Specter of the Rose (1946) Online

I saw this once at the age of 20. I'm now 80. It's still on my top ten, all-time list. I remember Lionel Stander and "loving her with his eyes". I haven't seen it since. It's a most unusual, beautiful memory. Others on my list are "Separate Tables" (produced by Hecht who wrote "Spectre) and Witness for the Prosecution": Is anybody picking up a pattern? No, because "My Fair Lady" and "Quacker Fortune Has A Cousin Living In The Bronx" are there, too. Until I wrote this I hadn't realized that everybody in all these casts only truly fell in love ONCE. Until I wrote this I hadn't realized that I did, at 20, and still am, at 80. And, until I wrote this line I haven't written the minimum ten.

This Ben Hecht film is one-of- a-kind. it's about the ballet world and might remind you a bit of The Red Shoes on a superficial level. However this film is quite different-more perverse and it contains some REALLY erotic dialogue between the young lovers--the wonderful Ivan Kirov and Viola Essen. Judith Anderson, Michael Chekhov and Lionel Stander are also superb. Ben Hecht wrote, produced and directed this film--too bad he didn't attempt more directing!! A must-see!

I am surprised and even saddened that there are no other votes or comments for this extraordinary film about the ballet world, because that would seem to mean that no one using IMDB has seen it; you are missing one of the most unique films ever made.

Ben Hecht wrote and Ben Hecht directed this surreal film about a dancer in the eccentric world of ballet who is obsessed with a ballerina; there are few if any obsessions that are not destructive, and I will not give away the ending, but it is spectacular and moving. You will not forget this film once you have seen it.

I agree that it has been shelved and not appreciated. The love scenes are better totally than todays bare all... you were in the room and at the table.. it should be revived. The ballet is made very real, and the people become part of the whole scene, even if you don't care for the ballet or understand it, you will get into this movie. As I said it is an unforgettable movie and should also be shown in cinema classes as an example of great writing and directing.

Whatever unfulfilled ambitions drove Ben Hecht to write, produce and direct Spectre of the Rose, it's charitable to pretend they bore scant relation to the gruesome folly that eventuated. Did Hollywood's most prolific uncredited contributor to great screenplays crave the glory that would come with his very own Citizen Kane? If so, he made choices that can only be accounted as bizarre.

First, he set his story in the world of `the dance.' Since of all the arts, ballet, for Americans at any rate, reeks of the rarefied – the elite, movies about it invariably lapse into gaseous talk about `aaht.' Spectre of the Rose dives right into this pitfall. The high-flown, portentous dialogue must have entranced Hecht but it plainly baffles his cast. They variously give it stilted readings, flat it out, and drop quotation marks around it, but except for Judith Anderson – as an old assoluta now training novices in a `dingy' studio – nobody can make it work. (But then, she made Lady Scarface work.)

The plot concerns a deranged male superstar called Sanine (Ivan Kirov), who may have murdered his first wife and partner and now seems to be rehearsing to kill his second (Viola Essen). It's safe to presume Kirov was engaged only to fling his polished torso around because he can't even act embarrassed; it's no surprise that this is his solitary screen credit.

But his murderous madness just sits there, with a take-it-or-leave-it shrug, while the movie pirouettes off on other tangents. There's a larcenous impresario (Michael Chekhov) who outdoes even Clifton Webb in trying to break down the celluloid closet's door. Most puzzlingly, there's Lionel Stander as a Runyonesque poet who seems intended as some sort of Greek chorus to the goings-on but serves instead as a major irritant, uninvited and out of place.

Without knowing what compromises Hecht made and obstacles he faced in bringing his work to the screen, it's easy to be glib. But there's such a discordance of tones and jostling of moods that the movie elicits diverse responses; thus some viewers have found in Spectre of the Rose something special and unique. Movies, maybe more than any other art form, touch our idiosyncracies. But when we're left unsure whether The Spectre of the Rose is dead-earnest or a grandiose spoof – an election-bet of a movie -- something has gone radically awry.

