Traveling On and Staying Put: On Heat Lightning

This is the hundred-and-seventy-eighth in a series of historical/critical essays examining the best in film from each year. Essentially, I am watching films from the beginning of cinematic history that interest me and/or hold some critical or cultural impact. My personal, living list of favorites is being created at Letterboxd, showcasing five films per year. All this being explained, what follows is an examination of my third favorite 1934 film, HEAT LIGHTNING, directed by Mervyn LeRoy.

The night has come, cooling the desert air only a bit from its height of 110 degrees Fahrenheit earlier that day. The heat lightning every once in a while casts an extra arc of light across the slightly cloudy skies, augmenting the moonlight that shines down upon a filling station-diner-auto camp vaguely situated in the American Southwest. The patriarch of a large migrant Mexican family, on their way to Juarez, begins strumming on his guitar and singing with a stirring voice out in their camp a ways into the desert. This scene of relatively tranquility defines HEAT LIGHTNING for me, although it isn’t necessarily representative of the fast-talking comedy and, ultimately, dramatic tragedy that makes up much of the rest of Mervyn LeRoy’s film. It does, however, fit into the Pre-Code movie’s mature, extremely efficient, and meditatively resigned treatment of its central themes: some travel on and on, others stay put.

HEAT LIGHTNING is one of the last movies released in that fabled era of the early Hollywood sound era when filmmakers and studios could tackle complicated and controversial issues with a relative graphicness the American film industry wouldn’t allow again until the late 1950s and early 1960s. Director LeRoy and producers Warner Bros. often did this. In the case of HEAT LIGHTNING, they depicted sexuality and murder with a frankness that still feels relatively shocking today. Sure, this is partly because of our expectations of a media landscape not nearly as permissive as today’s. But it’s also because LeRoy and his phenomenal performers bring a matter-of-factness to the proceedings that, if not truly realistic, embodies an emotional truthfulness in a setting uniquely rendered by location shooting and set design.

HEAT LIGHTNING is character actor heaven. Led by Aline MacMahon, a great performer who didn’t often get leading parts in the movies, the film weaves in an array of memorable figures at the aforementioned central filling station-diner-auto camp. The setting is a genius method of bringing in so many from such different walks of life, all of them complaining about the heat and remoteness of the location. It makes sense that HEAT LIGHTNING is based on a play, a 1933 production of the same name, as it keeps the action relegated to the one setting and even less than 24 hours. But LeRoy and Co. brilliantly “cinema-fy” the stage origins.

I’ve found conflicting reports HEAT LIGHTNING was shot in Lancaster or Vacaville, California; the latter makes no sense to me as someone who once lived there, so Lancaster’s probably more desolate environs in 1934 seem more accurate. These exterior shots are cleverly blended with lived-in sets and, in the nighttime scenes, artificial yet convincing desert surroundings. The way LeRoy and cinematographer Sidney Hickox shoot these locations creates an alluring Americana, a semi-ode to the American Southwest (the exact place where the film takes place is never named). As someone who often wonders what the food offered at the lunch counters in Depression-era films would taste like (I wouldn’t even necessarily expect greatness, of course), the constant mention of barbecue sandwiches “with all the trimmings,” Coca-Cola, and bottles of beer are tantalizing. Everyone is drinking beer in the movie. They’re all so tired out and dehydrated, and as much as I love a cold beer on a hot day, I can’t imagine it was helping that circumstance very much. In any event, sustenance comes up numerous times throughout HEAT LIGHTNING, reflecting the taming of the American desert that was still in progress at the time of the film’s production and release.

MacMahon’s Olga is one of those tamers, teased by her sister Myra (Ann Dvorak) as a great selfless helper along the desolate way. As the ending reveals, she is in a way. But her desire to run such an establishment in the middle of the desert is not some kind of idealistic pursuit; it’s to escape her past as a more “wild” woman in Oklahoma. This history is revived by the appearance of George (Preston Foster) and his accomplice Jeff (Lyle Talbot), who are fleeing the East where they robbed a bank and killed some guards along the way. These four top-billed individuals have great rapport. Dvorak’s plaintive desire to go out with her rascally boyfriend butts up against MacMahon’s tomboyish resoluteness to protect her kid sister. When George accidentally shows up to her home and place of business, the reason for her mistrust of men is revealed: the pair once “went out” together. Talbot’s more skittish runaway plays a similar role to Dvorak in that the more dominant Foster continually steers the spooked partner-in-crime where he doesn’t want to go. From many angles, Foster looks like an ancestor of Norm Macdonald and has a sarcastic grin and sense of humor to match. These two pairs are the heart of HEAT LIGHTNING’s plot progression and emotional themes, but the aforementioned character actors who come in and out of the picture buoy the concept of ephemerality.

