Dear Marlon Brando,I heard you rejected Human Desire because you were scandalized that the guy who made M was making this piece of trash. I agree with you. Sort of.The first half wasn't all that bad. Glen Ford always plays himself, you get Glen Ford in every single movie of his and not the character. I have always liked him. And Gloria Graham is terrific. She is not a conventional beauty but she oozes sex. I guess Broderick Crawford has done better roles than this one.The scenes in the train reminded me of another noir called "The Narrow Margin" which came out a couple of years before Human Desire. But the film never really goes anywhere after a certain point. All the whining and crying by the two female characters towards the end made it tough to watch. It was like a noir in the first half with the tough working class characters and their attitude towards life. The second half was like an intense weepie.All said and done, this film could have been named Horny Males or something.And Marlon, considering some of the films you did in the 50s and 60s ..... this film wouldn't have been all that bad a choice.Best Regards, Pimpin.(6/10)

"Human Desire" (1954) is technically a remake of Jean Renoir's "La Bete Humaine" (1938), which featured Spencer Tracy look-alike Jean Gabin and Simone Simon; which itself was an adaptation of French Naturalist writer Emile Zola's novel. But director Fritz Lang takes his version in an entirely different direction, turning the story from psychological thriller to film noir masterpiece by focusing on the two-timing woman (Vicki Buckley - played by Gloria Grahame).Renoir's "La Bete Humaine" had instead focused on the exploring the mind of Gabin's protagonist (Lantier); specifically his genetic curse of brutality and rage. His occupation of train engineer and the images of train tracks are used to reinforce the inevitability of his fate.In Lang's version this character (Jeff Warren - played by Glenn Ford) has no dimensionality, the train tracks reinforce his straight and narrow nature, he is not bent and his train engine must be placed in a roundhouse to be given a different direction.There are intersecting tracks in the train yard and Jeff's moral compass is only challenged in that location. The film's two most suspenseful sequences occur in the train yard and Lang amplifies the discordance with disorienting changes of camera angles and at one point an expressionistic jump-cut as Jeff and Vicki suddenly bridge the distance between each other.But this is Grahame's film; her all-time best performance and Lang's best work as an acting for the camera director. She gently teases this role, when others would fill it with overwrought melodrama. Her Vicki Buckley is the most authentic and complex heroine/fatale of the Film Noir genre; perhaps of all cinema. The character is a canvas filled with shades of gray; at once manipulative, vulnerable, self-destructive, and haunting. Much of Grahame's effectiveness is nonverbal and much of it derives from her physical qualities and inherent fragility. All very fitting as Zola was the pioneer of literary naturalism.Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.

From Zola, by way of Renoir, Fritz Lang's "Human Desire" becomes a story of love, hatred, murder, lust, and more murder in and around a railroad marshaling yard.Broderick Crawford is the hulking drunk who is morbidly jealous of his younger and horny wife, Gloria Grahame. Crawford has murdered a big shot who has shown interest in Grahame, and he makes her write a letter incriminating herself. The letter is a chain that shackles her to him. But they've reached that point in a marriage at which the husband comes home from work, the wife stands up from the dinner table and leaves the room. They don't sleep together. They don't speak. The hatred is incandescent. Well, at least hers is. He's still jealous and thick headed and he will never let her go.Enter handsome bland young Glenn Ford, returning to his job as brakeman on a locomotive after a stint in the Korean War. Ellen Case is a pleasant and appealing young woman who lives in the same boarding house and she develops a crush on Ford. Ford is not very interested. He's more interested in Grahame who exudes heat.Grahame has no trouble seducing the rather dull Ford. And she soon begins asking him suggestive questions. "You're a soldier. You must have killed men. Is it very difficult to kill someone? How about my husband?" I just made that last question up, but if Ford weren't so stupid he'd get the picture sooner than he does.However, it finally comes to him, after Grahame has lured him into her web. Let's see. Ford and Grahame are in love and want to get married. But then there the burly Broderick in the way. He's blackmailing Grahame into staying with him. So a reluctant Ford begins stalking his friend and co-worker through the dismal railroad yards one night, a heavy iron weapon in his hand. Crawford has quite a load on and should hardly notice it when his occiput is bashed in. At this point, and a bit earlier, it sounds a little like "Double Indemnity." But it's not as polished and taut a production as "Double Indemnity," nor is the movie-star-handsome Glenn Ford a good substitute for Jean Gabin with his creased and exhausted features. Ford in his railroad outfit isn't dirty enough.Gloria Grahame always suggests sex -- of some bizarre kind. She's at her best as a flirty and slightly mysterious babe who is almost comic in her sensuality. She was extremely good, for instance, in her role in "Crossfire," especially in her almost surreal scenes with Paul Kelly. But this is a straight dramatic role. And 1954 is not 1945, so she seems a little used, in a depressing way.The gloom isn't helped by the production design. Nice shots of tracks criss-crossing and whistles warning ball-playing kids to get out of the way. But those 1950s working-class apartments. Boxes within boxes. All the rooms, all the decor, all the kickshaws, reflective of an organized wholesomeness that is fake. I wouldn't live in one of those places. I'd rather live under one of the beds. The overall ethos is one of a witting, impending doom. If one of the characters saw a light at the end of the tunnel, he'd run out and get more tunnel.

While this movie is far from perfect, it is very good and very enjoyable mostly due to a dynamite performance by Gloria Graham--a highly underrated femme fatale. Like so many of her films, she plays a bad lady whose motivations are never exactly clear--you just know she is bad news! When the film begins, you are most likely going to be surprised by the bizarre casting (one of the few parts of the film I didn't like). The audience is expected to believe that ugly old Broderick Crawford is married to sexy Gloria Graham! While having the toad-like Crawford married to Judy Holiday in "Born Yesterday", he was a rich man in this film, so his marrying this pretty young woman was believable. But, in "Human Desire", Crawford is an engineer on a train--not the sort of man you'd ever believe would marry Graham (or vice-versa). On top of that, Crawford is an angry brute of a husband--making you wonder why she would stay.Early in the film, Crawford loses his job and wants his young wife to use her sexy wiles on the boss to help him get his old job. Well, this plan works all too well--and then, inexplicably, Crawford is angry at her and the boss and kills the man!! At this point, Crawford and Graham both hide the murder. But, after the killing, Graham is spotted by Glenn Ford--and him seeing her near the corpse could mean she and Crawford could go to prison. But Graham uses all her many charms to weasel her way into Ford's heart--and he's hooked. What happens next is for you to see. However, I did not adore the ending--mostly because it was gritty but not nearly as dark and horrible as I would have liked! While the dialog and style were clearly film noir, other noir films might have gone the extra step and made the ending even more downbeat. Still, it's a very good film--and you have to love Graham's performance. She was terrific.By the way, although not as badly cast as Crawford, Glenn Ford was also cast as a train engineer. Maybe I'm wrong, but this just seemed a bit odd to me.