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The Lost Weekend
1945's The Lost Weekend won 4 Oscars, including Best Picture, but this allegedly realistic look at the horrors of alcoholism has not aged well at all, rich with dated elements and scenes that are almost comical now.
Don Birnham is a writer who lives in New York with his brother, Wick and is getting ready to go to the country for the weekend with Wick when his girlfriend, Helen drops by before an afternoon classic music concert to see if Don is OK for the weekend. We then learn that Don is a heavy drinker, but has been sober ten days. Sadly, it's not long before Don has talked Helen into going to the concert with Wick and found $10 that Wick left for the cleaning lady, which initiates the beginning of a four-day drinking spree for Don from which there is no rescue.
Billy Wilder was the force behind this, at times, horrifying look at a deadly, incurable disease that probably frightened 1945 audiences out of their socks with its no-holds barred portrayal of what alcoholism can do to a person. In terms of intentions, this film hits a bullseye, driving home the dangers of drinking with a somewhat sledgehammer approach, but there's so much that goes on here that just looks silly in 2019.
On the positive side, I like the way Wilder chose to begin the story in the middle of Don's addiction...he's been sober ten days and is brimming with confidence about it, but it drives home another message that sober time is no guarantee of continued sobriety. Watching Don in this movie, there is nothing in his actions that indicate the man has not been drinking except for the fact that the screenplay tells us so. He walks into bars and bartenders look terrified and don't want to serve him.
There's just way too much going on here that just doesn't fly in 2019. Stealing the women's purse at the restaurant would have landed him in jail today. So would that scene where Don just walks into a liquor store and just takes a bottle without paying for it. And trying to buy a drink by hocking his typewriter just looked stupid today, as did that almost laughable scene near the climax where he hallucinates seeing bats eat a rat in his apartment.
Wilder won two Oscars for his direction and for his screenplay with Charles Brackett and Ray Milland's sincere work as Don won him the Lead Actor Oscar. Jane Wyman was lovely as his enabling girlfriend and Howard DeSilva was terrific as a not-so-sympathetic bartender. This was probably quite an eye opener in 1945 but it's definitely getting rusty around the edges.
1945's The Lost Weekend won 4 Oscars, including Best Picture, but this allegedly realistic look at the horrors of alcoholism has not aged well at all, rich with dated elements and scenes that are almost comical now.
Don Birnham is a writer who lives in New York with his brother, Wick and is getting ready to go to the country for the weekend with Wick when his girlfriend, Helen drops by before an afternoon classic music concert to see if Don is OK for the weekend. We then learn that Don is a heavy drinker, but has been sober ten days. Sadly, it's not long before Don has talked Helen into going to the concert with Wick and found $10 that Wick left for the cleaning lady, which initiates the beginning of a four-day drinking spree for Don from which there is no rescue.
Billy Wilder was the force behind this, at times, horrifying look at a deadly, incurable disease that probably frightened 1945 audiences out of their socks with its no-holds barred portrayal of what alcoholism can do to a person. In terms of intentions, this film hits a bullseye, driving home the dangers of drinking with a somewhat sledgehammer approach, but there's so much that goes on here that just looks silly in 2019.
On the positive side, I like the way Wilder chose to begin the story in the middle of Don's addiction...he's been sober ten days and is brimming with confidence about it, but it drives home another message that sober time is no guarantee of continued sobriety. Watching Don in this movie, there is nothing in his actions that indicate the man has not been drinking except for the fact that the screenplay tells us so. He walks into bars and bartenders look terrified and don't want to serve him.
There's just way too much going on here that just doesn't fly in 2019. Stealing the women's purse at the restaurant would have landed him in jail today. So would that scene where Don just walks into a liquor store and just takes a bottle without paying for it. And trying to buy a drink by hocking his typewriter just looked stupid today, as did that almost laughable scene near the climax where he hallucinates seeing bats eat a rat in his apartment.
Wilder won two Oscars for his direction and for his screenplay with Charles Brackett and Ray Milland's sincere work as Don won him the Lead Actor Oscar. Jane Wyman was lovely as his enabling girlfriend and Howard DeSilva was terrific as a not-so-sympathetic bartender. This was probably quite an eye opener in 1945 but it's definitely getting rusty around the edges.