The Swan

Charles Vidor – 1956

Sumptuous widescreen Technicolor MGM romance movie of the kind that was bordering on old-fashioned even in 1956. Under veteran journeyman Charles Vidor’s direction, and based on the oft-adapted stage play, The Swan feels at once breezy and lumbering. I spent the entire film expecting characters to break into song; it looks and feels exactly like a Rogers & Hammerstein musical from that same era. The cast is spectacular, led by Grace Kelly in her penultimate role before abandoning show business. She’s so ideal as a princess in an unspecified European country that speaks American English that it would be easy to believe the role was created specifically for her. Aristocrats struggling over a choice between duty and true love is not something that lends itself to relatability these days, but it’s not offensive, and still kind of fun as romantic-comic fluff. There are also frequent digs at all the pomposity that let us know the film’s true sympathies, such as a great gag right at the beginning in which the downstairs staff nonchalantly brushes off a bread roll that’s fallen on the floor and plopping it on a tray to be taken directly to the royal family for breakfast. It also features Louis Jourdan, Jessie Royce Landis, Leo G. Carroll, Estelle Winwood and Agnes Moorehead, a surreal mix of international personalities and accents. (Landis and Kelly also played mother and daughter the year prior in Hitchcock’s To Catch a Thief.) The primary attraction for me was star Alec Guinness as a prince who becomes the third point in the love triangle with Kelly and Jourdan. This was his first American film, and it demonstrates how unsuited he was to leading man roles. He was brilliant as the lead in many films, but never as a “leading man” in the romantic hero sense. He is my favorite actor and his other work from this same period – Father Brown, The Prisoner, The Ladykillers, The Horse’s Mouth, Our Man in Havana and The Bridge on the River Kwai – make excellent use of his unique qualities. He’s quirky and obsessive, making him ideal for comedic and military roles – but he’s also aloof and sexless; it’s hard to convincingly pair him with anyone with whom he’s supposed to be smitten. The driven professional thwarted by chaotic circumstances is Guinness’ ideal persona. His carefully choreographed poise, mellifluous voice and dancer’s stride make him the polar opposite of Marlon Brando and always fascinating to watch. In a sense, though unintentionally, his appearance in The Swan works because there isn’t a moment when he ever appears like he belongs in this genteel milieu or like he has a chance of being accepted over Louis Jourdan as the object of Grace Kelly’s affection. It’s not a great film but it’s diverting as a relic of the waning days of splashy MGM froth and as a vehicle – though on divergent paths – for Grace Kelly and Alec Guinness.