This seldom seen film produced, written and directed by Ben Hecht, brings some terrific dancing, namely from the two leads, Ivan Kirov [with a gorgeous physique, and doing fantastic leaps and bounds] and Viola Essen [another fine ballet dancer]whom I had the pleasure of auditioning with back in the 50s for "Dead End" [roles of Baby Face Martin and his ex-girl friend Francie] we didn't get cast, unfortunately. They bring some wonderful moments of dance in spite of a somewhat hard to believe plot and corny lines. Appearing as La Sylph, who sits around knitting, while the dancers go through their paces is none other than Dame Judith Anderson, the queen of film noir [such as "Laura"]. She does manage to keep herself out of the mire of this melodramatic piece with her presence. Add to this another great actor, Michael Chekhov, from Russia's Stanislavski Moscow Theatre, giving a silly performance of a foppish manager of the dance troupe. He did more realistic acting in the such of "Spellbound" and "Rhapsody". Hard to believe from this performance he was the great acting teacher of the time along with Sanford Meisner. Then there's comedian Lionel Stander being realistic as a sort of serious suitor to our leading lady. The choreography was done by none other than Tamara Geva, once married to George Balanchine, and star of Broadway's "On Your Toes" starring Ray Bolger where she initiated the "Slaughter On Seventh Avenue" ballet. [Later brought to film by Gene Kelly and Vera Ellen in "Words & Music"] In spite of a twisted plot and sketchy dialogue, you become fascinated with this gem of a movie. Watching the lovers dance is worth the price of admission.

This was one of the most unforgettable films I saw as a child, I never had the opportunity to see it again until 50 years later, and it remains a lasting impact. Its weaknesses are admitted, it's more like a play than a film, (although some cinematic tricks occur as positive surprises,) the acting is not very brilliant but rather stiff, the camera moves as little as possible; but against all these foibles you have the overwhelmingly beautiful and brilliant story and play, the virtuoso dialogue all the way, and above all, the music, the dances and the poetry. Ben Hecht clearly conceived the idea inspired by the fate of Nijinsky, who was disabled as a schizophrenic from the first world war till after the second, and the real theme of the film is the freedom of artistic madness at its most exuberant and creative. Michael Chekhov sometimes tediously dominates long scenes of the film as the sore tried impresario of infinite tribulations who nevertheless is wholeheartedly sympathetic but outflanked by the indomitable realist of long and hard experience, Judith Anderson, who is magnificent in every scene; while the focus of the drama is the dancer's genius and the difficulty of handling it, or rather, subjecting it to discipline, because it's so totally beyond control that it really can't be disciplined, only at best directed in a creative vein. Powell-Pressburger's classic "The Red Shoes" a few years later would have been unthinkable without this for a road mark, and it must remain for always one of the most important and innovative ballet films ever made, especially for its delicate treatment of the difficult subject of genius. The film gains by seeing it a number of times, at first sight its depth and ingenuity is not obvious, but as you sink into it you never reach the bottom. This is an ingenious film about the trickiness of genius.

"Spector of the Rose" may be overwritten and overwrought, but it also has mood to spare and is strangely haunting.

It was Samuel Goldwyn who said that it is the last five minutes that makes a film memorable, and "Specter of the Rose" has a stunning last five minutes. But the first eighty-five are more problematic.

Haidi Kuznetsova (Viola Essen), a young ballerina in Madame La Sylph's ballet school, is in love with Andre Sanine (Ivan Kirov) a brilliant dancer who is recovering from the death of Nikki, his previous love. La Sylph (Judith Anderson) warns Haidi that Sanine is going insane. He hears music, "Le Spectre de la Rose" that no one else can hear, and probably murdered Nikki - Sanine is an anagram for insane after all. Haidi marries him anyway.

When they embark on a successful ballet tour, Sanine suffers a breakdown. They leave the tour and book into a high-rise hotel. After the exhausted Haidi falls asleep, the internal music overwhelms Sanine. He becomes the Spirit of the Rose and commences to dance armed with a stiletto - "The rose has a thorn". In a truly startling sequence he dances around the apartment like a trapped animal before he takes that Nijinsky-like leap. It's a scene that stays with you.

Writer/director/producer Ben Hecht created an intriguing plot based on two of his earlier short stories, and the famous ballet. Although Judith Anderson's La Sylph is superb, Hecht also created some characters that drag the story down. Michael Chekhov as failed impresario, Max Polikoff and Lionel Stander as failed poet, Lionel Gans, overstay their welcome with ponderous dialogue and lots of it. Gans is also creepily attracted to Haidi.

It shows the dangers facing the auteur. Where another director may have considered some passages of dialogue overripe and jettisoned them, Hecht the director seemed to fall in love with every word Hecht the screenwriter wrote.

There is a whiff of tragedy about the two leads. Both were dancers with theatre backgrounds. This was Kirov's one and only movie and Essen only made one other. In Kirov's case you can see why, he is a pretty strange actor, almost distant, but as one critic noted, his alien presence was perfect for this part. He had a great physique, and the set of jumps (entrechat) he completes just after he first appears is pretty impressive, but his acting was leaden.

Not so Essen. Why a studio didn't grab her is a mystery, she had an unusual beauty, not unlike Pier Angeli or Gail Russell, and like them she died young, but she could act as this film proves.

