Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with the next installment of A Movie A Week.
[For those who new to the column, A Movie A Week is just that, a dedicated way for me explore vintage cinema every week. I’ll review a movie every Monday and each one will be connected to the one before it via a common thread, either an actor, director, writer, producer or some other crew member. Each film, pulled from my DVD shelf or recorded on the home DVR (I heart TCM) will be one I haven’t seen.]
Another week another hole in my movie education filled. This one was a biggie, the Best Picture Winner of 1956: AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS.
This flick is in the same category as IT’S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD… but more British. And, dare I say, a better movie.
Think of this movie as the AVATAR of its day. Much like James Cameron, producer Michael Todd made this film as a grand exorcise to showcase new technology. Todd was a key figure in the Cinerama movement (which was discussed in depth in previous AMAW How The West Was Won), but was miffed by the necessity of 3 cameras and 3 projectors to display the widescreen format.
So, he invented the Todd-AO 70mm camera, a single camera/single projector widescreen system and wanted to do a giant movie to show it off even though he had never produced a feature film before.
What bigger project to tackle than Jules Verne’s globetrotting epic AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS?
From the opening frames showmanship is on full display. The movie starts with Edward R. Murrow sitting in a library talking to the audience about Jules Verne and the first film adaptation of a Verne story: Georges Melies’ 1902 silent film A TRIP TO THE MOON. The aspect ratio is typical of TV at the time and it stays that way with Murrow’s talking head opening, through a showing of A TRIP TO THE MOON and then quickly starts to widen out when we get back to Murrow.
Even on standard def DVD the photography is impressive, but you can see the curvature of the lens quite a bit, giving some shots a fishbowl look.
So, with that knowledge we enter into the actual story, which is quite simple. A stiff, rich English gentleman makes a wager with other even stiffer, rich Englishmen that he can travel around the world in 80 days. They say it’s impossible, he says it’s quite possible and tons of money is put into a pot and the game is on.
What follows is a combination travelogue, lovingly photographing different cultures and countries, and adventure as the comical pairing of David Niven and Cantinflas set about on their trip around the world.
Now, I love David Niven. He is straight up awesome, a class act with impeccable timing and a fantastic presence. He’s great in this movie, but I don’t think this is Niven’s movie. Yes, he’s in 98% of the film, he’s the main character and the top-billed actor, but to me Cantinflas and the young ‘n hot Shirley McClaine steal the movie from him.
CANTINFLAS RIDES AN OSTRICH! Does David Niven ride a fucking ostrich on camera? No. Case closed.
The Mexican star plays Niven’s man-servant, what was originally written as a Frenchman named Passepartout by Verne. I can’t imagine this movie without him. Cantinflas brings so much humor and the perfect amount of crazy to balance out Niven’s straight man.
Due to the length of the movie (3 hours) there’s a unique pacing. Instead of the filmmakers just showing iconic architecture of each continent we get to stop and soak in different cultures. For instance, when Niven and Cantinflas’ hot air balloon falls in Spain we don’t just get the bullfight scene. No sir, we also take in some local dancing, festivity and ladies.
That sounds like it could get boring over the course of a movie, but I found it very compelling. I liked that we don’t just get an establishing shot of a new location and found the ability to soak it in almost feels like a personal vacation. I feel it helps bring the audience along on the trip around the world, pulling us in from our couches or theater seats if you’re lucky enough to catch this on the big screen.
Niven ends up rescuing an Indian princess about to be burned alive with her now dead husband, a man she only met once when she was 8, we come to find out. That Indian princess is Shirley MacLaine… maybe not the best casting as she doesn’t look even remotely Indian, but damn is she gorgeous. She also injects another type of chemistry, a slight romance, into the group.
Also along for the ride is Robert Newton as a Scotland Yard officer who is convinced that Niven is a bank robber using this bet as a way to flaunt his escape to a country with no extradition treaty and desperately wants to arrest him; constantly trying (and failing) to delay Niven so that both he and the arrest warrant are in the same place at the same time.
He soon becomes part of the group as they leave British territory. He doesn’t have the authority to arrest Niven, but by Jesus he can sure stick with him so Niven doesn’t get away.
Michael Anderson (THE DAMBUSTERS) does a fantastic job directing, keeping a dozen plates going at once. I’m sure having Michael Todd as producer helped. From all accounts, Todd was a snake oil salesman of the highest order. He could talk anyone into anything.
Indeed, Todd coined the phrase “cameo” for this picture as a way to convince giant stars to take bit parts. He ended up casting the hell out of the picture. Pretty much everybody that’s ever been in a movie is here. Frank Sinatra plays a honky tonk piano player with no lines and there’s everybody from Marlene Dietrich to Peter Lorre in this picture.
Add on to that a final awesome Saul Bass closing title sequence and you have a movie that has lived for over five decades and will live on for many more. Victor Young’s score (for which he won a posthumous Oscar for) is booming and energetic, some of my favorite work of his, which is saying something considering the man scored THE QUIET MAN, SHANE and RIO GRANDE).
Final Thoughts: While there’s room to argue if the film deserved the Best Picture (it won over GIANT, THE KING AND I, FRIENDLY PERSUASION and THE TEN COMMANDMENTS) I feel the film lived up to its reputation as a fun adventure story. Watching something this epic, spearheaded by a man like Michael Todd who really didn’t give a shit about anything other than making a huge spectacle, is a special kind of entertaining, something we don’t often see these days. There’s a carefree nature to this film that only helps continue its legend.
Upcoming A Movie A Week Titles:
Monday, September 28th: THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY (1955)
You may have noticed that I didn’t add a new title to the line-up. The answer for that is simple… Starting October 1st I’m going to be switching gears to this year’s HMAD (Horror Movie A Day) which I started last year. That means 31 horror films, one a day from October 1st-31st. When I get to THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY I’ll publish the first week of HMAD titles. Gonna be fun… right now the gamut is run between Ingmar Bergman and Troma… it’s gonna be a blast!
Next week we jump to Alfred Hitchcock's THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY which marks the screen debut of Shirley MacLaine. See you folks then!
-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com
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