Exclusive“Sunset Boulevard” (1950): First Hollywood Melodrama

With one look, I can break your heart. With one look, I can make your sad heart sing. With one look, you'll know all you need to know. With one smile, I'm the girl next door. All the love's with my soul. I can play any role. No words can tell the stories my eyes tell. Watch me when I'm through. You can't write that down. It's there in black and white. When I, you'll hear what I say. With one look, I put words to shame. Just one look sets the screen aflame. Silent music starts to play. One tear in my eye makes the whole world cry. Yes, with one look, they'll forgive the past. They'll rejoice I've returned at last. To my people in the dark. Still out there in the dark. Hello? Hello, Miss Schaefer. Miss Betty Schaefer. This is Betty Schaefer. You must forgive me for calling so late. But I feel it is my duty. It's about Mr. Gillis. You do know Mr. Gillis? Yes. Why? Exactly how much do you know about him? Do you know where he lives? Do you know how he lives? Do you know what he lives on? Who is this? What do you want? What business is it of yours anyway? Miss Schaefer, I'm trying to do you a favor. I'm trying to save you a great deal of misery. Of course, you may be too young to even suspect that there are men of his sort. I don't know what he's told you, but he doesn't live with relatives. Nor with friends, in the usual sense of the word. What do you mean? Ask him. I have. Ask him again. Or better yet, come out and see for yourself. The address is 10086 Sunset Boulevard. I'm Rebecca Brannan. And I'm Tiffany Brannan. Welcome to Real Thoughts on Cinema. People just love hearing the behind-the-scenes stories of movies, and especially about scandals or drama. And I want to say especially from the classic era, I think because the movies were so wholesome then. Yeah, they want to think something dark was behind it all. And even now, with some of the biggest films, like Lord of the Rings, I think people like watching the behind-the-scenes featurettes as much as the movies. That's true. But in spite of that, there aren't that many people who are interested There aren't that many classic films that are about the movie-making process, or the drama of the stars behind the screen. But the few that there are are all really fabulous, and they tend to be really famous, too. That's true. Our pick for a movie all about Hollywood is Sunset Boulevard from 1950. Because it stands alone in the genre. Although there are a few films of this type, even amongst those few, this one is unique. There's just nothing else like it. Sunset Boulevard is one of those titles that is very recognizable. Definitely. Not just because it's a famous street. But this movie tends to make top ten classic film lists. Yet, the sheer brilliance of the film itself, when you really delve into it, exceeds even its reputation. Very true. The story is very classic. We always like to say this, but it's sort of like an opera. Yes, it is. With sort of a love triangle of a simple young writer, Joe Gillis, in Hollywood, who's down on his luck, he's about ready to give up and go back home to Ohio, because he's about to lose his car, he can't make the payments, he can't get work anywhere. And then when he's running away from the finance men, he gets a flat tire, so he just pulls into this garage. Whose garage should it be but this former silent movie queen, Norma Desmond. And upon entering her house, he encounters her. And she offers him a very tempting job, editing a script she's written for a film of Salomé, which she's planning to return to the screen in this film, directed by Cecil B. DeMille. He accepts the job, not realizing that it's going to become a lot more complicated than just a writing assignment. And soon, by New Year's Eve, she reveals she's fallen in love with him. He tries to leave and go to his friend Artie's house, but there he encounters Artie's fiancée, Betty, who he met the same day that he met Norma. And she reminds him of himself when he first got to Hollywood. She wants to be a writer. She wants to help him turn this story he wrote a couple of years ago into a script. But when he learns that Norma tried to kill herself because he left, he goes back and basically becomes her companion and just keeps getting drawn further and further into this sort of whirlpool that is Norma Desmond. And at the core of this very story is the amazing cast which is in it. Gloria Swanson plays Norma Desmond and then you could say she is Norma Desmond. She herself was a silent movie star who really wasn't able to make the transition to talking pictures. And although she didn't become a crazy recluse, she understood what that struggle was and so a lot of her real life was incorporated into that character. And William Holden, an Academy Award winning actor, played the role of Joe Gillis, but at this point his career was kind of not at its highest point. He was quite successful before World War II but then after being in the service he struggled to gain his footing again and playing this role really re-established him as a star. And he would end up being nominated for Best Actor for this performance which he always felt he should have won for this one. And of course it's directed by the brilliant Billy Wilder who co-wrote the story with Charles Brackett who also produced it with him and it was produced by Paramount Pictures which is really, it's a character. Yes, Paramount Pictures was her studio and they talk about it a lot in the movie. The third corner of the triangle is Nancy Olsen, not that