The Magnificent Ambersons
Tags: romantic

Plot synopsis:
The Ambersons are by far the wealthiest family in the small midwestern city of Indianapolis at the beginning of the 20th century. Eugene Morgan is a young man who is courting Isabel Amberson, but she rejects him after he publicly embarasses her. Isabel instead marries Wilbur Minafer, a passionless man she does not love. They have a child, George, whom she spoils and who becomes the terror of the town. The townspeople long to see George get his comeuppance.
George Minafer returns home from college during the holidays and attends a large party at the Amberson mansion hosted by his grandfather, Major Amberson. Among the guests are Eugene Morgan, now a widower who has just returned to town after a 20 year absence, and his daughter, Lucy. George instantly takes to the beautiful and charming Lucy but intensely dislikes Eugene, whom he sees as a social climber. He also ridicules Eugene's investment in the new "horseless carriage" technology (automobiles).
The next day, George, Fanny, Isabel, and Isabel's brother, Jack, take a sleigh ride. They pass Eugene and Lucy, whose primitive automobile has gotten stuck in the snow. George derides Eugene and his "horseless carriage". The Amberson sleigh then overturns, and Eugene (his vehicle now mobile again) gives everyone a ride back to the Minafer mansion. George is humiliated during the incident and angered by Eugene's attentions toward Isabel as well as his mother's obvious affection for Eugene.
George returns to college. Wilbur Minafer loses a substantial amount of money on bad investments, and soon afterward dies. George is largely unmoved by his father's death. The night after the funeral, George cruelly teases Fanny, who is besotted with Eugene.
Time passes, and Eugene becomes very wealthy in automobile manufacturing. Eugene also begins to court Isabel. One summer, he asks Isabel to tell George about their love, but she refuses, unwilling to risk her son's disapproval. Meanwhile, George proposes to Lucy. She rejects him, claiming he has no ambition in life other than to be wealthy and keep things as they are. George blames Eugene for turning Lucy against him. Lucy leaves town soon after, and the Ambersons invite the lonely Eugene to dinner. During the meal, George nastily criticizes automobiles in front of Eugene. The other family members are taken aback by his rudeness, but Eugene says that George may turn out to be right. That evening, George learns from his aunt Fanny that Eugene has been courting Isabel. George's uncle Jack confirms Fanny's revelation. Enraged, George rudely confronts a neighbor for spreading "gossip" about his mother. The next day, George refuses to let Eugene see his mother. Jack tells Isabel about George's terrible behavior, but she declines to do anything which might upset her son. Eugene writes to Isabel, asking her to choose between her son and his love. Isabel chooses George.
Lucy returns home in time to discover that George is taking his mother to Europe on an extended trip. George talks to Lucy in an attempt to discover if she loves him. She feigns indifference to his absence, and they part. Lucy is heartbroken, however, and faints.
Months pass. Jack Amberson returns from Europe and tells Eugene that Isabel is seriously ill. George, however, will not allow her to come home because he fears she will renew her relationship with Eugene. When Isabel starts to die, George finally relents and he and his mother return to Indianapolis. Eugene tries to see her, but George refuses to let him into the house. Eugene leaves when Fanny tells him that Isabel is on her deathbed. Isabel dies while holding George's hand, begging to see Eugene one last time.
Shortly after Isabel's death, Major Amberson learns he has only a short time to live. George is too self-centered and preoccupied with his own problems, and ignores his grandfather's revelation. Major Amberson dies, and the family learns his estate is worthless and there are numerous large debts. Jack leaves town to take a job in another city. George tells Fanny that he intends to live on her income, but she reveals that she lost everything after making bad investments. With the utilities having been turned off and the Amberson home and all their belongings soon to be sold, George and Fanny discover they have only a few hundred dollars to live on for the rest of the year.
