Two for the Seesaw

Plot synopsis:
As the story opens, Jerry Ryan (Robert Mitchum) walking alone in lower Manhattan. Ryan was a lawyer in Lincoln, Nebraska, working in the law firm of his wife's father. No kids. After twelve years, she wants a divorce. Ryan leaves Lincoln while the divorce is pending and goes to New York to find himself. He is alone, living in a cheap room, and almost broke. He has an invitation from an old friend to an eclectic/beat party in Greenwich Village. He shows up and meets Gittel Mosca (Shirley MacLaine) at the party. Mosca is a Brooklynite who left home on her own and rented an apartment in Greenwich Village when she was fifteen. She works as a dancer of sorts, and has had a number of relationships. Ryan and Mosca hook up after a day or so and start a relationship. The core theme of the picture is how their relationship expands and develops their self-respect of themselves. The turning point for Mosca comes when she gets sick and, as Ryan is storming down the stairway, she leans over the railing and begs for help. Ryan takes her to the hospital and looks after her when she is released. Mosca discovers intimacy within love. Class rears its ugly head, but they get over it. They are acting like married people in love. Ryan receives notice that the divorce is final, but he is still conflicted about his ex (Tess). After the divorce is final, Tess calls and wants Jerry back. He agrees, but will work on his own in Lincoln and Tess must accept nothing from her father live in poverty with Jerry until his practice gets on its feet. In the final scene the couple have broken up and are in two separate sets in the same dual scene. This technique is used in the theater but rarely in movies. Ryan is leaving his room for the last time and Mosca is self-assured, self-respecting, and in control. This picture is a director's delight, with open dimensions in every scene. Robert Wise rises to the occasion.

Tags: melodrama

Review:
Robert Mitchum and Shirley MacLaine are well-cast in this engaging love story set in NYC and shot in gritty, atmospheric black and white.
Mitchum's wonderfully-modulated performance as a middle-aged lawyer on the rebound, and MacLaine's as the effervescent young dancer he becomes involved with, mesh very appealingly.
If "The Grass is Greener", a Mitchum (and Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr!) film from the same period and also an adaptation of a stage play, is a tepid example of how *not* to bring a play to the screen, "Two for the Seesaw" is a vibrant example of how to use film to endow a play with an intimacy that would be impossible to achieve onstage.
Major kudos to Mitchum, MacLaine, and the director, Robert Wise..
The post-beatnik / pre-hippie party scene is truly spectacular as a snapshot of a time/place rarely caught on film.
While most of America was still living a black & white Eisenhower existence, this film shows the cutting edge NYC scene that had already moved beyond bebop and Kerouac and was just about to stumble full tilt into the Warhol Factory.
I call this film surprisingly great not because I was shocked that Mitchum or MacLane delivered fine performances, it's surprisingly good because of everything else this film has...
And then it sucked me right in.Maybe because it started on the stage and the scenes were so long but the dialogue was so well crafted that you just had to pay attention.Maybe the fantastic real life portrayals by M&M - not straying nor betraying.But I found myself constantly wanting to talk some sense into Jerry and Gittel -- ah thats what cinema is -- the desire to find out how it ends.
Recently got a chance to see this movie and thought the performances by Robert Mitchum and Shirley MacLaine were great.
Especially like the part that Shirley MacLaine played.
I am not to used to seeing Robert Mitchum in roles like this but thought he did well.
He plays a man going through a divorce who meets a younger woman played by Shirley Maclaine.
Read in another post that at the time of this films release critics didn't think that Mitchum's role was believable enough because of perhaps the age difference.
I love good black and white movies.
This film is a good example of why I love black & white movies.Director Wise, cinematographer Ted McCord, and productiondesigner Boris Leven craft light, shadow, and line into two hours ofabsolutely lovely images, making the most of such elements asthe contrast between MacLaine's hair, eyes, and skin, and thejuxtaposition of the hard lines of doorframes and shadows withthe softness of rumpled fabric and fluid dancer's movement.
The characters' relationship is frustrating, and (reportedoffscreen chemistry notwithstanding) MacLaine and Mitchum lookvery much mismatched.
But we'll never know.) Ifound MacLaine's character to be much more believable--morerounded, containing more nuance--than Mitchum's.
