Acteurist Oeuvre-View – Season 1 – Jennifer Jones: Beat the Devil (1953) & Love is a Many-Splendored Thing (1955)

This time on our Jennifer Jones 'cast it's two movies based on novels by Communists, bafflingly made during the early Cold War era, one a failure and one a hit. We start with the failure, the original Dirtbag Left hang-out movie, John Huston's BEAT THE DEVIL (1953). It was based on a novel by Claud Cockburn (one-time Stalin apologist), with script contributions from Cockburn and a hot young novelist named Truman Capote. Then we turn to another critique of colonialism, Henry King's Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing (1955), based on the semi-autobiographical novel by Han Suyin (future Mao apologist). It's a radical field day!   Time Codes: 0h 01m 00s:          Beat the Devil (1953; dir: John Huston) 0h 39m 59s:          Love is a Many-Splendored Thing (1955; dir: Henry King)   +++ * Check out our Complete Upcoming Episode Schedule * Find Elise's latest published film piece – "Elaine May's Male Gaze" – in the Elaine May issue of Bright Wall/Dark Room* *And Read Elise's Writing at Bright Wall/Dark Room, Cléo, and Bright Lights.* Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy Write to us at [email protected] Theme Music: "What's Yr Take on Cassavetes?" – Le Tigre