Posted: Tue Sep 16, 2008 4:06 pm
Nice appreciation of STOLEN FACE here.
I just saw this and loved it to pieces. There's a difference between forgotten films and neglected films; this one seems sorely neglected and ripe for rediscovery. For the reasons enumerated in the above appreciation, A STOLEN FACE is definitely more than the sum of its parts. What really struck me was the perversity of the ending; the irony of Lily being disfigured in death, and the "where will they go now?" openness as the two leads walk away from the wreckage-- to what?
I kept thinking of Henreid as a precursor to Jimmy Stewart in VERTIGO, or a counterpart to Arturo de Cordova in Bunuel's masterful EL; both men are obsessed with re-creating Eves out of their women, the dark side of PYGMALION.
See it!
I just saw this and loved it to pieces. There's a difference between forgotten films and neglected films; this one seems sorely neglected and ripe for rediscovery. For the reasons enumerated in the above appreciation, A STOLEN FACE is definitely more than the sum of its parts. What really struck me was the perversity of the ending; the irony of Lily being disfigured in death, and the "where will they go now?" openness as the two leads walk away from the wreckage-- to what?
I kept thinking of Henreid as a precursor to Jimmy Stewart in VERTIGO, or a counterpart to Arturo de Cordova in Bunuel's masterful EL; both men are obsessed with re-creating Eves out of their women, the dark side of PYGMALION.
See it!