Martin Bradley Eugene O'Neill may be considered one of the greatest playwrights of the 20th century but apart from "Long Day's Journey into Night" you would never guess if from the films made from his plays. The epic "Mourning Becomes Electra" came out in 1947 under the turgid direction of Dudley Nichols. It was O'Neill's transference of "The Orestaia" to a post-Civil War New England and it's unbelievably bad with a great cast foundering on the almost unspeakable dialogue and it lasts forever. Amazingly both Rosalind Russell and Michael Redgrave were nominated for Oscars and more amazingly still Russell was the favourite in her category, (she lost to Loretta Young). Actually Redgrave isn't that bad, considering it may be the worst part he was ever given, and he did win the National Board of Review's Best Actor prize. This is the kind of filmed theatre in which the actors all shout at the top of their lungs so as to be heard at the back and as if by shouting the lines it gives them relevance. It doesn't and this monstrosity should be avoided like the plague.

calvinnme ... he was just the lit match that set the kindling afire. This is the most messed up family ever. Christine Mannon has always hated her husband Ezra Mannon, a general in the Union army at the time of the Civil War. Outside of casualties the Mannons have nothing to fear from the war since they are safely in New England, far from the actual fighting. But they actually have their own civil war brewing. On top of Christine hating her husband since she married him, begging the question WHY did she marry him, Christine has a much younger lover, sea captain Adam Brant (Leo Genn). Apparently the daughter in the family, Lavinia (Rosalind Russell) fancied Brant at one time herself, so she could hate her mom because she is betraying her father, or she could just be jealous that a woman in late middle age beat her out of a beau.Brant began just toying with Christine because he wanted revenge for something the Mannons did to his mother years ago, although the toying turned to love. Plus it turns out Brant is a Mannon himself, but it is a part of himself that he despises. But Christine knows about the shunned relative angle and is still not dissuaded.Then dad and son return from war, and it turns out that there is something pretty weird about the father/daughter and the mother/son love dynamic going on here. It doesn't look paternal and it does not look platonic. Christine switches Adam's heart pills with poison and kills him so she can be free to be with Brant. However, Lavinia discovers her scheme and the poison pills. Rather than turn her mother over to the authorities for murder, she convinces her brother (Michael Redgrave as reluctant war hero and mama's boy Orin) to mete out their own brand of personal justice rather than send mom to the gallows. The problem is, Lavinia is more like her mother than she would ever admit, Orin is a very unstable partner in her scheme, and Christine does not think that Lavinia's idea of justice is all that it is cracked up to be.Add in Lavinia's rather naïve yet devoted suitor with high moral standards, played by a - believe it or not - sixth billed Kirk Douglas, and you have a recipe for disaster.If this sounds like a Greek tragedy, actually it is. But you know what, I was glued to to the screen taking it all in. I felt like a voyeur invading this family's most personal crazy secrets. It was just like when the brother and sister were on the boat looking down, like voyeurs, into the galley and seeing their mother in the arms of her adulterous lover. The movie grabs your attention and keeps it for 2 1/2 hours.Highly recommended especially for Michael Redgrave and Rosalind Russell who, though she was just shy of 40, did not look too old for the part. Michael Redgrave takes a wild ride of emotions and has you believing every one of them. Oh, and Kirk, run! Run far away from these people! No scrape that Burt Lancaster or the Duke ever got you into was as dangerous as these Mannons!

T Y A proud ante-bellum family goes all 'Medea' on each other, and tears themselves to pieces for two and a half hours in this updating of the Orestia. It really pounds home how timeless the Greek classic is, in a way that seeing actors in togas, expounding on their anger, could never accomplish. The Little Foxes covers similar ground as a showcase for Bette Davis. And Peyton Place discloses the sinister secrets rotting the soul of an outwardly pleasant small town. But MbE is the most startling of them all, because it's so unsung. I put it on unsuspecting, and it was so engrossing and vengeful I couldn't stop watching until I saw who triumphed and who was punished. Only the last third falters a bit, as the rather explicit Freudian psychology of the first half doesn't have anywhere left to go.I don't understand viewer's qualms about 'dated acting.' It's 1947, what do they expect? I cut old movies a lot of slack for things like that as they also provide a window into a different moment in the culture. Everyone is up to their role, but Redgrave is above average. This is not a filmed play as some have indicated. There is modest camera work; this is clearly not some stage production that they just filmed. Just don't expect aggressive, needlessly showy visuals. The story is the thing here. This is where Tennessee Williams might have gone without resorting to excesses like cannibalism. It's a revelation that Rosalind Russell wasn't typecast, once upon a time. Not something I'd watch over and over, but wow, exhilarating, and relatively fast-moving for drama.

edwagreen Eugene O'Neil or not, this 1947 film is pure junk.Rosalind Russell was favored to win the Oscar for playing the horrid Lavinia. The picture was so lousy, that's what did her in.A story of love and continuous death, people literally die off like flies in this one, is depressing. The cinematography may also be described this way.Former Oscar winner, Katina Paxinou overacts. She literally screams her part. Michael Redgrave, who was also Oscar nominated here, is really vacuous here.Rosalind Russell was a superior actress who was given an inferior script. Had I been her, I would have headed to the exits right after this film was made.A pure a-one stinker.