Cheap Lonelyhearts (Video) (Montgomery Clift, Myrna Loy) (Vincent J. Donehue) Price

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Customer Reviews of Lonelyhearts

Wasted opportunity
Based on one of the handful of great American novels - by Nathaniel West, the author of "Day of the Locust", who died very young - this film was a wasted opportunity that is interesting none the less. The cast is wonderful but the surrealistic novel is both adapted and directed as if it were a social reality tract. Clift is fine as a shattered center, uncomfortably true to his own life at the time, but he's truer to the source material than the film is, so seems at odds with it. Myrna Loy is wonderful in a part that hardly exists in the book, and could have been cut from the film. To give you an idea who should have directed this material, Cocteau would have been ideal. Or Ken Russell before he became Hollywood bloated. Other plays have been written from the novel, but it's a black poem, and like "Locust" perhaps no film could truly express it. All the same, see it, then find the book. It could be argued it's the greatest American art novel ever written, rivaled only by the work of James Purdy and Jane Bowles.

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Poor Monty!
"Loneleyhearts" has two strong attributes in it's' favor: A solid plot premise and a very strong cast. The latter encompass Robert Ryan, Myrna Loy and Montgomery Clift. The story line concerns an advise columnist for the lovelorn who gets "slightly too involved" with one of his (married!) readers. The movie then proceeds directly downhill. None of the roles gel and the substantial talents of all 3 are wasted. The major problem with LH is that it was originally a play. The stage origins are patently obvious and there is absolutely NO transition to the screen. The lines are appropriate for a play but certainly not for a movie with any sort of action or flow. Ryan is wooden as a "cynical, big city editor who has seen it all". Loy plays his mousy, subjective wife and appears almost embarrassed at her inconsequential role. Clift is the hapless writer. The viewer expects some fireworks when his "admirer's" husband discovers their one night stand. The plot not only fails to thicken, it limply falls flat. LH was filmed in 1959, when Monty was still suffering physically and emotionally from his car crash. That much is starkly obvious here! The poor guy seems drugged. It is painful to watch him. We can all live with one poor movie. The only tragedy would be if viewers don't realize the superior work these 3 have done in so many other films. For a rare treat, catch Ryan in the undershown 1973 release "Executive Action", about the JFK assassination.

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Miss Lonelyhearts
In Patricia Bosworth's biography of Montgomery Clift, Clift is said to have hated the Dore Schary screenplay based on the novel by Nathaniel West and the play by Howard Teichman, calling it "Miss Lonelyhearts meets Andy Hardy", a joke on Schary as head of MGM. Whilst the treatment changes the fate of the Christ-like figure played by Clift, the character still suffers. He is burdened by the anguish of those who write to his advice column, his editor (Robert Ryan) is in pathological rage over the infidelity of his wife, his father is in jail for killing his Clift's mother, and his girlfriend is so controlling and possessive that she wants to know his "every thought". West's cynicism is prevalent in the Ryan character's ugliness - his contempt for humanity who he thinks are all fakes and frauds, and his humiliation of his wife as projected guilt over his own affairs. This all sounds pretty glum, and whilst I tend to agree with Clift's assessment of the Schary screenplay with the Clift romance with Dolores Hart as bland, one can be amused by the many ironies behind the scenes here. Casting Clift as a man who does not drink and one to dispense advice to the lost is laughable in light of Clift's alcoholism and shattered emotional state after his infamous car crash. However Clift remained a handsome man, perhaps even the change added character to his former face, and his shattered sensitivity makes his acting all the more remarkable. If him calling Hart "dear" and the way he leans on her reveals an essential falseness, the directness with Ryan more than compensates. Bosworth details the trouble the filmmakers had in capturing the scene where Clift punches someone, with Ryan finally providing the closeup, but Clift's pain afterwards is all too real. As Ryan's wife, Myrna Loy doesn't have much to do except be a masochist to Ryan's bile, but Maureen Stapleton is fun as a lonelyhearts letter writer who Ryan goads Clift into meeting. Stapleton's vengeful spite is very funny. Director Vincent J Donehue is said to have come from the theatre, which may explain the basic uncinematic style of the film, with the only notable visual image being a pan along a tree branch and back to suggest the passage of time.