Lilith (1964)

"Eighteenth Nervous Breakdown and Only One to Go"

I am going to break away from the pack and call this one a five star movie. It is a slow movie, unless you are constantly analyzing the actors, and why they did this or that, or played it this way or that way, which is the way I viewed it. I found the performances riveting and could not take my eyes or mind off the Peter Fonda character--such great acting as a pale, insecure, asylum inmate. Warren Beatty does not have a huge body of work--has restricted himself--so you take a greater interest in the parts he plays and why he plays them. He is always good. This movie about asylum innmates and the medical staff is fascinating. Made in the sixties, it is a great groundbreaker for "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" and "Awakenings." The added ingredient would be romantic obsession. If you have never seen "Lilith" you may find it interesting in a retro-Sixties way. September 17, 2008

A Mid-60s Melodrama

"Lilith" is worth a viewing on two levels. First, it was an early platform for a number of talented actors who later became stars. The protagonist is a young Warren Beatty, playing a World War II veteran returning to his home town to work as an occupational therapist at a private mental hospital. There he becomes entranced by a psychotic patient, Lilith, played by the lovely Jean Seberg. Another patient, also fascinated by Lilith, is the young Peter Fonda, while Gene Hackman, in an early role, plays a local hick who married Beatty's girlfriend while he was away at war. All these actors do a creditable job.

The other fascinating aspect of the film is its portrayal of mental illness. Anyone who has spent time with the mentally ill will groan at director Robert Rossen's hackneyed portrayal of the patients at the hospital, who portray every cliche in the book. Rossen manages to introduce some kinkiness by showing Lilith as a bit of a nymphomanic, with little discretion in the objects of her affection. But the film also projects what were some common views of mental illness in the 1950s and 60s, well before pharmaceuticals became the standard treatment.

The film is based on a novel by J.R. Salamanca, who had worked at Chestnut Lodge, a private mental hospital in Rockville, Maryland. Chestnut Lodge appears to have been a font of literary inspiration, because it was also the setting for the novel "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden." In both Salamanca's book and Rossen's film, the name of the institution is changed to Poplar Lodge, but nevertheless portions of the film were shot in Rockville. The real Chestnut Lodge closed in the 1990s, a victim of changing trends in treatment and insurance reimbursement. There is no record that it ever had a patient named Lilith.
October 30, 2007

This DVD could have been great if it had an audio commentary

The movie is 5 star; the DVD is only 3 star.

I first saw this movie 14 years ago and to this day it has left its mark. The music is so eerie and the way it was filmed so strongly enhanced the emotional and psychological feel of the film.

This DVD could have been just amazing, but it is completely bare, not a single extra to be had. If only it had an audio commentary or a good retrospective documentary on the making of the film.

Seems like a missed opportunity to me since this DVD was just put out in 2004. Such a shame.
October 20, 2006

For Fans of 60 Icons Beatty, Seberg, and Fonda

LILITH was made by the American director Robert Rossen after a period of having been blacklisted, or graylisted at any rate, and a tremendous comeback with THE HUSTLER starring Jackie Gleason. I remember thinking, well, LILITH might not be the ticket for a permanent comeback for Rossen and indeed this turned out to be the case. It's a failure, but an ambitious one and the kind of movie that makes you long for it to be just a little bit better.

Its stars are incandescent. In LILITH Warren Beatty shows for the first time that he's more than just a pretty face. He plays a troubled vet who takes a job as a "counsellor" at a swanky sanitarium, He's almost as messed up as his patients. I wonder if they called him "Vincent Bruce" to sound like "Vincent Price" because he exhibits all the signs of erotic obsession we associate with Price's AIP Poe films, though Beatty isn't as over the top. And playing the "Barbara Steele part" is Lilith herself, Jean Seberg, looking utterly beautiful and enchanting and evil. Peter Fonda is also in it, almost too young to believe, looking good and acting his ass off as another mental patient who falls for Lilith's wicked ways. And then, for fans of ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT on TV, you can spot Jessica Walter, the mother of the clan, here playing Laura, the former girlfriend of Vincent Bruce. He goes back to visit her, even though she married Gene Hackman, in a scene that seems very reminiscent of the end of SPLENDOR IN THE GRASS, where Beatty also had to confront the fact that his girlfriend is hitched up with someone else.

And KIM HUNTER is in the movie too, like Rossen also a victim of HUAC and blacklisting. Here she is a kindly older psychiatrist with a little bit of a thing for Beatty. Well, who wouldn't! Kim Hunter played one of the apes in Planet of the Apes and a memorable "final girl" part in THE SEVENTH VICTIM by Val Lewton and Mark Robson. She's wonderful to watch. August 30, 2004

crime and passion

This is a slow, delicate film. There are no car crashes, and no muscle bound hero to save the earth from some impending doom. What you will see is a brilliant study in how the weakness of one man, Warren Beatty, can cause so much harm. His misdirected passion causes the mental collapse of one, Jean Seberg, and the death of another, Peter Fonda. All cast members give excellent performances. This is a haunting film that has stayed in my memory for many, many years. April 18, 2002

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