THE OTHER SIDE OF MIDNIGHT: Blu-ray (2oth Century-Fox, 1977) Twilight Time

In the spring of 1977, 2oth Century-Fox was preparing what it believed to be a surefire box office dynamo. The powers that be had good reason to be this enthusiastic. The picture was based on a best seller by noted author and beloved of Hollywood, Sidney Sheldon – a pulpy romance in the best vein of a classic Bette Davis weepy, lushly photographed on locations all around the world with an international cast of newbies, seasoned hams and wannabes all vying for screen time. That the resultant spectacle proved an artistic turkey – if marginally profitable (more on this in a moment) - was regrettable, yet oddly enough, at least in hindsight, wholly predictable. Charles Jarrott’s The Other Side of Midnight (1977) remains a laughably bad soaper. Its kitsch and coo are Grade-C twaddle, miscast with colorless performances by B-ranking actors, John Beck, Marie-France Pisier, Raf Vallone and a then, as yet unknown and thoroughly mousy, Susan Sarandon. Beck is Lawrence ‘Larry’ Douglas, a supposedly dashing American flyer during WWII.  Actually, he is a rake in full progress, dropping his pants and impressionable paramours as indiscriminately as bombs from his B-52 all over the European landscape. Ricocheting from Washington to Hollywood to England, France and Greece, Douglas is an unscrupulous horn dog. Pisier is Noelle Page, the Parisian shop girl he transgresses against, but who is not about to take the snub lying down…not after being sold by her own father (Roger Etienne) to an amoral shop keeper (Sorrell ‘Boss Hog’ Booke), mistaken for a prostitute by a local cabby, and finally, taken advantage of by Larry; had for the price of a few romantic dinners at the Café Victor, then told to buy a wedding dress and wait for his return. Only Larry has absolutely no intention of coming back to marry Noelle. Instead, off camera, he knocks up some English lass, then disappears off the radar, only to resurface as an ‘extra’ in a training recruitment movie produced in Hollywood, managed by Catherine’s (Sarandon) New York marketing firm.

We have yet to touch upon the character, or lack thereof, of ruthless Greek magnet, Constantin Demeris (Vallone), whose affluence affords him a glittering salon of sycophants and a certain latitude to be brutal and benevolent in tandem. Aside: I would much rather him for a friend than an enemy. Also, in the mix are Clu Gulager as Cate’s sexually rigid boss, Fraser (he absolutely refuses to be unfaithful to his own wife, even after Catherine repeatedly throws herself at his head), Michael Lerner, as portly, stiff-britches French P.I., Barbet, and Antony Ponzini, an over-the-hill Lothario/French film producer, Paul Metaxas – responsible for making Noelle a big film star. Pisier’s acting chops may be limited, but oh-la-la; what a perky little rack she brings to the table, the bed, a fur-covered carpet on the floor next to a roaring fire…you get it; there is a lot of superficial nudity in this flick. Traversing many sun-filtered rivieras, moonlit byways, seedy back alleys and cozy Mediterranean bungalows, not to mention popping in and out of Washington’s social clubs and Hollywood sound stages, The Other Side of Midnight makes valiant strides to be the sort of globe-trotting epic love story a la David Lean that would appeal to anyone with a pulse. Regrettably, director Jarrott is far too eager to indulge in the many opportunities to see a taut and shapely Pisier repeatedly buck naked and bouncing off the loins of Noelle’s various meal tickets as she climbs and claws her way to the pinnacle of her profession, before tumbling ass over tea kettle into the bowels of dark despair. On this ‘other side of midnight’ we are privy to a homemade/botched abortion with a coat hanger in a bathtub, two fumbled murders, and Noelle, seeking, through Demeris’ formidable wealth, to lure the scamp of her squandered youth back into her boudoir – the black widow and the chump, happily ever after again…hardly!

