Great analysis of one of my favorite films. I remember reading that the director wanted to make the first real-time appearance of Laura anti-climatic--to show her arriving out of the rain and not looking particularly glamorous, in an attempt to de-mystify her at that turning point in the film. Tierney's beauty and what seems a half-hearted attempt on the part of the costume department results in this not actually happening; her mystique remains. And perhaps that is suggestive of the film itself and what it shares in common with the male characters: the movie can't help itself in objectifying Laura, and pulling back from any opportunity to examine too deeply Laura as a real flesh and blood woman, though clues remain throughout. ("My mother always listened patiently to my dreams of a career--and then taught me another recipe," Laura tantalizingly says as the one piece of her pre-Waldo background shared with us.) I think of this as occupying the center space in a loose trilogy of films, beginning with Hitchcock's "Rebecca" and ending with "Vertigo," all three films examining and/or displaying the characteristics of the construct of the feminine ideal, the effects of social class on women's agency and power, and the nature of obsession as an erasure of authentic identity. Yes, indeed, they don't make 'em like they used to.
Great points, and thank you for such an interesting, in-depth comment! I never knew that about Preminger's original idea for Laura when she shows up, but I totally agree with you that the film can't help itself in objectifying her either way. Everything about the cinematography and the framing of Tierney's face is just captivating. I noticed that line about her career too, which makes someone like Waldo so much more fascinating because he's in the power to give her what she's long been denied. Also love your idea of this being in the same vein as Rebecca and Vertigo. I'm long overdue for a rewatch of those, and now you got me interested again!
If you do re-watch them, I'd love to hear your thoughts! I think one of the reasons these kinds of stories of obsession always work so well on film is that film (especially Golden Age movies) offers a glamor and mystique that is unrivaled by other art forms. "Laura" as a novel is a well-crafted mystery, but on film it is an uneasy (and highly watchable) mixture of the sordid realities of deeply flawed peoples' lives and the mythic transcendence of beauty (to the eye and ear) that only film can achieve. ("Leave Her to Heaven" fits in here somewhere too.)
@@jasoncook7227 I found your take on Laura concise, and can see the connection to “Rebecca” & “Vertigo”, as it pertains to women objectified by men, and how pretty privilege is key. I really am curious as to why you referenced “Leave her to Heaven”? That is, like Laura, a favorite film of mine. And I’m interested in how it would expand or support the narrative of the other three films you referenced.
I've seen "Laura" at least a dozen times. The way the music, cinematography, and of course Gene Tierney came together to create this almost surreal noir is outstanding. It took me several viewings to also conclude all of the men were cads. McPherson always rubbed me the wrong way and you hit on several of the notes that I couldn't express. Actually, despite the "happy" ending, I always thought that a woman as smart as Laura was portrayed would actually tire of someone like McPherson. I picture her leaving him after the heat of the new fades and his sullen, domineering personality is truly revealed. I think a lot of the women in noir films (who survive LOL) wouldn't necessarily stay with their "saviors", i.e. Joan Fontaine in "Suspicion", Rita Hayworth in "Gilda", Ingrid Bergman in "Notorious", Grace Kelly in "Rear Window" at some point realize the charming and steely men that are also courting them have serious flaws. Tierney cemented her legendary femme fatale status with "Laura" and "Leave Her to Heaven" playing ethereal beauties that were polar opposites of one another.
My mother made sure I appreciate the films from her era. In many ways they are better than those from my era and beyond. After listening to your wonderful video essay, I was reminded of The Strange Loves of Martha Ivers (1946). I'll have to watch them both again to figure out why. Still, I'm glad I found your channel!
The music, especially "Laura's Theme" is just something difficult to describe, but I love it & can't get enough. It carries me back to a time I did not experience myself, being born in 1955.
@@robert2628 I just looked it up on YT & I was blown away! Thank you for telling me about this. It is romantic, but haunting too. And to think I had never heard of Charlie Parker's music until your suggestion, so I have some catching up to do!
“Laura” is, above all, a reflection on the true nature not of love, but of falling in love, which some think is only possible with an imaginary love object, never with a real person. This would explain why McPherson falls in love with a dead woman: not only does he not need the real Laura to do that, but the real Laura seems even to become a kind of nuisance for him and the rest of the male characters from the moment she reappears. The real Laura could be too complex, unpredictable and difficult to manage; and what is worse: compared to a man’s dreams she will always be dull, prosaic and flawed. As a modern Galatea surrounded by hardcore pygmalions, Laura Hunt is accepted only while she plays the part of the perfect, beautiful, malleable object of desire. Everything else (her aims, wishes, doubts and hopes, her conflicted, unlikable dark side; in other words: her true self) is negligible and the film does an excellent job in portraying the old myth as it is. As you know, Pygmalion saw women as flawed creatures and vowed never to waste any moment of his life with them. He dedicated himself to his work and soon created Galatea, a beautiful stature of a woman out of ivory. When his chisel finally stopped ringing, there stood before him a woman of such perfection that Pygmalion, who had professed his disdain of all females, fell deeply in love. As characters, Mark McPherson, Waldo Lydecker or Scottie Ferguson in Vertigo are outstanding specimens of the old pygmalionist breed. And Laura… well, I have just remembered a quotation from another great film directed by one of the most famous pygmalions of all time: “I'd say she's doing a woman's hardest job: juggling wolves”.
Waldo Lydecker’s line to McPherson about his caring of others cracks me up every time: “I should be sincerely sorry to see my neighbor's children devoured by wolves.”
I 100% agree with your analysis. But it's a film noir. And in all film noir the women are "dames" and the men are all hyper masculine hardened types. It's a problem for me watching these films with modern eyes. But I can't help it, I love film noir and try to remember that they were made at a different time. The first time I saw Laura, I was spellbound, and I still re watch it whenever I can. Thanks for your great analysis!
