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Movie Review: Four Daughters (1938) [1]

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Date: 2023-05-20

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SPOILER ALERT!

In the movie Four Daughters, there is a musical family consisting of a widowed father, Adam Lemp (Claude Rains), who plays the flute, his sister, Aunt Etta, and his four daughters: Ann (Priscilla Lane) plays the violin; Kay is a singer; Emma plays the harp; and Thea plays the piano.

Neither Ann nor Kay has a boyfriend.

Emma has a suitor named Ernest, whom she jokes about marrying. However, she does not love him, and for her, that is very important. She talks about wanting a “storybook” romance, a “knight in shining armor on a white horse,” while Ernest is always hesitant and awkward in her presence. As a result, she figures she will end up an old maid.

Thea plans to marry Ben (Frank McHugh), whom she does not love, but that doesn’t matter to her. She says that love is overrated. What is important is that Ben has lots of money and can provide her with status. This would not be so bad if she were good at faking it, as some gold diggers are, but throughout the movie it is obvious that Thea finds Ben irritating and doesn’t like it when he tries to be affectionate.

Ann and Emma both make disparaging remarks about Ben’s looks. Moreover, his personality is made out to be just as unattractive. Thea invites him to dinner. When he arrives that evening, he compliments her on the lovely house her family has, and then he compliments her on how beautiful she looks. So far, so good. But then we get the following:

Ben: I hope my watch is right. I’ve been driving around the block, afraid I’d be here too early. Thea: You’re right on time, as usual. Ben: Well, that’s my long suit: punctuality. I believe in hitting appointments right on the nose!

The reason for this dialogue is to make punctuality out to be a cringeworthy character flaw. For that reason, Ben is made to go on about it, showing him to be obsessed with being on time. Later in the movie, at Adam’s birthday party, Ben’s present to Adam is a watch.

At this point, I must confess to being punctual myself, and I have done something similar to what Ben did on many occasions. But one night stands out from the rest. I had a date with a girl when I was in college. I was to pick her up at seven o’clock. Never having been to her house before, I left early, just in case I had trouble finding it. However, I located her house at ten minutes before seven. I pulled around the corner, drove down the street, and parked my car. At seven, I drove back around the block, and pulled up in front of her house. Her father answered the door when I knocked, saying that Sarah wasn’t ready yet, but for me to come inside. I had a pleasant conversation with her father for about ten minutes, and then Sarah came down the stairs. The fact that she was running a little late didn’t bother me one bit. But as soon as we got in the car, she began lecturing me that a gentleman never shows up exactly on time for a date, because if the lady is running late, it makes her look bad.

I have read five books on etiquette: one by Emily Post, one by Amy Vanderbilt, and three by Miss Manners. I have never read what Sarah was talking about in any of those books. But one rule of etiquette stands out above the rest: you should never make someone feel bad by telling him he broke a rule of etiquette. After all, she never had to go out with me again, if I was so crude and boorish as to show up on time for a date. She should have acted as though nothing was wrong, and then said she already had a previous engagement the next time I asked her out. Needless to say, there never was a next time.

The moral of that tale is that people that run late resent people that are always on time, and they are at pains to put them in the wrong, making such people out to be uptight, while those who run late are held out to be free spirits. In the movie Nora Prentiss (1947), those in the movie who are punctual are shown to be stuffy and dull, while those who are often late are happy and carefree. A doctor who is always on time shows up late for work one morning. He says it was because it was such a nice day that he drove through the park on the way in. We rightly suspect he will soon be having an affair, cheating on his mirthless wife, who is always obsessed with her schedule.

In The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969), the title character, played by Maggie Smith, receives a note from her superior while she is teaching class. It reads: “Dear Miss Brodie, I hope it will be convenient for you to see me in my office this afternoon at 4:15.”

Miss Brodie is not amused. She reads the note aloud to her class, saying, “4:15! Not 4:00, not 4:30, but 4:15. She thinks to intimidate me by the use of quarter hours.” When Miss Brodie shows up at exactly 4:15, the clock in the office just striking the quarter hour, she says, somewhat snidely, “I was afraid I might be late … or early.”