well known of an actress, but before I had ever seen Sunset Boulevard we knew her as the mother in a Disney movie from the 70s, right? Snowball Express? She's also a character in Pollyanna so she made some Disney movies later and she made movies around this time but Billy Wilder wanted a less well known actress, sort of an up and comer so she wouldn't be recognised. She's not supposed to be an actress, she's a script girl. So she's very simplistic as a contrast to Norma. The whole film is a study in contrasts. It's a debatable point who's the third member of the triangle. You could say the third member of the triangle is Max who is Max von Meierling, Norma's butler and you find out later in the film her ex-husband. He was this famous director who gave her her start and then after she left him he still wanted to be with her so now he just works as her servant and he's really the person who enables her to keep living this life of delusion and interestingly he was played by Erich von Stroheim who was a famous director. It's very much like the character he played. He did direct one movie of hers, is that right? Yes, Queen Kelly, which was one of her last silent films and that was the only time they worked together. He was known for being a tyrant and she found some of his directorial choices very distasteful and she ended up walking off the set and she got him fired because she was kind of a producer on the film but as a result the movie was never released and in Sunset Boulevard when Joe's staying there and the only entertainment they have is watching her movies her silent films on the screen they pull down by the fireplace and the movie that's being played is clips from Queen Kelly. The first time that was ever shown. That's so amazing. It's just brilliant and just perfect that that movie existed. I think what makes this movie so potent and why it lasts so much is because it is so real. It is. There are quite a few cameos. Cecil B. DeMille, the famous director, is in the movie playing himself and some other old silent film actors. Buster Keaton. Everything about it is just very real. It was made about the industry at the time when it was made so it's all very organic. Yes, and by casting that character it's interesting to look at how this movie was developed because Billy Wilder wasn't an American, he was from Austria but he came to Hollywood in the 30s and then in the 40s he was fascinated with the movie industry before he ever came to America and he would drive around Hollywood and see how many silent film stars still lived in these huge mansions from the 20s but they weren't stars anymore. Many of them weren't even in the business and he wondered, what would it be like, the life of these people? And there was a novel which was about a similar idea which he was very interested in adapting but he couldn't get the rights to it. So this is sort of his take on it. So he just stole it? Sorry. But the actress they cast determined a lot of what happened in it and they only had a few pages written at a time. The script was not finished when they started shooting in 1949. One of the few times that actually worked. Most times that happened, it was not a good idea. That's not really true, that happens in a lot of movies. If it's closely related and they didn't have too many people involved with Billy Wilder's idea, he worked with Charles Brackett, they were a very successful writing team. So they wrote it and they considered many different actors and actress combinations. Interestingly, one of the first people they considered was Mae West. Why Mae West? She was never a silent film star. Yeah, that is odd. She was like this bombshell of the early 30s. But she was offended because she didn't consider herself a husband. That's a difficulty. And they considered several other... Was Mary Pickford considered for the part? Yes, she was. Actually, Billy Wilder went to Pickfair, her estate, but it was a little too close to home for her. Because she actually was a recluse living in her big estate, right? Yes, she found it distasteful. And the idea that she would be with such a younger man. So she was offended. That's a difficulty. You can't typecast too much with a character like this, especially. Because it's too on the nose. He considered Pola Negri, who actually was one of the inspirations. Because she was this Polish actress who was quite a bombshell and was supposedly romantically linked to Rudolph Valentino, who's mentioned in the movie. But she didn't make the transition to sound because of her strong accent. And Billy Wilder talked to her on the phone and he couldn't understand a word she said. So he decided that wasn't a good idea. So they ended up actually getting the suggestion for Gloria Swanson from director George Cukor. Because after the transition to sound, she worked in radio and she worked in New York on the stage. But she'd made one movie. Do you know why she didn't make the transition to sound? Because I find her voice to be really great. The way she talks is wonderful. You know, it's just luck. A lot of people, she was a great silent film actress. I don't know. This is like 30 years later, 20 years later. She may have learned to speak on radio and stage that she couldn't before. When they first were doing it, she didn't know how to do that acting. She wanted the part very badly. But then they wanted her to do a screen test and she was kind of offended by that. Because she said, I've made 20 movies for Paramount and now they want me to audition. And so that later was incorporated into it. Because