Thank you for watching! I hear you on the language aspect. It didn't bother me as I know how the men of this era talk, but it definitely allowed me see the film from a different perspective, which was fun!
Setting that hypermasculine film noir language into our terms, brings out Laura's oppression, elaborates on the pressure that needs release by avoiding any contact with her friends and foes. She won't get it by relying on McPherson of course.
Great commentary on this guilty pleasure. I have often wondered why I have remained intrigued by this movie over the years and your observations ring true!
This is an insightful and fair analysis of a great noir and I agree on almost all points. The only thing I might have an issue with is the idea that we’re meant to excuse or even admire the flaws of the central characters. You could very well be correct, but one of the great things about noir is that the characters are almost uniformly complicated and non-heroic and maybe they’re only being presented to us as “as is,” without any expected judgment on their virtues or lack thereof. Like… “here are these people. They are good and bad and everything in-between, just like you.”
I agree that a lot of good film noir presents characters that are flawed and that we can yet sympathize with. Among my favorite examples I'd point to the characters played by Louis Calhern and Marilyn Monroe in Asphalt Jungle. They are each ruthless and flawed in their own ways. They will do whatever they must to survive. And yet, that's why we can sympathize with them. We all want to survive.
Now you have 256 subscribers. I agree with your insights! 😊🎉 I adore the classics too, so much to learn from them, the interiors, the craftsmanship, the bigotry on display. Things change so little over time, largely due to Hollywood’s reification of stereotypes of race, gender, and ability. Interesting!
I'm glad to have come across your channel. 'Laura' is one of those strange films I both love - and don't. It's amazingly written, acted, filmed, etc., but as you point out; there are aspects of the male/female dynamics, that are more than just 'troubling'. Particularly, as this story can't simply be seen as some artifact of past behavior - it's still all too common.
Thank you so much for your video! Laura is weirdly my comfort movie because Gene Tierney is just so pretty 😂 I definitely hadn’t noticed the class issue before but you made me want to read the book and watch the movie again. I think one thing that stood out to me from my 1st time watching was that it wasn’t that much of a mystery thriller for me. I just thought that the men around her were so shitty that Laura can’t be the evil one, esp as Gene played her so wide eye-ly so I treated the movie like an old romantic drama instead.
Hahaha I definitely agree on that front, Gene just seeps innocence out of her pores! And thanks for the awesome comment. I hope this sparks a rewatch for you soon!
I've watched Laura many times and I own the DVD. I never considered the issues you brought up. I was too dazzled by the dialogue and the beautiful 1940s décor (especially Laura's apartment). Thanks for pointing out the class issues. I'll be watching it with your comments in mind next time. I thought the casting was superb. Each actor performs his/her role magnificently. I actually liked the Judith Anderson character, Laura's aunt. I would have enjoyed having a glass of wine with her. I had contempt for Shelby, but silently cheered when he stood up to Waldo and McPherson. As far as Waldo and Laura go, they are people I would never meet or hang out with in my own life but it was interesting to see these 1940s characters. As for McPherson, I respected him, but I have a little more of Bessie's attitude toward cops.
The character of Bessie, Laura's maid, illuminates the strength of the Laura character. Bessie was raised to spit at authority and she wouldn't be loyal to Laura if Laura "lorded it" over her. The scene where Mark and Laura get breakfast together reveals Laura's ambitions and her past. She hasn't forgotten her roots and that's why Bessie is attached to her. Laura uses Waldo as much as Waldo uses her and she's in charge of herself even as Mark tries to control her. The person who is lost in all of this movie is poor Diane Redfern, killed and abandoned, her identity confused in death and there is no one to mourn her or speak up for her. Another irony is that Laura is in the advertising game, selling image and product. She had the skills needed to rise in the field and that's why Waldo, who is as surface as anyone, is attracted to her. Thank you for your insight into the film.
I don't usually leave comments, but this is an excellent modern/21st c. analysis of "Laura" that is very relevant. I too watch it when it's on and you're right, a remake would be fascinating if done properly! Thanks! *I subscribed 👍
You brought up some interesting points in your analysis. I agree that Vincent Price in the role of Shelby is an interesting character. I think the attraction that Shelby has for Laura is that he's "old money" whose family fortune has been lost. Since Laura actually has a career, this indicates that she she is from the solidly middle class-upper middle class. If she was from a wealthy family, in this era, she wouldn't be working. For that era, Laura is shown as a woman with initiative who has climbed the ladder of success. By her approaching the Clifton Webb character in a restaurant, it shows that she is trying to land a big account or a "big fish" for her agency.
