7/10
Iconic Play.
14 March 2014
Warning: Spoilers
Viewing it now is like looking at a cinematic coelacanth, a thing long extinct, now coming to the surface unexpectedly in semi-fossilized form. It's easy to see why there have been so many versions of the play by Hecht and MacArthur. It's risqué, cynical, fast paced, and it sweeps you up in the characters and the story.

This one was directed by Lewis Milestone. It's not the funniest or the fastest version but it has a few gags the others lack, and Milestone does some inexplicable tricks with the camera. If the half dozen men in the press room are laughing, Milestone gives us a second-long shot of the first. The camera tilts upward to the ceiling, then down to the second reporter for another moment, then the ceiling, then the third reporter. Cuts would have been quicker but I suppose, given the nature of the early sound equipment, when the cameras were enclosed in dirigibles the size of the Hindenburg, it must have seemed like a novel idea. In another shot, a reporter is speaking (or yelling) into the phone in medium shot. From the side of the screen, somebody's crossed legs intrude, with one shod foot bouncing up and down.

I don't want to get too technical here because, after all, I don't know what I'm talking about, but I'm assuming a certain familiarity with the plot. There are a few unobtrusive gags that I haven't noticed in the other versions. The scene shows the press room interior. A door opens in the far right and a reporter dashes in, handing his coat to Pat O'Brien, who immediately tosses it on the floor behind him. It's not as marked as it is in the Marx Brothers' movie, but for that reason it's just as funny. Another example. O'Brien needs to pass through a crowded knot of reporters. Instead of roughly pushing his way through, he turns sideways and does a little ballet leap a la seconde, a waiter steering a tray full of plates through a crowded room. It just takes a moment, but then everything in the movie just takes a moment.

Well, one more. Dr. Egglehoffer is brought in to examine the prisoner and in the course of "reenacting dzah crime", the prisoner shoots Egglehoffer in the belly. The doctor wavers back and forth a bit before pointing an accusing finger at his patient and shouting, "Dementia PRAECOX!", then falls forward like a mannequin.

There's a lot of social commentary lurking behind the gags. These were pre politically correct days. It's not a polemic though. Only enough material to twit your conscience about self-righteousness, corruption, racism, and violence.

As editor Walter Burns, we see less of Adolph Menjou than I'd expected. The focal point is Pat O'Brien's Hildebrand Johnson. The press room is full of the usual colorful characters. Of the three versions I'm familiar with, I'd put Howard Hawks' first and Billy Wilder's second. However, I'd give this version a bonus point because it was the first.
4 out of 4 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

Recently Viewed