Nicholas Ray Blogathon: Flying Leathernecks (1951)

by Tony Dayoub

Another aviation-centered picture from billionaire Howard Hughes, Flying Leathernecks is also an uncharacteristic feature from director Nicholas Ray. Set during World War II's Battle of Guadalcanal, it essentially boils down to a two-hander pitting the stalwart John Wayne (Sands of Iwo Jima) against the pugnacious Robert Ryan (On Dangerous Ground). Given its use of an incredible amount of actual war footage, I'm assuming the story was built around the footage used (especially with such unique images as a pilot bailing out of a downed aircraft). So it's funny to think of a left-leaning maverick like Ray having to conform to all of these elements—a notoriously demanding eccentric as his studio chief, an equally iconic star who no doubt had demands of his own (both right-wingers) and the limitations demanded by such specific footage—in order to complete the war movie.

Nicholas Ray Blogathon: Born to Be Bad (1950)

by Tony Dayoub

A lot of the fun found in Born to Be Bad, a minor film by Nicholas Ray to be sure, is in watching Joan Fontaine subvert her sweet screen persona to play the manipulative Christabel Caine. From the moment she bursts into the life of her publisher uncle's employee, Donna (Joan Leslie)—the jaded city girl Christabel is staying with until she gets her footing in San Francisco—small-town Christabel's default mode of advancing in society is a sort of clumsy, saccharine method of laying love-traps around vain, rich men whose latent attraction to her blinds them to her motives. What else can explain how Donna's fiance, Curtis (Zachary Scott), is the only one to fall for the excessively honeydrippy Christabel?

Flying Leathernecks (1951) and Ray's Surrender to Conformity

by Tony Dayoub

Another aviation picture from billionaire Howard Hughes, Flying Leathernecks is also one of the stranger offerings directed by Nicholas Ray. Set during World War II's Battle of Guadalcanal, it essentially boils down to a two-hander pitting the stalwart John Wayne against the pugnacious Robert Ryan. Given its use of an incredible amount of actual war footage, I'm assuming the story was built around the footage used (especially with such unique images as a pilot bailing out of a downed aircraft). So it's funny to think of a maverick like Ray having to conform to all of these elements—a notoriously demanding eccentric as his producer, an equally iconic star who no doubt had demands of his own, and the limitations demanded by such specific footage—in order to complete the war movie.