That's what makes it rough - when they love you.

LOVE WITH THE PROPER STRANGER (1963)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Fluctuating between realism and occasional comical innuendos, Robert Mulligan's "Love With the Proper Stranger" is a slightly off-balance though compelling, forceful romantic drama with comedic and penetratingly dark overtones. It only seems like it ends with a sunny disposition but don't be completely fooled.

Effervescent Natalie Wood plays a Macy's salesgirl named Angie Rossini, who discovers she's been impregnated by a jazz, banjo-playing musician, Rocky Papasano (Steve McQueen, a little miscast playing an Italian-American). Angie confronts him at a union hall though it takes him a moment to recognize her. She wants to have an abortion, in those days a back alley abortion, and Rocky tries to financially help her with the decision despite just barely remembering their coital rendezvous. Rocky lives with a stripper named Barbie (Edie Adams) and gets thrown out when he asks her about a special kind of doctor for a "lady friend." The actual scene of a run-down building where Rocky and Angie are supposed to meet with the supposed doctor sticks out because when she can't go through with it and throws a crying fit, you feel her agony and shame in your bones. Rocky feels sorry for her, takes her to Barbie's apartment (oh, the nerve) and begins to develop feelings for sweet, angelic Angie.

Natalie Wood (Oscar-nominated for this film) does an excellent job of portraying a naive, clumsy, winsome young woman who is trying to find her place in the frantic city of New York. Her Italian-American family, which includes her watchful brothers (Herschel Bernardi and Harvey Lembeck) and her traditionalist mother, want Angie to settle down with a perfectly agreeable restaurant owner (a perfect Tom Bosley in his film debut) who is unsure of how to woo a woman. Angie recognizes his niceties but is more deeply attracted to Rocky and eggs him on, testing the waters to see if he is in love or just wants to settle down with her out of responsibility. Steve McQueen doesn't exactly convince me he is Italian, let alone a New Yorker, yet his charisma sells it and he has ample opportunity to show a character who is a bit of a goof, equally as naive as Angie, yet determined to make the relationship work.

Though the tone veers a little from highly dramatic to downright comical at times (the dinner sequence with Bosley preparing a meal and the climactic dinner date with Rocky towards the end), nothing in "Love With the Proper Stranger" feels too out of whack. There are scenes of Angie and Rocky not saying a word to each other, yet their body language says it all. Wood and McQueen don't seem like a real fit and lack chemistry yet purposely so, I think, to show how love can grow without realizing it. That is the special charm at the heart of "Love With the Proper Stranger." The movie is mostly about Angie finding her place in the midst of a chaotic life where all the male characters know what is best for her, never contemplating for a moment that she knows what is good for her. Angie moves out of her brothers' apartment and gets her own place, decorated with her own special touch (she also has a mini-bar though she forgets that scotch and tonic don't go together). Rocky wants to be with her and is attracted to her yet he can't help himself by trying to control her, paying compliments that are awkwardly delivered. It is Angie and Rocky's eventual, though at first unacknowledged, need for each other that marks "Love with the Proper Stranger" as an affecting, bristling romantic drama. There are fireworks at the end for this unusual couple though I am sensing more chaos will follow. You know, real life.

Cal in a fetal position

EAST OF EDEN (1955)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Of all the 50's Method actors who emerged from the Actors Studio, well, it is difficult to separate Marlon Brando from the lot, he practically burned the screen and left it in flames in "A Streetcar Named Desire." Having said that, the eternal rebel James Dean (who had a brief stay at the Actor's Studio) burned the silver screen with his phosphorescent presence yet he did it with more intimacy, more of an emerging brooding sense of despair and isolation. Dean had always exuded an uncertainty, a slight inability to connect to others though did he ever try. As the gloomy Cal Trask in "East of Eden," James Dean is the show, the centerpiece of the action, the one we gravitate to.

Early on in "East of Eden," Cal discovers that his mother is living right outside of the town of Salinas, California running a brothel (his father had told the family that she died). Cal is dismayed by his Bible-thumping father, Adam (Raymond Massey), and by his lies. Deep down within his soul, Cal knows he can succeed and prove he has mobility, without the aid of religious overtures. He amasses a lot of money from growing beans during the days of World War I yet Cal's father wants nothing to do with it despite gaining from the loss of his own lettuce operation. Only Cal's brother, Aron (Richard Davalos), is the one son that Adam admires though why is never clear. Cal sees himself as the bad son, and Aron is simply good. Aron will enlist in the Army and possibly marry Abra (Julie Harris) but where does that leave Cal? All Cal can do is react through violence, whether he hits his own brother (in one truly powerful scene after a Ferris Wheel kiss with Abra) or throw ice while dismantling a ramp at the ice house. Cal has tremendous guilt over his actions and tries to drink away his sorrows, and Abra is around the corner to soothe him despite understandable objections from Aron.

If "East of Eden" falters, it is in the sibling relationship between Cal and Aron and their unmistakable rivalry over winning a woman and their own father's approval. Richard Davalos convinces during his hauntingly drunken laugh while leaving for the Army but, otherwise, I could not get a handle on his character - somehow he comes across as a straight-arrow pretty boy who slowly becomes aloof (this may be the intention but a stronger actor might have worked to build the tension). Better handled is Cal's relationship with his father, Adam, whether it is Cal crying like a wounded animal that the father won't accept the profits from beans or the final scene where a sickly Adam finally admits his love for his "bad" son. That final scene is heartbreaking and comforting - Cal might just finally be able to move on to the next stage of maturity and responsibility.

Also stunning is Julie Harris as the demure, sympathetic woman Abra who is caught in the crossfire between these three men. She sparkles in her scenes with James Dean, and is especially romantic in the Ferris Wheel where she wants to commit to him despite knowing she is devoted to Aron. Also of major significance is Jo Van Fleet in the critical role of Cal and Aron's mother who keeps her emotions in check - there is not a sentimental bone in her performance as Kate/Cathy, a character who can be equal parts frustrating in her strict demeanor and her vulnerable side triggered by Cal. She can be difficult to like yet it is a towering performance that deservedly got her the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress.

"East of Eden" is not a great film, not even by the standards of director Elia Kazan, but it is often riveting and richly layered in certain sections. The use of Cinemascope to show the beautiful, almost majestic look of the small town, the expansive farmlands, and the rocky formations with the crashing waves all seem so much more grand and inviting than the characters themselves (which is precisely the idea). It is finally James Dean who evokes more than what is called for in John Steinbeck's novel (this adaptation chops off a lot from the book). Nothing evokes Cal's torment better than him crying on top of a train car, covering up his emotions and nestled in a fetal position. The critics said that Dean was just imitating Brando. The tremendous pull of that scene, and many more, says otherwise.