Storm Center is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 drama film

Drama film

A drama film is a film genre that depends mostly on in-depth development of realistic characters dealing with emotional themes. Dramatic themes such as alcoholism, drug addiction, infidelity, moral dilemmas, racial prejudice, religious intolerance, poverty, class divisions, violence against women...

 directed by Daniel Taradash

Daniel Taradash

Daniel Taradash was an American screenwriter.Taradash's credits include Golden Boy , From Here to Eternity , Rancho Notorious , Don't Bother to Knock , Désirée , Picnic , Storm Center , which he also directed, Bell, Book and Candle , Morituri , Hawaii...

. The screenplay

Screenplay

A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...

 by Taradash and Elick Moll focuses on what were at the time two very controversial subjects, Communism

Communism

Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...

 and book banning, and took a strong stance against censorship

Censorship

thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...

.

Synopsis

In the first overtly anti-McCarthyism

McCarthyism

McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from the late 1940s to the late 1950s and characterized by...

 film to be produced in Hollywood, Alicia Hull is a widow

Widow

A widow is a woman whose spouse has died, while a widower is a man whose spouse has died. The state of having lost one's spouse to death is termed widowhood or occasionally viduity. The adjective form is widowed...

ed small town librarian

Library

In a traditional sense, a library is a large collection of books, and can refer to the place in which the collection is housed. Today, the term can refer to any collection, including digital sources, resources, and services...

 dedicated to introducing children to the joy of reading. In exchange for fulfilling her request for a children's wing, the city council asks her to withdraw the book The Communist Dream from the library's collection. When she refuses to comply with their demand, she is fired and branded as a subversive. Judge Ellerbe feels she has been treated unfairly and calls a town meeting. Ambitious attorney

Lawyer

A lawyer, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is "a person learned in the law; as an attorney, counsel or solicitor; a person who is practicing law." Law is the system of rules of conduct established by the sovereign government of a society to correct wrongs, maintain the stability of political...

 and aspiring politician Paul Duncan, who is dating assistant librarian Martha Lockeridge, uses the meeting as an opportunity to make a name for himself by denouncing Alicia as a Communist. His forceful rhetoric turns the entire town, with the exception of young Freddie Slater, against her. The boy, increasingly upset by the mistreatment his mentor is suffering and affected by the influence of his narrow-minded father, finally turns on her himself and sets the library on fire. His action causes the residents to have a change of heart, and they ask Alicia to return and supervise the construction of a new building.

Production notes

In 1951, it was announced Mary Pickford

Mary Pickford

Mary Pickford was a Canadian-born motion picture actress, co-founder of the film studio United Artists and one of the original 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences...

 would return to the screen after an 18-year absence in The Library, produced by Stanley Kramer

Stanley Kramer

Stanley Earl Kramer was an American film director and producer. Kramer was responsible for some of Hollywood's most famous "message" movies...

 and directed by Irving Reis

Irving Reis

Irving Reis, born May 7, 1906, in New York City – died July 3, 1953, in Woodland Hills, California, was a radio program producer & director, and a film director.Reis was the creator of the experimental anthology program on the radio, Columbia Workshop...

. The following year, she withdrew from the project a month before filming was scheduled to begin, ostensibly due to the fact it was not a Technicolor

Technicolor

Technicolor is a color motion picture process invented in 1916 and improved over several decades.It was the second major process, after Britain's Kinemacolor, and the most widely used color process in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952...

 production. Within days, Kramer signed Barbara Stanwyck

Barbara Stanwyck

Barbara Stanwyck was an American actress. She was a film and television star, known during her 60-year career as a consummate and versatile professional with a strong screen presence, and a favorite of directors including Cecil B. DeMille, Fritz Lang and Frank Capra...

 to replace her, but scheduling conflicts with his new star repeatedly delayed the start of filming. Kramer eventually dropped out of the project, and it remained in limbo until Taradash decided to direct it himself with the new title .

