THE RECKLESS MOMENT (1949)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Crime / Drama

Director: Max Ophuls

Cast: Joan Bennett / James Mason / Frances E. Williams

Plot

After finding the dead body of her daughter’s boyfriend on her property, a suburban mother moves the corpse, hoping to avoid a criminal investigation.  A mysterious blackmailer then shows at her door, demanding $5,000 in exchange for the incriminating love letters between her daughter and the dead man.

What I Liked

I love a good subversive movie and “The Reckless Moment” is a wonderfully subversive suburban drama that challenges many of the accepted ideals of post-war America.  Mrs. Harper appears to be the model matriarch of the era, well-dressed and groomed, responsible, organized, acting as a moral compass for her children, and ferociously protecting her quintessential American family from the dangers of the outside world.   However, when her social role is challenged by the discovery of the corpse of a dead man and the possibility of her family and life being intruded upon by that outside world (the police) she abandons moral certainty and commits the crime of moving the body.  As time passes and the pressure mounts upon her, Mrs. Harper reveals to a stranger that she feels trapped by her family and her responsibilities, hinting that perhaps the ideal American mother might actually resent her family.  In a culture that worshiped Donna Reed, Mrs. Harper’s character insinuates that perhaps women might desire more out of life than being housewives.

That the thought of her family being investigated is enough for Mrs. Harper to panic and incriminate herself by moving the body represents another challenge of American society of this era.  In the post-war world, everyone had set social roles and everything was expected to be quiet and flawless.  In both the public and private arenas, those things considered weird, un-American, or different were quickly repressed or became the subject of fear and scandal.  “The Reckless Moment” displays a family, and particularly one woman, overcome by secrets.  Ashamed by something she did not even do and worried by what her neighbors might think, Mrs. Harper sets in motion a series of events that, instead of making her troubles go away, magnify them.  Thus this pseudo-noir film acts as an indictment of the so-called silent generation.

What I Didn’t Like

*spoiler alert*

The main arc of the story follows the blackmailer, Mr. Donnelly’s change of heart as he gets to know the put-upon Mrs. Harper.  James Mason does well at conveying that transformation from a remorseless victimizer to a hopeless romantic as smoothly as possible, yet the script simply does not allow enough time for that change to be plausible.  Somehow Donnelly, who admits himself to have been a vile crook his entire life, falls in love with Mrs. Harper and has a complete change-of-heart about his plot in a matter of about three face-to-face meetings.  This development has major repercussions on the conflict’s outcome as a whole and Mason’s interesting performance can’t compensate for a rushed plot, making the film’s conclusion seem entirely unbelievable.

Most Memorable Scene

Director Max Ophuls does a tremendous job throughout the entire film of playing up the film’s sense of paranoia through creating a prevailing sense of Mrs. Harper’s constant exposure to being found out.  Whether it is because of her constantly hovering family or her overly friendly neighbors, Mrs. Harper is constantly surrounded, with precious few moments of privacy.  Everyone in the film is filled with questions for the poor woman.  This is most effective when she travels into town with Donnelly and the two of them stop at a general store packed with locals.  Here, and again in a later scene where they discuss the death and blackmail in a crowded train station, the pair are surrounded by eyes, ears, and mouths that could launch a thousand rumors.  People step between them, bump into them, recognize them, and pry into their private details.  To the people doing all this, it is all part of everyday living; they think nothing of it.  But to Mrs. Harper and the viewer, these intrusions are maddeningly suspenseful.

My Rating: 3.5 out of 5