1964: The Night of the Iguana

The Night of the Iguana (Huston, 1964) 9/10

The last major entry in the cycle of Tennessee Williams' adaptations that permeated Hollywood from 1950 to 1966, The Night of the Iguana is a rich, sensual experience: a tropical fever dream of a film filled with crippling anxieties, devilish rogues and bittersweet redemption. Directed by famed Hollywood auteur John Huston, The Night of the Iguana is one of the finest translations of Williams' work on celluloid: a film that produced an iconic performance from Richard Burton and turned Puerto Vallarta from a remote village barracked by mountainous jungle into a bustling tourist destination.

Shot in stunningly sharp monochrome by Luis Buñuel cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa, The Night of the Iguana centers on the moral and spiritual trials of the Reverend T. Lawrence Shannon (Richard Burton). Locked out of his Episcopalian Church for indulging his immoral appetites, the former Minister now spends his time working as a tour guide escorting tourists on religious pilgrimages, rather than guiding a flock of parishioners. Yet, even south of the border, his errant ways and bothersome habits continue to clutch at his soul.

His response to the lusty whims of a promiscuous minor named Charlotte (Sue Lyons) in particular cause a stir amongst the busload of middle-aged female Baptist school teachers. Despite his best efforts, Shannon is unable to abscond from her rash erotic impulses. Accused by Charlotte's infuriated chaperon Miss Fellowes (Grayson Hall) of seducing the teenager in his bedroom, the desperate Shannon cracks under the strain and diverts the tour from their base at a modern hotel in Puerto Vallarta to another locale, the Costa Verde Hotel: a folksy hilltop establishment on the outskirts of town owned by his highly sexualized, proto-hippie friend Maxine (Ava Gardner).

Yearning to stop Miss Fellowes from contacting the tour company in Texas, Shannon mistakenly hopes that he and Maxine can win over the tour's patrons at Costa Verde in order to spare him his measly job. Nevertheless, Shannon's predilections for the flesh and alcohol continue to haunt him in the cool mountain air. Soon "at the end of his rope," Shannon descends into madness and physical anguish: culminating in breakdown during a frenzied stormy night with only the assistance of his friend Maxine, the soothing words of traveling painter Hannah Jelkes (Deborah Kerr) and the poetry of her ailing eight-year old grandfather Nonno (Cyril Delevanti).

The Night of the Iguana is an intense portrait of human destruction. Bordering on a nervous breakdown, Burton's Shannon is a figure drowning in his anguished mistakes. Unable to truly connect with others for help, Shannon is a figure caught up in his own dissolution. As shown visually throughout the film, this strain takes on an almost torturously biblical route. In one memorable scene, a barefoot Shannon walks across broken shards of glass in order to resist the tempting Charlotte as taunts and teases him with her lusty flirtatiousness. Convinced the weight of God's fury is upon him, Shannon even tries to strangle himself with a gold crucifix, he procured from a pawnshop.

Yet, despite his weaknesses and failings, Shannon is still an intensely proud individual. After Miss Fellowes engages in a fact-finding mission in order to taint his credibility, Shannon rebukes her claims that he was defrocked with conviction and intensity. In response, Shannon expresses his tormented relationship with God at the source of his professional woes; highlighted by his unwillingness to view God as a childish and petulant figurehead. In his frank discussions with Hannah Jelkes, Shannon strives to correlate a genuine spiritual association with Him. This connection is partially frayed by the inability of others to understand Shannon's moral faux-pas as the strain of enforced perfection on a broken individual.

The women in The Night of the Iguana play an important part in Shannon's misery and search for purpose. Like her earlier and more infamous role as the title character in Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita, Sue Lyons plays a teenager who tempts an older man. But unlike the lecherous Humbert Humbert in Lolita, Shannon earnestly wants to suppress his feelings. Lyons plays her role in The Night of the Iguana as a series of quick emotional outbursts; flitting from one frothy viewpoint to the next as each constituted an aspect of eternity.

Her chaperon, Miss Fellowes is an all together different creature. Unlike, the flirtatious Charlotte, Miss Fellowes is stiff and distant. Portrayed in the film as a closeted lesbian, her vocational need to protect Charlotte seems both connected to her highly moralistic character, but also her own interests in the girl. Her sharp tongued attacks are not only leveled at Shannon, but to his highly-sexed friend Maxine, who also poses a threat to the social character she aspires to represent.

Bouncy, yet bearing an undercurrent of contempt, Maxine is a highly independent woman. Sexually liberated even before the death of her husband Fred, Maxine is characterized by her earthy and carnal characteristics. Despite the censorship of the era, it quickly becomes apparent that Maxine regularly engages in a multitude of sexual activities with her two young Mexican cabana boys. Aging, yet still beautiful, Maxine feels alive and wanted through them. Yet, in spite of their presence, Maxine still desires Shannon, who has continually rebuffed her advances out of respect for Fred. Nevertheless, Maxine offers Shannon a sense of home and permanency that his troubled life is crucially lacking.

The final woman who offers Shannon comfort is the gentle painter Hannah Jelkes. Unlike Charlotte and Maxine, Hannah is a highly asexual creature. Contemplative and assured, she resists Shannon's advances because she believes in love for it what offers beyond its physical capacities. Traveling with her aging grandfather, the pair offer their art as payment for their lodgings and food. Unlike the proud Shannon, Hannah feels no shame for her destitution, because she is not bound to a world of materialism and money. Rather, she is complete in the world around her and thus tries to make Shannon understand his shortcomings and flaws.

The principal metaphor in the film emerges from their plainspoken conversations. Like the Iguana, Maxine's cabana boys have tied to a post in order to fatten up to eat, Shannon too has a noose around his neck. The weight of his religious commitments and his moral principles is too great a weight for his tortured soul to bear alone. Thus, Huston's film becomes a homage to companionship, to art and to ethereal beauty. The film's principal characters are each astutely acted. With his booming voice and theatrical disposition, Burton is perfect as the plagued priest. Ava Gardner is equally remarkable against-type as the primal Maxine, while Deborah Kerr adds a saintliness and calming resonance to the picture.

Featuring a series of superb performances and gorgeous on-location cinematography, John Huston's adaptation of The Night of the Iguana is a criminally overlooked and undervalued entry into his filmography and the filmic Tennessee Williams' canon. Unlike other "prestige pictures" of its day, The Night of the Iguana does not appear dated and bloated; in large part due to Gabriel Figueroa's cinematography and Huston's emphasis on capturing the emotional pitfalls and sensual primacy of Williams' work set to an exotic background.

At times a stunning achievement.

* The Night of the Iguana is released on DVD by Warner Home Video and is available in their excellent Tennessee Williams Film Collection box set

Other John Huston Films Reviewed:
Across The Pacific (1942) 3/10
The Unforgiven (1960) 7/10

Copyright 2008 8½ Cinematheque