Tea & Sympathy

And now for the DVD???????????????

Seems that with the death of Deborah Kerr that there are still a number of her films that have never been transferred to DVd and this would be one at the top of that list. Despite its age, its horrific ending (that tacked on guilt ridden ending should be burnt and let the film end the way the stage play did), there is still some great work here from Deborah and John Kerr (despite looking late 20s at the time which he probably was) I recently transferred my old video off- the -TV print to DVD and whereas it is nice to have it on a DVD format, with a scratchy print, it badly cropped for TV, its like watching half the movie. Other films of Ms Kerr that should also travel quickly to DVD would be "Chalk Garden"and "Bonjour Tristesse" June 10, 2008

A review of some reviews.

I haven't seen this film since I was 21, in 1956. I never read the book, nor saw the play. But with my limited sexual experience, and few friends of either sex, I had NO trouble understanding the movie, exactly as it was presented, and as all the actors and director wanted it underdstood. It never occured to me that Tom was gay; he was a sensitive boy whose father had sent him to this boys' school (explitive deleted!)to cure him of wanting to be a folksinger (of which there can never be too many!), reading literature and darning his own socks, having little interest in sports, and with no interest in having sex with a woman just to prove that he liked having sex with women. What a wonderful young man, I thought, and are there any more at home like him?

And if Laura's gentle lovemaking with this young man cost her her marriage--well, good! She was better off without her second husband anyway!

I hadn't really thought much about the movie for years, until I saw it prsented in "The Celluloid Closet"--which for the most part is an honest, interesting, moving and entertaining documentary about the way homosexuality was presented on the screen from 1895-1995--as (said with some scorn on the part of the narrator): Laura's act of love is shown as a "cure" for homosexuality" (!) But...there IS no cure for homosexuality, and the fact that Tom' introduction to love and sex from a woman is so successful should remove any lingering doubts as to Tom's sexual orientation--in case you had some, which I never did.

It is true that a person, before being introduced to sex (at 2, or 36) may be unsure of his own sexual preferences; he may also NOT be unsure of them. He may think all sorts of things, like, I really love my Teddy Bear, or my dog, or my mother, or the boy next door, or (even) the girl next door.

The proof of the pudding is sometimes in the eating of it.

I do remember the eating of the pudding, very well. That was lovely. February 11, 2008

Dated,but worth watching

"Tea And Sympathy" was a controversial movie in 1956,but it is now kind of dated.But it is still a strong drama worth seeing.It's the story of
two lonely people finding each other.Tom Robinson Lee is a sensitive young man very different from the other students at his college,and
hounded mercilessly because of it.Laura Reynolds is the wife of his housemaster Bill,who is an insensitive failure as a husband.She becomes sort of a mother to Tom,to whom she grows very close.
Laura constantly tries to help Tom fight the constant harrassment of his fellow students,but it grows unbearable and he attempts suicide after a
disatrous "date" with the town tramp.Laura then seduces Tom to help him
prove his manhood,which costs her her marriage.At the class reunion ten years later,a still resentful Bill gives Tom a letter from Laura that makes him appreciate her sacrifice.
Contrary to what you may think,the movie is not about homosexuality.The final scene makes that clear.Rather,the film is more about being yourself.
But though the film preaches tolerance,it also accurately reflects the
attitudes of its time,that if you were different you were gay.And that
dates the movie badly today.However,the film does have strong points that make it worthwhile.It has MGM's usual top-notch production values,and
John Alton's Metrocolor CinemaScope photography looks great.Adolph Deutsch
provides a lovely musical score.Screenwriter Robert Anderson and director
Vincente Minnelli have done an excellent job of adapting Anderson's
controversial play-for the most part.Unfortunately,they had to change some of the dialogue("Sisterboy" is the worst epithet hurled at Tom)
and change the ending by adding the scene in which Tom gets the "fallen "
Laura's letter(the play ends with her seducing him).And this dilutes the film's power.What makes the fim work as well as it does is the brilliant cast.Leif Erickson,Darryl Hickman,Norma Crane,and Edward Andrews are outstanding.But the movie belongs to its two stars.Though too old for his role,John Kerr is powerful and very moving as Tom.Deborah Kerr is luminous and enthralling as Laura.Each gives one of their best performances.Deborah in particular perfectly compliments her magnificent
work in "The King And I" that same year.She has the film's most memorable moment,in which she reaches out to Tom and utters the poignant line
"Years from now,when you talk about this-and you will-be kind" and handles it beautifully.
Granted,the movie is not as good as it could have been.But on its own terms,"Tea And Sympathy" is a solid,well-done,entertaining film worth watching.
June 30, 2007

A subtle movie about other things

The focus of Tea and Sympathy is clearly Laura Reynolds and her need for a sensitive man whom she can trust, love, and have a share in the life of a marriage. Her first husband does the macho thing in war and dies, her new boardinbg school husband is over the too butch, interested in his boys and not her..he forgets their first anniversary etc, What is Anderson saying here? A woman finds sensitive men who think they must be macho..the first dies, the second becomes a recluse..and yet too, there is the rather loud suggestion that these husbands are gay. The Leif Ericson character is too protesting, too much acting out being a man, and too much with the boys so as to raise suspicion in any 21st century person's mind. The husband is deeply homophobic..Tom (John Kerr) recalls his past, whe he himself was not a team player etc. He confesses this to Laura..and yet, he grows out of it, and becomes loud, forget =ful of her, and a bully toward Tom; he cannot cope with the double life he leads. He's attracted to Tom, as he is to the other boys, and Laura is a cover. I don't think she would mind a man who is gay, as long as he treated her with some fairness and tenderness, open to her protection from the homophobic world.

