The cinematography of legendary JAMES WONG HOWE, excellent supporting cast: KATE REID, MARY BADHAM, CHARLES BRONSON, handsome leads: NATALIE WOOD and ROBERT REDFORD, and based on a short story by TENNESSEE WILLIAMS, THIS PROPERTY IS CONDEMNED is a good movie, but could have been better. The fault lies in the screenplay & dialogue.
Set in the Mississippi during the early 1930's, THIS PROPERTY IS CONDEMNED is about Alva Starr (NATALIE WOOD) and Owen Legate (ROBERT REDFORD). Alva is the older daughter of Hazel Starr (KATE REID), who runs the local boardinghouse (for mostly railroad workmen). Mama has used beautiful Alva as the main attraction to the Starr Boardinghouse, and encourages her to be nice to Mr. Johnson, their wealthiest boarder. Mama's boyfriend J.J. (CHARLES BRONSON) clearly would like to have a piece of Alva, so would fellow boarder Sidney (ROBERT BLAKE), and all the men in town ! Enter Prince Charming in the form of Owen Legate (ROBERT REDFORD). Owen is also employed by the railroad, but his job is the unpleasant task of going town to town to cut back on employees. Obviously these two (Alva & Owen) are attracted to each other. Owen falls for Alva, he axes the jobs of most of the men staying at the Starr's, and asks her to go with him to New Orleans. Now Alva must make a choice whether to follow her heart or stay where she is.
NATALIE WOOD is very good in this movie, not as shrill as in some of her other work. She is much more reserved and in control. ROBERT REDFORD is also very good as the cynical Owen. Better performances are given by KATE REID as the calculating mother, and by MARY BADHAM as Alva younger sister. The cinematography is absolutely beautiful, mostly in subdued hazy colors. SYDNEY POLLACK'S direction is strong and thorough. The dialogue is 1 thing that could have been better. Fifteen minutes into the movie, in a night-time scene, Alva stands pensively on her porch as a train goes by and says, " Sometimes, I wish that the train would just come down off its tracks and sweep me up. Away from here." Like cut-rate INGE. The screenplay itself though clearly tries to sum up Alva in the first few minutes so that we can get to the meat of the story, and that was a mistake, because she's all summed up too fast, and mostly by her own dialogue. Another thing is that it's apparent that great efforts were taken to make sure that the actors, locations etc...were made to look like they would have in early 1930's Mississippi, so why does WOOD look like mid 60's starlet ? Aside from putting vamp straps across her pumps, she's all exaggerated eye make up, pale lips, and pageboy hair, hardly an early 30's image. This movie was generally panned at the time of its initial release, but I think that if you watch it thoroughly you'll find a very good movie here.............
Set in the Mississippi during the early 1930's, THIS PROPERTY IS CONDEMNED is about Alva Starr (NATALIE WOOD) and Owen Legate (ROBERT REDFORD). Alva is the older daughter of Hazel Starr (KATE REID), who runs the local boardinghouse (for mostly railroad workmen). Mama has used beautiful Alva as the main attraction to the Starr Boardinghouse, and encourages her to be nice to Mr. Johnson, their wealthiest boarder. Mama's boyfriend J.J. (CHARLES BRONSON) clearly would like to have a piece of Alva, so would fellow boarder Sidney (ROBERT BLAKE), and all the men in town ! Enter Prince Charming in the form of Owen Legate (ROBERT REDFORD). Owen is also employed by the railroad, but his job is the unpleasant task of going town to town to cut back on employees. Obviously these two (Alva & Owen) are attracted to each other. Owen falls for Alva, he axes the jobs of most of the men staying at the Starr's, and asks her to go with him to New Orleans. Now Alva must make a choice whether to follow her heart or stay where she is.
NATALIE WOOD is very good in this movie, not as shrill as in some of her other work. She is much more reserved and in control. ROBERT REDFORD is also very good as the cynical Owen. Better performances are given by KATE REID as the calculating mother, and by MARY BADHAM as Alva younger sister. The cinematography is absolutely beautiful, mostly in subdued hazy colors. SYDNEY POLLACK'S direction is strong and thorough. The dialogue is 1 thing that could have been better. Fifteen minutes into the movie, in a night-time scene, Alva stands pensively on her porch as a train goes by and says, " Sometimes, I wish that the train would just come down off its tracks and sweep me up. Away from here." Like cut-rate INGE. The screenplay itself though clearly tries to sum up Alva in the first few minutes so that we can get to the meat of the story, and that was a mistake, because she's all summed up too fast, and mostly by her own dialogue. Another thing is that it's apparent that great efforts were taken to make sure that the actors, locations etc...were made to look like they would have in early 1930's Mississippi, so why does WOOD look like mid 60's starlet ? Aside from putting vamp straps across her pumps, she's all exaggerated eye make up, pale lips, and pageboy hair, hardly an early 30's image. This movie was generally panned at the time of its initial release, but I think that if you watch it thoroughly you'll find a very good movie here.............