A Face in the Crowd (1957)

It's Twilight Zone. With all that implies, both good and bad. That style of the '50s, where this little cabal of oh - so - smart Liberal screenplay writers impose their critiques of Big Business and Madison Avenue on any consistency of created characters. So it becomes a kind of soapbox. I might agree with all of it - why not? But it's not good cinema - everything is just way too spelled out. Liberalism has failed - it degenerated into Neoliberalism. And yet,we all need to watch this film. It presages the Trump era brilliantly (not that he was the first, by any means, to work the liminal space between Show Biz and Politics). So it's a great document. And it's also an episode of the Zone expanded into 2 hours. But part of the greatness of, say, The Monsters are Due on Maple Street is its 1/2 hour length. Andy Griffith is good here. But, you know me...I would've preferred Claude Akins.Walter Matthau's monologue about Marcia and about his book - in fact, that whole section of the film - is dreadful. Overwritten and tin - eared. Patricia Neal starts the film out so beautifully - somebody else here called her performance "luminous" - and as the writing goes down the drain, so does her performance. Down, down, into pseudo - Tennessee Williams territory:"Marcia!"Watch the first hour with both eyes on the screen. And for the second one, keep one eye on the film while perusing, say, a Huey Long biography with the other eye.The ending? King Lear meets The Obsolete Man. That says what it says.I wonder what would've happened if those Kazans and Schulbergs and Chayefskys, etc. could've interrogated and implicated their own Liberal Allrightnik sensibilities? Then Auto - Derision wouldn't be a term only used in French.

There are films that are both a product of the time they are created in and yet timeless. They are films that remain prescient in the years and decades after their initial release. They may linger in the background but they are films that stand the test of time. A Face In The Crowd, released in 1957 and marking the breakthrough role for an up and coming Andy Griffith, is exactly that kind of movie. As a sit here writing this review in 2016, the film seems like a warning from decades ago and a warning prescient for the time we live in now.The heart of the film is Andy Griffith as Lonesome Rhodes, a drifter who through his talents and folksy charm manages to rise not just to celebrity status but to the cusp of potential political power. For those who only know Griffith from his roles as Sheriff Andy Taylor and the lawyer Matlock, this role is a revelation. All of that charm is there but it's just the tip of the iceberg that is the Rhodes character. Griffith's as Rhodes is a volcano, a man of extreme energy and talent who can be loving and charming one minute but hateful, spiteful, and downright unlikable the next. The depth and range that Griffith shows is simply startling and whenever he's on- screen (which is much of the film) you can not take your eyes off of him as he goes through the great American story of a man's rise and fall. That Griffith wasn't nominated for any kind of award for his performance is as startling as his performance as it is a performance of a lifetime and one that stays with the viewer long after the film is over.Right beside Griffith is Patricia Neal as Marcia Jeffries, the Arkansas radio producer who first discover Rhodes and gives him his new name and who goes with him on his journey through the film. Neal's performance is just as stunning as Griffith, a woman who goes on the incredible journey with the man she falls in love with despite the man's faults and eventually finds herself sacrificing herself almost heart and soul in the process. Neal throws herself into the role, being utterly believable throughout as she becomes increasingly conflicted about her role in Rhodes life. Her performance is a fascinating study of what it's like to be the power behind the throne and the price one pays for being so. The film's supporting cast is strong as well. Walter Matthau is particularly memorable as Mel Miller, a writer who finds himself brought in Rhodes orbit from Memphis to New York and ultimately gets to deliver a particularly effective dramatic punch line in the film's closing minutes while also acting as something of a voice of conscience for Neal's Jeffries as well. Anthony Franciosa plays Joey DePalma, an opportunist who becomes Rhodes' agent on his incredible rise to power. Bringing Rhodes into a political orbit is Percy Waram as the multi-millionaire General Haynesworth who puts into Rhodes the idea of gaining political power, drawing in presidential candidate Senator Fuller (played by Marshall Neilan) who are both well suited to their roles. With appearances from Howard Smith and a young Lee Remick plus cameos from Mike Wallace and Walter Winchell, the film's cast is superb.Beyond the cast, the film is a superb piece of work in its own right. The film makes excellent use of locations as well as sets, giving it a strong sense of verisimilitude that's especially evident today. The stark black and white cinematography brings the film's various locations to life from the back roads of Arkansas to New York City and the television studios around the country. All brought together under the direction of Elia Kazan, who brings the film to life with a great sense of both drama and irony that's especially present in the film's closing minutes. The overall result is a film that feels like a portrait of a time and place in American history never to be glimpsed again but that stands as a document for future generations.That being said, A Face In The Crowd isn't that dated at all. If Griffity is the film's heart, then the screenplay by Budd Schulberg is its soul. The film is a classic American story, played out again and again in our history. It's the tale of a man who comes from nothing yet, through his talents and lucky encounters, rises to become not just a celebrity but wield immense power before his ego and inability to keep himself in check leads him to self- destruction. It's a story that we've seen played out again and again in our history and it's something that gives the film even more power. Not only does the film tell that classic story, it also explores issues that we're still dealing with today: celebrity culture, the role of popular media in politics, the question of where entertainment and politics intersect and its effect on American society. Watching Griffith's Rhodes also feels like a nearly six decade old pre-echo of personalities currently dominating in politics and popular discussions of it, something that gives the film a power and message that few films of its age can claim to have.A Face In The Crowd, for all of these reasons, is something of an overlooked classic. Made in the 1950s about the rise of television, its script and the questions it raises are ones we're still coping with today. More than that, it's a finely crafted film featuring an incredible performance from Andy Griffith who is backed by strong performances and a finely crafted film. It's remains watchable and prescient, a film that begs to be seen even now. So see it and see it soon. You may be wondering why you haven't before.