George Antheil's rippling score sweeps the film along from the opening titles, and although studio bound, the cinematography, often shot at a low angle, is classy.

The film has similarities to the more successful "A Double Life", starring Ronald Coleman. In that film, the actor becomes possessed with his role as Othello. It came out around the same time as "Specter of the Rose" as did "The Red Shoes", but Hecht's film predates them both - did he spark a trend?

"Specter of the Rose" has flaws aplenty, but it also has an indefinable mood that makes it one of the strangest, most intriguing films you are likely to see.

This is the 6th viewing of Spectre of The Rose ( I see this every 10 years or so.

Aside from some Ballet scenes, this is primarily a love story centered around a male Dancer & the death of his first wife. Ivan Dixon plays the Dance with grace (he cant act) Viola Essen is the ballerina he falls in love with, ( she also dances gracefully) but cant act. The main reason to see this film is for LIONEL STANDER as a sardonic writer.(he could play this type role in his sleep),He should have been nominated for best supporting actor. Mikail Chekov plays an effeminate producer quite well. The magnificent Judith Anderson is the bitter dance teacher. & of course she is superb,

Reccomended for ballet loves & fans of Lionel Stander.

rating only **1/2 78 points 6 on IMDb

This movie, as self-conscious as it is in telling a tale of art and madness, is no work by Hollywood hacks. Unfortunately, it's even worse; it's the work of probably Hollywood's greatest screenwriter, Ben Hecht. He was at the height of his fame and clout, so he received the go-head to write, direct and produce what must have been a project close to his heart. It goes to show, once again, that even the greatest creative types need an editor, or at least a friend they respect who'll tell them when something isn't working.

The Specter of the Rose tells the story of Andre Sanine (Ivan Kirov), a great ballet dancer who is suspected of killing his wife in a period of madness, while they were dancing Le Spectre de la Rose. For weeks afterwards he simply lay in bed, unable to dance, unresponsive to all those in the world of ballet who see him as a genius. They include Madame la Sylph (Judith Anderson), once a great ballet artist herself who now runs an impoverished ballet school but who maintains the highest standards, and Max Polikoff (Michael Chekhov), an eternally optimistic and unreliable impresario, and as hard up for funds as is Madame la Sylph. Lurking about is a critic, poet and writer, Lionel Gans (Lionel Stander), who cynically comments on what he sees, usually in epigrams. When Sanine meets a young ballerina, Haidi (Viola Essen), he recovers. He has a renewed passion for dancing. He and Haidi fall in love and marry. Polikoff cobbles together enough funds to mount a production of Le Spectre. Madame la Sylph supervises the production, but with misgivings. And Sanine and Haidi will dance together...the story of a young woman who returns from her first ball joyous and clutching a red rose. She falls asleep and the rose comes to life as a lover. They dance, and as he fades away, she dies with a smile of love and longing on her lips. Will history repeat itself with Sanine and his new wife?

Somewhere between the opening message, "Here's to the seven arts, that dance and sing, And keep our hearts, green with spring," and the last message spoken by Gans, "Out of our endless tears, we make our own little songs and dances," one assumes is the place Hecht wanted for this movie. That he fails, in my opinion, doesn't make the film so much a failure as a gallant but misguided attempt. It seems to me that Hecht had the bones of an engrossing story, but he was felled by the excesses of his own script and by the problem he created for himself of having to find two dancers who could dance their roles credibly while being good enough actors not to compromise the story. He only managed to find two dancers. The acting by Kirov and Essen, combined with the self-consciousness of the script, is frustrating. Lionel Gans, with his epigrams and over-written posturing, is used by Hecht as a kind of on-screen commentator. He is just irritating. For instance, early in the movie Gans comes to Madame la Sylph's ballet studio with a police detective investigating the death of Sanine's first wife. Polikoff introduces himself to the detective. Gans speaks up with world weary cynicism, "A wilted carnation," he describes Polikoff, "in the Broadway buttonhole. This is Madame la Sylph, the remains of a pirouette. And this is the sad little factory where dancing toys are made."

Yet it seems Gans has been carrying a torch for Haidi. When he criticizes Sanine she turns on him. "Oh, you're a monster! I loath you! I just loath you!" she says and begins to cry. Gans looks at her for a moment and says quietly, "I didn't think you could cry. I often cry, at night. Then I think of you and I become full of young words all dancing for you, and then I pretend I'm not a monster. And on this delusion I live until morning." Ben Hecht or not, this sort of writing is awful. Or this exchange between Sanine and Haidi. They are sitting together at a small table. "Hug me with your eyes," he asks her. "I am," she says. "Harder," he replies. What happened to the skillful Ben Hecht of His Girl Friday, Notorious, Nothing Sacred and Wuthering Heights?

