A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

In this article, we will be looking at 2019’s book “1001 Movies to See Before You Die” and going through each film in a random order that I have chosen. We will be looking at what constitutes this film to be on the list and whether I think this film deserves to be here at all. I want to make perfectly clear that I won’t be revealing details from this book such as analyses by film reporters who have written about the film in question, so if you want the book itself you’ll have to buy it. But I will be covering the book’s suggestions on which films should be your top priority. I wouldn’t doubt for a second that everyone reading this article has probably watched many of these movies anyway. But we are just here to have a bit of fun. We’re going to not just look at whether it should be on this list but we’re also going to look at why the film has such a legacy at all. Remember, this is the 2019 version of the book and so, films like “Joker” will not be featured in this book and any film that came out in 2020 (and if we get there, in 2021). So strap in and if you have your own suggestions then don’t hesitate to email me using the address in my bio. Let’s get on with it then.

A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) dir. by Elia Kazan

Now, when I first watched this film I was in school and we were studying the book so we got to watch the movie afterwards as an achievement-like thing even though most of the people in my class did not look like they cared less. However, the film is a brilliantly-acted, amazingly characterised piece of exquisite all-American drama.

Bosley Crowther was particularly a fan of the acting of this dramatic and intense film and stated in his review of Vivien Leigh:

“Blessed with a beautifully moulded and fluently expressive face, a pair of eyes that can flood with emotion and a body that moves with spirit and style, Miss Leigh has, indeed, created a new Blanche du Bois on the screen -- a woman of even greater fullness, torment and tragedy. Although Mr. Williams' writing never precisely makes clear the logic of her disintegration before the story begins -- why anyone of her breeding would become an undisciplined tramp -- Miss Leigh makes implicitly cogent every moment of the lady on the screen.”

He went on to talk about her deceptions and agonies, her nervousness and her flexibility of each and every characteristic of Blanche in the book. He not only praises her acting though, but also praises the acting of the great Marlon Brando. He stated about Marlon Brando in his review:

“No less brilliant, however, within his area is Marlon Brando, in the role of the loud, lusty, brawling, brutal, amoral Polish brother-in-law. Mr. Brando created the role in the stage play and he carries over all the energy and the steel-spring characteristics that made him vivid on the stage. But here, where we're so much closer to him, he seems that much more highly charged, his despairs seem that much more pathetic and his comic moments that much more slyly enjoyed.”

The one thing that I love about Bosley Crowther’s review is the way in which he talks about the atmosphere that Mr. Kazan creates through his intentional use of lighting, camera technique and the way in which the entire thing is filled with these brutish close-ups:

“Melees, titanic and degrading, within the filthy New Orleans slum where Blanche comes to live her sister and her low-born brother-in-law have been staged by the prescient director with such tumultuous energy that the screen fairly throbs with angry violence, before settling sharply into spent and aching quiet. Hate-oozing personal encounters between the lost lady and the brutish man have been filmed with such shrewd manipulation of the close-up that one feels the heat of them. And with lights and the movement of his people and the conjunction of a brilliant musical score with dialogue of real poetic richness, Mr. Kazan has wrought heartache and despair.”

There is really no fault at all with this movie and I would wager that this is probably one of the best films adapted from a play in history, alongside “Twelve Angry Men” and the like.