A Star is Born (1954)

It’s weird to think that one of the most prevalent movies to last over almost a full century and beyond has been A Star is Born. Originally starting off as a 1937 film starring Janet Gaynor and Fredric March, the story of an aspiring Hollywood actress being assisted into the position of stardom by a fading alcoholic movie star was popular enough to get remade four separate times throughout three wildly different time periods, resulting in various different movies. There was the 1954 film starring Judy Garland and James Mason, the 1976 film with Barbara Streisand and Kris Kristofferson, and the 2018 film starring Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper, all of which managed to tackle a glaring issue within the entertainment industry and managed to win people over each separate time with what they changed and what they kept the same. Despite these various versions, each one seems to have its own component that people recognize, and the 1954 film seems to be the most universally loved. Norman Maine (played by James Mason) is a former matinée idol who has fallen into alcoholism after his career plummeted. After being saved from embarrassment by aspiring singer Esther (played by Judy Garland), he approaches her with a proposal to make a career for herself in Hollywood. Taking the plunge, the rise to fame is slow but eventually guaranteed as her singing voice secures her a film and it results in a massive hit. While Esther rises to extreme stardom, Norman falls further into obscurity and is now given no work due to his drunken behavior. Feeling useless and with Esther finally reaching her dreams, what use is he to her now? While the 2018 film is more popular and mainstream, the 1976 film more commonly disliked and the 1937 film not even known by most people, the 1954 film is usually the one everyone considers the gold standard. Regardless of this, the film has sadly shown its age in parts and has led the film down a less than glimmering path.

The premise behind all of these films is one that is strong enough to act as a mock-like examination of the entertainment industry (and each movie seems to take advantage of this and discuss each era’s unique qualities), but also straightforward and emotion-driven enough that it can ride on its simplistic yet tragic framework to be timeless. This film and the 1937 film primarily focus on the faults of the Hollywood industry and how it can very easily chew up and spit out the people that they supposedly love and cherish, and how much the popularity surrounding these stars can be as much a hindrance as it is a pleasure. Looking at these back-to-back, they seem to be almost identical and feel like proper original and remake as opposed to the latter two which took their stories in different directions. The screenwriter for the film, Moss Hart, had very little writing for film and only was involved in the theatre space, which would explain the limited alteration to the original story. With this in mind, it becomes a bit clearer why some of the components feel a little dated (even for the time) and why a lot of the story structure isn’t very seamless. The director for this movie, George Cukor, was proven to be a very capable director with projects like Little Women, Camille, Gaslight, The Philadelphia Story, and Adam’s Rib, so his talent was clear and his more theatrical sensibility that was proven years later when he directed My Fair Lady in 1964, proving that he could handled a musical effectively. However, whether it was a flaw in tone or just studio interference (which there was a lot of for this film), his directing style just seems like a miss for this film. His presentation, pacing and even comical energy seems to come out of nowhere and really clashes with the more real and unpleasant aspects that this movie is showcasing. It’s not really a musical in the usual sense as the songs are only staged performances rather than expressions of in-the-moment emotions , so it can’t really be creative and fun with the song numbers (outside of one in the middle where the staging, production and even lyrics are a little enjoyable) and the commentary on Hollywood and stardom feels like its prying attention away from the main narrative until it switches halfway and the commentary disappears only to appear at the last minute . It’s a pretty messy delivery not helped out by the constant struggles Cukor faced with Garland’s unstable nature, an entire section of the film being lost and having to resort to portraying the story through audio files and still shots, and the studio changing and cutting footage from the film without his permission.

