The Queen of Spades holds all the cards

The 1949 BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) Award for Best British Film went to Queen of Spades, directed by Thorold Dickinson and starring Anton Walbrook. The two had worked together previously on the first film version of Gaslight, made in 1940 and released in the United States as Angel Street. Queen of Spades was a critical and commercial success in Britain but never enjoyed the same success across the pond. I recently watched it for the first time on a newly purchased DVD twofer, Dead of Night/Queen of Spades, a DVD set I can highly recommend, and found it to be an absorbing and expertly made film from start to finish. I can only assume someone somewhere dropped the ball in the marketing department because it should have been a hit here, and it should be more widely known everywhere.

Still, I think I know why it wasn't a success here. It is billed as a macabre ghost story and yet the supernatural does not make an appearance until late in the film. The vast majority of the film plays as straight drama and this may have thrown off viewers expecting a chiller. It may still disappoint today for the same reasons but it shouldn't. As straight drama it works exceedingly well and Anton Walbrook, a personal favorite, gives a cold, chilling performance as Capt. Herman Suvorin, an officer in the Russian Army obsessed with discovering the secret of Faro, a card game he hopes will make him rich. He wants to know how to win, and he's willing to kill to find out.

Early in the movie he visits a bookshop to discover what he can and is given a book that will reveal to him the one person who knows the secret of the cards, the 102 year old Countess Ranevskaya, played by Edith Evans in an absolutely stunning performance. Long ago the Countess sold her soul for the secret of the cards and now the Captain is willing to do the same. But first he must get to her and to do so he must string along her attendant, Lizaveta, played by Yvonne Mitchell.

As straight drama this story is unnerving enough, watching the bitter and spiteful Captain lie to Lizaveta, making her believe he is madly in love with her, but by the time he finally gets to the Countess it's downright riveting. Walbrook's only scene with Evans is intense, captivating and, forgive the movie review cliche, electrifying. The two actors are at the top of their form here and watching Walbrook's now desperate and insane Captain plead with the Countess who cannot reveal the secret before she dies is an amazing viewing experience.

And if that's not enough, when the Captain finally receives his ghostly visitation late in the movie, it's mesmerizing. Most ghost entrances make use of light wind swirling about, blowing through the actor's hair as we the audience understand a supernatural entity has entered the room. Not Queen of Spades. My God, it's like a hurricane has descended upon the Captain's rented room. When the ghost makes its entrance, it really makes its entrance! And all of this leads the story to its end. Is the end a twist, a surprise or a foregone conclusion? It's hard to say. In many ways it is all three. It is certainly satisfying.

There are only two problems with the film that stand out. One, the opening gypsy dance sequences in the beer hall which go on far too long and feel as if they're being stretched out to get the film past the 90 minute mark. Two, the epilogue feels all wrong, as if tacked on by the studio in an effort to bring happiness and joy to Lizaveta whose life has been destroyed by the Captain. In fact, reading up on the film and Dickinson after watching it, I discovered that's exactly what happened. Not only does it feel phony, but displays her happiness as a result of incredible wealth she has married into. This coming at the tail end of a movie that has just presented two of the most miserable characters imaginable (the Captain and the Countess) suffering due to greed and wealth. Not only is it phony, it's contradictory. Sometimes the mind boggles at the ideas of Producers and Studio Heads. As Dickinson himself wrote about producers, ""It is the incomprehension of these men, who hold us all enmeshed in their bank balances, which inhibits and imprisons the artists and strangles ideas at birth." And did I mention the forehead slapping eye-rolling symbolism? She buys all the birds in the marketplace and sets them free. Oh brother. God I hate Studio Heads. But the film is great enough to survive even this dreary epilogue, and that's saying something.

The British recognized the film for the great work it is when they saw it but it was never heavily promoted outside the country. Thorold Dickenson made only nine films but many directors believe, from Martin Scorsese to John Boorman, that he should be considered among the greatest British filmmakers nonetheless. Boorman said Dickinson had "Michael Powell's daring, David Lean's taut editing and Carol Reed's emotional tension." All of those come into play in Queen of Spades, available on the new DVD twofer with Dead of Night. Both are terrific films to take in but I recommend the Queen of Spades more highly, if only because it is not as widely known and because of the great work of Walbrook and Evans that is splendid to behold. As is the movie. Queen of Spades, pardon the pun, comes up aces.

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Here is a short video clip I uploaded from the film where the Captain first obtains the book. I just love this scene because of the sinister shop owner and his little cackle at the end.

