Hello, Dolly! (1969) - Effervescent, grand musical entertainment from some of the greats

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A very late 1960s and supremely stylish poster for Gene Kelly's Hello, Dolly!

Dolly Levi is an effervescent widow who can afford just about anything. For her own future she targets the wealthy merchant of Yonkers, Mr. Vandergelder.

 

Hello, Dolly! is written and produced by Ernest Lehman (The Sound of Music (1965)), based on the same-titled 1964 Broadway play by Michael Stewart (Bring Back Birdie (1981)), which in turn was based on Thornton Wilder's (The Merchant of Yonkers (1938)) play The Matchmaker (1954). It is directed by Pennsylvanian master filmmaker Gene Kelly (On the Town (1949)), whose 9th feature it was.

Barbra Streisand (The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996)) is radiant comically, musically and motion-wise (as well as erotically) as never before in the festive title role, and Walter Matthau (Charade (1963)) is formidably funny as the square Vandergelder. With tremendous guys as Vandergelder's underlings, his clerks (in particular the young Danny Lockin (Gypsy (1962)) is irresistible), as well as Joyce Ames (The Todd Killings (1971)) and Tommy Tune (The Boy Friend (1971)) as the in-love Ermengarde and Ambrose and flyingly fresh and keen dialog. Perhaps the length stretches a bit comfortably, but a musical lover can't but fall in love with this grand, beautifully photographed (by Harry Stradling Sr. (Island of Love (1963))) master class. The costumes, which has the elegant meeting the gaudy in a whirl of colors, and the dance acts, - along with a couple of the songs, - simply don't come more attractive or impressive.

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 25.3 mil. $

Box office: 33.2 mil. $ (North America alone)

= Uncertain, likely even

[Hello, Dolly! was released 16 December (USA) and runs 146 minutes. Streisand was paid 750k $ for her performance; Matthau 500k $. Shooting took place from April - August 1968 in Pennsylvania, New York and in Los Angeles, California. The release was delayed due to a contractual issue that it would not be allowed release before the Broadway show of Hello, Dolly! ended. Fox eventually paid 1-2 mil. $ to secure a release before the contract had stated. The film opened #3, behind On Her Majesty's Secret Service and Easy Rider, in North America, where it grossed 33.2 mil. $, making it one of the year's 5 highest-grossing films domestically. The film reportedly earned Fox 26 mil. $ globally, - enough that it ranks here as 'even' or 'box office success' status, but reportedly still incurring a 10 mil. $ loss for the studio, likely due to big marketing and print expenses which are not calculated into the theatrical status of a film's performance here. The film was nominated for 7 Oscars, winning 3: For Best Art Direction/Set Decoration, Sound and Musical Picture Score (Lennie Hayton (The Virginian (1963, TV-series)) and Lionel Newman (The Pleasure Seekers (1964)). It lost Best Cinematography to Conrad L. Hall for Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Costumes to Anne of the Thousand Days, Editing to Z and Picture to Midnight Cowboy.  The film was also nominated for 3 BAFTAs and 5 Golden Globes, among other honors. Kelly returned with The Cheyenne Social Club (1970). Streisand returned in On a Clear Day You Can See Forever (1970); Matthau in A New Leaf (1971); and Michael Crawford (Condorman (1981)) in The Games (1970). Hello, Dolly! is rotten at 45 % with a 6.00/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of Hello, Dolly!?

The Front Page (1974) - Wilder's hilarious Chicago newspaper comedy

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This funny poster for Billy Wilder's The Front Page highlights its nostalgic period setting and the comic delights of its two stars' interplay

Hildy Johnson is the star reporter on the Chicago Examiner in 1929, who wants to exit the business to go marry his girl in Philadelphia. But his fiery editor refuses to let him go, especially since the two suddenly have an escaped convict facing the death penalty on their hands!

