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Classic Pick: The Long, Hot Summer (1958)

The Long, Hot Summer stands in the same category of Southern Gothic filmmaking as A Streetcar Named Desire and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Awash in Technicolor sweat, drawling Mississippi accents, and decaying plantations, the film is all about a dying society that desperately needs an influx of virility. Who better to provide that than a young Paul Newman?

Newman plays accused barn burner and con man Ben Quick, who shows up in a small Mississippi town run by Will Varner (Orson Welles) one hot summer day. Quick insinuates himself into Varner’s household, shaking up the family that includes the disappointing son Jody (Anthony Franciosa), daughter Clara (Joanne Woodward), and Jody’s wife Eula (Lee Remick). Varner decides that the charming con man is the perfect husband for Clara, a supposedly frigid young woman who wants nothing to do with him, six-pack abs notwithstanding. The result is a simmering tale of sex, chicanery, and the decaying Southern aristocracy as only William Faulkner could write.

With passionate relationships abound in The Long, Hot Summer – including the unlikely pairing of Orson Welles and Angela Lansbury – the most intense one develops between Quick and Clara. They love and loathe each other at first sight, and their exchanges simmer with a combination of repressed rage and repressed sexuality. Newman and Woodward were real life husband and wife, and the onscreen heat between them is palpable, especially in one notable scene as Quick stands half-naked on Clara’s balcony, calling for her to come out and play. Woof.

But then again, the heat in The Long, Hot Summer is palpable in general. Everyone sweats and steams, motives are obscure and inspired more by passion and revenge than by reason. Still, unlike many films of its ilk, The Long, Hot Summer has an undercurrent of ebullience that helps it avoid plunging into total melodrama. The cast helps too: there’s not a bad actor in the bunch, and all maintain their laconic Southern drawls without making them caricature-ish.

Summer’s coming apace, so there’s no better time to settle down and enjoy some good old-fashioned Southern Gothic, which The Long, Hot Summer has in abundance.