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Some movies are so revered that some of the praise may come off as clichéd and dry. When someone mentions “It Happened One Night,” there’s no doubt that a few chestnuts from folklore immediately come with it its prominence reputation as a romantic comedy, the fabulous Oscar awards it garnered, and its supposed contribution to America’s downfall in undershirt sales (Did anyone actually check this, by the way?). The telltale signs undoubtedly come forth but not till it’s painstakingly searched and revealed again on the big screen alongside a responsive audience do we truly reveal how amazing it really is. “It Happened One Night” stands as one of the easiest movies to appreciate and simultaneously one of the hardest to view as an artistic work.
The plot revolves around a pampered socialite Ellen Andrews (Claudette Colbert) who is financially independent and completely disobeys her tycoon father’s (Walter Connolly) orders. She marries a famous pilot, King Westley (Jameson Thomas), only to spend the rest of her time looking for him and ultimately figures out that her true love is a cynical journalist, Peter Warne (Clark Gable). At first glimpse, Ellie is puppish and headstrong, with some arrogance mixed in her playful side. However, there is something about her that is clever and tough, which makes Peter view her as both a prize and the perfect story. To secure his scoop, he agrees to assist her in reaching Westley. Ellie runs away in marriage yet again at the end of the film, but this time she is running away from Westley instead of towards him.
In my opinion, Robert Riskin adapts Samuel Hopkins Adams’s story into a masterpiece screenplay. Not only does it shine on its own but the Gable/Colbert dynamic literally feels ‘much ado’ to Beatrice and Benedick from the Shakespearean play. Now, we all know that that was also successfully replicated in ‘Gone With The Wind’ for Gable and Vivien Leigh, but I digress. The movie extends the attraction of wits into the attraction of bodies and remains still sexy as hell the Walls of Jericho scene is shot as luridly as anything in Joseph Von Sternberg’s high-end pervy extravaganzas of the same era. In my opinion Samuel Adams. Robert Riskin does a great job, but his Gable and Colbert dynamic feels like ‘Much Ado’ to Beatrice and Benedick, and we know Gable and Vivien Leigh also embellish Gable’s charm in ‘Gone With The Wind Fleet’. Now, It’s not all bad. The movie draws the line from falling in love to falling into lust and remains refreshing (a sexy blanket scene). Very different from Joseph Von Sternberg’s classically documented perverted perexaganzas of the epoch.
As Pauline Kael put it, American comedies of the 1930s presented marriage and courtship as if it were a vaudeville act and love as equated with role-playing throughout ‘It Happened One Night’. Peter and Ellie first bond as a couple while they are pretending to be in a scene where they are trying to trick the detectives who were sent by Ellie’s father. The entire campsite mock “fight”, which takes place in a camping bungalow in the midst of the lovingly depicted morning disarray, is the first instance of closeness that Peter and Ellie both enjoy. While engaging in what is otherwise vividly described as highly plausible marital discord (might we be catching them in the later stages of their marriage?), they are physically deriving euphoric satisfaction from suddenly transforming into a quarreling lower-middle-class couple.
The frame also deserves a mention for having one of the most entrancing and sexy moments of the movie. Phrases he uses to leave a clue, such as getting up, make more context with him insinuating that he is looking down on her. There is no need for him to look down on her for him to touch her breasts. There is no need to put a lot of sexy intention onto him putting clothes on, which is the case, especially considering that there’s hardly a costume change throughout the film in which he is placed alongside her like a commedia dell’arte mime, performing while remaining within his identity. “Dirty Dancing, It Happened One Night” is a movie even more so than “Dirty Dancing” in which sexual joy is expressed by lovers in the spirit of creatures’ delight as they are striking a note of balance.
