Sunset Boulevard (1950)

SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950)

 By Ralph Santini - ****

                A sensationally remarkable tour de force, Billy Wilder’s take on the ugly of side of Hollywood “Sunset Boulevard” is among one the finest films to ever tell such tragic stories. It’s a haunting story of a mentally-deranged forgotten movie star Norma Desmond (a terrific performance by Gloria Swanson) who meets up with an incompetent screenwriter Joe Gillis (an equally distinguished portrayal by William Holden) to make some “improvements” on a hopelessly impossible screenplay after 20 years for a “return” to the cinema. She is aided by her pleasing majordomo, Max Von Mayerling (Erich Von Stroheim) and she seems to be mired in the Silent Era, which of course was the era when she was most famous.

                Joe’s life on the other hand is far more obscure than that of Norma’s. Only 2 of his scripts where produced as “B” films to his own credit and he is threatened by two repo men who are ordered to take his car. That’s why he must find a hideout until he reaches Norma Desmond’s grotesque mansion at Sunset Boulevard. When Gillis sees Ms. Desmond he mentions something about once being big in silent pictures. She delivers one of the most brilliant lines ever spoken by telling him “I AM big. It’s the pictures that got small”.  

                Things however don’t go well for Joe as his car is eventually repossessed for good, invited to a New Year’s Eve party with no other guests which really makes Joe uncomfortable hanging around only with Norma after dancing with her. He tells Norma that he is all wrong for her and it makes Norma hysterical by even slapping him. Joe is not very pleased and leaves Norma’s mansion for a good while and hitchhikes his way to a more happy New Year’s Eve party with a lot more guests including an old friend Artie Green (Jack Webb) and his fiancée Betty Schaeffer (Nancy Olson) a script-girl at Paramount Pictures who at the beginning of the film rejected Joe’s screenplay calling “flat and trite”.

                Although Joe is close to being happy leaving Norma’s wretched mansion he makes a phone call to Max by asking him to pack up his things but the butler ignores him because it turns out that Norma has cut her wrists. This of course, somewhat, shocks Joe leading him to stay even more at Norma’s home until she is called by Paramount, not on behalf of Cecil B. Demille, as demanded by Ms. Desmond, but by an obscure production executive which makes her extremely mad because she’s been writing her screenplay for a very long time. Later Norma, Max and Joe visit the old studio in a darkly hilarious scene where a young guard does not recognize Norma Desmond and it makes both Norma and Max furious until an older guard does let them in and Norma says yet another comically memorable line where she tells the old guard to teach the younger one some manners by saying “without me there wouldn’t be ANY Paramount Studios”.

                Soon after, Norma wants to see Cecil B. Demille (playing himself in the movie) in person which causes the director, with a dubious thought of Norma’s screenplay, to stop the shooting of his new historical epic for Paramount. We later find in possibly one of the most beautifully moving scenes ever filmed, where Norma cries in Demille’s presence about missing her old job at Paramount in the silent days and Demille somewhat shows some wonderful empathy towards her. Meanwhile Joe goes to Betty’s office about a good idea of writing a screenplay together, an incident that might affect something in Joe’s life later on. Suddenly we get a mighty bad feeling over the reason why the executive called Norma and tragically it’s not because of Norma’s screenplay but because of her old "Isotta Fraschini" limousine for a new Bing Crosby film. However after Norma and company leave Paramount Demille decides to tell the studio not to use the car at all given that he clearly doesn’t want to hurt Norma’s feelings over it.

                There is not much to give away for the film’s conclusion since they can spoilers but the closing of this film has arguably one of the greatest of all ending speeches ever used in Cinema. It consists of Norma saying a wonderful discussion to the public of what it’s like to come back to the film industry telling that she and Demille will make one picture after another since her days of when silence was golden. It concludes by Ms. Desmond saying “All right Mr. Demille, I’m ready for my close-up”. That it is just pure screenwriting perfection because nothing in absolute can top this closing ending. That’s why the film is not just a motion picture but a great milestone in the history of filmmaking. Swanson gave an Oscar-worthy performance as delusional has been film star, Holden is just as terrific as the loser screenwriter, and even Erich Von Stronheim delivers as the butler who not only is Norma’s butler but also was once a film director who discovered her when she was young and was once her first husband. This film featured some of the greatest cameos ever including Buster Keaton as one of Norma’s friends from the silent Era along with Hedda Hopper and H.B. Warner, the druggist from It’s A Wonderful Life. Franz Waxman’s score is refreshingly breathtaking, John F. Seitz’s photography is stunningly pristine and the shots called by the great Billy Wilder not only makes this film one of the greatest of all time but also an absolute milestone in film history.