I enjoyed your thoughts on this “difficult” classic-despite it’s problematic characters, whenever it’s on TCM, I’ve got to watch all the way through. Thx!👍
🎹 Your points are well taken, but Laura was a product of its time and I can never fault this brilliant and utterly hypnotic film. And let us not forget the exquisite title theme composed by David Raksin. 🎹🎹🎹🎹🎹🎹🎹
This was a very interesting analysis of this movie. It was well done and I enjoyed it. Some of it, I think is spot on, but I don't agree with all of it. I don't really see Waldo Lydecker as an incel. He doesn't really fit the profile. He's wealthy and through his radio show and newspaper articles, he's an influential person with contacts in business and high society in New York City. I think he might be closer to someone who is asexual. This doesn't make Waldo any less controlling, possessive and ultimately murderous, it just means his motivations are different from the other men in Laura's life. To back up my interpretation of Waldo's character, there is the scene where Waldo is talking about Laura's rise in the advertising industry and he says, "Tuesdays and Fridays we would stay home, listening to my records and I would read Laura my articles." The first time I saw Laura and heard that line I thought, "Seriously Dude, you got someone this good looking coming over to your place and you read to her?" Even an incel wouldn't be that passive or clueless. However, there's probably no absolutely right way to interpret Waldo Lydecker. Some reviewers have even thought that Waldo is gay, but that makes even less sense than him being an incel. If Waldo is gay, he might disapprove of the younger men that Laura dates and he might even be attracted to some of them, but it doesn't make sense that Waldo would be jealous of them. The screenplay is somewhat vague about Waldo's character and sexual desires, just as it's vague about why Detective McPherson falls in love with Laura or why Laura would fall in love with him. In the novel the movie is based on, Waldo is one of Laura's former lovers as well as her mentor, but in 1944 Hollywood wasn't going to there; it couldn't be that realistic in its portrayal of adult relationships, so hence the nonsexual nature of their relationship in the movie. Before I respond to the one other part of this analysis that I disagree with, I do want to acknowledge something in this analysis I do agree with. Detective Mark McPherson doesn't fall in love with Laura as much as he falls in love with an idealized version of Laura that's been put in his head, largely by Waldo. If Otto Preminger and the screenwriters had wanted to, they could have had shown McPherson being moved by reading Laura's diary, learning what kind of person she was, but we see McPherson toss her letters and her diary on a table like they mean nothing to him. Also, the movie dialogue makes it pretty clear that for the detective, going through Laura's letters and diary was just part of his job; something he had to do to look for clues to find the murderer. The other detail in this analysis I don't agree with is Waldo being moved to help Laura because he was taken by her beauty, her pretty privilege. Watch that scene again. Waldo looks at Laura and treats her quite rudely. Gene Tierney wasn't any less good looking at the beginning of that scene then at the end of it when we see Waldo start to reconsider his actions. What moves Waldo is Laura's empathy. If a person is treated rudely, they might respond by saying "I feel sorry for you," but do so in a way that actually means, "I feel sorry you. You miserable SOB." Laura's "Your a poor man. I feel sorry for you" was genuine empathy. If Shelby Carpenter and Ann Treadwell were any indication of the type of people Waldo normally associates with, he doesn't meet many people who have much empathy for other people, which is why he could be moved by Laura's. I think the key to understanding Waldo's motivations can be seen in the first scene in the movie, where we see Detective McPherson looking at the masks Waldo has hanging on his wall and the objects Waldo has displayed in glass counters. The detective opens one of the glass cases and starts to pick up one of the presumably rare glass items when Waldo yells at him to be careful because the item is priceless. Waldo likes to show off his possessions, but he doesn't share them. Waldo is taken by Laura's empathy but he also sees her as something; not someone, he can mold and build up. Waldo acknowledges that Laura's own intelligence and personal drive helped get to the top of her profession, but Waldo helps take Laura beyond that plateau. Mostly, Waldo believes that he molded Laura, that both her personal presentation and opinions were actually his own ideas. He sees her as one of his possessions. It doesn't matter that Laura said that she was going away for the weekend to rethink getting married to Shelby. Waldo realizes that if it isn't Shelby, it will be someone else who takes his creation, his possession, away from him.
9:53 as I AGE! (Almost 80) I have begun to realise the pressure on “beautiful people” of movies(I use quotes to indicate it’s not necessarily true or untrue they are gorgeous- but the system works hard to fulfill our fantasies that pretty people have all the luck -and we can too if we prettify enough. The stars are destroying themselves- see plastic surgery disasters and homogenous faces! to survive - to work a few more years as some have truthfully indicated. Tierney and Andrews barely survived Hollywood - their lives were dark and troubling. Laura is a nightmare masquerading as a fairy story. Who will live happily ever after? No one. We keep watching hoping something will change - it does on every repeat view. No one is leaving this hell - in celluloid or irl - we are just going to survive it all.
I had the experience of playing Waldo in a community theater production of the play version on which the movie is based. It was a challenge but fun as an actor.
I wonder what is in store for Laura Hunt? My mother was beautiful and worked as an art buyer at the #1 advertising agency in Philadelphia during the time this movie took place: WWII. There was a dearth of datable men. When the war ended, datable men returned but they also took her place at the agency.
As a 60 yr old white male with a huge love of golden age Hollywood I can’t help but view nearly all the product from those decades through the same lens as expressed in this video.
I think that's natural when revisiting art over the years. Our feelings and viewpoints will always change based on where society is as a whole. I think that's a great thing!
The films of the 1940's as produced by Hollywood are some of the finest that ever existed and they are my favorites. I first watched 'Laura' fifteen years ago and never tire of seeing it again. Your analysis of it is very well said especially regarding the character Waldo Lydecker as played by Clifton Webb. I had never heard of the personality trait of involuntary celibate. Would you consider him antithetical as well?
I subscribe to your analysis, but put in the historical and social context of Hollywood, don't get as frustrated with retrospective moralising. Fabulous movie with a magnificent Gene Tierney. Leave Her To Heaven is another classic of hers - in sumptuous Technicolor worthy of multiple viewings. As to remakes! Today's heavyhanded almost unbearable writing is certainly not the time to attempt what would certainly be a classless self-conscious uber-woke remake. I'm finding that the imperfections of oldies don't call for corrections or remakes, but contextualized appreciation and understanding of both the writing and realisation. What we consider imperfections in them or shocking proof of overt or latent sexism and racism are what make them unique yet imperfect works of art. The pretense of improving upon a classic is the road to the formulaic boredom of so much contemporary film and TV.
Never considered Lydecker as what's now called an Incel so much as a gay man who can't admit it to himself. So he snaps at everyone and makes them miserable and then Laura stands up to him. She has the courage he doesn't. And by taking over her life he's living certain things through her that he wants but thinks he can't have. Then her complete rejection of him cuts him off from that. A film kind of like this - "films", actually - are "Vicki" and the remake "I Wake Up Screaming". A group of men who get a waitress a job as a model and then think they own her. I believe "Vicki" was the original and was better. One comment....I have to put in earbuds to hear your commentary because it's so low. Not a sound balance thing but volume. I have the sound at full blast and can't hear you over normal sounds in the room most of the time.
