Review of Bigger Than Life (1956) by Jonathan M — 08 Apr 2010

Dark stuff from Nicholas Ray, who follows "Rebel Without a Cause" with an equally anarchic study of American domesticity and it's troubling underbelly, trading youth angst for drug addiction and megalomania.

James Mason brings an air of repressed authority to his role of a meek school-teacher/suburban husband and father who, diagnosed with a fatal disease, becomes addicted on the pain medication, unleashing an outspoken, heavily aggressive totalitarian version of himself on his family and inner circle that dominates with a devastating critique.

Ray's descent into Americana hell is splattered with expressionistic shadows and a use of Cinemascope that traps his characters in their outstretched, bland domestic surroundings, suggesting that surface materialism and dressing has behind it a dark, troubled core.

Nice that Criterion has finally added Ray to their collection, let's hope the criminally not-on-DVD "Johnny Guitar" is next.