as she's driving in, she says, tell the guard at the gate, without me there wouldn't be any Paramount Studios. And she's offended that an assistant calls her a Nazi salutemail. That's interesting. But it ended up that she wasn't quite as crazy as Norma. So she asked George Cukor, am I being unreasonable? And he said, this will be the part of your lifetime. If they want you to do 20 screen tests, do 20 screen tests and get that part. So she did. And it was the part of a lifetime for her. And she said she kind of became that character while doing it. And she was living with her daughter at the time. She was a little method. Yeah, she was living with her daughter at the time in this house that she was in the part. And afterwards, when she came home and they'd finished filming, she said, now there are only two of us living here. Before, there were three of us. Because Norma Desmond was living in this house too. But interestingly, some of the things like with Cecil B. DeMille, he was the director who really gave her her start. And at one point, he calls her young fella. And that was his nickname for Gloria Swanson. So it's just so much of her own personality. So they just wrote a lot of her into the part. Yes. That's another, again, very real, putting real people into their story. And then again, William Holden was just perfect in the part. They were considering some other people like Montgomery Clift. But he's just so good in the role. Yeah. He embodies that. Another thing that could make this a familiar name to young people is Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical, Sunset Boulevard. Yes. Which has been very successful and very famous. Because it debuted in the 90s. And I don't think there is a musical out there that is as closely adapted from a film as that one. But the development process of that musical is so fascinating. I just really recently found out about all this. So Gloria Swanson wanted to turn it into a musical. She was collaborating with a writer to try and turn it into a musical. And there were a couple of working titles. One of them was just Boulevard. And it seemed like it was in development. But then I believe Paramount decided that they contacted her and they said it would be detrimental for it to be presented in any medium other than a film, a stage musical, so call it off. And the writer she was working with ended up integrating some elements of it into another musical that he wrote. And then Stephen Sondheim wanted to adapt it into a musical. He was working on it. He actually had written an opening number, I believe. And then he happened to run into Billy Wilder at a party. And he told him about his idea to do this. And Billy Wilder said, it can't be a musical. It would have to be an opera. After all, it's about a dethroned queen. It would be a great opera. It would be a wonderful opera, yes. That's interesting because you know about Weber's musical. That's really fascinating. So then eventually it got around to, I think actually Stephen Sondheim was offered to write songs for a movie musical adaptation of it about a former comedian instead of a silent film star. But he recalled what Billy Wilder had said to him and said no. So then finally it rolled around to Angeloid Weber got the idea. And he started working on it. And then he ended up reworking some of those numbers for another musical. But then after he had written Aspects of Love, I believe, he just decided he needed to do this project. So it went through a pretty long developmental process. He performed it at his Sydmonton Festival. And when it finally opened in London, Billy Wilder and his wife and Nancy Olsen were all at the opening. That's great. And Billy Wilder said the best thing they did was to leave the script alone. And it's so true. There's so much of his script in that musical. A lot of it is just his words. I wonder if he liked it because he mentioned that it should be an opera. And I certainly don't think Angeloid Weber's music is opera. But it's almost as sung through as opera. It's just like nonstop singing in all his musicals. And he's kind of known for being a thief and for being warmed over Giacomo Puccini, the great opera composer. But never more than in this. It's just full of opera melodies. Almost more than Phantom of the Opera. And since now it's being revived, I think that name is on the headlines again. And it's being performed again. And so it's a great time for people to find out the original source material because I consider that Angeloid Weber's masterpiece because he used that brilliant script and he stole a lot of brilliant Puccini music. But if you like it at all, or you saw the musical back in the 90s, or you want to see it now, you've got to see the movie because it is just so much better. And apparently, I mean, they've been saying since I think like either 2002 or 2004 that they were going to make the musical into a movie. And it just kept getting pushed back. Because Paramount technically still owns the rights. And Angeloid Weber was trying to communicate with Paramount and get them to say yes. And then finally, it's supposedly like it's happening. Glenn Close, who played Norma in LA and then on Broadway. So even though Patti LuPone technically originated... Yeah, it actually was on Broadway. I wasn't sure if it was because there isn't a Broadway cast recording. But Patti LuPone originated the part. Glenn Close has kind of made it her own. So she, I guess, is going to be in the movie. I don't know. But she's really pushing for it to go through. So supposedly, it's