Best Screenplay 1942

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What were the Best Original and Adapted Screenplays of 1942?

One of Our Aircraft Is Missing (Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger)
5
21%
The Road to Morocco (Frank Butler, Don Hartman)
0
No votes
Wake Island (W.R. Burnett, Frank Butler)
1
4%
The War Against Mrs. Hadley (George Oppenheimer)
0
No votes
Woman of the Year (Michael Kanin, Ring Lardner, Jr.)
5
21%
49th Parallel AKA The Invaders (Rodney Ackland, Emneric Pressburger)
4
17%
Mrs. Miniver (George Hilton, Claudine West, Arthur Wimperis)
4
17%
The Pride of the Yankees (Herman J. Mankiewicz, Jo Swerling)
1
4%
Random Harvest (George Froeschel, Claudine West, Arthur Wimperis)
3
13%
The Talk of the Town (Sidney Buchman, Irwin Shaw)
1
4%
 
Total votes: 24

Big Magilla
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Re: Best Screenplay 1942

Post by Big Magilla »

While I don't disagree with Tee's assessment of Bosley Crowther, his was the prevailing view on To Be or Not to Be at the time.
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Re: Best Screenplay 1942

Post by Mister Tee »

If anyone wonders why Bosley Crowther was such a fuddy-duddy as to have totally missed the boat on Bonnie and Clyde, a read through those excerpts Magilla provides below should make it clear. His reaction to To Be or Not to Be, especially, marks him as totally dense, a square's square.
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Re: Best Screenplay 1942

Post by Big Magilla »

In retrospect it does seems ridiculous that Sullivan's Travels, The Palm Beach Story and To Be or Not to Be weren't nominated, but Sullivan's Travels, which was one of the National Board of Review's ten best in 1942 had been released way back in January which could account for its being overlooked by Oscar. The other two, however, were hardly beloved at the time.

This is the opening paragraph of Bosley Crowther's December, 1942 review of The Palm Beach Story:

It's a shame that Preston Sturges the writer and Preston Sturges the director of loco films didn't get a little better acquainted before they—or, collectively he—put the final and finishing touches on "The Palm Beach Story," which came to the Rivoli last night. If so, we might now be exulting over another of those delicious comedies such as this ambidextrous young gentleman has been giving us for the last couple of years. But, as it is, Mr. Sturges's "write" hand has let his somewhat more deft one down; his fiction this time is much too barren of bright surprises for a bold directorial splurge. And, as a consequence, "The Palm Beach Story" never really becomes the romp it aims to be. Except for some helter-skelter moments, it is generally slow and garrulous.

To Be or Not to Be received mixed reviews. It made contemporaneous audiences uncomfortable for two reasons - it starred a beloved actress who recently died in a horrific accident on her return from selling war bonds in a role in which audiences were expected to laugh at her, and even more unsettling, the subject matter was not considered to be anything to be laughed at. From Crowther's March review:

Perhaps there are plenty of persons who can overlook the locale, who can still laugh at Nazi generals with pop-eyes and bungle-some wits. Perhaps they can fancy Jack Benny, disguised be-hind goggles and beard, figuratively tweaking the noses of the best Gestapo sleuths. Those patrons will certainly relish the burlesque bravado of this film. And many more will enjoy the glib surprises and suspense of the plot. But it is hard to imagine how any one can take, without batting an eye, a shattering air raid upon Warsaw right after a sequence of farce or the spectacle of Mr. Benny playing a comedy scene with a Gestapo corpse. Mr. Lubitsch had an odd sense of humor—and a tangled script—when he made this film.
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Re: Best Screenplay 1942

Post by The Original BJ »

The three titles Mister Tee listed as replacements under Original -- Sullivan’s Travels, The Palm Beach Story, and To Be or Not to Be -- are vastly superior to the actual nominees. And you can’t even just write these omissions off to genre bias, not when multiple inferior comedies did manage to place (one of them even winning).

I consider myself lucky that I had already seen Wake Island for the Picture/Director thread, because I’ve been watching so many boring, generic, narratively mundane WWII movies lately the idea of stomaching any more would just be too much. This is certainly not one of the special ones.

