Face to Face ** (1952, James Mason, Gene Lockhart, Michael Pate, Robert Preston, Marjorie Steele , Minor Watson) – Classic Movie Review 10,898

The 1952 Face to Face is an unusual, interesting, though not wholly satisfactory black and white double bill movie feature, sometimes screened separately as two short films, but when shown together billed as a Duo Drama. The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky stars Robert Preston, Marjorie Steele and Minor Watson. The Secret Sharer stars James Mason, Gene Lockhart and Michael Pate. It is produced by A&P grocery store chain heir Huntington Hartford and released by RKO Radio Pictures.

Bretaigne Windust’s The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky is written by James Agee based on the 1898 Western short story by American author Stephen Crane (1871–1900), originally published in McClure’s Magazine. It is a tale of the Old West and the end of the gunfighting era. Robert Preston stars as the peace-loving sheriff Jack Potter who is set to fight gunman (Minor Watson) who wants to keep the old traditions alive: by shooting people down dead. The lightness of touch in James Agee’s writing (adapting a story by Stephen Crane) and Windust’s intense direction keep this short film involving. Author James Agee appears as a prisoner, Frank. Marjorie Steele plays the sheriff’s new Bride of the title.

For John Brahm’s The Secret Sharer, James Mason stars as the sea captain and Michael Pate as the rescued murder fugitive Leggatt, whose presence aboard ship he has to conceal from his crew, in this thoughtfully filmed version of the Joseph Conrad short story that originally played Face to Face as a double bill with the Western Bride Comes to Yellow Sky.

Despite good writing and acting, the double bill anthology film was not a hit, but a typecast Mason went straight on to play another captain in Botany Bay.

Also in the cast are Michael Pate, Gene Lockhart, Albert Sharpe, Sean McClory, Marjorie Steele, Minor Watson, Dan Seymour and Olive Carey.

Face to Face: The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky/ The Secret Sharer is directed by Bretaigne Windust (segment The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky) and John Brahm (segment The Secret Sharer), runs 89 minutes, is made by Theasquare Productions, is released by RKO Radio Pictures, is written by James Agee, based on the story The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky by Stephen Crane, and Æneas MacKenzie based on the book by Joseph Conrad (segment The Secret Sharer), is shot in black and white by George E Diskant and Karl Struss, is produced by Huntington Hartford and scored by Hugo Friedhofer, with Art Direction by Edward L Ilou.

Marjorie Steele was married to Huntington Hartford from 1949 to 1961. She acted in films for a very short time, making only three, also Tough Assignment (1949) and No Escape (1953). He was worth $70 million when they married. Her second husband was actor Dudley Sutton.

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 10,898

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