Sometimes when a film goes through the restoration process the result is like replacing a missing piece of a puzzle. The result is a more complete vision of what the work was intended to be.
Other times it is like putting a removed appendix back into a patient; it may not harm the patient, but it really doesn't do much good either. It is especially bothersome if the restored portion is incomplete or strangely deformed. Nothing good can come of that, other than maybe a scholarly understanding of the film-making process. A STAR IS BORN, the 1954 Judy Garland version, famously underwent such a reconstruction back in 1983 and it was praised for restoring a masterpiece. It is debatable whether A STAR IS BORN was ever really a masterpiece, but it is clear that the restoration made the film bigger, though not necessarily better. At two and half hours the meager story would seem sadly stretched and restoring another supposedly lost half hour makes the film lose its focus even further. And a portion of the restored version featuring black-and-white production stills, replacing lost or incomplete film footage, make the film stop dead in its tracks.
A STAR IS BORN is the oft-told tale of two stars whose paths cross briefly while speeding in opposing trajectories. Garland's Esther Blodgett (a.k.a. Vicki Lester) is on the rise as a young singer, while her mentor and lover, movie star Norman Maine (James Mason), is in a downward spiral. He pauses briefly in mid-air to give her a career boost and a crack at being a movie star. It is pure soap opera, though any student of Tinseltown knows it is rooted in more than one Hollywood legend. This is the third of four versions of the tale, with the key plot twist being that it is a musical, designed to showcase Garland's distinctive talents as a bona fide song and dance legend -- which is both the film's saving grace and its ultimate undoing.
Using flimsy boy-meets-girl stories as an excuse for all-singing, all-dancing musicals is part of Hollywood tradition; the stories never being as important as the musical moments they frame. When the framing story is merely a light-hearted romp, in the Astarie-Rogers mode, it doesn't seem to matter that much. Indeed, the plot is sometimes just a bother. But when the melodrama begins to get heavy and the film strives for pathos, the reality of the drama and the artificiality of the music can compete more than contrast. Either the musical numbers seem extraneous or the drama seems trite -- and with A STAR IS BORN, it is more than a little of both.
Like the lamentable Streisand version that would follow, this was clearly intended as a vanity production, produced by Garland and her husband Sid Luft to rejuvenate Judy's sagging career and her damaged reputation. Therefore, it is not surprising that as a musical it is designed to play to her formidable talent (and it's not surprising either that the Norman Maine character is just an actor and not a singer as well -- thus there is no one to upstage Judy in the musical numbers). The various numbers are generally well staged and Garland belts them out with gusto, though the songs themselves are strangely banal; only "The Man Who Got Away" really endures, possibly because it does reflect the film's theme of love and loss. Otherwise, the other songs seem intrusive and beside the point. The "Born in a Trunk" number, for instance, may tell us a lot about Judy Garland, but not much at all about Esther Blodgett. Overall, the musical and melodrama never quite meld together -- often it is like switching back and forth between two unrelated films.
The film is mostly revered for the Garland showstoppers, but it comes at the expense of the love story. Which is a shame because the main story is handled fairly well. Garland, always hyper and a bit theatrical, gives a performance that nicely contrasts Mason's quiet intensity and skilled underplaying. As much as Garland is overly praised for this film, Mason is equally underrated, lending a haunted quality to his character with his sad, grave eyes and solemn voice. On the other hand, Garland seems needy, almost desperate to be loved in her role, which may have been what put off Academy Award voters who denied her the much anticipated Oscar that year (she lost to Grace Kelly's bitter and melancholy performance in THE COUNTRY GIRL). It was Mason's star that was born as it bumped him up to leading man status; he proved he could more than hold his own against Garland, even as the film brushes him into the wings during the long stretches when Judy holds the spotlight hostage.
And ironically, though the film was meant to revitalize Garland's film career, it slowed, but didn't stop, her downward slide. Not only is Garland a bit old to once again be playing the spunky wide-eyed ingenue, in reality she was more like the self-destructive Norman Maine character, a troubled and troublesome star struggling with too many demons, real and imagined. A STAR IS BORN was meant to be her Esther Blodgett, the second chance at redemption. Instead, though many triumphs and tragedies would follow, including a Oscar-nominated performance in the drama JUDGMENT AT NUREMBURG, Garland took the film's relative failure as a personal affront and more or less shunned Hollywood thereafter. The film would eventually enhance her post-mortem status as a legend, but as an attempt to recapture her place as a film star, it was more a last hurrah than a rebirth.
