Sunset Boulevard (AFI Series)

On DVD (1950). 110 minutes. #16 on the AFI list. Trailer.

The next in my continuing AFI series is Sunset Boulevard, written and directed by the great Billy Wilder. As the film started, I knew nothing about it except the title, but it was soon clear this was my kind of movie. The film opens with narration as ambulances and policemen rush to a home on Sunset Boulevard to find a man floating dead in a pool. The story then flashes all the way back to the beginning of the sequence of events resulting in the floating corpse. Click below for more on one of my new favorite movies.

Joe Gillis (William Holden) is an attractive and capable screenwriter who has yet to find success in the movie business. As a result, he is behind on his rent and being chased by the bank to repossess his car. Driving around LA after eluding his
creditors, he is spotted driving on Sunset Boulevard and quickly pulls into the garage of a seemingly abandoned mansion. After closing the door he starts to look around the place, only to be welcomed in by a butler and ushered into the master suite where Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) is mourning a dead chimp. After realizing he isn't the monkey mortician, Desmond starts to kick him out until Gillis recognizes her and says "You're Norma Desmond. You used to be in silent pictures. You used to be big." Norma responds with "I am big. It's the pictures that got small." He tells her he's a screenwriter and she insists he review and rewrite her script while living in the house for the foreseable future.

Desmond's character is tragic...she is a huge star from the old days that can't come to grips with her fading beauty and lack of fans or current movie opportunities. Watching her vamp to no one as her butler and Mr. Gillis refuse to acknowledge that the emperor has no clothes is entertaining and sad at the same time. Gillis is also an interesting character...a man caught between what he wants and what he needs, with no apparent moral compass.

The screenplay is brilliant and engaging, shockingly edgy for the time in which it was written. Wilder's direction is also bravura film-making with several great shots (the pool, the final sequence during Norma's arrest, her visit to the studio). Priest, you'll love this if you haven't seen it. Doc is probably shaking his head since he's known about how great this one is for years.