Eugene asks Lucy if she will reconcile with George. Lucy instead tells her father a story about a Native American chieftain who was "pushed out on a canoe into the sea" when he became too obnoxious and overbearing, which Eugene understands to be an analogy for George.
Penniless, George gives up his job as a clerk at Roger Bronson's law firm, and finds entry-level but high-paying employment in a dynamite factory. This gives him enough money to live on and take care of Fanny. George wanders the newly-industrialized city, dazed by the modern society that has grown up around him. In his last night in the Amberson family home, George prays desperately by his dead mother's bed. The narrator says that no one is around to see George Minafer receive his comeuppance.
The next day, George is struck by an automobile and seriously injured. In the film's final scenes, Lucy is seen in the hospital at George's bedside, having reconciled with him. Eugene and Fanny walk arm in arm down the hospital corridor, as Eugene says that taking financial care of George and Fanny is what Isabel would have wanted.

Review: (For an excellent account of this truly remarkable story behind the film, read Joseph McBride's bio "Orson Welles")  50 minutes of film were burned, however, the 88 minutes left for us to see contain some incredible, even revolutionary moments.Joseph Cotten plays his consummate "2nd place" character, a man unable to have his real true love.
Plot elements aside, this central theme is the powerful backbone that leads to the inevitable destruction of the narrow-minded Tim Holt.The latter aspects come across on screen so memorably because of Orson Welles' continued experimentation with film.
If only Welles stayed in America at the time and protected THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS from the long arm of the near-sighted studio system, he may have had #'s 1 and 2 on the AFI's list of 100 Greatest American films..
Some have even said that, scene for scene, it's a better film than "Citizen Kane."The opening montage, set to Welles' narration, is as good as anything of its kind that's been done before or after -- brilliantly, and I hate to use that word because it's so often overused, it achieves two things:  1) it sets up the dramatic side of the story, with Eugene's fawning for and losing the affections of Isabel, and 2) putting us in a specific, historical time and place.
She's a pressure cooker to begin with, but when the Ambersons hit rock-bottom she lets go, in a torrential, hysterical performance that's still getting praise today."The Magnificent Ambersons" also carries an equally dramatic story of Hollywood's assault on artistic expression; almost everyone knows that RKO seized the film and cut it to pieces while Welles was out doing his documentary "It's All True."  Today there's other ways for great directors (Kubrick, Altman) to dodge the system, but film stock and equipment in those days could only be procured from big studios, and for the remainder of Welles' career his genius would only be seen fleetingly (his adaptations of Shakespeare, Kafka's "The Trial").
Agnes Moorhead, as the Neurotic aunt, gives a performance rarely equaled in movie history.Stanley Cortez was cinematographer for three great movies (and many other fine ones): "The Magnificent Ambersons," "Night of the Hunter," and "The Naked Kiss." Each relies strongly on its look and Cortez created three very different, memorable canvases.One fan hope against hope that the lost footage turns up in someone's basement, unlikely as that is.
Orson Welles was drawn to Tarkington's novel because Tarkington had been a friend of Welles' father and Welles identified strongly with the story, seeing something of his own family's history there.Whether it is better than Kane is a fun question for film clubs to debate (I did once but I don't now), but it is interesting to note that while Orson Welles was particularly bitter that RKO re-shot his ending to make it more appealing to audiences, if you read the novel  you will see that it is the novel's ending that RKO tacked on.
While he was out of the country filming 'It's All True!' (another doomed film in the Welles cannon), RKO pictures, the studio that had granted Welles total freedom for Citizen Kane and a few future projects, cut out fifty minutes (mostly of the last fifty), put a happy ending, and released it on a double-bill with a B movie.
As he grows up, he's still a little hard-headed (played in one of the top, intense performances in any Welles film by Tim Holt), as he is against the changing of the times, in particular of Eugene's re-founded courtship of the mother following his father's death.