With the exception of Judith Anderson, who turns in a highly professional job, the other actors are either exaggerations or dull. Michael Chekhov, with a hairdo that looks like it was created for one of the Munchkins, plays an aging, effeminate, eye-rolling, overly-dramatic character who outclasses even Clifton Webb. Lionel Stander, with that tough looking mug and rough voice, seems almost willfully miscast. He's interesting at first, but then the character, a one-note portrayal, becomes tiresome. The two leads both seem to be professional and competent dancers. Kirov, especially, is called upon to do impressive leaps. Neither can act well. Kirov, for modern audiences, looks uncomfortably like a young Leslie Nielson.

Hecht, for all this, makes the movie an amusing look at all it takes to make something creative happen, from musicians' unions, agents, society backers and billing lines. The movie also has a fine musical score by George Antheil. Although he paid the bills by writing for movies, Antheil was a widely respected composer of symphonies, chamber works, sonatas and ballets. The music he wrote for the Specter of the Rose ballet in the film features an intriguing and angular waltz that most decidedly doesn't make you think of turn-of-the- century Vienna.

As the creation of a hugely gifted writer and outstanding screen-writing craftsman (just check all the movies Hecht was called on to fix without taking credit), The Specter of the Rose is worth watching and even buying. But it is a curiosity piece, an intriguing failure.

18 years before Susan Sontag defined "camp" in her famous 1964 essay, Ben Hecht fully realized its on screen possibilities with his "The Spectre and the Rose." Words fail entirely to capture the fruity tongue in cheek ineptitude here--it must be seen to be believed.

Judith Anderson, who looks like a fortune teller for a rural traveling carnival, is worth the whole price of admission. She utters lines like: "We've eaten caviar and we've eaten sawdust," but, oops, that was actually Joan Crawford's line from "Berserk," (which is, in many ways, cut from the same cloth.)

Well, anyway, you get the point.

This is a delightfully campy melodrama that delights in its often unintentionally funny script by Ben Hecht. It also features one of the mist delightfully bad performances from its sexy but shamefully rotten leading man, Ivan Kirov, who gets to say lines such as "I'd like pick you up right now and hold you until you were tattooed on me" while sounding like Jack Nicholson. Leading lady Viola Essen isn't much better, but she's a reactor to his character's madness, and doesn't get the chance to speak such outlandish lines.

Coming two years before the classic ballet movie, "The Red Shoes", this deals with a sensitive yet masterful ballet dancer (Kirov) who may or may not have killed his wife before a performance of "The Spectre of the Rose" ballet. Imperious ballet instructor Judith Anderson, once a great ballet star herself, warns Essen of the danger, but she refuses to listen. When Kirov dances (especially shirtless), he has everybody's attention, but perhaps he should have kept his mouth closed.

Top billed Anderson gets many showy moments, but while her lines are often very funny, she delivers them masterfully. On the cusp of her great theatrical triumph in "Medea", this film is as close to her stage work as she got, even as the notorious Mrs. Danvers in "Rebecca". Another great performance comes from Michael Chekhov as a hanger on who becomes Anderson's confidante. Lionel Stander gets some great lines as well, making the real star of this art house film its script. This ranks as one of Republic pictures great artistic films, showing what it could do on an A budget.

When my mother took me to see this film in 1946 at the Leland Theater in Taft, Texas, I was 7 years old. This movie set a standard ,for me,of motion picture excellence and expectation that has never wavered. I am not saying that this is the greatest movie ever made, I am just expressing or rather trying to convey the power of this film over the rather naive mind of a young boy. Judith Anderson became my role model of female intuition and cohesiveness. Every time I watch a movie (and I have watched literally thousands over the years), I communicate with her and wait for her voice to put it into perspective. She was a remarkable actress whose theatrical actions were a combination of dance and music that revealed hidden truths and subtle whispers about life, death and our invisible role within it.

An all-American young man, who is an excellent classical dancer, has risen to fame under the Russian-sounding name of Sanine. After the sudden death of his wife, Sanine sinks into a deep depression. Cared for by a kind-hearted and besotted ballerina, Sanine seems to recover both his mental health and his appetite for life. But what about the persistent rumours ? Did Sanine really kill his spouse ?

"Specter" is an uneven and over-ambitious movie. At the same time it is an original and electrifying noir, notable mainly for its evocation of a certain kind of Russo-American ballet circa 1940-1950. Viewers interested in ballet, or in the history of ballet, are sure to enjoy both the music and the (excerpts from) performances. There is also a colourful depiction of the artistic bohème, with its age-old and universal problems : amorous rivalry, lack of money, nomadic employment, conflicts between real life and play-acting or between soaring vision and vulnerability.

