A WOMAN'S FACE (MGM 1941) Warner Archive

One of Joan Crawford’s most substantial roles came at the tail end of her tenure at MGM; cast as the bitter, haunted and manipulative Anna Holm in George Cukor’s A Woman’s Face (1941). Only a year earlier Crawford, desperate to remain under contract at MGM after having been labeled ‘box office poison’, and accepting a brutally scaled-down contract for less pay and barely any options, merely to continue working, had appealed to L.B. Mayer to find her suitable work in the movies. Mayer, however, had grown weary of most of his leading ladies, cultivated under the old Thalberg/Mayer alliance. With Thalberg’s untimely passing in 1936, Mayer was quick to take the reigns of his studio to go in search of younger, more malleable talent, he alone could command. And Crawford, who had stubbornly fought management every step of the way, was just the sort Mayer was looking to unload.  Nevertheless, even Mayer could see there was a bit more life to be squeezed from Crawford’s contract, and thus, he did the squeezing with rather ruthless determination to prove a point to her – that she was no longer considered either a star of the first magnitude, nor even worth investing huge sums of money on to resurrect her sagging career. Cukor, however, had pursued Crawford for this part, and was granted the right to use her. A Woman’s Face is a powerful and very satisfying emotional cocktail.

Crawford stars as Anna Holm, a lonely recluse living in Stockholm with a hideous scar on her left cheek. To avenge herself in a world that considers her a freak, Anna headlines a ring of blackmailers from her outpost inside a fashionable country inn nestled in the Black Forest. This out-of-the-way gambler’s paradise caters to the idle rich. And it is there that Anna wages nonstop extortion on her unsuspecting clientele who have past secrets they would like to remain hidden. At the inn, Anna meets Torsten Barring (Conrad Veidt), an ambitious cutthroat masquerading as an aristocrat. Sensing Anna’s desire to be loved, Torsten exploits her insecurities about her face, breaks down her defenses, then, sets about plotting the murder of his young nephew, Lars-Erik (Richard Nichols) so he can gain control of the fortune bequeathed to Lars by his late father, Consul Magnus Barring (Albert Bassermann). At first, Anna agrees to Torsten’s plan. But then she meets Dr. Gustav Segert (Melvyn Douglas), a sympathetic plastic surgeon with a simpering wife. Gustav convinces Anna he can reverse the effects of her disfigurement. Anna is remade into a ravenously beautiful woman – and, in fact, reforms, but one whose darkest demons continue to haunt the tabernacle of her mind.

Furthering Torsten’s plan to murder Lars, Anna assumes a position as Lars’ governess, but becomes so attached to the child she is unable to carry out Torsten’s plan. Instead, in defense of the child, Anna accidentally kills Torsten. Exonerated at trial by the discovery of a letter she wrote much earlier explaining the plot to kill Lars, Anna and Gustav are reunited, he leaving his wife to pursue Anna instead. Reportedly, director Cukor was unimpressed by what he perceived as Crawford’s rehearsed mannerisms. In order to deconstruct these for the climactic moment when Anna regales Gustav with the story about how she was wounded, Cukor made Crawford run through the scene over 90 times. In a state of physical exhaustion at the end, Crawford performed the scene for the cameras almost dead pan. Even today, this moment of revelation is remarkably stirring – showcasing Crawford at her most vulnerable. Alas, A Woman’s Face was performed poorly at the box office. Given the picture’s production values, Mayer took it as yet another sign Crawford had become more of a liability than an asset to the studio. Indeed, Crawford had less than a year to go before she was officially shown the door.  Mercifully, this would not be the end of Joan Crawford – movie star, arguably, he best work yet to be achieved at Warner Bros., beginning with her Oscar-winning turn in Mildred Pierce (1945).

A superior film deserves a superior transfer. Unfortunately, that isn't what we get from Warner Home Video’s DVD treatment. All begins well enough with a superbly rendered B&W image. The mastering of the gray scale is truly impressive. Age-related artifacts are rare, and the image is remarkable smooth, yet sharp. Fine details are evident even during the darkest scenes. However, midway through this transfer, excessive aliasing and shimmering of fine details begin to occur. It really is bizarre - as though someone has fallen asleep at the mastering controls shortly after the sequence where Crawford's restored face is revealed for the first time. Certain scenes remain virtually free of these distracting anomalies while others - like the scene where Crawford contemplates pushing her young charge off a ski tram into the swirling waters below - are completely ruined by excessive instability of the image. What a disappointment! The audio is mono but presented at an adequate listening level. Extras include short subjects and a theatrical trailer. Recommended for content - not presentation!

FILM RATING (out of 5 - 5 being the best)

4.5

VIDEO/AUDIO

2.5

EXTRAS

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