William Wyler

Discussion and info on people in film, ranging from directors to actors to cinematographers to writers.
Message
Author
User avatar
domino harvey
Dot Com Dom
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#26 Post by domino harvey » Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:16 pm

While the Young Turks were later all over the place on Wyler, one of the most important works written on him comes from Andre Bazin and his study of adaptation using the Little Foxes as a model. I would argue it is the best thing Bazin ever wrote, and I don’t even particularly care for the film!

User avatar
dustybooks
Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2007 10:52 am
Location: Wilmington, NC

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#27 Post by dustybooks » Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:19 pm

To me, Best Years is essentially about a society collectively recovering from trauma, so I'd imagine that it will become even more relevant in the next few years!

User avatar
domino harvey
Dot Com Dom
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#28 Post by domino harvey » Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:20 pm

knives wrote:
Mon Jul 20, 2020 3:37 pm
domino harvey wrote:
Mon Jul 20, 2020 3:30 pm
Just as an FYI, this thread will at some point be moved and converted into a Wyler filmmaker thread, so feel free to continue having civilized discussion about the director even though you're in the pisstake subforum!
Because I have too much free time I just started on the opening post. Do you want me to continue on that or no?
TBD, I’m waiting to hear back. Don’t delete whatever you worked on!

User avatar
knives
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:49 pm

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#29 Post by knives » Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:26 pm

domino harvey wrote:
Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:16 pm
While the Young Turks were later all over the place on Wyler, one of the most important works written on him comes from Andre Bazin and his study of adaptation using the Little Foxes as a model. I would argue it is the best thing Bazin ever wrote, and I don’t even particularly care for the film!
I'd absolutely love to read that. I don't think too fondly of the film either, but that approach sounds super interesting.

User avatar
domino harvey
Dot Com Dom
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#30 Post by domino harvey » Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:37 pm

It’s “In Defense of Mixed Cinema” but thumbing through it, he talks about the film less than I remembered! Bazin loved Wyler though, that’s for sure— he uses his movies in the same breath as Renoir as examples of the best film can be as an art form throughout the collection of essays in What is Cinema?

User avatar
knives
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:49 pm

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#31 Post by knives » Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:47 pm

Thanks.

User avatar
Michael Kerpan
Spelling Bee Champeen
Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 1:20 pm
Location: New England
Contact:

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#32 Post by Michael Kerpan » Mon Jul 20, 2020 5:11 pm

therewillbeblus wrote:
Mon Jul 20, 2020 3:15 pm
Even The Little Foxes, which I know many adore and I wouldn't place near his best, is a good film that deserves more attention than it gets.
Marc Blitzstein's operatic version of this story is pretty incredible. It works surprisingly well as music drama.

User avatar
hearthesilence
Joined: Fri Mar 04, 2005 4:22 am
Location: NYC

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#33 Post by hearthesilence » Mon Jul 20, 2020 7:19 pm

Absolutely, and I would never question his critical reputation back then either. Besides, the first film I saw was Ben-Hur which had been marketed for its record 11 Oscars, and Wyler's record-tying three Oscars for directing was also pointed out, so unless he torched his bridges, I never imagined him having anything less than a lofty place within the industry too. Bette Davis and many others have gone on record with their gratitude - he often brought out the best in his actors, and some of my favorite performances were achieved under his demanding direction. (Walter Huston in Dodsworth, Olivier in Carrie, etc.) Going back to Carrie, one of the pleasant surprises was Eddie Albert - it took me a while to recognize him, but I eventually could tell it was the same man who played the deeply and hilariously skeptical father in The Heartbreak Kid 20 years later. I was stunned to find out that he was named in the HUAC proceedings around the same time Carrie was made - it's believed his record as a war hero was the only thing they saved his career (his wife wasn't so lucky). Wyler was a fierce and vocal opponent of HUAC, and that alone should earn him a great deal of respect.

Re: the discussion on The Best Years of Our Lives, I recall the generational divide was observed in how the film resolved (or did NOT resolve) the characters' struggles to move on with their lives. There was a feeling that those old enough to remember WWII in at least their young adult or teenage years saw the film as providing a strong measure of comfort (or at least selling the illusion of it) whereas those a generation later believed the film was far more unsettling, with everyone's struggles doomed to worsen after the film was over.

[EDIT: it took a while to post this, it was in response to the final two posts of page 1, but since then a substantial 2nd page has grown!)

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#34 Post by therewillbeblus » Mon Jul 20, 2020 7:31 pm

hearthesilence wrote:
Mon Jul 20, 2020 7:19 pm
Re: the discussion on The Best Years of Our Lives, I recall the generational divide was observed in how the film resolved (or did NOT resolve) the characters' struggles to move on with their lives. There was a feeling that those old enough to remember WWII in at least their young adult or teenage years saw the film as providing a strong measure of comfort (or at least selling the illusion of it) whereas those a generation later believed the film was far more unsettling, with everyone's struggles doomed to worsen after the film was over.
That would also make a lot of sense given the optimism of promise cradled in secure institutions reinforced by the film- with hope that loyalty, hard work, skills, and safe systems would support people, even if the film does a fantastic job at showing how some of these don't align with the traumas of war, and emit degrees of false hope. The next generation wasn't supported by them, or rather didn't view these ideological apparatuses as safe and supportive, or preferred, so it would on-brand for them to smell a facade.

