THE GOOD EARTH (MGM, 1937) Warner Archive

Luise Rainer’s rise to prominence in Hollywood is the stuff of legend, and arguably, what the very best dreams are supposed to be made of…briefly. The Viennese-born actress swept into the industry, seemingly on a pink cloud of ambitions, met with instant fulfillment, a stellar promotion and overnight fame, fortune, and back-to-back Best Actress Oscar wins for The Great Ziegfeld (1936) and The Good Earth (1937). Hence, to label her as a meteor in the cinema firmament is to put actual meteors in the heavens to shame. Rainer would have been deeply embarrassed by such gushing praise. Indeed, ego never entered her vocabulary in conjunction with her work. She relished the opportunity to prove herself. That is all. Attempting to qualify Rainer’s acting brilliance, her ‘Ziegfeld’ costar, William Powell offered, “She is one of the most natural persons I know…generous, patient…extremely sensitive…and has a great comprehension of human nature…Definitely a creative artist…she thinks over every shade of emotion to make it ring true. She deserves to be a star. Unmistakably, she has all the qualities.”

While on the surface, Rainer appeared to have it all, smiling sweetly for the cameras as she graciously accepted her little golden statuettes with inimitable shyness that had translated so well to the big screen, behind closed doors the actress was deeply unhappy with the trajectory of her career. She never complained or threw tantrums. But she often left the studio defeated, deflated and in tears.  After several tepidly received movies failed to generate the sort of buzz that keeps movie careers alive for decades, Rainer asked for an audience with MGM’s big boss – Louis B. Mayer. “Mr. Mayer,” Rainer implored, “I feel as though my source (of inspiration) has dried up” to which Mayer, rather impatiently offered, “What the hell do you need a source for…don’t you have a director?” As the conversation progressed, Rainer intuitively reasoned she would never win this war – nor, even its first battle to have her concerns legitimately heard. “Rainer,” Mayer reportedly threatened, “We made you and we’re gonna kill you if we have to!” Rather gutsily, the actress took her stance in Mayer’s posh art deco office, concluding, “Mr. Mayer, I am now in my twenties. When I am in my forties, the same age as most of the actresses you have under contract now, you’re dead…and that is precisely when I will begin to live.” Reflecting decades later, Luise Rainer had lost none of her vim or vigor of the moment, concluding, “…and I walked out.  That was the end between Mr. Mayer and me.”

Rainer, who lived to be 104 and died in 2014 from pneumonia, seemed destined to endure in a life after Hollywood. Departing MGM in 1938, she never again set foot on an American sound stage. Nor, did she miss it, or even appear to look back with anything but waning affection – if not, for Mayer, then certainly for his VP in Charge of Production, Irving Grant Thalberg, who unfortunately died suddenly from a heart attack, just as shooting was to commence on The Good Earth. The picture had been a passion project of Thalberg’s. Despite their differences in artistic sentiment, Mayer knew he should not argue with Thalberg’s uncanny ability to hit the bull’s eye. Thus, and in spite of Mayer’s reservations regarding a movie about Chinese peasants enduring famine, The Good Earth progressed without his interference. Rainer’s Hollywood career is one of the shortest on record. She arrived in 1935, and was virtually expunged from the record as ever to have existed a scant three years later. That was Mayer’s doing – partly. But it was also Luise Rainer’s iron will and immense pride as a person first/actress second, that kept her working abroad, well beyond Mayer’s reach and determination to wreck her chances elsewhere in America.

That she could have so completely soured on Mayer, and vice versa, is unfortunate, and, particularly odd, since it was Mayer, along with story editor, Samuel Marx, who were responsible for acquiring her contract in the first place. Mayer especially felt the actress possessed a “certain tender vulnerability” that bode well with his own ideas of femininity on the screen. And Mayer diligently worked to improve Rainer’s prospects, assigning actress and vocal coach, Constance Collier to develop her English and diction. Mayer also granted his ‘new find’ the luxury of first appearing in Escapade (1935), a remake of one of her Austrian films, thus breeding a sense of familiarity for the material to instill her confidence. Rainer was appalled with the results, but the picture generated immense buzz and she was hailed as MGM’s great ‘new star’ of the season.

