There are movies with reputations that have long had me intrigued and I've really been interested in seeing them.
Today's Cinema Sunday is about one of those movies.
In 1934, director Frank Capra created a romantic comedy that has served as the template for all the romantic comedies that have come after. For nearly a century, romantic comedies have strived to replicate the cinematic alchemy of this movie.
Today, we're going to talk about It Happened One Night.
Claudette Colbert is Ellie Andrews, a spoiled heiress who has eloped with a due named King Westley, a ne'er do well pilot and fortune hunter. Alexander Andrews, Ellie's dad, wants to have the marriage annulled because he knows this dude is only it for the money.
Now Alexander is not coming off too good in the early going of this movie, acting like an insufferable tyrannical jerk. We don't meet King Westley until much later in the movie and when we do, just the sight of him tells you, yeah, he's in it for the money.
But NO! Ellie swears they love each other and dear old daddy will not get in their way.
So Ellie runs away and boards a Greyhound bus in Florida bound for New York City to reunite with her husband. The detectives dear old daddy hired to find Ellie don't catch up to her because they though she was too high falutin' and fancy to take a bus.
Apparently there is NO news of any significance going on in the world as Ellie's runaway adventures makes headlines while dear old dad keeps the heat on to find his wayward daughter.
This is where Clark Cable comes in as a fellow passenger named Peter Warne, a newspaper reporter who recently lost his job. He needs a really hot story to get back into the good graces of his ex-editor.
And there's one sitting next to him on the bus.
Peter offers Ellie a deal: if she gives him an exclusive on her story, he will help her reunite with Westley. If not, he will tell her father where she is.
Ellie agrees as she needs all the help she can get. She's not even out of Florida and her suitcase with all her money has been stolen and she's doesn't have two bits left together.
But she really finds Peter annoying and Pete is quite irked by Ellie.
So our irksome pair are facing a long journey north. This is 25 years before I-95 even existed; it's like the friggin' Oregon Trail getting from Miami to New York City by bus.
Over the course of their journey there are shenanigans mixed in with stuff 'n' junk with things going wrong running neck and neck with things going right.
Yeah, Ellie is high maintenance but danged if Peter ain't growing fond of the girl.
And boy, that Peter can be such a smart ass but Ellie feels drawn to his roguish charms.
Ah, these two crazy kinds are in love!
Luuuuuuuuvvvvvvvv!!!!
BUT....
But there misunderstandings, mishaps and some other 3rd word that begins with "mis-" and Ellie winds up with King Westley (and when we meet him, oh yeah, this bastard's in it for the money).
Anyway, there's going to be a big formal wedding for a big to-do on the society page.
Then Peter confronts Alexander Andrews looking for money. Dad thinks Peter might be angling for the $10,000 reward money daddy dearest had offered when his daughter was missing.
Nope! Peter is there for $39.60 to cover items lost and expenses incurred during his trek with Ellie.
Walking his daughter up the aisle, Alexander quietly tells Ellie if she runs out on the wedding, that'll be OK and if she does, Dad has a car all gassed up and ready to go out front.
And she's off!!
And Ellie and Peter wind up happily together and yeah, not really a spoiler! C'mon! We know how these things work.
OK, so a lot of what I described above my seem like a cliche. Look, if you sat through almost any Julia Roberts moving in the latter part of the 20th century (Pretty Woman, Runaway Bride, etc), yeah, you've seen this movie.
But a couple of things to keep in mind.
1) It Happened One Night did it first. Every romantic comedy since that movie seeks to replicate the DNA of that 1934 film. And the reason for that is....
2) It Happened One Night did it best. Even with the knowledge of all the films that have come after, It Happened One Night crackles with a fresh wit and a sparkling energy that comes from a tight script, sharp direction and an undeniable chemistry between Claudette Colbert and Clark Gable.
A lot of what makes It Happened One Night still resonate nearly a hundred years later is the film is free of the artifices imposed on American film with the advent of the Motion Picture Production Code enforced by the infamous Hays office starting in July 1934.
As an example of the relatively breezy attitude towards sexuality that would later be gutted by the Hays office, there's the famous hitchhiking scene from It Happened One Night where in Peter rhapsodizes over his ability to get a ride from anyone and it's all in how you put your thumb out. Many, many efforts of Peter's magic thumb failed to elicit a single offer of a ride.
Then Ellie steps out to the side of the road and....
And I'll be damned if they don't get a ride.
The film won all five of the Academy Awards for which it was nominated at the 7th Academy Awards for 1934:
- Best Picture
- Best Director for Frank Capra
- Best Actor for Clark Gable
- Best Actress for Claudette Colbert
- Best Adaptation for screenwriter Robert Riskin
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