I have an essay in the September/October issue of Film Comment, in their new column “Finest Hour,” singing the praises of Dean Stockwell’s radical and honest performance as the sexually-repressed/tormented/closeted Judd Steiner in the 1959 film Compulsion (based on the Leopold/Loeb murders). I’ve written almost as much about Dean Stockwell as I have about Elvis, and actually flew to Taos to crash an art gallery party showing his work. Listen, I don’t mess around.
This is my print debut (well, in film writing, anyway) and I’m so happy that Stockwell is the topic.
Film Comment Table of contents here, and you can purchase a copy here. Eventually, they may excerpt it online, but for now: order a copy!
Congratulations! How perfect that it’s Dean Stockwell. I’ve loved reading your writing on him, especially the post on his listening in Long Day’s Journey with all your beautiful screen captures, and the one talking about his stint in community theater. And the one on his signature gesture. All of it in other words …
I have to check this out!
Kristen – you are so wonderful for remembering that piece about his signature gesture!!
I love him so much (obviously) – it’s always great to meet other fans – and I’m really happy Film Comment took this particular pitch! (It’s also great to pay tribute to actors who are still alive – a new experience for me.)
Thanks again!
Congratulations on your print debut – first of many, I’m sure.
Thanks Helena! Always loved Film Comment too so I’m honored to appear there.
Wonderful essay Sheila! And congrats! I love the idea for a regular column and you are just the person to kick it off. I hope you get another chance to contribute soon.
It makes me want to watch Compulsion all over again. He is certainly the thing I remember best of it. You really capture the kind of mix of repulsion, fascination, compassion in his performance and in my emotional response to his performance. There’s none of the kind of almost camp toffy thrill of Rope. It’s just ugly…but also…almost because he’s not asking for sympathy, just presenting the facts, just exposing his vulnerabilities, I definitely feel something for him.
It’s shocking when you think how long he’s been around! I shot out of my chair when I saw him in a Thin Man!
Jessie – thanks for reading!! Hopefully it will be shared online eventually – but yes, very happy to appear in that magazine, kicking off this new column. Right up my alley too! Went to a fun launch-party the other night and got to meet a couple of my long-time writing idols who are editors there, etc., so that was cool too.
Talked to the editor, Michael Koresky – who had commissioned the piece from me – I had never met him before – and he said that when he asked for pitch ideas from me and Dean Stockwell showed up on my list, with a comment from me along the lines of “He’s one of my favorite actors” – he was like, “Wait, what? Who says that. I need to read that piece.” hahaha
// It’s just ugly…but also…almost because he’s not asking for sympathy, just presenting the facts, just exposing his vulnerabilities, I definitely feel something for him. //
Definitely!
I decided to focus in the piece on his clear feelings for his friend – and how openly Stockwell was playing it in a more hemmed-in time. There are definitely other “issues” with this story – as happened during the original real-life case too – associating gayness with criminality and all that. as well as the other part of the film which is really an anti-death-penalty argument. I don’t feel that Compulsion trucks in pathologizing being gay (maybe a little – although the girl he tries to rape sees beneath his surface, and understands as opposed to mocks/jeers, etc.) – it’s very much of the 1950s – with the 50s obsession with Freudian psychology and sexuality. Neither man here (boys, really) are good people – but Stockwell brings that sexual loneliness and desire to it that still feels radical when I watch it. To me, that journey of his is what it’s REALLY about – and that’s even before Orson Welles lumbers on in and the film becomes an “issue” film in re: the death penalty.
so yeah: honored to write the piece and I loved that of all the pitches I sent to them, THIS is the one they went for. Go, Stockwell, the little kid getting spanked by William Powell in the Thin Man – to this!!
:)
Compulsion is one of the movies I watch whenever it pops up on TV, and 90% of the reason is Dean Stockwell’s performance. He is so INTENSE and focused and I can’t take my eyes off him.
The other part that pulls me in is the UST between the leads. I could go into a big gut-spilling about getting a tingle while watching buddy shows in the 70’s (Starsky and Hutch forever), but Compulsion was one of the first movies that made me tilt my head and think “hey, these guys have something going on”.
Pat – He really is so intense. It’s unbearable. There’s the scene at the speakeasy where he realizes he lost his glasses somewhere – and that a pair of glasses was found next to the dead body. This is a classic “oh shit” moment but Stockwell makes the moment so trapped, so claustrophobic, that you can barely breathe.
// I could go into a big gut-spilling about getting a tingle while watching buddy shows in the 70’s (Starsky and Hutch forever), but Compulsion was one of the first movies that made me tilt my head and think “hey, these guys have something going on”. //
I love this! Too bad they’re both murderous psychopaths! Ha. But I agree: it’s completely clear the nature of their relationship, and that’s mainly because Judd is more in love than Artie is – and Stockwell plays the role in almost a lovelorn way – incredibly open about it.
Glad to hear of someone else who remembers and loves this movie.