The Bigamist

source: The Bigamist

Edmond O'Brien as "Harry Graham is a lonely traveling salesman looking for love. He finds it by marrying an eligible young woman (Joan Fontaine) - and then by marrying another eligible young woman (Ida Lupino) in another city. When Harry and Eve Graham try to adopt an baby, the head of the agency senses Harry is keeping a secret and does some investigating. Via flashbacks, Harry tells the adoption agent how he ended up in two marriages," according to the DVD sleeve description. Producer/writer Collier Young was married to director/star Ida Lupino (1948-1951) and co-star Joan Fontaine (1952-1961), which should be totally irrelevant - but, considering the film's Hollywood movie star bus tour, seems appropriate to mention. The script even notes Edmund Gwenn's resemblance to a certain holiday icon, and notes the actor's appearance in "Miracle on 34th Street" (1947). Everyone tries very hard to make "The Bigamist" work, but it's a painfully hopeless cause. **** The Bigamist (12/3/53) Ida Lupino ~ Edmond O'Brien, Joan Fontaine, Ida Lupino, Edmund Gwenn

You would think that given the nature of the plot-bigamy and deceit, a terrific cast headed by Edmond O'Brien, Joan Fontaine and Ida Luppino, the latter also directed, there would be a lot of fireworks. If anything the film fizzles out at the end. O'Brien is a businessman whose marriage has really become a business arrangement with wife Eve. (Fontaine) Along comes Luppino and love and another marriage with a baby ensues. Edmond Gwenn is his usual whimsical self. As an over zealous adoption agency person, he fully investigates O'Brien due to his suspicions. The majority of the film is where O'Brien relates to Gwenn how he got into this predicament. You actually gain sympathy for the O'Brien character. The picture needed more excitement. You have 3 players who were so capable of explosive scenes. There is none of that here and that is the fault with this film.

IDA LUPINO may well have been one of our great dramatic actresses, but the feminist films she chose to direct in the '50s were not up to the standards of her best acting performances while under contract to Warner Bros. in the '40s in the films that established her as a star. Nor are any of her co-stars seen at their best in this story of a man (EDMUND O'BRIEN) who keeps the secrets of his unscrupulous behavior (which gets sympathetic treatment here) from the women who love and marry him. The story is told from his viewpoint, as he recalls how he met a lonely woman (IDA LUPINO) and fell quickly in love with her while his marriage to JOAN FONTAINE was suffering from a lack of time spent together. It's rather smoothly directed and acted by the cast, including KENNETH TOBEY as a lawyer friend who makes a courtroom plea for understanding O'Brien's situation. The presiding judge also passes comment that seems to suggest society is somewhat to blame for what happened. Summing up: A strange film that really avoids taking a stand on the issues involved and leaves the viewer feeling as remote from the events on screen as O'Brien's attitude toward his loving wife, Fontaine. Trivia note: Ida's landlady, Miss Higgins, is played by none other than Lilian Fontaine, mother of Joan Fontaine and Olivia de Havilland.

An interesting drama with some thoughtful moments, "The Bigamist" succeeds in offering a sympathetic look at everyone involved in an emotionally trying situation, and in maintaining drama and tension for the entire running time. Ida Lupino does a good job both in acting and in directing, playing one of the key characters while telling the story in a careful fashion that does not oversimplify the issues involved. As the three main characters, Lupino, Edmond O'Brien, and Joan Fontaine all give believable and effective performances. All of them make their share of mistakes, and yet all three characters are worth caring for, and their mistakes are understandable ones. The double-life situation and its consequences for all concerned is set up so as to go against some of the usual preconceptions. O'Brien's character is lonely, but by no means ill-intentioned, and the situation is sad, never sordid. The tone is somber almost from the beginning, and except for a couple of amusing references to Edmund Gwenn's earlier role in "Miracle on 34th Street", there are few or no moments of humor to break the tension. Thus you can feel the unending sense of foreboding that O'Brien's character feels in regard to the complications he has caused. Lupino and the script also manage to provide an honest look at the situation with few hindrances from the strict production code of the era. Only at a couple of odd moments can you tell that they had to shift gears slightly so as to placate the censors. Although the movie is low-key and straightforward, it's a commendable effort, and it makes for good drama.

Blah hum-drum of a movie. A sappy boring romance. I kept falling asleep. I won't watch it again & do not recommend wasting your time on this. There's much better movies out there.

One of a handful of low budget films from pioneering woman film-maker Ida Lupino. Known mainly for her soulful screen portrayals in the 1940's of downtrodden women, she managed this career turn in the early 50's, a remarkable feat given a production industry so thoroughly dominated by men. Her best known feature is the chilling and critically acclaimed account of serial killer Emmet Myers, called "The Hitchhiker". But all her films are marked by an earnest concern for the lives of ordinary people, whether menaced in extreme circumstance or in more ordinary circumstance by the unwed pregnancy of "The Outrage". Moreover, at a time when studios were fending off small screen television with big budget Technicolor, she gamely persisted with the small, the intimate and the unglamorous. "The Bigamist" remains an oddity, very much an artifact of its time, but worth viewing for its sensitive handling of male loneliness, a topic for which macho Hollywood has never had much time. The acting is first-rate from a trio of de-glamorized Hollywood professionals, including the poignant Lupino; there's also Edmond O'Brien in a low-key, nuanced portrayal of a man trapped by emotions, showing once again what a fine, intelligent performer he was. Notice how elliptically the pregnancy is presented, and how subtly Fontaine's career woman is projected into the breakup. Both are very much signs of that time. Although the subject matter may have tempted, the results never descend into bathos or soap-opera, even if final courtroom scene appears stagy and anti-climatic. All in all, it's a very well wrought balancing act. Lupino's reputation should not rest on gender. This film as well as so many of her others demonstrate what a versatile and unusual talent she was, whether in front of the camera or behind. Too bad, she never got the recognition from an industry to which she contributed so much.

