boblipton After he lost out in a power struggle at Paramount, Jesse Lasky went to Fox, where he produced some innovative pictures that were not particularly successful at the box office. This is one of them.Most of what is interesting about this movie is the opportunity to see the handiwork of a couple of marionette companies of the era. Otherwise, there is one clear case of miscasting (Gene Raymond is supposed to be the neurotic scion of five generations of puppeteers who has a better relationship with his puppets than human when he looks and acts like a college football star) and some more subtle mistakes in acting and directing: Lilian Harvey is directed in the opening scenes as so withdrawn that I thought she might be playing an idiot, but as she gains in self control and knowledge, she becomes audible. Leslie Banks is quite amusing in a brief foray into the colonies and Georgia Caine handles the confidante-out-for-herself role very well.Although this is a visually striking film, there are script problems. There is an interesting subtext about the relationship of identity and control as various people insist that they are Suzanne, the Lilian Harvey character, before the matter is sorted out. Had the film makers had a little more confidence in their audience, this might have turned into a better movie.

GManfred You have probably never seen a movie like "I Am Suzanne!" Read the summary and you will get a feel for it, and it will save me from trying to explain why this is such a rewarding, heartwarming film - and those are adjectives I seldom use. I just wonder where the idea came for this picture - 'original' is hardly the word to describe it.I think it is basically a love story and would be rated 'G' today, as it would have great appeal to children; think "Hans Christian Andersen" (1953) but minus puppets, and that would approximate the depth of the plot. The principals are childlike, and behave like children would think adults behave. Bland 30's leading man Gene Raymond is the puppeteer who thinks his marionettes are almost real, and Lilian Harvey is an unhappy dancer. They fall in love, although she is a greater success than he; few come to see his puppet shows and she is a celebrity.Special mention should be made of the Yale Puppeteers, the real stars of the piece. When they are on-camera they steal the show, as much as possible for dolls on strings. So good are the Puppeteers that the dolls come to life in the several different set pieces they are in. I always thought puppeteers just stood above the puppet stage, but here they have intricate walkways to follow the movements of the puppets. The whole novel effect of the picture is fascinating and might have been better with a replacement for Raymond. Also if Fox spent a few more dollars on the production.This one is worth it if you can find it. It comes in one-strip color but my copy was slightly blurry. Find a good movie pirate and buy it.

cecetaylor I Am Suzanne is recognized by many puppeteers as a milestone for puppet movies. Yet, very few have seen it. I worked with the Yale Puppeteers in the late fifties, sixties, seventies and eighties into their very senior years. So being the youngest of their troop, the "Turnabouters", I have many recollections. There are few of us left. Perhaps only Gene Maiden and myself, Charles Taylor, have the knowledge of details regarding the Yale Puppeteers.I always wondered how the portrait puppets were created. My apprenticeship with Harry Burnett led me to believe that the fine portrait work was beyond his ability. There are clues in Punch's Progress,and Small Wonder, the biographies of the Yale Puppeteers and the latter book including Turnabout Theater. by Forman Brown, that led me to believe that work was carried out with someone with finer sculpting ability . Harry Burnett would have made the bodies, hands and heads of most of the characters but definitely not the true likeness of the puppets representing well known "portrait" personalities.Harry gave me photographs of Lillian Harvey and Gene Raymond with their puppets. Many years later I happened on the puppet figure of Lilian Harvey without her head. I am pleased to have the headless puppet in my collection. Perhaps one day I can replicate the head to go with the torso. It is possible that the portrait puppets of Lilian Harvey and Gene Raymond were in the possession of the actors. Although, during the mid to late fifties, much of the puppets and personal possessions of the Yale puppeteers were stored in an elephant van by Jimmy Woods owner of Jungle Land. Vandals broke into the unguarded van and photographs, negatives, and antiques were strewn about the field. Many of the puppets had been stolen. This was between 1956 and 1959. Perhaps that is how the Lillian Harvey puppet "lost" her head! Many of these objects had been wrapped in newspaper and stored in boxes. We found some items had been pulled out of their wrappings tearing priceless antiques. I have a set of crèche figures that stood in the Turnabout Theater. Hat brims and small details were destroyed when they were pulled out and so they were left behind in the field. Other objects were totally lost. Fortunately, there were so many items that the thieves didn't scratch the depth of their treasures!You can see a photograph of the Lilian Harvey and Gene Raymond puppets by going on line and type in Turnabout Theater then go to the Los Angeles Library | Regional History | Turnabout Theater - Then go to TT-001-804 no neg. It's many pages in but worth looking at the fun pictures of the Turnabout Theater family and Yale Puppeteers history. You'll see me in there too!Another excellent source of information regarding I Am Suzanne, The Yale Puppeteers, Turnabout Theater would be Alan Cook of COPA, Conservatory of Puppetry Arts. Just type COPA puppets.

