Gilda jumps from the frying pan and directly into the fire, a Caribbean Hell of oppressive heat, biting centipedes and leering patriarchy. William Wellman’s direction is sweaty and fierce, pulling no punches, framing characters in unglamorous closeups which creates a sadistic porous atmosphere that seems to suffocate the characters trapped in this tragedy. DP Sidney Hickox captures this with low angle compositions, often filming reflections in mirrors to create a moralistic and complex duality. The set design of the bar in Tortuga seems influenced by German Expressionism with strange angles and key lighting, as if Gilda was a somnambulist wandering towards her fate like Cesare, her freewill surrendered to a higher authority. This is one of the most sordid Pre-Code films, and one of the best.
Gilda (Dorothy Mackaill) is a victim who is forced into a life of prostitution, then in a fit of rage against the man who raped her, kills him (or so she believes) with a bottle of champagne. Which she throws almost directly at the camera! She accidentally sets the hotel on fire while fleeing and soon her sailor boyfriend Carl (Donald Cook) has her stowed away on a boat for safety on a small island that has no extradition treaty. Once there, they perform their own marriage ceremony without a priest before he has to ship-out, and even though he knows how she made ends meet (so to speak), loves her deeply. But here in Hell love and hope have no power, except to exacerbate her suffering.
Wellman and Hickox create some memorable compositions, such as the match cut in the first act of a ship in a bottle to a steamer with Gilda hidden aboard. Or the lecherous perspiring men who line up their chairs to ogle Gilda as she leaves her room. Hickox utilizes a wonderful tracking shot the begins at one end of the line as each man mimics the other, hunching down in their chair, one by one. In the final act, there’s some great key lighting upon Gilda’s neck as her hangman smirks, which gives us his skewed and perverse perspective. I can’t say this is a beautiful looking film, but it’s beautifully shot! Wellman also allows the two black characters some dramatic screen time, Leonie (Nina Mae McKinney) as the bar owner and her porter Newcastle (Clarence Muse), who are represented without contemporary cliché. Both are also presented as moral and intelligent, though still trapped in the same value system that victimizes Gilda.
Our poor heroine transforms from victim to survivor, however briefly, but exits Hell on her own terms.
Final Grade: (A)