It definitely struck me how quickly The War Against Mrs. Hadley came to theaters following the events of Pearl Harbor. (Could you have imagined a movie about 9/11 reaching audiences in mid-2002?) But the script itself is pretty ho-hum, a homefront drama without even the intermittent highs of Mrs. Miniver. And the arc for the protagonist, as she goes from feeling irritated at the war’s effect on her personal life to flag-waving patriotism, is fairly simplistic.

I think the meta references and sight gags of Road to Morocco are funny enough stuff -- even after decades of imitators, the jokes don’t feel as dated or groan-worthy as such shticky material might have. But the plot is, of course, beyond silly, and such fare is far too trivial for writing prizes.

Woman of the Year, as with most Tracy-Hepburn vehicles, gets by mainly on the amusing interplay between the performers, and the funny banter the actors are clearly relishing. And while the set-up is promising for a battle of the sexes comedy, as it goes on, it has its fair share of silly plot elements (like the adopted child), and culminates in a really retro ending -- it’s truly disappointing to watch Hepburn’s character go from successful reporter at the film’s opening to nothing-but-a-domesticated wife at the conclusion.

One of Our Aircraft is Missing takes a while to get started -- I thought the first half hour easily could have been the first five or ten minutes. But once the plot kicks into gear, sort of an inverted version of The Invaders, the film becomes thoroughly engaging. It isn’t what you’d call wildly suspenseful, but it largely manages to sustain tension throughout, and paints a portrait of Nazi-occupied Holland that’s full of compelling details I didn't find familiar. Given the thin competition, it gets my vote fairly easily.
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Re: Best Screenplay 1942

Post by Mister Tee »

As I said in the Original Story thread, a pretty dreary year to write about – with the situation exacerbated by the absence of titles that kick the crap out of anything on this roster: Sullivan’s Travels, The Palm Beach Story and To Be or Not to Be under original (the last my favorite on the year), and The Magnificent Ambersons in adaptation. That the Sturges titles are missing is puzzling because nearly everything else he wrote during this brief flourishing period DID get writer-cited, and it’s not as if this year’s field offered tougher competition. The Lubitsch & Co. omission should be just as shocking, but, in fact, a trip through the records reveal a startling (to me) fact: except for The Patriot (which none of us will ever see, and which seems far less Lubitschian) and Ninotchka, no Lubitsch film ever got a writing nomination. Not The Love Parade, not Smiling Lieutenant, not Trouble in Paradise, not The Shop Around the Corner, not even film/director-nominated Heaven Can Wait. For all the good the writers’ branch has done over the years, this seems an insupportable omission.

So, to the originals:

Wake Island actually has one line that has gone into common memory – observing a soldier praying on the beach while awaiting battle, someone says “No atheists in foxholes”. That’s the sole memorable screenwriting in the whole movie.

The War Against Mrs. Hadley is interesting simply for being a portrait of America in the very early months of the war. The film deals with a society lady’s reaction to Pearl Harbor; since the film was released in September of 1942, a mere 9 months after the attack, it has a feel of fresh, raw feelings. That said, the film isn’t very good. Spring Byington, in particular, is stuck with such thankless lines you can almost hear her thinking “They told me this would be funny”.

I see a bunch of you have voted for Woman of the Year, and I wish I could share your goodwill. This is probably the least funny of the Tracy/Hepburn match-ups, and the most drearily conformist: Hepburn’s Tess has to “learn” how much less important her work is compared to her woman’s “destiny” of motherhood. This culminates in the stupefying nightmare-in-the-kitchen sequence – which, to be fair, Ring Lardner claims he had nothing to do with – one of the worst climactic moments in a movie I’ve ever seen.

The Road to Morocco is, along with Utopia, the peak of the Road series, but still minor stuff.

So, I make it a pretty good year for Powell/Pressburger by voting for their One of Our Aircraft is Missing, which has similarities to their also-nominated The Invaders. It’s not as good, but still rates above anything else nominated here.

In adaptation (where, I echo BJ, Ambersons would have been my runaway choice):

I spoke of The Pride of the Yankees (and two other of the nominees) under Original Story, so I don’t feel I need to say much more.

I saw Mrs. Miniver at NY’s Regency Theatre back in the 70s, and when it was over, I turned to the woman I was with and said, “War bonds will go on sale in the lobby”. The movie was really over the top propaganda. That isn’t to say there aren’t things I like about it – the sequence with the wounded soldier; much of Teresa Wright’s storyline. But I can’t take the film very seriously.

I was enjoying Random Harvest as an inventive amnesia story….right up to the moment (SPOILER WARNING) when Greer Garson walked in as Colman’s secretary. I was really looking forward to seeing how the movie got them reunited, and, thanks to this scene, I was not only cheated of that moment, the plot went flat for me from then on. Many people seem to enjoy this movie way more than I.

The Talk of the Town, as I noted in Original, has some snappy dialogue and an engaging story. But that wasn’t enough to get my vote there, nor here.

So, I end up voting a clean sweep for Powell/Pressburger – picking The Invaders here for all the reasons I gave under Original Story. Not a great choice, but such a thing wasn’t available from this year’s list.
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Re: Best Screenplay 1942

Post by The Original BJ »

The Magnificent Ambersons would have been my easy choice over all of the Adapted Screenplay nominees.

I discussed The Pride of the Yankees and The Talk of the Town in the Story thread, and don't have anything new to add, as neither contends for my vote here.

I discussed The Invaders/49th Parallel as well, though that's one I actually would consider voting for, and maybe even might have, had there not been the option to give it the Story award. Of course, had the Story category not have existed, this would be considered an Original script, making the point moot -- it still seems so weird that Pressburger would get two nominations for writing the same movie just because he had a co-writer on the screenplay but not the story.

But, in the interest of spreading the wealth, and because I don't view The Invaders as so tremendous it needs multiple writing prizes, I'll look to the other two films here. I actually didn't realize, until Magilla pointed it out, that many of the same writers were involved with both movies in some way.

Mrs. Miniver has certainly dated some over the years -- seen today, its elements of wartime propaganda can come off as simplistic. And there are elements of the script (especially the flower stuff), that tilt toward the frivolous. But there are also a lot of powerful, memorable scenes as well -- Mrs. Miniver's encounter with the German, the bomb shelter, Teresa Wright's last scene, the final church sermon. At its strongest, the film presents a compendium of moments depicting life on the home front during the war, and it's hard not to be moved by the cumulative effect.

Random Harvest is melodrama through and through, but it totally puts me away. And I find that the writing from scene to scene is a big part of what makes the movie work for me. Because that plot could have come off totally ridiculous -- I know, for some it does already -- but for me what grounds it is the level of nuance and detail in the relationship between Garson and Colman's characters, both very-well shaded, with the progression of their relationship through trying circumstances a hugely touching narrative. I don't have a terribly enthusiastic preference among the nominees, but I think I'll lean toward Random Harvest of the options.
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Re: Best Screenplay 1942

Post by Big Magilla »

Original

A funny thing happened on the way to the 1942 Oscars. The Academy announced in mid-December that the January 12th of the following year cut-off date for Los Angeles openings would no longer be the rule, that starting this year December 31st would be the cut-off date. New York Film Critics winner In Which We Serve scrambled to find an L.A. theatre in which to open the film before the end of the year, but they were all booked. Noel Coward fumed. To calm him down they gave him a special Oscar for the film which he refused to show up to accept, assuming he could even manage the trip with the war on. Consequently the year's likeliest front-runner for Original Screenplay would have to wait another year to be nominated.

Woman of the Year was the best choice among the nominees then and now, although One of Our Aircraft Is Missing is a worthy runner-up. Wake Island has not aged well at all. The Road to Morocco was probably the liveliest of the Crosby-Hope-Lamour films but not really worthy of its nomination. The War Against Mrs. Hadley was a little film and an odd choice, but not an unworthy one although it's the most likely of the bunch to have benefitted from the absence of In Which We Serve.

Adapted

This was an excellent group of nominees, although it might have been a better idea to have nominated The Magnificent Ambersons or Now, Voyager instead of double-nominating 49th Parallel AKA The Invaders which would easily win Original Story.

For me it's toss-up between the two James Hilton films. He was nominated for his screenplay for Mrs. Miniver with two co-writers who then adopted his novel, Random Harvest with a third writer substituting for Hilton. I vote, as did the Academy, for the one for which he gets to accept the award - the then much loved Mrs. Miniver, which may not be the greatest movie ever made but is much better than its detractors would have you believe.
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Best Screenplay 1942

Post by Big Magilla »

The poll is open.
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