ARCH OF TRIUMPH

Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman

ARCH OF TRIUMPH (1948). Director: Lewis Milestone.

"A refugee without a passport has lost his membership in the human race."

In pre-WW2 Paris two strangers meet and become unhappily involved. One is Ravic (Charles Boyer), who was tortured in Austria by the Nazi Haake (Charles Laughton), and has taken illegal asylum in France. Joan (Ingrid Bergman) is a woman of "easy virtue" whose latest lover has just died. The couple seem to fall in love, but Ravic's illegal status and very real fear of jail and deportation, means he cannot get married. Then there's the added complication of Alex (Stephan Bekassy), with whom Joan gets engaged during a period when she is alone, and who is very possessive of her. Arch of Triumph, based on the novel by Erich Maria Remarque, should have been a powerful film, and it does have its moments, but it never emerges as the dramatic triumph that it could have been. A big problem -- besides the fact that everything is too prettified -- is that Boyer and Bergman have absolutely no chemistry, and even if one might acknowledge that Ravic might be a rather dour character, Boyer's emotionless and often perfunctory performance -- one of his worst -- doesn't help. Bergman is much, much better, and the picture is nearly stolen by Louis Calhern [Athena] as a friend of Ravic's who works as doorman at a Russian nightclub. Charles Laughton [They Knew What They Wanted] is excellent, as usual, as the repulsive Haake, but much more should have been made of his very final confrontation with Ravic. The fake "prince" Michael Romanoff, who opened his own Hollywood restaurant, plays the captain of the aforementioned club, and is rather unprepossessing. Ruth Warrick comes and goes too quickly to make any impression. William Conrad [East Side, West Side] , who later starred in TV's Jake and the Fat Man, has a terrific bit as a police man who corners Ravic and questions him after the former tends to an injured woman on the street. This is, I believe, the one and only picture made by Enterprise studios.

Verdict: Not terrible by any means, but not at all what it should have been. **1/2.

THE OTHER LOVE

Richard Conte and Barbara Stanwyck

THE OTHER LOVE (1947). Director: Andre De Toth.

"I'm not fooled, doctor. I know death is a guest here. Though he sent me his compliments."

Karen Duncan (Barbara Stanwyck) is a successful concert pianist who comes to a sanitarium for treatment of an unspecified illness. She and her doctor, Anthony Stanton (David Niven), find themselves falling for one another, and he suggests that Karen spend many months just resting. But Karen is restless for life, and goes off with race car driver Paul Clermont (Richard Conte) for a romantic and wearying time in Monte Carlo. Trying to evade her fate, Karen only gets sicker ... The Other Love is based on the story "Beyond" by Erich Maria Remarque. Fourteen years after The Other Love was released, Remarque wrote the novel "Heaven Plays No Favorites," which was filmed as the Al Pacino starrer Bobby Deerfield, which also deals with a dying woman and a race car driver. The Other Love proves no more convincing than Deerfield and Stanwyck's fine performance is wasted in a trite, superficial soap opera. Although Stanwyck is never that good at portraying vulnerability, she easily out-acts her two male co-stars. Gilbert Roland has a nice turn as a croupier who tries to take advantage of Karen, and Joan Lorring [The Corn is Green] is notable as another doomed patient in the sanitarium. Natalie Schafer briefly appears to sparkle in that certain sleazy way of hers as a guest at Monte Carlo. Miklos Rozsa' score doesn't help at all. Roland had a much more memorable appearance with Stanwyck in The Furies. NOTE: For more on Bobby Deerfield see Al Pacino In Films and On Stage.

Verdict: Dark Victory this isn't. **.

SO ENDS OUR NIGHT

SO ENDS OUR NIGHT (1941). Director: John Cromwell.

"When she dies, I'm done for anyway."

Based on Erich Maria Remarque's novel Flotsam this deals with the plight of Jewish and other political refugees from Germany just before the Nazi occupation of Austria, and then France. Josef Steiner (Fredric March) is wanted by German authorities for political actions and is afraid that his wife (Frances Dee), whom he must leave behind when he flees, will suffer because of his actions. Their long-distance relationship takes a back seat to the burgeoning love affair between two of Steiner's friends, Ludwig (Glenn Ford) and Ruth (Margaret Sullavan), both of whom are Jewish. As we see the difficulties these and others have because they are official non-persons without passports, the film builds up to a situation in which both couples are in crisis, cruelly separated, with Steiner and Ruth each racing desperately to be with the one person in the world they love above all others. Ford and Sullavan make a more compelling team than you would imagine, and March, while he "acts" a bit too much, has some excellent moments as well; Sullavan is as splendid as ever. Dee hasn't as much to do as the others but makes full use of a very expressive face. There are a host of fine character actors as well, including Erich von Stoheim as a German police officer. This film is yet another that shows that Glenn Ford was not just a merely competent pretty-boy, but an accomplished and versatile performer. Louis Gruenberg's score is a little weird at times, but overall is very effective. Two scenes stand out: Ludwig trying to sell some meagre possessions to two extremely weird old sisters, and an unexpected and very dramatic murder-suicide that comes late in the picture.

Verdict: Imperfect, perhaps, but intelligent, adult fare with fine performances. ***1/2.