Cinema Sunday: The Ghost and Mrs. Muir

 

One Sunday morning recently, I happened across a black & white classic from 1947, The Ghost and Mrs. Muir. 

What made me decide to stick around and watch this movie to the end, I'm not entirely sure.  But it's a beautifully made film with a story that spans a lifetime.  

In the early 1900's, Mrs Lucy Muir, a young widow moves to the seaside  English village of Whitecliff. She rents a house there named Gull Cottage.  Lucy sets up house there with her daughter Anna and her maid Martha.

And a ghost.  

Specifically the ghost of sea captain named Daniel Gregg. He's not exactly happy to find his home occupied by women. He had plans to turn Gull Cottage into a home for retired seamen. 

<Let's take a moment to enjoy a giggle. "Retired seamen". Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!>

But Lucy's determined to make Gull Cottage her home and the sea captain acquiesces.  He'll stay out of her way if she'll stay out of his. 

But financial disaster strikes. The investments that fund Lucy Muir's way of life at Gull Cottage have gone bust.

That's when Daniel Gregg comes up with a plan to make some money.  Lucy Muir will publish a book!

Specifically, Daniel will dictate his stories from his time at sea and Lucy will write it up as book.

And avast ye mateys, the daft plan works. Blood and Swash,   the book of the Captain's lurid and sensational recollections, become a bestseller. Sales of the book make Lucy's financial state strong enough for her buy Gull Cottage. 

Lucy Muir, the published author, finds herself in the company of other writers including Miles Fairley who writes children's stories under the pen name Uncle Neddy. Miles is sauve and sophisticated and Lucy falls in love with him.

Which is a problem for Daniel Gregg.

The ghost is in love with Mrs. Muir. 

But not wanting to be an obstacle to Lucy finding true love with a living, breathing man, the ghost decides to take his leave of Lucy and Gull Cottage. While Lucy sleeps, Gregg plants a suggestion in her mind that she alone wrote the book, the ghost was but a dream. 

And with that, the ghost of Captain Daniel Gregg fades away.

But...

It turns out that Miles Fairley is nothing more than a common hustler, romancing Lucy on the side while he as a wife and children at home. 

Heartbroken, Lucy lives at Gull Cottage as a recluse under the watchful care of her loyal maid, Martha. 

Years past and Anna is off to college.  She returns home for a visit with her fiance, a Royal Navy lieutenant.  It is during this visit that Anna tells Lucy she saw the ghost too and she was also aware of what went down with "Uncle Neddy".  

Lucy reveals that time has not been kind to Miles Fairley who is now a fat, bald alcoholic abandoned by his wife and children.  

More time passes. Anna is away with her own daughter while Lucy is much older and in poor health, still being cared for by Martha. While sitting in a bedroom chair, Lucy dies. It is then that the ghost of Captain Daniel Gregg reappears. Daniel takes Lucy hands as her youthful spirit leaves her aged body.  

They walk arm in arm out of the house into the mist. 

No, I'm not crying. You're crying! 

Oh shut up!    

If you're into stories about romance, ghosts and romance with ghosts, well, The Ghost and Mrs. Muir is the movie for you.

Gene Tierney as Lucy Muir is warm and witty and sure has hell ain't afraid of no ghost when the spirit of the old sea captain turns up.

Rex Harrison has a very fine needle to thread with a character that is by nature brittle and brusque but ultimately charming. 

Gene and Rex in their scenes together spark with chemistry, at first with their flinty resolve not to concede any ground to the other to their growing realization that they work well together.  

This movie simply looks good under the able direction of Joseph L. Mankiewicz with Charles Lang's  razor sharp B&W cinematography. 

Fun fact: while the movie is set in England, it was filmed entirely in southern California.  

The Ghost and Mrs. Muir is a very good movie, at turns witty and even whimsical and at other times, poignant and sad. 

OK, that is that for today's Cinema Sunday. Next week, I'm actually going to write about a movie in this century.

Until then, remember to be good to one another and don't hog all the popcorn, will ya?