Director Don Siegel (left) and Clint Eastwood on the set
Actress Jo Ann Harris
THE BEGUILED B
USA (105 mi) 1971
d: Don Siegel
Well the dove she’s a
pretty bird, and she sings as she flies
She brings us glad tidings and she tells us no lies
Well she flies in the mountains and the valley so low
And if you live peaceful then she never will go
Come all you young men, take a warning by me
Don’t you go for a soldier, don’t you join no army
For the dove she will leave you and the raven will come
And death will come marching to the sound of a drum
And come all pretty young girls, come walk in the sun
And don’t let your young men ever carry a gun
For the gun it will scare her and she’ll fly away
And then there’ll be weeping by night and by day
Well the dove she’s a pretty bird, and she sings as she flies
She brings us glad tidings and she tells us no lies
Well she flies in the mountains and the valley so low
And if you live peaceful then she never will go
She brings us glad tidings and she tells us no lies
Well she flies in the mountains and the valley so low
And if you live peaceful then she never will go
Come all you young men, take a warning by me
Don’t you go for a soldier, don’t you join no army
For the dove she will leave you and the raven will come
And death will come marching to the sound of a drum
And come all pretty young girls, come walk in the sun
And don’t let your young men ever carry a gun
For the gun it will scare her and she’ll fly away
And then there’ll be weeping by night and by day
Well the dove she’s a pretty bird, and she sings as she flies
She brings us glad tidings and she tells us no lies
Well she flies in the mountains and the valley so low
And if you live peaceful then she never will go
—The Dove She Is a
Pretty Bird (Traditional), sung by Corporal John ‘McBee’ McBurney (Clint
Eastwood)
Made a year before Eastwood’s first directed movie, PLAY
MISTY FOR ME (1971), and just months before the release of DIRTY HARRY (1971),
which became an Eastwood staple in popular culture, this film was largely lost
and overlooked, having failed at the box office, though the French revered it
and invited the film to the Cannes Film Festival, but the producers declined,
as they hadn’t a clue how to market this film, advertised as a psychedelic
western, which is a major reason the film never struck a chord with the public,
where this sense of confusion only adds to the film’s lore, rediscovered
decades later in a flimsy remake by Sofia Coppola, The
Beguiled (2017), that actually won the Best Directing prize at Cannes,
though it’s a pale substitute of the original, which is an explosion of bizarre
and oddly unfamiliar ideas. Watching
this film is a reminder of a superior age in filmmaking in the late 60’s and
early 70’s, an era of greater freedom, when directors constantly took risks,
exhibiting a greater sense of urgency, where the 70’s was actually a golden age
of American filmmaking. While hardly an
example of one of the better films, this is instead a more provocative effort,
a battle of the sexes, where a wounded soldier from the north finds himself
cooped up in a sanctuary of Southern belles in the plantation era of the
antebellum South during the Civil War, notable for being the sole film in the
entire Eastwood repertoire where he gets his comeuppance, described as a
castration fantasy by the director, outsmarted by a group of women in the
heyday of feminism and the women’s liberation movement, headed by the great
Geraldine Page, queen of American theater and stage, nominated for eight Academy
Awards (winning once) and four Tony awards, who is at her most devious when
confronting the likes of Eastwood. While
Coppola’s film is immaculately photographed, it remains calculatingly reserved
and feels more like a minor work, perhaps trying too hard to retain that
balance between comedy and camp, never registering the bleak dramatic overtones
of the original, which suggests a greater sense of inner desperation. While Coppola depicts the film exclusively
from a woman’s point of view, capturing subtle nuances, the original does as
well, but is all Eastwood (check out the hair!), distinguished by his male
bravado, showing his guile and charm, attempting to have his way with women
young and old, feeling he is invincible in a house filled with women, only to
be rebuffed by Page in one of her more disturbing roles, where her moral
authority is continually undercut by flashbacks of incestial relations with her
brother, altogether left out of the more sanitized Coppola film, creating a
darker more perverse vision, while also adding ambiguity to the chosen title.
