- Something Wild (1961 film)
Infobox_Film
name = Something Wild
caption =Ralph Meeker andCarroll Baker in "Something Wild".
imdb_id = 0055464
producer =George Justin
director =Jack Garfein
writer =Jack Garfein Alex Karmel (also novel, "Mary Ann" )
starring =Carroll Baker Ralph Meeker Mildred Dunnock Jean Stapleton Martin Kosleck Charles Watts Clifton James
music =Aaron Copland
cinematography =Eugen Schüfftan
editing =Carl Lerner
distributor =United Artists
released = flagicon|United StatesDecember 23 ,1961
runtime = 112 min.
language = English
budget ="Something Wild" was a 1961 independent film, starring
Carroll Baker andRalph Meeker and directed byJack Garfein , who was Baker's husband at the time.The film, adapted from a book by novelist
Alex Karmel , violated a number of Hollywood conventions and taboos by showing an on-screen rape and brief nudity. It featured a musical score byAaron Copland and was filmed largely on location in New York City, which was rare at the time.Well known stage actors of the era, such as
Mildred Dunnock ,Doris Roberts andJean Stapleton , had roles in the movie. The director of photography,Eugen Schüfftan , was a noted German cinematographer, inventor of theSchüfftan process , who won theAcademy Award the following year for The Hustler.Plot summary
Mary Ann Robinson is a teenage girl attending college in New York City. On her way home, while walking through the park, she is brutally raped. Traumatized by the experience, Mary Ann washes away all the evidence and destroys her clothing. She hides the rape from her mother and stepfather, with whom she has a distant relationship.
Mary Ann tries to continue living her normal life, unsuccessfully. She takes the subway to school and faints during the crush of people. That results in the police taking her home, which upsets her prim and unsympathetic mother, played by
Mildred Dunnock .The rape continues to haunt Mary Ann. She leaves school abruptly and walks downtown, through Harlem and Times Square, down to the Lower East Side. She rents a room from a sinister landlord (
Martin Kosleck ), who overcharges her. She takes a job at a five-and-dime store and her coworkers dislike her because she is distant and unfriendly. Her crude, promiscuous neighbor at the rooming house (Jean Stapleton ) is rebuffed when she tries to be friendly.At the end of her tether, Mary Ann walks across the
Manhattan Bridge and almost jumps in theEast River when she is stopped by a sympathetic mechanic, Mike (Ralph Meeker ). At first he seems to be a knight in shining armor. She decides to stay with him. But that night he comes home drunk, tries to attack her, and Mary Ann kicks him in the eye. The following morning he has no recollection of that, but his eye is badly hurt and has to be removed.Mike now says that he wants Mary Ann to stay there, saying "I like the way you look here." She wants to leave but he refuses to let her go. He holds her captive in the apartment for months, even though she refuses to have anything to do with him.
One day Mike leaves the door unlocked. Mary Ann leaves, walks through the city, sleeps in Central Park, and now she sees how wonderful life is. She goes back to the apartment and decides to stay with Mike, voluntarily. She marries Mike and rebuffs her mother's attempt to get her to return home.
Cast
*
Carroll Baker as Mary Ann Robinson
*Ralph Meeker as Mike
*Mildred Dunnock as Mrs. Gates
*Jean Stapleton as Shirley Johnson
*Doris Roberts as Mary Ann's co-worker
*Clifton James as Detective Bogart
*George L. Smith as Store ManagerMusic
The score for the 1961 film was by the distinguished American composer
Aaron Copland , who in 1964 re-used some of its themes in his symphonic work "Music For a Great City." The original film score, taken from private session recordings preserved by the director, was released on CD in 2003.Critical reception
The movie received an uneven critical response. Jonas Mekas wrote in
Film Quarterly that the film was the "most interesting American film of the quarter; it may become the most underestimated film of the year."However,
New York Times criticBosley Crowther said that it was "quite exhausting to sit through that ordeal in the apartment." and that "it is not too satisfying, because it isn't quite credible and the symbolic meaning (if there is one) is beyond our grasp."The movie was not a commercial success, and was Jack Garfein's final project as a movie director.
The film was never released on DVD or home video. It was shown at New York's
IFC Center in early 2007, billed as a "lost indie film classic."References
External links
* [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055464/ Something Wild at Internet Movie Database]
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.