Sidney Sheldon made his name on such nonsense and treacle, although, having recently re-read the novel, I must admit, it seems franker, adult, and more plausibly intelligent than anything we get in Jarrott’s film adaptation. The stick figures with no soul who populate his movie are waxworks of such unabated silliness, they sink the severity of the story’s last act – Catherine’s near death, and, Larry and Noelle’s execution with Demeris’ complicity. Even at nearly 3-hours, The Other Side of Midnight is pure hokum. That Fox thought it smelled success in this sex-laden farce, and hoped to shore up their anticipated losses on another movie simultaneously in production – Star Wars – by forced block-booking The Other Side of Midnight with George Lucas’ presumed sci-fi ‘clunker’, actually proved The Other Side of Midnight’s fleeting salvation. From the late sixties, well into the early eighties, Fox was hardly what one might call a ‘forward thinking’ studio. In hindsight, their eager and weighty investment in Jarrott’s lushly produced idiocy illustrates precisely where their spirited demise lay; in wait for a never-to-be renaissance for that simpler time in the picture-making biz, when even the most transparently ridiculous potboiler could sell enough tickets to turn a tidy little profit. That The Other Side of Midnight was made, not in the halcyon age of Hollywood’s glamorous gala days, but spawned from another, entirely graceless decade, dominated by cheaply made trash and blue movies, with dialogue so inane it served merely as connective tissue for revolving sex scenes and car chases, The Other Side of Midnight cannot help but to transgress hard left and away from the soft-centered afterglow of passion, landing smack-dab into the softcore skin flick with superficial class, being pumped out in its place.

As with any heavy-handed enterprise, though particularly one ventured from the seventies’ misguided vogue for nostalgia, Fox squanders a good deal of assets, time and effort on a picture where performance takes the proverbial backseat to plot; the studio, throwing its best hopefuls and tired old hams into the blender, alongside art house imports with virtually zero staying power. The Other Side of Midnight is woefully embarrassing, even at a glance, like watching a full-blown asthmatic struggling to cross the finish line in a triathlon. Nothing works; not Michel Legrand’s lounge-lizard groundswells of syrupy-sweet orchestral underscoring, nor master builder, John De Cuir’s plush production design (keen eyes will note De Cuir even steals from his own sets for 1963’s Cleopatra, redressed as Noelle’s private bedroom inside Demeris’ seaside villa), nor Fred J. Koenekamp’s rather flat, but otherwise colorful cinematography that even makes the picture’s then whopping $9 million budget appear chalky and cheap.        

Herman Raucher’s screenplay kicks off with a prelude in Greece; aerial shots of the stone temple ruins and the Aegean shimmering like diamonds under the sun’s anvil. We briefly meet Constantin Demeris attending Noelle Page in her prison cell.  However, after the main titles, we regress to Paris on the eve of WWII. We meet the ingenue, Noelle Page, about to have her school girl’s heart broken by her father, Jacques’ betrayal. For a few measly perks, dear ole daddy has traded his daughter for sexual favors to the lascivious shop keeper, Lanchon (Sorrell Booke) who wastes no time sliding his pudgy little fingers up Noelle’s skirt. She resists, but is forced to return to him for a night of distasteful and passionless sex. However, in the morning, Noelle sneaks away for good. Suffering the indignation of being mistaken for a prostitute by a cab driver, Noelle applies for work as a model in Madam Rosa’s (Josette Banzet) couturier. The two become close friends. In the meantime, Noelle inadvertently bumps into handsome American flyer, Larry Douglas at the Café Victor. The two fast become lovers, Larry awakening the relatively inexperienced Noelle to the truest definition of passion. For a while, all is right and the couple are blissfully contented. Ah, but then Larry is redirected to England for what he describes as a brief delay in their plans to be wed. Predictably, this turns out to be a lie, as Larry, we later discover, took up with a British girl in London whom he impregnated before hightailing it back to America, still footloose and fancy free.

Alone and heart sore, Noelle discovers she is pregnant. Confiding in Rosa, Noelle steadily unravels into an emotional mess, culminating with her decision to abort the baby in a hot bath with a coat hanger. Nearly dying from infection, and nursed back to health by the ever-supportive Rosa, Noelle elects to take up Gaumont film producer, Paul Metaxas on his offer to appear in pictures. Owing to Metaxas’ extracurricular interests, Noelle becomes a great European cinema star. Her beauty garners the attentions of aged, though ruthless Greek millionaire, Constantin Demeris, who recurrently requests the pleasure of her company at his elegant parties. At first refusing such generous invitations, Noelle hires a private investigator, Barbet to track down Larry. After Barbet informs Noelle that her lover has since married Catherine, a Washington public relations expert, Noelle concocts a deceitful plan to wreck her former lover’s future plans for marital bliss. Feigning amorous interest in Demeris, Noelle uses the old tycoon’s unlimited resources to buy off virtually any air freight company that would otherwise have hired Larry to fly for them. Unable to procure suitable employment in America, Larry reluctantly accepts Demeris’ offer to become the pilot of his private plane, still unaware Noelle is Demeris’ lover.