While thisseems mostly the script's fault, I do feel that MacLaine here bringsmore quirky humanity to her work than does Mitchum (who I likevery much in general)."Seesaw" stands out for me as one of those films that, because ofits meticulous attention to visual detail, becomes an archetypalperiod piece as it ages--firmly among the films everyone making amovie set in the early 1960s should study carefully..
The frustrating loop-de-loops of an uncertain love relationship between a Greenwich Village kook-dancer and a Midwestern suit-and-tie lawyer on the verge of divorcing his wife of 12 years.
It gets awfully pedantic at times; for instance, we know the characters' names, they know their names, so why do they keep saying to each other, "Jerry?", "Yes, Gittel?" "I'm sorry, Jerry." "I know, Gittel." The performances by Shirley MacLaine and Robert Mitchum are excellent (we like them even before their self-doubting, insecure characters take shape), but this stage-vehicle hasn't been turned into a star-vehicle.
Ted McCord's black-and-white cinematography provides a terrific compensation for the film's minor weaknesses; André Previn's "Apartment"-like score is rapturous as well.
It looks like a play on film.
With a couple of exceptions, all of the dialogue is between the two characters played by Robert Mitchum and Shirley MacLaine.
I don't think he was the best choice for a lonely, insecure and lost bachelor in New York City; Mitchum begging for help from a woman who appears to be half his age?
And she even does a bit of dancing in this movie.I am a big Robert Mitchum fan, but he is too old, and the physical mismatch with MacLaine is too distracting.The sets are static; the action, such as it is, rarely leaves the two protagonists' apartments.
The left half of the shot is MacLaine's home, the right Mitchum's.
Suddenly, the camera pans right, to focus on Mitchum, and you realize that it is one set, cleverly made up to look like a standard split screen; that is, it is arranged exactly as if it were on a stage, the left side one apartment, the right the other.
I am not a big fan of movies made to look like plays, but this is beautifully and cleverly photographed.
Most of it is Mitchum and MacLaine, but the bit parts are fantastic, like the landlord.Most of all, Andre Previn did the music.
These days women have names like Jennifer or Ashley, but Shirley MacLaine's memorable character in this film is named "Gittle".
A Jewish girl in early '60s New York, she becomes involved with Jerry Ryan, (Robert Mitchum) an introspective, self loathing mid-western lawyer.
The relationship becomes a bit complicated, and the two find their love cannot survive the rough seas of romance.Critics in 1962 complained about the lack of on screen chemistry between Shirley MacLaine and Robert Mitchum, even though they began a real life romance directly after this film..
Two For The Seesaw as a two character play by William Gibson ran for 750 performances in the 1958-1959 season and starred Henry Fonda and Anne Bancroft as the uptight Nebraska lawyer and the Greenwich Village bohemian who find each other in New York.
As for Bancroft, she was just coming off her Oscar for The Miracle Worker.When it comes to playing kookie people you can't do much better than Shirley MacLaine.
She holds her end up far better than her co-star.In the Lee Server Robert Mitchum biography, Robert Wise said that this was one of the few times he ever directed a film where the casting was already set before he was hired.
Mitchum is much too unconventional in his way to ever really be believable as a family values Republican type lawyer from the midwest.
What interest there is in Two For The Seesaw comes from the interest MacLaine and Mitchum had for each other..
but you gotta like them talky to love this one.Based on a play and that really shows.
he is completely his character, a old school guy of another generation (compared to Gittel, or MacLaine for that matter)...
The phone calls between him and his wife are painful, Mitchum who himself had a long suffering wife who he had married young and ultimately stuck by (despite, apparently being super unfaithful), I think gives a very brave performance, possibly inspired by the cheer chutzpah of MacLaine's talent.
He really shows the complex emotional ties that come with a very long marriage....for the generations who really, without a second thought, thought they married for life.The emotional tables are turned on them both several times, and you always think its completely true.There are a couple of clunky moments, and you must honestly also just take it on the chin (pun) that this was made in an era when a "slutty" woman could expect to be slapped for flaunting her "lack of morality".
Here its all part of her problem though, the way she accepts how others treat her, much too readily.Great, very little known film that seems to fit no genre what so ever.Maybe its closest relatives are some french new wave relationship dramas.
