The Men (1950)

There have been many attempts to tackle the issues of shell-shock and the like, to offer "normal" people a chance to sympathize with war veterans and understand the issues they face upon returning home. "The Men" is about paraplegics at a time when the study of paraplegia was a relatively new science. I am automatically disinclined to like this film, just as I dislike most of these types of movies, as I find them to be irrelevant watching for anyone but those who can empathize rather than sympathize.

Marlon Brando makes his first on-screen appearance as ex-GI Ken who, a year after his spine was severed during the war, is still bedridden, depressed in his condition. The doctors tell him he will never walk again and he rebuffs the advances of his once intended wife, Ellen (Teresa Wright). It is a story about how he comes to terms with his condition and the struggles that he faces with his relationship, himself and with society.

Again and again, this film shouts to the audience that we need not pity these men. They are no different than the men they were before the war, and feeling sorry for them does nothing but serve as a hindrance to their progress. It seems to me, however, that although this is a tremendous effort to make these men appear courageous and valiant in their efforts to appear normal, when they continuously talk about bladder control and spinal taps and there are parents who would tell their daughters not to marry a crippled man in the same way they would tell her not to marry a black man, it doesn't seem that there is much else I can do but feel pity.

Brando gives a strong effort to breathe life into a dismally written character. It is praise that could be given to several of the actors here, who were pitted against a blunt and amateurish script. However, Brando, unlike the others, is already offering a caliber of acting unique to him and is a style noticeably different than those he plays opposite against. For instance, watch Everett Sloane as Dr. Brock compared to Brando. Sloane's words are clipped, he uses lots of pre-planned gestures, he plays the idea of a doctor rather than this particular Dr. Brock. His patient, on the other hand, simply seems to be there, a newly crippled person who wandered his way onto a film set. The words he says are not lines, they are thoughts that he vocalizes. It's actually quite startling to see the emergence of a new style of acting materializing right before my eyes.

When Brando is not speaking or moving or being, this is a little chore of a film which offers nothing in the way of substance and may as well be an advert for a disabled persons charity or something. It seems to me to be a waste trying to educate an audience on something they could never fully understand. How is an audience member supposed to know what true emasculation is if they themselves have never had to deal with no longer getting an erection, or use the bathroom by themselves? It's too much a foreign experience for me to fully connect to a character that I wanted to reach and therefore I felt disinterested in the movie.

Apart from a lousy script which talked more about one woman's inadequacies than the men facing real issues, this is an okay movie with one standout performance. I don't hold too much against it personally, but rather this type of plot in general. I would much prefer a story about how these men come to terms with their disabilities together than one where I feel like a worse person for not being more understanding of something that I could never hope to grasp in the first place.

1.5/4