by Gus Sanchez

Created on: February 01, 2007   Last Updated: May 09, 2007

Modern acting on the silver screen begins here. Marlon Brando isn't just acting the role of Stanley Kowalski; he is Stanley Kowalski. It's as if director Elia Kazan merely hired the salt of the earth off the streets and told that man to just be himself. It is absolutely impossible to break down Brando's smoldering, menacingly sexual performance as Stanley Kowalski and suggest that he's reading his lines and acting very well. To suggest he's acting would be an affront to Brando's innate, uncanny ability to become the character and not just read the lines very well. A Streetcar Named Desire is an erotic masterpiece, and not because of Brando. Taking the unmistakable brilliance of Tennesse Williams' masterwork of a play, Elia Kazan smartly allows the actors to spur the story along, not allowing his directing to obtrude or detract, and what you get is a gripping story of sexual tension and jealousy. As the mercurial, emotionally-crippled Blanche DuBois, Vivian Leigh loses herself in the traumatic aftermath that has become Blanche's life. The pampered Southern belle is somewhat of a cliche, but Leigh manages to parlay her insistence on the good (and expensive) things in life and her dependence "on the kindness of strangers" as Blanche's singular strength, one that she clings to in a perfume-soaked desperation. Her descent into madness is the focal point of the inevitable, immediate clash between herself and her brother-in-law, Stanley Kowalski, and to a large extent, her sister Stella. Blanche has a hideous secret she is desperately hiding, Stanley, one way or another, in his brutish fashion, is going to get it out of her, despite his wife Stella's (played keenly with great sympathy and strength by Kim Hunter) opposition. It's not, however, a clash of egos; Blanche and Stanley are fighting over control of Stella's soul, the emotional rock of Streetcar. On the one hand, she is fiercely devoted to Stanley, despite his "commoner" status, but she cannot bear to watch her sister slide into madness. This is the struggle that is played out before Stella's eyes. In perhaps the most memorable scene, the "Stella!" scene, Stanley's fury at Blanche's unrelenting pretensiveness causes him to erupt violently against a radio the sisters have been playing during one of his poker games, and Stella's anger at his loss of temper causes him to beat her. Blanche thinks she's beaten Stanley and won Stella's soul, but as a contrite, devastated Stanley shrieks Stella's name out in the pouring rain, outside of the apartment where Stella and Blanche have taken shelter with the Kowalski's neighbors, the erotic impulses of Stanley and Stella prove Blanche otherwise. In this scene of great erotic play, Stella saunters down the flight of stairs, eyes fixed longly on Stanley and his beaten, muscular body, and Stanley receives her both gently and with great animalism. It's a scene where the tension can't be cut whatsoever. While Streetcar is the first example of the modern acting that would someday introduce us to Brando's heirs, including Dustin Hoffman, Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro, to name a few, Elia Kazan's film is a tremendous display of ensemble acting, where Brando overwhelms the viewer with his menacing, soulful impression of Stanley, and Vivian Leigh physically and emotionally metamorphosizes into Blanche DuBois. Great acting from Kim Hunter and especially Karl Malden, as Mitch, a good-hearted mama's boy and card-playing buddy of Stanley's and Blanche's suitor, who will soon learn what horrible secrets Blanche has been holding inside her.

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