I think Waldo is right. Laura and McPherson will have a very exciting "earthy" relationship, but eventually Laura will tire of McPherson and go back to her career. Hooray for the Code (irony).
I don't think it makes a lot of sense to dig too deep into genre melodramas that are just trying to tell a page-turning story full of self-UNexamined men bowled over, simply, by the enticement of beauty and little else. It's fun but shallow fun, whose pleasures lay in their basic simplicity, along with the professionalism of the production. There are many highly entertaining tales about unenlightened players-in -life (often men) whose compulsions are mightier than their values. Kind of a football game of emotions with a single rather lovely goalpost. Just my view of the thing. Thanks for the video and your thoughts.
You hit the nail on the head with everything you said. I think UA-cam suggested your video to me because I did watch a lot of old films, and film noir is kind of my favorite. Over several decades, I've watched "Laura" probably a half a dozen times and I just can't like it. I like all the actors and it's certainly got that beautiful direction and set. As far as incels go, this has way too many for me even for film noir.
It's a photograph that's had a thin layer of oil paint over it. The same technique was used in Woman in the Window. Apparently, real paintings didn't read clearly on the screen.
Nice insights! I have to disagree with you about the Waldo character being an Incel. Widely believed to have been inspired by playwright and radio broadcaster Alexander Woollcott, the character is obviously gay, or at the very least, asexual.
I disagree that he was gay. He loved Laura and had jealous feelings that she was attracted to other men. He wanted a domesticated life with her but knew he couldn't have it, which led to his violent nature. I think if he were asexual, their platonic relationship would have served him just fine.
The novel Laura adds even more credence to what you're saying. *novel spoilers* : Lydecker is described as obese in the novel, and is even more bothered when he sees her attracted to muscular strong youthful men. Interestingly, at one point Laura tries to seduce him, thinking that's what he wants, or perhaps because she feels she owes him for what he did to jump start her career. It's unclear and also from his pov, so we never know exactly why she tried to do it. But it is after she tires this, and he rejects her, that he sees her in a new light. She's no longer the pure woman he believed her to be, but now sees her as tarnished and worthy of destruction. He definitely views her from the madonna/whore complex mindset. When he can't have something he wants, he would rather destroy it so no one can have it. This is demonstrated when he lets slip and break a beautiful and one of a kind artifact he wants to add to his collection but someone has outbid him. He plays it off as an accident. This mirrors his actions toward Laura when he tries to murder her. He truly sees her as an object to possess and add to his collection, rather than a person. Fantastic analysis video. Thank you
What strikes me about "Laura" is just how sexually ambiguous it is -- not one of the major characters conforms with the sexual or gender norms of its period. Waldo Lydecker is clearly gay, and needs Laura for purposes of social camouflage, i.e., to create some sort of heterosexual identity. Waldo resonates with Vincent Price's Shelby, a prissy "kept man" dominated by the mannish Ann, played by the out-of-the-closet lesbian Judith Anderson. Gene Tierney's Laura herself, who glows with a kind of Helen of Troy beauty that drives men crazy with desire, is more of a china doll than an embodied human being -- she has no visible chemistry with anyone here, and there are compelling suggestions that she's in love with her own image, as is McPherson, the woman-hating "romantic hero"! (In real life, Tierney had deep mental and emotional problems, which she managed by creating a false, people-pleasing personality.) All of this to me suggests that director Otto Preminger, one of the many European ex-pats to direct film noir, was as an outsider making a comment about the social and sexual strangeness of America, with its confusion and taboos and deep inhibitions and falsity, its tension between self-gratification and puritanical repression, creating a pressure cooker atmosphere ripe for violence.
Yes, it is noir, it does have a clever (and rich and complex and ambiguous) plot, but it sure as heck ain't a B movie, not with direction by Otto Preminger, score by David Raksin, and a cast including Gene Tierney, Clifton Webb, Dana Andrews, Vincent Price and Judith Anderson. It was a top-flight A production, and it received no fewer than five well-deserved Oscar nominations. @@2msvalkyrie529
@@truthadvocacy I believe it has been politicitized to seem that way, but I only learned of the term from men online who identify as such. Case in point: ua-cam.com/video/DdHqzr4DyIs/v-deo.html
Enjoyed the review of a 1940’s hard boiled detective movie through the woke filter. So paradoxical that the cinema had much stronger independent female roles back then.
This movie should have no title. As the titular character has no intrinsic value and no one owes her anything. Intentionally head-palming male characters with a women of no value.
Great analysis of one of my favorite films. I remember reading that the director wanted to make the first real-time appearance of Laura anti-climatic--to show her arriving out of the rain and not looking particularly glamorous, in an attempt to de-mystify her at that turning point in the film. Tierney's beauty and what seems a half-hearted attempt on the part of the costume department results in this not actually happening; her mystique remains. And perhaps that is suggestive of the film itself and what it shares in common with the male characters: the movie can't help itself in objectifying Laura, and pulling back from any opportunity to examine too deeply Laura as a real flesh and blood woman, though clues remain throughout. ("My mother always listened patiently to my dreams of a career--and then taught me another recipe," Laura tantalizingly says as the one piece of her pre-Waldo background shared with us.) I think of this as occupying the center space in a loose trilogy of films, beginning with Hitchcock's "Rebecca" and ending with "Vertigo," all three films examining and/or displaying the characteristics of the construct of the feminine ideal, the effects of social class on women's agency and power, and the nature of obsession as an erasure of authentic identity. Yes, indeed, they don't make 'em like they used to.
Great points, and thank you for such an interesting, in-depth comment! I never knew that about Preminger's original idea for Laura when she shows up, but I totally agree with you that the film can't help itself in objectifying her either way. Everything about the cinematography and the framing of Tierney's face is just captivating. I noticed that line about her career too, which makes someone like Waldo so much more fascinating because he's in the power to give her what she's long been denied. Also love your idea of this being in the same vein as Rebecca and Vertigo. I'm long overdue for a rewatch of those, and now you got me interested again!
