STRANGE LADY IN TOWN
US, 1954, 112 minutes, Colour.
Greer Garson, Dana Andrews, Cameron Mitchell, Lois Smith, Walter Hampden.
Directed by Mervyn Le Roy.
Greer Garson is not the immediate name that springs to mind for a leading actress in a western. A woman of great dignity and bearing on screen, she had begun her career with Goodbye Mr Chips, moved into dramas with Walter Pidgeon (Blossoms in the Dust directed by Mervyn LeRoy), winning an Oscar for Mrs Miniver and continuing for the next twelve years as a leading lady at MGM Studios. This was her first film outside the studios. She is teamed with Dana Andrews and Cameron Mitchell.
The film is quite entertaining. Dana Andrews is the doctor in town. Greer Garson is a doctor who has travelled in Europe and who has some up-to-date ideas. The two doctors clash. Meanwhile, there are the various incidents that usually occur in westerns ranging from outlaws to saloons and victims needing doctors. The film is enjoyable in its way, especially for Greer Garson fans to see her in a different kind of role.
Mervyn Le Roy had a long career from the 1920s to the 1960s, directing a great range of films including Little Caesar and I Was a Fugitive from the Chain Gang before he moved into ‘more respectable’ films at MGM including Waterloo Bridge, Random Harvest, Madame Curie. He also directed Quo Vadis and a number of the musicals at MGM in the 1950s. In the 1960s he directed The Devil at Four O’ Clock, A Majority of One and Gypsy.
1. The appeal of this particular film as a western, Greer Garson vehicle? Its particular qualities?
2. The contribution of colour, western locations, wide screen? Musical background and song and its repetition?
3. The film as a fifties soap opera, set in the west? The presentation of sentiment, good, right and wrong religion, healing? The combination of these ingredients for popular appeal?
4. The character of Julia Garth? Her first impressions, her lady-like behaviour and style, her friendly encounter with the workers, her popularity , her qualities as a doctor, strength of character, charm, stubbornness, her progressive beliefs as a doctor? Audience response to this kind of heroine?
5. The presentation of her achievement in her work, the visit to the hospital? The eyes? The impact of her work?
6. The presentation of her in her home, the western town? her attitudes of rivalry of O’ Brien, her devotion to her brother and her blinding herself to his faults, her admiration for Father Gabriel.
7. The conflicts in which she was involved? The conflicts about profession, the role of men and women with O’Brien? Her running away from the east? Her belief in women’s status and their role in society? Her proving her beliefs?
8. The character of Spurs? Her devotion to Julia, getting the original patient, staying around, discussing her father, helping Julia, especially at the end? How good a characterization of such a young girl in the west?
9. David and his lack of character? A conventional, weak villain for such a film? Julia’s lack of influence on him? This working into the structure for a sub-plot? The weak type, the army role, dishonesty and gambling, violence and shooting, involved in a robbery, the spectacular gunfight, the inevitability of his death?
10. The staging of the bank robbery, the background of the fiesta, the irony of killing Fr Gabriel and his work?
11. O’Brien? as the hero of he film? description of him, his attitudes towards his practice, his criticisms of things
new? The background of his marriage? Fascination with Julia, stubbornness? The manifestations of his love yet his irritation? Teaching her to write? The romantic proposal and poetry? Then the flare ups? The party and the celebration of her bitthday? How engaging a masculine hero? His fighting for Julia?
12. The visualising of the medical rivalry? Especially her diagnosis of Governor’s troubles?
13. The aftermath of the gunfight? The portrayal of the hostility of the town? O’ Brien’s speech against them and its significance?
14 How appropriate the happy ending? This kind of film as humane, sentimental, religious, an atmosphere of niceness? The kind of impact that it has?
