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Dmytryk's Tender Comrade is the main precedent, Westinghouse posters and Life covers supply the visual template. From the eve of Pearl Harbor to after V-Jay Day, the home front as an evolving feminine conscience, out of the bungalow and into the factory. Husband (Ed Harris) joins the Navy, wife (Goldie Hawn) learns about grit and love four to midnight at the armaments plant. "Same old light touch?" Her marital resolve weakens before the blues trumpeter (Kurt Russell), her independence strengthens alongside the nightclub chanteuse (Christine Lahti). The sailor's return exacerbates the mixed feelings. "Blame it on the war. It's everybody's excuse." Jonathan Demme's unhappy experience with his first major studio project is scarcely surprising in a system that can't tell Rosie the Riveter from Charlie the Tuna, glimpses of what was intended still shine through despite the intensive meddling. The fuzzy blonde gets promoted to leadman and juggles desire and faithfulness, thus the bittersweet is massaged into the inspirational and an ensemble piece is hacked into a star vehicle. (Indicative of the original democratic spirit is a sprawling crane shot at the aircraft assembly line, which glides past the heroine and comes to rest on a close-up of a moon-faced extra who chokes back tears and goes about welding the fuselage.) Glenn Miller and Carly Simon, a creamy period sheen cracked every so often by Demme's sense of unguarded emotion—the way a co-worker (Holly Hunter) breaks down to a young Marine messenger before he can deliver the tragic news, or the bewildered melancholy in the husband's voice when he observes that "the whole world is different." Marshall sands off the remaining edges for A League of Their Own. With Fred Ward, Belita Moreno, Sudie Bond, Patty Maloney, Lisa Pelikan, Susan Peretz, Charles Napier, Stephen Tobolowsky, Belinda Carlisle, Beth Henley, and Roger Corman.
--- Fernando F. Croce |