If you do re-watch them, I'd love to hear your thoughts! I think one of the reasons these kinds of stories of obsession always work so well on film is that film (especially Golden Age movies) offers a glamor and mystique that is unrivaled by other art forms. "Laura" as a novel is a well-crafted mystery, but on film it is an uneasy (and highly watchable) mixture of the sordid realities of deeply flawed peoples' lives and the mythic transcendence of beauty (to the eye and ear) that only film can achieve. ("Leave Her to Heaven" fits in here somewhere too.)
@@jasoncook7227 Yep, I completely agree. What a wonderful way of looking at it!
@@jasoncook7227
I found your take on Laura concise, and can see the connection to “Rebecca” & “Vertigo”, as it pertains to women objectified by men, and how pretty privilege is key. I really am curious as to why you referenced “Leave her to Heaven”? That is, like Laura, a favorite film of mine. And I’m interested in how it would expand or support the narrative of the other three films you referenced.
I've seen "Laura" at least a dozen times. The way the music, cinematography, and of course Gene Tierney came together to create this almost surreal noir is outstanding. It took me several viewings to also conclude all of the men were cads. McPherson always rubbed me the wrong way and you hit on several of the notes that I couldn't express.
Actually, despite the "happy" ending, I always thought that a woman as smart as Laura was portrayed would actually tire of someone like McPherson. I picture her leaving him after the heat of the new fades and his sullen, domineering personality is truly revealed. I think a lot of the women in noir films (who survive LOL) wouldn't necessarily stay with their "saviors", i.e. Joan Fontaine in "Suspicion", Rita Hayworth in "Gilda", Ingrid Bergman in "Notorious", Grace Kelly in "Rear Window" at some point realize the charming and steely men that are also courting them have serious flaws.
Tierney cemented her legendary femme fatale status with "Laura" and "Leave Her to Heaven" playing ethereal beauties that were polar opposites of one another.
I agree about Laura being too smart. It's another reason that I'd actually be supportive of seeing this movie remade someday.
Idk Twin Peaks always felt to me like a perfect combo of Laura and Vertigo. I certainly got all the nods to both films.
My mother made sure I appreciate the films from her era. In many ways they are better than those from my era and beyond. After listening to your wonderful video essay, I was reminded of The Strange Loves of Martha Ivers (1946). I'll have to watch them both again to figure out why. Still, I'm glad I found your channel!
The music, especially "Laura's Theme" is just something difficult to describe, but I love it & can't get enough. It carries me back to a time I did not experience myself, being born in 1955.
check out the version of Laura by Charlie Parker 👍
@@robert2628 I just looked it up on YT & I was blown away! Thank you for telling me about this. It is romantic, but haunting too. And to think I had never heard of Charlie Parker's music until your suggestion, so I have some catching up to do!
@@danhutson3460 your welcome. that intro is awesome on the Charlie Parker version.
check out, (Star Eyes ) by Charlie Parker.
@@robert2628 Better yet, that of Clifford Brown.
“Laura” is, above all, a reflection on the true nature not of love, but of falling in love, which some think is only possible with an imaginary love object, never with a real person. This would explain why McPherson falls in love with a dead woman: not only does he not need the real Laura to do that, but the real Laura seems even to become a kind of nuisance for him and the rest of the male characters from the moment she reappears. The real Laura could be too complex, unpredictable and difficult to manage; and what is worse: compared to a man’s dreams she will always be dull, prosaic and flawed. As a modern Galatea surrounded by hardcore pygmalions, Laura Hunt is accepted only while she plays the part of the perfect, beautiful, malleable object of desire. Everything else (her aims, wishes, doubts and hopes, her conflicted, unlikable dark side; in other words: her true self) is negligible and the film does an excellent job in portraying the old myth as it is.
As you know, Pygmalion saw women as flawed creatures and vowed never to waste any moment of his life with them. He dedicated himself to his work and soon created Galatea, a beautiful stature of a woman out of ivory. When his chisel finally stopped ringing, there stood before him a woman of such perfection that Pygmalion, who had professed his disdain of all females, fell deeply in love.
As characters, Mark McPherson, Waldo Lydecker or Scottie Ferguson in Vertigo are outstanding specimens of the old pygmalionist breed. And Laura… well, I have just remembered a quotation from another great film directed by one of the most famous pygmalions of all time: “I'd say she's doing a woman's hardest job: juggling wolves”.
Great perspective on it, thank you for sharing!
Waldo Lydecker’s line to McPherson about his caring of others cracks me up every time: “I should be sincerely sorry to see my neighbor's children devoured by wolves.”
Larry Edwards: This is my favourite line, too! Not only is it snappy dialogue -- Clifton Webb has perfect timing with his delivery.
I 100% agree with your analysis. But it's a film noir. And in all film noir the women are "dames" and the men are all hyper masculine hardened types. It's a problem for me watching these films with modern eyes. But I can't help it, I love film noir and try to remember that they were made at a different time. The first time I saw Laura, I was spellbound, and I still re watch it whenever I can. Thanks for your great analysis!
Thank you for watching! I hear you on the language aspect. It didn't bother me as I know how the men of this era talk, but it definitely allowed me see the film from a different perspective, which was fun!
Setting that hypermasculine film noir language into our terms, brings out Laura's oppression, elaborates on the pressure that needs release by avoiding any contact with her friends and foes.
She won't get it by relying on McPherson of course.
Great commentary on this guilty pleasure. I have often wondered why I have remained intrigued by this movie over the years and your observations ring true!
Thanks so much! I'm glad you enjoyed it :)
Laura isn’t a guilty pleasure it’s an acclaimed film.