Based on the 1966 novel The
Painted Devil by Thomas P. Cullinan, the film is notable for the
exaggerated delirium and towering performances, becoming an expression of
Southern gothic horror, taking place at the Farnsworth Seminary for Young
Girls, a cloistered community on the outskirts of war with a near religious
devotion to manners and etiquette. While
the war itself is never seen but only heard in the background, the gated
seminary remains a safe refuge, surprisingly absent of discord, led by founder
and school headmistress Martha Farnsworth (Geraldine Page). The opening credit sequence is notable, shot
by Bruce Surtees in sepia tones, featuring blown-up vintage photographs of
Lincoln, but also fallen soldiers, where we hear the bloody sounds of war as
the screen is flooded by images of the dead still lying on the
battlefield. What follows is the soft,
yet distinct voice of Eastwood himself singing a traditional anti-war folk
ballad with ominous implications, as a tattered and badly wounded Corporal John
‘McBee’ McBurney (Eastwood) is discovered hiding in the woods by a young
12-year old girl, Amy (Pamelyn Ferdin, the voice of Lucy in the Peanuts movies), while picking
mushrooms. When announcing her age, he
mysteriously suggests, “Old enough for kisses,” and kisses her right there on
the spot as a squadron of soldiers passes by on the road. Enough to make you squirm. Helping him into the grounds of the school,
his arrival causes quite a commotion, as the women all want to get a good look
at him, though he is nearly unconscious, uttering delirious remarks. What’s immediately recognizable are the
litany of voiceovers from many of the women, where viewers can hear what
they’re really thinking, offering a woman’s perspective, while also using
skewed camera angles accentuating a feeling of disorientation. This feeds into the flashbacks of the
headmistress, frolicking in the fields with her brother, hidden messages
undermining her moral authority. Meanwhile,
all the girls want to sneak a peek, peering around corners, sneaking in for a
visit with the soldier in their midst, the lone man on the premises for quite
some time, where each seems intoxicated by their own internalized fantasies. The women start dressing nicer for the
occasion, apparently trying to impress, with Miss Martha acknowledging, “The
Corporal seems to be having an effect on all of us.” Hallie (Mae Mercer) is the only slave on the
premises (also left out of the Coppola film), yet she has some of the best
lines in the film, showing an uninhibited nature, singing hymns to herself,
where much more than the rest, as she’s not a student affiliated with the
school, she feels like a free spirit, and she is the one asked to clean him up,
washing his body, including his private parts.
When he awakes, she tells him, “Mr. Yankee, there was enough iron in
your leg to shoe a horse!”
Any film that features a harpsichord on the soundtrack is
weird, and this one is wildly bizarre throughout, featuring lots of swooping
camera movements and super imposition, shot at the Ashland-Belle Helene
Plantation near Baton Rouge. The writing
in the film is distinguished, partially adapted by Albert Maltz and Irene Kamp,
both writing under pen names, though the lion’s share was probably written by
associate producer Claude Traverse, who was uncredited, as there is a
choreography of lines, each one feeling like a zinger, revealing something
irrefutable about the person or place.
In this way, the various personalities are revealed, including the
ultra-repressed Edwina (Elizabeth Hartman, plagued by depression, committing
suicide in 1987), the oldest girl, who is also a teacher, a shy and
romantically dreamy character right out of The
Glass Menagerie, as fragile and forlorn as they come, instantly falling in
love with the first man she sees. Having
discovered him, it’s Amy though who feels she has original rights to him,
speaking candidly with him every chance she gets. 17-year old Carol (Jo Ann Harris, who became
Eastwood’s girlfriend even after the film) is the most sexually precocious, a
sultry vixen kissing him right on the lips, leaving an impression there’s
plenty more where that came from. And
finally there’s Miss Martha herself, too proud to admit it, though she openly
flirts with the Corporal as well, having late night drinks by the fire,
removing the key to his door, allowing him free admittance to her room. This myriad of sexual opportunity is like a
revolving door, with something different offered behind each door, where
McBurney openly plays each one, as if he only cares for them, leading each one
of them on in a web of deceit that causes the women to turn on each other in a
jealous fury. This kind of mischief
casts a dark shadow, though with this director there’s not an ounce of
subtlety, as McBurney is a fraud and master of deception, a complete hypocrite,
unashamed to blatantly lie (flashbacks reveal otherwise) in order to portray
himself in the best possible light, though his ultimate goal is left unspoken,
yet he seems to be having too good a time to want to leave. After all, he’s constantly the center of
attention, surrounded by girls that adore him, which in itself is a kind of
male misogynist fantasy, especially in view of his overly deceptive motives,
where all he wants to do is take advantage of the situation. So the Corporal is not a noble character,
more of a sly fox who is raiding the hen house.
