No Sad Songs for Me

No Sad Songs for Me-480P

The most interesting part of this singular film is the co-acting between Margaret Sullavan and Viveca Lindfors. They both love the same man, and Viveca is intent on leaving him not knowing that his wife Margaret is dying, while Margaret is intent on leaving her family to her after her death. They are rivals but very sympathetic and find each other, and Viveca also has a tragedy behind, having lost her husband in the war after too short a marriage, and somehow they find each other in their mutual fathomless sorrow and sadness. The story is not remarkable. It's an ordinary melodrama in the style of Douglas Sirk, Margaret thinks she is crowning her family happiness by at last having another child, and hopefully a son, when the doctor tells her otherwise. She forces him to tell her the whole truth, which is that she only has six months left to live. She decides not to tell her husband (Wendell Corey), but although he gets mixed up with the lovely Viveca, who is employed as his assistant, he decides that Margaret and their daughter (Natalie Wood) mean more to him than Viveca, without knowing his wife is dying. This is a rather ordinary sob story, but Margaret Sullavan turns it into something much more advanced by her heart-rending acting, which is totally sincere and almost unbearably convincing all the way. Your heart will bleed for her, and you will sob throughout the film, if you are human. Only she knows what she is up to, while the others just carry on, believing she is on as well, and her doctor plays a key role as he knows the whole truth and has to stand by her without any power to do anything. To all this comes the very prudent and delicate score by George During which gradually transcends into Brahms (1st symphony, last movement), which eventually gives the film something of an apotheosis of the kind that Frank Borage used to excel in, who made several of Margaret Sullavan's best films. She is forgotten today, but all her films stand out still, and she was actually married to Henry Fonda to begin with. This was her last film and in some ways both her most personal and typical.

Recalling Frank Borzage's movies in which Margaret Sullavan was often cast as the unfortunate heroine ("three comrades" "moral storm" ,classics all); it was her final film. Not unlike "dark victory " in which Bette Davis was the last to know about her terminally-ill condition (memorable scene of the menu) ,from the beginning the doctor reveals her patient that she only has a few months to live ,but she insists her husband be unaware of her condition;hence the doctor's beautiful lines to Wendell Corey :" she has been playing her role for five months ,now,it's up to you" . The movie is a hymn to the family and the gypsy's predictions are ,in their way ,quite true . There are no sad songs ,no self-pity, no words about the awful truth ,but sometimes a sentence almost gives her away (she cannot complete a sentence after the word "before") and some lines remind her of her condition (the policeman: "you have to read the road signs if you want to live long".)Let's also mention the New Year 's celebration , when Sullavan watches the clock just before it strikes twelve ,and her last year .... The ending is treated with a great modesty: a close shot of a black phone, then Viveca Lindfords listens to the call , returns to the piano where she joins the little girl (Nathalie Wood) to play a tune ; Polly has this admirable word "smile" .

Although it's sometimes difficult to do, judging a 1950's film with 2000's social mores and sense of letting it all hang out is probably not the best way to view this film, a sensitive and understated tale of a woman with cancer. Having lived through a time when the word was usually whispered rather than stated, and was usually not talked about in polite company, I know that Sullivan's horror at discovering not only that she cannot have a child but that she is also stricken with a killer illness is quietly realistic for the time (this is not a spoiler, such information revealed with the first ten minutes of the film). Sullivan delivers an amazing subtle performance, understated in her refusal to stage hysterical scenes of unhappiness, quietly demonstrating strength in attempting, as many people do, to not "become a burden." Underrated Wendell Corey, who is a powerful player in such melodramas as Harriet Craig and Desert Fury, is Sullivan's Mr. Average Guy, an amiable husband who loves his wife, kid, and work--and it is at work he meets a young woman who tempts him, a woman whose history reveals some hidden strengths. Enough said. Sure it's a weeper, supremely so as it gathers steam, but unlike a Crawford or Davis film, Sullivan's heroine is all about self-effacement and loving no matter what the cost, and thus appears to many contemporary viewers as a dated woman; the Oscar-nominated music score George Dunning (with plenty of help from Brahms) constantly underscores the film with a quiet persuasiveness; the supporting cast, including a delightfully thoughtful Natalie Wood deliver the goods.

I have seen many films of this theme a la dying of incurable illness.. Bette Davis made her dynamic imprint with Dark Victory. Lana Turner moved beyond soap opera and made Madame X impossible to not weep in her demise.. Margaret Sullavan simplifies and shines in a glowing performance in this film.. With her incredibly unique speaking voice,her subtleties that are hers alone,this is an experience to marvel and weep over time and time again. An undervalued jewel!

Margaret Sullavan's last film and she didn't go out on a high. "No Sad Songs for Me" is a weepie and not a very good one. Margaret has only ten months to live, (she has cancer), but being the stoic, self-sacrificing type all she worries about is her husband, (Wendell Corey, very good considering the material), and her daughter, (Natalie Wood, obnoxious in pigtails). Rudolph Mate was the director and I suppose he did his best under the circumstances while Viveca Lindfors is 'the other woman' Margaret would be happy her husband settles down with after she's gone. Mercifully, her ten months fairly fly by and the movie manages to clock in at under ninety minutes.

