Today's film reminds us that a man may be morally guilty of a crime he may not have committed in fact, and that punishment can bring healing to an embittered soul.
I was surprised when I first saw this that Taylor is not any kind of femme fatale. She is completely innocent both of ill intentions and any knowledge of the truth.
I wonder why they changed the names from the Dreiser novel. Particularly to Eastman. Could not have won the studio any friends at Kodak.
Taylor was 17 when she made this film, and they did play her as an innocent, a school-girl, even. I wondered about the name, as well. I taught this book and film in my American Novels on Film class at PC many times, and never did turn up anything about the use of George Eastman name. And it's always seemed unlikely to have been a coincidental choice. In the book, stage play and original film, the family name is Clyde Griffiths (journalistically close to Charles Gillette, the actual murderer in the true story Dreiser based his story on). I don't think that Gillette was related to the Gillette manufacturing magnate, but who knows?
I was surprised when I first saw this that Taylor is not any kind of femme fatale. She is completely innocent both of ill intentions and any knowledge of the truth.
I wonder why they changed the names from the Dreiser novel. Particularly to Eastman. Could not have won the studio any friends at Kodak.
Taylor was 17 when she made this film, and they did play her as an innocent, a school-girl, even. I wondered about the name, as well. I taught this book and film in my American Novels on Film class at PC many times, and never did turn up anything about the use of George Eastman name. And it's always seemed unlikely to have been a coincidental choice. In the book, stage play and original film, the family name is Clyde Griffiths (journalistically close to Charles Gillette, the actual murderer in the true story Dreiser based his story on). I don't think that Gillette was related to the Gillette manufacturing magnate, but who knows?