Nightmare Alley

I just saw Nightmare Alley, directed by Guillermo del Toro, a remake of a 1947 Tyrone Power movie of the same title. Based on a novel by William Lindsay Gresham, the first version was made as a vehicle for Power to go beyond the swashbuckling roles that had made him enormously popular. He was later to say it was his favorite film role.  Gresham wrote his novel after returning from being a volunteer in the Spanish Civil War, where he had met someone who told him stories about carnies. In the Tyrone Power film, the carnie world is exploitative and dedicated to putting one over on the rubes, but it has its own moral code, whereas in Guillermo del Toro's remake, the moral corruption is total. The first version is in sumptuous velvety black-and-white while the second is in color and uses vivid red throughout: Molly's electrogirl costume; her coat once they have left the carnival; Cate Blanchette's lipstick; and Molly's bloody hands when she is "materializing" the dead Dorie as part of the con that goes wrong in the end. In the end, Tyrone Power's character has hit rock bottom as a geek but is saved when Molly finds him, while Bradley Cooper's Stan is left howling "I was made for this" as he accepts the job of geek.

There are three great roles for women: Joan Blondell plays Zena (played by Toni Collette in del Toro's film) who is Stan's first partner in the art of the "mentalist" con; Coleen Gray plays Molly who is Stan's wife and partner in his high society version of the con, (Rooney Mara); Helen Walker is the "psychologist" Lilith Ritter who cons Stan (a mesmerizing Cate Blanchette).

The figure of the geek, ("man or beast"?) as the the lowest point of degeneration of the alcoholic opens and closes each film. In the first version, the geek's screams are blended with the musical score at various points in the action. There's the geek, and then there is Zena's alcoholic husband who has fallen from his former success and dies of alcohol poisoning at the hands of Stan. Tyrone Power's Stan clearly feels guilt over accidentally giving wood alcohol to his mentor, while Bradley Cooper's Stan might have done it on purpose. Both of them give a bottle to a man who clearly dying of his addiction.

Stanton is a beast in the form of a beautiful man. Guillermo del Toro doesn't have to worry about the Code or a studio imposing a redemptive ending (and then sabotaging the film's release through lack of promotion because Zanuck didn't like it) so he was more faithful to the novel, and he doesn't hesitate to display all the depravity of his characters. One result is that we don't like Bradley Cooper the way we can't help but like Tyrone Power, who seems to be a charming scoundrel but not a cold-blooded murderer like Bradley Cooper's Stan. 

Del Toro talks at length about his film noir inspirations here.

Here's the trailer for the 1947 version:

 

Here's the trailer for Guillermo del Toro's film: