Showbits

In the tradition of It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, I recently watched the comedy The Great Race. Though it was fun to see Jack Lemmon as a villain, the film itself was lighthearted to the point of superficial. But I was glad to have seen it for having introduced me to two features: the song "The Sweetheart Tree" by Henry Mancini (who also created the memorable theme song to Mr. Lemmon's finest work, Days of Wine and Roses); and Natalie Wood, who I'd never seen in anything else (not even Miracle on 34th Street). All the Race characters were caricatures, making for not the best first impression of Ms. Wood — but upon a friend's recommendation, I sought out one of her more substantial works, Splendor in the Grass.

The gulf in quality between these two films proved more drastic than I expected. This 1961 drama about two teenagers coming of age in 1920s Kansas provides both Ms. Wood and newcomer Warren Beatty (who I'd only ever seen in his later films such as Dick Tracy and Bulworth) with the opportunity to demonstrate their talent. Together they tell the tale of a romance obstructed by morality, upbringing, and parental expectations. It seems no matter what they do, it will be for the wrong reason, and they will let somebody down — but their passion is so ardent, so fervent, that to deny it drives them to physical and mental exhaustion, landing each in a different kind of hospital.

Though the teenagers were the stars, the audience is given the context necessary to understand their dilemmas, leading me to find the parents to be entirely loathable characters. Parts of this film actually reminded me of Spider-Man: young Mr. Beatty bares a passing resemblance to James Franco (that film's Harry Osborne), with both characters having rich, manipulative fathers who find common women beneath them. It makes it all the more powerful when their children ultimately overcome their upbringing and find that there is nothing to forgive. "If I raised you wrong, I'm sorry," the girl's mother says. "I raised you the only way I know how; it's the way I was raised and probably the way my mother was raised." Though the impact our parents have on our lives is both undeniable and indelible, every person must eventually move past that and accept responsibility for their own lives.

Despite being set almost a century ago on the cusp of the Wall Street Crash of 1929, Splendor in the Grass remains a tale to which the youth of any era can relate. Its ending provides satisfactory closure while still remaining melancholy — a more realistic finale than Hollywood prefers. It harkens truly to the Wordsworth poem from which the film draws its name:

What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
    Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
        We will grieve not, rather find
        Strength in what remains behind.