In “It Happened One Night”, there is a lot of socio-political contexts to discover; meanwhile, the movie is not overly feminine. Like the controversy of ‘Taming of the Shrew’, this movie was anchored in a strong degree of chauvinism, however, Ellie gets spanked, but it’s a gesture that holds no context of foul play. What strikes me as paramount, is that Peter does not wish for Ellie to become something different, all he wants is for her to indulge with him in his pastime. Capra makes it plain that he and his daughter are both shocked by his male character’s action when he slaps Ellie for rebellion. What is noteworthy is that Capra is quick to show the immediate regret as well as the tears running down Ellie’s eyes. ”I am a little screwy myself! So is Ellie as Capra puts it. In this case, the personification that there is no reason as to why screwy would not be his is used. You can have two daughters and talk to neither of them or slap both and talk quietly with one. The latter option being more appealing. Neither option is truly sane, and yet, was offered as a solution.
Apart from that, the amount of times Peter’s machismo and bravado are mocked throughout the film’s scenes (especially during the most hilarious mock-phallic hitchhiking scene when it is more than obvious that Peter’s thumb is even less useful than some of Ellie’s appendages), ensures that the film is completely free from that pleasure with which genuine classics such as “Woman of the Year” or “The Philadelphia Story” are stained with. Some long passages of conversations about the most mundane things, including donut-dunking or the proper definition of piggybacking, seem to have a very early Seinfeldian touch to them. It is easy to imagine Peter and Ellie as manifestations of Jerry and Elaine before the time of the sexual revolution, who do not consummate their relationship until after both marriages and Peter taking on the role of a breadwinner.
Naturally, being a Frank Capra film, ‘It Happened One Night’ is nowhere near de-linked from the Great Depression period. Apart from snippets of people moving from one corner of the country to another in search of work (however subliminal, these bits are persistent), apart from the hints at perpetual hunger and class division, there is also a widespread capture of mass media and even news. No 1930s comedy can do away without a single shout for “holding the presses” and this one is no different, thanks to Charles C. Wilson’s wonderful aggravated newspaper editor (himself a fossil in our post-printing-press eyes) makes sure of that. The film is brimming with allusions to popular culture from its time: Peter dresses up as a Warner Brothers’ gangster to intimidate the rude fellow named Shapley (Roscoe Karns) and also parodies the hit song from Disney’s Silly Symphony that came out the year before, proclaiming that only “Big Bad Wolf” can frighten someone who has not seen action.
About the required blend of absurdity, my dear mush”, when a man started a telegram business with a cap of little “Peter mush” doubts whether he can decipher “mush”. While some directors prefer heavier like you can take it with you”, This movie picture has remained within my skull after seeing “cheers” Age Democracy vision grew further than “a man on the flying trapeze while others simply watching him”. The boy’s account of his mother’s struggle and anguish she had to bear while losing consciousness from lack of food is a part of the movie that appeals to the audience’s sympathy. The performance proceeds to crown and while the audience feels sympathy for the sick desperate woman, MC Dowell changes the portrayal of the mother and everyone she has shown from more than 50 of D.W. Griffith’s cameo where she appeared in from 1908 to 1913. Regardless, this nuanced component comes along with the story when Peter mocks trying to act like he is while ironically being poorer and grimmer then he usually is.
It is American in every sense, and deeply Emersonian in spirit, too. King Westley is a British-esque, aristocratic bore. His piloting skills, if you can call them that, do not help him in any way. Instead, he is merely some sort of trinket that Peter disparages. It is Gable’s character who really captures self-help bohemianism, a trademark of every American dreamer. To him, living supinely on a secluded island is just as appealing as it is deeply delusional. In the end, he only wishes for the girl, and the $39.60 that he is owed.
Finally, as much as ‘It Happened One Night’ is humorous, sexy, and wise, narratively, it is also strikingly beautiful. While Joseph Walker was leaning towards the more gritty side in his cinematography, he still managed to maintain a gauzy feel as well. Capra’s tendency for grand long-takes also showcases perfectly framed moments of comic timing that other films attempt to achieve, but fail to capture the realism in that frame. His long stretches of set pieces timing also bring forth great realism.
Even after 80 years, ‘It Happened One Night’ acts as both a mirror reflection, and an English ruler to measure not only other romantic comedies but, more importantly, all the lovers that came after Peter and Ellie and aspire for a similar coming together of bodies, minds and fates.
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