The Front Page is an adaptation of the same-titled 1928 Broadway play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur by I.A.L. Diamond (Let's Make It Legal (1951)) and Austrian-Hungarian master co-writer-director Billy Wilder (Double Indemnity (1944)), whose 24th feature it was. It follows previous big-screen adaptations of the same play, The Front Page (1931) and My Girl Friday (1940).
The dialog in this thoroughly wonderful film is so sharp, witty and keen that every second of it is relished for this quality in itself, something Wilder's direction and respectful dealing with the play vouches for.
Walter Matthau (Mirage (1965)) and Jack Lemmon (Save the Tiger (1973)) suit each other as good as they ever did as a comedic dream duo here. The Front Page runs on a story that takes crazy turns, - which always remain credible within its universe, - filled with witty inventions and outrageous characters; among them is a Viennese doctor and Vincent Gardenia (The Manchu Eagle Murder Caper Mystery (1975)) who is hilarious as an incompetent sheriff. Not many may agree with me, but in my book, Wilder's The Front Page is a comedy masterpiece.

Related post:

Billy Wilder: Double Indemnity (1944) - Wilder's noir classic

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 4 mil. $
Box office: Reportedly 15 mil. $
= Big hit (3.75 times its cost)
[The Front Page premiered 18 December (USA) and runs 105 minutes. Wilder was averse to remakes and stated to his biographer that he wasn't 'particularly proud' of The Front Page. The idea to make the film appealed to him because of his early days as a newspaperman. Shooting took place in California, including San Francisco and Los Angeles, from April - June 1974. Diamond and Wilder insisted on the dialog being spoken clearly and exactly as written, without overlapping, to Lemmon's detriment. Wilder's economical shooting and editing 'in-camera' meant that a rough cut was assembled just four days after shooting had ended. The film made 7.4 mil. $ (49.3 % of the total gross) in North America. It was reportedly Wilder's first profitable film since Irma la Douce (1963), (there are four films between the two), although he regretted doing it. It was nominated for 3 Golden Globes and won 2 David di Donatello awards (Italy's Oscar). Roger Ebert interviewed Wilder in 1974 about the film, which can be read here. Wilder returned with Fedora (1978). Lemmon returned in The Prisoner of Second Avenue (1975), and Matthau in The Sunshine Boys (1975). The Front Page is fresh at 73 % with a 5.8 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of The Front Page?

Charley Varrick (1973) or, The Last of the Independents

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The tagline for the US poster for Don Siegel's Charley Varrick, together with Walter Matthau's participation, could make you think that the film is an action comedy, (which it isn't)

QUICK REVIEW:

Charley and his three cohorts rob the small Tres Cruces bank, but by a coincidence, the bank holds 750k $ in mob money on this particular day. With a dim-witted partner, a goon and the police at his heels, Varrick tries to navigate for safety.

Usually great comedic actor Walter Matthau (The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974)) works surprisingly well bereft of his crooked smile as the title antihero here; Andrew Robinson (Dirty Harry (1968)) is good as (like in master director Don Siegel's (The Verdict (1946)) Dirty Harry) a psychopath, and Joe Don Baker (The Living Daylights (1987)) is equally commanding as the mob hitman.
Varrick is a hardboiled, efficient, economically edited heist thriller adaptation of a John H. Reese (Pity Us All (1969)) novel from 1968 called The Looters by screenwriters Howard Rodman (Coogan's Bluff (1968)) and Dean Riesner (High Plains Drifter (1973)).
It is marvelously entertaining, another cool and gritty movie from Chicagoan Siegel, a master of American cinema from the 1950s through the 70s.

Related reviews:

Don Siegel: The Beguiled (1971) - Intense, erotic Civil War kammerspiel thriller
Coogan's Bluff (1968) or, Dopes and Hippies, Beat It! 

German poster for Don Siegel's Charley Varrick with Walter Matthau in his robbery disguise

A very differently styled Soviet poster for Don Siegel's Charley Varrick

The action-promising Japanese poster for the movie

The tagline The Last of the Independents was director Don Siegel's title preference for the film, which got dumped by Universal Pictures

Watch the trailer for the film here

Cost: Unknown
Box office: Unknown
= Uncertainty
[But reportedly a disappointment. Siegel blamed the poor audience reception on Matthau, who apparently talked badly of the film in public, seemingly because Siegel refused to explain the story more to the audience, as Matthau had insisted it needed. Varrick looks like a typical Siegel-Clint Eastwood movie (of which there were several), and it is likely that it would have become a home-run financially also, if Eastwood had been the protagonist instead of Matthau, for whom this was a highly untraditional vehicle for, and who wasn't normally a film-carrying star.]

What do you think of Charley Varrick?
What is your favorite Don Siegel movie and why?
(Mine is Escape From Alcatraz (1979))