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SONG OF BERNADETTE
Review by Ed Nguyen
Stars:
Jennifer Jones, Charles Bickford, Vincent Price, Gladys Cooper, Anne Revere,
William Eythe, Lee J. Cobb, Linda Darnell
Director: Henry King
Audio: English stereo, English mono, Spanish mono
Subtitles: English, Spanish
Video: Black & white, full-screen 1.33:1
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Features: commentary, trailers, Biography
on Jennifer Jones, newsreel, restoration featurette
Length: 156 minutes
Release Date: June 3, 2003
"I
cannot promise to make you happy in this world, only in the next."
Film
*** 1/2
By
most accounts, Marie-Bernarde Soubirous seemed to be a simple French peasant
girl. There was nothing
particularly remarkable about the child, and since she had little time for
proper schooling, she could also neither read nor write.
Moreover, Bernadette, as was her common name, was often sickly, a
consequence of having contracted cholera at the age of eleven, and suffered
frequently from chronic asthma. Bernadette
was also regularly malnourished, for her family lived in dire poverty and could
barely even afford the former prison cell of Lourdes in which they lived.
The parents were often forced to seek whatever meager employment that
fate might bestow upon them. As the
eldest child, Bernadette did what she could to help care for her younger
siblings and worked at times as a waitress or shepherdess.
However, on February 11, 1858, the 14-year-old Bernadette would have an
experience which would forever change her life and would alter the lives of so
many people around her.
While
gathering firewood with her sister, Bernadette encountered a beautiful lady in a
nearby grotto. The lady was attired
in a white veil with a blue girdle around her waist and a golden rose upon each
foot. There was a pleasant
friendliness about the lady which warmed and intrigued Bernadette. An irresistible desire to see the lady once again brought
Bernadette back to this same grotto many more times over the following days, and
on most occasions, she would receive a visitation from this apparition.
News of Bernadette's vision quickly spread.
The local townspeople began to accompany Bernadette to the grotto on her
visits, though only Bernadette was privy to visions of the lady.
On the ninth visitation, the lady asked Bernadette to drink from the
spring and to eat of the grasses there. With
no spring visible, Bernadette dug at the ground near the grotto, and water
slowly began to flow from the shallow hole. To some, the appearance of the spring, with its healing
waters, was considered a miracle.
On
the twelfth visitation, the lady asked Bernadette to request of her priest to
build a chapel upon the site of the grotto.
On the sixteenth visitation, when Bernadette summoned the courage to
finally ask the lady of her name, the lady's reply was, "I am the
Immaculate Conception."
In
total, there were eighteen visitations. By
then, news of Bernadette's visions had spread even to the ears of Emperor
Napoleon III. When the grotto was
temporarily boarded off by nervous local officials, the Emperor eventually
re-opened it to the public in November of that year. By that time, Bernadette's visions had long ceased, though
she would continue to hold a deep affection in her heart for the grotto.
At
the age of twenty, Bernadette eventually retired to the Saint Gildard's Convent
in Nevers. Therein, she took her
vows with the Sisters of Charity and spent her remaining days in the relative
seclusion of the convent until her death on April 16, 1879 at the age of 35.
Bernadette's
true story was recounted in the novel The
Song Of Bernadette (1942) by Franz Werfel.
The novel was a best seller, and the Fox Studios, seeing in it the
potential for a truly inspirational movie, quickly acquired the film rights.
The Song of Bernadette (1943) was to become a major Fox production
during the WWII era. That the
film's theme was one of simple yet endearing faith played very well to wartime
audiences searching for hope during this rather dark chapter in humanity.
But beyond its uplifting theme, the film had three incredible strengths -
a wonderful score by Alfred Newman, brilliant cinematography by Arthur Miller,
and a wholesome performance as Bernadette by newcomer, Phyllis Isley.
Phyllis Isley was a protégé of the great Hollywood film producer David
O. Selznick (best known for his classic films King
Kong and Gone with the Wind).
Selznick had arranged for her to star in The
Song of Bernadette, and he also provided her with a more famous screen name
- Jennifer Jones.