The idea is that punctual people not only have the bad taste to always show up on time, but they expect the same of others. Of course, it is folly to try to change anyone. If a friend, a lover, or an employee continually shows up late, either accept it with a smile, or find someone else.

And then there was this one guy I knew who said that he always showed up late for appointments because he didn’t like to wait.

Following the punctuality scene with Ben, his interaction with the family that night is uncomfortable. While offering Ben some wine, Adam presumes to pat Ben on his chest. When Ben makes a weak attempt at humor and nervously laughs, Thea’s sisters make fun of his laugh, mocking him. At the dinner table, Ben sips some water, only to have the family embarrass him when they start saying grace without any warning. A couple of times, later in the movie, Ben starts to tell a story, but others in the room pay no attention to him, talking right over him as if he weren’t there.

In general, Ben is always good natured and friendly, with never a mean word to say about anyone. And yet, everyone in the movie treats him badly. Either they make fun of him, despise him, or ignore him. Nor does the movie want us to take his side, but rather expects us to be in agreement with those who have contempt for him. Admittedly, he is not tall and handsome. He is not witty or clever. If it weren’t for his money, no one would have anything to do with him. He’s just a nice guy, but that doesn’t count for much, not in this movie and not in this world.

As is typical in a melodrama, once we are acquainted with a stable family or community, a bachelor comes along and stirs things up. In this case, the bachelor is Felix, a handsome composer. As an example of just how charming he is supposed to be, he tells everyone where to sit at the table in their own home. Furthermore, he thinks he is being oh-so cute when he flirts with the elderly Aunt Etta, acting as if she is young and pretty. She appears to be flattered by it, as old women always are in the movies when young men pull this routine. I suppose in real life, there are old women who like this attention, but lot of them hate that kind of patronizing attitude, because it only underscores just how old and unattractive they have become, and makes them appear silly and foolish for being taken in by it. This might have been especially painful in Aunt Etta’s case, since she later refers to herself as a spinster. Of course, the men who do that sort of thing always seem pleased with themselves, imagining that they are bringing a little happiness into the life of an old woman.

But just like Aunt Etta, everyone in the family is charmed by him, and we are supposed to find him charming as well. As a result, all four sisters start falling in love with him. And they certainly don’t treat him the way they did Ben. None of them make fun of the way Felix laughs. When Adam offers him some wine, he does not pat him on the chest. At dinner, the scene cuts off before the family says grace, so Felix is spared any embarrassment on that score. Later in the movie, after Felix has won a contract with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra, he excuses himself, saying he has to catch the train to Seattle. Just to remind us one more time that punctuality is something to be despised, Aunt Etta says, “Can’t you miss your train? You know, they’ll never believe you’re a great musician in Seattle, if you get there on time.”

As if one bachelor were not disrupting enough, another one enters the community, a man named Mickey (John Garfield), who excels at playing the piano. Felix needs Mickey to help him with his composing. Felix explains to Adam that there is no telling when Mickey might show up: “He’s an hour late now, but he may not be here for a week. In fact, he may not get here at all…. He’s just a little, well, unpredictable.”

Since Mickey is not at all punctual, that means we are supposed to like him before we have even met him. When he finally arrives, his hair is mussed, his tie is loose, and his shirt is not fully tucked in. Later on, when talking to Ann, he says that the Fates are against him, determined that he will always be a loser. It has never occurred to him, apparently, that being undependable and looking like a slob might have more to do with being a loser than the Fates.

Normally, people speak of fate when they wish to express a kind of personal determinism, but Mickey puts it in the plural: “The Fates, the Destinies, whoever they are that decide what we do or don’t get.” This makes us of think of the Moirai of Greek mythology, but we don’t believe for a minute that Mickey embraces that pagan religion. This is the movie’s way of letting us know he is an atheist. At another point in the movie, Mickey says to Ann, “Allah be with you.” Because he is obviously not a Muslim, we take this as another expression of his atheism. We can’t imagine him saying, “God be with you.” Of course, since he is an atheist, movie logic required that he come to a bad end.