Although set in New England

New England

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

, the Columbia Pictures

Columbia Pictures

Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...

 release was filmed on location in Santa Rosa, California

Santa Rosa, California

Santa Rosa is the county seat of Sonoma County, California, United States. The 2010 census reported a population of 167,815. Santa Rosa is the largest city in California's Wine Country and fifth largest city in the San Francisco Bay Area, after San Jose, San Francisco, Oakland, and Fremont and 26th...

. It is the only film ever directed by Taradash.

The film is also notable for featuring an early poster and title sequence created by noted graphic designer Saul Bass

Saul Bass

Saul Bass was a Jewish-American graphic designer and filmmaker, best known for his design of motion picture title sequences....

. The opening title sequence features flames that eat away at both the face of a boy and pages from a book.

Principal cast

• Bette Davis
  Bette Davis
  Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress of film, television and theater. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional...
  
   ..... Alicia Hull
• Brian Keith
  Brian Keith
  Brian Keith was an American film, television, and stage actor who in his four decade-long career gained recognition for his work in movies such as the 1961 Disney family film The Parent Trap, the 1966 comedy The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming, and the 1975 adventure saga The Wind and...
  
   ..... Paul Duncan
• Kim Hunter
  Kim Hunter
  Kim Hunter was an American film, theatre, and television actress. She won both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award, each as Best Supporting Actress, for her performance as Stella Kowalski in the 1951 film A Streetcar Named Desire...
  
   ..... Martha Lockridge
• Paul Kelly
  Paul Kelly (actor)
  Paul Michael Kelly was an American child actor who later as an adult became a stage, film, and television actor.-Child actor:...
  
   ..... Judge Robert Ellerbe
• Joe Mantell
  Joe Mantell
  Joe Mantell was an American actor. He was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role as "Angie" in the 1955 film Marty, which earned the Best Picture Award....
  
   ..... George Slater
• Edward Platt
  Edward Platt
  Edward Cuthbert Platt was an American actor best known for his portrayal of "The Chief" in the 1965-70 NBC/CBS television series Get Smart...
  
   ..... Rev. Wilson
• Kathryn Grant
  Kathryn Crosby
  Kathryn Crosby is an American actress and singer who also performed under the stage-name Kathryn Grant.-Early life and career:...
  
   ..... Hazel
• Kevin Coughlin ..... Freddie Slater

Principal production credits

• Producer
  Film producer
  A film producer oversees and delivers a film project to all relevant parties while preserving the integrity, voice and vision of the film. They will also often take on some financial risk by using their own money, especially during the pre-production period, before a film is fully financed.The...
  
   ..... Julian Blaustein
  Julian Blaustein
  Julian Blaustein was an American film producer.Born in New York City, Blaustein graduated from Harvard University in 1933. He spent a year in flight training at the Randolph Air Force Base before heading to Hollywood, where he became a reader in the story department at Universal Pictures. He...
  
  
• Original Music
  Film score
  A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film, forming part of the film's soundtrack, which also usually includes dialogue and sound effects...
  
   ..... George Duning
  George Duning
  George Duning was an American musician and film composer. He was born in Richmond, Indiana and educated in Cincinnati, Ohio at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, where his mentor was Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco....
  
  
• Cinematography
  Cinematography
  Cinematography is the making of lighting and camera choices when recording photographic images for cinema. It is closely related to the art of still photography...
  
   ..... Burnett Guffey
  Burnett Guffey
  Burnett Guffey, A.S.C. was an American cinematographer.He won two Academy Awards: From Here to Eternity and Bonnie and Clyde .-Career:...
  
  
• Art Direction
  Art director
  The art director is a person who supervise the creative process of a design.The term 'art director' is a blanket title for a variety of similar job functions in advertising, publishing, film and television, the Internet, and video games....
  
   ..... Cary Odell
• Title Design
  Film title design
  Film Title Design is and always has been an essential part of any motion picture. Film Title Design was originally a motionless piece of artwork called Title Art....
  
