What's the AFI Project, you ask? For more information, or if you just enjoy my bemused ramblings, read here: http://www.spout.com/blogs/pippin06/archive/2008/3/1/25756.aspx
Sunset Boulevard is on the following AFI lists:
The Original Top 100 (#12)
100 Movie Quotes (#7 - Norma Desmond: "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up;" #24 - Norma Desmond: "I am big. It's the pictures that got small.")
25 Film Scores (#16)
The Revised Top 100 (#16)
Sunset Boulevard was next up on the list and, therefore, next up on my Netflix queue (I do love that service). I had never seen this movie and did not really know what to expect, past the infamous "ready for my close-up" line. I didn't realize that it was the concluding line of the movie, and I was a little perturbed by that. Nothing is given away, really, if you've never seen the movie before, but still! It says something for the film, that the last line has become one of those pop culture idioms, bandied about in all sorts of situations (have my make-up on? I'm ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille!). I still hate that it was the last line; I sort of kept waiting for it and waiting for it, and that probably distracted me a little from appreciating the film itself...but not much.
Sunset Boulevard refers to a concrete strip in Hollywood and also to this film satire written (in part) and directed by Billy Wilder. It's also a noir film in the classic sense: the film opens with a murder and the body of Joe Gillis (William Holden) floating in a Hollywood swimming pool; Gillis tells the story of how he ended up in that pool in flashback and as a ghost, of sorts. Gillis is a screenwriter, down on his luck and in piles of debt. While running from repo men after his fancy car, he pulls into what appears to be an abandoned garage of an abandoned mansion, only to discover that the house is occupied by former silent film actress (in real life and in the film!) Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) and her man-servant, Max (Erich von Stroheim, the silent film director in real life). If the house weren't spooky enough, Norma and her obsession with her one-time fame (cut short by the advent of sound in film) is enough to make your hair stand on end. Norma finds out that Joe is a screenwriter and commissions him to help her edit a script she's been working on to plot her "return" ("comeback" is such an ugly word). Joe realizes that the script is awful, but she offers to pay him handsomely, buys him fancy presents, and "keeps" him in a stately room in her house. It becomes clear that she is just a lonely woman, pining for her limelight, until Joe takes up with Betty Schaefer (Nancy Olson), a reader at Paramount looking to become a screenwriter herself, in a joint effort to rework one of his scripts. At that point, Joe's uncomfortably comfortable life becomes complicated, to say the least.
This movie has a lot of layers. On the one hand, it is a biting, merciless swipe at the Hollywood machine, made even more effective by the fact that there are cameos from several old-time Hollywood biggies, not the least of which includes the man himself, Mr. Cecil B. DeMille. Casting an actual silent film actress was a stroke of genius (her old films could be mined for versions of Swanson's younger self). On the other hand, it's a murder mystery with noir narration, playing up some Hollywood conventions of the period to over-the-top effect. On still another hand, the noir aspect comes off a bit tongue-in-cheek, with some hammy and cheesy lines from Holden's Gillis that leave the viewer perplexed as to whether they should laugh or cringe. Apparently, Wilder wrote it originally as a comedy, and it retains some comedic flavor, even thought the events of the story are anything but funny.
I liked this film, but it wasn't perfect, in my eyes. I know many people love it, and it's been ranked highly on AFI's original and revised movie lists, but there were things I couldn't get over, mostly what I see to be narrative and direction flaws. Norma, as a character, is incomplete - or contains too many superfluous bits of randomness. Gloria Swanson played her with great gusto (she practically embodies the phrase "over the top"), and that paints the picture of crazy quite nicely, but random factoids pop in and out of her story that seem to have no place in the overall arc of her character, whereas other bits of the story seem to have obvious holes. Some of it is simply to drive home her eccentricities, such as the introductory (but random) death of her beloved monkey, which is also a funny, satricial bit to set the mood not only of eccentricity but of excess. Some of it just left me wondering: she had three husbands? Where did they all go (no spoilers here, folks)? Also, she was always a bit dotty, but why did she break with reality during the concluding moments, during this particular event? Other than her zeal for fame and maybe some guilty feelings on her part for various behaviors, why then? It seems that too much was left out of the picture, even if the picture's focus was meant to include Joe too, and I don't think I was supposed to be left guessing. Unless I missed something waiting for the "close-up" line.
Joe was also an imperfect character, but at least his imperfections were consistent. I simply kept thinking that he was not very bright; none of his decisions were good until his final decision, but at least his character story had motivation: the high life of Hollywood versus the alternative of a $35/week desk job in Ohio, and at least, he strived for last minute redemption. Norma had motivation too, mostly, arising from loneliness and hunger for the adorations she used to enjoy, but I just felt like there were too many loose ends. If I was meant to be kept guessing, it worked, but I don't feel like this is one of those movies that had that intention, since the film opens with the "it" of the whodunit.
There was also some erratic pacing. The film, already a slow and methodical flashback account of a murder mystery, slows up considerably during the parts in which Joe is especially enjoying the perks of escorting the aging starlet about town. While his narrative voice waxes about the "prison" he's found himself in, the movie shows him shadowing Norma to bridge games and attending not-so-well-attended soirees. I'm sure it's meant to give the viewer a sense of irony, as well as give Joe the opportunity to encounter Betty randomly a few times, but it brings the movie to a slow crawl, and I found myself checking how much time had elapsed on the film by that point.
What I did like was the photography and lighting, rendering Norma's decrepit mansion almost like a haunted house, occupied by the ghosts of her lost career. My favorite shot was when Norma and Joe are watching one of her old silent films, and she gets into one of her impassioned fits about making her return, and she stands up, her face pointed toward the flickering light of the movie projector, a ghostly reminder, perhaps, of the star she used to be. The art direction was also wonderful: I found myself studying all of the props and trinkets lining Norma's mansion, an extension of her somewhat-mad self. The most effective prop, and I wonder just how it came into creation, was her eccentric little cigarette holder. I think that was the best material representation of her madness in the entire film.
The performances were also good. William Holden is pretty much always good, and Gloria Swanson was just so over-the-top, so theatrical. As was the score, which received a top 25 ranking. I don't remember anything particular about it, less than 12 hours later, but I do remember that it was as melodramatic as Norma Desmond herself.
Still, I'm finding it hard to say I loved the film because I really didn't, if for no other reason than this film, more than others I've seen to date, felt really dated and not in that charmingly nostalgiac way. Maybe that was the point too, but I just don't hold this film up in as high esteem as others might.
Thusly, it does not pass the test. And as to ratings, I think it's squarely an 8 for being very good but with minor flaws. It gets points for taking on Hollywood when the system held so much sway (reportedly, studio heads were not happy with it), but as entertainment, I just didn't find myself in love with it, classic last line or no.
Actually, I liked the other quote better: "I am big. It's the pictures that got small." I feel it is so much more representative of Sunset Boulevard and the main character; alas, it's not as well-known and didn't come with Gloria Swanson's huge, insane eyes and slow approach toward the camera, but it's got the essence of the satirical subtext of the film.