The Philadelphia Story was released in 1940 and has never once felt like it needed updating. George Cukor directed it with such confidence in the material that time has had nothing to work with. Eighty-five years later it plays like a film made by people who knew exactly what they were doing and had no interest in hedging.
Continue readingFiled under Steven Doyle
The street is quiet in the uneasy way only a frontier town can be. Lamps glow faintly through the windows of Shinbone’s storefronts, and the townspeople line the boardwalk in tense silence. In the center of the dirt street stands a thin young lawyer clutching a revolver he barely knows how to use. Across from him, lounging with casual cruelty, is a man who lives for moments like this. Liberty Valance flicks his whip against his boot and smiles. The lawyer’s hands tremble. Someone whispers a prayer. Then the gunfire cracks through the night, echoing down the empty street as a legend is born.
Continue readingFiled under Steven Doyle
