Matt's Big Oscar Challenge 129: Wilder Wilder West

We trickle on down the river of the Oscar hunt as we have two westerns for your delication and delight.

Kicking off with High Noon, a nominee from the 1953 ceremony but a film that did win four awards including Best Actor for Gary Cooper and Best Original Song for the completely annoying Do Not Forsake me My Darling which plays throughout the film. Cooper stars as Will Kane the sherrif of a small New Mexico territory who is to give up his job and leave the town with his new wife Grace Kelly's Amy. However just before he is to go he gets word that Frank Miller, a criminal that he convicted, is to return and has his mind set on revenge. Even though he is advised to leave the town he realises that things will only get worse if he doesn't take care of Miller. He desperately tries to drum up support in his help of taking down Miller and his three gang members but is met with resistance from everyone he asks some on personal reasons, others because they are scared and some because they think that it will make the town look bad if it became associated with a shootout. At noon, Miller gets in and a classic shootout begins in the deserted town between Miller's gang and Kane. I have to say I really like High Noon mainly because of its simplicity. The central theme with Kane going round the town is handled well with everybody finding different reasons not to help him even though most concede that Kane has helped clean up the town they just don't want to help him. The design of the town is also deftly handled each set is laid out well and this helps in the final scenes with the shootout. Cooper gives a good performance and is ably supported by Lloyd Bridges as his deputy who refuses to help out as he is jealous of Kane and thinks he still has designs on his ex girlfriend now Bridges' girl. This girl is Helen Ramirez played by Katy Jurado who sizzles in the film coming across as a strong latino woman and a lot more interesting than Grace Kelly's pacifist who has little to do for most of the film apart from hang around at the station although she does come into her own in the final scenes. As I've said I found the song completely annoying and its not perfect but as a classic western High Noon still stands up today.

Going forward one year we have Shane another fairly simplistic western seeing Alan Ladd as the titular stranger who comes to a town which is involved in a war between the homesteaders and the landowners lead by Emile Meyer's Ryker. Shane eventually moves in with Van Heflin's homesteader Joe Starrett and helps strengthen their cause while at the same time becoming a second father to Starrett's son and falling in love with his wife Marian played by Jean Arthur in her final film role. Shane incorporates several showdowns between each gangs as Ryker becomes rattled by Shane and hires ruthless gunslinger Jack Wilson played by Jack Palance. Wilson quickly takes out one of the best loved homesteaders who is able to stick to his ground. After his funeral Starrett tries to rally the homesteaders against Ryker and most agree to help him. Shane realises that the only way to help Starrett is to take down Wilson and Ryker and free the homesteaders of the threat of them losing the land once and for all. After a gun battle, witnessed by Starrett's son and his dog, Shane is wounded and goes off on his horse at the end with the audience wondering whether he is dead or not. As we are now into the 1950s colour is starting to be used more and more and that is evident in Shane which won an Oscar for its cinematography. Taking advantage of its large sweeping landscapes and exterior shots Shane is a gorgeously shot film and also is great in its themes of what it means to be a man with the juxtiposition between the classic hero Shane and the grounded family man Starrett both envy each other for different reasons and that's why each of them want to sort out Ryker. Ladd, Arthur and Hefflin all play their roles very well and Ladd in paritcular has a difficult job portraying a character with very little dialogue. None of these got an acting nomination instead Palance was nominated as the striking Wilson while Brandon De Wilde as Joey Starrett also got a nod despite being realy annoying throughout the film like most child actors in the 1950s. The biggest problem with the film for me is Meyer whose Ryker never comes off as a viable threat appearing more as a panto villain but despite this Shane is a competently directed Western which capitalises on the use of technicolour cinematography and utilises to its full extent.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 128: A Trip to Italy

