Because what the world needs more of today is individual, selfish behavior right?
While Ayn Rand's novels and philosophy are lightning rods for criticism, I don't have a problem with them per se, and I'm a liberal politically. She was born in Russia before the Revolution, and after seeing its ravages and loss of freedom, escaped to America, so it's not surprising to me that she was so fervently anti-communist. As Marx reacted to worker exploitation in the 19th century, Rand reacted to the implementation of communism in the 20th, and it's interesting to me to see these things with the benefit of looking back at history. The film is true to her novel because she wrote and had full control of the screenplay, which is a positive in one sense (her views are not distorted), and a negative in another (she's decidedly mediocre as a writer, so the film is painfully stilted and didactic to an extreme).
The virtues which Rand's ideal man, the architect Howard Roark (Gary Cooper), embody include reason, innovation, achievement, independence, stoicism, perseverance, not compromising, and being brutally honest to himself and to others. He's as iron-like and rigid as those skyscrapers he architects, a manly man who will only be with a rich socialite (Patricia Neal) on his terms, even if she throws herself to his feet and says she'll keep house for him (ugh). Through the story Rand expresses the fear of the collective and of self-sacrifice because she saw it as a means powerful men use to assert control over the masses, which we see in the architecture critic who wields quite a bit of power in the city (Robert Douglas). In a world of the collective, she believed humanity would be levelized, liberty lost, and progress stopped because creativity and individualism would be in a yoke. Think of the Cultural Revolution in China, she might say, and she'd have a point.
It's the extreme to which she took this that's the issue though, and which makes her philosophy and what we see here a historical anachronism. She was naive because she assumed that "creators" like Howard Roark are pure and always in the end doing the public good by inventing or producing new things which help humanity - not possibly doing it a disservice, playing on ignorance, or taking advantage of it to enrich themselves. And while these 'elites', these Übermensch are the highest ideal for her, the rest of humanity, the masses, are just weak parasites living off of them. It's an incredibly cynical, black and white view of mankind, one without nuance or an appreciation for just how complicated and diverse people really are.
Furthermore, in a world of the extreme capitalism and the oligarchies of today's age, with all of its attendant unfairness and suffering, and the world on the brink of destruction, it's hard to stomach Howard Roark saying things like "to get things done, you must love the doing, not the people. Your own work, not any possible object of your charity." He doesn't give two hoots about humanity or empathize with anyone. When the world seems to be crying out for collective, cooperative behavior, it's tough to appreciate Rand's philosophy from the 1940's, or at least, I think the answer has got to be more in the middle.
Artistically the film suffers because Rand's characters are caricatures, and their dialogue robotic. The plot line that has Roark blowing up a building because it's been modified to include balconies and some other entryway adornments, and his subsequent trial, is ludicrous (and what an awful way to express her philosophy too). Patricia Neal and Gary Cooper have some steamy moments, with their chemistry and looks somehow emerging from the heavy and rigid script. Cooper is otherwise miscast though, lacking the fire to play the dynamic and innovative Howard Roark. Director King Vidor gives us a few fine shots, including an elevated shot looking down diagonally at the many desks of an office arrangement, which reminded me of a shot he used in The Crowd (1928), but overall I don't think the look of the film was all that remarkable. I thought it was a better watch years ago when I first saw it, but now its defects are more glaring to me, and I have to say, I was glad when it ended.
While Ayn Rand's novels and philosophy are lightning rods for criticism, I don't have a problem with them per se, and I'm a liberal politically. She was born in Russia before the Revolution, and after seeing its ravages and loss of freedom, escaped to America, so it's not surprising to me that she was so fervently anti-communist. As Marx reacted to worker exploitation in the 19th century, Rand reacted to the implementation of communism in the 20th, and it's interesting to me to see these things with the benefit of looking back at history. The film is true to her novel because she wrote and had full control of the screenplay, which is a positive in one sense (her views are not distorted), and a negative in another (she's decidedly mediocre as a writer, so the film is painfully stilted and didactic to an extreme).
The virtues which Rand's ideal man, the architect Howard Roark (Gary Cooper), embody include reason, innovation, achievement, independence, stoicism, perseverance, not compromising, and being brutally honest to himself and to others. He's as iron-like and rigid as those skyscrapers he architects, a manly man who will only be with a rich socialite (Patricia Neal) on his terms, even if she throws herself to his feet and says she'll keep house for him (ugh). Through the story Rand expresses the fear of the collective and of self-sacrifice because she saw it as a means powerful men use to assert control over the masses, which we see in the architecture critic who wields quite a bit of power in the city (Robert Douglas). In a world of the collective, she believed humanity would be levelized, liberty lost, and progress stopped because creativity and individualism would be in a yoke. Think of the Cultural Revolution in China, she might say, and she'd have a point.
It's the extreme to which she took this that's the issue though, and which makes her philosophy and what we see here a historical anachronism. She was naive because she assumed that "creators" like Howard Roark are pure and always in the end doing the public good by inventing or producing new things which help humanity - not possibly doing it a disservice, playing on ignorance, or taking advantage of it to enrich themselves. And while these 'elites', these Übermensch are the highest ideal for her, the rest of humanity, the masses, are just weak parasites living off of them. It's an incredibly cynical, black and white view of mankind, one without nuance or an appreciation for just how complicated and diverse people really are.
Furthermore, in a world of the extreme capitalism and the oligarchies of today's age, with all of its attendant unfairness and suffering, and the world on the brink of destruction, it's hard to stomach Howard Roark saying things like "to get things done, you must love the doing, not the people. Your own work, not any possible object of your charity." He doesn't give two hoots about humanity or empathize with anyone. When the world seems to be crying out for collective, cooperative behavior, it's tough to appreciate Rand's philosophy from the 1940's, or at least, I think the answer has got to be more in the middle.
Artistically the film suffers because Rand's characters are caricatures, and their dialogue robotic. The plot line that has Roark blowing up a building because it's been modified to include balconies and some other entryway adornments, and his subsequent trial, is ludicrous (and what an awful way to express her philosophy too). Patricia Neal and Gary Cooper have some steamy moments, with their chemistry and looks somehow emerging from the heavy and rigid script. Cooper is otherwise miscast though, lacking the fire to play the dynamic and innovative Howard Roark. Director King Vidor gives us a few fine shots, including an elevated shot looking down diagonally at the many desks of an office arrangement, which reminded me of a shot he used in The Crowd (1928), but overall I don't think the look of the film was all that remarkable. I thought it was a better watch years ago when I first saw it, but now its defects are more glaring to me, and I have to say, I was glad when it ended.