GREAT DAY IN THE MORNING: Blu-ray (RKO, 1956) Warner Archive

Although millionaire, Howard Hughes' general disregard for how to run a movie studio led to the official shuddering of RKO in 1953, the iconic rotating radio transmitter atop the world, continued to broadcast its Morris Code call letters on a handful of high-profile pictures, independently made and seeking distribution. Of these, producer, Edmund Grainger’s Great Day in the Morning (1956), directed by the legendary Jacques Tourneur in Superscope and Technicolor no less, at least in hindsight, reflects RKO’s precipitous vanishing act most deftly. The picture, written by Lesser Samuels, based on a best seller by Robert Hardy Andrews, written six full years before the picture’s debut – time enough for its marketing hype to have already cooled - Great Day in the Morning also hails from an epoch in westerns that, by 1956, had already outstayed its welcome with movie goers. Robert Stack, Raymond Burr, Ruth Roman and Virginia Mayo are on tap for this one – respectively cast as 'hero'/villain and virgin/whore.  Sated with enough plot developments for two movies, but bereft of any meaningful character development along the way, Great Day in the Morning emerges as a very contrived claptrap. Stack’s Southern rake, Owen Pentecost, is of the fairly ruthless sort. With an assist from the county tart, Pentecost hornswoggles Burr’s balloonish saloon keep, aptly named Jumbo Means, out of the deed to his place, shoots dead a prospector, Jack Lawford (George Wallace) for attempting to double-cross him on a gold mining claim, sheepishly takes over the rearing of Lawford’s young son, Gary (Donald McDonald) and, throws over the lady of ill-repute, Boston Grant (Roman) for Mayo’s ‘Sweet Polly Purebred’ - Ann Merry Alaine, who never entirely has his back because she is too self-involved, saving face.

Robert Stack, who began his movie career under the auspices of Hungarian powerhouse producer, Joe Pasternak, and, for a brief wrinkle, established himself as leading man material of the ‘teen heartthrob’ ilk (he gave Universal’s prepubescent protegee, Deanna Durbin her first ‘controversial’ screen kiss in 1939’s First Love, and wooed Elizabeth Taylor and Jane Powell in tandem in MGM’s A Date With Judy, 1948) would graduate to more mature roles, alas – as the antagonist and third wheel in A-list pictures like John Wayne’s indie-produced, The High and the Mighty (1954) and, Douglas Sirk’s syrupy melodrama, Written on the Wind (1956). While Stack’s performances were praised, his on-screen persona began to erode - not as leading man material, but the ‘go-to’ fellow to play increasingly troubled young men destined for untimely ends. The reprieve for Stack, as an actor, would come – not in the movies – but on TV, playing Federal agent, Elliott Ness in ABC’s iconic series, The Untouchables (1959-63).  And television would lionize Stack’s reputation forever, as the host of Unsolved Mysteries (1987-2002); the highly popular interactive crime-solving program.  Stack’s performance in Great Day in the Morning is more than a little heavy-handed; Owen Pentecost, exhibiting rather conflicted, and occasionally psychopathic tendencies, even towards those who ostensibly have his best interests at heart. It is difficult to peg Pentecost, and therefore, not easy to warm up to his late-slated altruism – his aversion to the town’s faction of Southerners (to whom he belongs by birthright), disdained by the Northern community, demanding remuneration to help in their war effort, then, surrendering his share of the profits. At the same time, Pentecost illustrates a genuine affinity for Gary Lawford, only to derail the boy’s idolization by rather callously revealing the truth about his father’s death.

Great Day in the Morning has wonderful performances by Ruth Roman and Raymond Burr. First to Roman, the uber glamorous Lithuanian-Jewish beauty, who emerged as the stunningly handsome creature of Farley Granger’s affections in Hitchcock’s classic, Strangers on a Train (1951) after a seemingly interminable string of disposable parts that spanned almost a decade’s worth of indistinguishable cameos. Indeed, she was barely glimpsed in such high-profile fare as Stage Door Canteen (1943), Since You Went Away (1944), and Gilda (1946). By the time Roman appeared in Great Day in the Morning, she had already worked alongside co-star, Virginia Mayo in 1949’s Always Leave Them Laughing. Then, Mayo had the more striking career prospects and the healthier spate of projects on the go. Barely seven years later, Roman was given the more plum part; that of fiery saloon hostess, Boston Grant. And she delivers a fairly effective and hard-hitting performance as the proverbial harlot with the heart of gold, alas, and regrettably undervalued by our hero, and, to meet with a brutal end for taking his side.  But it is rather sad to see Mayo playing second fiddle to Roman in Great Day in the Morning; the one-time dazzler and Goldwyn girl, a ripe comic foil for the likes of Danny Kaye and Bob Hope, reduced herein to the stiff-britches gal who cannot make up her mind between stirring her slightly dishonorable intentions for Owen or pursuing an above-board romance with the stalwart Capt. Stephen Kirby (Alex Nicol).  Mayo’s movie career never did progress beyond the bevy of platinum beauties she portrayed in the forties; her tenure, to continue well into the 1960’s, but her ability to draw in quality offers, instead listing into ‘B’ and even ‘C’ grade filler that helped to render her reputation as the queen of largely forgettable film fodder, relegated to the dust bins of time and memory.