After two pretty heavy classics I'm ready to have a bit of a break and a bit of light relief so next up are two films both featuring Americans living in Italy and, in the case of the first film Roman Holiday, what happens when a member of the royalty rocks up. That member of royalty is put-upon Princess Ann, played by Audrey Hepburn in her first major role and the only one that would get her the Best Actress Oscar, who while on an official visit to Rome escapes to see the city. Eventually finding herself tired out she is encountered by Gregory Peck's American journalist Joe Bradley who begrudgingly allows her to sleep on his couch. Bradley eventually discovers her idenity and smelling a scoop decides to try and trap Anne long enough so he can write a story about it to impress his editor. But during their trip around Rome, accompanied by Joe's photographer friend Irving who is secretly taking pictures of the princess, they inevitably fall for each other and share a kiss before Anne realises that she must return to her duties and leaves Joe in the cold. Joe realises that with his new found feelings for Anne he can no longer publish the story and tells his suspicious editor that he has no idea where the princess is convincing Iriving not to sell the photos they journey to the palace for a press conference where the princess discovers that they are both members of the press. During the press conference Joe and Anne both share their feelings for each other in thinly veiled messages while Irving presents Anne the pictures he took of the three of them together. The final scene seees Joe lingering in the palace eventually leaving.

It is this final scene that stuck with me most of all as I was glad that the film ended with the two going their seperate ways rather than having a happy ending. As a whole Roman Holiday was a satisfying film there were parts of it where I found myself getting a little bit bored. I thought Hepburn did very well in her first starring role and opening scenes in which she finds herself tiring of her overly-structured life were particularly endearing. Her chemistry with Peck was also one of the things that made the film work and the way she grows as a character as their relationship develops was another plus point to the film. However I just felt there was just too much dilly dallying and too many establishing shots of Rome its like William Wyler was trying to drum home the fact that it was shot entirely on location in the Roman capital. Hepburn did indeed deserve her Oscar but I'm surprised that Peck didn't get a nomination as he was just as good as her and the closing scenes really showed a vulnerability to the character that a lesser actor couldn't have mustered. I also don't understand why Eddie Albert, as Irving, was nominated for Supporting Actor when Peck didn't get a look in as Albert had such a minor role in the film that I didn't feel an Oscar nomination was justified. Roman Holiday is certainly a very light film but the romantic comedies of today can't really hold a candle to it.

I'm not sure if the next film Three Coins in the Fountain, also considered itself a romantic comedy, but one of the problems with it was that it had no definite tone. The Fountain in question is the Trevi Fountain in Rome and the three coins belong to American women working as secratries in the Italian captial played by Dorothy McGuire, Jean Peters and Maggie MacNamara. Inevitably each find love McNamara plays Maria the newest secretary out in Rome and is told by Peters' Anita that Rome is horrible place for secretaries to fall in love. But soon both find romance Maria with an Italian prince and Anita with local boy and fellow office worker Georgio however the latter's romance is in jeapordy as the boss has a strict rule about the American girls fratenising with the Italians. Finally McGuire's Frances has been in love with her boss the reclusive writer Shadwell, played by Clifton Webb, but her coin in the fountain finally works out as the two fall in love but the hinderance here is the fact that Shadwell finds out he is dying. Three Coins is the first film since I entered the 1950s that is filmed in technicolour and that it was one of its advantages. The colour cinematography, which one it an Oscar, allows the film to capture some of Rome's landmarks in beautiful sparkling colour and therefore does a better job of selling Italy than perhaps Roman Holiday does. The other thing the film is famous for is the Dean Martin song of the same name which is better remembered than the film and won it its second Oscar. However beautiful it might look and sound there was really not enough going on for me in Three Coins to keep me interested. I feel that if it had been One Coin in the Fountain then I may've been hooked but there wasn't enough time to cover all three romances in depth especially that between Anita and Giorgio which was almost a two-scene love affair. The corniest part of the whole film is the final scene in which each woman is at the fountain and is greeted by her respective love interest. I think if this film had been made today then it wouldn't have been nominated for an Oscar but back in the 1950s a sparkly new colour film made in Italy was probably seen as being revolutionary by the Academy.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 127: Faded Stars and Small Pictures