There is also the character of his Aunt Fanny, in another perfect performance from Agnes Moorhead (the mother from Citizen Kane).Alongside this examination of a family's downfall amid the changing of personal relations, and of George's own complex emotional problems, and of George's coming-of-age, there's also the examination of the transition from the horse and buggy to automobiles, to the heavier boost of the industrial age.
Stealing the acting honors throughout the production are Tim Holt with his superb portrayal of the spoiled brat heir-to-the-throne, so to speak and Agnes Moorehead as his Auntie, who put their plan into action to sabotage a relationship between the widowed Isbabelle Amberson and charmer Eugene Morgan.Overall, lives up to it's expectations of success, but suffers due to limited screen time and a very confusing plot for audiences of our generation.7/10.
And isn't it ironic that Tim Holt, son of cowboy actor Jack Holt, returned to the family business of B-Westerns (along with his sister Jennifer) after he turned in good performances in 2 of the greatest films ever made (his other major role was in "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" -- he also had a minor role in "Stagecoach")?Read the novel if you want a full explanation of how the Amberson family lost its fortune.
Isabelle's imperious son George grows up and, thwarted in his own love for Lucy Morgan, develops an intense antipathy towards Eugene, the ever-present guest at the Ambersons' dinner table.Welles' affection for the Booth Tarkington novel which inspired this masterpiece is easy to understand.
No one will ever know what it would have been like if Orson Welles' original version had been allowed to stand as it was, but what is left is still extremely good despite the missing portions.The story of the leading residents in a turn-of-the-century town combines some interesting themes.
Welles regulars Joseph Cotten and Agnes Moorehead are especially good.The only real disappointment in the movie is that, due to all the cuts made against Welles' wishes, there are times when it is obvious that a scene or information is missing, since characters at times refer to events that are not quite familiar to the audience.
This approach is ideal for this kind of story of individuals within the context of historical fact, and although the content is totally different, it's not unlike the way in which Martin Scorsese would construct films like Raging Bull and Goodfellas decades later.The opening sequence of Magnificent Ambersons, in which Welles narrates the changing fashions of the 1870s and Eugene's courtship of Isabelle, is this film's equivalent of the "News on The March" sequence from Citizen Kane.
The story of the destruction of Orson Welles' second "Mercury" film THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS is pretty well described in these remarks on this thread.
But if it did, I wonder if we would end up siding with the powers that be at RKO or with Welles.About three or four years back a television version of THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS was made on cable television, which contained far more of the novel than the deconstructed Welles' film currently does.
It was in Wise's interest to deflect any negative views about the butchering of the film for the sake of his own reputation (and it is interesting that in the years after he made that comment, Wise was given an Oscar for his life's contributions to movies - he gave some good ones, but he helped to destroy one great one).I think that if AMBERSONS had been a comedy Welles would not have had the same problem.
But it captured the mood of a time when the automobile was an unknown quantity, as well as a story of family and personal jealousy.The cast is excellent, especially Tim Holt as George, a character who is so nasty, he makes the current screen evils look like teddy bears.
The scene when he turns Joseph Cotton away from seeing his mother was magnificently played.Technically it's as interesting as Kane, but Orson Welles holds back, doesn't need to be so flashy, but instead, lets the story do the work, and it works.
For his second feature film directorial effort Orson Welles assembled a lot of his Citizen Kane alumni, Joseph Cotten, Erskine Sanford, Ray Collins, and Agnes Moorehead, for this screen adaption of the Booth Tarkington novel The Magnificent Ambersons.
The Magnificent Ambersons certainly didn't have that kind of a built in publicity gimmick.Even with the cuts that Welles objected to the film still has great merit, a fine group of players telling a good story.
Orson Welles's flawed and troubled film The Magnificent Ambersons is in some ways just as great as Citizen Kane.
George (Tim Holt) rejected modernization and kept his mother (Dolores Costello) from the man she loved (Joseph Cotten), who invented automobiles.This film is a beautiful example of Welles work, especially how lighting changes as the movie progresses.
