While Nicholas Ray’s work is still treated with little respect on DVD in R1, there are a couple of films he directed which seem especially difficult to track down. One, which I’ve still not seen, was a project Ray made for Paramount, between Johnny Guitar and Rebel Without a Cause, called Run for Cover. The 1955 VistaVision release, just the third to use that process, starred James Cagney and reunited Ray with his young Knock on Any Door lead John Derek. From what I can tell, the film - a far more traditional Western than Johnny Guitar had been - enjoys virtually no reputation to speak of and is unavailable mostly due to a lack of interest. Any future release would almost certainly be built around its genre or, more likely, Cagney, though he too has an abundance of movies that haven’t seen the light of day for home viewers.

The other terribly rare picture Ray was credited with directing is Wind Across the Everglades, a 1958 Warner Bros. release in which Ray’s partners in the creative triangle of doom were brothers Budd, who wrote the screenplay, and producer Stuart Schulberg. It was supposed to be the start of Schulberg Productions, but it ended up as effectively the end of that venture also. The situation on set was such a nightmare that Ray had to be relieved of his directing duties with a couple of weeks still left to shoot. In his book Nicholas Ray: An American Journey, Bernard Eisenschitz writes of severe tension around the production and ultimately paints a sympathetic picture of Ray as being unable to work in the creatively loose manner he needed. Of course, the unhealthy amount of alcohol and drugs involved hardly helped matters, but Eisenschitz seems to argue that it’s unclear whether the toxic atmosphere on set was the cause or the result of Ray’s level of substance abuse. The most logical conclusion might be that his ultimate removal stemmed from a combination of perhaps Ray not being in ideal condition from the start and then the troubled production only exacerbating the problem, one which, given the director’s history, may or may not have still resulted in quality work if he’d been allowed greater control of the film.

The Schulberg perspective, as you might imagine, is completely different. Wind Across the Everglades effectively killed the brothers’ production company and Budd never had another feature writing credit so placing at least a good amount of the blame on Ray is not surprising. Eisenschitz was able to speak at length with Budd Schulberg, who, as of this writing, is now 95 years old, for his book on Ray in 1980. The excerpts from that session suggest an extreme clash between director and writer. Schulberg, accustomed to the style of Elia Kazan with whom he’d already made On the Waterfront and A Face in the Crowd, had expected Ray to direct the script word for word without any additions. When Ray wanted to make changes, Schulberg became incensed. He felt offended despite this merely having been what Ray often did from film to film. Schulberg also revealed to Eisenschitz that he questioned his director’s mental wellbeing at the time, recounting a story from the night before the shoot when star Christopher Plummer expressed concerns that Ray was “mad” and making a separate mention, supposedly from the same night, where he told his brother Stuart that they should fire Ray because he was “crazy.”

Budd Schulberg talked vaguely with Eisenschitz about Ray’s heavy drinking being an issue, that drugs were also a problem, and that the director was “out of control.” His niece - Stuart’s daughter - was more to the point. In an unadvertised introduction prior to one of Film Forum’s recent screenings (of which there were just two and at least the first was sold out over half an hour before it was scheduled to begin) of the film, Stuart Schulberg’s daughter Sandra, who was on the Florida set as a child, claimed that Nick Ray was strung out on heroin and, if I heard her right, Budd Schulberg  had to take over directing after about three weeks. That last part is definitely questionable, as other sources including Eisenschitz’s book have Ray being removed with approximately two and a half weeks left to shoot. Filming lasted from early November 1957 until the end of January 1958 and Ray’s apparent exit was on the 13th of January, 58 days into production. The specifics seem of minimal importance now, but the final dust-up involved continuity girl Roberta Hodes telling Ray an actor exiting one direction wouldn’t match what was already filmed and him stubbornly refusing to listen to her until others joined the argument on Hodes’ side. It’s Hodes who places the remaining amount of time to shoot at two and a half weeks in the Eisenschitz book.

Ms. Schulberg also essentially disavowed Ray of any sort of author status to the picture. She said it wasn’t really a Nicholas Ray film, that it was more of a Schulberg film. After waiting a good while to see Wind Across the Everglades (both over the years and on the night of the screening), that wasn’t quite what I wanted to hear. It was like a sabotage or coup during Film Forum’s Nick Ray festival. It’s not a secret that Ray didn’t direct the entirety of the film, but Schulberg’s comments almost felt like an attempt to strip away his contribution entirely. Maybe that’s why this is only getting two showings, I thought (55 Days at Peking didn’t make the cut at all in the retrospective, although rights issues and print quality could’ve played a factor). The chapter in Eisenschitz’s book has Budd Schulberg just directing the ending scenes between Plummer and Burl Ives, which is almost unquestionably the least effective part of the film and the most poorly directed. His book may be biased in favor of Ray, but I’m still more inclined to believe that sort of heavily researched text (which has never been questioned to my knowledge) than a few remarks from a Schulberg family member over fifty years after the fact.

