Winterset

Winterset is a highly unusual film. It’s part proto-noir, part Greek tragedy, part arthouse film before there even was such a thing. It’s bleak and poetic. It’s a tale of revenge and a tale of redemption. Strangest of all, most of the film takes place in what must be some kind of dreamworld where all the key characters connected to a 16-year-old state execution somehow stumble upon each other in a single city square on a dark, rainy night with a hurdy-gurdy playing in the background. In his film debut, a young Burgess Meredith stars as Mio Romagna, a troubled young man avenging the long-ago, wrongful execution of his father Bartolomio (John Carradine) based on newly emerged theories about the case. When a storm arrives, Mio finds himself, out of pure coincidence, taking shelter in the ramshackle home of the reluctant witness in his father’s case, Garth Esdras (Paul Guilfoyle). They’re soon joined by more coincidental characters: the judge who sent Mio’s father to the electric chair (Edward Ellis), the gangster who was actually responsible for the killing (Eduardo Ciannelli), and Garth’s sister Miriamne (Margo), who falls in love with Mio at first sight. The foggy cobblestones and never-ending rain steep the film in an atmosphere of urgent fate, while director Santell relieves the dreariness from time to time, such as when Esdras allows a homeless man to sleep inside to keep warm under the exposed pipes.