Features in 'Catcher in the Rye'!
Interesting fact: This is the movie that Holden Caulfield watches and pans mercilessly at Radio City Music Hall late in the novel by J.D.Salinger.
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MovieChat Forums > Random Harvest (1943) Discussion > Features in 'Catcher in the Rye'!
don't see it if you don't want to puke all over yourself'.
This is how Salinger concludes the one and a half page review on p149-50 of the penguin 2010 uk paperback. I have not seen the film but wondered what it was as he does not mention title, director or actors. Found it with keyword search of 'amnesia' and 'london england'. Glad someone else made the connection!
Here's the full text (chapter 18), but he's using the story to make his own parody, he's not really panning Random Harvest as such.
After the Christmas thing was over, the goddam picture started. It was so putrid I couldn't take my eyes off it. It was about this English guy, Alec something, that was in the war and loses his memory in the hospital and all. He comes out of the hospital carrying a cane and limping all over the place, all over London, not knowing who the hell he is. He's really a duke, but he doesn't know it. Then he meets this nice, homey, sincere girl getting on a bus. Her goddam hat blows off and he catches it, and then they go upstairs and sit down and start talking about Charles Dickens. He's both their favorite author and all. He's carrying this copy of Oliver Twist and so's she. I could've puked.share
Anyway, they fell in love right away, on account of they're both so nuts about Charles Dickens and all, and he helps her run her publishing business. She's a publisher, the girl. Only, she's not doing so hot, because her brother's a drunkard and he spends all their dough. He's a very bitter guy, the brother, because he was a doctor in the war and now he can't operate any more because his nerves are shot, so he boozes all the time, but he's pretty witty and all. Anyway, old Alec writes a book, and this girl publishes it, and they both make a hatful of dough on it. They're all set to get married when this other girl, old Marcia, shows up. Marcia was Alec's fiancée before he lost his memory, and she recognizes him when he's in this store autographing books. She tells old Alec he's really a duke and all, but he doesn't believe her and doesn't want to go with her to visit his mother and all. His mother's blind as a bat. But the other girl, the homey one, makes him go. She's very noble and all. So he goes. But he still doesn't get his memory back, even when his great Dane jumps all over him and his mother sticks her fingers all over his face and brings him this teddy bear he used to slobber around with when he was a kid. But then, one day, some kids are playing cricket on the lawn and he gets smacked in the head with a cricket ball. Then right away he gets his goddam memory back and he goes in and kisses his mother on the forehead and all. Then he starts being a regular duke again, and he forgets all about the homey babe that has the publishing business. I'd tell you the rest of the story, but I might puke if I did. It isn't that I'd spoil it for you or anything. There isn't anything to spoil for Chrissake. Anyway, it ends up with Alec and the homey babe getting married, and the brother that's a drunkard gets his nerves back and operates on Alec's mother so she can see again, and then the drunken brother and old Marcia go for each other. It ends up with everybody at this long dinner table laughing their asses off because the great Dane comes in with a bunch of puppies. Everybody thought it was a male, I suppose, or some goddam thing. All I can say is, don't see it if you don't want to puke all over yourself.
The part that got me was, there was a lady sitting next to me that cried all through the goddam picture. The phonier it got, the more she cried. You'd have thought she did it because she was kindhearted as hell, but I was sitting right next to her, and she wasn't. She had this little kid with her that was bored as hell and had to go to the bathroom, but she wouldn't take him. She kept telling him to sit still and behave himself. She was about as kindhearted as a goddam wolf. You take somebody that cries their goddam eyes out over phony stuff in the movies, and nine times out of ten they're mean bastards at heart. I'm not kidding.
I just watched RANDOM HARVEST on TCM and then re-read the passage from Catcher in the Rye. There's very little in common between the two, just the amnesiac who gets his memory back and then marries the woman he was with during his amnesia. All the other stuff about Charles Dickens, publishing, the doctor, the blind mother, the dog, etc. either comes from different movies or was just made up for the book.
the amnesiac who gets his memory back and then marries the woman he was with during his amnesia
Spoiler The soldier marries the woman when he has amnesia then gets his memory back, forgets all about the woman and gets engaged to another woman. He doesn't get his memory back and then marries the woman.
I agree that Salinger's description is not of the film Random Harvest. The only thing that's similar is the soldier marrying someone during his amnesia phase. share
I haven't seen this but when I come across this page that was the first thing I wondered. If it was the film that Holden was referring to.
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