This is an insightful and fair analysis of a great noir and I agree on almost all points. The only thing I might have an issue with is the idea that we’re meant to excuse or even admire the flaws of the central characters. You could very well be correct, but one of the great things about noir is that the characters are almost uniformly complicated and non-heroic and maybe they’re only being presented to us as “as is,” without any expected judgment on their virtues or lack thereof. Like… “here are these people. They are good and bad and everything in-between, just like you.”
I agree that a lot of good film noir presents characters that are flawed and that we can yet sympathize with. Among my favorite examples I'd point to the characters played by Louis Calhern and Marilyn Monroe in Asphalt Jungle. They are each ruthless and flawed in their own ways. They will do whatever they must to survive. And yet, that's why we can sympathize with them. We all want to survive.
Now you have 256 subscribers. I agree with your insights! 😊🎉 I adore the classics too, so much to learn from them, the interiors, the craftsmanship, the bigotry on display. Things change so little over time, largely due to Hollywood’s reification of stereotypes of race, gender, and ability. Interesting!
I'm glad to have come across your channel. 'Laura' is one of those strange films I both love - and don't. It's amazingly written, acted, filmed, etc., but as you point out; there are aspects of the male/female dynamics, that are more than just 'troubling'. Particularly, as this story can't simply be seen as some artifact of past behavior - it's still all too common.
Thank you so much for your video! Laura is weirdly my comfort movie because Gene Tierney is just so pretty 😂 I definitely hadn’t noticed the class issue before but you made me want to read the book and watch the movie again. I think one thing that stood out to me from my 1st time watching was that it wasn’t that much of a mystery thriller for me. I just thought that the men around her were so shitty that Laura can’t be the evil one, esp as Gene played her so wide eye-ly so I treated the movie like an old romantic drama instead.
Hahaha I definitely agree on that front, Gene just seeps innocence out of her pores! And thanks for the awesome comment. I hope this sparks a rewatch for you soon!
Lovely video, and I am a huge fan of film noir, and Laura is one of my favorites.
I've watched Laura many times and I own the DVD. I never considered the issues you brought up. I was too dazzled by the dialogue and the beautiful 1940s décor (especially Laura's apartment). Thanks for pointing out the class issues. I'll be watching it with your comments in mind next time.
I thought the casting was superb. Each actor performs his/her role magnificently. I actually liked the Judith Anderson character, Laura's aunt. I would have enjoyed having a glass of wine with her. I had contempt for Shelby, but silently cheered when he stood up to Waldo and McPherson. As far as Waldo and Laura go, they are people I would never meet or hang out with in my own life but it was interesting to see these 1940s characters. As for McPherson, I respected him, but I have a little more of Bessie's attitude toward cops.
The character of Bessie, Laura's maid, illuminates the strength of the Laura character. Bessie was raised to spit at authority and she wouldn't be loyal to Laura if Laura "lorded it" over her. The scene where Mark and Laura get breakfast together reveals Laura's ambitions and her past. She hasn't forgotten her roots and that's why Bessie is attached to her. Laura uses Waldo as much as Waldo uses her and she's in charge of herself even as Mark tries to control her. The person who is lost in all of this movie is poor Diane Redfern, killed and abandoned, her identity confused in death and there is no one to mourn her or speak up for her. Another irony is that Laura is in the advertising game, selling image and product. She had the skills needed to rise in the field and that's why Waldo, who is as surface as anyone, is attracted to her. Thank you for your insight into the film.
I don't usually leave comments, but this is an
excellent modern/21st c. analysis of "Laura" that is very relevant. I too watch it when it's on and you're right, a remake would be fascinating if done properly!
Thanks!
*I subscribed 👍
I loved reading
Daphne du Maurier's books as a youth. (my gram had a collection) "Rebecca" would be an interesting film to analyze, IMHO.
Great movie. I suspend all judgment and just enjoy the story, the actors, the witticisms of Waldo, and especially the score!
You brought up some interesting points in your analysis. I agree that Vincent Price in the role of Shelby is an interesting character. I think the attraction that Shelby has for Laura is that he's "old money" whose family fortune has been lost. Since Laura actually has a career, this indicates that she she is from the solidly middle class-upper middle class. If she was from a wealthy family, in this era, she wouldn't be working. For that era, Laura is shown as a woman with initiative who has climbed the ladder of success. By her approaching the Clifton Webb character in a restaurant, it shows that she is trying to land a big account or a "big fish" for her agency.
I enjoyed your thoughts on this “difficult” classic-despite it’s problematic characters, whenever it’s on TCM, I’ve got to watch all the way through. Thx!👍
🎹 Your points are well taken, but Laura was a product of its time and I can never fault this brilliant and utterly hypnotic film. And let us not forget the exquisite title theme composed by David Raksin. 🎹🎹🎹🎹🎹🎹🎹
This was a very interesting analysis of this movie. It was well done and I enjoyed it. Some of it, I think is spot on, but I don't agree with all of it. I don't really see Waldo Lydecker as an incel. He doesn't really fit the profile. He's wealthy and through his radio show and newspaper articles, he's an influential person with contacts in business and high society in New York City. I think he might be closer to someone who is asexual. This doesn't make Waldo any less controlling, possessive and ultimately murderous, it just means his motivations are different from the other men in Laura's life.
To back up my interpretation of Waldo's character, there is the scene where Waldo is talking about Laura's rise in the advertising industry and he says, "Tuesdays and Fridays we would stay home, listening to my records and I would read Laura my articles." The first time I saw Laura and heard that line I thought, "Seriously Dude, you got someone this good looking coming over to your place and you read to her?" Even an incel wouldn't be that passive or clueless.
