When he directed this classic, Laughton had recently taught Mitchum and Winters acting. He uses all of his cast adeptly here. There is a real Queer sensibility to this film, I can't quite put my finger on where it lays. It is certainly there in the wonderful stylised sets but maybe it is also there in the love/hate relationship the director/ camera has with a very rough trade Mitchum ? It is my sense that this is why audiences and straight studio heads missed the brilliance of the film when it was released in Eisenhower's America. It is remiss of me not to mention Ms Gish by now; she is wonderful as she plays larger than life entrancingly and diminutively. It is the norm to bemoan the fact that the tortured homo that was Charles Laughton was discouraged and never made another film: I see it differently, for me the singularity of the work makes it all the more beautiful and valuable.
* Like all films today the synopsis is easily available anywhere on www. It is the only film directed by Charles Laughton, an openly Gay actor known for his portrayals of Quasimodo and Henry the 8th, and debuted in 1955.
* Like all films today the synopsis is easily available anywhere on www. It is the only film directed by Charles Laughton, an openly Gay actor known for his portrayals of Quasimodo and Henry the 8th, and debuted in 1955.