I do like sad movies, ones that tugs at your heartstrings, I do love the movie Somewhere in Time by the way. However this movie is the most frustrating movie I have watched in a long time. What I don't like about this so-called tearjerker is that the wife, played by Margaret Sullivan, never tells her husband she is dying. He only finds it out at the very end of the movie by error when he sees a pill bottle on the bedroom table and calls up the doctor who tells him. Even the doctor doesn't tell him. She thinks she's saving him grief by not telling him, but to me she's just selfish. This was six months after she knew she had cancer. The first half an hour was okay, but when her husband is having an affair with his co-worker, even then she tells no one. Nothing in this movie seemed genuine. They even played a melody from a Brahm's symphony which I love, over and over to the point where I couldn't stand to listen to it any more. The acting was artificial from everyone. If you like soap operas this might be enjoyable, but for people who like sad movies every once in a while, this was disappointing and a waste of my time. Margaret Sullivan's last movie was not her best

There's no time for songs when you've got less than a year to live, and for wife and mother Margaret Sullavan, finding out that she has cancer and only six to ten months of a productive life left has her setting the wheels in motion of how she intends to finish off her life with dignity, concentrating on continuing the lives of husband Wendell Corey and daughter Natalie Wood. When rumors of an affair between Corey and his assistant Viveca Lindfors circulate within her social circle, Sullavan puts a plan in motion that will move the future forward. This most delightful of tearjerkers isn't so much sad as it is moving. Here is a woman of such pure unselfishness who isn't prideful to not see the importance of her mission, and see the years ahead she won't physically be a part of. After surviving the material trappings of wife Joan Crawford in "Harriett Craig" and fight the fury of Barbara Stanwyck in the same year's "The Furies", Corey took on a gentler partner with Ms. Sullavan here. She gives a bravura performance as that most laughable of 30's movie heroines: the completely noble wife, but with the onslaught of time and lots of tougher, more manipulative females, Sullavan's lady is a delightful change of pace. Corey still has that brick wall acting style, but this time, he's not a sap, so the result is a somewhat stronger performance. Lindfors, wasted during the film's first three quarters with small appearances here and there, strongly brings her character to life in the last quarter, making you see why Corey would be tempted by her, and understand why Sullavan might choose her as a potential replacement. This is evidenced in a scene where Sullavan visits her home town and runs into a male widowed friend who is now involved with a selfish harpy. Wood manages not to inflict too much pre-teen obnoxiousness into this character, making her more real for a change and not a pain in the neck that on occasion in her roles could make you wince every time she came on screen. As far as women's pictures go, many of them attempt to manipulate the audience's emotions, but this one steers clear of that path. This can be attributed to a better than average screenplay and Sullavan's believable portrayal of a wonderful woman fighting for a dark victory with dignity and class.

Cancer was still something to be whispered about in 1950 (and, of course, it was less prevalent then than it's become in the meantime) and the rather melodramatic way in which it's uttered here can be quite a surprise to modern viewers. Thankfully, some sensitive acting and pretty well modulated direction help keep this film from getting too far out of hand, though it does get a tad sticky, despite the title. Sullavan plays a housewife, devoted to her engineer husband Corey and their precocious daughter Wood, who goes in to see her doctor (McIntire) about a potential pregnancy, but, instead, is told that she has an advanced case of cancer. Determining that she has about 10 months to live, only 6 of them fully on her feet, she decides to keep this from her family and attempt to live as normal a life as possible. Looking more wan with each passing weak (not something ascertained by the black and white photography, but indicated by Sullavan's continual application of blush and the pinching of her cheeks to add color!), she frets about the fate of her family after she's gone. As it turns out, things may not be too horrible for them after all since Corey has hired a lovely Swedish "draftsman" in the form of Lindfors who he works with in close proximity and for long hours. It isn't long before Corey is placing Lindfors in the sites of his surveying scope and he doesn't even know that Sullavan is sick! The town hens begin to pick up on it, though, and when they warn Sullavan, she thinks about how to turn lemons into lemonade. Sullavan, in her last big screen role, is sincere and strong in a part that could easily have veered into camp. Looking a bit like June Allyson in certain shots, she elicits viewer compassion even though the bulk of the trouble she takes on, apart from the disease, is her own fault! It's quite preposterous that a woman could deteriorate and die from cancer with no one in her presence aware that she's ill, but Sullavan pulls it off as well as anyone could. Corey is appealing and multi-dimensional. His affection for Sullavan and his attraction for Lindfors are palpable. Lindfors does an admirable job, not allowing herself to be painted just one color either. A very gangly Wood is uncharacteristically grating here, overacting in some moments and coming off as a pest in others. McIntire's role makes little sense. One minute he's trying to inform Corey of Sullavan's illness without informing HER and then he's content to let Corey go uninformed until the 11th hour! He also gives her nearly a year to live, but with no procedures or treatment aside from painkillers. If this is a glimpse into the ethics and integrity of doctors in the 1950's, we have certainly come a long way since. His real life wife Nolan plays the same in the film. The premise is far-fetched to be sure (and has been done, variously, many times in movies and on TV), but somehow the cast and director make it work to a great extent. Look out for the New Years Eve party that contains more streamers than can be imagined! Sullavan, an actress who frequently died on screen and who portrayed attempted suicide victims a couple of times (including here) actually took her own life with an overdose about a decade after this film was released when depression and a congenital defect took away her hearing.

I thought it was a bit over the top when it came to melodrama. But I have to chuckle at those that review the old movies and talk about "sexism" and "racism." There is a cure for that - don't watch these movies. The film was about a woman who, given 10 months to live from cancer, decides to get her affairs in order and wants to make sure that her child and husband are settled. Do not take the word of the goofy person who reviewed this and obviously didn't understand the film, but watch the film yourself. Wendell Corey was wonderful as the husband. Yes, things definitely are different today (the doctor not wanting to tell the patient she is dying but the nurse picking up the phone to tell the husband is against HIPAA laws today) but this was not set in the present day.