BEHOLD A PALE HORSE (1964)

THE FILM

FILM DIRECTOR: Fred Zinnemann

SCREENWRITER: JP Miller

FILM STARS: Gregory Peck, Anthony Quinn, Omar Sharif, Raymond Pellegrin, Paolo Stoppa, Mildred Dunnock, Christian Marquand, Carlo Angeletti, Daniela Rocca, Rosalie Crutchley, Michael Lonsdale

COUNTRY: USA

THIS BOOK

AUTHOR: Emeric Pressburger

TYPE: Novel

PUBLISHER: Fontana

THIS EDITION PUBLISHED: 1964

COUNTRY: Great Britain

COVER: Paperback

THE ORIGINAL BOOK

ORIGINAL AUTHOR: As Above

YEAR FIRST PUBLISHED: 1961

ORIGINAL BOOK TITLE: Killing a Mouse on Sunday

NOTES

GENRE: Thriller

WORDS: Author Emeric Pressburger is Hungarian-British screenwriter, film director, and producer who occasionally wrote fiction. He wrote this book, after years of “communal” creativity in film with Michael Powell (together they did The Red Shoes (1948), Black Narcissus (1947), Stairway to Heaven (1946), The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943) and many others) to prove he could do something on his own. The book is a thriller but not a conventional page turner thriller. Its subplots and moralising make it more of a character story with thriller elements.

The story takes place shortly after the Spanish Civil War. It’s the story of an aging leftist revolutionary who wants to sneak back into Spain from France to see his gravely ill mother, but the dying mother asks a priest to tell her son that he will be killed by the Francoist rightist Guardia Civil police if he comes. Simple enough and the priest feels duty-bound to go and tell the man, even though the mother doesn’t believe in God and the son hates priests. Thoughts on religion, conscience, love, loyalty, law, duty are at the back of this story.  Interestingly it’s told from four different points of view – those of a former leftist revolutionary, a policeman (who has been hunting the leftist), a priest, and a small boy. It sounds serious, and it is though it is essential an adventure with tragedy and even comedy interjected , much in the style of  Hemmingway.

The original title of the novel, “Killing a Mouse on Sunday”, is intriguing,. I’m not sure who changed the title though “Behold a Pale Horse” is more what I would expect from something by director Zinnemann.”Behold a Pale Horse” is a phrase taken from the biblical Book of Revelation. A reference to the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, as the rider of a pale horse is Death … “And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth”.

I saw the film many years ago. I recall it being well made but one note and lacking heart or soul and slightly “important” (like many Fred Zinnemann films – yes, all well made very watchable films, but with characters that seem a little cold and one dimensional (much like Kubrick’s human characters). You may get caught up in their plight but you are never going to hold your breath, or cry or cheer ecstatically with or for them). For me the joy was of seeing Quinn and Peck in another film together, I recall it being an odd film, dark and ambiguous (which seems the intention of the filmmakers). Influenced by Hemmingway and others I liked my Spanish Civil War black and white then though I suspect I would enjoy ambiguity and grey more so now. I do recall being more sympathetic with Quinn’s “fascist” character, though that I put down to as much as I like Peck I like Quinn more. Interestingly Quinn wanted Peck’s sympathetic role but to avoid typecasting (apparently) they gave him the role of the police captain. Quinn would play a variation on the Peck role in The Passage (1979). The film was written by the great J.P. Miller, a novelist and screenwriter and another of the great writers who came through the golden age of  US TV drama in the 1950s to write feature films.

The film was banned in Spain. “Incensed by scenes showing Viñolas with a mistress, and taking bribes, the government of Spain denied filming as well as distribution in Spain, causing problems for its distributor, Columbia Pictures, which had all of its films denied distribution in Spain, and was compelled to sell its distribution arm in Spain. Columbia Pictures remained closed in Spain for several years, until agreeing to release several Spanish films outside of Spain. Months prior to the release of the film, Columbia Vice President M. J. Frankovich estimated that the studio had lost “millions” in the year since it had decided to go ahead with production against the wishes of the Spanish government”. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behold_a_Pale_Horse_(film)

The film was a flop at the time, Zinnemann said in 1966 (in an article “A Man for All Seasons’: Less Pomp, More Circumstance” for The New York Times), “The reaction to that was a disappointment, but it was justified. The point simply did not get over. I took too much for granted. I thought the Spanish Civil War was still with us, but apparently it is dead, in spite of all those refugees. There were other troubles too – with the Franco government. I was to blame for playing the Spanish Civil Guard as ‘heavies.’ They are sacred cows. Columbia suffered heavily through the Franco ban on their films because of ‘Pale Horse’ but they were wonderfully good about it”.

I must watch the film again. As cold as Zinnemann may be, his films can be repeat viewings.

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