Review of The Heiress (1949) by Veronique K — 10 Sep 2009

"the heiress" is william wyler's adaption from henry james' novella "washington square", featuring montgomery clift in his utmost of gracious beauty and a mature olivia dehavilland who still preserves a girlish coyness despite she's reached into matron-hood. it's one of those marvellous examples of dialogue-driven movies based upon the stage plays like "long day's journey into night" or wyler's another work "little fox" starring bette davis. now wyler's on his way to catapult another major warner-studio actress, olivia dehavilland, into further award-winning niche of accomplished actress like he did with bette davis in earlier years.

Dehavilland is a rich spinster whose lack of glamour has dwarfed her from being the charming socialite her father wishes her to be, just like her absolutely gracious late mother who has been immortalized by her worshipping dad. the silhouette of her mighty gorgeous mother has intimidated her from blossoming into a genuine womanhood since father always makes woeful comparison between the fabulous mom and the plain-jane daughter. so she's never in love until a handsome playboy who secretly covets her fortune sets his eyes on her..then her timid virginal heart is stirred with rejoice until she discovers the cruel truth of life about her father and her lover's mercenary motive.

Clift's social climber has an overlayered parallel with his another role in "the place in the sun", but he just has a sort of boyish naivete and some beguiling refinement to make you hesitate whether you should hate him or accept his warming embrace. there's a very blurred and grey dubiety in his performances as if you could detect some gentleness in him even when he's conniving some bad schemes in his mind. when he's making love to de havilland, you're aware he's mainly after the money but his gestures are so sincere that you tend to fall into his trap. you cannot see any apparent vileness in a character who's supposed to be vile by purpose. that's the so called "elegant rotten-ness".. somehow you almost want to pity him in the end when he knocks the door desperately like a panic child even he just gets what he deserves.

In a nutshell, olivia de havilland sheds off her swashbuckler sweetheart halo and proves to you that she could also be hardened, cruel and callous and she's not just a bundle of sugary water. ralch richardson could pull off any heavy task of stage-play kind of movie like his another success in katherine hepburn's "long day's journey into night" and the imaginative glamour of the protagonist's late mother totally relies upon richardson's nifty expressions, needless to say, it requires subtlety and culture in his blood to channel a fluent suaveness to deliver those lines of classic plays in a stagy movie like this.