Keeper of the Flame (film)

1943 film by George Cukor

MGM studio head Louis B. Mayer assigned the script to Donald Ogden Stewart—one of his favorite screenwriters. Mayer's choice seemed unusual, because up to that time Stewart had written only light romantic comedies featuring wealthy East Coast socialites, but Mayer felt Stewart's strongly leftist political leanings would enable him to chalk out a better screenplay. Stewart approached the project with gusto, remarking that he "wrote an adaptation from a novel that tells about the fascist mice who are nibbling away at our country while we're busy fighting a good war." Stewart believed Hollywood had punished him for years for his political views and felt vindicated by the assignment, declaring that "here was my compensation for the sabotage of my radical attempt to do my bit  ". The script was the proudest moment of his entire career. Stewart, however, had extensive problems adapting the novel for the screen, and filming—originally due to begin in June 1942—was delayed for several months while he worked on the screenplay. He consulted with the Bureau of Motion Pictures in the U. S. Office of War Information, an agency of the federal government created in June 1942 to promote patriotism and warn the public about domestic spying. Spencer Tracy had been cast as the male lead in the film just days after MGM purchased the rights to the novel. George Cukor was chosen to direct in late April 1942 because he had dealt well with troubled and headstrong actors in the past, and Tracy was considered a difficult actor to direct. Bronisław Kaper, who had come to MGM in 1935 from Nazi Germany, was assigned to compose the film score. William H. Daniels was named the cinematographer. Katharine Hepburn joined the cast in mid April 1942 after Stewart sent her a copy of the unfinished script. Hepburn was fascinated by the character of Christine, and felt that doing the film would be a way of contributing to the war effort. MGM executives did not want Hepburn attached to the picture, feeling it was an inappropriate follow up for her (first) previous pairing with Tracy in Woman of the Year (1942), but Hepburn insisted, and MGM relented. Hepburn showed some concerns with Stewart's redrafting of the script, in that he toned down the novel's love story, placing more emphasis on the character of O'Malley and the action. She asked for more romance in the film. Although Hepburn had spent much of the prior year searching for scripts with equally strong male and female parts for her and Tracy, she now requested that the O'Malley role be restored to the function it served in the novel (where O'Malley is impotent, troubled, and despairing of love) and her own part expanded. Film producer Victor Saville threatened to resign if the changes were made, and Spencer Tracy supported him, which led to the changes being rejected. Nonetheless, the script still had numerous problems, and Stewart refused to recognize these shortcomings. In late summer 1942, Cukor brought in Zoë Akins, one of his favorite playwrights and screenwriters, to help with the script. Victor Saville expressed concern that Stewart was basing more and more of the script on William Randolph Hearst, one of Louis B. Mayer's best friends, and that this might jeopardize the success of the picture. As script work continued, casting on the film (which had been delayed months) went ahead in mid 1942. Richard Whorf was cast as the villain, Clive Kerndon, in early June. Pauline Lord was cast in late July, and Darryl Hickman added in early August. Craven, whose character was not initially specified, was given the role of Dr. Fielding in early August. Forrest Tucker and Percy Kilbride were the last members of the cast hired. Phyllis Brooks tested for a part in the film in mid June, but was not cast. A search was even made for the voice of Robert Forrest.

Principal filming began the last week of August 1942. The entire picture was filmed on a sound stage, with no location shooting. Hepburn had already begun her extramarital affair with Spencer Tracy, and the production was notorious for the ways in which Hepburn doted on Tracy. Tracy drank heavily during the shoot, and Hepburn was his constant guardian, nurse, maid, and gofer during this time. She tried to keep him out of the bars, assisted him when he was drunk, reinforced his ego, and ran lines with him. However, Hepburn continued to be upset by the script, and dealt with this problem by isolating herself from friends and family in order to concentrate on her interpretation of the role. The filming process was an efficient one, and it was going so well that in the middle of the production Cukor asked Hepburn to talk to Judy Garland in an attempt to convince Garland of the need to sober up. In order to add realism to the production, Cukor consulted reporters from United Press for advice on how newspapermen would handle Forrest's funeral. Based on their critiques, Cukor changed the scene in the village hotel's bar so that instead of drinking and talking about the funeral, the reporters get to work drafting articles on their typewriters. The script, too, was changed to permit the bartender to make a quip about reporters working rather than drinking. Reshoots occurred in September and October. Katharine Hepburn returned to Hollywood in early September for retakes, and Pauline Lord was called back in early October. but he was not nominated. Keeper of the Flame premiered at the Albee Theatre in Cincinnati on January 28, 1943, setting a box office record for the city. Following a few other limited dates in February, it had a premiere at New York City's Radio City Music Hall on Thursday, March 18, 1943. The premiere served as a fundraiser for the Outdoor Cleanliness Association (a group dedicated to public lighting and enforcement of trash laws). The premiere did not go well: MGM head Louis B. Mayer stormed out, enraged by his having encouraged the making of a film that equated wealth with fascism. It opened in Los Angeles at Grauman's Chinese Theatre on Thursday, April 1, 1943. Keeper of the Flame made its Australian premiere at the Metro Theatre in Melbourne in June 1943. It didn't appear on American television until March 1957.