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* The quotes used in this piece come from The Guardian article on Thorold Dickinson, Something Happened, found here.

The Smell of Death: Gaslight Through the Years

Patrick Hamilton wrote Gaslight (produced as Angel Street in America) in 1938 and it was an immediate success. Through the years it has seen many stage (and even a couple of film) productions.

Vincent Price played the malevolent husband in the 1938 Broadway production of Angel Street, pictured here.

In the first film adaptation, 1940, Anton Walbrook plays the evil husband while Diana Wynyard played the suffering wife. It was directed by Thorold Dickinson. MGM tried to get all copies of this version destroyed before releasing their version so it would have no competition, but they failed.

The most famous version, with Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman and directed by George Cukor. It also stars Joseph Cotten.

And the most recent stage version, from the Old Vic in 2007, it's Rosamund Pike (from Die Another Day and Joe Wright's lover girl) and Kenneth Cranham. It got great reviews from the British papers but so far, Joe Wright be damned, there are no plans to bring it back to the screen.

Acting Up: Anton Walbrook

From time to time here on Cinema Styles I've mentioned The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, and for good reason. Not only do I consider it the finest of Michael Powell's achievements but it is far and away one of my favorite films. It's central performance by Roger Livesy is one of the great performances in all of cinema. He takes the character of Clive Candy from a blustering old man in the beginning to a younger man through a series of flashbacks and back again, filling him with honesty, integrity and humanity every step of the way. But I'm not profiling Livesy for this edition of Acting Up because there is another less heralded performance in the film, one that is the equal of Livesy's in almost every measure, but in a supporting role that has been overshadowed by the towering character of Candy. That performance is by Anton Walbrook, as Theo Kretschmar-Schuldorff. At first he is Candy's adversary in a duel, then his rival in love, then his enemy in war and finally his friend. And Walbrook, so effective five years later in another beautiful Powell film, The Red Shoes, as the demanding impresario Boris Lermontov, plays it subdued and nuanced to heartbreaking effect.

Throughout his career Walbrook had a tendency to overplay a role and occasionally in roles such as Bavarian King Ludwig (Lola Montes) or Johann Strauss (Vienna Waltzes) this was evident. But here, in this film, he achieved his perfect performance, one that includes nary a raised voice or arch of the eyebrow. Candy is all emotion and bluster, Schuldorff is deliberate and reserved. An overplayed performance by Walbrook against Livesy as Clive Candy would have created a clash of performances, but played as an observational bystander it produces a performance mesh that by the end leaves the viewer with no doubt that these two men lived full lives, together and apart.

When we first meet Theo it is in a duel. Clive has offended the entire German army with an insult at a cabaret and they have selected their best swordsman to challenge him, Theo. Our first glimpses of Theo are simply that of a silent duellist, staring intently at his mark across from him. And that's it. As the duel begins the camera pulls back until it leaves the building entirely, pulling back from a beautifully rendered model (how I miss models and miniatures in film) to a carriage where Edith Hunter (Deborah Kerr), a recent friend of Candy's, anxiously awaits the results.

Later in the hospital, we learn that both men are there. Clive won the duel then slipped on some ice tearing his upper lip open while Theo suffered injuries from the duel itself. He would very much like to meet Clive and when they are introduced it is awkward. Theo cannot speak English except for "Not very much" and "Very Much." As Theo begins to learn a little English and spend more time with Clive and Edith (who speaks fluent German) Walbrook plays him as a lovable little boy. He eventually falls for Edith, marrying her and taking her from Clive, unaware Clive has any feelings for her. He fills this early part of the performance with an utterly convincing naivete that becomes all the more impressive later in the film when his character is forced to confront Clive's naivete head on as a cynical yet concerned friend.

Later in the film Walbrook must play Theo quite differently. After World War I has concluded Candy finds out that Theo is being held in one the prison camps run by the British on the mainland. Candy is thrilled to see Theo again but in a shocking moment for Candy, Theo turns his back and refuses to speak to him. Later at a dinner party hosted by Candy, Theo arrives and apologizes. He did not want to show his friendship for a British officer in front of his men. But despite this apology, Theo is completely out of place as he is patronized by the other British officers, including Candy, who tell him that Britain will patch up Germany and all will be right again. In this scene again, Walbrook's role is mainly silent. He listens and watches and creates an unease and tension with his face and body that signals to the viewer immediately that he has much to say but restrains himself. After the party, on the train with other prisoners now freed and heading back to Germany he finally speaks at length. For the first time in the film, we see Theo in a new light. He seems cynical and angry.