Tom is the third "man" in her life..he needs reassurance from her. She takes no conscious stock of what his orientation might be, and yet she sets him up in drag for a part in the SChool for Scandal, inviting him to dance with her. She wants this boy and his androgynous nature in her life. And so they have their tea together, as it were. Yet, she's so motherly it is like incest; it's almost Lesbian, as Tom lies there, submissive and wondering and weak, while ahe dominates him, and then holds him as a mother would, in that forest that is so like a womb; and this would be acceptable to Tom who had no mother to speak of. He talks of this loss on several occasions. But it is Laura who gains the center arena when she goes off with Tom into the woods...she wants to control the sexual thing, in a 1956 world where women did no controlling at all, this is very daring, yet acceptable, as this movie was a big hit with women. Even if it fails, the love scene, this is nothing..Laura is all tea and sympathy, motherly emotions and desires, smothering him with her ideas about sexual orientaion conversion, and yet, would she want Tom macho, or her first husband..never. Her second husband plays at the macho bit and she rejects him, and swings toward Tom..safe sex, mother-love potentials, tenderness, some maipulation..gay men present minium risks, and Tom likes this. The waitress scene before this is tacky, heterosexual proving grounds, and we see how Tom reacts to the waitress, with a knife. Laura has been by with her roses, and the contrast bewteen her softness and the waitress' coldness is too obnvious..Deborah Kerr and John Kerr (how did that happen?) are different..in every way. He (Tom) needs her protection, her understanding, even if he has to be sexual with her, He can think same sex thoughts; she has set that up for him in a way too.

At the end she writes a letter that makes Tom glare out at the yard around him, and finally sort of depair, crushed by the moral high ground Laura takes. But you notice at the very end of the letter she goes back on it all,,,"the woman would always remember the boy etc"...She's got him hooked again, and herself back at that tea pot..women like Laura give tea and sympathy, but they want to give and get more. Not these macho cover up deniers of their basic homosexuality, but those who do acknowledge it in their contrast to the accepted order, and in their "sons and lovers" approach to her..incestuous, and not brutal, but psychologically brutal. But again, this is 1956, and these Lauras are doing the best they can to get out of the mill of the conventional(Henry James) and into the tea pot itslef. So, gay men(Tom) and their sponsers (Laura) have the poetry, the soul, etc...they get out, into the woods, and pass on guilt, but also edgy love, and that last letter scene..if that doesn't propel Tom out of the sham marriage he's in and make him go into the woods with another man, nothing will. Laura has lost Tom, but in the end she frees him in her guilt letter from aqny heterosexual responsiblity. He did the BIG thing with her..it was only partial..the next move is the whole thing.

This is a film directed by Vincente Minelli, always gay, and wriitten by Robert Anderson, another man from Tea and sympathy land. They knew what they were doing weith the Legion of Decency.

A GREAT performace by Deborah Kerr..she is the mystery here.

Buy it and see it many times..it's better than the play ever was. June 9, 2006

Its not about homosexuality--stop the fantasizing

This is a bittersweet story of a sensitive 17-year-old boy in a New England boarding school who happens not to be interested in sports or chasing girls, but is into listening to music and acting and enjoys the company of women. In the movie, you realize that he grew up without a mother, hence his bond with older women. Of course, he doesn't fit the outwardly masculine image of the other boys and chooses to be a lone a lot.

He develops an attraction to the housemaster's wife, who has a motherly-like and caring disposition toward the protagonist, Tom Lee. She feels his pain and reaches out to him. The fact that the housemaster's wife, Laura Reynolds is played by Deborah Kerr introduces some sexual attraction into the mix: not only is she kind, motherly, and understanding, she quite attrcative in a quite femine way.

Goated by the other boys and the constant name calling (sisterboy), Tom decides to prove his manhood by having a tryst with a tramp-like woman and finds he cannot do it unless there's love involved. In the end, Laura Reynolds, offers herself to him as a way to save him from his own guilt and shame.

The last scene takes place ten years later with Tom reading a letter written by Ms Reynolds to Tom in which she clarifies the events leading to her seduction of him and the after effects and offers kind encouragement to him for the future. This last scene, despite what many say, is the most touching and bittersweet part of this movie--harkening to a long past love that was never allowed to flourish, and the sadness of looking back at what no longer is.

Too many people are inserting their own fantasies into this movie as a justification/confirmation of being a homosexual. Looking at the movie with an open mind, one sees it as a story of a lonely boy who wants a womanly shoulder to rest his head on cry and hold on to as well and someone to show understanding.

Its a sad and bittersweet story that spans 10 years. I envy the character of Tom Lee. If only many guys can meet their Laura Reynolds to help them through beginning adulthood. If only there were more women like Laura Reynolds. December 16, 2005

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