It can be a bit
weird watching movies that were shot decades ago as well as movies in which the
characters work in your own profession. With His Girl Friday (1940) I get a helping of both cases since a lot of
this movie is set in a newspaper office close to 80 years ago. Some things
portrayed in the movie have changed, some things have stayed the same, and as
with most movies set in a certain workplace some things are down right
inaccurate. However there’s no denying this remains a hugely entertaining story
thanks to the rapid-fire dialogue, the film’s humour and the chemistry between
the two leads.
I think I first
saw His Girl Friday during a
university course on classic movies, but I recently re-watched it to refresh my
memory. Upon first viewing I was just a university student and now I have been
working as a journalist for a few years. Since then the terms “fake news” and
“alternative facts” have sadly become a part of the vernacular, and it was hard
not to think of that while watching the movie’s fake journalist sometimes stretching
the facts in order to increase their readership. However I did like seeing them
running about in the late hours of the night trying to be the first ones
to crack a big story. That’s still an admirable goal nowadays.
The movie,
directed by classic Hollywood era director Howard Hawks, focuses on two
journalists over roughly one day. Rather it focuses on editor Walter Burns
(Cary Grant), and his ex-wife Hildegard “Hildy” Johnson (Rosalind Russell) who
wants out of the newspaper business. This being the 1940s, Walter refers to
Hildy as a great newspaperman while admitting she is the best in the business
regardless of her gender. Yet clearly their marriage did not work out since they
are divorced and Hildy has come back to the newspaper offices only to announce
to Walter that she is leaving the big city for good and moving to Albany, New
York, with her new fiancé Bruce (Ralph Bellamy) the very next day.
For Walter this
cannot happen. Setting aside the fact he still loves his ex-wife, he is
convinced she is meant to be reporting on big stories in the city and not
living with some insurance salesman and his mother (Alma Kruger). To make sure
this doesn’t happen he comes up with one crazy scheme after another to keep
Hildy away from Bruce, whether that means getting Bruce arrested, or even
worse, having Bruce’s mother sort of abducted.
In the meantime
there is a really big story cooking up in the courthouse that could make a
break a journalist’s career. A bookkeeper named Earl Williams (John Qualen) is
scheduled to be executed for murder in a few hours unless a psychiatric
evaluation or a new development leads to a stay of execution from the governor. There
are political implications since the man Earl shot and killed was an African-American
police officer and there is a mayoral election coming soon. As you can imagine,
that particular plot point would have very different implications in this day
and age.
While Walter is
busy trying to salvage his love life, he is also trying to lure Hildy back to
work to cover Earl’s story hoping just a taste will convince to stay on as a
journalist. Some pretty ludicrous and wacky things ensue, from Earl escaping
prison and hiding in a journalist’s desk, to Walter and Hildy playing phone tag
with several people while trying to break the story. That last part is
especially funny given that they are using those old phones that now belong in
museums. Nowadays they would be on different cell phones while looking for trending
stories on Twitter.
One very striking
thing about the film is the rapid-fire dialogue. Every character speaks their
lines as though they’ve ingested five cups of coffee first thing in the morning.
People frequently speak over each other while trying to transmit crucial
information. You can tell the script is based on a play given how much the
story relies on dialogue and the action is set in about two key locations.
There are many
things that could have gone wrong with this movie, from bad chemistry between the
leads, to the story not being a good fit for the big screen. Yet everything here
works. Grant and Russell are perfect as an on-screen couple, the dialogue feels
natural even though it clearly isn’t and the movies goes by like a breeze while
putting a big smile on your face. As a journalism movie His Girl Friday is not All
the President’s Men in terms of accuracy, but in terms of entertainment it’s an absolute classic comedy movie.
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