From the bickering husband and wife that open the film (Edgar Kennedy and Jane Darwell) to the chauffeur-and-two-divorcees trio comprised of Frank McHugh, Glenda Farrell, and Ruth Donnelly, HEAT LIGHTNING’s constantly clever dialogue finds a home with a suite of comic relief characters. The latter group figures into more of the picture, as they have to stay at the auto camp overnight. McHugh is always a welcome presence and Farrell is incredibly attractive in her flirty and knowing persona. Farrell and Donnelly’s innuendo-laden references to sex and their status as rich divorcees after traveling from Reno are daring and often hilarious. Brief episodes featuring two hitchhiking Hollywood aspirers and their “thigh-pinching” “Popsy,” the sheriff, and more also flesh out Olga’s establishment as, if not exactly bustling, then a real place with an array of real travelers.

Another special group of characters enriches HEAT LIGHTNING’s sympathies. The aforementioned group of Mexican travelers has a pleasant exchange with Olga, who doesn’t charge them to camp out at her place’s edges. The father’s (Chris-Pin Martin’s) song, which provides an ambient soundtrack for a large chunk of the nighttime scene, is gorgeous and compliments the stark beauty of the desert. But the family’s presence makes another statement as it advances the plot. Mrs. Ashton-Ashley (Donnelly) is fearful of the “gypsies” and complains of them to Olga, who assures her that they are in fact Mexicans and they are just harmless travelers. It’s an admission of humanity that wasn’t terribly common as an affordance to any minority group depicted in American film at this time. But Olga concedes that she’ll hold the duo’s jewels, which George has loitered around to steal, in her safe.

George seduces Olga and follows her into her room as a means of reaching the jewels. Meanwhile, Myra returns from her date with Steve Laird (Theodore Newton); both are drunk. It’s implied that Myra and Steve have had sex, and now that the deed is done, Steve is not so inclined to return Myra’s “honeys” and shows of affection. While sneaking back in, Myra sees George come out of Olga’s room, and when the sisters meet, their fight about seeing “toxic” men results in their most touching scene, one of sisterly connection. After this moment, Olga begins to return to her room, but she hears George’s urging of Jeff to open the safe. She grabs her gun. George turns with alarm. And she fires, just like that. No big speeches, no pained looks. It’s remarkably cold, and while it’s given emotion by Olga’s rush to George’s side as he dies, it’s not weepy or melodramatic. George delivers an apology of sorts, saying “You’re a good kid, Olga” before uttering his last words: “Oh, who cares.” Almost to the very last, George is playing a character, ever a con man, as this last line reveals.

It’s very indicative of the permissiveness of the Pre-Code era that HEAT LIGHTNING does not end with Olga’s immediate punishment. Everett (Willard Robertson), a rancher obviously sweet on Olga who’s been hanging around throughout the movie, arrives in the early morning as the sun crests the desert’s horizon. She asks him to “take care of it,” it being George’s dead body; lest we think she’s trying to escape her fate, she follows this up by asking Everett to talk to the sheriff about everything for her. It’s a very bittersweet moment, as Everett tenderly agrees. Robertson’s performance throughout the film is immensely likeable and sympathetic, especially since it doesn’t feel like Olga has quite the same sort of fire for him, even if she generally likes him. In any event, a customer interrupts the conversation. Olga reflexively moves to assist the chipper guy who’s already complaining about the heat and asking if running such a place must lead to a “quiet life.” “Yeah, real quiet,” Olga replies, glancing over at the dining room where her former lover lies.

The implications of HEAT LIGHTNING’s ending can be interpreted a few ways. Although Olga, within the text of the film, seemingly goes “unpunished,” there is a reference to law enforcement becoming involved. However, she also tells Everett that George tried to hold up the joint. It could be a self-defense case that leads to her freedom, especially since Olga is obviously well-liked by the sheriff, customers, and townsfolk like Everett.

Thematically, it makes a poignant point about seeking escape. HEAT LIGHTNING’s characters are almost all fleeing from something: George and Jeff from the law, the divorcees from their old husbands, and the two “cuties” from their apparently boring lives to make it big in Hollywood. Even Olga, the paragon of stability in the film, initially fled to make a new life in the middle of the desert, and Myra certainly wants to escape this gas station milieu. Olga is stubborn in staying put after her transformation, however, to the point that she wants to restrain Myra from making the same mistakes she did. Maybe she sees the futility of the travels of the numerous people who cross their orbit, and in the case of George, that travel leads to a whole new kind of journey…into death.

HEAT LIGHTNING is an example of the best kind of Hollywood film of its era. At just 63 minutes long and with a slew of seedy characters, raunchy jokes, and ultimate violence, it’s an elevated form of Pre-Code exploitation. But its softer sides underscore a sensitivity to the human condition and a relatability one might not expect to find in its remote location and extraordinary 12 hour or so period. LeRoy professed he didn’t make “message pictures” and specifically didn’t have much to say about HEAT LIGHTNING, but whether intentionally or not, his best films of the early 1930s struck a delicate balance between a realism of a sort (typified by the performances and cadence of these actors) and the seductive allure of Hollywood film grammar and space-building (eloquently captured by the production design and cinematography here). The movie is the definition of a hidden gem, underseen and underappreciated to the degree that one might think it a minor work in the Pre-Code “canon” or LeRoy’s filmography. HEAT LIGHTNING is not, however, and deserves to loom large for its mature and relatively subtle means of drawing out complicated human emotions.