Leaving her career and family to support her husband in this latest endeavor, Catherine steadily slinks into an isolated alcoholic haze. Only now, Noelle does everything in her power to make Larry pay for abandoning her ten years earlier. She treats him as her personal slave. However, when Noelle orders Larry and his copilot to fly her to Switzerland in the middle of a hellish and life-threatening blizzard, only to book him into a substandard hotel room (basically, a closet), while she enjoys the royal suite, Larry rebels. He barges into her boudoir and forcefully seduces Noelle for a second time – only, the stakes are much higher now. Noelle knows Demeris is the brutal sort who would think nothing to destroy her if ever he found out about the affair. So, again, Noelle plots with Larry to find reasons – good, bad or indifferent – to be flown to remote locales where they can indulge their carnal lust. Gradually, this too wears thin. Noelle is eager to possess Larry completely. So, together they hatch a plot to murder the already fragile Catherine. Meanwhile, in Larry’s absence, Cate has pulled herself together. So, Larry elects to take her on a tour of some isolated caves, deviating from the chosen paths into a darkened corner where he all but abandons Catherine, hoping against hope she will never find her way out. Instead, Cate survives this ordeal and is attended to by a kindly doctor under Larry’s watchful eye.

While Catherine is convalescing in the next room during a wild thunderstorm, Larry and Noelle have an explosive argument. Things have reached a critical impasse. Catherine must die tonight. Overhearing this latest plot against her life, Catherine frantically escapes from her bedroom window, venturing into the gale, wearing only her nightgown. Pursued by Larry, Cate manages to slip into a rowboat moored at the docks. Regrettably, the violent thrashing of the waves dislodges the ropes and Catherine is set adrift. Her boat capsizes and Catherine is presumed to have drowned at sea. As Catherine had earlier implored Dr. K (George Keymas) to listen to her ravings about Larry’s plot to murder her, upon her disappearance now, Larry and Noelle are indicted for murder and put on trial. Demeris attends Noelle in her prison cell. Despite her despicable infidelity, he loves her still…or so it would seem. He makes Noelle a promise: she will belong to him completely in exchange for his rigging the trial in her favor. She agrees to these terms – also, to convince Larry to take a similar plea in exchange for a reduced sentence. However, at trial, Chotas (Charles Cioffi) the defense attorney hired by Demeris to safeguard against a conviction, instead convinces Larry and Noelle to plead guilty to the charge of murder. They do and are summarily sentenced by the judge to be executed by a firing squad. In the penultimate moments of the film, a woman bearing an uncanny resemblance to Catherine, and suffering from shock, is seen, cared for by the nuns at a nearby convent under Demeris’ patronage.

The Other Side of Midnight is a deliciously misguided and over-the-top tragedy; Sidney Sheldon's prose, once considered among the foremost crime/thriller novelists of his generation, veering uncomfortably into Danielle Steele territory. Having read more than a few of his books, stylistically, The Other Side of Midnight is more romanticized, even treacly and grotesque, as it wallows in the particulars of so many unhappily ‘ever afters’. Is it any wonder the filmic reincarnations of Sheldon’s characters become mere casualties of life, circumstance and fate almost by default – and undeniably, via movie-land cliché? Martyred love appeals to the sadomasochists from all walks of life, who worship at the altar of a good cry over the bittersweet sorrow that only uncommon beauty, implausible opportunities and untold wealth seem to bring. Noelle Page’s Scarlett O'Hara-esque able-bodied inability to bargain love over jealousy and revenge – the false prophets, never to deliver on their promised satisfaction - reveal instead their truth in an old Chinese proverb…something about a dish best served cold - and revenge, an even more insidious specter, for whom two graves must first be dug.  Alas, Jarrott’s classy skin flick begins on this downward spiral almost from the outset, thereafter to descend from one iniquity to the next as our heroine, blindly entrenched, sets about to destroy everything she touches, quite simply, because she can.