However, there's probably no absolutely right way to interpret Waldo Lydecker. Some reviewers have even thought that Waldo is gay, but that makes even less sense than him being an incel. If Waldo is gay, he might disapprove of the younger men that Laura dates and he might even be attracted to some of them, but it doesn't make sense that Waldo would be jealous of them. The screenplay is somewhat vague about Waldo's character and sexual desires, just as it's vague about why Detective McPherson falls in love with Laura or why Laura would fall in love with him. In the novel the movie is based on, Waldo is one of Laura's former lovers as well as her mentor, but in 1944 Hollywood wasn't going to there; it couldn't be that realistic in its portrayal of adult relationships, so hence the nonsexual nature of their relationship in the movie.
Before I respond to the one other part of this analysis that I disagree with, I do want to acknowledge something in this analysis I do agree with. Detective Mark McPherson doesn't fall in love with Laura as much as he falls in love with an idealized version of Laura that's been put in his head, largely by Waldo. If Otto Preminger and the screenwriters had wanted to, they could have had shown McPherson being moved by reading Laura's diary, learning what kind of person she was, but we see McPherson toss her letters and her diary on a table like they mean nothing to him. Also, the movie dialogue makes it pretty clear that for the detective, going through Laura's letters and diary was just part of his job; something he had to do to look for clues to find the murderer.
The other detail in this analysis I don't agree with is Waldo being moved to help Laura because he was taken by her beauty, her pretty privilege. Watch that scene again. Waldo looks at Laura and treats her quite rudely. Gene Tierney wasn't any less good looking at the beginning of that scene then at the end of it when we see Waldo start to reconsider his actions. What moves Waldo is Laura's empathy. If a person is treated rudely, they might respond by saying "I feel sorry for you," but do so in a way that actually means, "I feel sorry you. You miserable SOB." Laura's "Your a poor man. I feel sorry for you" was genuine empathy. If Shelby Carpenter and Ann Treadwell were any indication of the type of people Waldo normally associates with, he doesn't meet many people who have much empathy for other people, which is why he could be moved by Laura's.
I think the key to understanding Waldo's motivations can be seen in the first scene in the movie, where we see Detective McPherson looking at the masks Waldo has hanging on his wall and the objects Waldo has displayed in glass counters. The detective opens one of the glass cases and starts to pick up one of the presumably rare glass items when Waldo yells at him to be careful because the item is priceless. Waldo likes to show off his possessions, but he doesn't share them. Waldo is taken by Laura's empathy but he also sees her as something; not someone, he can mold and build up. Waldo acknowledges that Laura's own intelligence and personal drive helped get to the top of her profession, but Waldo helps take Laura beyond that plateau. Mostly, Waldo believes that he molded Laura, that both her personal presentation and opinions were actually his own ideas. He sees her as one of his possessions. It doesn't matter that Laura said that she was going away for the weekend to rethink getting married to Shelby. Waldo realizes that if it isn't Shelby, it will be someone else who takes his creation, his possession, away from him.
Terrific ideas. Preminger scanned Lydecker's possessions at the start of the film for a reason.
9:53 as I AGE! (Almost 80) I have begun to realise the pressure on “beautiful people” of movies(I use quotes to indicate it’s not necessarily true or untrue they are gorgeous- but the system works hard to fulfill our fantasies that pretty people have all the luck -and we can too if we prettify enough. The stars are destroying themselves- see plastic surgery disasters and homogenous faces! to survive - to work a few more years as some have truthfully indicated. Tierney and Andrews barely survived Hollywood - their lives were dark and troubling. Laura is a nightmare masquerading as a fairy story. Who will live happily ever after? No one. We keep watching hoping something will change - it does on every repeat view. No one is leaving this hell - in celluloid or irl - we are just going to survive it all.
I had the experience of playing Waldo in a community theater production of the play version on which the movie is based. It was a challenge but fun as an actor.
I've read the play is very different from the film. Is it true?
I wonder what is in store for Laura Hunt? My mother was beautiful and worked as an art buyer at the #1 advertising agency in Philadelphia during the time this movie took place: WWII. There was a dearth of datable men. When the war ended, datable men returned but they also took her place at the agency.
One of my Favorites
As a 60 yr old white male with a huge love of golden age Hollywood I can’t help but view nearly all the product from those decades through the same lens as expressed in this video.
I think that's natural when revisiting art over the years. Our feelings and viewpoints will always change based on where society is as a whole. I think that's a great thing!
Nice review. That's me subscribed.
I mean it has kind of been remade… it’s called twin peaks
The films of the 1940's as produced by Hollywood are some of the finest that ever existed and they are my favorites. I first watched 'Laura' fifteen years ago and never tire of seeing it again. Your analysis of it is very well said especially regarding the character Waldo Lydecker as played by Clifton Webb. I had never heard of the personality trait of involuntary celibate. Would you consider him antithetical as well?
I didn't read Lydecker as an incel. He seems to be coded as gay but I suppose your underlying analysis remains.
Excellent!
I subscribe to your analysis, but put in the historical and social context of Hollywood, don't get as frustrated with retrospective moralising. Fabulous movie with a magnificent Gene Tierney. Leave Her To Heaven is another classic of hers - in sumptuous Technicolor worthy of multiple viewings. As to remakes! Today's heavyhanded almost unbearable writing is certainly not the time to attempt what would certainly be a classless self-conscious uber-woke remake. I'm finding that the imperfections of oldies don't call for corrections or remakes, but contextualized appreciation and understanding of both the writing and realisation. What we consider imperfections in them or shocking proof of overt or latent sexism and racism are what make them unique yet imperfect works of art. The pretense of improving upon a classic is the road to the formulaic boredom of so much contemporary film and TV.
Never considered Lydecker as what's now called an Incel so much as a gay man who can't admit it to himself. So he snaps at everyone and makes them miserable and then Laura stands up to him. She has the courage he doesn't. And by taking over her life he's living certain things through her that he wants but thinks he can't have. Then her complete rejection of him cuts him off from that.