The other outstanding performance in Great Day in the Morning is owed Raymond Burr who, weighing in at a whopping 300 lbs., entered the annals of entertainment as the heavy – literally; his formidable physical girth wed to that impossibly sinister baritone voice. Indeed, for a while it looked as though Burr would be reared and cultivated as the film community’s new Laird Cregar, especially after his hair-raising turn as Jimmy Stewart’s next-door neighbor, Lars Thorwald, who also, as it happens, has murdered his wife, in Hitchcock’s Rear Window (1954).  Of the more than 50 movies Burr would eventually appear in, he inevitably always played the villain.  Ah, but then came radio, Burr’s great chance to translate that commanding voice of his into an omnipotent force for good. By 1956, television had tapped into Burr’s appeal as a leading man, and the legend of attorney at law, Perry Mason was born. From 1957 to 1966, Burr was the court room crime fighter extraordinaire, moving effortlessly into the role of Ironside in 1967 – as a wheelchair-bound San Franciscan Chief of Detectives. That latter effort would run until 1975 and dovetail into Burr’s resurrection of Perry Mason for a series of reoccurring 2-hr. movie of the week TV specials.

After an exuberant main title, scored by Leith Stevens, Great Day in the Morning wastes no time inveigling Owen Pentecost in an Indian ambush in the foothills of pre-Civil War Colorado territory. Although Pentecost is a crack shot with a pistol, he is outnumbered three to one until the sudden and unlikely appearance of Ann Merry and her two burly male escorts, Phil – the cannibal (Peter Whitney) and Zeff Masterson (Leo Gordon), of which only Zeff takes an immediate dislike to Owen. Nevertheless, this trio offers to escort Pentecost into the nearby mining town where they are met by the benevolent, Father Murphy (Regis Toomey). In short order, the troop seeks room and lodgings for the night at the saloon run by Jumbo Mean. Engaged in a poker game, Pentecost uses a loaded deck of cards to stack the odds in his favor. Recognizing a con when he sees it, Jumbo intervenes by pretending to play for his entire set-up – the saloon, his lodgings and several ill-gotten claims he stole from miners using his own loaded deck of cards and appointing one of his own, Boston Grant, as the new dealer. Alas, Jumbo is foiled in his revenge by Grant, who has taken an immediate shine to Pentecost and seizes the moment to get out from under her employer’s iron-fisted rule.  Dealing the cards in Pentecost’s favor, Jumbo is forced to concede and walk away with nothing.

Now, Owen is approached by the small contingent of Southerners working a nearby mine, already to have yielded nearly 2 million in gold. As rumors of a mounting Civil War between the states ripens, these men propose smuggling their earnings out of town to help fund the Confederacy. Alas, Owen refuses to help unless they agree to divvy up the profits in a way that will also benefit his involvement in their plan. Meanwhile, Owen has called a meeting together of the men who were deprived of their own mine claims by Jumbo, offering anyone who wishes to take back their deeds, the opportunity to do so for free and without reprisals; but only, if they sign a contract to a fifty-fifty split of any profits derived from their efforts. Initially, miner Jack Lawford agrees to these terms. However, when he discovers gold on his land, the terms and conditions of his arrangement with Pentecost are altered. Stumbling across Lawford attempting to conceal his discovery, Pentecost implores him to reconsider. Instead, Lawford pulls his guns on Pentecost, and Owen – faster on the draw – shoots his adversary dead as Ann Merry looks on. Not long thereafter, Lawford’s 10-year old son, Gary, arrives in town, informing Pentecost his mother has died and that, owing to the kindness of neighbors back in Chicago, they have paid for his fare to rejoin his father now. Having previously returned Lawford’s body into town – Ann Merry, lying to Father Murphy and the embittered town’s folk - that she and Pentecost discovered Lawford’s body together, already dead in the foothills – Pentecost now sheepishly accepts the responsibility for looking after Gary without telling him what really happened to his father. Ann Merry is appalled by Owen’s saintly and protective attitude towards the boy. But Boston accepts the challenge to help Owen rear and educate Gary who, daily, comes to regard Pentecost as his surrogate father.

Pentecost is sincerely protective of the boy, especially after a shoot-out in the saloon in which Father Murphy is inadvertently gunned down and Zeff wounded by a stray bullet. While the bond between Gary and Boston strengthens, she begins to realize her hold on Owen is waning, as he pursues Ann Merry for his own. She is resistant – at first, having entered into an arrangement with Capt. Kirby who, along with Col. Gibson (Carlton Young) are preparing their cavalry for Civil War. While Pentecost conspires with the Southern contingent to relocate their gold to parts unknown to help the Confederacy, Jumbo confronts Boston – luring her into his saloon under the cover of night before viciously murdering her. Unaware of her fate, Pentecost leaves Gary, presumably in Boston’s care, while he stages a harrowing break from Kirby’s men, setting off explosives that inadvertently kill Jumbo. Before the smoke from this deluge can clear, Phil and Owen lead Kirby and his men on a wild goose chase into the foothills while the rest of the Southern contingent hightail it in the opposite direction with the gold. Thrown from his horse-drawn covered wagon, Pentecost ventures on foot into the hills, taking refuge in a damp cave. He is confronted by Kirby. Alas, realizing Owen is not in possession of the gold, and furthermore, given Pentecost’s word, that he will not pursue a romance with Ann Merry – thus, freeing her up for Kirby to woo – Kirby feigns not having found Owen to his waiting cavalry. As the men ride back into town, Owen sets out for an uncertain future. Will he rejoin the Southerners he aided, or will he resume his solitary trek across these open hills, marching valiantly towards a very uncertain future?

