From the far reaches of the Milky Way Galaxy, It's Retro Nerd Girl with a film review for you.
Today I'll be reviewing the movie She released in 1935.
Starring:
Helen Gahagan, Randolph Scott, Helen Mack
Directed by:
Lansing C. Holden, Irving Pichel
Genre:
Adventure, Fantasy, Romance
Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) Rating:
Approved
Budget:
N/A
Current IMDb Rating When Reviewed:
6.6
The Synopsis is:
Leo (pronounced Ley o)Vincey goes on an adventure to discover the lost city of Kor to find the secret to immortality and encounter immortal queen of the flame, called She, who believes Leo is her long-lost lover.
Story:
The movie is based on H. Rider Haggard's popular novel, She: A History of Adventure in 1887. Very rare to find films adapted the book in 1908, 1911, 1916, 1917, and 1925.
In July 1932 Universal Studios announced they had bought the rights to the story and two years later the movie studio RKO announced they would make the film. Merian C. Cooper stepped in as producer and expectations were high after his success of the 1933 movie King Kong.
Ruth Rose wrote the initial adaptation while Dudley Nichols filled in the dialogue.
The screenplay is a combination of all three of H. Rider Haggard's books in the series: She: A History of Adventure, She and Allan, Ayesha: The Return of She and Wisdom's Daughter.
The story is good. It’s a lot like Dracula meets Indiana Jones. But what really trips up the story is the dialogue, which at times makes little sense at times or seem forced. It undermines the more dramatic moments.
Pacing:
At an hour and 41 minutes, the film has a decent flow, however there are a few scenes that went on for much longer than they needed to.
Challenge:
The challenge in the film is the queen of the lost city, or She, named Hash-a-Motep who resides in the Russian Arctic ruling her subjects of a combined mixture of Aztec and Egyptian cultures. (In the book, She is called Ayesha and the lost city is in Africa.)
One of her titles is She, who must be obeyed. We never know what makes her the queen of these people except that she has the ability to live forever and has a pinchon for men who are already taken.
500 years ago she fell in love with John Vincey, who came to Kor with his wife. Hash-a-Motep killed John in jealousy but always hoped that he would return reincarnated.
The problems with this character really stem from how she was written in the books.
There is a notion that there is a feminist spin on She since this is portraying a female character in power. As well, there is a contrary argument that She is anti-feminist because we have a powerful woman that is portrayed as a villain fighting with other women over a man. I actually think that She is neither. Like Dracula or any other monster or villain, She is after her own desires whether they be power or love, we must treat these characters alike if there is going to be any gender equality in cinema.
At the core of it, the queen is a character that is irrationally in love, cursed by her self imposed loneliness and has lost her humanity after 2,000 years of life. She is simply out of her mind with boredom for the world, she doesn’t even venture out. The only thing she understands is how to unfairly wield her power among her subjects.
Without a blink of an eye she issues unjust death sentences and revels in human sacrifice. This is where you realize that she is quite mad and completely unredeemable.
She wouldn’t be half as nasty as she is without her right hand man, Billali, who spies among the people and feeds her with cruel anecdotes.
There’s no romance between them, but an intense connection. They have a strange symbiotic relationship wherein when she dies, he does as well. I wish that was explained in the film. Does he die from grief? Is he secretly in love with She?
Empathy:
The rugged hero of the film, Leo Vincey has no backstory other than his heritage is from England, but his mother and father moved to the United States before he was born. At the urgent request of Horace Holly, a companion to his uncle, Leo comes to England to learn about the immortal flame discovered by is ancestor, John Vincey 500 years ago.
Leo and Holly seek the help of some locals on their journey through the Russian Arctic and find a mean guide by the name of Tugmore and a young woman he has stolen as his daughter, Tanya.
The character of Tanya serves as Leo’s love interest created for the film as a combination of many of Leo’s lovers in the books. Their love affair is something that happens a little too quickly to stand up against the temptation of the queen and immortality.
I enjoyed the fact that Leo exhibited some weakness and consideration of She’s offer. This was the perfect opportunity for Tanya’s character to shine, wherein she describes the comfort of the love between two people through a lifetime.
Technical:
I enjoyed the look of this film incredibly. I actually wasn’t expecting to see something so grand for 1935, but these are the kinds of films I am attracted to.
