The Cobweb (1955)

the audience applauded

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

I'm watching this right now and wow what a mess. It's total nonsense first off the therapy they're using, if that's supposed to be psychoanalysis I'm a hermit crab. I've known psychoanalysts and understand their methods, surely they'd cringe seeing this garbage. As far as story it's bland as heck and boring, you want it over the moment it begins. Nothing redeeming here pure absurdity.

Copyright 1955 by Loew's Inc. New York opening at Loew's State: 5 August 1955. U.S. release: 15 July 1955. U.K. release: February 1956. Australian release: 24 October 1955. 11,125 feet. 124 minutes.SYNOPSIS: Tensions among the staff at a private mental clinic reach a crisis.NOTES: Film debuts of John Kerr and Susan Strasberg. Negative cost: approximately $2½ million. Initial domestic rentals gross: approx. $1½ million.COMMENT: The most difficult type of role to accomplish successfully, is one in which a person conceals his or her true character under a false personality. Players cast in such roles, are faced with quite a problem. They must act convincingly enough to dupe their fellow- players, and yet unconvincingly enough to reveal their true characters to the audience. There are many examples of outstanding portrayals of this kind — Pierre Blanchar in "Symphony Pastoral", Gloria Grahame in "Human Desire", Mary Murphy in "Hell's Island", Edmond O'Brien in "The Barefoot Contessa" (for which he deservedly won an Academy Award). The latest example is admirably executed by one of the world's foremost actors, Charles Boyer, in "The Cobweb".Boyer provides a fascinating study of a once-brilliant psychiatrist, now a deteriorated man. Nominal head of a clinic for nervous disorders, he hides his gross inefficiency, his moral corruption, his cowardice, his deception and his cunning, beneath a bogus charm. Ironically, by too zealous an application to his work, his own mind has become so warped, that besides wrecking his own life and that of his wife, he now begins to wreck the lives of the people he seeks to assist.Secretary of the Clinic, is Victoria Inch, a vain, insolent, brawling, commandeering, middle-aged spinster, determined to be on the winning side of any quarrel. Interested solely in herself, she has no regard whatever for the feelings of other people, least of all the patients in her care. This role is superbly portrayed by veteran, Lillian Gish.Oscar Levant is excellent in his characterization of a patient who discourages others, in order to increase his own sense of importance. Newcomer, John Kerr, either lacks experience or natural acting ability. His performance may depend entirely on the work of ace director, Vincente Minnelli.Minnelli has a flair for satirical character-sketches. That's why he excels in his treatment of Miss Inch. Watch out for the scene in her home, between herself and Richard Widmark. Notice, also, the talkative bore who makes a nuisance of himself at the patients' meetings, the two ambulance men on the river-bank, the loutish types in the picture-theater, etc.The film's only defect is its rather pat conclusion. All the plots are nicely straightened out to the complete satisfaction of the box- office. Even Miss Inch's heart is touched. In spite of this one shortcoming, the picture is nevertheless quite absorbing and certainly well worth seeing.

As the great satirist Tom Leher once observed, "If people can't communicate then the very least that they should do is to shut up". "The Cobweb" is a perfect case in point. There's a tremendous amount of talk in this movie, but almost no communication. The plot revolves around the selection of new drapes for the library in a psychiatric hospital. However, it's the lack of communication in regard to that issue, and the complications ensuing therefrom, that form the crux of the story. Along the way it becomes clear that the staff are not all that much more well-adjusted than the inmates. They display a great deal of professional and personal jealousy, insecurity and frustration. But then, as the frustrated head of the Bullock household wisely observed in the classic screwball comedy film, "My Man Godfrey", "All you need to start an asylum is an empty room and the right kind of people." There are plenty of the right kind of people in "The Cobweb", among both the staff and the inmates.Directed by Vincent Minelli and featuring a first-rate cast (including one of the great stars of silent films, Lillian Gish), "The Cobweb" had all the elements to have become a really great movie. Nevertheless, somehow, it doesn't quite come off. Perhaps it's because the film is a little bit too talky. Perhaps the issue of which drapes to hang in the sanatorium library is a bit too minor and superficial to excite the viewer's attention. Nevertheless, if you haven't seen this one, give it a chance, it might just grab you.

I can only figure ace director Minelli got this movie on assignment. Because however much drama is inherent in the screenplay, it gets drained by an uncharacteristically flat visual style. There are no close-ups to emphasize emotion. Instead, the camera remains impersonal regardless what's happening with the characters. Plus the actors basically walk through their parts, excepting a fiery Gish and Grahame. Then too, the scenes simply follow one another without heightening the various dramatic impacts. The overall result is to disengage the viewer from what's on screen, creating what amounts to a limp drama.As I recall, the movie got promoted on the basis of its marquee cast, including the classic Lillian Gish making her first appearance in a number of years. The large number of names, of course, required the script be extended so that each star would get an appropriate amount of screen time. This results in a number of subplots and an over-stretched 2-hour-plus runtime, way more than the slender who's-going-to decide-the-draperies premise can sustain. However, unlike most reviewers, I don't object to the running issue of the curtains, ridiculous as it sometimes seems. After all, this is an institution for troubled people including the staff, so they may well obsess over something seemingly as minor as a decoration. Then too, who makes the decision serves as a catalyst for bringing out the various unresolved conflicts among the residents. I just wish the surrounding drama was better written, acted, and directed. Certainly, the talent was there to do just that. Instead we're left with a film that remains obscure for good reason.