Peyton Place
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Movie Reviews of Peyton Place
Movie Review: A Story about Small Town Life
Summary: 4 Stars
The film opens on a seashore town while the credits roll. The leaves on the trees says Autumn. There is snow, then spring. Time is told by seasons. A horse-drawn plow furrows the field. There is trouble in a small farm family. The newspaper says the year is 1941. The local textile mill got a government contract for uniforms; more people will move to town. Scenes show this small town. [No New England accents?] The School Board wants a new man as Principal, not the local experienced teacher. But Rossi wants a fair wage, and gets it. [This teaches a lesson.] The owner of the textile mill runs the school board as well. The janitor gives his views on society. Rossi shows his skill to Miss Thornton.
Allison is attracted to local society, the well-to-do who have plenty of money and time. [Is there danger here?] Was Allison's mother right about that party? Will Principal Rossi start a class in sex education? Mrs. McKenzie is surprised at home. Does Peyton Place have low standards? What will Allison do? We see the many churches in town. Also a family squabble. Norman and Allison wander into the woods. A book in a "plain wrapper"? Do they have overly-protective single parents? Is their conversation too cute? Is there too much gossip in Peyton Place? Local standards are described to Rodney Harrington. He will obey his Father. Betty shows her appreciation for Rodney's gallantry. [Could Ted Cotter become a lawyer's clerk and learn on the job, as many did in older times?] Allison is the valedictorian for the Class of 1941.
That summer Allison writes stories. Principal Rossi recommends college, but Allison wants to learn by doing, and writes for the local newspaper. Selena confesses, Doctor Swain takes action to solve a problem. Selena falls, and has an "appendectomy". There is a Labor Day Parade, then a speech by the mill owner. Their prosperity comes from government contracts (taxes or deficit spending for non-productive functions). Life is carefree. Couples go to the lake. Will people gossip? Will this make trouble for Allison and Norman? Is there a secret that Mrs. McKenzie has never revealed? Will tragedy strike their home? Then Pearl Harbor changes their world. Life goes on in Peyton Place.
Lucas gets an unexpected hard welcome when he returns home. Will there be another scandal? What kind of respectability is there in Peyton Place? Will Selena tell the whole story? The trial of Selena brings out the facts and the truth. Dr. Matthew Swaine testifies about the past. Do young people leave Peyton Place because of gossip? Or for better jobs in a dynamic community?
I wonder what was changed in adapting the novel to a movie? Was part of this based on Grace Metalious' personal experience? Did life in Peyton Place reflect the Great Depression? Were the events common in many small towns of that era? Or today?
Movie Review: The Darkside of Small Town Life
Summary: 4 Stars
1957's Peyton Place was based on the tawdry best seller by Grace Metalious that depicts the sorted lives of the residents of the titular small New England town. The film was quite controversial at the time as it contains frank talk about sex, an incestuous rape, a hinted at abortion and murder. The film helped paved the way for the abandoning of the Hollywood moral codes. Everyone in Peyton Place, it seems, has something to Hide. Constance MacKenzie (Lana Turner) is an uptight single mother to Allison MacKenzie (Diane Varsi). She is fearful of scandal and rebuffs the advances of new high school principle Michael Rossi (Lee Phillips). Constance is hiding a secret from Allison and after Allison is wrongful accused of swimming naked with Norman Page (Russ Tamblyn) she reveals that Allison was born illegitimately as her father was living with Constance but was married. Allison leaves Peyton Place to go to New York City. Allison's best friend Selena Cross (Hope Lange) lives in a shack with her drunken stepfather Lucas Cross (Arthur Kennedy). Lucas is abusive and beats Selena and eventually rapes and impregnates her. Confronted by Dr. Swain (Lloyd Nolan), Lucas leaves town. He eventually returns and tries to take advantage of her again and Selena kills him. This leads to trial where Allison returns to town to speak on her Selena's behalf. She avoids her mother and in a bitter meeting tells her of her feelings towards her. At the trial, Selena refuses to let Dr. Swain speak about the rape. Dr. Swain's conscious gets the best of him and in an impassioned statement on the stand he reveals Selena's secret and chides the townspeople for their gossiping ways that led Selena to this position. Selena is acquitted and Allison reunites with Constance. The film was a huge hit and ironically Ms. Turner was embroiled in her our murder trial when her fourteen daughter stabbed her mobster boyfriend to death. It spawned a sequel and a popular television series. The film garnered nine Academy Award nominations including Best Picture, Best Director (Mark Robson), Best Actress for Ms. Turner (her only nomination) and two Best Supporting Actor & Actress nomination for Mr. Kennedy, Mr. Tamblyn, Ms. Lange & Ms. Varsi. The film holds the ignominy of having the most nomination without a single win.Movie Review: sudsy melodrama supreme
Summary: 4 Stars
Twentieth Century-Fox's film version of PEYTON PLACE (based on the novel by Grace Metalious, adapted for the screen by John Michael Hayes) remains an enjoyable sudsy melodrama, full of fantastic performances including Oscar-nominated turns from Lana Turner, Diane Varsi, Russ Tamblyn, Hope Lange and Arthur Kennedy.
