A Streetcar named Desire review

 Number 276 on the top 1000 films of all time is Elia Kazan's 1951 drama 'A Streetcar named Desire.'

Based on Tennessee Williams' Pulitzer prize winning play of the same name, A Streetcar Named Desire (Streetcar) follows the fading southern belle Blanche Dubois (Vivian Leigh) who due to misfortune has come to New Orleans to stay with her sister Stella (Kim Hunter) and her Polish-American boyfriend Stanley Kowalski (Marlon Brando.) However, the prim and proper Blanche soon starts to clash with the often drunk, rough-and-ready Stanley Kowalski.

This is the second Tennessee Williams' film I have seen recently after Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. While I was critical of CHTR for its perceived lack of subtext, I think Streetcar was far more nuanced. It was a rapt, often distressing collision of two different worlds. You have the old-fashioned, mentally unstable Blanche who is desperately clinging onto the morals of a long-dead world, and then you have the crude and animalistic Stanley who has been worn down by many years of institutionalised and personal racism. Vivien Leigh and Marlon Brando were very capable in the lead roles. They gave us an often uncomfortable, but necessary window into the American experience.

But also two very different American experiences. Due to Stanley's Polish background, he has had to fight for everything he's ever had, leading to plenty of smouldering resentment. Contrast this to Blanche who is living on the wealth of a bygone generation. Or trying to live, I should say. And poor Stella is caught between this warring couple.

This was also a scary film. Far scarier than it had any right to be. At times Brando was very relatable as the beaten-down Stanley, but he was also terrifying when he entered a fit of rage. It was similarly upsetting watching Blanche lose her sanity. The final few scenes where she is rendered to a near-catatonic state due to Stanley's actions, and is being taken away to a psychiatric institution, are disturbing to watch.

I enjoyed Streetcar more than I thought I would. I thought it would be dark and hard-going, which it most certainly was, but this darkness was underlined by a powerful subtext. I just don't think I will be watching it again in a hurry.

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof review

 Number 235 on the top 1000 films of all time is Richard Brook's drama 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.'

Based on Tennessee Williams' play of the same name, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof focusses on the dynamics of the self-destructive Pollitt family in Eastern Mississippi. Brick (Paul Newman) is a drunk, former high-school athlete who hurts himself trying to recapture his glory days. His long-suffering wife is Maggie (Elizabeth Taylor) who is still deeply in love with him, but there is still plenty of tension between the pair. There is also Harvey "Big Daddy" who is the ageing patriarch of the family. In ill-health, his other son Cooper "Gooper" (Jack Carson) and his wife Mae "Sister Woman" (Madelaine Sherwood) are desperate to be written into his will.

I am not particularly familiar with Tennessee Williams' source material. but I am given to understand that Brooks did not make a faithful adaptation. Within the original play, there was a strong homosexual subtext including an implied romantic attraction between Brick and his unseen friend Skipper who committed suicide a few years before. Due to production codes, this was largely admitted. And by production codes, I, of course, mean institutionalised homophobia. And that's ironic as that subtext was supposed to be a critique of homophobia.

But I do think that the film suffered from the omission of this subtext. Without it, everything felt very superficial and bland. And it wasn't just this subtext, but it felt like there was little behind the curtain. Being based on a stage-play, it is a small and intimate film. There is a tiny cast, although with two massive names - Elizabeth Taylor and Paul Newman - and the film is largely limited to the one set of the Pollitt family mansion. Obviously, I wasn't expecting a major spectacle or massive explosions, but everything still felt very lacking.

Much of the play was everybody shouting at each other, which all became rather tedious after a while. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, which also starred Elizabeth Taylor, was similar, yet it still had an apparent but subtle subtext. And so there was a point to all the yelling. But there was no discernible point here. It's a shame, because it sounds like Tennessee Williams was making a great point about the homophobia of the time, yet Richard Brooks wasn't able to convey the same ideas in his adaptation, whatever the reason might be. And this ultimately diluted the potency of the film.

I can only speculate that the fault of this film lies with the actual studio or film industry itself rather than with the film makers and actors - Paul Newman was brilliant as was Taylor - perhaps if they were given a chance, they could have made a very faithful adaptation of the American classic that is Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.