User reviews

1st watched 1/21/2010 – 5 out of 10 (Dir-D.W. Griffith): Interesting movie about the struggle against alcoholism that doesn't quite hit the mark due to it's lack of showing us how the battle can be won. The story is about a good-ole boy named Jimmy, played by Hal Skelly, who doesn't like to put the juice down until he meets his to-be wife. She persuades him to stop drinking if they get married and he does OK until after their first child is born and then he falls back into his same old ways. He loses his job, his family, and practically his life until he's rescued again by his wife. The movie shows how dependent family members are on the alcoholics and how difficult it is for the addicted to change his ways, but it doesn't make it clear how things can change. Things just kind of get better in the movie eventually and we know this doesn't happen in real life. A valiant effort by renowned silent movie director D.W. Griffith but there doesn't seem to be a clear focus on the purpose of the film and therefore it doesn't all quite jell. He drifts from an initial focus on the prohibition to eventually being a more personal movie but never quite aces either one. The quick ending kind of ruins what could have been an important piece of film about this disease instead it's just an OK film about this struggle.

D.W. Griffith's final film is a talkie remake of a silent short made early in his career. It's a morality play about a man's struggle with alcoholism. Interesting subject matter, ahead of its time in some ways, but probably not the kind of thing Depression-era audiences were looking to see to escape from their troubles. Today, it's a real creaker but has a lot to recommend about it. Hal Skelly, who had a short film career before dying in a tragic car/train collision in 1934, gives an impressive performance in the lead. Zita Johann, a year away from her biggest movie role in The Mummy, makes her film debut here. She gives a subtle turn as the put-upon wife (the last of Griffith's heroines who have it rough because of the crappy men in their life). Edna Hagan, who plays Skelly and Johann's daughter, is also really good. It's a fine movie, although not without its flaws. The ending is the biggest negative, in my opinion. I can overlook the creaks and groans but I don't care for happy endings when they feel unearned. Everything in the film up to that point screamed tragedy. It just felt like a cop-out.

The Struggle (1931)

There is one main reason to see this film—it is D.W. Griffith's last. Whatever horrors he is responsible for supporting the KKK in "Birth of a Nation," he was a maverick, a brilliant innovator. This is the end of the line, twenty years after he got going full steam.

The theme here is so prominent it almost dwarfs the plot—drinking. And getting drunk. The first example of a woman being drunk at a party is almost laughable, at least to those of us who have seen more than one person who has drunk "too much."

The filming here is typical Griffith, and he moves the story through the very years of his career, and the scenes update from the teens to the twenties to the "present," meaning 1931, a year or so before the end of Prohibition. You can make a case, I think, for some kind of radical fracturing of the plot, with a whole slew of characters and story lines started in the beginning of the movie and never followed up. It avoids normal linear storytelling.

It's tough to compare to other movies from 1931—this was still generally a rough time for the movie industry getting used to sound, but we are starting to see masterful meldings of visual and aural components, along with the consistency of acting and plot. The camera doesn't do much moving, and the sound is sometimes muddled or coarse, but you can rise above the limitations and see glimmers of both brilliance and depth. Truly—glimmers I mean. This isn't a brilliant movie.

There is a pretty linear downward trend here, and almost predictable. And the scenes are increasingly simple, showing interior rooms from one point of view. What holds it up at the best moments is some intense acting (the little girl, among the brightest spots). But it's no masterpiece, and could easily be avoided on your watch list.

It's no wonder that "The Struggle" flopped when released in late 1931. Even for that time it was considered stagey and out of date. When you consider that it was the work of veteran innovator D.W. Griffith it's all the more surprising that it is so humdrum in cinematic technique. It's about a factory worker (Hal Skelly) who struggles with alcohol addiction, gradually alienating his wife (Zita Johann) and daughter and sliding into impoverishment and dementia. Skelly is excellent as the drunk, as great a physical actor as he was in "The Dance of Life" a couple of years earlier. Johann seems uncomfortable. In general the direction of the actors, particularly the timing of their dialogue, is stiff. The scenes where Skelly hits rock bottom in a dark hovel are hideously effective but even the lighter scenes are dreary, taking place in drab apartments, barrooms and work places. The daily life of the characters as depicted in these scenes would drive anyone to drink.