It’s full of incredible visions of adventure through the icy arctic terrain and visually bold world of Kor, using a mixture of massive sets and elaborately painted realistic backgrounds.
There were so many great costumes and dancing. There was one elaborate dance sequence that was actually gave the film a nomination for an Academy Award in 1936 for Best Dance Direction by Benjamin Zemach for "Hall of Kings".
The music was pretty good, delivering all of the drama of a good action adventure film by Max Steiner famous for his later work on Gone with the Wind released in 1939.
Performances:
The performances were highly criticized, but I do believe that much of the issues that are present in the performances are due to the dialogue.
This was the first movie for Helen Gahagan after a long career on Broadway. And her performance is theater-esque but it is still pretty good and matches her character’s personality save for a few moments that fell awkward, again having to do with dialogue.
I thought Helen Mack as Tanya was especially noteworthy to mention because she is quite enjoyable on screen.
Best:
The best part of the film would be nearly every scene with She in it. She is fascinating and every time she is on screen you hope she will shed more light on what is going on.
I also enjoyed the fantasy of it all, the adventure and the idea of the story.
The Ending:
The ending was a little too simplistic for me. I wanted something a little more elaborate.
Wish List:
I wish the film went a little deeper with the character motivations. Why does She not venture out into the world and find a new lover, see new sights and learn new things? Why do the people of Kor accept her as their queen? Besides sexual attraction what makes Leo and Tanya fall in love?
I would have love to have seen more of the seduction of Leo and perhaps some latent memories of his past life. It would have also been great to know why he is so entranced by Hash-a-Motep? This is never explained, so his behavior seems completely weird.
Enjoyment:
The film was a huge disappointment when it was released and is listed in The Official Razzie Movie Guide as one of the 100 Most Enjoyably Bad Movies Ever Made.
I also think that many of the complaints about the movie were because of two important factors. Firstly, the film too different from the book. Secondly, after hearing that the film was produced by Merian C. Cooper, people expected it was going to be as epic as his previous successes. Even Cooper agreed as he referred to She as the worst picture he ever made in his later years. He may have felt that way, but I think it was still pretty amazing and I'm not the only one because it influenced many movie makers that proceeded him.
Many reports say that Helen Gahagan had retired from acting in movies due to her experience in this film, but it was mainly rather that she became interested in politics to the point she was eventually elected to the United States House of Representatives from 1945 to 1951. It was also rumored that when she was running for Congress, she attempted to buy up all prints of the movie to protect her image.
She might have been successful at eradicating the film from cinema history if silent film star Buster Keaton hadn’t a copy of the original print stored in his garage. Thank goodness.
In 1949 the film was re-released and gained a following of moviegoers with a positive response.
Initially Merian C. Cooper wanted to shoot the film in color, but budget required that the film be in black and white.
In 2006, Legend Films and Ray Harryhausen colorized the film and it works so much better in color giving the audience a deeper layer of fantasy to imagine in. I am usually not a fan of colorizing films, but comparing the black and white to the color film, I feel as if I had a more fulfilling experience with the colored version. It really brought out the fantasy elements in the film beautifully and it was how Merian intended for it to be shown. I always love to respect a visionary artist.
The film feels like a bit of an Indiana Jones adventure and it makes sense that it does because he was inspired by Allan Quatermain from H. Rider Haggard's King Solomon’s Mines. It’s natural that it would me of Indiana Jones.
Tonya’s sacrifice scene was completely copied and modified in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom right down to the fiery pit of sacrifice. Even the high priest is a complete facsimile.
But the extent of inspiration to popular films does not end there. She was the inspiration for the appearance, body language and speaking voice of the Evil Queen in Walt Disney's 1937 animated film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Helen Gahagan's performance though heavily criticized in this movie was eventually loved as an animated character.
Even with its flaws, the film has a strange fast paced hokey charm about it that reminds me of the black and white Buck Rogers serials of the 1930’s. It’s all in line with the pacing and story structure of the modern summer blockbuster, a shallow story, full of action and spectacle.
I had an absolute blast watching this film.
My Rating:
7.5
That sums up my review. This is Retro Nerd Girl signing off! Take care movie lovers! I'm off to the next review!
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