Great Day in the Morning ends ambiguously. Having exhausted all of its Shakespearean-esque tragic elements, the picture concludes on a rather dour note that leaves the fates of young Gary Lawford and Ann Merry in limbo too. Somewhere in this milieu there likely remains a sequel, to have followed the exploits of Owen Pentecost and his possible reunion with these loose ends left behind. Lesser Samuel’s screenplay takes its own ‘not so’ sweet time outlining the main point of the narrative, meandering in its first and second acts through a series of perfunctory ‘cute meets’ and not so ‘joyous’ defeats. That the picture never settles – even momentarily – on these ripening character studies, deprives empathy from the audience for any of the characters we meet.  The most tragic of the lot is Boston Grant – the seemingly charmed and hard-edged ‘good time’ gal who is destroyed by a virtuous act; attempting to rescue Gary, who has gone missing and presumably wandered into Jumbo’s saloon after fleeing, distraught and confused over the realization the man he has looked up to is, in fact, his own father’s killer. Ruth Roman’s portrait of this tender-hearted harlot is first-rate and compelling in spots. One sincerely wishes more had been done with her character, because when she is on the screen she sizzles as none of her co-stars can or do.

Robert Stack’s ‘hero’ is a convoluted mess, further complicated by Stack’s one-note gesture, willing Owen Pentecost as a man who stands firm on the ever-shifting quicksand of his improbably maturing conscience and even more unstable adolescent sexual interests in the wrong girl for him.  It isn’t entirely Stack’s fault, as Samuel’s screenplay quite simply finds new, if not terribly convincing ways for Owen Pentecost to perpetually question his own motives and, as readily being incapable of finding his truest self in the clumsy decisions made along the way. Raymond Burr’s baddie is played with appropriate menace, but strictly speaking – as a remorseless, barbarous and cruel menace of the Sydney Greenstreet ilk, albeit, with none of Greenstreet’s multi-layered texturing or flavor. Cinematographer, William E. Snyder seems incapable of generating mood. Even when the tone of the piece turns to ominous gestures of deadly looming fate, the images on the screen are a colorful parade of Technicolor, rendering everything a Mexican fiesta on Olivera Street. This shows off Gwen Wakeling’s costumes to their best effect, particularly the gaudy ensembles worn by Roman’s sexy tart. But it does absolutely nothing to ignite the mounting suspense in certain sequences, again – played under the rainbow hues of Technicolor in its vintage prime. In the end, Great Day in the Morning is an interesting - if failed - attempt to resurrect the western melodrama with flashes of the woman’s weepy and actioner feathered in. It doesn’t quite come off as compelling, but holds together as a ‘chestnut’ of the genre.

Great Day in the Morning arrives on Blu-ray via the Warner Archive (WAC). While I sincerely want to champion more vintage Technicolor coming down the pike, Great Day in the Morning lacks the overall clarity and grain-concealing quality vintage Technicolor possessed. I don’t believe this is a 3-strip Technicolor release. Nevertheless, there are some subtle mis-registration problems scattered throughout – with grain toggling between adequate to exaggerated, particularly during transitional dissolves and/or fades from scene to scene. Superscope might have contributed to these shortcomings. But the movie has a rather rough look to it. Colors are ripe and bold. But flesh tones can frequently lean toward a very ruddy orange. Day for night sequences are bathed in azure blue, with deep, velvety shadows that, only intermittently, display crush. Age-related artifacts have been eradicated. The image is refined, with close-ups revealing adequate overall clarity and fine details. Medium and long shots tend to suffer from residual softness, especially around the peripheries of the screen. None of this appears to be the result of shoddy hi-def mastering, but rather, baked-in anomalies at the time the production was shot. Overall, WAC gets very high marks for its preservation of these slightly flawed elements. The DTS mono audio here is adequate too. WAC has included several vintage featurettes shot by Jacques Tourneur at MGM – none, afforded even basic clean-up. In fact, several suffer from digital combing, derived from interlaced video sources rather than going back to original 35mm negatives for a new scan to upgrade their masters for Blu-ray.  Disappointing and short-sighted, actually. Bottom line: Great Day in the Morning is not a great film. It is competently made, but largely forgettable. The Blu-ray is solid – if not perfect. Judge and buy accordingly.

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

3

VIDEO/AUDIO

3.5

EXTRAS

1