{"id":9068,"date":"2010-04-28T11:26:19","date_gmt":"2010-04-28T19:26:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=9068"},"modified":"2010-04-28T12:41:56","modified_gmt":"2010-04-28T20:41:56","slug":"sunset-blvd-billy-wilder-1950-usa-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=9068","title":{"rendered":"Sunset Blvd. (Billy Wilder, 1950): USA"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy<\/a>.\u00a0 Viewed at the TCM Film Festival in Hollywood, CA.<\/p>\n

\"\"\u00a0 In\u00a0the final collaborative effort between Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett, comes\u00a0a true work of art in\u00a0Sunset Blvd<\/em><\/a>.\u00a0 A film as grandiose as the Desmond Estate, Wilder began his career in Hollywood as a writer.\u00a0 He uses this\u00a0dark satire to\u00a0continually poke fun at Hollywood, its stars, and especially the\u00a0writers.<\/p>\n

Joe Gillis (William Holden) is an out of work screenwriter “with a couple of\u00a0B pictures to his credit.”\u00a0 On the lam from having his car repossessed,\u00a0he stumbles upon a grand mansion on Sunset Boulevard that appears unkempt and\u00a0abandoned.<\/p>\n

Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) is the owner of the estate and a forgotten film star of the silver screen.\u00a0 She lives alone, save for her devoted butler Max (Erich von Stroheim), who beckons to her every whim.<\/p>\n

Norma is working on a script that contains hundreds of pages of scenes, placing her character in each scene – she is staging her own return to the big screen.<\/p>\n

Gillis is offered the job of cleaning up, and trimming down Norma’s script, in exchange for room and board.\u00a0 Since this includes caviar, champagne, and use of her elegant Isotta Fraschini, Gillis agrees,\u00a0telling himself that “sometimes it’s interesting to see just how bad, bad writing can be.”\u00a0 As\u00a0the two collaborate, the house is fixed up, the pool is filled, and the yard cleaned up – and also, Gillis is given expensive jewelry, a tailored wardrobe (including a vicuna topcoat), and conveniently moved from the guesthouse into the mansion, just next door to Norma.<\/p>\n

Spoiled and bored with his surroundings, Joe yearns to socialize with a much younger crowd.\u00a0 He seeks the companionship\u00a0of his best friend’s girl, sweet natured Betty Schaefer (Nancy Olsen), which sends Norma into a tailspin.<\/p>\n

Wit and cynicism are the driving force in the film, and Wilder keeps the momentum going throughout, from beginning to end.\u00a0 Nominated for a copious amount of awards, Sunset Blvd. won the Oscar for Best Writing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0Although Gloria Swanson was competing against Bette Davis in All About Eve, the Best Actress Oscar shockingly went\u00a0to Judy Holliday\u00a0in Born Yesterday.\u00a0 What’s up with this?\u00a0 Swanson as Desmond, imitating Chaplin is absolutely brilliant, making \u00a0Holliday’s performance as Billie Dawn\u00a0appear flat.<\/p>\n

It was wonderful to watch one of my all time favorites up on the big screen, but such an iconic film like\u00a0Sunset Blvd. really should have been screened at the classier\u00a0Grauman’s Chinese Theater.<\/p>\n

Nancy Olsen introduced the film, and was lovely, articulate, and full of fascinating anecdotes.\u00a0 The few minutes she was given to speak was simply not enough.\u00a0 Many of us in the audience would have enjoyed hearing a tad\u00a0more about Swanson, Holden, Wilder, and even Von Stroheim.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy.\u00a0 Viewed at the TCM Film Festival in Hollywood, CA. \u00a0 In\u00a0the final collaborative effort between Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett, comes\u00a0a true work of art in\u00a0Sunset Blvd.\u00a0 A film as grandiose as the Desmond Estate, Wilder began his career in Hollywood as a writer.\u00a0 He uses this\u00a0dark satire to\u00a0continually poke fun […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,143],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9068","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-films","category-tcm-film-festival-2010"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9068","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9068"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9068\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}