SYNOPSICS
The Reckless Moment (1949) is a English movie. Max Ophüls has directed this movie. James Mason,Joan Bennett,Geraldine Brooks,Henry O'Neill are the starring of this movie. It was released in 1949. The Reckless Moment (1949) is considered one of the best Crime,Drama,Film-Noir movie in India and around the world.
In the charming community of Balboa 50 miles from Los Angeles, middle-class housewife Lucia Harper travels to Los Angeles to meet scoundrel, Ted Darby. Her seventeen year-old daughter Beatrice is in love with Ted. He asks for money to leave Bea, but Lucia refuses to give any. Bea does not believe her mother when told and during the night she sneaks out to the boat garage to meet Ted who admits that Lucia told the truth. Bea pushes him and Ted falls to his on an anchor. The next morning, Lucia finds the body and assumes that Bea has killed her lover. She decides to get rid of the corpse and puts it in her boat and dumps it far from home. When the police find Ted, a stranger, Martin Donnelly, visits Lucia to blackmail her on behalf of his partner, Nagel who has several letters Bea had written to Ted. Donnelly wants $5000 for the letters. The desperate Lucia tries to raise the amount. Martin falls in love with Lucia and tries to help her too. The dangerous Nagel wants to receive the ...
Same Actors
Same Director
The Reckless Moment (1949) Reviews
Joan Bennett highlights Max Opuls' nuanced, ironic film noir
The sultry temptress of Fritz Lang's Scarlet Street and The Woman in the Window, Joan Bennett dons spectacles and a harried mien as a respectable mother in a California coastal town. Family life is proving nettlesome, what with a husband traveling the globe on business, a teenage son drawn to inappropriate states of attire, and two live-ins, a father-in-law and a cook/housekeeper. The nettle-in-chief, however, is her handful of a daughter (Geraldine Brooks). Like her predecessor Veda Pierce, she fancies herself a worldly woman and has taken up with a penniless but pretentious lecher, who winds up dead. Bennett's battle to cover up the death becomes the story's meat. Into the mix ambles James Mason, wanting $5-grand for incriminating love letters.... Mason, with an Irish lilt, is the film's most intricately shaded character (and he gets top billing) but Bennett delivers a controlled, expert performance, possibly her finest. The star of The Reckless Moment, however, is the great Max Ophuls (though the directorial credit has it "Opuls"). Displaying evocative chiaroscuro -- Burnett Guffey was cinematographer -- and voluptuous slow takes, Ophuls creates a rich texture ranging from shabby seaside respectability to the grungy sidewalks of nearby Los Angeles. This splendidly nuanced work has emerged as one of the standouts of the noir cycle, its ironies so understated that their oppressive weight isn't felt until long after the film has unspooled.
Top notch suspense melodrama with excellent cast.
'The Reckless Moment' is Max Ophuls' excellent 1949 suspense melodrama, starring James Mason as a blackmailer who falls in love with his desperate victim (Joan Bennett). Ophuls direction is superb, with the suspense mounting in every scene as housewife Bennett, mistakenly believing her daughter has killed a man, disposes the body and tries desperately to hide the girl's involvement from the police and her family. Then Mason appears, demanding money for incriminating love letters he has which the daughter had written to the dead man. The plot thickens from there, with Bennett trying to shield her family from scandal as the blackmailer begins to admire and then love the devoted housewife and mother. James Mason is always excellent in sinister roles, and his performance here is one of his best, though his character's motivation isn't quite clear. By his own admission, he's a loser who's never done a decent thing in his life, so why he suddenly develops a conscience is never fully explained. But who wouldn't fall in love with beautiful Joan Bennett, giving the performance of her career as the desperate mother who's commonplace life is suddenly turned upside down by crime and blackmail. Ophuls, who the year before had guided Joan Fontaine through one of her greatest performances in 'Letter From an Unknown Woman,' drew from Bennett her most natural, believable performance. She's never been better. Highly recommended for the outstanding direction and two great stars in peak form.
Not a wasted frame
Near perfect, this is a marvellous and magical non stop emotional thriller with the camera moving with such fluidity we can only stare in wonder. As the camera swirls, so does the middle class family of Joan Bennett. She is constantly keeping the plates in the air, cheering them along chiding them at dinner or suggesting changes of clothes. When trouble strikes it is she who has to confront the big bad world and visit the boat shed, the less salubrious parts of town and confront people and issues she never has before. All seems to depend upon her and James mason's character appears forcing financial worries on top of all else. Until he falls for her and begins to relent and finally even more. Not a wasted frame.
Excellent 40's thriller.
This movie is result of an unusual combination, of a foreign movie director working within limitations of Hollywood in the 40's. This is really one most impressive thrillers and of my favorite movies. Ophuls does a great job working within pretty simple story line and illustrating how strong of a grip a family can have on a person life and how quickly it can come apart when fate intervenes. Ophuls camera creates nagging, dark atmosphere out of this middle class community, sort of like on a Twin Peaks episode. The story deals with a housewife, played by Joan Bennett, having to manage her family while her husband is abroad. Her daughter's relationship eventually escalates into blackmail and Joan has to deal secretly by herself with this problem, while trying to manage her family and keep everything under control. Bennett is excellent at portraying a person whose world is slowly caving in under pressure. Ophuls cleverly uses just about every scene to illustrate the tensions and inner conflicts of Bennett's character. James Mason is great as a refined crook who suddenly finds himself feeling empathy for others. Can't think of too many actors who could pull this off, or other places in time where this character would work. In addition to strong acting performances, there are lot of interesting allegory in the things which Ophuls shows and a very strong ending make this movie a masterpiece.. A + most strongly recommended.
Blackmail, murder, and dark secrets
An unusual film, this slow-burner starring Joan Bennett and James Mason seems like a straight-forward murder and blackmail case, but that's only part of the story. Joan Bennett is the mother living apart from her husband (he's working away), and coping with her growing son and daughter, and their maid. James Mason is an Irish low-life, who hopes to make money from Bennett's family misfortunes. From the start, where we see the 'murder' and find out what really happened, to the startling ending, this film, directed by Max Ophüls, grips. Aside from the two leads, Geraldine Brooks is good as the teenage daughter struggling with a lost love affair and the hormonal rage of puberty; and Kathryn Card is suitably condescending as she refuses to loan money to the increasingly desperate Bennett. 'The Reckless Moment' has a frisson of noir, and a strong script. It is a minor film, certainly, but a rewarding one.