This Property Is Condemned
(1966)
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Sydney Pollack directs this steamy melodrama co-scripted by Francis Ford Coppola from a play by Southern Gothic maestro Tennessee Williams. Robert Redford stars as Owen Legate, a handsome railroad official who comes to Depression-era Dodson, Mississippi, to shut down the local rail yard and lay off its already struggling employees. When Legate begins a passionate affair with town flirt Alva Starr (Natalie Wood)--a small town girl with big dreams of escaping her dead-end surroundings--the romance angers Alva's domineering mother (Kate Reid) and ignites the town's economic resentments, provoking an act of revenge against the lovers. |
This adaptation of Tennessee Williams's early one-act play was to have starred Elizabeth Taylor with Richard Burton to direct. Francis Ford Coppola — who once directed a college production — was one of the screenwriters, but though his name appears on the credits he had little to do with the film that was eventually made. The setting is a boarding house during the Depression where the landlady exploits her daughter Alva's charms to attract custom. But Alva — gorgeous Natalie Wood — has her eye on nice Robert Redford, who has arrived in town to lay off the railroad men. The beautiful camerawork (courtesy of James Wong Howe), the fresh performances and Sydney Pollack's assured direction keep this impressive film from overheating in the usual Williams manner.
Halliwell's Film Guide
The Tennessee Williams mixture as before, quite well done but almost entirely resistible.