Felix asks Ann to marry him, and she accepts. They announce their engagement at her father’s birthday party. Because Mickey has fallen in love with Ann, he is crestfallen. And as Ann’s three sisters are also in love with Felix, they are all upset too. Kay, who had been procrastinating about going to Philadelphia to study on a singing scholarship, immediately announces that she intends to do just that. Thea, who had been stalling Ben about setting a marriage date, announces that she will marry him in June. Ernest, thinking that Emma will be similarly disposed, suggests getting married, but she rebuffs him, and goes into the kitchen to cry.

On the day of Ann’s wedding, Mickey not only tells Ann that he loves her, but also reveals that Emma was heartbroken when she found out that Felix was going to marry Ann instead of her. At first Ann does not believe it, but later she sees that it is true when, standing outside, she looks through the kitchen window and sees Emma and Felix together. Emma helps Felix with his cravat, and then starts crying when Felix leaves the room. In what can only happen in a movie, Ann leaves Felix standing at the altar and elopes with Mickey.

When an event in a movie is of great significance, and yet is not dramatized, that is sometimes because had it been so dramatized, we wouldn’t have believed it. Let us, therefore, imagine said dramatization. Because people are in the house getting ready for the wedding, Ann cannot go inside and pack. As soon as she walked in through the door, they would expect her to put on her wedding dress. Therefore, she must elope with Mickey with only the clothes on her back. She doesn’t even have her purse with her. We’ll have to assume that the impecunious Mickey actually has some money on him, so he can buy tickets for the train, pay the first month’s rent for an apartment, and then buy some clothes and a purse for Ann.

But let’s not forget the dialogue we must imagine for ourselves when Ann proposes to Mickey:

Ann: Mickey! I just realized you are right. Emma loves Felix. So, I’ve decided to jilt him so he can marry her instead.

Mickey: That's noble of you.

Ann: And now I want to marry you.

Mickey: But you’re in love with Felix, not me.

Ann: I know, but I have to fool Emma into thinking I love you so she’ll feel free to marry Felix.

Anyway, let’s return to the movie as it was actually filmed. Contrary to Ann’s expectations, but not ours, Felix does not marry Emma on the rebound. In fact, Emma ends up marrying Ernest after all. Later in the movie, she tells Ann how much she admired the way Ernest took charge at the wedding, explaining to the guests what had happened. And in doing so she contrasts Ernest with Ben, whom she regards as an incompetent blowhard. Poor Ben.

Four months later, Ann and Mickey are struggling financially. When they go back home for a family reunion at Christmas, Mickey notices how Ann reacts when she sees Felix again, realizing she still loves him. As often happens in a melodrama, things get so messed up and complicated that someone has to die in order for things to get straightened out, and that is what happens here. Between not being able to provide for Ann, and her still loving Felix, Mickey decides to commit suicide by driving really fast in a snowstorm. Apparently, he had never read Ethan Frome. Well, things don’t turn out that bad, but he does wind up in the hospital, living just long enough to say a few words to Ann before he dies. In the next scene, we see it is spring. Felix returns, and it is clear that eventually he and Ann will get married. This is a happy ending, but it is compensatory, softening the tragedy of Mickey’s death.

There are numerous changes in the remake, Young at Heart (1954), one of which is that all the names are different. (Don’t ask me why.) Kay’s character has been eliminated as superfluous. Here are the rest:

Ann = Laurie (Doris Day)

Emma = Amy

Thea = Fran (Dorothy Malone)

Adam = Gregory

Aunt Etta = Aunt Jessie (Ethel Barrymore)

Ben = Bob (Alan Hale Jr.)

Ernest = Ernie

Felix = Alex (Gig Young)

Mickey = Barney (Frank Sinatra)

There is only a hint of Bob’s punctuality, and he does not make a big deal out of it the way Ben did. In the original, Aunt Etta says to Felix, “You know, they’ll never believe you’re a great musician in Seattle, if you get there on time.” In the remake, Gregory says to Alex, “No one will believe you're a real composer if you show up at every rehearsal.” These changes in the script were probably made by someone who regarded punctuality as a virtue and took exception to the way it was demeaned in the original.