As
an actress, Jennifer Jones had remarkable range. Her portrayal of the pure and innocent Bernadette was in
stark contrast to her later portrayal of the tempestuous and lascivious Pearl in
Duel in the Sun, a major Selznick
undertaking. Her other memorable
roles included the haunted, mysterious Jennie of Selznick's Portrait of Jennie and the mature, intelligent Eurasian doctor in
the tragic romance Love is a Many-Splendored
Thing. But The
Song of Bernadette brought Jennifer Jones arguably her best role and her
greatest critical acclaim. Though
she was only on-screen perhaps half the running length, her scenes truly
elevated the film. Jennifer Jones
was in her mid-twenties during production, yet she was able to portray the
younger Bernadette convincingly from her youth in Lourdes until her passage into
the convent of Nevers.
The
film itself commences in Lourdes with Bernadette's family upon that fateful day
of February 11, 1858. The first
seven minutes alone, though essentially dialogue-free, create an extremely
expressive atmosphere conveying the poverty and despair of the Soubirous family.
The cinematography during these early scenes is, honestly, quite
mesmerizing, from its establishing shots of the Soubirous prison cell home to
the dreariness of the father's occupation.
The Song of Bernadette easily
won an Oscar for best cinematography, and right from the start, it's easy to see
why.
Bernadette,
the film soon reveals, is a shy and not entirely well-learned girl.
She frequently misses school due to her asthma and as a result is scolded
in class for her insufficient knowledge of the catechism.
Yet, Bernadette shoulders her weaknesses and sufferings well.
As the film progresses, it becomes obvious that the character of
Bernadette is a pure-hearted and honest one.
Her physical ailments do not hinder her from attempting to lead a simple
and good life.
Later,
on the same day, Bernadette receives her first visitation in one of the classic
moments in cinema history. The
combination of Alfred Newman's whirling flutes and strings and choral
arrangements, the deeply evocative cinematography, and Jennifer Jones'
expressive acting during this scene make it truly unforgettable and certainly
one of the highlights of the film. The
remainder of the visitations closely follow the accepted account of Bernadette's
experience.
The
Song of Bernadette
can be considered a film of three acts. The
first part concerns Bernadette's visitations, whereas the middle portion details
the repercussions of those events and the reactions of various people to them.
The final portion focuses once again on Bernadette, her acceptance into a
convent, and her final days. It is
in the beginning and final portions of the film that Bernadette is featured most
prominently, and consequently, it is in these scenes that Jennifer Jones shines
most brightly. Jennifer Jones is so
good (and gets even better as the film progresses) that she transcends the
material and brings a true aura of magic to the screen.
The film may be based upon an actual miracle that occurred in
nineteenth-century France, but the miracle of this picture is Jennifer Jones'
performance, which earned her a well-deserved Best Actress Oscar.
In
a sense, The Song of Bernadette may be
a historical film, yet believe it or not, it is not a religious propaganda film.
In reality, the Roman Catholic Church had actually refused to recognize
Bernadette's visions as a miracle and had remained neutral on the entire matter
for a very long time, a historical fact which is bravely reflected in the film.
In fact, a great portion of the film is remarkably faithful to the actual
events, although the scenes are presented with a somewhat melodramatic flair, a
trait fairly common to these old Hollywood films.
At
156 minutes however, this is a long film (and was once intended to be 3 hours in
length!). At times, the middle
portion can drag a bit, mainly because this section focuses more on peripheral
characters such as politicians or regional ministry and less so on Bernadette.
Much of the film's middle portion, pertaining to these local civil
authorities, seems slightly contrived in order to generate an antagonistic force
to Bernadette's sincerity. Vincent
Price as the Imperial Prosecutor, Aubrey Mather as the opportunistic town Mayor,
and Charles Dingle as Jacomet, the chief of police, are all decent in their
roles (which have a basis in historical context), but they seem to exist in the
film more for the sake of dramatic conflict than for any true significance to
the story. Furthermore, the
inclusion of good-hearted Antoine (William Eythe) as a potential (and thankfully
unfulfilled) love interest is somewhat unnecessary considering the nature of the
film, but such invented love interests were common practice for films in those
days. To some degree, perhaps the
filmmakers felt that Bernadette was so angelic that they needed to introduce
other flawed, emotional characters so as to balance the story. On the other hand, Charles Bickford is excellent as the
crusty town priest who initially dismisses Bernadette but eventually believes in
her, and Dame Gladys Cooper is beyond amazing as Sister Marie-Thérèse, the
conflicted nun who formerly served as Bernadette's school teacher and who later
doubts the word of a child she knew to be poorly schooled in religion.
Both actors were nominated for Academy Awards for their performances.
