adult farce in a world a youthful romance
by
Douglas Messerli
Nora
Johnson and Nunnally Johnson (screenplay), George Roy Hill (director) The World of Henry Orient / 1964
Yes, his films are often attentive to the
outsiders in our culture, but the characters, themselves, seem to be totally
immune the true battles within American political/cultural divides, representing
stand-ins for those who simply cannot truly fit into the American system, but
blithefully move through their fairly empty lives nonetheless. Even his most
political of films (Slaughterhouse Five and
The World According to Garp)
represent ironic stances against American failure.
His early—and I must admit, quite
charming film—The World of Henry Orient, reveals
all his directorial abilities and failures. Here the major figures are two
rather special and highly intelligent young girls, from rather wealthy families
living in comfortable Manhattan surroundings, one of them, obviously, Marian
(“Gill”) (Merrie Spaeth) living a seemingly normal life—although one does have the right
to question just what is the relationship between her loving mother, Phyllis
Thaxter (as the long divorced Mrs. Avis Gilbert) and her live-in friend, Erica
“Boothy” Booth (Bibi Osterwald). I think in 1964 that the fact that the witty
Booth lived with Gilbert might have meant very little; but today, it reads like
something close to a lesbian relationship. Why else even introduce this strange
alliance, both of these woman having now lived long lives together and
experiencing many mutual events? If nothing else it is a oddball friendship in
the cast of Auntie Mame and Vera Charles.
These young outsiders quickly bond
against their smug snobbish fellow classmates, and before long are chasing one
another along Manhattan streets, leaping over garbage cans, fire hydrants, and
even tricycling children in a stock expression of Hill’s notion of happiness
(he used a similar motif in the blissful bicycling scene of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
accompanied to Burt Bacharach’s quitschy “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head”).
Now bonded by an oath of blood, the two
girls almost brutally track him down, Valerie, in particular, acting a bit like
the naughty French school-girl, Raymond Queneau’s havoc- wrecking Zazie—without the latter’s complete
abandonment all good behavior; after all, Valerie is dressed in an expensive
ankle-knee fur coat throughout.
When, a bit like Raymond Shaw’s
dreadfully dominating mother (a role also played by
Lansbury),
Isabel—her husband, Frank (the always likeable Tom Bosely) traipsing a bit
behind—suddenly descend upon her daughter, all hell breaks loose. Discovering
her daughter’s teenage scrapbook dedicated to Henry Orient, Isabel grows into a
rage, separating the two girls, and determining to destroy what little career
Orient has left, as well as any dream-life her young daughter has been able to
establish.
The meeting of these two conniving beings
is inevitable, and they fall immediately into one other’s arms; to give her
credit, at least the mean-spirited Isabel never plays coy.
When the girls slip out, after Valerie
has gone hiding in Gill’s bed (another strangely sexual, but this time
perfectly innocent, situation), they determine to actually say goodbye to Val’s
former heart-throb, discovering a far more devastating truth as they watch
Isabel exit from her late-night visit to Henry’s bed.
Father and daughter now know the truth
without even having to express it to each other. Isabel is out of the picture,
quite literally, as Henry slinks off to South America and Frank divorces her,
determining to set up a real home for his daughter—in whatever major city
(Rome, Paris, New York, London) she might desire.
Why, however, did I still have a feeling
of a sour breath after watching what billed itself as a thing of charm? Maybe
Hill’s daredevil heroes—Butch Cassidy, the Sundance Kid, Waldo Pepper, Henry Gondorff, Johnny Hooker, Garp and others—all
destined to ignoble endings do not entirely present positive views of the human
race. One has the feeling that, with this director, none of them really
mattered enough to become real human beings. The two wild sweethearts of The World of Henry Orient, we are
assured, will simply grow up to marry well and, maybe, sneak off into their own
private afternoon affairs. The dirty fact is that Hill was having his own
affair with the 16 year-old Walter during much of the film’s shooting and
after—despite his own marriage and four children.
Ultimately, all I can say is that I still
enjoyed the afternoon watching the movie. All I lacked was a little popcorn.
Los Angeles,
April 5, 2017
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