The lives of the residents of Peyton Place, a small New Hampshire hamlet, are exposed in this movie which was once considered the epitome of scandal. Looking back the film is much more tame than what we would see today, nevertheless certain scenes still contain a raw intensity. Lana Turner's performance does sometimes border on camp, but would we have her any other way? She's fabulous here in Technicolor.
The film focuses on strait-laced single mother Constance MacKenzie (Lana Turner) who is struggling to bring up her intelligent-yet troubled daughter Alison (the equally-troubled young starlet Diane Varsi). Alison's quiet romance with the shy Norman Page (Russ Tamblyn) comes to a premature end when the local gossips wrongly accuse the couple of swimming in the nude. Feeling suffocated by small-town morality (and discovering the truth about her father), Alison disowns her mother and moves to New York to become a writer. Meanwhile the frosty, repressed nature of Constance threatens to ruin a romance with the new high-school headmaster Michael Rossi (Lee Phillips).
We also zero in on the poor Cross family: Lucas (Arthur Kennedy) a drunkard who rapes and beats his stepdaughter Selena (Hope Lange). When Selena finally snaps and kills her tormentor, the town is thrown head-first into a murder trial.
Other roles are taken by Lloyd Nolan (as the trustworthy Dr Swain), Terry Moore (as the town tramp Betty Anderson), Scotty Morrow (as Selena's brother Joey), Betty Field (as Selena's mother Nellie) and Mildred Dunnock as beloved teacher Miss Thornton.
Mark Robson, who also directed the legendary sud-fest VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, gives this movie the same sort of feel. The score by Franz Waxman is very stirring, and the CinemaScope photography executed by William Mellor is superb. Running a hefty two-and-a-half-hours, the pace of the film never drags or lulls and cracks along at a good pace.
Movie Review: Racy and exciting melodrama - but Lana's miscast
Summary: 4 Stars
The filmed version of the famously shocking and successful bestseller is a little tamer than its literary parent, but still very racy and excting viewing. Even today the frankness of some of the stories is astounding - and all the moreso because this film was made in the '50s.
Firstly, the photography is sublime. The Maine locations are beautiful and the natural perfection of the town is an excellent and jolting counterpoint for the seedy storylines in which the town's participants are involved. All of the film's exteriors (except, very joltingly, for Lana Turner's scenes) was shot on location. The fact that Turner's scenes were obviously shot on a soundstage when the rest of the film was not is one of the few aspects that does date this film.
Single mom Lana Turner (in goregeous costumes and looking glamorously radiant throughout - in fact, far too glamorous for the part) is having problems with her clever but sexually curious teenage daughter Diane Varsi, who is involved with the hunky but smothered mommy's boy Russ Tamblyn. The daughter's best friend, lovely Hope Lange, daughter of Lana's cleaner, comes from the wrong side of the tracks and has her own problems, not least of which is her lecherous stepfather (Arthur Kennedy). Like most of the characters, Turner has a secret from her past, which initially inhibits her relationship with an unvconventional school principal.
"Peyton Place" is a long but riveting soap operatic film, still compulsively watcheable today. The only flaw is the lovely Lana, who, despite her own sordid private life which assured the film its great success, is simply too glamorous and thus miscast as a small-town single mother. Her inclination toward artifice was used to great effect in "Imitation of Life" a few years later, but in this particular part Lana is plainly ineffective with her Hollywood gloss and her "big" acting style.
The younger actors are all excellent and there are many moments to commend this interesting and visually goregeous film.
Movie Review: Tawdry best-seller becomes tasteful melodrama...
Summary: 4 Stars
PEYTON PLACE was a rather lurid best-seller that took the country by storm back in the 1950s by tearing the lid off a New England town and exposing the corruption and hypocrisy of its citizens. It must be stated that John Michael Hayes took the raw material from Grace Metalious' novel and transferred it to the screen in a way that sanitized it but kept its drama and conflict intact. It's a model of craftsmanship in how to take a steamy best-seller and give it an acceptable screen treatment. Today, given the lack of restrictions and censorship, the results would have been more graphic and the film would have exploited all the more vulgar aspects of the novel.
Lana Turner gives her finest mature performance as Constance, the worried mother who keeps her past a secret until she finally reveals it to her rebellious daughter, well played by Diane Varsi. Their emotional confrontations are highly satisfying from a dramatic standpoint, making it easy to understand why both actresses won Oscar nominations.
Others in the large cast do exceptional jobs--everyone, from Russ Tamblyn (as Norman), Lee Phillips, Hope Lange, Arthur Kennedy, Mildred Dunnock, Lloyd Nolan, Leon Ames, Terry Moore, Betty Field--all give compelling performances under Mark Robson's direction.
Special mention has to be made of Franz Waxman's soaring and poignant musical score, one of his finest, completely capturing the moods and seasons of this New England drama.
Another novel of small town hypocrisy was made into a stunning movie in 1942--KING'S ROW--and it too did a marvelous job of transferring a bulky, rambling novel into a coherent multi-plot film. By all means, see it if you can. And oddly enough, Betty Field had a featured role in that one too.
Trivia note: Lana Turner's fans may enjoy reading my feature article on the actress titled LANA TURNER: DANGEROUS CURVES published in the Spring 2002 issue of FILMS OF THE GOLDEN AGE.