This sort of sadism can work in a novel, as extemporaneous passages are employed to flesh out a character's subtler motivations. Without this benefit, on celluloid, Noelle’s willful derailment comes off as little more or better than the erratic behavior of a very petulant strumpet; her dark and flashing eyes, sparked with the muse of an unquenchable hatred for this man who done her wrong.  Yet, beneath this is the careworn cliché of a woman who just needs to be needed - or else…and not even hell hath a fury like this woman scorned! Marie-France Pisier’s remains the sturdiest performance in The Other Side of Midnight, which is not saying nearly enough, and yet, conversely, monumentally more about the lack of an adequate male counterpoint to offset Noelle’s venom.  Demeris’ steely-eyed tycoon runs her a distant second. But the rest of the milksops who pass in and out of Noelle's life and loins are barely recognizable as real men; rather, wily, ineffectual and lascivious cons with only one thing on their mind. They prey upon Noelle's beauty as though it were fresh meat cast before a starving wolf pack, never realizing it is they who are the hunted.   

If Noelle's incentives for revenge seem deficient, they are positively authoritative compared to Larry's. Having wed Catherine, apparently not under duress, Larry agonizes from ‘big dumb male macho deprivation’, derived from his lack of suitable employment after the war. Artificially pressured out of the airline biz, and repeatedly emasculated by his former lover’s sharp-tongued threats, Larry’s provocation for seducing Noelle again is…what? To murder the wife hopelessly devoted to him?  Can he even fathom the concept of a ‘happily ever after’ that does not include raw sex?  No, it takes time – too much, in fact – for our Larry to connect these dots. But murder as a prelude to eternal bliss? Really?!? Granted, director, Charles Jarrott is bound by the contrivances in Sidney Sheldon's bodice-ripper. But at least Sheldon provides his readership with clarity, and time to warm to the idea. The movie allows for no such build-up. Larry and Catherine are marginally contented in Greece. He confides in her, at first, but then, only a few short scenes later, becomes confrontational as Cate takes to the bottle – then, self-improvement – turning to the viper, already predicting from afar this brief stumble, awkward retribution and return to her bed. In the last analysis, The Other Side of Midnight falls apart because it merely echoes the structure and plot of Sheldon’s novel without actually delving into the mechanics and mind-trick-playing intrigues by which three frightened people become victims of their own design.

The Other Side of Midnight arrives on Blu-ray via Fox’s alliance with Twilight Time in a sparkling 1080p transfer to perfectly authenticate the flatly lit (almost, made for TV) appeal of Fred J. Koenekamp’s cinematography. The color palette is fairly robust, reds in clothing, lipstick and the occasional Nazi swastika, bounding off the screen, as do the lush emerald hues in outdoor greenery. Flesh tones are accurately represented. The image is not razor sharp, as I suspect Koenekamp has used some sort of diffusion filter to add yet another layer of faux realism to amplify the picture’s romantic elements. Still, overall detail is quite good, as is contrast, with a light smattering of film grain looking very indigenous to its source. There are virtually no age-related artifacts to worry about either. This is a smooth and pleasing visual presentation. The DTS 2.0 stereo captures the tinny brilliance of Michel Legrand’s score, with dialogue dead center and only marginal use of the rear and side channels for SFX.  TT provides an isolated music track, plus, an audio commentary recorded in 2007 for the DVD release, featuring producer, Frank Yablans, director, Charles Jarrott, author, Sidney Sheldon, and Film Historian Laurent Bouzereau. Finally, we get Julie Kirgo’s liner note and an original theatrical trailer. Bottom line: The Other Side of Midnight is still not a great (I would even argue – good) picture, hemorrhaging from its hostile unease about (as the somber narrator of the trailer puts it) “a boy, a girl, and a universe.” Oh, please!  The Blu-ray is better than its recorded content. Judge and buy accordingly.

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

1.5

VIDEO/AUDIO

4.5

EXTRAS

2