That’s not necessarily a denial or disagreement with the idea that Wind Across the Everglades should be considered something other than a Nick Ray film in the strictest sense. As seen in its released and only form, the movie is clearly not Ray’s alone. It’s probably not what he envisioned from the start nor how he wanted it to be upon completion. Production notes indicate 154 minutes and 40 seconds of usable footage shot by Ray, with another 27 minutes and 46 seconds completed after he left. This is for a film that now lasts just 93 minutes. Most disappointing is the failure to use any of the notes Ray later supplied following a private screening one and a half months prior to the film’s opening. Eisenschitz reprinted this memo in its entirety and virtually everything Ray writes is absolutely spot-on, yet it was totally ignored. So is it then a “Nick Ray film” in the sense that he controlled what’s in the final version? No. But it surely could have been.

Even looking at the film now, the ingredients are there for Wind Across the Everglades to fit comfortably in Ray’s filmography. It’s a step removed from his great ones, ultimately a curiosity caused by a general lack of any rhythm, but there are still elements of what would’ve interested Ray in most every scene. When Christopher Plummer’s character Walt Murdock first appears, we see him pluck a feather from a lady’s expensive hat out of playful disgust that a bird had been sacrificed for this piece of headwear. Predictably, the woman protests but Walt wryly asks how she would feel if the bird were wearing her. This initial scene follows a voiceover detailing the situation in southern Florida where poachers target beautiful birds for their plumage to sell to the more fashion-conscious and financially capable women. Some amazing nature footage, including a shot which is repeated later of white birds in flight covering almost the entire frame, illustrates the opening while additional scenes of a similarly natural feel are spread throughout the picture. The idea here, in the opening and that early scene with Plummer, is very much one of our protagonist being an outsider who’s committed to something society does not quite understand. This is wholly typical of a male lead in a Ray film, particularly his later pictures, and many things we see here seem to hint at where the director would later go in The Savage Innocents a couple of years later.

I thought Plummer gave a really solid performance in the film, oddly attuned to Ray’s casual depiction of madness and not at all stiff or too serious. It’s really Plummer who brings some accessibility to an underdeveloped character whose motivation is revealed almost piecemeal. The actor had both Sidney Lumet’s Stage Struck and this film released in 1958, and they were his first two movies. I don’t know if or how much Plummer discusses Wind Across the Everglades in his recent autobiography, but I did come across some information on a screening of the film in Florida from earlier this year in which Plummer appeared. A brief but charming YouTube video of the post-screening conversation is worth the couple of minutes to watch. It seemed interesting that this particular film would be shown in conjunction with Plummer’s appearance given its rarity and admitted troubles. It’s also worth noting that Plummer was not the original choice for his part. Ben Gazzara actually had dropped out and Plummer soon enough found himself headlining a movie between drinking sessions on location in Florida. I’m a big admirer of Gazzara but Plummer seems to have been the better fit for such an idealistic and open character.

The point/counterpoint for Plummer’s Murdock is the character of Cottonmouth, played by Ray’s old radio pal Burl Ives. He’s the leader of a real motley group of poachers situated in the swamp. They don’t take too kindly to Murdock at first, but a key drinking contest late in the film spins things a bit differently from everyone’s perspective. The peripheral characters, played by extremely diverse performers including Curt Conway, Peter Falk (in his film debut), and Emmet Kelly, make up another example of Ray’s often seen dysfunctional families. These are the typical blend of outcasts you’ll see again and again in Ray’s films. Schulberg might have created these characters, but Ray certainly made them his own in the time he was given. Even the relationship between Plummer and Israeli actress Chana Eden as Naomi is fascinating to a degree. It needed more fleshing out in the film, but the romance still works in the signature Ray fashion of lonely souls colliding. An exchange between the two characters where she gives him her Star of David necklace stands out as being particularly heartfelt.

So what exactly is wrong with the picture? I’d really need to see it again before offering any detailed complaints, but the general problem seems to be the compromised nature of the entire thing being unavoidable to the viewer. As Ray addressed in his memo, the plotting lacks a sense of coherence and overall purpose. The basic ideas are there, they just need some more shading to be fully formed. This is an ecologically-themed movie from 1958 so a certain modernity shouldn’t be expected. However, I do think it’s fair to want better transitional scenes and more interaction with the characters like Gypsy Rose Lee’s brothel madam. Even if Ray was unfit to direct by the time he was removed, it seems likely his final edit, presumably done months later, would have been a superior work. The film’s inability to find the glue necessary to hold everything together from scene to scene makes it all come across as unpolished, even unfinished. Just when the two main characters are coalescing to form a somewhat tender and vital bond over the importance of nature, everything shifts in tone to confusion over why Cottonmouth would behave as he does and why Burl Ives is suddenly going way over the top. If you know that Ray didn’t direct those portions then it’s understandable, but that’s really an unfair chore to ask of an audience.

Wind Across the Everglades is hardly a bad movie, but Ms. Schulberg might have been right in saying it’s not really a Nick Ray film, at least not a full one. It seems unfair to Ray to sidle the editing deficiencies on his direction.