I'm sorry to say that the actor playing Sanine is both a beautiful man and a decent dancer, but not the most gifted of actors : watching him tackle a demanding, psychologically complex role is rather like watching a hamster drive a school bus. He redeems himself in his final scenes, which are genuinely chilling and unsettling. I do not think that anyone who saw Sanine's final exit, will ever watch "Le spectre de la rose" with the same eyes again...

You must see this movie. We were baffled and amused by the incomprehensible dialogue, stone-faced acting, and ridiculous plot of this ballet/murder mystery written and directed by Ben Hecht(!?). Actually, we were more than amused, we were in physical pain from continual laughter!

Dame Judith Anderson manages to rise above this surreal debacle and provide an intelligent performance. On the other end of the scale is legendary acting teacher Michael Chekhov, nephew of Anton, who is so over-the-top that doubts arose in our minds about his acting theories.

The fact that Hecht, writer of hard-boiled cynical tales (The Front Page), would write such loopy dialogue leads us to theorize he meant this to be tongue-in-cheek. We can only hope.

See this film!

For those of us who are part of the real world of ballet - this film is completely ridiculous. Ivan Kirov was basically a gymnast, not a ballet dancer. Viola Essen at the time was with Ballet Theater, now American Ballet Theater, and a reasonably good dancer, but except for Dame Judith Anderson, the acting is amateurish and Checkov is completely over the top .... embarrassingly so! I saw this film at age 14 and at that time, never having seen a ballet, I was very impressed. However, later in life, long after I had completed my own career as a dancer - I purchased the video tape of it, curious as to what it was like after so many years. I couldn't believe how naive Hollywood could be about the world of ballet. But it was made in the mid 40s, before The Red Shoes or The Turning Point, the latter giving a true picture of the ballet world. The entire cast of Spectre have now passed away ... Ivan Kirov (not his real name)dying at age 79. It was his one and only film, thereafter being kept by a Chicago business man .. so the rumor goes.

"Andre is not a man...he is a shadow that flickers on the wall..."

Andre Sanine: Hug me with your eyes. Haidi: I am. Andre Sanine: Harder.

Such is much of the dialog in this film. To be blunt, it's among the worst written dialog I've ever heard and it's often unintentionally funny. Because it is so incredibly bad, it makes it hard to believe that the dialog was written by the incredibly respected guy who wrote such classics as "The Front Page", "Kiss of Death" and many other good films. Perhaps the director should have stepped in and objected, but in this case Hecht was also the director! The bottom line is that the only reasons to watch the film are to laugh at the tripe they consider dialog or if you hated Hecht and wanted to see his worst. As for the story...who cares.

Ben Hecht's major off the rails story about the possible murder of a ballet's star's first wife.

It's a very deliberate film full of beyond purple prose and performances that are way to over the top to be anything but deadly serious. Laughably bad, I sat staring at the screen for fifteen minutes wondering what the heck I was watching, unsure if I should be laughing or not- finally I just started to laugh and went with it...

I had no clue why anyone would chose to do this deliberately- especially when its some one who should know better. It was painfully awful in a way that only films that are supposed to be works of art can be. It's a film to make you go- you have got to be f-ing kidding me over and over again

Judith Anderson who was the nasty, evil Danvers in Rebecca and the miscast "big mama" with a British-Louisiana accent in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof plays a former ballerina who runs a ballet school (don't they all?). Lionel Sandler who became the gruff major domo in the TV series Hart to Hart, plays a gruff non-rhyming poet. Some other guy, plays an over the top effectual show biz promoter. This other guy decides to resurrect the career of a the brilliant ballet dancer Ivor Somebody,who may or may not have killed his wife a few months early and since then he has become a looney toon recluse;he hears music in his head and sees ghost dancers with his face. Anywho, he says he is OK now and begins a series of road shows and has a hot love and marriage to another dancer, I forget her name..she made two movies in her entire career...twice as many as Ivor. Well, as luck would have it, sometime after Kansas City, Ivor sort of starts going cuckoo again. Lots of drama and jumping and twirling which is suppose to resemble ballet ensues and instead of slitting his wife's throat he takes a flying leap out the plate glass window. Kerplunk. Some silly dialog for a couple of minutes. And then the movie ends. I streamed this on Netflix but the won't give me a pro-rated credit. The acting is dreadful. The dancing by Ivor is gymnastics, not ballet. The whole thing is awful.