Ida Lupino directed and starred in this haunting 1953 film "The Bigamist". Lupino, a rare female director working in the 1950's made a number of cheaply budgeted, but highly interesting films in that era. The plot of "The Bigamist" is probably the most intriguing of them all- but Lupino doesn't let the sensational subject matter slide into pure melodrama. This is a sad, quiet and painfully honest look at the lives of the three central characters and the tragic situation they find themselves in. Joan Fontaine gives the film's best performance as Eve, who is married to Harry (Edmond O'Brien) and can't conceive a child. So she turns her energies into trying to become the perfect wife and business partner to O'Brien. Fontaine's portrait of a woman, outwardly confident, but desperate for approval and the "completeness" of motherhood, is subtle and highly affecting. Lupino is almost equally good as Phyllis, the woman lonely O'Brien, working in a city away from Fontaine, turns to ad falls in love with. In a way, Phyllis is very similar to Eve. Both of them seem to not need anyone, but inwardly there is a huge gap in their lives. Phyllis becomes pregnant with a child, and to protect her, Harry marries her. This sad tale is told is flashback to adoption agency head Edmund Gwenn, who, at the beginning, sense's Harry's deception of the desperate Eve. I haven't mentioned O'Brien much yet, so I will now. While we are drawn to sympathise and connect more with the two women involved, O'Brien's character is hardly a villain. In the affecting courtroom scene, where looks say a thousand words, we are asked to question our own morals. Harry cheated on his wife, yes, but he actually married Phyllis, instead of abandoning her and the child. It is a terribly complex situation, and as the judge says, the result result is nothing compared to the damning effect on all their lives.

Lupino's second 1953 directorial effort (her first was the nightmarish road-movie/film-noir "The Hitch-hiker") is at first glance an entirely different affair -- pun intended -- charting the investigation of San Francisco adoption agent Mr. Jordan (Edmund Gwenn) into the background of a childless couple who wish to become parents, Harry and Eve Graham (Joan Fontaine and Edmond O'Brien). For the first couple of reels, the investigation is the story, as Jordan discovers several rather suspicious items about the husband, a traveling salesman who makes quite regular trips to Los Angeles. Suspecting that all is not as it seems, Jordan eventually follows Graham to L.A. and discovers that he goes under a different name, and doesn't seem to register at any of the typical hotels. We know from the title what is going to happen, and sure enough when Jordan tracks Graham to a small house out in the suburbs, a baby cries, and Graham's big lie unravels.... Yes, Graham has another wife, Phyllis Martin (Ida Lupino), a waitress and the mother of his baby boy. He admits it all to Jordan, admits that he fell in love with Martin because she offered something that his career-woman wife and partner Eve could not -- real love, need, romance. Most of the rest of the film is a flashback, detailing the last year or so of Graham's life; probably the best part of the film lies in the next couple of reels, O'Brien showing real pathos as the lonely husband, the romantic and would-be lover whose marriage has become a business arrangement, wandering a large and unfriendly, alien city -- Lupino does a beautiful job of conveying the desolation and unfriendliness of Los Angeles -- and finally striking up a tentative friendship and would-be romance with a tart-mouthed waitress from Pennsylvania who's still dreaming of a better life. Eventually that friendship becomes a one-night stand on Graham's birthday that results in the unexpected, but not unwanted child, and when back in San Francisco Eve decides to finally look into adopting after 8 years of childlessness, Graham realizes that difficult choices are closing in, though he avoids them until caught. What's most striking about The Bigamist to me is how it avoids taking an easy way out, avoids making any of the characters into villains or clichés, though Fontaine's Eve is a little scantily fleshed out and is probably the least likable character of the trio; the film really comes off as an indictment of the career and capitalist-based world, of the conflicts between money and real joy that we face in this society, and it nearly achieves mastery in its exploration of these themes through the great location work and fine acting (especially by O'Brien) -- until a weak and fairly slapdash moralizing courtroom ending which boils it down all too simply. Still, for the most part this is a beautifully worked out look at the challenges people face alone and together, and a bravely realistic portrait of a crime that was barely talked about in an era where even divorce was often taboo. Though I haven't yet seen all of her films, I suspect this is Lupino's best; and though stylistically it couldn't be more different, in theme and feeling it is rivaled in its era in American film only by Douglas Sirk. Kino VHS rental.

Ida Lupino, the trail blazing female director, both stars and directs in this extraordinary 1953 film "The Bigamist". Ms. Lupino made interesting films and tackled some difficult subject matter. This being one of them, the plot conveyed in the title. However, Ms. Lupino, brings sympathy and understanding to all 3 main characters, herself playing Phyllis, Joan Fontaine playing Eve, the barren wife and the travelling tortured salesman played by Edmond O'Brien. Twee in-jokes aside and a few groan-worthy melodramatic moments, the film has aged well. Eve plays the business woman extremely well. Everything starts to turn on its head when she decides she does want a child after all and they proceed with the adoption process. Lupino plays the tough farm girl, working at menial jobs in the city and all too ready to have a romance. Her vulnerability is beautifully portrayed. Her pregnancy is handled with subtlety. Edmund Gwenn plays the adoption agency investigator and does an admirable job. The climax comes in the courtroom scene and this is where some melodrama comes into play but it does not affect the restraint shown by the director in letting the audience decide the moral outcome. 8 out of 10. Recommended.