Of the films Montgomery Clift made during his relatively short life, Vincent J. Donehue's 1959 Lonelyhearts has been nearly forgotten compared to classics like Red River or From Here to Eternity. It's possible that audiences preferred him in period pieces or genre fare, like westerns and war movies. It's also possible that Lonelyhearts was just too downbeat—and harder to classify—to catch fire in the same way.
Clift plays Adam White (not his real name), a young man committed to a career in journalism. Despite his grim childhood, he's a non-smoking teetotaler with a sweet, steady girlfriend, Justy (King Creole's Dolores Hart). At the local watering hole, he befriends Flo (Myrna Loy of The Thin Man fame), a lonely alcoholic who sparks to his potential, offering to introduce him to her husband, Bill Shrike (On Dangerous Ground's Robert Ryan), a powerful, caustic newspaper editor.
Upon making his acquaintance, Shrike is skeptical of Adam, who strikes him as too idealistic to make it as a newspaperman. He assigns him the advice column, Miss Lonelyhearts, a popular feature—and an emasculating one. Shrike dismisses the sad sacks who write in as "fakes and frauds." Though Adam has no training as a counselor, he genuinely wants to help.
Shrike is hardly sympathetic, but Dore Schary's adaptation of Nathanael West’s 1933 novella sides with him, because Adam will meet someone, Fay (Oscar nominee Maureen Stapleton), who presents a false façade. Unhappy in her marriage, she manipulates Adam to provide the comfort she craves. He turns to the bottle for solace, threatening his relationship and his job, but also forcing him to come clean to Justy about the father—a convicted murderer—he claimed was dead.
Donehue, a TV and stage director, has crafted an odd if affecting affair. Shot by John Alton (He Walked by Night), a cinematographer famed for his expertise with light and shadow, Lonelyhearts resembles a film noir, but it's more of a character study, since Adam, though well-intentioned, is also a bit of a fake and a fraud.
Despite the hopeful ending, melancholy provides the dominant mood. Though never as nightmarish as The Lost Weekend, Billy Wilder's tale of an alcoholic on a death spiral, Clift's real-life alcoholism would contribute to his death, making Adam's turn to the bottle especially discomforting. If Ryan, a tall man known for tough-guy roles, proves intimidating, Stapleton is terrifying. The two actors come close to overpowering Clift, who gives a sympathetic if more recessive performance.
Kino Lorber’s release should help to bring attention to this underappreciated film, though it could benefit from a better restoration since the darks are darker than Alton surely intended (MGM's HD master leaves much to be desired). It's also missing a commentary track to put the careers of West and Clift in context. None of those things, however, are damaging enough to make the film any less worthy of renewed interest.
What type of library programming could use this title?
Library programming on films about the newspaper business, the work of Montgomery Clift, or Nathanael West adaptations, like John Schlesinger's The Day of the Locust, could well use Lonelyhearts.
What academic subjects would this film be suitable for?
Lonelyhearts would be suitable for courses on Nathanael West and the American novel of the 1930s, American cinema of the 1950s, and films about the newspaper business.
What kind of film series would this narrative fit in?
Film series on Montgomery Clift, Robert Ryan, and lesser-known films of the 1950s would find a fitting example in Lonelyhearts, which has been adapted four other times as two films, a play, and an opera.