I'm glad to see that the previous comments have been charitable. It's interesting that Griffith was filming the same type of story back in 1909 at Biograph. There are several characteristic Griffith touches in this film -- for instance, the tenderness of the wife when her husband first comes home drunk to her, and in the penultimate scene at his bedside. I'm sorry this picture never had a general release because it is well worth seeing. Chaplin made a silent film as late as 1931; perhaps Griffith should have taken a chance and done that with "The Struggle," because it may have worked better as a silent. References are made to the early days of Griffith's career in the opening scenes of the film; 1911 would seem to have been more remote to a 1931 audience than, perhaps, 1987 seems to us today. A fascinating film.

....when you consider some of the other movies for the year - "The Public Enemy", "Bad Girl", "The Maltese Falcon", "Waterloo Bridge", and that "The Struggle" was released in December of that year. Like the other reviewers, I was a bit hesitant to watch it - the last time I saw it was in the early 70s, at a film society and the only information I could find out about it then was in Anthony Slide's book "The Griffith Actresses" and he spent the article vigorously defending it against what critics had said when it was first released. They hated it and apparently there was even laughter in the first night audience. They called it old fashioned and criticized the banal dialogue - by 1931 Griffith was finished in Hollywood and critics were not going to view "The Struggle" with an unbiased eye. From the moralizing forward to the fact that there didn't seem much of a reason for Jimmy's descent into Hell, shows why it wasn't a success at the time. Sure, the depression was on but the public probably didn't want to be reminded of what, to many families (according to the forward) was a too real problem.

The movie took a sermonizing, finger shaking view. The prologue didn't seem to serve a purpose - except to show off the overlapping dialogue technique and to show that people were getting drunk (it was 1911) even before prohibition. 1923 - Zita Johann plays Florrie, a typical Griffith heroine, sweet, innocent and believing in her man - Jimmy (Hal Skelly), who, even before they marry, is considered the life of the party. The thing I found hard to swallow was that there was no huge crisis that happened for Jimmy to fall off the wagon. Of course, before his marriage he takes "the pledge" and they have several happy years, before a bar-tender's snide remark at his drink of choice - sarsaparilla, causes him to go on a bender. In another scene the thought of having to wear a lavender tie causes him to miss his sister's engagement for a night on the town. The best scene, in my opinion, is Hal Skelly's bout of the D.Ts - his was the best performance in the movie. I believe he could have developed into a great character actor, if he had lived. Zita Johann had been recruited from Broadway, where, along with Clark Gable, she had appeared in the play "Machinal", but in this movie, she looked very new and obviously wasn't a natural for the movies. (She only made a few, including "The Mummy" before she returned to the stage). Most of the performances seemed stiff and lacking in the direction that Griffith should have provided. Helen Mack made her debut as a "catty" girl at the engagement party and Evelyn Baldwin, who became Mrs. D.W. Griffith in 1936 played Jimmy's sister, Nan.

Griffith's title of this movie lives up to what he must have gone through to get the movie made. It's a story that he could've easily made in the midst of the silent era circa 1913. It moves like his Biograph shorts, just with sound. Zita Johann is so 'Alice Joyce-like' in her performance that is the sympathetic-understanding wife type. Why doesn't she just take the daughter and leave Hal Skelly one would ask?

The later parts of the film pick up steam as opposed to the earlier parts. A group of children taunt Kelly in the street after his descent into alcoholism and loss of his job. Griffith meant to show the kids as cruel but they are more cute than malevolent. They are dressed like they are readying for a Little Rascals shoot. If you're acquainted with Griffiths numerous Biograph shorts, especially the preachy ones making moral statements, this film shows his return to this genre.

The 1931 film, "The Struggle" touches on an issue that many families even today face; alcoholism. The newly married couple of Jimmie and Floria seem to be enjoying their young, peaceful lives until an undesirable habit of Jimmie's past comes back to haunt him. His marriage and family life soon become questioned and may not ever return to normal unless he achieves sobriety. Personally, I wasn't a big fan of this movie. Although it was a simple movie with a simple message, not a whole lot was happening and was basically filmed in only two separate rooms. The acting was sub par and the dialogue was often corny. I was also skeptical of the overall message. I understand that this movie was showing that drinking can lead to disaster but Jimmie wasn't even an every day drinker. Often times when we hear of alcoholics, we think of people who binge drink every day which was not necessarily what Jimmie was. However, I do believe this movie is slightly significant solely because of a message portraying that bad things happen to those who drink heavily.

this movie really bugged me out. I didn't really get why this mad got into drinking so heavy. his wife did everything for him, cooked, cleaned, stayed home to watch the kid while he worked, and took care of him. what was going on in his life that caused him o drink so drastically I didn't get it. the way he was drinking you would think his jobs sucks, he has a crappy marriage or something. but everything was perfect she worshiped the ground he walked on , constantly forgiving him every single time he messed up. unless there was something happening that they didn't show on screen I honestly think this guy just didn't like life. like he drank until what I believed to be him loosing his eye sight like his daughter would be right in his face and he would ask "where are you?" was that because he was too drunk or sick?