By the 1950s film-makers and screenwriters were playing around with new ways to drive the action and one way this was done was by focusing on Hollywood itself and 1951 nominee Sunset Boulevard does just that. Narrated by its lead character, William Holden's struggling screenwriter Joe Gillis, it tells the story of how he came to be living with former star of silent pictures Norma Desmond. Gillis while trying to escape from people who owes money to has a flat tyre and drives into the garage of what he believes to be a deserted mansion. It is only when he is confronted by the only member of staff, Erich Von Stroheim's Max, that he finds out that the house actually belongs to Desmond. Gillis, who owes money all over town, agrees to help Desmond edit her screenplay about Salome and bit by bit he finds himself living in the house and eventually in the room in which all of Desmond's former husbands have lived in. Although a satire the film almost becomes a horror picture with Joe feeling trapped in the house, which in itself becomes a character, and by Desmond who buys Joe expensive clothes and accesories to make him stick around. Meanwhile Joe is secretly sneaking out to Paramound Studios to work on one of his own screenplays alongside the beautiful Betty Schaefer who just happens to be engaged to one of his best friends. These nightly rendevouzes quickly turn into something more and when Desmond discovers what he's been up to she goes into a fit of hysterics. She also discovers that she is no longer wanted by any director, Cecile B De Mille pops up at one point as himself as one of Desmond's former friends and has to do something drastic for the cameras to focus on her.

Sunset Boulevard was partly succesful at the 1951 Ceremony winning three awards including a very deserved prize for Best Screenplay and Story. One thing that drives Sunset forward is its narrative provided by Gillis now looking back on all the mistakes he had made throughout the course of the film. The Art Direction of the daunting house and Franz Waxman's haunting score also picked up wins. I believe though had the film not come up against the juggernaut that was All About Eve it would've triumphed even more. It is one of only a handful of films to have someone nominated in all four acting categories and I was especially surprised to see that Swanson lost to Judy Holliday rather than one of Eve's two principal actresses. Swanson is definitely the best thing about the film her Norma Desmond sticks in the mind long after you've finished watching from her manic eyes to her raspy commanding voice everything about her strikes fear in the viewer. Holden is brilliant as the down-on-his-luck everyman who thinks he spots an opportunity to exploit Desmond before seeing that it is the other way around. Von Stroheim, also nominated, adds something more to the film as Max's true identity is revealled later in the film we find out why he is devoted to Norma in the way he is. Finally the beautiful Nancy Olson as Betty was also nominated for bringing a strong presence to a character who could've just become the token love interest. I'm so glad I rewatched this film as I'd forgotten just how good it was and just how brilliant the writing is. I've not got a problem with the fact that it lost but as long as people still remember the film and still watch it then I'll be happy with that. And I think I agree with Desmond one aspect the pictures now have gotten smaller than they were when Sunset was released.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 126: My Day in Court

So finally a new decade in the Oscar challenge and we move from the tumultous 1940s to the glorious 1950s in which the big screen came alive as technicolour became more and more frequent and the cinemas were dominated by large, colourful epics luckily Oscar still had place in its nomination slots to hnour smaller films that were well written but may've only had two or three sets to their name. And we're starting off with two such films both based in a courtroom setting.