Although the film was held over for a fourth week at Radio City Music Hall (most films lasted a week), it did not do well at the box office nationally and is considered the least successful of the Hepburn Tracy films. It earned $2,190,000 in the United States and Canada and $1,032,000 elsewhere, making an overall profit of $1,040,000.

The film generated some political controversy. Republican members of Congress complained about the film's obviously leftist politics and demanded that Will H. Hays, president of the Motion Picture Production Code, establish guidelines regarding propagandization for the motion picture industry. Critical reaction at the time was mixed. While at least one reviewer felt the film was reminiscent of motion pictures like Citizen Kane and Rebecca, Crowther called the film "a courageous and timely drama" and praised Tracy and Hepburn for performances that featured "taut solemnity." But the script seemed uneven dramatically ("  the nature of this story is a murder mystery and yet the interest is centered much more upon the dead man than on the hunt"), and a critical problem was that the audience "is informed much sooner than the journalist what the nature of Forrest was, and the story drags while we wait for the journalist to catch up." The Hartford Courant, meanwhile, raved about the film: "Hepburn and Tracy have given us a great film in Keeper of the Flame  Great because of the courage and daring it took to make it, the magnificent production it has been given, the excellent acting within it, and the exciting, tense story it contains." Generally speaking, the film was better received in the eastern half of the United States. Cukor himself was highly dissatisfied by the film. "I suspect the story was basically fraudulent," he told an interviewer. Like many critics, he felt that "as a piece of storytelling, the unfolding of a mystery, the first half of Keeper of the Flame is a damn good show," but the rest of the film had substantial problems. He praised Spencer Tracy's work, saying: "Tracy  was at his best in the picture. Subdued, cool, he conveyed the ruthlessness of the reporter sent to investigate Forrest's death without seeming to try. He was ideally cast in the role, grimly and skeptically exploring the secret of the dead boys' club hero who was in fact a rampant fascist." Hepburn, he felt, was hindered by the role and her approach to it. "It was Kate's last romantic glamour girl part, and she acted with some of that artificiality she'd supposedly left behind at RKO. That first scene, floating into a room in yards and yards of draperies with these lillies—well, it was all far, far too much. I don't think I really believed in the story, it was pure hokeypokey, and her part was phony, highfalutin." But he felt Hepburn did her best: "That's awfully tricky, isn't it? And doesn't she give long, piercing looks at his portrait over the mantel? Well. I think she finally carried a slightly phony part because her humanity asserted itself, and her humor. They always did." Overall, though, Cukor felt the film was leaden, and that it had "a wax work quality". Even screenwriter Stewart eventually came to feel the film was "tedious, wooden, and heavy handed". More recently, some critics have reassessed the film positively, and it has been cited as 1943's "great emotional drama." Critics and scholars note that the film is a good example of the type of anti fascist films produced in America early in World War II. Kevin Starr states that the film "remains astonishing in its bold effort to shape American public opinion" and is a film that "preaches a hard line Popular Front message." Robert Fyne, author of The Hollywood Propaganda of World War II, (1997) notes the film's "strong warning to the American people about demagoguery, domestic fascism, and mind control, while praising the virtues of freedom of the press." One film historian has concluded that Keeper of the Flame is "truly provocative in that it was one of Hollywood's few forays into imagining the possibility of homegrown American Fascism and the crucial damage which can be done to individual rights when inhumane and tyrannical ideas sweep a society through a charismatic leader." Other authors have noted that the film is different from other anti fascist films of the period in that it clearly links wealth and fascism and points out the ways in which patriotism may far too easily be turned toward fascist ends. The technical quality of Keeper of the Flame has been highly praised since its release. William H. Daniels' cinematography and lighting design has been described as lush and virtuosic, and he received accolades from his peers for his work on the film. Cukor biographer and film critic Emanuel Levy praised the strong atmosphere of Keeper of the Flame and Cukor's "interesting Gothic style." Other historians have pointed out that the film's score is particularly good. For example, one review noted that the music goes silent during the climactic scene in which Christine Forrest reveals her secrets to Steven O'Malley—an effective and unexpected emotional tactic.