I hesitated for some time before seeing "The Struggle" because it was considered by most critics to be a pathetic boring mess done by a broken man. I knew it was Griffith's final film and I didn't want to see this great master produce a terrible film at the end of his career. When I finally did view it I found that a film that is full of passion, new ideas and bold innovative strokes.

There are several innovations in the use of sound. At the time actors were careful to talk one after the other because it was thought that people talking at the same time would be too confusing for the audience. Griffith used overlapping dialog and a party scene with multiple background sounds of music and talking as well as dialog. This sounded far more natural. Also at this time actors were being told to use artificial elocution and diction when speaking on screen. They usually sounded either foreign or very upper crust. Griffith had his actors use natural accents. Hal Skelly and Zita Johnson sound like normal people who talk fast use slang and sometimes slur their words.

The most impressive innovation was in Griffith's development of the plot. The story of a man who sinks into alcoholism could and would normally be treated as a moral lesson against the evils of drink. In Griffith's hands it is personal tragedy that has to do with the strength's and weakness of the individuals involved. Jimmy becomes an alcoholic because of his own personality traits and whatever redemption he achieves is due to the strength of his love for his wife and his daughter. There is no preaching here. Griffith had done a similar film called "Isn't Life Wonderful" in Germany which influenced German filmmakers particularly Pabst in his "Joyless Street." "Joyless Street" is innovative in it's own right but it is clear where its inspiration comes from when whole sections of it are lifted from "Isn't Life Wonderful".

"The Struggle" was a financial failure. Without enough personal funds and without the confidence of any backers, Griffith would never make another film. He had lost touch with his audience. Caught in the middle of the Great Depression, American audiences wanted a moral lesson so they could fix blame, or pure escapism. The last thing they wanted was a complex personal drama to remind them of their own complex personal problems. It would be a long time before films like this would be made in America. But although Griffith had lost his audience, enough creative artists must have seen and been influenced by this film, because starting with films like Citizen Kane, we began to see films about difficult problems treated as stories that were personal to the characters involved and not as moral lessons.

The film pioneer practically invented the cinematic narrative language we have in today's movies. Yet, just 16 years after making America's monumental first feature film, D. W. Griffith was having difficulty finding an audience for his latest-and final-full-length movie, December 1931's "The Struggle." This was his second talkie after directing over twenty-years of silent movies. And the transition wasn't going over well with the public. At the time it was unusual for a movie to get only one week's run at a theater, yet "The Struggle" was yanked before that time in a majority of movie houses. This was an inglorious ending for the 56-year-old filmmaker who created so many elements in cinema for the modern era.

The talkies presented a challenge to the master of silent movies. Lisa Marie Bowman, in her critique of "The Struggle," said, "it's obvious that he never learned how to work with speaking actors. As well, dialogue that would have worked on a title card came across as being over-the-top and preachy when actually uttered aloud." Griffith's last film, partly funded by him, reflects the director's own battle with the bottle. The plot, written by his long-time scriptwriter Anita Loos, deals with an outgoing businessman who had been a regular customer at the city's speakeasies, but promised to reform when he met his future wife. He did, until several years into his marriage he slipped back into his old habits, potentially ruining his family.

Richard Cross, in his modern-day review, wrote, "Too often 'The Struggle' looks like a silent movie, and rather than being the hard-hitting expose it clearly sets out to be, it proves to be as unconvincing and unsatisfying as a near-beer." His assessment reflected the opinion of the majority of critics back when "The Struggle" was first released. However, one reviewer today feels Griffith's last hurrah has been deeply unappreciated and "is not only Griffith's best available film since (1920) 'Way Down East,' it's one of his best, period. 'The Struggle' is surprisingly modern - in everything from its use of sound to its performances to its photography. This is an astonishing and impressive work of art, all the more so for being unusual in Griffith's canon."