A film kind of like this - "films", actually - are "Vicki" and the remake "I Wake Up Screaming". A group of men who get a waitress a job as a model and then think they own her. I believe "Vicki" was the original and was better.
One comment....I have to put in earbuds to hear your commentary because it's so low. Not a sound balance thing but volume. I have the sound at full blast and can't hear you over normal sounds in the room most of the time.
I think Waldo is right. Laura and McPherson will have a very exciting "earthy" relationship, but eventually Laura will tire of McPherson and go back to her career. Hooray for the Code (irony).
I don't think it makes a lot of sense to dig too deep into genre melodramas that are just trying to tell a page-turning story full of self-UNexamined men bowled over, simply, by the enticement of beauty and little else. It's fun but shallow fun, whose pleasures lay in their basic simplicity, along with the professionalism of the production. There are many highly entertaining tales about unenlightened players-in -life (often men) whose compulsions are mightier than their values. Kind of a football game of emotions with a single rather lovely goalpost.
Just my view of the thing.
Thanks for the video and your thoughts.
You hit the nail on the head with everything you said. I think UA-cam suggested your video to me because I did watch a lot of old films, and film noir is kind of my favorite.
Over several decades, I've watched "Laura" probably a half a dozen times and I just can't like it. I like all the actors and it's certainly got that beautiful direction and set. As far as incels go, this has way too many for me even for film noir.
As an artist,I would like to know who painted the portrait of Laura?
It's a photograph that's had a thin layer of oil paint over it. The same technique was used in Woman in the Window. Apparently, real paintings didn't read clearly on the screen.
I love this film everthing about it the scenery the actors the lines some hilarious and the music wow that theme song is the greatest
Nice insights! I have to disagree with you about the Waldo character being an Incel. Widely believed to have been inspired by playwright and radio broadcaster Alexander Woollcott, the character is obviously gay, or at the very least, asexual.
I disagree that he was gay. He loved Laura and had jealous feelings that she was attracted to other men. He wanted a domesticated life with her but knew he couldn't have it, which led to his violent nature. I think if he were asexual, their platonic relationship would have served him just fine.
the commentator can hardly be heard. it reminds me of when someone is talking during a movie at a movie theater .
The novel Laura adds even more credence to what you're saying. *novel spoilers* :
Lydecker is described as obese in the novel, and is even more bothered when he sees her attracted to muscular strong youthful men. Interestingly, at one point Laura tries to seduce him, thinking that's what he wants, or perhaps because she feels she owes him for what he did to jump start her career. It's unclear and also from his pov, so we never know exactly why she tried to do it.
But it is after she tires this, and he rejects her, that he sees her in a new light. She's no longer the pure woman he believed her to be, but now sees her as tarnished and worthy of destruction. He definitely views her from the madonna/whore complex mindset.
When he can't have something he wants, he would rather destroy it so no one can have it. This is demonstrated when he lets slip and break a beautiful and one of a kind artifact he wants to add to his collection but someone has outbid him. He plays it off as an accident. This mirrors his actions toward Laura when he tries to murder her. He truly sees her as an object to possess and add to his collection, rather than a person.
Fantastic analysis video. Thank you
Thank you for this info! Very interesting element that makes me want to read the book even more now.
Fabulous film have you heard the Jeanne Lee recording ?
Ran co author of storyboarding noir This is an excellent commentary great channel
@@RanBlakePiano I have not but will check it out. Thank!
What strikes me about "Laura" is just how sexually ambiguous it is -- not one of the major characters conforms with the sexual or gender norms of its period. Waldo Lydecker is clearly gay, and needs Laura for purposes of social camouflage, i.e., to create some sort of heterosexual identity. Waldo resonates with Vincent Price's Shelby, a prissy "kept man" dominated by the mannish Ann, played by the out-of-the-closet lesbian Judith Anderson. Gene Tierney's Laura herself, who glows with a kind of Helen of Troy beauty that drives men crazy with desire, is more of a china doll than an embodied human being -- she has no visible chemistry with anyone here, and there are compelling suggestions that she's in love with her own image, as is McPherson, the woman-hating "romantic hero"! (In real life, Tierney had deep mental and emotional problems, which she managed by creating a false, people-pleasing personality.) All of this to me suggests that director Otto Preminger, one of the many European ex-pats to direct film noir, was as an outsider making a comment about the social and sexual strangeness of America, with its confusion and taboos and deep inhibitions and falsity, its tension between self-gratification and puritanical repression, creating a pressure cooker atmosphere ripe for violence.
Alternatively : It's just a noir B movie murder mystery with a clever plot ?
Yes, it is noir, it does have a clever (and rich and complex and ambiguous) plot, but it sure as heck ain't a B movie, not with direction by Otto Preminger, score by David Raksin, and a cast including Gene Tierney, Clifton Webb, Dana Andrews, Vincent Price and Judith Anderson. It was a top-flight A production, and it received no fewer than five well-deserved Oscar nominations. @@2msvalkyrie529
Can't we just enjoy the film?
What’s stopping you from enjoying it?
@@toyiahm "incel" is a modern slang word folorn US females like to use for man bashing.
@@truthadvocacy I believe it has been politicitized to seem that way, but I only learned of the term from men online who identify as such. Case in point: ua-cam.com/video/DdHqzr4DyIs/v-deo.html
Great movie.
These films taught men to be SIMPS,,,,
Enjoyed the review of a 1940’s hard boiled detective movie through the woke filter. So paradoxical that the cinema had much stronger independent female roles back then.
5:31 6:30 7:14 7:54 reward 8:22 9:22
Fascinating analysis. You don't like men much, do you?
Love everyone equally, just don't think we live in a society that likes women all that much.
Gay, straight, gay, straight.
Waldo Lyedecker. 😁
Vincent Price character was the worst to me, a broke preditor.
LoL😋
This movie should have no title. As the titular character has no intrinsic value and no one owes her anything. Intentionally head-palming male characters with a women of no value.