Bob gets much better treatment in this remake than Ben did in the original. When we first see Bob and Fran, they are kissing. We never saw Ben and Thea kissing, for she had a physical aversion to him. Gregory does not pat Bob on the chest, and Laurie and Amy do not make fun of his laugh or disparage his looks. In the original, when Emma tells Ann how Ernest took charge of things at the wedding, she said, by way of contrast, “Ben, who blows the loudest trumpet, he couldn’t do a thing.” In the corresponding scene in the remake, Amy tells Laurie how Ernie took charge of things at the wedding, but without making any negative remark about Bob.

Barney does not die in the end. However, this happy ending is suspicious, because we never see him get out of the hospital, which is usually the case when someone’s recovery is to be understood realistically. See, for example, The Glass Key (1942), Kiss Me Deadly (1955), and The Godfather (1972). Another movie that fails to provide such a scene is Vertigo (1958). Because there is no scene showing James Stewart getting out of the psychiatric hospital, I believe the second half of that movie is really James Stewart’s dream, while he remains in a catatonic state. The closest we come to a getting-out-of-the-hospital scene in Young at Heart is when we see Barney being wheeled into a room for surgery. But even so, there is no scene following surgery, where the doctor says the operation was a success. We immediately go from Barney apparently dying in the hospital at Christmas to Barney singing at the piano in the Spring, surrounded by the entire family, including his wife Laurie. The whole thing just seems fake. For that reason, it is easier to accept this ending as the dream of a dying man.

Furthermore, for the first time in the movie, Barney seems to be happy, instead of being the disgruntled loser that he has been through the whole movie. It is one thing for someone to make a miraculous recovery after almost dying. That can happen. But as far as personality goes, people don’t change that much. For him to go from being terminally grumpy to inexplicably cheerful, without any attempt to show us dramatically how such a transformation was possible, that just isn’t believable.

I suppose the explanation for this change in personality is the fact that Laurie has had a baby. She had just found out that she was pregnant at Christmas, when Barney tried to kill himself. And now Laurie wishes the baby Happy Easter. So, this must be over a year later. I should have thought the novelty of a baby would have worn off on Barney by that time, especially now that he knows he has another mouth to feed.

Although Four Daughters is about a musical family, and there is music played or sung at times, it just doesn’t strike me as being a musical, although I would not argue the point if someone said otherwise. Young at Heart, however, is definitely a musical, and perhaps that accounts for the difference. It’s not just that we expect musicals to end happily, though not all of them do, but it is easier for us to accept an artificial, tacked-on happy ending when the movie is a musical than when it is a melodrama. Still, the ending is so abrupt and unrealistic that it is easier to imagine that it is Barney’s hallucinatory dream just before he dies.

This is similar to another musical, Young Man with a Horn (1950). In that movie, Kirk Douglas is a grumpy trumpet player. When he finds out that his wife, Lauren Bacall, is a bisexual who has decided to go full lesbian and run off to Europe with another woman, his life starts going downhill. He ends up living on the street, where he collapses. A cab driver, who happened to be driving by, brings him to a place for alcoholics, but Douglas has pneumonia and must be transferred to a hospital. His two friends, Doris Day and Hoagy Carmichael, are with him at what appears to be his deathbed scene. When he hears the siren of the ambulance coming to get him, he says that’s the note he’s been looking for all his life, which is a bit delusional by itself.

And then, with only a brief explanation by Hoagy Carmichael, who has been narrating this movie, as to how Douglas turned his life around, becoming a good person and a great musician, we see Douglas and Doris Day performing together. His trumpet playing is given a reverb effect to make it seem ethereal. Once again, given the absence of a scene showing him getting out of the hospital, along with a complete character change that is only described, not dramatized, that final scene lends itself to a dream interpretation.

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