Because of smart investments he made throughout his movie career and were depression-proof, Griffith was able to ride into the sunset a reasonably wealthy man. He has been credited in contributing to 1936's "San Francisco's" earthquake finale as well as Hal Roach's 1940 "One Million B. C.,' but he never directed another film-short or full-length-in his life. The Academy awarded him a special Oscar in 1936 for his contributions in cinema. In 1948, at the age of 73, he died in the lobby of the Knickerbocker Hotel in Los Angeles, where he was residing during the last years of his life.

In the 1910s, there were many short films about the evils of demon drink--such as D.W. Griffith's "What Drink Did". These films were NOT in the least subtle and invariably showed a nice family man becoming a horrible brute...all due to his taking a drink of alcohol. It's not surprising in light of these films that there was a push to make alcohol illegal--eventually culminating in Prohibition.

More than two decades later, Griffith has dusted off the cobwebs and created a full-length sound version of one of these morality plays. While the film is much more sophisticated than these early silents, for sound films they were still VERY dated---with very, very broad acting and the simplest of stories. In "The Struggle" a guy likes to drink but gives it all up for his fiancée. He's good at his promise for several years and lives a successful sober life. Then, on a lark, he takes a drink and it's a long, long slide into oblivion. But, since the film is much longer than the older ones, you get a chance to see the guy eventually work his way out and by the end, all is well.

Had the film had better acting, direction and a better script, Griffith could have gone on to better things. Unfortunately, the film was seen at the time as very dated and the film was a bust--and was Griffith's last full-length film as a result. It is interesting how this great director was at the forefront of innovation in the 1910s--now in the 30s, he was hopelessly behind the and mired in dated ideas. It also didn't help with the confusing prologue which seemed to say perhaps Prohibition was the cause of rampant alcoholism--the exact opposite of what they'd been arguing two decades earlier!! Probably not worth your time unless you are a film historian or insist on seeing everything Griffith directed.

A very well made film from start to finish, it is rather solid all the way through, but it is nothing that screams "revolutionary" by any means. An interesting plot following the descent of a man into deep brooding alcoholism, it is by no means a pleasant film, with a rather dark subject matter, but that is where the appeal comes from. It touches a topic, that at the time, was an extreme issue, and can still be debated now if it's as bad as it was before. The last film D.W. Griffith did, it came under scathing criticism at its original release. Now the film has kind of sweetened with age, making the simple plot, seem a bit more deep. Many look at the film as Griffith's own rationalization on how things went for him. His change from the start of his career to now. Some critics have called it a last ditch effort by a broken man about a man breaking. That can sum it up very well, the tale of how Griffith had to make this film is enough of a sad tale to make you feel a bit sad, it came to major scrutiny by the public due to the depression, making no one want to see a complex drama making them look into themselves. They wanted escape, not return. A fair watch, if you have some spare time, and feel like watching something a bit deep, this is a good pick.

Struggle, The (1931)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

D.W. Griffith's final movie received terrible reviews upon release and died a very painful death at the box office so needless to say, this was the final nail in Griffith's directing coffin. In the film, a man (Hal Skelly) agrees to stop drinking after the woman (Zita Johann) of his dreams agrees to marry him. This deal works for about seven years but then the man hits the bottle again and soon has his life spinning out of control. As you can see, The Lost Weekend certainly wasn't the first film to take a hard look at alcoholism and even Griffith made several shots about the subject. It's easy to see why this film bombed back in the day but the story plays somewhat better today. However, like many of Griffith's later films, there are signs of brilliance in a few scenes but overall the film just doesn't really work. The worst thing about the movie is that it looks and feels like something Griffith would have made in 1910. Had Griffith changed with the times then there's no telling what he could have done but he was never able to do this. Another problem is that the start of the film is pretty dull and the energy Griffith can provide doesn't show up until the final third of the film. With that said, there's still a lot to enjoy here but the best thing is the performance by Skelly. He goes through various changes throughout the movie from a fun drunk to a non-drinker to a raging alcoholic and he pulls off every step without a hitch. Griffith himself has several scenes that really hit home and pack nice punches ala his early days. One is a party sequence where the husband returns drunk. The way Griffith shows the wife's embarrassment is very hard hitting. Another great sequence is when the husband finally hits rock bottom. The use of lighting and the director's touch makes this a very emotionally devastating scene. Another nice touch is an early scene that takes place in 1911. In the film a group of drinkers are talking about movies and brings up Biograph and Mary Pickford. It seems that even after twenty years Griffith was still mad at Pickford.