'We want to trade with Germany,' said one! A General said: 'We don't want to keep an army just to occupy your country!' A General! They are children. Boys playing cricket! They win the shirts off our backs and now they want to give them back, because the game is over! War is the most unpopular thing in England. They are already organizing pacifist societies, their newspapers are anti-militarist — Here can we get to something! This is our chance! Their childlike stupidity is a raft for us in a sea of despair! Do you know what my friend, Brigadier General Candy said? He said 'We'll soon have Germany on her feet again.'

Because of the gentleness and naivete we have seen in Theo up until now this moment stuns us and puts a knot in our stomach. Walbrook does not shout the scene or over-emote, but lets each word slip out with a smoldering sense of anger and resentment. The knot in our stomach comes from our knowledge of history. We know how everything turned out. Because of that, after this speech on the train, we are sure that the next time we see Theo he will have a swastika armband on his uniform and there will be no British dinner parties for Theo to attend. But this movie is too smart for that.

The next time we see Theo it is twenty years later and he is at a customs tribunal to gain entry into England. He is being questioned on why he wants to leave Germany and move to England. He gets the usual suspicious questions and replies bluntly, with respect, but bluntly. When the judge remarks that most citizens fled Germany in 1933 and asks why Theo didn't leave when Hitler came to power Theo remarks,

I had nothing to fear from Hitler. At least I thought so. It took me eight months to find out I was wrong

The judge wonders what took him so long. Theo replies,

Please, I mean no offence - but you in England took five years.

The judge asked if he is married and he informs the judge, and us, that Edith died in 1933. Asked if he has any children he replies,

Two. I have no connection with them. They are good Nazis - as far as any Nazi can be called good.

Theo then describes his life in Germany and his longing to come to England. It is this scene, this speech, all done in one long unbroken take, that ranks Walbrook's performance among the finest of all the forties cinema, perhaps all of cinema period. It is acting that Roger Ebert called "sublime" in his review and I couldn't agree more. Ebert referred to Walbrook's "mastery of tone and mood" and that is the key. There is no crying, no anger, no emotion. No actor's tools. But there is an overwhelming sense of sadness and defeat that is conveyed by Walbrook so deftly that it is, quite simply, breathtaking to behold. Here I will not quote for the words themselves would be meaningless without the experience of witnessing Walbrook deliver them. Suffice it to say that upon my first viewing of this great movie this was the moment that truly had me mesmerized. But it works as well as it does only if one witnesses Walbrook's Theo in his other forms before this moment. Knowing the cheerful Theo, the naive lovable Theo and then the bitter and angry post-war Theo before arriving at this moment provides the framework that Walbrook must navigate to confidently arrive here: A Theo that now, at last, understands the world around him and is no longer willing to pretend he does not.

In his final great moment in the film Theo councils Candy on the state of the world. Candy is a distinguished old British General, trained in the rules of war and thoroughly unprepared for the new state of evil that knocks at his door. Candy would rather lose the war than use ungentlemanly methods where advancing and retreating do not win the day. It is Theo that must assure him that this is no ordinary adversary and that Britain must fight until its last breath, and again Walbrook delivers it as truth, not monologue, not acting:

You have been educated to be a gentleman and a sportsman - in peace and in war. But, Clive, dear old Clive, this is not a gentleman's war. This is a life and death struggle, with your backs to your cliffs against the hordes of barbarism. This time you are fighting for your very existence against the most devilish idea ever created by a human brain — Nazism. And if you lose there won't be a return match next year, perhaps not even for a hundred years.

Anton Walbrook was christened with the name Adolph. Anton Walbrook was also a homosexual living in Austria under Nazi rule. Life was intolerable for him there and by 1936 he knew time was running out. It wouldn't be long before Adolph Wohlbruck would be made to disappear. In 1936 he was required to fly to Hollywood to re-record dialogue for an international film. He saw it as his chance. He never returned and promptly changed the spelling of his last name and changed his first name entirely, from Adolph to Anton. He settled in Hampstead, England and one can only surmise that his circumstances played no small part in his delivery of such a magnificent performance. Perhaps that is why there is so little emoting, so little "acting", so much mood and tone. Perhaps the reason the viewer feels such a sense of truth from Theo is because Anton felt it too. The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp was made in 1943. The war was not over yet. While making the film, the outcome was still uncertain. But in Anton Walbrook Michael Powell had an actor that understood the struggle the world was involved in on a personal level and was willing to allow that to shine through in his performance. It was 1943 and Anton Walbrook, at last, understood the world around him and was no longer willing to pretend he did not.

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