Essential: SAPPHIRE (1959)

TopBilled:

Consequences and justice

The opening sequence is quite memorable. A college-aged female is found dead in a park on Hampstead Heath. We learn her death may have been the result of a hate crime. A respectable London detective (Nigel Patrick) is put in charge of the case. He is joined by his assistant (Michael Craig). As their investigation gets underway, the audience sees that these men are immersed in a situation that involves class division, racial bigotry and scandal.

Despite Basil Dearden’s production having been shot in handsome Technicolor, I felt the film should really have been presented in black and white. Mainly because this underscores the central theme about black-white relations. But also because when we see the victim’s corpse at the beginning she would look less “colored”…as in any color.

It is obvious they’re using a Caucasian actress to play the murder victim, because her neck is a creamy white, and her face is peach complected. With black and white cinematography, we wouldn’t be able to tell her race so easily. Her being a black woman who passes as white is what the whole story is predicated upon, and we are not supposed to know right away what her true race is.

The best performer in this picture is Yvonne Mitchell, who plays the killer. She has been assigned the most difficult role. We are not supposed to like her character but Miss Mitchell elicits sympathy from us with her anguished portrayal. This makes it harder to reconcile her part in Sapphire’s death at the end.

I don’t want to see a mother of two torn away from her kids and her husband, going off to prison. But of course that is what will happen, since she must face a consequence and justice must be served.

We’re supposed to view the white boyfriend’s family as a bunch of narrow-minded bigots, or at least people who do not handle race relations well. However, Sapphire’s boyfriend did love her and did plan to marry her.

I didn’t feel Sapphire’s pregnancy added anything to the story and question its inclusion. Even though the white boyfriend acted like it would have been his child, there was no certainty of it. And he seemed to be more at a loss over Sapphire’s death than he was over an unborn child’s death. It felt like the filmmakers were trying to give us more dimensions to Sapphire and thought revealing her as a mother-to-be increased the tragedy.

This story, if made today, would probably be reworked as a plot about a transgender character. Where the conservative family couldn’t accept their son/brother being involved with a transgender male who had passed as female.

What I like most about the story is how one person’s death affects so many people. This event ripples across the landscape and causes many of these characters to re-examine their lives. You do wonder how they can all go forward now.

***

Jlewis:

The most important scenes in this movie, for me, are those right before and after the opening credits and at the end just before “The End.”

In the beginning, a woman’s face is shown… dead, with blood from her mouth. After we get through the credits, a toy ball rolls towards it and one of two girls comes to retrieve it. She and her sister are speechless when confronting the corpse. Their mother arrives and screams in shock. This scene is vitally important because they are not the only mother-with-two-daughters featured in this movie.

Before the final end credits, Inspector Learoyd (Michael Craig) compliments the head police investigator Hazard (a most unusual name, played by Nigel Patrick) on finally solving the murder of Sapphire, the woman whose corpse was showcased. His response is “We did not solve anything. We just picked up the pieces.” That, for me, is a rather powerful statement to end a movie.

In-between we learn who Sapphire was, with just a photograph of her alive (and very happy)…dancing with a partner whose side of the picture is torn off. We learn more about her when we meet her brother (Earl Cameron), who surprises those investigating with his appearance. You see, like Sarah Jane in the newer version of Imitation Of Life, which preceded this by just a few months, Saphhire was biracial and passing for “white” so she could have better advantages in life.

While Sarah Jane was humiliated by her boyfriend when he learned the truth, Sapphire was lucky in that her boyfriend (Paul Massie) accepted her. Only his family (Yvonne Mitchell, Bernard Miles, Olga Lindo) did not, and they were in a state of shock. Plus she was three months pregnant at the time of her death.

I saw this British movie, coming from Basil Deardon (who also handled the even more socially influential Victim),  when President Obama was in office and pretty much considered it a relic of an earlier time. Today I think differently due to how much has happened these last few years…or, rather, how much has been exposed that I was not noticing enough. Thus, I agree with Hazard that picking up the pieces is not quite the same as solving anything.

Obviously this world is not black and white, figuratively speaking. Every one of us has a back story. Every one of us has prejudices about something or somebody due to either the way our parents raised us (cue the mothers and daughters in this movie) or due to personal experiences that impacted us psychologically. Spencer Tracy tells Katharine Houghton and Sidney Poitier in Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner: “I’m sure you know what you’re up against. There will be 100 million people right here in this country who will be shocked and offended and appalled.” Remember too that his character of Matt Drayton was initially among those 100 million before he changed his mind.

What I like about this movie is that we have no cardboard villains; nobody dressed in white robes and burning crosses like so many ol’ South sagas in vogue during the 1970s and ’80s whom we can point the finger to and say “well, I am at least not like those people.” “Those” people in this film include a very kind landlady who still refuses back payment from the murdered woman’s brother and a seemingly well-educated and highly articulate black man (a very stoic Paul Slade) who had refused to marry this same woman because she wasn’t 100% his race either.

Ironically he and his new girlfriend ride a very white sport-car, which was clearly an intentional visual reference showcasing how people of all races are more willing to conform to a black vs. white world rather than accept the many shades of gray.

We get a few “red herrings” in this lengthy detective story to distract us. Most notable is a black dancing partner of Sapphire’s at an “international” club named Johnnie (Harry Baird). He is not guilty, but his found knife causes him trouble. The speed with which he becomes a suspect over other Caucasian characters present was a rather provocative statement for its time.

The message of this movie may be what hooks me in more than its entertainment value. The detective story itself isn’t all that exciting otherwise, especially if you have watched many like it before. Yes, we are surprised by who is found guilty; it does satisfy with its conclusion. However, had this movie been made more recently, I think we would get more out-and-out suspense involved. For example, there is an extended scene of the boyfriend searching for stuff at the scene of the crime and being casually observed by those who aren’t concerned at all if he would notice them noticing him.

Likewise, there is a certain drabness to the visuals (perhaps intentionally?) with the usual abundance of winter coats and hats in the wardrobe, making one wonder why this wasn’t shot in black and white instead of the stock fifties Eastmancolor that tends to make many faces of different racial tones look brown. Nonetheless this is still a stellar three and a half star production, if I was to rate it accordingly.