Main Cast: Dana Andrews, Susan Hayward, Kent Smith, Lois Wheeler, Jesse Royce Landis
Release Year: 1949
Country: US
Run Time: 98 minutes
Plot
Producer Samuel Goldwyn dishes up sentiment by the bowlful with My Foolish Heart. Susan Hayward is (somewhat unconvincingly) cast as a wide-eyed girl from Idaho who meets bon vivant Dana Andrews at a Manhattan party. Their brief affair results in a pregnancy, but since Andrews has been killed in the war, Hayward marries a man she doesn't love to give her child a name. The experience turns the girl into an embittered alcoholic, but she sees the light before she can cause grief for her baby. Based on a story by J. D. Salinger (the only one of this reclusive author's stories ever translated to film), My Foolish Heart strains credulity to the breaking point, but was popular enough to yield a hit title song, which is still a standard on "easy listening" FM radio stations. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
My Foolish Heart is often cited by fans of J. D. Salinger (who wrote the story on which the movie is based) as the reason why none of the author's other works will ever be filmed, as he apparently hated what the creators of Heart did to his story. However, if viewed simply as a film and not as an adaptation, Heart is an above average and enjoyable little "weepie." Sure, it's soap opera, but it's an engaging enough soaper, especially for people who are fans of the genre. The script, for the most part, is pretty standard stuff, but it does deserve some special mention for its ending, which is a bit of a surprise and which doesn't go all out for tears as one might rightfully expect. Heart also benefits from one of Susan Hayward's best performances. Hayward excelled at playing tough broads who may or may not have had a tender side to them; indeed, at times, she played the tough so well that even when there was supposed to be a tender side, it was hard to see. But she plays both sides of the character very well in Heart, and her work here is exceptional. As her true love, Dana Andrews is adequate but no more; however, as Hayward's father, Robert Keith turns in a very finely-tuned, carefully nuanced performance that deserves special mention. There's also some very affecting father-daughter chemistry between Keith and Hayward. Mark Robson's direction is good, if not outstanding, and Heart also boasts a title tune that is quite memorable. ~ Craig Butler, All Movie Guide
For the 1999 television miniseries, see Foolish Heart.
My Foolish Heart is an Academy Award-nominated 1949 film which tells the story of a woman's reflections on the bad turns her life has taken. It was directed by Mark Robson and stars Dana Andrews and Susan Hayward. Adapted from J. D. Salinger's 1948 short story "Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut," it remains the only authorized film adaptation of Salinger's work; the filmmakers' infidelity to his story famously precluded any possibility of film versions of other Salinger works, including The Catcher in the Rye.
History
After being disappointed, according to biographer Ian Hamilton, when "rumblings from Hollywood" over his 1943 short story "The Varioni Brothers" came to nothing,[1] J. D. Salinger did not hesitate when independent producer Samuel Goldwyn offered to buy the film rights to "Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut." His agent Dorothy Olding later explained this uncharacteristic relinquishing of control with the simple statement that “we thought they would make a good movie."[2]
Indeed, "a good movie" would seem to have been implied by the production’s pedigree, which included Oscar-winning actress Teresa Wright and Casablanca screenwriters Julius J. Epstein and Philip G. Epstein. (Some years earlier, Salinger had actually referenced Casablanca in his 1944 short story "Both Parties Concerned"; one of its characters, upon learning his wife has left him, re-enacts the "Play it, Sam" scene from the film with an imaginary pianist.) However, the eventual film, renamed My Foolish Heart and with Susan Hayward replacing Wright at the last minute,[3] was critically lambasted upon its release.
The New Yorker wrote that it was "full of soap-opera clichés,"[4] and, while allowing for "some well-written patches of wryly amusing dialogue," Time rejected it as a "damp fable....the screenplay turns on all the emotional faucets of a Woman's Home Companion serial."[5] Goldwyn biographer A. Scott Berg explained that “in the Epsteins’ version, more than had ever been suggested [in the original story] was shown, resulting in a ‘four handkerchief’ movie with a farfetched plot."[6] Berg even called the film a “bastardization.” Because of what Salinger's agent later called "'a terrible movie' made in the 1950's [sic]" of one of his stories,[7] the author never again relinquished control of his work to Hollywood filmmakers, despite persistent interest in adapting his most famous work, The Catcher in the Rye, for the screen.