F Gwynplaine MacIntyre 'I Am Suzanne' is an astonishing film, one of the most original movies I've ever seen ... and yet it reminds me of several others. Director Rowland V. Lee and his co-scenarist Edwin Justus Mayer are both severely underrated; their careers are overdue for reappraisal, and this movie is a good place to start.'I Am Suzanne' was apparently meant as a star vehicle for Lillian Harvey, an actress who seems highly artificial. Her accent is slightly too cut-glass, her performance (in this film, at least) too mannered. She is blonde and pretty, but not quite beautiful: her eyebrows have been plucked to within a millimetre of their lives, and her nose is slightly bulbous. The best performance in the film is by that excellent and underrated character actor Leslie Banks: he manages to invest some subtlety into a highly theatrical role which gives him legitimate reasons to chew the scenery.'I Am Suzanne' has strong overtones of the later and better-known 'Lili', Edgar Ulmer's 'Bluebeard', 'Pinocchio', 'Laugh Clown Laugh', and also the weird semi-fantasy 'Zoo in Budapest' (starring Gene Raymond in a role similar to the one he plays here). The dream sequence in this movie reminds me of the trial scene in 'Alice in Wonderland' and also of 'Attack of the Puppet People' ... specifically, that science-fiction film's bizarre scene in which a woman, shrunk to doll size, is forced to co-star opposite a marionette in a puppet-show performance of 'Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde'.CONTAINS SPOILERS. Suzanne is a beautiful young orphan who dances for coins in the street, and who is dominated by her Svengali-like guardian, who calls himself the Baron, It's clear that the Baron's interest in Suzanne is entirely exploitative: he makes money off her, and he lusts for her. The only implausible thing about this arrangement is that he hasn't tried to rape her yet.Handsome young Tony (Raymond) is a puppet-master who becomes so enamoured of Suzanne's beauty that he asks her consent to make a marionette in her likeness, so that 'Suzanne' (the puppet, not the woman) can star in Tony's shows. There are several very impressive set-pieces, in which the marionettes perform enjoyable routines. The only flaw in these delightful sequences is that Tony is ostensibly manipulating the marionettes, yet it's clear that actor Gene Raymond is being 'doubled' by some experienced puppeteers. Comedic actress Florence Desmond, well known in England at this time for her deft impersonations of film actresses and celebrities, provides the voices for several of Tony's marionettes.The Baron hopes to make more money off Suzanne: the woman, not the puppet... although Suzanne symbolically *is* a puppet under his domination: it's this sort of layered symbolism that makes this story so fascinating. The Baron bullies Suzanne into performing a tightrope act. She falls and injures herself. Now her dancing days are over, and she might not even walk again.Lillian Harvey convincingly depicts Suzanne's confusion and immaturity, even though the actress is slightly too old for this 'Lill'-like role. She feels attracted to Tony ... yet she also feels jealousy towards the puppet-version of herself, as Tony seems to be more interested in the marionette Suzanne than in the real version. Eventually, she shoots the puppet version of herself! This prompts the film's most remarkable set piece, a nightmare sequence that reminded me of 'Puppet People'.In her nightmare, Suzanne dreams that she has been put on trial for murder: the murder of her puppet-self! She finds herself in the dock at a Kafka-like trial, with a puppet jury, presided over by the King and Queen of Puppet Land! It would have been easy for this sequence to slide into absurdity, and I had a whole flotilla of wisecracks ready for the King and Queen of Puppet Land: Do they run a puppet government? Can they pull a few strings? If the marionettes find Suzanne guilty of murder, will they string her up? Remarkably, this film expertly maintains its balance between fantasy and reality, between imagination and delusion.Is it possible to rate a movie 11 points out of 10? No? Then I'll have to rate 'I Am Suzanne' a lowly 10 points out of 10. Why didn't Lee and Mayer follow this triumph with another great film?