From this inauspicious debut, Mayer immediately cast Rainer as Anna Held – the first Mrs. Florenz Ziegfeld in the elephantine biopic, The Great Ziegfeld. Controversy dogged her casting, even before a single strip of film had been photographed. But once she committed, such early judgement calls were as easily dismissed, as Rainer proved – if not the physical embodiment of the Polish star, then distinctly, to possess her rare qualities, capable of overcoming other shortcomings. As Thalberg had envisioned, Rainer exuded the “coquettishness, wide-eyed charm”. And Rainer, who deeply respected Thalberg as a “fine, intelligent man” did her finest work for him in this movie, particularly during the now infamous telephone scene where Anna, attempting to reconcile with her ex, instead discovers he has already wed again. Her elation turned to dust. Miraculously, she lingers between made-up vivaciousness and a mounting sense of Arctic desolation that, upon hanging up, adjourns into brutal bewilderment and tears.

For her follow-up, nothing modest would do. Thus, Thalberg, having taken a personal interest in Rainer’s career, entered negotiations with Pulitzer prize-winning author, Pearl Buck to secure the rights to her 1931 best-seller, The Good Earth. Rainer drew her inspiration for the part of O-lan from one of the real Chinese extras hired to partake. On that particular afternoon, Rainer was strolling the backlots in full makeup, still consternating as to whether or not she had made the right decision to follow Thalberg on his Asian odyssey, when suddenly, she dropped her note pad, carried to write down thoughts and motivations for the part. Kneeling to pick it up, Rainer bumped heads with a tiny Chinese girl. As Rainer would later explain, “She let out a little gurgle of a laugh. Apparently, the sight of a Viennese passing for Chinese amused her. And suddenly there was this person. She was Olan. And I could relate to her and use her to craft my character.”

As with her casting in The Great Ziegfeld, Rainer’s involvement on The Good Earth was initially scrutinized, particularly as real-life Chinese star, Anna May Wong had briefly been considered. Indeed, Mayer was against the idea outright. By 1937, he and Thalberg were at each other’s throats, creatively speaking. Mayer, who had championed Thalberg to Lowe’s Incorporated president, Nicholas Schenck in 1925 as the ‘boy wonder’ to whom a thousand-dollar-a-week salary would be granted (when bread was 10-cents a loaf) and had been exceptionally pleased with Thalberg’s early successes, as they fattened Metro’s coffers and made MGM the envy of Hollywood, gradually began to resent the authority and respect Thalberg was garnering on the backlot. Diminutive in size, though mighty in his passion, Thalberg was viewed by his peers, and, in fact, the industry, as a genius. Mayer was merely his administrator.

Apart from Mayer’s objections to Rainer’s casting in The Good Earth, he also believed Thalberg’s plan to invest more heavily on single projects, reducing the studio’s annual output from 52 pictures, was suicidal to the company’s profit margin. Things reached a critical mass after Thalberg elected to take 7 of MGM’s biggest stars and put them in a single movie. Conventional wisdom of the day suggested one star per picture was sufficient to guarantee box office. The result, however, was Grand Hotel (1932), a runaway hit that took home the Academy Award for Best Picture and proved unequivocally Thalberg knew his craft better than almost anyone. Alas, returning home from the picture’s premiere, Thalberg was felled with the first of 2 heart attacks.  Seizing upon the opportunity to re-take his kingdom, Mayer put Thalberg out to pasture for an extended ‘recuperation’, taking the helm to promote his own ideas about family entertainment. When Thalberg returned to MGM he discovered, to his chagrin, there were now two factions toiling at the studio. His autonomy with Metro’s top-heavy producer system had been taken away. To blame Mayer for Thalberg’s death is more than a shay premature. To blame Mayer for the stress that contributed to it, however, seems fair, as Thalberg could not/would not rest. He loved the picture-making biz from top to bottom and side to side. And he derived his greatest pleasure from seeing the stars he had assembled for his projects succeed, perhaps even beyond their wildest dreams. Apart from his personal supervision of wife/actress, Norma Shearer’s career, Thalberg’s investment in Luise Rainer was arguably second to none. He fervently believed with the right projects to propel her, MGM had found another Garbo to carry the studio onto future profits.  