"Magnificent Ambersons"(1942) is a magnificent film even with its 88 min running time that was left after RKO took advantage of the director/writer/narrator Orson Welles absence by editing down the film from its original 131 minutes.
"Citizen Kane" may be the most enjoyable 'high brow' movie ever made and I can't think of another film quite like it that moves at such a clip, but isn't there something just faintly facile about the way it reduces it's characters to stereotypes.
Great fun it may be but it never goes very deep into the psychology of it's characters including Kane himself, despite the greatness of Welles' performance."The Magnificent Ambersons" may have been butchered by the studio and may have had the most unsatisfactory ending tagged on to it of any great film but what remains dazzles on an entirely different level from "Kane".
What we do get is 88 minutes of sheer human drama in glorious black-and-white.In a day when films spend ridiculous amounts of money to satisfy the brain-dead masses who want every movie to be a roller coaster ride for the senses, it brings tears to my eyes to see human drama like The Magnificent Ambersons.
But there is a reason I think it never caught on like many other classic films of the time: it is a lavish though dated production that is more lamented among film fans for its lost footage than it is for its cinematic greatness.For those who have always wanted to know what was lost, the best source is The Magnificent Ambersons - A Reconstruction by James Carringer.
The Magnificent Ambersons succeeds in being an exciting trailer of a great movie that we probably will not ever see.However it thankfully remains that Agnes Moorehead is very very powerful, especially in a later scene, and Tim Holt is incredibly becoming as a man we cannot stand.
I haven't read the Booth Tarkington novel on which Orson Welles' film is based but I mean to, if only to try to fill in some of the gaps that the 50 minutes of studio cuts made to the 90 minute running time.
There are several Hollywood movies where the production suits upstairs have cut down the running length of a film, but I can't think of another where I'd so much want to see what was lost.It's just so obvious watching it that the story of this film had more to give and should have been allowed to play out like say "Citizen Kane" had.
So much originality and imagination right from the start as Joseph Cotten's ardent young Eugene almost falls out the frame in the opening minute, the long dolly shot as George walks Lucy around the Amberson mansion at the grand ball, the shadow of Eugene's head on a door to signify death within, the changing light on the dying Isabel's face as the curtains are drawn in her room, the upward tracking shot up two flights of stairs to gauge George and Aunt Fanny's reactions after George has sent Eugene away, itself so reminiscent of the famous reaction shot of the stage workers in "Kane" to Susan's disastrous operatic debut, all these and many more.Of course there are other recognisable Wellesian trademarks, like the monumental sets, overlapping dialogue, long takes and extreme close-ups not to mention his entirely novel way with title sequences.Up until the part where you can see the scissors wielded, the story of mummy's boy George's unhealthily protective love for his mother and hers for him, for him justifying his extreme petulance and selfishness as an adult to the exclusion of her future happiness and indeed his own, makes for engrossing viewing.
Knowing some of Orson Welles' other films, and what Welles himself said about "The Magnificent Ambersons" and how it was taken from his control and ruined beyond recognition, I can only heartily agree with his point of view.This is one movie that starts out with a Welles setup and dies in a corny mess, something like Hitchcock's "Rebecca" with Mrs. Danvers taken out - Manderley ends up in flames, but just how it got so far must have been too distressing for a test audience.All of Welles film have a strong narrative and ask interesting, often uncomfortable questions.
If you have to have one lopped-off masterpiece in the sound era of American cinema, it might as well be "The Magnificent Ambersons." The very title, as well as the movie's treatment of the insular, too-proud clan, speaks of a grandeur that's not all quite there.What's left of the story, after heavy cuts (a full hour from its original running time, and more than 40 minutes less than it had been when previewed in Pomona, CA) and an upbeat reshoot of the ending while director Orson Welles was away, tells about the son of one Amberson, George Minafer (Tim Holt), and his downfall after he stops his widowed mother from taking up with the only man she ever loved, car inventor Eugene Morgan (Joseph Cotten)."The Magnificent Ambersons" is a satisfying film in many ways.
