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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Easy to Overlook, 9 Sep 2008
This review is from: Daisy Kenyon [DVD] [1947] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC] (DVD)
This is an easy to overlook movie from Joan Crawford's noir lead renaissance in the late 40s.
Most of them were made by her home studio Warner Brothers, but for this one, she was loaned out to 20th Century Fox. It is not as well known, or readily available as her WB films.
The style of this movie is clearly noir, but the subject matter is a love triangle. Where is the murder, or the serious mental illness, or the organised crime syndicate? The subject matter seems a bit at odds with the style. That is not to say that it makes it a bad movie, but it can be heavy going for a relatively simple and benign plot.
Joan is well at home in the genre, and wrings every emotion from her lines. Here she looks and acts most like 'Mildred Pierce' of all her other movies. Dana Andrews and especially Henry Fonda provide excellent foils for her.
The disc has a good 'making of' featurette, and another about producer Otto Preminger.
If you are a fan of Joan Crawford you will love it.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Another Fantastic Film Staring Miss Crawford, 20 Dec 2007
This review is from: Daisy Kenyon [DVD] [1947] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC] (DVD)
Daisy Kenyon (Joan Crawford) is a lovelorn commercial artist caught in a romantic triangle with two men - one she loves but cannot have and one who's love she cannot return. While in an emotionally draining love affair with married attorney Dan O'Mara (Dana Andrews), who refuses to leave his wife, she meets returning army sergeant Peter Lapham (Henry Fonda) "a decent and gentle man" who instantly falls in love with her. Although she carries a torch for Dan, she knows Peter will give her the secure life she desires and she agrees to marry him. But when Dan divorces his wife, Daisy is suddenly torn between her obligations¡and her passions.
Bonus features include:
- Audio commentary by Film Noir historian, Foster Hirsch
- From Journeyman to Artist: Otto Preminger at Twentieth Century Fox featurette
- Life in the Shadows: The Making of Daisy Kenyon
- Poster, still, and behind the scenes galleries
- Interactive pressbook
- Theatrical trailer
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
"Anything logical makes me want to fight, for some reason", 23 Nov 2009
This review is from: Daisy Kenyon [DVD] [1947] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC] (DVD)
Daisy Kenyon was conceived by Daryll Zanuck and 20th Century Fox as a 'woman's picture' in the film noir manner. Oscar Preminger, a Fox staff director at this time, was assigned to direct it, Joan Crawford hired to star and she in turn pressed for Dana Andrews and Henry Fonda to co-star.
The film has Andrews (an unhappily married lawyer) and Fonda (damaged by his tough war experiences) locked in a love triangle as the two men compete for the Crawford's affections. Both have emotional problems to cope with while desperate to overcome their rival, and one of the intelligent features of the movie is that they conduct this rivalry by Queensberry rules, eschewing the trite punch-up and barrack-room brawling in favour of debate. Andrews' and Fonda's characters are more interesting that Crawford in that they have a capacity for explained change whereas she remains at the end essentially the same as she was at the start.
The two male stars also have low-key, very effective acting styles here (as usually elsewhere, too) that contrast with Crawford's tendency to telegraph her emotions, even though Oscar Preminger keeps her tendency to emote well in check. She's also too old for the part and never interesting enough in what she says or how she looks to explain why these two men chase persistently after her - this is substantially a drawback of the script and leaves a bit of a blank at the centre of the picture. But Preminger's careful direction has energy and style in a way that's now right out of fashion - few close-ups and little rapid cutting, and the set design is a delight.
This is no. 23 in the R1 Fox Film Noir series, and the best special feature is a commentary by film historian Foster Hirsch - well-informed, insightful and never wordy.
ps we are told that Joan Crawford''s contract stipulated that the set be kept in the low 50s Fahrenheit, a temperature that Henry Fonda and Dana Andrews found too cold, so Crawford bought both of them long underwear!
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