The Spirit of St. Louis November 15, 2006
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1950s, Billy Wilder , trackback
More than the noble failure it’s often called, The Spirit of St. Louis
It’s obvious and unavoidable that James Stewart is much too old to play Charles Lindbergh here. The pilot was only 25 at the time of his flight while Stewart was about 48 when the movie was filmed. Nevertheless, it’s not a fatal flaw and Stewart’s boyish persona combined with his fine acting make it far less distracting than it could have been. It also helps that Stewart’s slim frame and pilot experience lend the portrayal a certain amount of authenticity other actors probably would have lacked. His presence in nearly every scene required a strong, likeable actor to play Lindbergh and Stewart was therefore a good choice. If it’s true that James Dean was set to play the role before his death then he might have pulled it off, but almost any other actor of the time would have struggled to play the part as well as Stewart did, regardless of age.
I certainly might be biased in my opinion of The Spirit of St. Louis since it was the only pairing of my favorite actor and director, but I don’t think the film is anywhere near as plodding or long-winded as some reviews portray it. Billy Wilder’s creativity shines even in this, his most uncharacteristic work. While Wilder is often described as the quintessential cynical auteur and Stewart as the wholesome star, both men showed plenty of evidence that these labels were much too simplistic. Wilder’s work is often much sweeter than he’s given credit for (”Shut up and deal.”) and Stewart’s post-war roles were as daring as any major Hollywood star, if not more so. Their work together in The Spirit of St. Louis may not be close to either’s best, but it’s still solid entertainment.
Wilder’s insistence on the fly buzzing around Lindbergh’s plane as he travels over North America probably had its origins in the unfilmed scene between Charles Boyer and a cockroach that director Mitchell Leisen omitted from the final version of the Wilder-scripted Hold Back the Dawn. The insect passenger may look a little silly to some, but the monologues that Stewart delivers to the fly are testament to the pilot’s internal nerves leaking out into a one-sided conversation with a bug. That Lindbergh seems more at ease with a companion in the early and tense stages of his flight, an essential for the pilot to remain awake and accomplish his great feat, was surely Wilder’s goal.
For the most part, it doesn’t matter how accurate the portrayal of Lindbergh and the events leading up to his flight are. I don’t think Wilder had in mind that he was making a docudrama or historical document here. Lindbergh’s faults as a man have been much explored elsewhere and there’s certainly nothing in this movie that negatively portrays him. Even though the final cut was apparently not what Wilder had in mind initially and Lindbergh greatly restricted what was to be shown, I don’t think this hurts the film that significantly. The most interesting aspect of the movie is the extraordinary achievement Lindbergh accomplishes, not the pilot’s personal opinions. His outside determination and unblinking stoicism combined with the inner anxiety and fear is certainly an affecting human contrast and probably the only way someone in Lindbergh’s shoes could have handled the enormous pressure and uncertainties he faced.
The movie looks spectacular on the recently released DVD. I noticed only two small aberrations, one involving sharpness for a few seconds and the other being some brief damage most likely from the negative. Otherwise, it looks like a film from twenty years or more after it was made. The colors and cinematography are extraordinary. This is a film that really benefits from a large screen and I have to wonder if its critical reputation would not have been more positive had The Spirit of St. Louis been seen more often in a theatrical setting. Its widescreen composition was certainly intended to be viewed this way and not on a much smaller television screen, especially in the butchered full frame format it has often suffered from on cable television channels.
Like Howard Hawks’ Only Angels Have Wings, Wilder’s film, ultimately, is about aviation and the obstacles and dangers faced by the men who had a passion for flying. Lindbergh was an unlikely candidate to pilot the first solo Transatlantic flight, but his determination and confidence in his own abilities made him one of the most famous men in the world in 1927. The Spirit of St. Louis does a nice job of showing Lindbergh’s undying commitment to flying. That the film (as well as Lindbergh’s book) is named after the plane instead of its pilot is instructive, I think, since it’s much more about the flight than the man.
Comments»
no comments yet - be the first?