***SPOILERS*** Years ahead of its time movie in how the American public can be manipulated, like it is today, by a smooth talking demigod who uses the electronic media of radio & televising to fool it into thinking that he or she, with women now so prominent in US politics,is the greatest kindest and most of all righteous person that ever walked the face of the universe. That's until feeling invincible as well as all powerful he slips up and is exposed like the main character of the movie Larry Lonesome Rhodes, Andy Griffith, and forced against his will to face the hard reality, or Karma, of his sleazy and immoral actions.Discovered at a jail house drunk tank by local radio personality Marcia Jeffries, Patricia Neal,in rural Arkansas the home of the former Prsident of the United States William Jefferson "Slick Willie" Clinton Larry right away with his boyish good looks so impressed her in his folksy delivery and skill of playing the guitar the Marcia quickly saw in him a combination of a Will Rogers and Hank Williams and puts him on the radio as soon as he dried himself out. Not at first interested in his new found fame Larry or Lonesome soon discovered that he can get people to buy products as well as later elect politicians by just putting in a good word for them on his talk & country & western music hillbilly radio/TV show. The people including Marcia that are behind Lonesome's incredible rise in the TV ratings and popularity never once notice that he was anything but the lovable country bumpkin that he made himself out to be but a Frankenstein monster!***SPOILERS*** IT was in fact Marcia who had fallen in love with the big jerk who was hurt in the most personal way by Lonesome dropping her for this young teenage chickadee the baton twirling Betty Lou Fleckum, Lee Remick, whom he also dropped after he got, as in with so many other women in his life, tired of her. Seething with both hatred and revenge as well as feeling hurt & deserted Marcia planned to show the real Lonesome Rhodes to the public, who are just crazy about him, for what he really is. And this came on rating week or sweeps for TV & radio with tens of millions of his fans and admirers tuning in to see and hear their hero.Like the saying goes "It's a dirty job but someone's got to do it" and Marcia's exposer of Lonesome, when he thought no one was listening in, was anything but pretty. Within minutes of the big show going off the air thousands of outraged listeners as well as it's sponsors, by canceling their sponsorship of his show, showed Lonesome just what they think about him! Not quit getting the picture in how badly he screwed himself up Lonesome in his rage to get the person who left the mike on when the shows credits were rolling down the TV screen was shocked to find out that the person that he trusted the most, even though he treated her like dirt, who was responsible for his sudden downfall was non other then Marcia Jeffries! What I got from the ending is that Lonesome Rhodes was so popular that the millions who tuned into his show didn't at the time bother to turn it off in being so impressed by it! Even in the last minute or so when it was going off the air which in the end made the greatest impact, in seeing or hearing what a low life creep he really was, on them!

Marcia Jeffries (Patricia Neal) is the host of the radio show "A Face in the Crowd" for a regional Arkansas station KGRK. She goes to the local jail of Tomahawk County to talk to the incarcerated. Among others, she finds the charming drunk Larry Rhodes (Andy Griffith). She puts him on the air and he gathers a following as "Lonesome" Rhodes. Together they go and hit it big in Memphis, not just in music but as an advertising pitch man.This is sold as Elia Kazan's next great discovery after Marlon Brando and James Dean. Andy Griffith's does great in his film debut, but it's nothing quite so revolutionary. The story has quite a bit of bite but this is more about Griffith. He plays it really big. If there is any minor problem, there is something theatrical to it all that isn't quite real. He's definitely playing a role whether he's singing, or talking big, or laughing, or drunk acting. Part of that is the fact that the Lonesome character is actually play acting himself. He's a horrible drunk at his heart. If Griffith could put more vulnerability into his character, I think Lonesome would be a much more compelling character.