Gene Tierney can make us doubt the people who insist they know her characters. Her composure is absorbing when the film gives us reasons to study it, though the same reserve can look blank.
Fi1m perspective
In Laura (1944), Gene Tierney has to hold our attention while other people tell us how remarkable Laura Hunt is. She does it by remaining composed, allowing us to question how well these admirers know her. We were drawn to her and uneasy about the attention she received, because her quietness leaves the men's accounts open to doubt. This is where we rate Tierney most highly: in a part that gives us a reason to watch her closely.
Before Laura established her as a star, she had top billing in Ernst Lubitsch's comedy Heaven Can Wait (1943). In Leave Her to Heaven (1945), Ellen Berent Harland is jealous and possessive, with emotional intensity beneath her composure. Joseph L. Mankiewicz's The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947) gave her a mature romantic lead, Lucy Muir, opposite Rex Harrison.
In Otto Preminger's Laura, the photography and music do important work alongside her. Joseph LaShelle photographs her face with a care that makes the men's fascination plausible, while David Raksin's score supplies romantic warmth their behaviour does not always deserve. Dana Andrews, playing detective Mark McPherson, gives her a steady counterpart without competing for attention. The romantic feeling is persuasive enough to make us sympathise with men whose behaviour gives us reason for doubt.
The later work includes Mary Bristol, a supporting part in Jules Dassin's Night and the City (1950). Preminger returned to her in Whirlpool (1950) and Where the Sidewalk Ends (1950), and later in Advise & Consent (1962). His four films with her offer a useful route beyond the familiar Laura.
Critics have often found her acting wooden or too reliant on her appearance, and the impassiveness can be a limitation. Her quietness needs the right writing and direction. In Laura, though, her reserve gives us something to study beyond her beauty, even when the detective plotting feels overarranged. Start with Laura, and be slow to believe what the men tell us.
Biography
Gene Tierney was an American stage and film actress. She made her Broadway debut in 1939 in Mrs. O'Brien Entertains and her film debut the following year in The Return of Frank James. She appeared in a series of 20th Century Fox productions during the 1940s.
Tierney starred as Laura Hunt in Otto Preminger's Laura (1944). She received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress for her role in Leave Her to Heaven (1945). Other films include Heaven Can Wait (1943), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Night and the City (1950) and The Egyptian (1954). She died in Houston, Texas, in 1991.