Other times it is like putting a removed appendix back into a patient; it may not harm the patient, but it really doesn't do much good either. It is especially bothersome if the restored portion is incomplete or strangely deformed. Nothing good can come of that, other than maybe a scholarly understanding of the film-making process. A STAR IS BORN, the 1954 Judy Garland version, famously underwent such a reconstruction back in 1983 and it was praised for restoring a masterpiece. It is debatable whether A STAR IS BORN was ever really a masterpiece, but it is clear that the restoration made the film bigger, though not necessarily better. At two and half hours the meager story would seem sadly stretched and restoring another supposedly lost half hour makes the film lose its focus even further. And a portion of the restored version featuring black-and-white production stills, replacing lost or incomplete film footage, make the film stop dead in its tracks.
A STAR IS BORN is the oft-told tale of two stars whose paths cross briefly while speeding in opposing trajectories. Garland's Esther Blodgett (a.k.a. Vicki Lester) is on the rise as a young singer, while her mentor and lover, movie star Norman Maine (James Mason), is in a downward spiral. He pauses briefly in mid-air to give her a career boost and a crack at being a movie star. It is pure soap opera, though any student of Tinseltown knows it is rooted in more than one Hollywood legend. This is the third of four versions of the tale, with the key plot twist being that it is a musical, designed to showcase Garland's distinctive talents as a bona fide song and dance legend -- which is both the film's saving grace and its ultimate undoing.
Using flimsy boy-meets-girl stories as an excuse for all-singing, all-dancing musicals is part of Hollywood tradition; the stories never being as important as the musical moments they frame. When the framing story is merely a light-hearted romp, in the Astarie-Rogers mode, it doesn't seem to matter that much. Indeed, the plot is sometimes just a bother. But when the melodrama begins to get heavy and the film strives for pathos, the reality of the drama and the artificiality of the music can compete more than contrast. Either the musical numbers seem extraneous or the drama seems trite -- and with A STAR IS BORN, it is more than a little of both.
Like the lamentable Streisand version that would follow, this was clearly intended as a vanity production, produced by Garland and her husband Sid Luft to rejuvenate Judy's sagging career and her damaged reputation. Therefore, it is not surprising that as a musical it is designed to play to her formidable talent (and it's not surprising either that the Norman Maine character is just an actor and not a singer as well -- thus there is no one to upstage Judy in the musical numbers). The various numbers are generally well staged and Garland belts them out with gusto, though the songs themselves are strangely banal; only "The Man Who Got Away" really endures, possibly because it does reflect the film's theme of love and loss. Otherwise, the other songs seem intrusive and beside the point. The "Born in a Trunk" number, for instance, may tell us a lot about Judy Garland, but not much at all about Esther Blodgett. Overall, the musical and melodrama never quite meld together -- often it is like switching back and forth between two unrelated films.
The film is mostly revered for the Garland showstoppers, but it comes at the expense of the love story. Which is a shame because the main story is handled fairly well. Garland, always hyper and a bit theatrical, gives a performance that nicely contrasts Mason's quiet intensity and skilled underplaying. As much as Garland is overly praised for this film, Mason is equally underrated, lending a haunted quality to his character with his sad, grave eyes and solemn voice. On the other hand, Garland seems needy, almost desperate to be loved in her role, which may have been what put off Academy Award voters who denied her the much anticipated Oscar that year (she lost to Grace Kelly's bitter and melancholy performance in THE COUNTRY GIRL). It was Mason's star that was born as it bumped him up to leading man status; he proved he could more than hold his own against Garland, even as the film brushes him into the wings during the long stretches when Judy holds the spotlight hostage.
And ironically, though the film was meant to revitalize Garland's film career, it slowed, but didn't stop, her downward slide. Not only is Garland a bit old to once again be playing the spunky wide-eyed ingenue, in reality she was more like the self-destructive Norman Maine character, a troubled and troublesome star struggling with too many demons, real and imagined. A STAR IS BORN was meant to be her Esther Blodgett, the second chance at redemption. Instead, though many triumphs and tragedies would follow, including a Oscar-nominated performance in the drama JUDGMENT AT NUREMBURG, Garland took the film's relative failure as a personal affront and more or less shunned Hollywood thereafter. The film would eventually enhance her post-mortem status as a legend, but as an attempt to recapture her place as a film star, it was more a last hurrah than a rebirth.