THE STRUGGLE (United Artists, 1931), directed by the legendary D.W. Griffith of such silent screen classics as THE BIRTH OF A NATION (1915), INTOLERANCE (1916), WAY DOWN EAST (1920), ORPHANS OF THE STORM (1921), takes the director's chair for the last time for his second talkie. Following his biographical all-talking success of ABRAHAM LINCOLN (1930) starring Walter Huston, Griffith's work for THE STRUGGLE turns out to be something more heavy-handled in regards to one man's struggle with alcoholism. Featuring a cast of unknowns rather than actors from the Griffith stock company of the past, the story is headed by stage performers of Hal Skelly, with some talkies to his credit, the best noted being THE DANCE OF LIFE (Paramount, 1929); and Zita Johann, better known to many for her performance opposite Boris Karloff in THE MUMMY (Universal, 1932), each doing their best in a scripted story by Anita Loos.

FORWARD: "This is a true narrative based on actual fact mirroring what is happening to thousands of families throughout the land. While 'The Struggle' is a powerful indictment of bootleg liquor emphasizing its devastating effect on American youth, it is not presented as a preachment either or against Prohibition. The picture, however, does raise these questions: If Prohibition is a success that people claim it is, how could all these things have happened? Is man's struggle against intemperance controllable by law, or is it solely a matter of individual characters." Prologue: 1911. Against the underscoring to "In the Good Old Summertime," couples are gathered together drinking and dancing at a beer garden, some discussing the current events of the day of movie actress, Mary Pickford, and of Ziegfeld Follies girl Peggy Joyce " getting married again." Move forward to 1923, where music has been jazzed up, and Prohibition and bootlegging liquor is in the news. Jimmy Wilson (Hal Skelly) is seen at a speakeasy socializing and boozing it up with the patrons. One of them in attendance is Florrie (Zita Johann), who not only loves Jimmy but wants him to stop drinking. They soon marry with Jimmy promising never to drink liquor again. Their marriage is blessed with a daughter, Mary (Edna Hagen), and Jimmy keeping true to his promise until he takes a drink again. His drunken appearance and obnoxious manner soon spoils the engagement party for his sister, Nan (Evelyn Baldwin) to Johnnie Marshall (Jackson Halliday), which finds him fired by his employer, Mr. Craig (Charles Richman), also a guest at the event. Jimmy's boozing puts a strain of his marriage, especially after his involvement with Nan (Charlotte Wynters), a cabaret girl who, along with her boyfriend, wipes him out of his savings, leaving his family to lose their apartment. Jimmy becomes a homeless bum of the streets, followed by a series of other unforeseen circumstances.

While melodramatic themes about alcoholism might have worked better during the silent 1920s movie era reflecting upon the Prohibition era (or possibly the film noir realism style of the 1940s in the wake of Ray Milland's powerful Academy Award winning performance as an alcoholic in THE LOST WEEKEND (Paramount, 1945)), Griffith's THE STRUGGLE only became a notorious flop. Possibly the reason for its theatrical failure comes at the time of its release (being the peek of the Great Depression), or possibly how the movie itself being poorly constructed with a outdated acting style with script reflecting back to the silent movie days. While THE STRUGGLE did have some fresh new faces, so to speak, in the cast, its direction by Griffith must have seemed out of date for 1931 or ahead of its time by today's standards. The actors do what's expected pf them, but there's something lacking here to make this into a strong and powerful story. There have been other movies of this nature with depressing theme with realistic and unpleasant motivations that have proven successful, THE STRUGGLE. however, didn't garner any Academy Award nominations and the success of THE LOST WEEKEND.

Unseen for decades probably due to its reputation, to date, THE STRUGGLE has never been shown on television, except for clips on the film on documentaries on D.W. Griffith. A struggle for some, a curiosity for others, THE STRUGGLE is of notability today solely on the D.W. Griffith name attached to it, especially for movie scholars and fans of the director's work. This 76 minute feature film production has become available for rediscovering on DVD from Kino Video with Griffiths ABRAHAM LINCOLN on its flip-side. (*1/2)

By the time he made this film, Hollywood had D.W. Griffith right where they wanted him; a broken man. His studio was gone and he was selling out his UA shares--to make this film, I think. It's a shame that things went so wrong for him at this time, for it is evident in "The Struggle" that he was figuring out how to use this new sound gizmo. I was very impressed by his use of sound, almost Altman-like at times with overlapping dialogues. But, sadly, Hollywood had moved beyond DW, and didn't need or want him around anymore. This film is not the calibre of "Broken Blossoms" or "Intolerance", but it's a fine effort on a small scale from one of filmdom's greats.