How Douglas Sirk’s Melodrama Became Better ‘Written’ Over Time

March is Melodrama Month in New York City or, at least, the upper reaches of Greenwich Village at which the Quad Cinema is mounting a series of overripe entertainments intended to titillate the most jaundiced of souls. Sounds rich? If the shoe fits, film it in technicolor and tack on a soundtrack of commensurate soupiness. Or, pace the organizers at the Quad, dial the emotions up to 11. Douglas Sirk’s “Written on the Wind” (1956) is showing this week, and it’s a sterling example of the genre, as well as a measure of how works of art can take on different guises through the march of time.The picture was met with critical brickbats upon its release. “The trouble with this romantic picture,” the Times noted, ” . . . is that nothing really happens.” Sirk was sniffed at as a company man, a hack who specialized in sentimental entertainments for that most sentimental of species, women. But what do critics know? Audiences flocked to “Written on the Wind.” In terms of the bottom line, Sirk rarely disappointed the bean counters.Which isn’t to say that keeping them happy was light work. After the release of his biggest box office, “Imitation of Life” (1959), Sirk called it quits and moved to Europe (he was born in Germany.) Illness was a factor in the departure from Hollywood, but so was boredom and frustration: “I had had enough.” Sirk spent the last decades of his life — he died in 1987 at the age of 89 —directing theater and teaching film, but never put his hand to another feature. Before his eyesight failed, Sirk was content to spend the time writing and reading. What might he have thought of a younger generation of critics and historians who went on to enthuse about his films? Few directors have seen the estimation of their work elevate quite as drastically.Jean Luc-Godard testified that Sirk’s movies “set my cheeks afire.” MOMA curator, Dave Kehr, wrote that Sirk captured “the hollowness of middle-class American life.” Proponents of queer cinema have adopted Sirk as their own, as has the stray Freudian and Marxist. Three young critics — Fran Hoepfner, Imogen Sara Smith and Alexandra Coburn — were scheduled to appear at the Quad to introduce “Written on the Wind.” What post-millennial angle might these writers have divined from Sirk’s artifact?To get a feel for how seriously “Written on the Wind” was taken back in the day, consider that it was nominated for three Oscars: best song, best supporting Actor, and best supporting actress. The songwriters Victor Young and Sammy Cahn were snubbed — Jay Livingston and Ray Evans took home the award for “Whatever Will Be, Will Be (Que Sera, Sera)” from Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Man Who Knew Too Much” — and Robert Stack lost out to Anthony Quinn’s take on a Post-Impressionist painter, Paul Gauguin, in Vincent Minelli’s “Lust for Life.”It’s too bad: Stack is pretty good as a self-loathing alcoholic, Kyle Hadley. However, Dorothy Malone did take home the gold statuette as Kyle’s sister, the town slattern Marylee. At this date, we might be tempted to peg Malone as a Marilyn Monroe-wannabe, a brunette, she dyed her hair blonde for “Written on the Wind,” and consider the role as hyperbolic and, perhaps, laughable. But how campy was it in 1956? Malone’s acceptance speech can be found online, and there’s not an iota of irony to her effusiveness. “God love you all” are the last words she says before being rushed off stage.Art can date and conventions change. How we respond to shifts in tone and taste says as much about our own time, and, perhaps, our limitations, as it does about the item under consideration. “My idea . . . ,” Sirk stated, “was to create a comedie humaine with little people, average people — samples from every period in American life.” His immaculately crafted movies reflect and absorb everything that comes their way. “Written on the Wind” is a film whose facets are likely to further multiply over time.

How Douglas Sirk’s Melodrama Became Better ‘Written’ Over Time

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