In
the end, The Song of Bernadette is an
extremely good film and wonderful to behold.
I have always felt that black & white photography is far superior to
color in bringing out the true artistry of film images.
The Song of Bernadette offers a
resounding case in point. Arthur
Miller's Oscar-winning cinematography is subtle but quite breath-taking and many
of the scenes at the grotto and the Soubirous home are simply so luminous that
they deserve to be re-watched several times.
Yet, as lovely as those scenes appear, the final sequences at the Saint
Gildard's Convent are even better. True,
the film is over fifty years old, so some of the conventions of filmmaking and
acting may seem dated to modern viewers, but the beauty of the film is beyond
doubt.
On
a final note, the real spring of Bernadette still exists.
It regularly receives a huge number of pilgrimages to Lourdes each year
and is purported to have mysterious, curative properties unexplainable by modern
medicine. Bernadette was herself
canonized by Pope Pius XI in 1933. Her
body was exhumed for an Ecclesiastical Inquiry in 1909 and twice thereafter.
Each time, remarkably, the body was found to be perfectly intact, as
though she were merely asleep. After
the third exhumation, Bernadette was enshrined in the chapel of Saint Gildard's
Convent for public veneration. She
remains there to this day, miraculously and perfectly incorrupt, more than a
century after her death.
Video
*** 1/2
The
Song of Bernadette
is presented in a black & white, full-frame format.
The film's original nitrate negative no longer exists, but an original
era nitrate composite dupe negative was still available.
A copy was made from this negative and was used to create the fine grain
master print that is the source for this DVD's transfer.
And
wow. Where did they find that dupe
negative for the film? The image
quality is simply incredible. The
black & white photography is very sharp and crystal clear, and the contrast
level is very deep and quite excellent. This
film looks fantastic. A restoration
featurette provided on the DVD shows just how much care was given to restoring
this wonderful film into a new-pristine shape.
The restoration segment clearly shows the improvement between the film's
image quality in a decent 1993 print to the current excellent print (with and
without digital clean-up of dust and debris).
While there are still a few dust marks here and there, the presentation
of The Song of Bernadette on this DVD
is as good as you'll ever see the film.
Audio
***
The
Song of Bernadette
can be listened to in either English stereo, English mono, or Spanish mono. For a change with the Fox Classics series, the stereo and
mono tracks are not too different from one another.
I prefer the mono track, being somewhat of a purist, but either English
track is quite agreeable. Just keep
in mind that this is an old film, so the sound can be a little thin or reedy at
times, and the subwoofer will not get much of a work-out here.
Nonetheless,
the film sounds just fine, all the better with which to hear Alfred Newman's
great score! Newman's specialty was
his soaring violins, and he used them wisely with choral arrangements in this
film to set a reverent tone for the proceedings.
The Song of Bernadette was
nominated for twelve Academy Awards and won quite a handful, one of them a
well-deserved nod for Newman's score.
Features
***
As
with all the Fox Studio Classic DVDs, this DVD has a number of goodies.
Among the smaller features are a short newsreel in which Jennifer Jones
accepts an award from American GIs, a restoration featurette in which
before-and-after shots are shown of the film's restoration, and a wealth of
trailers (eight in all) for all the currently available DVDs in the Fox Studio
Classics collection.
The
main feature is a segment from the regular A & E show Biography. This
hour-long segment focuses upon Jennifer Jones and provides a good overview of
her early life and her career. Viewers
who are unfamiliar with the star may be surprised to learn the degree of
influence that legendary producer David O. Selznick provided for much of her
career. He recognized a certain
luminous quality about her, which is startlingly clear in an early screen-test
of her (included in this feature). In
truth, Selznick almost single-handedly made Jennifer Jones into a Hollywood
star.
Lastly,
there is a commentary track. The
narrative duties are shared by three commentators: Edward Epstein, an author of
a biography on Jennifer Jones; John Burlingame, a biographer on the great film
composer Alfred Newman; and Donald Spoto, a film historian and theologist.
Together, they have a great deal to say about the film.
Of the three, Burlingame is the most vocal.
He also makes no secret of his opinion that Alfred Newman's score is one
of the finest in all of film history and is of incalculable importance in
creating the film's atmosphere and lasting ability to move audiences.
Epstein, of course, offers much insight into Jennifer Jones' public and
private life while Spoto discusses the film's spirituality and commendable
faithfulness to the actual historical events.
Summary:
