A few weeks ago I spoke to Marilyn Ann Moss, the Los Angeles-residing author of “The Farrows of Hollywood: Their Dark Side of Paradise” (Skyhorse, 4.11).
In late ’21 I had seen and reviewed an interesting doc about the late filmmaker, titled “John Farrow: Hollywood’s Man in the Shadows.”
My motive is speaking to Ross was to try and persuade her to tell me a bit more about Farrow’s personal life and maybe answer a couple of other dangling questions that the doc hadn’t really gotten into. Alas, Moss was more into verbal volleying for its own sake. So we just kind of chatted and danced around. Cool.
I haven’t had a chance to read her Farrow book, but Moss seems to know nearly everyone and everything…she’s really been around. And her literary credentials are impressive — author of “Raoul Walsh: The True Adventures of Hollywood’s Legendary Director” (2011) and “Giant: George Stevens, a Life on Film (2004). In 2021 the Criterion Collection released her 2019, feature-length documentary, The True Adventures of Raoul Walsh, on Blu-ray. Moss is a former film and television critic for The Hollywood Reporter and Boxoffice Magazine.
“Undimmed Saga of John Farrow,” posted on 10.17.21: Last night I watched John Farrow: Hollywood’s Man in the Shadows, a 96-minute doc about the prolific, under-rated Australian-born director. Farrow made scores of better-than-decent, lower-budgeted films (The Big Clock, Five Came Back, Calcutta, His Kind of Woman, Hondo). A skilled and dependable craftsman, he directed no drop-dead masterpieces but was great with long takes.
Married for 20-odd years to Maureen O’Sullivan while constantly catting around, the Roman Catholic Farrow sired seven children, including Mia Farrow.
Co-directors Claude Gonzalez and Frans Vandenburg have delivered a respectable effort, often edifying if less than fully satisfying, for reasons I’ll try to explain.
The sage talking heads include Australian directors Phillip Noyce, Bruce Beresford and Philippe Mora, plus film critics Todd McCarthy, David Thomson, David Stratton, Margaret Pomeranz, Imogen Sara Smith and Farran Smith Nehme. Hollywood biographer Charles Higham and Farrow’s wry look-alike son, John Charles Farrow, also participate.
I’m not a serious Farrow devotee but I respect his assurance and sense of polish and control, and his extra-long takes are Scorsese– or Coppola-level.
I’m as much of a fan of The Big Clock as the next guy. Vincent Price’s performance in His Kind of Woman is one of my all-time camp favorites of the ’40s, and Five Came Back (’39), a crashed-in-the-jungle survival story with Lucille Ball, is a keeper. I’m trying to recall if I saw Farrow’s 1956 remake, Back From Eternity. And the 3-D, John Wayne-starring Hondo is pretty good.
I understand why producer Mike Todd fired Farrow off the direction of Around the World in 80 Days (i.e., Todd wanted a less headstrong director, someone he could push around) but why exactly did Farrow lose the King of Kings gig? The filmmakers couldn’t explore that? This is one of the issues I wanted Moss to explain.
Farrow losing two high-paying 1950s prestige gigs in the space of five years is odd. It alludes to an imperious, uncooperative manner.
Was Farrow’s 1963 heart attack a genetic thing? Was it due to alcohol abuse? Farrow was only 58 when he passed — a relatively early departure for a man who wasn’t overweight.
How many years ago was this doc shot? The answer seems to be “not recently.” Three, four years ago for the most part? More?