in development. But like we were saying, the reason that it was brilliant was that she was that character. She was in that time period. Max really was a silent film director. They were those characters that could never be replicated now. The closest I would say is just recently in Revival. And I was trying to research this and I couldn't find information. It was in Australia, I think. Yeah, Australia. Sarah Brightman played Norma Desmond. And I have to say that's brilliant. Speaking of dethroned queens and being like, has it been? Yeah, Sarah Brightman. And Angeloid Webber is her max. That's brilliant. She's the perfect person for that part. One of the most interesting things is the beautiful location. That house. And it's not a set. It's a real house. It wasn't on Sunset Boulevard. It was on Wilshire Boulevard. And it was called the Phantom House because it was built in the 40s by a millionaire. And then this family built the house and only lived in it for a year. And at the time that this movie was made, it was the residence of Mr. Getty's ex-wife. You know, the Getty Villa, the Getty Museum. That wealthy oil Getty. She lived in that house. He bought it for her. Okay. And I believe the deal they made was if she let them film there, they would fix up her pool. So that's what they did. And during the movie, the pool starts out all decrepit and then she fills it for Joe. They actually did that, yeah. That's really amazing. And then it was torn down in the later 50s to make way for an office building. But it's just perfect in that movie. And it's so opulent and gorgeous. And some people criticized it, but William Haynes, who was the interior decorator of the stars, said a lot of those silent film actresses had gaudy houses just like that. And in her bedroom, she has this amazing bed that looks like a boat. And that bed pops up in a lot of movies, notably the 1925 silent film with Phantom of the Opera, right? She married to a dancer and it was built in 1920. She had two of them, the boat bed and the swan bed. And after she died, she had all this really opulent furniture and it ended up belonging to a movie studio. So yeah, it's... You see that bed around a lot. So what better bed for her to have than this? It's so ornate and gorgeous. Norma doesn't do anything small. She's so over the top, but she can pull it off because she's just fabulous. Speaking of, you know, all that glamour, how she looked was extremely important. Edith Head designed the costumes, but she said it was the hardest job she ever did to capture that style. And there was a lot of thought that was put into it with Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett, Edith Head and Gloria Swanson. To make her look good, but to not make her look too good because they're still making a point that she has been the faded star, the older woman. And they say she's 50 and that was the actual age Gloria Swanson was. And you could say, should they have gone total 1920s with the hair and the fashion? Because they didn't. It's 50. I know, that's interesting. But they reasoned she's not completely behind the times. She knows what's going on. So they actually incorporated a lot of the Dior new look of the late 40s. She's a little bit behind the times. There is a lot of glamour, a lot of exoticism. It's a little gaudy. It's a little dated. And Edith Head said Gloria Swanson knows more about it than I do. So she gave her a lot of advice on what to do. And you see that in her hairstyles as well. By contrast, Nancy Olsen's character is so simple. Her clothes are very basic in her hair. Both she and Erich von Stroheim wore their own clothes for their parts. But when they were originally doing the advanced publicity, everyone was saying that she and Joe looked too close to the same age because she looked really great. She prided herself on taking care of herself. And then Billy Wilder was saying, we need to use more makeup to make you look really old. And she said, no, I think that a wealthy woman like this would take care of herself. She cares about how she looks. That's a good point. So you need to make him look younger. So then they, maybe that's why he has really short hair, I don't know. Oh, that's a thought. They tried to costume him a little differently and do things to make him seem simpler. Wilhelm has the kind of features that can read as very mature. Yeah. He's young, but he has very strong features. Yeah, he's not a kid. And I would say he doesn't look as young as Montgomery Clift, the other actor they considered. But you get the idea. She's an older woman, but she's still glamorous and fabulous. The outfit I'm wearing is a replica of the first costume that Norma wears when you first see her calling out to him. It's a jumpsuit with a pant outfit. Reminiscent of the 1950s hostess style with a leopard scarf, a leopard turban, and about 5,000 bangles on her left wrist, but really no other visible jewelry. But I'm wearing some simple gold hoops because she's always very glamorous and extravagant. And Gloria Swanson was under five feet tall. And you don't really notice it because throughout the film she wears platform shoes. So I'm wearing these black high heels that are reminiscent of a style that she wears a lot. My outfit reflects the very simple style of Betty Shaffer, Joe's other love. In their scene when they admit their love for each other, she's wearing just like this, a simple black turtleneck and a gray pencil skirt with a thin black belt, black patent leather pumps, and a little black bow in her hair. You talked about that Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett were a longtime partnership. Yes, they collaborated on some of his films. This was the movie that broke up that partnership. Yes, it was. Is that true? Because Billy Wilder wanted to be grittier about it and Charles Brackett wanted to go the more spiritual approach. He was a very refined gentleman. Notably, the sequence when Norma thinks she's going to make her return to the screen and she goes through this intense skin care and all these different treatments from this crew of beauty experts. Charles Brackett was dead set against that, right? He thought it wasn't tasteful to show what women do to themselves to look good. And because Billy Wilder stuck to it, he didn't want to work with him again. He was very upset about that. He really would hate that there's a whole song about it in the musical. But I have a feeling that he had died long, he was older, he definitely had died long before the musical was written. But that highlights that he was not the only one who thought they were treading on dangerous territory. Many people didn't think he should tackle a movie of this sort. As a matter of fact, the Paramount executives didn't even know he was making this movie. He was making it under the working title Can of Beans because a lot of people said, you're opening a can of beans making that movie. Sort of like Can of Worms? Yeah, so it was a joke that he called it that. And as a result, he sort of had carte blanche. He could do whatever he wanted because they didn't know what he was doing. How did he get away with that? Well, a lot of it wasn't filmed on a soundstage or it was filmed on the real back lot. So he didn't need a bunch of sets. And they just said, oh, okay, he can do whatever he wanted. Now, people talk about how they tried to get around the PCA by only sending a few pages at a time. No, I don't think that's why they did it. And if they did, they weren't going to fool them there. And to give a little clarification, that's the Production Code Administration or the Hays Office, as it's commonly misnomered, which enforced the Motion Picture Production Code, an important part of the studio system, which is not mentioned in this film or really any other movie because it was kind of the behind the scenes that they didn't talk about. Even today, people don't really understand it. I think it's so funny, though. There's a line, and this isn't from the movie, in the musical, where she's reminiscing about sound films and she says something about, like, there were no rules. I feel like that's a little reference, too. And in one of the script writing songs, they're talking about all the things you have to do. And they say all the goofy things that people say. That the PCA didn't really enforce, but that the studio said they did. Like, no one's a communist. No one mentions communism. No one takes a black friend to a restaurant to keep one foot on the floor. All these strange things that the PCA certainly didn't say, but they were certain ideas. And this is not an easy topic. No, this one is treading on dangerous ground from a moral standpoint because the code, of course, enforced all films had to be acceptable for all people. So this is no rating system. All movies have to be basically the equivalent of rated G, but with the kind of maturity that now we have in R-rated films. It's not easy. I think it's so interesting that in transitioning this to the stage and the musical, the main changes that they made was to make it not code compliant anymore. They debrined it. They put in all the swear words that Billy Wilder might have liked to use. I know. They're Hollywood people. That's how they talk. But you don't miss it. No, it's brilliant. I don't think anyone would say, I really missed that there wasn't swearing in this movie, watching a classic film. It actually weakens all the lines where they put it in. It's a weaker point. Or it's just coarse for no reason. But beyond just little things like that, the whole topic of any time you've got two people living together, you know, there's an implied illicit affair. Yeah. There's a problem there already. But this is, because of the kept man and the older woman, that's just very taboo. Even more so than now, it was taboo, I'd say. The kept woman is something you see more often. I feel like somehow that's a little easier to handle. This one, they just had to tread so carefully with this. As well as a couple of references to attempted suicide. That's right. That was another kind of a big no-no at the time. But it's just really, you can tell they guided... Murder, yeah. They guided it through with kid gloves. And as a result, it's just, it's so brilliant. Because, you know, a modern, either we've got the modern musicals full of profanity, or a modern G-rated film, they couldn't approach any of this stuff because they wouldn't know how to do it without being R-rated. Exactly. And I'd say, if you're at all interested in anything about the golden era of Hollywood, or classic filmmaking, this is the movie to start. Because you'll see about the story behind the story, like how they made movies. Yeah, if you're already a classic film fan, like we were when we first saw it, you'll notice all these little references. They'll just mention an actor's name in passing, or a studio head, all these little things. And it's very, it's like, oh, I know that, you get all these references. If you don't know anything about classic films, it might make you curious. You might want to go and look up what are all these interesting