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Dances with Finesse
Jan. 8th, 2014 12:57 pmI seem to have fallen into a need to obsess over Charles Laughton this month. Last night I found Ruggles of Red Gap on YouTube and watched the first half or so; will likely watch the rest tonight. Thoughts so far:
On the odd chance you've never heard of the movie, Laughton plays an English butler whose master loses him in a poker game to an American millionaire couple. In its way, the movie addresses the fact that the American class system, being more fluid, is also much trickier to deal with: poor Ruggles, who was reasonably content in a system where the rules were obvious, is now caught in a situation in which Effie Floud is delighted to have a status-symbol butler, but also expects him to nanny her husband and keep him out of trouble; meanwhile Egbert Floud treats Ruggles as a buddy that he can pull rank upon when he wants to get away with something.
This limnality backfires on the flouts (to Ruggles' benefit) once they take him home to their frontier town: the townspeople mistake him for an aristocratic houseguest of the Flouds, who have to play along because the distinguished English visitor is getting them more social invitations than they'd receive on their own.
This was directed by Leo McCarey, who also helmed Duck Soup, and, I think, some of Laurel and Hardy's comedies. What I'm getting from him so far is a sense of good will without naivete -- the Flouds, despite my description above, aren't actually awful -- the only unsympathetic character so far is their snobbish Boston-Brahmin brother-in-law. Laughton spends much of the first reel wearing a terrified smile, but it's endearing rather than painful to watch, because when he and the Flouds realize the implications of the townspeople's error, it does a wonderfully subtle segue from terrified to slyly pleased.
He had yet another kind of smile in an earlier bit in which Egbert Floud and another American make him get drunk with them -- drunk!Ruggles is consistently associated with animal imagery ("it brings out the beast in him") and there's a wonderful moment where the three of them end up on a carousel -- the American men cavort on their horses like cowboys, but Ruggles reclines gracefully upon the carousel's tiger as if he's part of it, smiling serenely. I've never seen anyone look more like the Cheshire Cat in human form (This was three years after his turn as Dr. Moreau in Island of Lost Souls). ETA -- Looking at it again, I think it's Dionysian imagery, actually.
High hopes for more of this.
On the odd chance you've never heard of the movie, Laughton plays an English butler whose master loses him in a poker game to an American millionaire couple. In its way, the movie addresses the fact that the American class system, being more fluid, is also much trickier to deal with: poor Ruggles, who was reasonably content in a system where the rules were obvious, is now caught in a situation in which Effie Floud is delighted to have a status-symbol butler, but also expects him to nanny her husband and keep him out of trouble; meanwhile Egbert Floud treats Ruggles as a buddy that he can pull rank upon when he wants to get away with something.
This limnality backfires on the flouts (to Ruggles' benefit) once they take him home to their frontier town: the townspeople mistake him for an aristocratic houseguest of the Flouds, who have to play along because the distinguished English visitor is getting them more social invitations than they'd receive on their own.
This was directed by Leo McCarey, who also helmed Duck Soup, and, I think, some of Laurel and Hardy's comedies. What I'm getting from him so far is a sense of good will without naivete -- the Flouds, despite my description above, aren't actually awful -- the only unsympathetic character so far is their snobbish Boston-Brahmin brother-in-law. Laughton spends much of the first reel wearing a terrified smile, but it's endearing rather than painful to watch, because when he and the Flouds realize the implications of the townspeople's error, it does a wonderfully subtle segue from terrified to slyly pleased.
He had yet another kind of smile in an earlier bit in which Egbert Floud and another American make him get drunk with them -- drunk!Ruggles is consistently associated with animal imagery ("it brings out the beast in him") and there's a wonderful moment where the three of them end up on a carousel -- the American men cavort on their horses like cowboys, but Ruggles reclines gracefully upon the carousel's tiger as if he's part of it, smiling serenely. I've never seen anyone look more like the Cheshire Cat in human form (This was three years after his turn as Dr. Moreau in Island of Lost Souls). ETA -- Looking at it again, I think it's Dionysian imagery, actually.
High hopes for more of this.