As his health improves, so does his opportunity. McBurney tries to get Hallie on his side,
suggesting they are both prisoners, that maybe they should both help each
other, where flashbacks suggest she was violated by the former master of the
house, yet she is perhaps the only one strong enough to stand up to McBee, as
she never allows herself to fall under his spell, but views him much as she
does all white men, where whites with their monstrous history are simply not to
be trusted, blatantly revealing, “You white folks ain’t killin’ each other
‘cause you care about us niggers. White
man’s the same everywhere in this world.”
While there are some initial thoughts about turning the
prisoner over to the Confederate soldiers, the women’s personal interest
quickly changes all that, each with their own designs on the man, with Miss
Martha thinking she may need a handy man on the premises to keep up the place,
to grow a garden that produces food, to help stabilize the future of the
school. When Carol finds the Corporal
smooching in the garden with Edwina, promising a world of possibilities, she
jealously ties a blue cloth to the entrance gate, a sign to alert the troops of
a Yankee trespasser. Quickly there are
three armed soldiers surrounding McBurney, but Miss Martha has the presence of
mind to pretend he is a distant cousin from Texas, a state loyal to the
Confederacy, and not from around there.
This incident adds a certain amount of suspense, but also shows how far
some are willing to go to protect their prize, as if he’s their own personal
possession. Another example is a visit
from drunken Confederate soldiers offering to spend the night, suggesting
safety is their utmost concern, but their lecherous behavior suggests
otherwise, almost as if they’re marking their territory, adding a tantalizing
moment of terror that requires cunning and sophisticated misdirection from Miss
Martha, who must refuse without drawing suspicion, leaving McBurney duly
impressed afterwards with her savoir faire.
Martha’s infatuation grows, leading him on even further, which only fans
the flames of her sexual hysteria, including a surreal dream of a near naked
McBee in a ménage a trois with Martha and Edwina, who are seen kissing
together, suggesting an unbridled inner spirit that breaks all bounds, merging
into an image of the Holy Trinity, like something we might see in the graveyard
hallucination section of Easy Rider
(1969), expressed through a steamy montage of illicit sexual desire that is
shockingly memorable. A study of
suppressed sexuality only grows more terrifyingly macabre, as three women leave
their doors unlocked for McBurney, but only one (Carol) is bold enough to
follow his tracks, making sure he doesn’t make the wrong decision, inviting him
into her boudoir, removing her clothes, where the man simply can’t resist her
offer. But they make noise that can be
heard, causing Edwina to explore what’s going on, opening the door, finding
them naked on the bed and screaming bloody murder, waking up the entire
house. When McBurney tries to explain,
she knocks him down the winding staircase with the candlestick, fracturing his
leg and leaving him unconscious. Seizing
the moment, Miss Martha sends the younger girls to bed, suggesting the onset of
gangrene could result in slow and painful death, having only one recourse,
amputation, which Siegel shows in graphic detail, including Expressionist
lighting and a hacksaw, never shying away from blood and gore, becoming a
gruesome operatic horror show of exploitive excess on display, with the key
being Martha’s mad steely resolve, as only someone with her dignified air of
bravado and panache could pull this off.
At the time, Eastwood had not yet developed the iconic reputation he has
today, a rugged Hollywood figure of stoic masculinity, but it’s rare for actors
in their careers to allow themselves to become this vulnerable, this openly
susceptible to dirty tricks, where the inestimable actions of Geraldine Page
literally provide chills. Eastwood is
quoted in interviews (Clint
Eastwood: Interviews, Revised and Updated) as saying, “I thought Geraldine
Page was out of my league, being a big star on the Broadway stage and all, but
when we started The Beguiled she told
me she was a big fan of mine on Rawhide. I’ve got no regrets, man, no regrets at all.”
Showing why she is one of the greatest
actresses of her generation, inviting criticism and comparisons, she simply
rises above with the poetic ease and grace of a dove transforming into a raven,
as Eastwood’s foreshadowing song of grave warnings are heard again over the
closing credits.
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