Johnny Eager 1942

 

M.G. Empty or how Green Was My Valley Of Decision.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer ah the very name conjures up images of satin and silk. Furs and Art Deco interiors, and more stars then there are in heaven. From the start they were not known for gangster films or streets running red with the blood of small time hoods and tough guy gangsters. That was Warner Bros.

And one of the big time directors of the era worked big at both. Mervyn LeRoy's career loomed large and long at both studios during the golden age of Hollywood. His career began in 1927 and ended in 1966 quite a run. His Warner Bros. Years was full of harsh sharp edge gangster movies and stories “torn from the headlines” as studio publicity liked to use in their ads. Leroy made “Little Caesar,” “I am a Fugitive From A Chain Gang “,”Five Star Final” and a big Busby Berkley musical Gold Diggers of 1933 all within a 3 year time span. He was in the money, and these films still shake and shudder me.

Then in the late 30's he moved on to M.G.M. Where he made big budget smooth women weepie movies like “Random Harvest,” “Waterloo Bridge”, “Blossoms In The Dust”,and “Madame Curie” and also found time to produce “The Wizard Of Oz”. Making big bucks and big movies was his game and he did it very well.

Which brings me to the movie I saw of his the other night 1942's war time Johnny Eager. This one has glamour,silk and satin, but it also has harshness and criminality that recall his Warner Bros. Days. Its a bowl of slick MGM mixed with Warner Bros. Grime.

This was not an easy one to pull off and LeRoy mostly does a good job telling the story of a real rotten apple, no soul, harsh and nasty to everyone including his best friend, a poetic sensitive soft young Van Helflin who is also alcoholic, depressed and wounded. More about Van later. Meanwhile let me focus on who he got to play the lead criminal and racketeer.

Robert Taylor who began life in films as a soft pretty young actor in such forgotten little nubs as “A Wicked Woman” “Buried Loot”, “Society Doctor,” “Times Sq. Lady” & “Murder In The Fleet” before making it somewhat big as Irene Dunne's co-star in the original “Magnificent Obsession” and as Garbo's young lover in “Camille” which did it.

He was coasting on his very good looks, that profile, that nose but he was treading water as rumors were running wild because of his sexuality which is still brought up in red light stories about Hollywood. Was he gay? Some say yes, some say duh we don't know, so he had to be “butched” up, regardless of who he played around with. This was a mama's boy oh boy oh boy so the studio big boss Louie B. got him married to that tough as nails gal and also rumored lesbian the great Barbara Stanwyck.

The stories of these two still bounce and ricochet off the walls of the internet, and fill big hefty bios. The latest one on Stanwyck weighs a ton and is soft around the edges. No smut or scandal here. Anyway getting back to Bob who as Johnny was given a butch look including a nice little mustache and a nasty persona as a racketeer gangster who will do anything to make a buck and keep his head and body out of prison where when the movie opens he is just out of and working a taxi driver.

This is of course a ruse, a nice surprise for the audience as hey we believe it when he goes to his parole office but we quickly realize he's still on the game running rackets and living the life of a crook, and he lies about everything to get away with his rackets and crimes. Women are of course all over him the sexual innuendos are quite randy for the time, but he just uses them without any remorse or feelings for them.

Toss them away and get on with your conniving and lying Johnny. That is until he falls for a soft conniving Lana Turner, all blonde fluffy and sexy who just so happens to be the step daughter of the vengeful prosecutor played by the always good Edward Arnold who first put Johnny in a cell and is out to do it again if he can.

Supposedly Bob and Lana hit it off big time off screen and filled the gossip rags with lots of sex talk for months which of course got Babs in a tiff. Personally I don't believe any of it, but never mind, they do burn up the screen which is all that mattered to movie audiences. They wanted their movie stars to be movie stars and these two filled the bill.

Meanwhile Taylor/Johnny schemes to make Lana his fall gal and uses her in a plan to make her think that she has killed a rival gangster. She really didn't. Hey Lana its only ketchup on his shirt. Doesn't matter Lana goes off the deep end and winds up on planet Debbie even though Taylor tries to convince her that the guy is still alive. Poor Lana, a decade or so later, her life will become like this movie. Taylor is surprisingly good playing bad, and this will become his winning hand in the years to come including his embracing of far right wing politics and his founding of the Motion Picture Alliance For The Preservation of American Ideals along with his giving damaging testimony before The House Committee on Un-American Activities naming Karen Morley and Howard DaSilva as communists thus ruining their film careers. To his credit he did this reluctantly and refused to appear unless subpoenaed.
He was and he did.

The End fades out as Taylor lies in the gutter cradled not by Lana but by sweet confused Van Heflin. Tears rolling down his face and hey wait a minute is this really what I'm seeing, what I thought I saw through most of the film? The minute Heflin appears my gaydar went off loud and screeching. This is an early 40's closeted gay man. Coded for sure but I got it and Van I got it. Of course the critics of the day never saw this or simply ignored it, but many contemporary reviewers of the film make a point to point this deep dark gay romance “out” in their reviews.

This is of course not the first movie of the time to use coded gay romances, there are quite a few including this one, “Captains Courgeous”, and “Test Pilot” which come to mind. It was and it is a coded gay romance between Taylor and Heflin, and of course that's why Van is a walking drunk through the entire film, mooning and sprouting romantic lines of poetry at Taylor and begging him to go off to the mountains with him and not being able to accept who he is. Heflin 34 at the time went on to win a best supporting actor Oscar for his superb and moving performance. At the time Supporting winners were given a plaque instead of the statuette but this changed in 1943. This one is well worth a look, not only Heflin's staggering performance but also for the glory of M.G.M. Film making at its height.