Review of A Place in the Sun (1951) by Paul Z — 21 Oct 2008

The powers involved in the creation and crafting of this socially, historically and artistically important masterpiece have a deep perception of social evils, human emotions, temptation, and the thin lines that divide good and evil, perceptions the power of which we would hardly be conscious without watching a film like this. One of the most brilliantly crafted works of drama I have ever seen, A Place In the Sun is a captivating examination of the American class system and how it shapes one shy and unassuming young man who makes some terrible decisions, but the inevitable question is, Who can't at any rate identify with and have compassion for his aspirations?

A Place In the Sun is an affecting film that generates as much gray uncertainty in us as the protagonist feels over his actions. He is affable on top of gravely faulty by his circumstance. Shelly Winters is also a perfectly lovable, timid and humble young girl, but clearly incomplete in her idea of the world. Liz Taylor is overpoweringly sexy, but not as honest and wholesome as Shelly Winters. Considering the story and the protagonist's hopes, let alone his beginnings, what would you do? If you answer this one in your mind as you watch the film, it is likely to be the same answer that Montgomery Clift resolves to himself shortly thereof.

Director George Stevens has fashioned a persuasive, disquieting film with realistic production design and a quintessential example of the nature and purpose of black and white cinematography. He prolongs an engulfing, boding thrust, never interrupted by even a breath of lightheartedness. Lethargic, unhurried dissolves and their overlaid images intensify the feeling of unavoidability as each scene slithers like a dream into the next. Yet, Stevens leaves many of Theodore Dreiser's characters' outlooks and ways of thinking implicit, giving the actors room to act, to emote. Montgomery Clift and Liz Taylor's own personal histories, closeness as friends away from the camera, shared love and shared admiration fueled the passion internalized in their own characters' respective ways that makes us long for their unity. The film gives the impression of an ode from Stevens to his stars, who reciprocate his admiration for them. Most emotionally gripping is Shelley Winters, playing a homely, underprivileged girl whose wholesomeness, too, has its limits, her progression to those limits flooding a well of sympathy for her.

The film is a masterful illustration of Stevens's gift for empathy. We all know that accusations of classism frequently cause a lot of squabble, usually over personal history or issues of discernment of circumstances. People who commonly have a tendency to find accusations of classism against less privileged people to be groundless or unjustly severe time and again distinguish the supposed bias as signifying "class envy." Those who claim classism is exceptionally persistent or deep-seated in America often equate classism as the manifestation of organized economic manipulation by the upper classes, and may associate it with plain class warfare. It is also perceived that classism is widely held with bitter lower classes, looking for an antagonist as to their disadvantaged means. Stevens grasps Dreiser's story with a moving understanding of class struggle. No one twists anyone's arm to do any of the things they do in this film, nor do they find people who understand what they do. A Place In the Sun knows that the vital impetus for having this effect is by sparing us nothing, by not being afraid to let us down. And it uses that wisdom.