plug: Rope (1948) + Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean (1982)
A pair of phenomenal one-location stage-to-screen adaptations.
Welcome to today’s plug, a quick recommendation of an oft-forgotten film, cult classic, or movie that is dying to be rewatched //
Hey hey, comin' atcha with another double-feature plug. Today we're lookin' at two phenomenal movies based on plays that succeed by avoiding the usual traps of adapting stage work for film: Alfred Hitchcock's Rope and Robert Altman's Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean. Thought about dropping a holiday-themed pick for Christmas Eve but seein' how this is like the least Christmas-feeling Christmas ever I'm just rollin' with what I got.
I caught both these joints in fairly rapid succession on The Criterion Channel this month, and together they made me rethink my usual misgivings about stage-to-screen adaptations. Outside of musicals ( which have a broad, innately dreamy quality that works well on film) I sorta get turned off by the idea of movies based on plays 'cause they so often feel like they aren't justifying a cinematic rendering of the text. Or they try too hard to expand the action and the extra scope feels forced. Obviously there are a million exceptions to this rule, but when I watch a movie I know is adapted from a play, I tend to go in with my guard up until I see an active avoidance of the usual pitfalls.
Anyway, Rope is the first technicolor picture from the master of suspense and a riveting exercise in stretching the elastic band of tension as slowly and subtly as possible. All set in one Manhattan penthouse, the film begins with two evil-genius roommates, Brandon Shaw (John Dall) and Phillip Morgan (Farley Granger), murdering their old college buddy and putting his body in a large wooden chest, where it'll be hidden in plain sight for the duration of their upcoming dinner party. Over a private conversation before their guests arrive, we find out these guys are on some narcissistic kick to prove their intellectual and, by extension, moral superiority by committing the "perfect murder." One of the party guests, the pair's old prep school housemaster Rupert Caldwell (Jimmy Stewart), quickly notices that something's awry in the house and slowly puts the pieces together throughout the evening.
Rope comprises 10 extended shots, all about 5-10 minutes long, put together to look like one continuous shot. I don't know if it's the first instance of this kind of thing (probably isn't) but considering the time and technological limits involved, the result is pretty damn impressive (and effective, even when the "disguised" transitions from one shot to the next are pretty obvious). It's also dope when super long takes give actors the chance to really "do it live" like they would on stage, at least for a solid stretch. Overall, it's not Hitchcock's most exciting work, but it's plenty intriguing and uncannily tactile in execution.
Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean is Robert Altman's 1982 screen adaptation of a play he directed on Broadway the same year. Set at a Woolworth's five-and-dime store in McCarthy, Texas, the film tracks the reunion of a small-town James Dean fan club on the 20th anniversary of the actor's death. What makes this thing cook is how uniquely Altman and his phenomenal, mostly-female cast use a single space to tell the story. The set itself is doubled and separated by a two-way mirror, the "present time" action playing out on one side of the set while a series of flashbacks are performed on the mirrored side. This is a story of old friends walking and talking circles around their tragic shared past until it all comes spilling out in a mess of sadness and deflection and anger and love, and the unique dimensions of the set contribute to the film's emotional pull in ways you’d never anticipate.
In countless other respects, 5 & Dime is quintessential Altman—meeting people where they’re at, warts and all, awash in the nagging Hollywood archetypes that continue to impose upon everyday American life. It’s a mournful meditation on shattered dreams, the passage of time, and the inevitable moments of weakness that shape our futures. Astounding what you can communicate with one room, a camera, and a handful of sharp collaborators if you’ve got the eye for it.
You can stream Rope and Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean on The Criterion Channel (5 & Dime leaves Criterion at the end of the month) and rent them both from wherever.
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