The acting is uniformly strong, with Cotten especially engaging our amusement and favor at the opening ballroom scene (I see more of Welles in him, the inventor, than I do in Holt, who is often spoken of as having the Orson role in the film) and Richard Bennett, playing the Amberson patriarch literally on his deathbed and working it into his performance, standing out.So why don't I think it's great?
This time Isabel seems more interested in Eugene but her son, George, is not so happy with this attention  nor with his lack of success in the love stakes and sets about to scupper any chance of the reunion working out.Apart from the fact that it had a good going over by RKO executives and the fact that the "happy" ending doesn't totally ring true, this film still stands up as being an interesting and dark look at the fall of a family with the passage of time.
While the Magnificent Ambersons have an interesting cast and story, it lacks the drive that Welles' other films had..
But still, the RKO Radio version is a remarkable one, and everyone should definitely see it.It's worth mentioning that this picture wouldn't be so fine without the great narration, provided by the director himself, which places the movie in time and space, and give a great insight into the characters' personalities.The Magnificence of the Ambersons lies in their ability to make money.
Being so full of hatred and jealousy he, along with the help of a devious and eccentric aunt Fanny (Agnes Moorehead), plans to sabotage their relationship.I think it's brilliant that Orson Welles was able to present a tragic story about love, and at the same time show how, in the times of industrial revolution, one rich family lost their big chance to stay on top and eventually collapsed under the weight of industrialization.
In the final scenes, he wanders around town confused, looking at the changes that the revolution brought, and realizing that everybody went forward but him, as he was too concentrated on his selfish desires.Great performances from all the actors: Joseph Cotton as the stylish and dignified man, who was true to his first love up till the final moments; Dolores Costello shines in all her beauty and elegance; Tim Holt as the spoiled brat George, who not only made his mother miserable and sad, but also missed a chance to rebuild his family's magnificence; Agnes Moorehead gave probably the most memorable performance of all, as the wacky aunt Fanny, so in love with perfidious affair of any sort that it ultimately made her descend into psychosis.All in all, The Magnificent Ambersons is a vital position in the Orson Welles directorial career.
And I don't think even Welles' "true" version would have changed that, since the failing is in the actor, not the editing.However, that aside, "The Magnificent Ambersons" stands as a towering achievement in film art.
Though the RKO cut which survives leaves much to be desired (the studio excised and re-shot a significant portion of the film), Ambersons remains a very good picture and a glimpse into the cinematic genius of Orson Welles.The film centres around George Amberson Minafer (Tim Holt), the spoiled heir to the Amberson legacy.
Finally forced to kick reality, George gets a factory job and injures himself - his story parallelling the fall of old money and rise of industry at the turn of the century.The only criticism to be levelled at The Magnificent Ambersons is the editing job done by RKO, you sense that the original cut was an uncompromising work of art and that the surviving version, while still quite good, is by comparison inferior.
The Magnificent Ambersons was an almost-great Orson Welles-directed film.
Their lives change drastically as the country is industrializing.Orson Welles amassed an impressive cast where Joseph Cotten twice attempted to marry Isabelle Amberson, (Dolores Costello) but fate intervened each time.While both marry others, it appears that their offspring George (Tim Holt) and Lucy (Anne Baxter) will marry each other but the fates are tempting again.Holt, as the wealthy scion, steals many of the scenes in every sense of the word.
Orson Welles thought his version of The Magnificent Ambersons could had eclipsed Citizen Kane.
Meanwhile, the selfish and rude George falls in love with Eugene's daughter, Lucy (Anne Baxter).There is much to be admired about 'The Magnificent Ambersons,' but I don't think it worked quite fully as a film, perhaps due in no small part to the intervention of the studio.