Nevertheless, and despite Thalberg’s untimely passing mid-way through production, Mayer kept his distance on The Good Earth. As such, the picture emerges as the last untainted of Thalberg’s truly great achievements. Refusing to wear rubber applications to alter her looks and make her more Chinese, Rainer created O-lan from a tower of sheer will and the strength of her convictions. As outlined in the screenplay, O-lan is a humble Chinese peasant girl, subservient to her husband (played by Paul Muni). Rainer hardly speaks in this pivotal role, built almost entirely around her ability to tenderly emote with her eyes. “Mr. Mayer was horrified at Irving Thalberg's insistence for me to play O-lan,” Rainer later recalled, “She has to be a dismal-looking slave and grow old. But Luise is a young girl. We just have made her glamorous — what are you doing?”  Nevertheless, Thalberg’s judgment was solid.

The Good Earth began under a cloud when its original director, George W. Hill, newly arrived back in Hollywood after having spent several months in China to shoot background plates for atmospheric scenes, suddenly committed suicide. The movie went on hiatus. Sometime later, it was reassigned to Metro stalwart, Sidney Franklin. Rainer knew nothing of Hill. But she deeply admired Thalberg, and his passing left her feeling vulnerable and with a terrible artistic void. “His dying was a terrible shock to us. He was young (37 years old) and ever so able. Had it not been that he died, I think I may have stayed much longer in films.” Owing to Thalberg’s influence, not only on this movie, but the entire picture-making biz during its early sound era, Mayer afforded Thalberg the following dedication – “To the Memory of Irving Grant Thalberg – his last greatest achievement – we dedicate this picture.” Throughout his reign, Thalberg had never accepted screen credit for his involvement in shaping Metro’s product, claiming “credit you give yourself is not worth a damn!” Yet, in death, his contributions and legacy were to be acknowledged in more ways than one. Hollywood in totem effectively closed its doors on the day of his funeral – an honor never before - and never again - afforded any of its creative alumni. Mayer, who had considered Thalberg a thorn in his side in these latter years, now helped establish the Irving Thalberg Academy Award for excellence. And Mayer would also rechristen the studio’s newly built administrative offices as The Irving Thalberg Building – an honor intact until the late sixties’ when foundering ‘new management’ felt the company’s ‘old-fashion-ness’ was hurting MGM’s reputation and removed the plaque from the wall. With the relocation of Columbia Studios to the old MGM backlot after Lorimar Telepictures decamped in 1989, and, Sony’s acquisition of Columbia, Thalberg’s name plate was reinstated.

After establishing the mood of the piece with a few stock shots, director, Sidney Franklin settles in on the story of an introvert - O-Lan, a slave in a ‘great house’, sold into marriage to a modest farmer, Wang Lung (the brilliant Paul Muni). O-Lan is, at first, fearful of her husband. Gradually, she comes to respect him. He, in turn, promises no harm will come to her in his house. The two work the land together and have a son. But Wang’s father (Charles Grapewin) and freeloading uncle (Walter Connelly) are superstitious. Eventually, their greatest fears are realized when a devastating famine wipes out all Wang’s crops. Impoverished and forced to flee from the ominous and advancing revolution – O-Lan is nearly assassinated by revolutionary soldiers for stealing some jewels from the now decamped ‘great house.’ In a sequence that must rank among the finest Hollywood has ever committed to film, the estate is stormed by starving peasants, ransacked with terrific speed, leaving O-Lan to be crushed under foot. Trampled into unconsciousness, but still very much alive, she awakens to bear witness as a firing squad shoots many of the looters. But before she too can be executed, the army is recalled to fight.

