WORLD TOUR Day 21 - New York, NY
BEFORE: Another legal film, but I think this is the last one. I didn't include "Inherit the Wind", because I'm fairly sure I've seen it before (maybe I'll watch it over the holiday break, just as a refresher) and I didn't include "Witness for the Prosecution", because I don't have a copy. Anyway, a change in venue brings me to New York City, which means I've made it all the way across the U.S. But since so many movies are set here, and because it's my adopted home, I'll be here for about a week, hopefully the movies I've picked will represent the city well, and I'll take the tour global on October 1.
Linking's pretty simple tonight, Jimmy Stewart to Katherine Hepburn (last seen in "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner") via "The Philadelphia Story".
THE PLOT: Domestic and professional tensions mount when a husband and wife work as opposing lawyers in a case involving a woman who shot her husband.
AFTER: This is sort of the flip-side to last night's film, which featured a man who shot the man who'd raped his wife, and tonight a woman is on trial for shooting her husband, who'd been having an affair. But what this is really about is the cause of equal rights, treating both sexes the same in the eye of the law.
Hepburn's character points out the double standards of the day (1949), saying that if a man had an affair, he was merely "sowing his wild oats". It wasn't exactly overlooked, but neither was it treated as a scandal in the way that a woman's affair would be. A man's reputation would probably survive a public affair, but a woman's might not. The shooting victim in this film felt no need to return home to his wife each night, and seemed to prefer the company of his girlfriend, and moreover, felt no remorse in doing so.
Also like last night's film, there's no question about who committed the crime, merely questions about the state of mind of the shooter, and whether there was just cause for committing the act. While one lawyer sees an open-and-shut case, the other sees a woman who was in a blind panic, concerned not only for her marriage but also the welfare of her children.
The conflict here spills over from the courtroom into the lives of the opposing counsel, who are married to each other. I don't know, it seems like there should be some rule that prevents this - yeah, maybe they just both agree to not discuss the case while they're at home. But one or the other could have asked to bow out, they're both just too sure of their causes to do so. Perhaps they each are the best choice of lawyer for their clients, but if one of them asked to be taken off the case, at least it wouldn't have gotten so personal.
So it's a strain on their marriage, one wins the case, but at what cost? There's a third side to the love triangle as the sarcastic songwriter neighbor (so obviously gay by today's standards, but you couldn't say that sort of thing back then) seems to have an interest in Hepburn's character, and moves in when the couple's going through a rough patch. What to make of this? Well, she's also his lawyer for songwriting contracts, so perhaps he was just interested in marrying in to some free legal work, or maybe he wasn't fully aware of his nature. Maybe he was looking for a relationship that would act as a cover for his proclivities. Everyone sure seemed to be aware of who he really was, Hepburn's character never considered him a viable suitor for a moment.
It's an engaging enough farce, but the movie's poster claims "it's the hilarious answer to who wears the pants", but I'm not sure it answers anything. Treating the sexes as equal is a noble cause, but it takes time to catch on. Most people were like the secretary character, who didn't realize they had the power to change society, just by virtue of being part of society. This concept can be extended to today's equal rights issues, such as gay marriage. But already some states that granted it have repealed it, so again, it takes a generation or so to make a change stick.
NITPICK POINT: Hepburn's character calls about 30 female witnesses to prove the equality between the sexes. But no judge in his right mind would allow this, in my opinion, since this was not the central issue to the case at hand. It was in her mind, but that doesn't make it directly relevant from where the judge sits. Society itself was not on trial here.
NITPICK POINT #2: Lamb curry takes time to cook (I'm assuming...) but someone in this film slaps it together in just a few minutes. Yum, raw lamb!
Also starring Spencer Tracy (also last seen in "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner"), Judy Holliday, Tom Ewell (last seen in "The Seven Year Itch"), David Wayne (last seen in "The Front Page"), Will Wright (last seen in the original "All the King's Men") with cameos from Tommy Noonan (last seen in "A Star Is Born"), and Marvin Kaplan (later known for a lot of animation voice work, and for playing Henry the mailman on the TV show "Alice")
DISTANCE TRAVELED TODAY: 778 miles / 1,253 km (Marquette, MI to New York, NY)
DISTANCE TRAVELED SO FAR: 5,773 miles / 9,293 km
RATING: 5 out of 10 home movies
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