In my opinion, Howard Hawks’ HIS GIRL FRIDAY is one of the greatest screwball comedies ever made, a full speed ahead movie that’s pretty much got everything a film fan could want. A remake of the 1930 Lewis Milestone classic THE FRONT PAGE (itself an adaptation of Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur’s Broadway smash), Hawks adds a delightful twist by turning ace reporter Hildy Johnson into editor Walter Burns’ ex-wife… and casting no less than Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant in the roles!
The two stars are in top form as the bickering ex-spouses, with their rapid fire banter nothing short of verbal dynamite. Grant in particular spouts off words quicker than a rapper (where did he get all that wind!) and his facial expressions and comic squeals (reminiscent of Curly Howard!) are simply priceless! Roz is more than his match as Hildy, with one lightning-fast zinger after another. Miss…
The 44th film in Mill Creek’s Fabulous Forties box set was the classic 1940 comedy, His Girl Friday.
Earlier this week, when I mentioned that Cary Grant’s Oscar-nominated work in Penny Serenade was not the equal of his work in comedies like The Awful Truth and The Philadelphia Story, quite a few people took the time to let me know that their favorite Cary Grant film remains His Girl Friday. And I can’t blame them. Not only does His Girl Friday feature Cary Grant at his best but it also features Rosalind Russell at her best too. Not only that but it’s also one of the best films to ever be directed by the great Howard Hawks. There are a lot of career bests to be found in His Girl Friday, and that’s not even counting a supporting cast that is full of some of the greatest character actors of the 1940s.
The film itself is a remake of The Front Page, that classic story of an editor trying to keep his star reporter from leaving the newspaper in order to get married. (Along the way, they not only manage to expose municipal corruption but also help to hide and exonerate a man who has escaped from death row.) The action moves fast, the dialogue is full of quips, and the whole thing is wonderfully cynical about … well, everything. The major difference between The Front Page and His Girl Friday is that the reporter is now a woman and she’s the ex-wife of the editor. When Cary Grant’s Walter Burns attempts to convince Rosalind Russell’s Hildy Johnson to cover just one last story, he’s not only trying to hold onto his star reporter. He’s also trying to keep the woman he loves from marrying the decent but boring Bruce Baldwin.
Bruce, incidentally, is played by Ralph Bellamy. Bellamy also played Grant’s romantic rival in The Awful Truth. To a certain extent, you really do have to feel bad for Ralph. He excelled at playing well-meaning but dull characters. As played by Bellamy, you can tell that Bruce would be a good husband in the most uninspiring of ways. That’s the problem. Hildy deserves more than just a life of boring conformity and Walter understands that. Not only do Walter and Hildy save the life of escaped convict Earl Williams but, in doing so, Hildy is also saved from a life of being conventional.
As we all know, it’s fashionable right now to attack the news media. Quite frankly, modern media often makes it very easy to do so. For that matter, so do a lot of a movies about the media. To take just two of the more acclaimed examples, there’s a smugness and a self-importance to both Good Night and Good Luck and Spotlightthat becomes more and more obvious with each subsequent viewing. (Admittedly, Edward R. Murrow was prominent way before my time but, if he was anything like the pompous windbag who was played by David Strathairn, I’m surprised that television news survived.) Far too often, it seems like well-intentioned filmmakers, in their attempt to defend the media, end up making movies that only serve to remind people why the can’t stand the old media in the first place.
Those filmmakers would do well to watch and learn from a film like His Girl Friday. His Girl Friday is a cheerfully dark film that is full of cynical journalists who drink too much and have little use for the type of self-congratulation that permeates through a film like Spotlight. Ironically, you end up loving the journalists in His Girl Friday because the film never demands that you so much as even appreciate them. There are no long speeches about the importance of journalism or long laments about how non-journalists just aren’t smart enough to appreciate their local newspaper. Instead, these journalists are portrayed as hard workers and driven individuals who do a good job because deliberately doing anything else is inconceivable. They don’t have time to pat themselves on the back because they’re too busy doing their job and hopefully getting results.
If you want to see a film that will truly make you appreciate journalism and understand why freedom of the press is important, watch this unpretentious comedy from Howard Hawks.
As part of my efforts to watch every film ever nominated for best picture, I recently watched 1931’s The Front Page (which lost to Cimarron, the first western to ever win best picture).
The Front Page, which is based on a broadway play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, is the story of Chicago newspaper editor Walter Burns (Adolphe Menjou) and his favorite reporter, Hildy Johnson (Pat O’Brien). Hildy is planning on retiring from the newspaper business so he can get married and take a job in advertising. Walter is determined to keep his star reporter. Walter’s attempts to keep Hildy from quitting are played out against a larger background of civil corruption, cynical reporters, and an escaped death row inmate who ends up hiding out at the newspaper.
It’s odd to watch a film like The Front Page today. It’s not just the fact that the movie is technically primitive but that the film is such a product of its time and a lot has changed since 1931. This is one of those old films where African-Americans are continually referred to as being “colored” and the modern-day audience cringes in discomfort and tries to figure out the correct way to react. As a reviewer, I guess I’m supposed to explain how you should react but I really can’t say. Personally, I look at a film like this as a reflection of its time and the casual, unthinking racism that was a part of the culture back then. Then again, I’m not the one being called “a pickaninny.” This is also another one of those old films where women are presented as distractions and the only work that’s worth doing is man’s work. Oddly enough, the sexism didn’t surprise me as much as the racism. Then again, sexism is still socially acceptable while our modern, patriarchal society now insists that people, at the very least, pretend not to be racist.
Still, as dated as many of the film’s attitudes may be, the movie’s cynicism and it’s portrayal of journalists as essentially being a bunch of biased, blood-sucking leeches does give the film a slightly more contemporary feel than most films from the 30s. As Hildy and Walter, Pat O’Brien and Adolphe Menjou are both well cast and the rest of the film’s characters are played by a strong collection of character actors. A surprisingly large amount of the cynical one-liners still work and, once you get used to the film’s pre-CGI style of filmmaking, it occasionally show some genuine visual flair.
Personally, I think that The Front Page makes a lot more sense once you acknowledge the unstated fact that Walter and Hildy are former lovers. Hollywood realized the same thing because The Front Page was later remade as His Girl Friday with Rosalind Russell taking over the Hildy Johnson role.
Through the Shattered Lens 