Something to Live For

Jenny Carey is an actress but her dependence on alcohol and a destructive relationship is threatening her blossoming career. A married reformed alcoholic Tony Miller tries to help her but they soon fall in love, straining his marriage.

Sleek romance with a subtle ending in which the couple increasingly face a dependence of a different type, which helps them avoid a return to alcoholism. Joan Fontaine and Ray Milland play the couple with Teresa Wright as the wife.

I am surprised to see how subtle this film actually is in its depiction of alcoholism. There are no great dramatic scenes, and the film is based more on character than plot. An actress calls for help played adequately well by Joan Fontaine ( I did not feel she was at ease in the film ) and Ray Milland arrives to help as he has been through the same addiction, and in many subtle ways the scenario shows the temptation of drink and how probably, despite all ' cures ' the need never really goes away. This aspect Milland explains in a glance, and his wife excellently played by Theresa Wright watches and by a look expresses more than dialogue. As for the dialogue I found most of it natural and only in sequences of a dreadful Broadway play does it descend into banality. But with the absurd title of ' The Egyptions ' ' with terrible sets and costumes George Stevens should have chosen better. The ending is low key and yes many could find this dull, and given the publics need for melodrama in films dealing with this subject ( I'll Cry Tomorrow with Susan Hayward is an example ) the way Steven's treats it could appear too soft. In fact it appeared to me quite the contrary, showing how it can develop ' love ' out of need more than true equality of relationship and also how jobs could be put into jeopardy. There is a cruel scene at a party where everyone knows that Milland and Fontaine are ' together ' despite Milland's wife being there as well, and both are mocked and humiliated which was cruelly accurate of certain human behaviour. This is George Steven's at his best. and his best is very good indeed. He made a few uneven films, and this in its way is one of them, but he also made ' Shane ' and ' A Place in the Sun, ' both fine examples of inner suffering in cinema. It should also be remembered that he filmed the liberation of places like Dachau, and that he could not film comedy afterwards. But coming back to ' Something to Live for ' it is flawed, but it also has a quiet punch about human nature that hits hard.

Sophisticated tale of a married alcoholic who strays in order to rekindle his own inner fire, SOMETHING TO LIVE FOR (1952) has an almost un-American delicacy. A mere advertising man wasting creative talents on shoe campaigns, Ray Milland comes to the rescue of a fellow alcoholic who happens to be a talented actress recovering from an abusive relationship with a narcissistic director. Joan Fontaine gives arguably her best performance as a sensitive soul saved by her love for a married man who's fighting similar demons. Their impossible love nonetheless strengthnes both of them.

Director George Stevens paints an intimate portrait of Manhattan work life and night life, including a beautiful evocation of what Broadway theater used to be. He makes space for Fontaine's vulnerability without going maudlin, and gets Milland to let down his guard as the most skewered of lovers. There's so much to love in the framing and lighting, above all a spontaneity thrillingly incarnated by Fontaine.

The script by Dwight. Taylor is stunning - Romantic but not unrealistic, capturing aspects of the artistic temperament and the human need for love that will inspire artists of all ages.

The movie centers around Milland and Fontaine two alcoholics on the verge of a co-dependent romance. Milland is sober and is trying to help Fontaine, an actress, stop drinking. He is married to Teresa Wright, and has a couple of kids, but none the less finds himself drawn to Fontaine. He finds he is just as needy as her and falls in love, despite the fact that his wife is pregnant. The romance is doomed from the start. In the end Wright and Milland are still together, he realizing that the love for the other woman is not real love, but dependency. I do not see the spark between Ray and Joan. I think another pairing might have been more real. This reminds me a bit of A Life of Her Own, with he and Lana Turner as the doomed lovers. Not much of a spark there either. If George Stevens meant to make a Days of Wine and Roses, he should have shown more of the alcohol abuse with Fontaine. In real life a AA mentor would hardly of fallen in love, with the person he is trying to help. Trading one addiction for another is not the answer.

Despite the fact that you have a good cast, this fails to be a good film, merely because of the script and direction. It is dull from start to finish, and apart from a scene where Ray Milland and Joan Fontaine are reading a script together and then kiss, there is nothing to commend it. I'm not particularly a fan of Theresa Wright, and although her performance may be commendable, she doesn't grow or develop in the part. It is one- dimensional from beginning to end. Having said that, it doesn't harm any of their careers. Fontaine would go on to do 'Ivanhoe' in the same year, and Milland would go on to do 'Dial M For Murder' with Hitchcock. This suggests that as an actor you should do as many films as possible so that the good ones can cancel out the bad ones.