Tay Garnett is worth seeking out for the conviction he draws from his stars, especially when desire gets people into trouble. His strongest work has patience, though some of his comedies and adventures let the running jokes take over.
Fi1m perspective
John Garfield and Lana Turner are given time to want each other in The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946). Tay Garnett does not hurry them towards suspense, because the crime will mean little unless the attraction is persuasive. This is where we recommend him most readily, directing a romance carefully enough to make its bad decisions credible. The opening takes its time, and we would not pretend otherwise. But the patience is useful: we need to believe in the couple before we worry about them.
That interest in romance was already there in One Way Passage (1932), with William Powell and Kay Francis as lovers aboard a ship. Its mixture of sentiment and comedy points towards the romantic adventures of his strongest period, from the mid-1930s to the mid-1940s. China Seas (1935) gives him Clark Gable, Jean Harlow and Wallace Beery; Seven Sinners (1940) pairs Marlene Dietrich and John Wayne. Comedy belongs in these films, but Garnett sometimes gives it too much space. In Her Man (1930), the running gags can crowd out the story.
In Postman, cinematographer Sidney Wagner’s shadows supply much of the unease while Garnett concentrates on the leads. We felt anxious for the couple because Turner and Garfield make their desire convincing enough for their bad judgement to matter. They do much of the work without explicitness, though the film’s restraint about sex sometimes makes the relationship harder to believe than it should be. Garnett’s decision to establish desire before building suspense is still the right one. It gives us a reason to care about something beyond the next development in the crime story.
The later features are less dependable, a falling-off after the mid-1940s that makes recommendations beyond that period harder to give. From the late 1950s Garnett worked primarily in television, including Rawhide and Gunsmoke. That is no reason to treat the earlier films merely as exercises by a reliable craftsman. Start with The Postman Always Rings Twice, and allow the lovers their time; anyone impatient for the crime may find the first stretch a long wait.
Biography
Tay Garnett (born William Taylor Garnett) was an American film director and writer. He entered the film industry as a screenwriter in 1920 after serving as a naval aviator in the First World War, later working as a gag writer for Mack Sennett and Hal Roach before directing his first feature in 1928.
Garnett directed nearly 50 films across genres. His credits include One Way Passage (1932), China Seas (1935), The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946) and Cause for Alarm! (1951). In later years he worked extensively in television, directing episodes of series including Gunsmoke and Rawhide.
