Although based on a John O'Hara novel, "From the Terrace" is another 'Young Philadelphians': a smart, heavy-going family melodrama, set from the late forties to the late fifties, with Newman as an angry young opportunist from Philadelphia
Again the moral (which undoubted1y attracted him) is that the drive for wealth and power corrupts innocence and love Here there's more of a motivation, the old reliable one: his father hates him... He tells his cold, nasty father (Leon Ames), "All I ever wanted was to be friends with you," then defiantly rejects the family's fairly substantial steel mill He wants moreto make $5 million by age forty, to be better than his old man
On his way up the cynical path to Wall Street, he ignores his marriage, driving his once-sweet wife (Woodward) to bitchery and into the bed of an old flame He works intensively to become a high financier, but suddenly realizes how empty his life is; unlike Tony Lawrence ("The Young Philadelphians"), he drops out completely, leaving his failed marriage and flourishing career to marry a wholesome small-town woman
Newman battles valiantly with incredible soap opera contrivances, crises and inflated dialog, but he loses He's worst in his scenes with the decent young woman (Ina Balin), because the relationship is improbable, their talk about love is slow, and he's not convincing as the shy, gentle lover We've seen him earlier as sexually confident and aggressive, and besides, Newman is not very good at expressing tenderness
He's excellent at the beginning, indicating bitterness toward his father with contemptuous facial expressions, although here, as elsewhere, his tendency to show tension or self-absorption by blinking and looking away during conversations is overdone
But with Woodward, he and the film really come to life During their first meetings, as he comes on strong and she resists, the antagonism, flavored with overtones of desperate sexuality, reminds us of "The Long, Hot Summer." Then, in their marriage, the roles are reversed: he becomes immersed in business, and she becomes sexually frustrated, creating a highly-charged tension between them
There's a beautifully acted scene near the end when, like Maggie the Cat, she pathetically flaunts her sexuality at him and he merely sits there with a world-weary look Ironically, Woodward make the wife so vital and pathetic that it's hard to accept her as a bitch, and the ending makes little sense...
Again the moral (which undoubted1y attracted him) is that the drive for wealth and power corrupts innocence and love Here there's more of a motivation, the old reliable one: his father hates him... He tells his cold, nasty father (Leon Ames), "All I ever wanted was to be friends with you," then defiantly rejects the family's fairly substantial steel mill He wants moreto make $5 million by age forty, to be better than his old man
On his way up the cynical path to Wall Street, he ignores his marriage, driving his once-sweet wife (Woodward) to bitchery and into the bed of an old flame He works intensively to become a high financier, but suddenly realizes how empty his life is; unlike Tony Lawrence ("The Young Philadelphians"), he drops out completely, leaving his failed marriage and flourishing career to marry a wholesome small-town woman
Newman battles valiantly with incredible soap opera contrivances, crises and inflated dialog, but he loses He's worst in his scenes with the decent young woman (Ina Balin), because the relationship is improbable, their talk about love is slow, and he's not convincing as the shy, gentle lover We've seen him earlier as sexually confident and aggressive, and besides, Newman is not very good at expressing tenderness
He's excellent at the beginning, indicating bitterness toward his father with contemptuous facial expressions, although here, as elsewhere, his tendency to show tension or self-absorption by blinking and looking away during conversations is overdone
But with Woodward, he and the film really come to life During their first meetings, as he comes on strong and she resists, the antagonism, flavored with overtones of desperate sexuality, reminds us of "The Long, Hot Summer." Then, in their marriage, the roles are reversed: he becomes immersed in business, and she becomes sexually frustrated, creating a highly-charged tension between them
There's a beautifully acted scene near the end when, like Maggie the Cat, she pathetically flaunts her sexuality at him and he merely sits there with a world-weary look Ironically, Woodward make the wife so vital and pathetic that it's hard to accept her as a bitch, and the ending makes little sense...