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THE PALM BEACH STORY
Preston Sturges made only a handful of movies, but all of them are interesting and worth seeing, which cannot be said about many directors' bodies of work. I personally think The Palm Beach Story is his masterpiece, though many others would not agree. I give The Lady Eve as right up beside Palm Beach Story. But PBS is a movie one can watch multiple times even so much that you eventually know whole patches of dialogue and yet still find new things to love about it. It is screwball comedy at its very best and one of Hollywood's greatest films ever. It is sad that none of the principals--most of whom lived to be quite old--got interviewed for extras on the videos and discs that are available because it is the kind of movie that you want to know more and more about. The cast is exemplary. One of the great things about almost all movies from the so-called golden age is how much more carefully they were cast than many films of today are. Every r0le in this film has been very meticuluously attended. It was an age of great character acting anyway, but here even the tiny roles such as a maid or train porter with only one or two lines get super careful attention and pay off beautifully. Claudette Colbert was never better than here. Nor Joel McCrea and Rudy Vallee also does some of his best screen work in PBS, probably his very best. The redoubtable Mary Astor, whose range was astonishing and who remains a greatly under-rated actress, is not to be missed.The Sturges stock company--a group of great actors who appeared in virtually all of his films, are in excellent form here. Many have only minutes of screen time, but you don't forget their work, which is a great tribute to screen directing and writing as well as the acting. PBS for all its lightness, even down right silliness sometimes, is wonderfully life-affirming and gives anyone who sees it a huge pick up. It's really hard to have a bad day if this superlative film is a part of it. I'm not much for lists, but I suppose if I were picking 10 films I could save or take to a desert island, PBS would absolutely make the cut.
Preston Sturges made only a handful of movies, but all of them are interesting and worth seeing, which cannot be said about many directors' bodies of work. I personally think The Palm Beach Story is his masterpiece, though many others would not agree. I give The Lady Eve as right up beside Palm Beach Story. But PBS is a movie one can watch multiple times even so much that you eventually know whole patches of dialogue and yet still find new things to love about it. It is screwball comedy at its very best and one of Hollywood's greatest films ever. It is sad that none of the principals--most of whom lived to be quite old--got interviewed for extras on the videos and discs that are available because it is the kind of movie that you want to know more and more about. The cast is exemplary. One of the great things about almost all movies from the so-called golden age is how much more carefully they were cast than many films of today are. Every r0le in this film has been very meticuluously attended. It was an age of great character acting anyway, but here even the tiny roles such as a maid or train porter with only one or two lines get super careful attention and pay off beautifully. Claudette Colbert was never better than here. Nor Joel McCrea and Rudy Vallee also does some of his best screen work in PBS, probably his very best. The redoubtable Mary Astor, whose range was astonishing and who remains a greatly under-rated actress, is not to be missed.The Sturges stock company--a group of great actors who appeared in virtually all of his films, are in excellent form here. Many have only minutes of screen time, but you don't forget their work, which is a great tribute to screen directing and writing as well as the acting. PBS for all its lightness, even down right silliness sometimes, is wonderfully life-affirming and gives anyone who sees it a huge pick up. It's really hard to have a bad day if this superlative film is a part of it. I'm not much for lists, but I suppose if I were picking 10 films I could save or take to a desert island, PBS would absolutely make the cut.
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