OK, This isn't the best movie ever made, but all the reviews in this site seem to start this way, so I'm just adapting my writing style to this fact.
Ambiguity is the key of the movie. Quoting one character, "Truth is the bottom of a bottomless well." Also, a character mentions that, he thinks, "We should at least consider the possibility that the girl's story is true". Both writers, Tennessee Williams and Gore Vidal were gays. Gayness without ambiguity was unthinkable at Hollywood, 1959.
But there are more, much more. It's a melodrama, which means that relationships among characters are over the top. A fine example of what is over the top really this movie gives.
Gothic is very often associated with darkness, yet this movie resolution is an example of white, luminous, Gothic style.
There are four main characters. The manipulative Mrs. Venable, her son Sebastian, who remains always off screen, Sebastian's cousin Cathy, and a psycho-surgeon that maybe will make a lobotomy to Cathy.
An aberration of the 20th Century, lobotomy has a story worthy of being read. It's a fact that Williams's sister was lobotomized, so maybe he put more personal issues here than one could suspect.
All the technical aspects of the movie are first rate. There are divergences in the reviews I read about the performances, but I think the whole cast did it very well.
And there are more, much more, but I don't want to spoil anything. I said enough.
As a final note, I must say that I'm usually against remakes, but I would love to see a remake underlining the subtle movie eroticism.
Ambiguity is the key of the movie. Quoting one character, "Truth is the bottom of a bottomless well." Also, a character mentions that, he thinks, "We should at least consider the possibility that the girl's story is true". Both writers, Tennessee Williams and Gore Vidal were gays. Gayness without ambiguity was unthinkable at Hollywood, 1959.
But there are more, much more. It's a melodrama, which means that relationships among characters are over the top. A fine example of what is over the top really this movie gives.
Gothic is very often associated with darkness, yet this movie resolution is an example of white, luminous, Gothic style.
There are four main characters. The manipulative Mrs. Venable, her son Sebastian, who remains always off screen, Sebastian's cousin Cathy, and a psycho-surgeon that maybe will make a lobotomy to Cathy.
An aberration of the 20th Century, lobotomy has a story worthy of being read. It's a fact that Williams's sister was lobotomized, so maybe he put more personal issues here than one could suspect.
All the technical aspects of the movie are first rate. There are divergences in the reviews I read about the performances, but I think the whole cast did it very well.
And there are more, much more, but I don't want to spoil anything. I said enough.
As a final note, I must say that I'm usually against remakes, but I would love to see a remake underlining the subtle movie eroticism.