MADAME CURIE: Blu-ray (MGM, 1943) Warner Archive
The age of the irreverent, tasteful and sumptuously
mounted biopics reached its apogee with Mervyn LeRoy’s production of Madame
Curie (1943) – an eloquent love story about the husband-and-wife scientists
who discovered radium. Speculation today swirls on a suspicion Marie Salomea
Skłodowska Curie may have murdered her husband. It’s only a theory, folks, and
one not substantiated by history either. What is for certain, Skłodowska, a naturalized-French
physicist and chemist, conducted pioneering research on radioactivity; efforts
to afford her the Nobel Prize, the first woman ever so honored – twice, in two
scientific fields. Marie Curie was also the first woman to become a professor at
the University of Paris in 1906, the same year her husband, French physicist,
Pierre Curie was run down by a horse-drawn carriage in the streets. Skłodowska had wed Curie in 1895, and along
with fellow physicist, Henri Becquerel began to develop a theory of radioactivity,
along the way, discovering polonium and radium using techniques she invented
for isolating radioactive isotopes. Madame Curie would go on to found two
institutes, the first in 1920 in Paris, the second, in 1932 in Warsaw, for the furtherance
of medical research, and, developing mobile radiography units for X-ray
services in field hospitals. Curie eventually died of aplastic anemia, a
byproduct of over exposure to radiation. The year was 1934. She was barely 66.
In the years to immediately follow her death, Madame Curie would be paid
tributes and honors, becoming the first woman to be entombed on her own merits
in Paris' Panthéon. Then, there was LeRoy’s movie – the definitive movie homage
– Oscar-nominated, and, to reunite those beloveds of the silver screen: Greer
Garson and Walter Pigeon.
Madame Curie marks the third
outing for Garson and Pigeon, presented to the world as idyllic marrieds long
before the studio had any inkling of trying out this same formula on Spencer
Tracy and Katharine Hepburn. And for a time, Garson and Pigeon represented a
sort of utterly idealized view of what married love could be; the bloom of
passion, ripened and/or replaced by mutual respect and admiration. If elsewhere in Hollywood, such storytelling
was only concerned with what led up to that declaration of a life-long
commitment between two people, Garson and Pigeon played to the strengths of
what followed once the chapel bells ceased pealing madly. Interesting to
consider the trajectory of each star’s career at this juncture. Pigeon’s was
decidedly the more established in 1943. Indeed, he had had his best show yet,
on a loan out to 2oth Century-Fox, headlining as the kindly minister in the
Oscar-winning, How Green Was My Valley (1941). Classically trained, and,
of the old school, with the looks and magnificent presence to match, Pigeon’s
early silent career was unremarkable. His real/reel coming almost a full decade
later in 1937, the year MGM put him under contract as a second-string, playing
the ‘other man’ roles in Saratoga (1937, and Jean Harlow’s last movie)
and The Girl of the Golden West (1938), opposite Nelson Eddy and
Jeanette MacDonald. Pigeon might have been entombed in that mold, except for
Zanuck’s tender-and-teary-eyed magnum opus. L.B. Mayer took notice and Pigeon
returned to MGM with a plan to fashion some good movies in support of his obvious
talents. Kismet is Pigeon’s teaming with Greer Garson for 1941’s Blossoms in
the Dust, almost immediately followed by Mrs. Miniver (1942), to
cement Pigeon’s screen persona as a courtly, polished and elegant leading man. Pigeon
remained at MGM until 1956, departing after his contract was up to pursue other
endeavors on the stage, and returning to pictures, though not Metro, as Florenz
Ziegfeld in 1968’s Funny Girl, opposite Barbra Streisand.
Pigeon’s co-star, Eileen Evelyn Greer Garson had come
to Mayer’s attention when he attended a London West End performance of ‘Old
Music’ – a silly, little melodrama. As the story goes, Mayer asked Ms. Garson
to dinner and she brought along her mother to chaperone. Signed to a contract
immediately, Garson was given a plum build-up in Goodbye, Mr. Chips
(1939), earning the first of six Academy Award nominations as Best Actress.
Instantly embraced by the public for her tender and heartfelt performance,
Garson was given star-billing in another of the studio’s prestige pictures, Pride
and Prejudice (1940), and then, another Oscar nod for Blossoms in the
Dust, before actually taking home the golden statuette in 1942 for Mrs.
Miniver, the same year she also appeared in the solid women’s weepy, Random
Harvest. Garson would continue her uninterrupted streak of appearing in Oscar-nominated
roles, first in Madame Curie, then Mrs. Parkington (1944) and
finally, The Valley of Decision (1945). However, she was increasingly
displeased with being typecast as the virtuous and seemingly irreproachable
female. Garson and Pigeon would end their lucrative run at Metro with The
Miniver Story (1950) – a dour note in which Garson’s beloved matriarch, Kay
Miniver contracts cancer and dies. Leaving MGM four years later, Garson
suddenly discovered there was seemingly no place for her in the wilds of
Hollywood. She would not be rediscovered, to enjoy a brief renaissance in her movie
career until 1960, playing Eleanor Roosevelt in Sunrise at Campobello,
and then in back-to-back musicals; The Singing Nun (1966) and, for Walt
Disney in The Happiest Millionaire (1967). The great lady’s final 3-years
were spent ailing from a chronic heart condition in Dallas’ Presbyterian
Hospital. Garson died at the age of 92 in 1996, and was to be much eulogized as
the alabaster-skinned and apricot-haired proper English lass, despite hailing
from mixed Scot/Irish parentage. Heavily costumed and sensibly typecast in her
cultured pics for Metro, Garson nevertheless managed to exude a rather
extraordinarily lithe and lovely, unpretentious charm and effervescence, a very
rare sport indeed, epitomizing the well-put-together and steadfastly middle-class
champion in which the seemingly irreconcilable artistry of both theater and
movie-land glamor seemed to effortlessly reside.
Madame Curie is based on another
great lady’s daughter, Ève Curie’s glowing memoir of her mother. Despite
renewed interest in Curie and her research, MGM was slow to pick up the option,
leaving Universal to slide in in its stead and snatch up the rights to produce
it, with a plan to cast Irene Dunne in the lead. Instead, Universal continued
to delay, then sold its share outright to MGM. At Metro, the role was much
sought after by the studio’s formidable roster of screen queens. Joan Crawford desperately
campaigned for it. However, her career prospects were decidedly on the wane in
1943. Mayer had rather hoped to star Greta Garbo, as the reclusive star had not
made a movie at MGM since 1941’s ill-fated Two-Faced Woman. But Garbo
was reticent of ever returning to Culver City after that movie’s box office
implosion. Indeed, Garbo never worked in pictures again. Besides, Ève Curie,
whose contract afforded her star approval, was not at all interested in Garbo,
and, in fact, championed Garson in her stead. The screenplay, officially
credited to Paul Osborn, Hans Rameau and Walter Reisch and first handed over to
imminent playwright, Aldous Huxley, was rejected for being ‘too literal’. At
one point, F. Scott Fitzgerald was also hired to write, but, like Huxley, was
fired from the project. After only a week on the job, director, Albert Lewin
was replaced by Mervyn LeRoy, and, mostly thereafter, Madame Curie
proceeded without incident – save one. Garson, who preferred a daily afternoon
indulgence of a good English tea, was in the middle of a tender scene when
suddenly the quiescent moment was interrupted by a piercing whistle from just
beyond the cameras. LeRoy hollered ‘cut’ and inquired what had ruined an
otherwise perfect take, only to be informed by his assistant, it was Ms. Garson’s
boiling kettle. Four-o’clock. Time for tea!
Owing partly to MGM’s strict adherence to glamor above
all else, Madame Curie does not conclude with the death of the great
lady, but rather, her proud and motivating address to a new breed of scientists
studying their craft at the university. As
a matter of record, the real Curie’s lab books are still radioactive more than
100 years after use. Indeed, radiation-poisoning was to also claim the lives of
Curie’s daughter, Irène Joliot-Curie and, her son-in-law, Frédéric
Joliot-Curie, who had continued her research. In stark contrast, Curie's surviving
daughter, Ève, who did not follow in her mother’s footsteps, lived to a ripe
102. And yet, given Ève’s involvement and creative control, much of the resultant
picture is heavily fictionalized in support of the Garson/Pigeon chemistry. Lost
in this translation: Marie’s devotion to her family, particularly her sister,
Bronislawa, as well as Curie’s own passion for politics. The MGM reincarnation of that extraordinary
life instead finds an idealistic, Marie Sklodowska (Garson) studying hard at
the Sorbonne. Poor Marie faints during class from malnutrition. Learning of the
girl’s extreme isolation (she knows no one in Paris) her empathetic tutor,
Prof. Jean Perot (Albert Bassermann) invites Marie to a soirée his wife is giving
for the university intelligencia and their wives. Among this scientific glitterati
is physicist, Pierre Curie (Pigeon), an introverted and absentminded fellow,
completely absorbed in his work. Curie is impressed by Marie’s scientific mind
and allows her to share his lab. He quickly discovers she too possesses a
brilliant mind for analytical research. Appalled by Marie’s desire to return to
Poland, Curie takes her on a visit in the country to meet his family. The two
are so invested in their research, neither seems to realize they have, in fact,
fallen in love. Awkwardly, Pierre’s proposal of marriage is outlined in terms
of its practicality to their mutual scientific interests.
After they are wed, Marie becomes obsessed by a demonstration
of a pitchblende rock that appears to generate enough energy to take small
photographs. She decides to make the rock the basis for her doctoral thesis,
but comes up with conflicting measurements, wisely assessing that a third
radioactive element must be housed within it. Alas, without proof, the physics
department is unable to secure the proper grants for further her research. The
faculty does, rather begrudgingly, allow the Curies to occupy a dilapidated
shed on the outskirts of their courtyard. Importing eight tons of pitchblende
ore, the Curies plan to distill it to a new core element – radium after Marie’s
hands are burned by it. Eventually, they come upon the laborious process of
crystallization to separate pure radium from the rock. Their discovery lands
the couple in every prominent scientific journal in the world and earns them
the Nobel Prize. The Sorbonne relocates the Curies to a state-of-the-art
facility. In preparation for its inauguration, Marie buys a new dress,
inspiring Pierre to acquire as a surprise gift, earrings she has long-since
admired. Alas, Curie’s daydreams are cut short when he absent-mindedly steps
before a delivery wagon and is immediately run down and killed. Overwrought in
her grief, Marie is comforted by the kindly Perot. Realizing their work must go
on, she marks the 25th anniversary of their joint discovery of
radium with an impassioned address to the students; fresh, young minds in whom
the promise of a better scientific world now rests.
Despite its formidable production values and critical
cache, Madame Curie is a rather unevenly paced biopic. Part of the
problem here is the Osborn/Rameau screenplay, interminably to dwell on several
key scenes, expressly written to celebrate the already trademarked Garson/Pigeon
on-screen chemistry. Unfortunately, these scenes, considered vital elsewhere in
their joint movie canon, herein stop the show – literally – as well as to omit
more prescient truths about the Curie’s private lives – chiefly, their devotion
as parents. We lose virtually any and all meaningful, familial interaction.
Instead, the movie strings along procedural vignettes aimed to explain their
hand-in-glove research. As such, what emerges is a distinct disconnect between
the Garson/Pigeon ‘tender’ moments interpolated throughout, deliberately to
remind us of better work done elsewhere, and a sort of textbook, ‘this is
how you make radium’ to merely connect-the-dots and move this lumbering narrative
along. Strangely enough, the ole Garson/Pigeon sparkle is missing, the pair to
downplay that chemistry, perhaps, in an endeavor to more clearly assimilate
into their alter egos. MGM’s investment in this sumptuous re-telling is
irreproachable, the studio’s ultra-high-gloss treatment working overtime to
ensure a marvelous and handsome-looking movie from start to finish. But, in the
end, Madame Curie does not represent Garson/Pigeon at their best. The
picture’s Oscar nods, in hindsight, are far more indicative of its ‘prestige’,
rather than its ‘entertainment’ value.
Better news, indeed, for Madame Curie on
Blu-ray. As per the Warner Archive’s (WAC) usual commitment to the classics, Madame
Curie arrives in knock-out hi-def presentation looking utterly ravishing
and pristine. It’s become something of a snore to review the studio’s product
as the signifiers used to describe their sterling efforts remain unaltered. So,
yes – an absolutely gorgeous B&W image derived from a 4K scan of original
elements, perfectly preserved for posterity and showing off Joseph Ruttenberg’s
sublime cinematography to its very best advantage, with a subtly nuanced grey
scale, extraordinary amounts of fine detail and a perfect showing of grain
indigenous to its source. The 2.0 DTS mono audio has, likewise, been lovingly
handled within the limitations of vintage Westrex sound recording. Dialogue is
crisp. Herbert Stothart and William Axt’s underscore is plush and lovingly
represented. Truly – nothing to complain about here. A little light on extras –
a Pete Smith short on the Curies and a theatrical trailer.
Bottom line: Madame Curie hails from a golden
epoch in the picture-making biz when biopics about those larger-than-life
figures from humanity’s ever-evolving pantheon were in vogue: Viva Villa!
(1934), The Story of Louis Pasteur, and, The Great Ziegfeld (both
in 1936), The Life of Emile Zola (1937), Marie Antoinette (1938),
Jesse James (1939), Young Mr. Lincoln, The Story of Alexander
Graham Bell, Juarez, and, The Private Lives of Elizabeth and
Essex (all in 1939) and on and on. As with everything Hollywood touches,
those seeking truth from their cinema would do their best to seek it elsewhere
with Madame Curie. The picture is pure Metro gloss of the highest order,
alas, not entirely to come across as some of their other vintage product, but still
well worth your coin and time. The first third of this soapy melodrama is
vintage MGM treacle, masterfully produced and performed by one of the screen's
most enduring and endearing teams. As Curie’s well-meaning parents, Dame May
Whitty and Henry Travers are delightful. Ditto for Robert Walker’s brief appearance
as another of Curie’s pupils, David Le Gros.
Alas, we come to the dramatic impasse – the lengthy
experimentation sequences regarding Curie’s discovery of radium. Though
artfully shot, there is just not a lot of tension or excitement to be derived
from two scientific minds peering through their microscopes. Layering montages
in rapid succession also tends to retard the melodrama. Director LeRoy is
clearly working with a stellar cast and a proven formula – Garson and Pigeon,
by now regarded as the idyllic portrait of resilient, if restrained love. To be
sure, their chemistry is what keeps this film going. And the penultimate
moments of Curie’s university address stir, as Garson's virtues as a consummate
actress, her ability to ring tears and pathos from her audience, are justly
celebrated here. But Madame Curie is not Mrs. Miniver (1942) despite
its clever ambitions to rekindle that magic. That it only comes to life in fits
and sparks is regrettable. However, Garson’s solid performance is never
anything less than riveting. The Blu-ray is perfection. Judge and buy
accordingly.
FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the
best)
3
VIDEO/AUDIO
5+
EXTRAS
1
Comments