The extent to which the direction of George Stevens makes A Place in the Sun one of the most essential Hollywood movies ever made is perhaps most explicitly revealed by the bizarre occurrence at the Academy Awards the year it received so many nominations. Stevens took home another gold statue for Best Director and yet—inexplicably—An American in Paris was named Best Picture. The logic here is beyond inexplicable, actually, yet the failure of Hollywood to name A Place in the Sun as Best Picture is entirely explicable.
Aesthetically, A Place in the Sun is perhaps perfect. If not absolutely, then very close. But it was the 1950’s and a film that would finish out the 20th century as the single most corrosive critique of American capitalism to ever be honored with any Oscar could certainly not be honored as the best of the year. In a way, handing that honor over to film set in Paris and with the American of the title in the Paris in the title—rather than a film based on the novel An American Tragedy—is inexplicable while being almost predictable. A Place in the Sun destroys the idea of American capitalism as the route to the American Dream with such precision that it may as well have been co-written by Marx. Or, at the very least, Thorstein Veblen.
And it is George Stevens who deserves the credit. Along with his screenwriters, cinematographer, actors, etc. The real irony here is that it was not Stevens alone who took home Oscar gold that night. The film’s screenwriters, editor, score composer, and even legendary costume designer Edith Gold also won. In other words, all those contributors except—amazingly—the actors were all recognized. It was a team effort, guys, but, hey, we’re still going to say the very best movie overall was a musical with absolutely nothing to say.
Stevens takes apart a very long and complex novel by Theodore Dreiser, distills it down to the essence over which he layers one of the greatest romances in Hollywood history and through the subtlety of his direction and editing makes literally almost every scene come across as a powerful critique of how capitalism creates tragedy for most Americans. The portrait of George Eastman’s downfall begins with what is surely one of the most ironic juxtapositions in film history: poor George hitchhiking in front of a billboard for his rich uncle’s company as Angela Vickers speeds by in a sleek little convertible only to immediately be forced to accept a ride from a kind driver in one of the junkiest vehicles ever seen on screen.
The genius of George Stevens has been more powerfully demonstrated. In less than a minute, everything that is to follow has been foreshadowed. George’s abstract dreams of joining the American wealthy elite are doomed not just to failure, but abject failure. Not through any fault of his own, but because that is how the system has been designed and maintained.