Shirley MacLaine and Robert Mitchum give excellent performances, but that's exactly what they are – performances.
As good as she is at playing "kooky" characters, MacLaine is never convincing as a Jewish girl from The Bronx.
Beautiful black and white photography of New York and a moody soundtrack recall a time when movies mattered, but the endless, stilted, stage bound dialog ultimately goes nowhere.
Probably sweet and even touching onstage, at two hours, with essentially only two characters, this is lethal.Shirley MacLaine plays a hapless New York Jewish girl.
Made up to look like a cross between Molly Goldberg and Betty Boop, she is appealing but never convincing.Robert Mitchum (who, according to his biography, began a serious romance with his co-star during the filming; and chemistry there is) is appealing, as he generally is.
Robert Mitchum lays a lawyer whose marriage back in Nebraska has just dissolved.
So lonely that he calls a woman (Shirley MacLaine) he barely knows.
In many ways, this odd relationship that defies the odds seems very reminiscent of THE WAY WE WERE (and you probably know how that film ended).Unfortunately, because the chemistry seems so odd in this film and the film is quite talky and stagy (it was originally a very successful Broadway play--and it shows), it's not a great film.
Perhaps, though this sure isn't a glowing recommendation.By the way, in a very disturbing scene, eventually Mitchum slaps MacLaine pretty hard.
A tale of 'love will not find a way' as Robert Mitchum manfully looks for a member of the 'weaker sex' in New York.
The story is somewhat repetitive as trad-male Mitchum tells modern girl Shirley MacLaine she is 'a beautiful girl' on numerous occasions.
There are scenes of domestic violence, with Ms MacLaine on the verge of rearranging Mr Mitchum's face because he hadn't informed her of his divorce papers coming through..
It's one of those movies you watch once, appreciate the acting, and never want to see again.Robert Mitchum is getting a divorce, and in 1962, that's not a common occurrence.
Behind the scenes, Robert Mitchum and his leading lady Shirley MacLaine had an affair, and you can see the hurt and romance smoldering off the screen.
Shirley Maclaine stars in both but now playing a rather less idealised character.
I wonder if Jack Lemmon turned down the chance to play the male lead because Robert Mitchum is not conventional enough to be really convincing.
I'm not sure.Someone obviously saw possibilities in the original stage play to transfer it to film as The Apartment 2.
It means the film and no doubt the play will likely remain period pieces for ever more.
It's basically about a romance between Robert Mitchum, who is getting divorced and Shirley Maclaine.
Mitchum and Maclaine are good and is the black and white photography is excellent..
In spite of Ted McCord's beautiful deep focus b&w photography there is very little in this film that is interesting to look at.
As a stage play brought to film, it never manages to get off the stage and with all of NYC as a potential set, a little more time devoted to exterior shots could have opened this up and made it into a 'real' film.
A few brief glimpses of lower Manhattan, Mitchum pacing the streets in the opening sequence or stalking MacLaine from the shadows outside her apartment gives a taste of what this film could have been if Wise hadn't allowed himself to become hidebound by a talky script.Mitchum is clearly miscast - it almost feels like the overabundant dialog is being dragged out of him.
If Mitch said anything funny, I must have missed it.Unfortunately most of the film is shot in two tiny, claustrophobic apartments with very few changes in camera angle which made me think that Wise could take a tip or two from Ozu on how to make a repeatedly shot interior more interesting.
Beyond that, it threatens to over power the film by setting a jazzy New York tone that the proceedings simply can't live up to.
A divorcing man from Nebraska comes to NYC and falls in love with a Jewish woman named Gittel.
Mitchum and MacLaine do the best they can with the boring dialog..
Robert Mitchum seems hardly interested and Shirley McClaine does a tamped down Barbra Streisand imitation (before Barbra Streisand) in this glum and slow romance about two people in a state of flux trying to connect.
Shot mostly in cramped poorly lit interiors it conveys a morose feel that well may be at the heart of the story but poorly counterbalanced by director Robert Wise who slowly drags the matter to its tepid melancholy conclusion.Jerry finds himself in New York after deep sixing his job as a lawyer and wife in Nebraska.