Everybody whose seen this movie can clearly see it was specifically made for Judy Garland. Not just in the fact that the role of Esther seems like a good fit for someone of Garland’s capabilities, but even from the first idea pitch for this movie, it was always envisioned that Judy Garland would be the starring role and it’s clear that everything was built around that. On the one hand, this makes sense; this was the first film that Garland had made since she left MGM and this was considered a come-back role for her, and it seemed to be successful as critics and audiences fell in love with her in this role, calling it the best in her career and was even nominated for an Oscar that everybody was sure that she would win (imagine the surprise when she actually didn’t). With this in mind, the performance is effective in that Garland is clearly giving everything she can in every second she is on screen whether its singing, dancing or just plain acting. There is a never a moment where it feels like any cast member isn’t trying, and she really is given the most to work with because of how much screen time is dedicated to her. She is given a few monologues where she pulls them off very effectively (mainly one in a dressing room) and you can clearly tell this film was meant as a tribute to Garland’s whole career as even the struggles Esther goes through feels like something Garland would’ve gone through in her Hollywood experience. The flip-side to all of this is that because the movie is so laser-focused on Judy Garland that not only does it give little to no time for any other character to leave an impression (even her male co-star), but it never feels like we’re watching a character in this film, we’re just watching Judy Garland. Its not that she was really a transformative actress who did a variety of roles, but in her other work, you can tell she’s playing a character whereas here, she’s just told to be herself and every time the movie shows her off whether acting, singing, or dancing, it doesn’t feel like the character doing this, it feels like Judy Garland showing off her talents. Its sad to say that something that clearly has a lot of love behind it doesn’t work, but it takes time away from the other characters. Because of this, James Mason as the co-lead doesn’t really work as the character is poorly delivered and executed, even though acting wise he’s perfectly decent, and the rest of the cast act well enough but never leave an impression. Even though the role of Norman Maine has plenty of meat to it and acts as a cautionary but also tragic viewpoint into the troubles with celebritism and how much an actor really relies on viewership in order to not only stay relevant in the public space, but in their own self-worth as well, but limited screen-time and even occasional creepy forcefulness towards Esther (old fashioned Hollywood romances always feel incredibly one-sided) keep him from feeling more than just a prop in Garland’s film. Most of the supporting cast isn’t anything that memorable despite containing famous names like Charles Bickford and Jack Carson.

From a musical perspective, the film doesn’t really get to operate in a semi-authentic reality like most musicals. The performances are either fully staged and sung like they’re shooting a movie or stage-show, or they are just people singing songs on their own that don’t really factor into anything. This isn’t much of an issue as later versions would adopt this similar stance and the movie didn’t need to be like an actual musical to function, but it almost feels like this could’ve benefited much more if it did. Even though this was the first musical Cukor ever directed, he again proved later in his career with My Fair Lady that he has the style and personality for an effective musical director, and you can feel that his pacing, dialogue, staging and even some of his choreography feels perfect for that kind of environment (even using the set decorator, George James Hopkins, and production designer, Gene Allen to help make My Fair Lady) . But this movie isn’t trying to emulate a half-real world, it’s trying to be taken seriously and for the most part that doesn’t really work. When the movie does sit down and let its character vent about real issues, it does that okay and the actors do sell quite effectively, but you can feel a confliction of tones bubbling in this film and they sadly clash quite a bit and take you out of certain moments. When the movie wants to be funny and intentionally sets a scene to be like that, it actually doesn’t do too bad of a job at that, especially when its mocking the Hollywood system (a whole scene of her literally being flung around a studio only to end up right at the start forgotten about is pretty good), and scenes like her trying to continue a performance while James Mason’s character is drunkenly parading around on-stage works on both a humorous and investment level, so it’s not that the film is incapable of being more grounded, but its not what was delivered. Even the music is nothing special; for a movie with a lot of music in it, none of the songs are really that memorable or interesting to listen to. They all kind of sound the same, Garland is the only one doing the singing so that gets a little repetitive after a while, and aside from the opening number and a song in the middle that gets fun with the staging, layout, and cinematography, none of them really leave much of an impression.

Considering how popular A Star is Born is in general and with how much this one was specifically praised, its strange to see that this film was not as trailblazing as it was made out to be. Maybe due to the passing of time and other movies tackling this in a more engaging, relatable, and new manner has made this presentation age poorly, but even from a basic story and character perspective, there’s a lot of problems with the film that hold it back from being truly great. It isn’t an awful film by any means and everybody who worked on it is clearly talented and showed their strengths in other projects and even in this one, its just mishandled in a way that makes it not as strong as it arguably was in the past. When looking at all the versions of these films, each one probably has something strong in each of them and there will always be a favourite for those who get into them, so the ones who get into this will still love this one regardless, and to that end, this rise to fame has plenty of Judy Garland to showcase, just not much else.