DRAGONWYCK

US, 1946, 103 minutes, Black and white.
Gene Tierney, Vincent Price, Walter Huston, Glenn Langan, Spring Byington, Anne Revere, Jessica Tandy, Henry Morgan.
Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz.

A 19th century American Gothic romantic melodrama based on a best-selling novel by Anya Seaton. It is in the vein of Rebecca
and Jane Eyre which were so popular during the forties.

Gene Tierney is attractive as the heroine, all eager - even saying Golly, Moses - who goes into a world beyond her and becomes the victim of evil only to grow up and assert herself. Vincent Price, whose film it really is, shows his capacity for rhetorical high melodrama. It is almost a rehearsal for so many of the films that he was to make in the sixties and seventies.

There is an excellent supporting cast of character actors and actresses notable with Walter Huston as Gene Tierney's father, Anne Revere as her mother and Spring Byington, as a sinister maid. The film is interesting in its presentation of the Dutch descended aristocracy of New York State and the intense religious and worldly principles used to dominate the tenant farmers of the area.

They were doomed to defeat by the gradual progress of democracy in the United States. The film makes a great deal of implicit social comment. The film is moody, morbid and melodramatic - always popular ingredients with this kind of best-selling melodramatic story. Writing and direction is by Joseph L. Mankiewicz who had only begun a directing career after a great deal of producing and writing. He was to have a fine reputation and win Oscars at the and of the forties with A Letter To Three Wives and All About Eve. Amongst his other noted film were Julius Caesar, Guys And Dolls and the Elizabeth Taylor Cleopatra.

1. The perennial appeal of this kind of romantic melodrama? The popularity of this kind of film in the forties? Gothic romance? Rebecca and Jane Eyre? The film as derivative of these stories? The original touches with the background of the Dutch aristocracy of New York State contrasting with the free farmers and citizens other States? The insight into the growth of democracy in New York State? The American heritage?

2. The recreation of period: black and white photography, decor, farms and mansions? Romance and gloom? The atmospheric score by Alfred Newman?

3. The plausibility of the plot: the farmers of Connecticut and their way of life, the tenant farmers of Upper New York State, the Dutch aristocracy? The background of heritage, upper-class privilege, wealth? The decay of the power class - madness and violence? American origins and decay? The screenplay's comment on decay, greed, religion and atheism, oppression?

4. The focus on Miranda as heroine? The film as a Gene Tierney vehicle? Her beauty, vivacity, charm? Audiences identifying with her? Her hopes and ambitions, her home being too small for her? The background of the family with its reliance on the Bible and proper manners? The family meeting about her going away? The Bible text and the irony of Hagar wandering the desert? Her relationship to her father and his strictness - at home, in New York, the reading of the Bible, expectations of Nicholas? Her mother and her care for her? The meeting of Nicholas at the hotel with the background of wealth, the hotel attendant, the meal in the room? The anticipation of Dragonwyck and the ferry up the Hudson? The meeting with Johanna and her eating so much at the table, the repressed daughter? Magda and her sinister smiling advice and questions? Her place in the household. giving lessons and delighting with the daughter, her enjoying the atmosphere of affluence, being served? The background of her ancestry and style and the clash with the people at the dance, her humiliation and her being raised to heights by Nicholas? Her overhearing the judgment on the tenants? The encounter with Dr. Turner?

5. Her growing more and more to belong to Dragonwyck? The build-up to Johanna’s death and the irony of Nicholas's intense proposal on the night of the death? Her going home? Dr. Turner's attentions? Nicholas's proposal and the marriage?

6. Her being happy and unhappy? Peggy an her companion and maid? Her reaction to Nicholas' humiliation of Peggy? Her pregnancy, Dr. Turner's coming for the birth of her son? The baptism and his death?

7. The spurning of Nicholas? The humiliation of Peggy? Her growing in strength? Her decision to confront him in the attic? Her discovery of the truth? siding with Dr Turner? The final confrontation? Her returning home - the future and Dr. Turner's visits?

8. Miranda as a symbol of the eager, ambitious, easily bedazzled Golly, Moses American girl? Eager for what she didn't have? Underestimating what she did have? Being changed by wealth and power? Coming under the influence of evil? Nicholas and the house as symbols of class and evil? Her absorbing this but suppressing it? The possibilities in marriage, pregnancy? The death of the sickly child, no fruitful union from Nicholas and Miranda and what they stood for?

9. Vincent Price's style as Nicholas? His rhetoric, minister ravings? High powered melodramatics? The Dutch family background, the role of the Patron? His audience with the tenants and his cruel and avaricious manner? His spurning of his wife? His daughter not knowing him? His ambitions for a son? His impatience with anything that was imperfect? His choosing of Miranda, becoming infatuated by her, dancing with her in spite of all the gossip? His decision to kill his wife - and the smooth-talking with giving her the oleander? The death and his proposal to Miranda on the same night? The seemingly happy marriage? The confrontation with his rudeness to Peggy? His having Dr. Turner in for the birth and the irony of having him there as a cover for his wife’s death? The baptism of the child and its death? His hiding in the attic, Miranda’s discovery, his drug addiction? His gradually going mad? The truth exposed by Dr Turner? The final ravings and sitting on the judgment seat - with the irony of his seeing the tenants asking him in the Inn? The confrontation with the gun and resort to violence, mad shooting and his death? The symbol of them taking their hats off at his death? A symbol of an aristocratic past out of place in America?

10. Johanna, the nouveau riche, eating, hypochondriac, the daughter not knowing her father? The atmosphere of ghosts and haunting, Miranda not hearing it, the daughter hearing it, Nicholas hearing it?

11. The contract with the Wells family and their farm, reliance on the Bible, freedom?

12. Magda and the irony of her laughingly sinister questions?

13. Dr. Turner - the bland hero, supporting the men, the visit to the home, the diagnosis and Johanna’s death, assisting with the birth, the final confrontation? The solid American hero figure?

14. Themes of American society, class and equality, 19th century religion? The Dutch background to New York State? The film exploring the American heritage and being critical of it?