`Ayn Rand: A Sense Of Life': Mild But Fascinating Documentary

Movie review XXX "Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life," documentary written and directed by Michael Paxton. 145 minutes. Varsity, today through Thursday. No rating; includes mature subject matter.

It's hardly the most balanced of biographies, but Michael Paxton's lengthy portrait of one of the century's most hotly debated and popular political novelists rarely fails to fascinate.

It would take a weak filmmaker indeed to make a dull film out of the stranger-than-fiction tale of the Russian-born Ayn Rand's migration from the Soviet Union to the U.S., her early success as a Hollywood extra in the 1920s, her long marriage to a fellow struggling actor, her creation of the best-selling "Atlas Shrugged" and "The Fountainhead," and her direct involvement with the 1949 film version of the latter.

Yet this Oscar-nominated documentary's impact is surprisingly mild. Paxton doesn't exactly shun controversy, but he has a way of sidestepping it once it's been introduced. Rand's friendly behavior toward the House Un-American Activities Committee is mentioned, as is her lengthy affair with a much younger married man, Nathaniel Branden.

And that's it: case closed, no need for opposing views or further discussion. You'd never guess from watching this film that Rand's literary reputation is less than exalted, or that her quite public affair with Branden had ruinous consequences, or that her belief that the world is being destroyed by "an orgy of

self-sacrifice" is regarded as selfish and repugnant by many.

When the defiant Rand wins the right to keep Warner Bros. from cutting a single word from Gary Cooper's final sermon in "The Fountainhead," Paxton clearly regards this as a triumph over Hollywood compromise. Yet somehow that movie is regarded as a disappointment, even by Rand, who is not held accountable for its failure to create people instead of speech-making stick figures.

Paxton's film makes much of her attempts to produce a miniseries version of "Atlas Shrugged," but it doesn't go into the reasons why it didn't happen. The friends and followers interviewed here give no indication that there might have been some merit in the criticisms of Rand's blend of literature and "objectivist" philosophy.

As heroine-worship goes, "Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life" is nevertheless almost alarmingly watchable. Biased as it is, it can't keep the real Rand from emerging.

Whether she's being interviewed by Mike Wallace or Tom Snyder or Phil Donahue, or appearing as a wild-eyed extra in Cecil B. DeMille's "King of Kings," or just being her cantankerous self, she can't help drawing attention to whatever she does or says.

"A Sense of Life," directed by a devotee who has staged a couple of Rand's plays, turns out to be a most appropriate subtitle. Rand died 16 years ago, but in Paxton's film she still seems quite vibrant.

Next weekend, the Varsity has scheduled a couple of matinees of "The Fountainhead." It plays at 12:30 p.m. only May 2-3. The superior 1942 Italian movie of her earlier novel, "We the Living," is available on video.