Seen from a distance of over 50 years, the once-daring "Picnic" barely emerges from the background of stage drama and silent movies that came before it. It is, in the way of most '50s Hollywood films, deliriously artificial in manner, though the settings look real, and are. Its only excellent performance is by the grain-belt town where the exteriors were filmed.
Picnic asks us to accept a mid-30s and facially haggard (but tanned and very fit) William Holden as a post-collegiate. That could work in a play, where acting, body language and makeup could make us believe. But here he looks a lot older than his college chum Cliff Robertson. Holden is game and fearless, but is directed to a performance that is hammy, frantic, almost awkward. He moves big and impulsive, like Elizabeth Berkley in "Showgirls."
Holden generally just doesn't seem right for a likable if show-offy lummox with a disreputable side. He's intrinsically a man's man, a Don Draper prototype, a wordly cynic, not someone who's going to mask his insecurities and shame with puppy-ish fratboy physicality. That much of this energy is directed at tiny, under-age Susan Strasberg, his "date" for the big picnic (before his real love interest is revealed), seems creepy to 21st century sensibilities.
Other apparent age anomalies include Kim Novak and her mom looking to be about 12 years apart.
The director gives his actors stagy bits of physical business that make the most normal gestures--hanging onto the ropes of a swing or the columns of a porch while speaking--look forced.
This is the corny kind of a movie where when a character thinks of the whole wide world outside of Kansas, then their eyes have to loft achingly upward of the horizon.
To me the film's loud, broad and energized acting and brisk editing suggest a sort of terror of the bucolic setting and overtly prosaic title as being threats to the searing, sexed-up realism that was being attempted. The performances play to the back rows, lobbing one uninflected emotion at a time, and the characters fairly frequently blurt out just how they feel, even before the bottle gets passed around. Seems among these salt-of-the-earth Midwestern types, only the stuffy schoolmarm has any use for any pretense or posturing. Rosalind Russell's Romemarie still just about beats her head with her own limbs like a Tex Avery wolf when Holden takes his shirt off. Subtle. Scenes like this make this wide screen Technicolor epic feel like it was directed for the iPod.
There are bits that work. Arthur O'Connell escaped with his dignity and an Oscar. By being authentically good, he excels here. The actress who played Kim Novak's mom, while generally acting as if in a silent melodrama, does manage to beautifully project mingled worry and sympathetic excitement for her daughter near the end. One key scene between O'Connell and Russell is done in one long take and as the scene goes on, they seem to emerge from the cloud of recently whispered dunderheaded directorial instructions, escaping to something authentic and touching.
A vastly over-celebrated film.
Picnic asks us to accept a mid-30s and facially haggard (but tanned and very fit) William Holden as a post-collegiate. That could work in a play, where acting, body language and makeup could make us believe. But here he looks a lot older than his college chum Cliff Robertson. Holden is game and fearless, but is directed to a performance that is hammy, frantic, almost awkward. He moves big and impulsive, like Elizabeth Berkley in "Showgirls."
Holden generally just doesn't seem right for a likable if show-offy lummox with a disreputable side. He's intrinsically a man's man, a Don Draper prototype, a wordly cynic, not someone who's going to mask his insecurities and shame with puppy-ish fratboy physicality. That much of this energy is directed at tiny, under-age Susan Strasberg, his "date" for the big picnic (before his real love interest is revealed), seems creepy to 21st century sensibilities.
Other apparent age anomalies include Kim Novak and her mom looking to be about 12 years apart.
The director gives his actors stagy bits of physical business that make the most normal gestures--hanging onto the ropes of a swing or the columns of a porch while speaking--look forced.
This is the corny kind of a movie where when a character thinks of the whole wide world outside of Kansas, then their eyes have to loft achingly upward of the horizon.
To me the film's loud, broad and energized acting and brisk editing suggest a sort of terror of the bucolic setting and overtly prosaic title as being threats to the searing, sexed-up realism that was being attempted. The performances play to the back rows, lobbing one uninflected emotion at a time, and the characters fairly frequently blurt out just how they feel, even before the bottle gets passed around. Seems among these salt-of-the-earth Midwestern types, only the stuffy schoolmarm has any use for any pretense or posturing. Rosalind Russell's Romemarie still just about beats her head with her own limbs like a Tex Avery wolf when Holden takes his shirt off. Subtle. Scenes like this make this wide screen Technicolor epic feel like it was directed for the iPod.
There are bits that work. Arthur O'Connell escaped with his dignity and an Oscar. By being authentically good, he excels here. The actress who played Kim Novak's mom, while generally acting as if in a silent melodrama, does manage to beautifully project mingled worry and sympathetic excitement for her daughter near the end. One key scene between O'Connell and Russell is done in one long take and as the scene goes on, they seem to emerge from the cloud of recently whispered dunderheaded directorial instructions, escaping to something authentic and touching.
A vastly over-celebrated film.