User avatar
knives
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:49 pm

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#35 Post by knives » Mon Jul 20, 2020 8:58 pm

In examining the film it is probably helpful to note that on the film just previous to it Wyler himself was disabled when a plane flew by him leaving him completely dead for a few months with his hearing returning to only one ear. That alone should highlight how the argument of the '60s that he was a bland craftsman and not some respectable auteur as ridiculous. He was very nakedly working on his own pain in that film.

User avatar
Dr Amicus
Joined: Thu Feb 15, 2007 10:20 am
Location: Guernsey

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#36 Post by Dr Amicus » Tue Jul 21, 2020 4:45 am

A bit over twenty years back, I read Jan Herman's biography of Wyler - subtitled "Hollywood's most acclaimed director" - which got me thinking. At the time I was looking to return to University to do a PhD and had been thinking I'd expand work on Walter Hill I'd done for my MA, but following Herman's (excellent) book I prepared a submission looking at critical and theoretical responses to Wyler and trying to place that within the context of auteurism (and arguments about that). I had an interview with Richard Dyer and Ed Gallafent up at Warwick but didn't get in there (I made a glib remark about George Stevens which I don't think went down well!) - but Dyer said he'd long hoped to write a study of Wyler (which, as far as I'm aware, never materialised). At the time I did watch quite a few Wyler films - I'd seen a few over the years but never systematically - and it did certainly amend my previous ambiguous relationship with his work. There are quite a few holdouts still I haven't got to but one of these days I'll tackle them again (and reread the Herman!).

When I was on the tuition team a few years later at Sussex University, we chose The Letter for our surprise film analysis - the students were shown the film twice over a few days and had to write an analysis of it - the only time I can remember a Wyler film being part of an academic course I was involved in.

User avatar
knives
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:49 pm

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#37 Post by knives » Tue Jul 21, 2020 6:41 am

Does the Herman book, as far as your recollection goes, deal heavily with the silent part of Wyler's career?

User avatar
Dr Amicus
Joined: Thu Feb 15, 2007 10:20 am
Location: Guernsey

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#38 Post by Dr Amicus » Tue Jul 21, 2020 7:13 am

Good question and I honestly can't remember for sure - I think it was reasonably thorough but not to the same depth as (at least some of) the later sound films.

User avatar
knives
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:49 pm

Re: Wyler So Serious?

#39 Post by knives » Tue Jul 21, 2020 8:30 am

Thanks. That makes sense. I don't expect any diamonds in the rough, but there's an allure for how forgotten they are.

User avatar
DarkImbecile
Ask me about my visible cat breasts
Joined: Mon Dec 09, 2013 6:24 pm
Location: Albuquerque, NM

Re: William Wyler

#40 Post by DarkImbecile » Tue Jul 21, 2020 10:37 am

Thanks to knives for putting in the work to make the thread header for this new Filmmaker thread!

User avatar
Rayon Vert
Green is the Rayest Color
Joined: Wed Jan 08, 2014 10:52 pm
Location: Canada
Contact:

William Wyler

#41 Post by Rayon Vert » Tue Jul 21, 2020 10:47 am

Thanks DI and knives.

Here's another web resource at senses of cinema highlighting his strengths as a director that I've turned to more than once.
Last edited by Rayon Vert on Tue Jul 21, 2020 10:47 am, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
knives
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:49 pm

Re: William Wyler

#42 Post by knives » Tue Jul 21, 2020 11:07 am

I'm happy to help out when I can. It was surprisingly fun to research which of those early titles actually exists.

User avatar
hearthesilence
Joined: Fri Mar 04, 2005 4:22 am
Location: NYC

Re: William Wyler

#43 Post by hearthesilence » Tue Jul 21, 2020 3:37 pm

Thanks Knives and thanks DI

chetienne
Joined: Sat Jan 30, 2016 4:49 pm

Re: William Wyler

#44 Post by chetienne » Wed Jul 22, 2020 10:13 pm

I reset my password just to chime in, as Wyler is one of my favorite studio era filmmakers.

Like many twenty-something hardcore auteurists, I spent years avoiding his films under the heady influence of Sarrisian gospel, and as in the cases of Huston, Wellman, Hathaway, Daves et. al. I owe a lot to reading and conversing with Kent Jones in bringing me around, but I think after a while one also just mellows out and wants to see them, because, hey, these were important figures at the very least.

I think if one takes the time to get to know Wyler's body of work, it reveals itself to be among the strongest of the period. Is it on the level of someone like Ford's? In the narrowest sense, no, but Wyler was skillfully and temperamentally attuned in ways a Ford was not. Very few American films extend such a genuinely democratic sense of equanimity and grace to all their characters in the way that DODSWORTH, MRS. MINIVER and THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES do, or treat the moral costs of exploitation and rapaciousness with as cool and clear-eyed a perspective as do THE LETTER, THE LITTLE FOXES and THE HEIRESS.

In the thirties, Wyler made a lot of underappreciated films. COUNSELLOR AT LAW is one, but there's also A HOUSE DIVIDED, which even Dave seems to like (https://festival.ilcinemaritrovato.it/e ... divided-2/), and HELL'S HEROES, one of the best precode (and pre-STAGECOACH) westerns from the same story as 3 GODFATHERS.

I think the work after CARRIE isn't as good, but he ended on a bitterly strong note with THE LIBERATION OF L.B. JONES, a really underrated social commentary in the vein of IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT. It's flawed, and has a hint of salaciousness that has led to it mislabeled an exploitation film, but from today's vantage point, it seems more honest about racial apartheid in the south than Jewison's film.

Post Reply