references that they're making. And even some of the slang from the time is kind of fascinating to hear. But anytime you're talking about Billy Wilder, he's known for being a rule breaker. He's like one of the people who's considered to have broken down the code in the later 50s. Yes. And it's such a tragedy when you see his earlier works that were made under Joseph I. Breen, who enforced the code between 1934 and 1954, when it was really done properly. Billy Wilder is so brilliant in the way that he implies things, but in a tasteful way. And it brings the themes across. To a more mature audience member, you know what's going on. To a more immature audience member, you probably, it might go over your head, and that's how it should be. And that was just so lost. When there aren't guidelines, people just kind of don't think anymore. He really became a goofball. Like, there are funny moments in basically every Billy Wilder film. Sometimes it's just a moment. Like, one of the original reviews said, there are no Billy laughs, but there are some strangled giggles. So, it's like that. There are times when you laugh in spite of yourself. Yes. I would say this one has less than pretty much any other Billy Wilder film I can think of offhand. That's true, but there are funny moments. Oh, definitely. Like when Gloria Swanson dresses up like Charlie Chaplin is doing a little... That's the funniest part. Very funny. It's a very odd moment for Norma to let her guard down that much. As well as little lines that are clever, and you'll find yourself laughing ironically. Because of the cynicism. Yeah, when she's telling him, oh, today's the day we're sending the script to Paramount. She's like, oh, I talked to my astrologer, and she read my horoscope in DeMille's. And he says, did she read the script? Yeah. And just, of course, the cinematography is brilliant. People call this a film noir, a term which annoys me greatly. People call everything film noir. Even if you do believe that, it doesn't have the modern crime aspect that a film noir would. And they say, oh, that's why they decided to film it in black and white, so it'd be a film noir. I say, no, they filmed it in black and white because it's about silent films. And it is a dark subject. It's about the past. Yeah, there's a certain... It would be way too modern in color. There's a certain kind of moodiness to it that you get from black and white. And the cinematographer sprinkled dust in front of the cameras to give it this musty, dusty look. That's so interesting. That explains a lot. I've always noticed it has this interesting kind of aura to it. Like, instead of putting something over the lens... Yeah, it was John F. Zeitz, who had worked with them before, and he was quite brilliant. Again, before there was so much technology... They had to use it. And on the one dramatic shot where her chimpanzee is going to be buried, he asked Billy Wilder for some insight. How should we film this shot? He said, oh, it's just your standard monkey funeral scene. That shows Billy Wilder's strange sense of humor. He was very much like Joe Gillis in being a writer, but also like Erich von Stroheim in being a crazy, dramatic director. You think he put a lot of himself into this film, too? I think he did. I think he put a lot of himself into every film. Speaking about the cinematography, there's one shot particularly where you see Joe in the doorway, and above the doorway there, there's this sort of framework, and Norma is on the landing of the stairs above him, and they had to line up that shot so carefully that it pans up and you see her right-framed in this little square. They probably had to have a tape marker on the floor or something because it's just lined up really perfectly. And on New Year's Eve, you see him and the mirror reflecting her in the bed. Mirror shots are so great. It's very interesting. And it's interesting you mentioned Charles Brackett being a man of taste and how Joseph Breen helped it because a few years later, when Joseph Breen retired in 1954 at the Academy Awards, his Honorary Academy Award for his dignified enforcement of the code was presented by Charles Brackett. Oh. So you could see how they were similar. Both men of taste who wanted films to be done tastefully, which is why Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder couldn't work together much longer because Billy Wilder did not want things to be tasteful. He made tasteful movies in spite of himself. Right. And like so many classic films, this one is easy to find. You can rent or buy it for a good price on Amazon Prime Video, YouTube, any other streaming platform. Find it on DVD and just take a couple of hours to journey back to the 1950s and then through that lens looking back at the 1920s and the transition to sound. And if you want to talk about acting, the acting levels in this film are off the charts. I mean, everyone is so superb in this movie. I can see why William Holden and his wife both felt he should have won the Oscar for this because even though Joe is the narrator, the narration is largely kind of cold. It's just like stating the facts, so you don't get a lot of insight into him emotionally. He plays it very bland, but he does so much just with his facial expressions. Like watch him watching Norma. It's without any dialogue. It's really something to witness. Next week, we will be journeying into the jungles of Africa for a dramatic adventure film which inspired a famous theme park ride. Join us next week as we talk about that. Thank you for watching. Goodbye.