   ..... Saul Bass
  Saul Bass
  Saul Bass was a Jewish-American graphic designer and filmmaker, best known for his design of motion picture title sequences....
  
  

Critical reception

In his review in the New York Times, Bosley Crowther

Bosley Crowther

Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...

 felt "the purpose and courage of the men who made this film not only are to be commended but also deserve concrete rewards. They have opened a subject that is touchy and urgent in contemporary life . . . [they] put a stern thought in this film, which is that the fears and suspicions of our age are most likely to corrupt and scar the young . . . However . . . the thesis is much better than the putting forth of it. The visualization of this drama is clumsy and abrupt . . . Mr. Blaustein and Mr. Taradash have tried nobly, but they have failed to develop a film that whips up dramatic excitement or flames with passion in support of its theme." Of Bette Davis, he said, "[She gives] a fearless and forceful performance as the middle-aged widowed librarian who stands by her principles. Miss Davis makes the prim but stalwart lady human and credible."

Time

Time (magazine)

Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...

said the film "makes reading seem nearly as risky a habit as dope . . . [it] is paved and repaved with good intentions; its heart is insistently in the right place; its leading characters are motivated by the noblest of sentiments. All that Writer-Director Taradash forgot was to provide a believable story."

In the Saturday Review, Arthur Knight

Arthur Knight (film critic)

Arthur Knight was a movie critic, film historian, professor and TV host.His book The Liveliest Art, first published in 1957, is a history of the cinema used as a text book at colleges and universities throughout the world.-Early life:...

 opined the film "comes to grips with its central problem with a forthright honesty and integrity . . . It may be that in fashioning the story the authors have made their film a bit too pat, a bit too glib, a bit too easy in its articulation of the various points of view expressed. Bette Davis's enlightened liberalism sounds at times as dangerously smug and self-righteous as the benighted politicos and anti-intellectuals who oppose her."

The National Legion of Decency

National Legion of Decency

The National Legion of Decency was an organization dedicated to identifying and combating objectionable content, from the point of view of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, in motion pictures...

 stated the "propaganda film offers a warped, over simplified emotional solution to the complex problems of civil liberties in American life." Daily Variety

Variety (magazine)

Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...

responded to the Legion by suggesting "it's almost impossible to over-dramatize human liberty whether it's a depiction of Patrick Henry

Patrick Henry

Patrick Henry was an orator and politician who led the movement for independence in Virginia in the 1770s. A Founding Father, he served as the first and sixth post-colonial Governor of Virginia from 1776 to 1779 and subsequently, from 1784 to 1786...

 ... or a librarian sacrificing her reputation rather than her democratic principles."

Time Out London calls the film a "didactic, laborious piece."

TV Guide

TV Guide

TV Guide is a weekly American magazine with listings of TV shows.In addition to TV listings, the publication features television-related news, celebrity interviews, gossip and film reviews and crossword puzzles...

says, "While the film was forthright in its attempt to deal with censorship, the execution was dismal. The sudden alteration in the town's beliefs is just too nonsensical to accept. Davis, however, is quite convincing as the principled librarian, but there just isn't enough of a story to complement her performance."

Of it Davis herself said, "I was not overjoyed with the finished film . . . I had far higher hopes for it. The basic lack was the casting of the boy. He was not a warm, loving type of child . . . his relationship with the librarian was totally unemotional and, therefore, robbed the film of its most important factor [since] their relationship . . . was the nucleus of the script."

In 1957 Storm Center was awarded the Prix de Chevalier da la Barre at the Cannes Film Festival

Cannes Film Festival

The Cannes International Film Festival , is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films of all genres including documentaries from around the world. Founded in 1946, it is among the world's most prestigious and publicized film festivals...

, where it was cited as "this year's film which best helps freedom of expression and tolerance."

External links

• Storm Center at the Internet Movie Database