Based on a William Gibson play (his The Miracle Worker was also made into a film in 1962), it stars Robert Mitchum and Shirley MacLaine as a square and a beatnik (guess which one's which) who hook up.
The issue shouldn't really be their differences in culture, but the fact that Mitchum is like 20 years older than MacLaine.
Great Little Black & White Film - Perfect for a Rainy Day. I've waited TOO long to write a few words on this film.
I had then preceded to watch this film almost every night for a couple of years...it sort of became my going-to-bed movie (much like the man in "Kate and Leopold" who puts on "Moon River" every night before he goes to bed..but for me, it was a whole movie).It's a very simple story about a Nebraskan attorney named Jerry Ryan, played by Robert Mitchum, and a single, slightly kooky dancer and dance instructor named Gittel Mosca, played by MacLaine, who meet at a party, and eventually have an affair.
He's from Nebraska, but taking some to think in New York, away from his wife, from whom he's separated.
Jerry and Gittel have very little in common, but manage to help each other a bit during this very transitional period in predominantly his life.
The score/musical theme of the movie, however, is used IN the movie, as background music in one of the scenes...maybe the party scene in which Mitchum and MacLaine meet.
and she's been on Seinfeld and other shows much more recently).All in all, I LOVED the tone of this film, and the acting was fine.
I would have loved to have seen Anne Bancroft and Henry Fonday play these roles on stage.
And, if you've ever seen the film "The Turning Point", with both MacLaine and Bancroft (LOVE THIS FILM AS WELL), in the scene in which their two characters have a fight on the rooftop, and then settle down, Bancroft's character Emma then chimes in that she would have done anything to get that part..she just had to have it (in talking about the role of "Anna Karenina").
When she utters that piece of dialog, I often wonder if a part of the actress Anne Bancroft didn't think concurrently about her longing to have played the film version of "Two for the Seesaw", but losing it to Shirley MacLaine.Anyway, check out "Two for the Seesaw"...it's a charming little movie..
Although trying very hard, Shirley MacLaine gives us the impression of someone trying hard to be Jewish rather than someone who is, even with the set designer's help of a menorah on her mantelpiece.
Jerry need only be about five years older than Gittel, but Mitchum is old enough to be her father and, since she looks younger than her age, could almost be her grandfather.
He never shows the vulnerable, lost quality that Jerry should have--you never believe he can't take care of himself and any trouble that comes along.At the time the film was made, it could just about get away without asking these questions, but now we are more skeptical and curious.
You get that feeling ever since the sublime main titles, with Mitchum wandering in the black and white streets of New York.
Jerry is a successful lawyer in Nebraska, who has never get around much, and now has lost everything, including the love of his wife Tess.
Gittle, twenty-nine years old, is a divorced day-to-day dancer who'd like to open a class of her own.
They meet quite by chance and decide to help each other, through their own frailties and struggles.Adapted from a play by William Gibson, the script offers many exteriors shots and several settings, but never quite believes in them.
But, the girl remarks, when two people love each other, why should they need to make any claim?Set in an atmospheric mood, in shadows of black, with beautiful Andre Previn score in the background, the film constantly drifts from raw, honest naturalism to a more sophisticated, classical drama.
It's reminiscent of the New Wave (some scenes evoke Breathless) as well as Billy Wilder's The Apartment (MacLaine even goes to a Chinese restaurant) but the tone keeps a definitive identity until the very end.
Frustrated in their feelings, the two leads are tempted by violence as a sure way of expression: Mitchum slaps his partner after a fight, and near the end, MacLaine seems eager to do the same with a cup.
I couldn't help thinking of the Jack Lemmon character in The Apartment as a likely candidate for that.The conclusion, then, is that Jerry and Gittle were not made for each other.
Mitchum and MacLaine happen to make a wonderful combination, with the right rate of instability, surprise and charm.
The supporting cast is hardly there at all, although one sees the shadows of Jerry boss in New-York, his two boheme friends, who have an arty flat and a high regard for matrimony, and of course the voice of his wife, Tess.MacLaine later revealed she had a three year affair with Mitchum, that began during the shooting.
They have a terrific chemistry, and somehow, succeed in making you believe the story of Gittle and Jerry is how an ill-fated relationship should be lived.