory isn't what it once was but one thing I seem to remember about RD was that it was rated wrong. Seems to me the rating was something that made parents think they could take kids to see it, but I do remember seeing parents taking their young children out in droves at, I think it was, a quick shot of a bare breast. Oh, correct me someone if I am misremembering!

That's certainly interesting, Patty! You may have something there...

According to IMDB, the original rating was GP, which meant Parental Guidance. It was later changed to R, probably because of the aforementioned sex scene, which Lean agonized over. The scene does show a glimpse of nipple, but it also shows Sarah and Christopher's torsos clearly rocking with sexual intercourse. This was probably too much for most parents.

Expensive epic films needed a mass audience. As soon as the theatre going audience fragmented, the epic genre died.

So, I wouldn't be surprised if Lean co-operated with C.A.R.A. to get that PG rating. The profitibility of the film probably depended on it.

But Patty's epiphany is that the GP rating may have backfired, because people weren't expecting "adult" scenes, and probably told their friends not to go to it. If they wanted to make it acceptable for teenagers, they should have altered that scene.

Exactly, Dee. That would make two very expensive breast shots (counting Janet Jackson's.)

Ladies, Sarah Miles' boob shot was nothing special or unusual in 1970. It was quite common in M or GP rated films. In those days audiences were more level-headed than they are now. Nobody went into a tizzy if there was a little nudity in a non-R rated film. Charlton Heston could show one side of his business in Planet of the Apes and the other side of his business in Number One and nobody took much notice. Today there would be fighting in the streets.

I don't recall hearing of any debate over nudity or the rating when Ryan's Daughter was first released in 1970. Other films rated M or GP were more explicit. Perhaps something came up years later, but the scene is exactly the same now as it was then. No changes.

And get a G rating in the former, no less.

I'm sure that would only merit a G rating!


As I say, this was some time ago, so I may misremember (is there such a word?) Also, the folks who took out their kids in my theater viewing may have been taking them out to potty, but I remember there were several sets of parents involved, and I really don't think they came back. And although there may not have been a debate about it, I was about 20 then, and it made an impression enough to stick with me. But I live in the Midwest and everyone knows we would have found that too explicit back then.

That was just my experience.

I don't think that's true Brandon. What other GP movie has a breast shot?