Synopsis
"The Barefoot Contessa" (1954) — watch online on iFILM — is a Hollywood drama written and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, shot partly in Rome with Humphrey Bogart and Ava Gardner. Bogart plays Harry Dawes, a director past his prime who spots a shoeless dancer in a Madrid nightclub and pulls her into the studio machine. Gardner plays Maria Vargas — stunning, magnetic, and resistant to almost everything the industry wants from her.
The story comes out of order: it opens at a funeral, then loops back through accounts from men who each believed they understood Maria. None of them did. Mankiewicz hid a sharp, uncomfortable study of power and self-delusion inside what looks like a glamour picture.
Edmond O'Brien landed the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his portrait of the slippery publicist Oscar Muldoon — one of the film's most unsettling performances. Stream "The Barefoot Contessa" (1954) online on iFILM.
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