The reprieve is bittersweet. Giving the jewels to Wang, he mounts a campaign to regain his land. But the plot turns sour when Wang decides to take up with a wanton loot player, Lotus (Tilly Losch), a woman who uses Wang for his money, then turns to his eldest son for sexual comfort, thus driving a wedge between father and son. Distraught, Wang banishes his son and Lotus from the ‘great house’ while O-Lan, who has never fully recovered from her injuries, looks on with helpless abandonment. However, before either the harvest or exile can take place, a horrifying plague of locust descend upon the crops. This sequence is one of the most visceral and disturbing – a feast for Buddy Gillespie’s SFX department. Wang’s son comes up with the idea to set ablaze part of their fields, thus creating a smoke barrier between the locust and the remaining crops. The plan works and Wang’s faith in his son is restored. O-Lan, grateful for the smallest of mercies, lies on her deathbed, even as Wang and the rest of the family celebrate the marriage of his son to another Chinese woman.

The Good Earth remains one of the finest pictures in MGM’s canon, teeming with author, Pearl Buck’s rich characterizations of Asian culture. Buck – born, Pearl Sydenstricker Buck in 1892, and, the daughter of missionaries, had spent most of her early life before 1934 in Zhenjiang, China. So, The Good Earth was derived from personal experiences. Its publication in 1931 was followed one year later by Buck’s winning the Pulitzer for outstanding literature. Although Buck would continue to write – prolifically, in fact - after 1935, back in the U.S., her greatest notoriety as an authoress was already behind her by the time The Good Earth made it to the big screen. Although Oscar-nominated as Best Picture – The Good Earth lost that coveted top spot to The Life of Emile Zola (ironically, also to star Paul Muni – a chameleon’s choice, who effectively played everything from Louie Pasteur to Antonio ‘Scarface’ Camonte with shape-shifting conviction). Viewed today, The Good Earth’s somewhat glacial pace is ever so slightly obscured by Rainer’s introspective performance.  Denied dialogue, Rainer unearths a startling array of emotions, building upon an introverted exterior, and gradually, to layer ever so gently the more refined sincerity and content of O-lan’s character – otherwise kept hidden within a society where women share no voice as they bear the glories and chaos their men folk have wrought. Rainer’s performance endures as a staggeringly original and altogether successful portrait of the subservient whose depth of compassion is greater and more evolved than her outspoken contemporaries. That The Good Earth has all but vanished from public view in more recent times is truly an obscenity.

Warner Home Video’s DVD is sub-par in overall quality, if still watchable. Although much of the image endures with solid tonality, various scenes appear to have been sourced from less than perfect elements, or even ‘second generation’ dupe negatives, resulting in an excessively grainy image with amplified distortions and occasionally blown out contrast. Age-related artifacts are everywhere and occasionally quite distracting. Horizontal scratches are the most common, and a little white speckling. Contrast is anemic at best. Fine details are often obscured during scenes shot at night. The audio is 1.0 mono and presented at a reasonable listening level, with minimal hiss and pop. Extras amount to two short subjects – neither of interest to the movie itself, and, a badly worn theatrical trailer. Bottom line: The Good Earth is a devastatingly handsome production that plays with Shakespearean overtones as a heart-rending tragedy. Viewed today, it has lost none of its ability to captivate and break our hearts. This DVD is not up to snuff, and one would sincerely wish for the Warner Archive to endeavor to make a newly remastered Blu-ray available when time and moneys permit. Otherwise, recommended, though mostly - for content.

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

4

VIDEO/AUDIO

2.5

EXTRAS

0