The first of these two films is 1958 nominee Witness for the Prosecution the adaptation of Agatha Christie's novel starring Charles Laughton as the belligerent Sir Wilfred a brilliant barrister who has just returned to his chambers having suffered from health problems. It is not long before Wilfred is visited by a soliciter friend who has a new client - Leonard Vole who is accused of murdering the wealthy spinster Emily French with strong circumstancial evidence pointing towards him as the killer. The only person who can vouch for his whereabouts and act as his alibi is his German wife Christine, here played by the sultry Marlene Dietrich, but Wilfred warns that a testimony from a loving wife doesn't hold up to much. The best scenes of the film happen in the Old Bailey mainly because the set is so impressive, it had been recreated by Alexandre Trauner, and is also where the trial begins The prosecution calls several witnesses before their key witness is revealled as Christine acting as the titular Witness for the Prosecution. Anything I say from there would spoil the film and I was told specifically at the end of the film by a stern voice-over not to tell my friends anything about the film's conclusion. I will say however that I very much enjoyed Witness for the Prosecution and most of that is down to Laughton's performance a mix of drama and comedy he captures what I believe the character needed and ultimately is able to do the right thing. It is odd to see Laughton act this way after portraying a bunch of villains in the 1930s, in films such as Les Miserables and Mutiny on the Bounty, however he did display comic flare in Ruggles of Red Gap and he uses that here getting a Best Actor Nomination but ultimately losing to Alec Guinness. The other Oscar nominee here is Elsa Lanchester who plays Sir Wilfred's fussing personal nurse Miss Plimsoll with whom Wilfred clashes but by the end they have a grudging respect for what the other does while I did enjoy this performance I'm suprised Dietrich didn't get a nomination for playing her feme fatale role to great effect. Sometimes the tone doesn't feel just right, ocassionally the comedy feels misjudged especially since this is a film about an old woman who has been murdered but the great ending which I didn't see coming makes up for any shifts in tone.

Also nominated at the 1958 ceremony was a film which is still my favourite of all time that being the late Sidney Lumet's classic 12 Angry Men. If you haven't seen the film then you need to as, in the words of one of my friends, its good for you but I will indulge you with a small plot summary nonetheless. Almost all of the film takes place in a jury room in which the twelve men who make up the jury are discussing whether the boy on trial killed his father or not and if they find him guilty he will go to the chair. The boy has been raised in a slum and two witnesses atest to seeing the boy stab his father or that they heard him shout that he was going to kill him. Initially only Henry Fonda's Juror Number 8 stands up for the boy voting Not Guilty in the first round of votes so that there can be a discussion about the trial and whether all the evidence was completely accurate. Some people bring their own prejudices to the table for example one juror has a problem with people from slum backgrounds while another lets his personal issues cloud his judgment. The best thing about the film, in my opinion, is the way in which the plot unravels and the characters are given more depth as the time goes on. We only learn two of the juror's names and that only happens in the very final scene instead they are referred to simply by their juror numbers. Despite the cramped setting, filmic techniques are still employed throughout 12 Angry Men including using different shots to focus on either the whole set or one character in particular for example a close-up on Juror Number 4 who in his own words never sweats but is in fact seen persipirating during one key moment. I honestly can't find fault with this film and have seen it so many times and I'm still horrified that it didn't win Best Picture or at least Best Screenplay. The only actor nominated for his role in the film was Fonda which I think is a mistake there are plenty of strong performances most notably from Lee J Cobb as the last angry man Juror No. 3. Overall a masterpiece and that's my final word on the matter.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Ceremonies 12-21 (1940-1949)

As you know the way I have been doing this Oscar ceremony business is by watching the films by when the awards ceremonies were held rather than when the films were released so in fact the final ceremony celebrates films released in 1948 and the films released in 1949 will be reviewed as part of the 1950s selection. Anyway in this blog I will look back at all the films I have watched and give my verdict on whether or noth the right film won.

Ceremony 12: 1940
Winner: Gone with the Wind
Nominees I've Watched: Dark Victory, Goodbye Mr. Chips, Love Affair, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Of Mice and Men, Stagecoach The Wizard of Oz, Wuthering Heights
Not Available to Me: Ninotchka
Did the Right Film Win: Yes
Although I do think Gone with the Wind waffles on a bit its still an epic and rightly viewed as a classic plus the only real competition comes from The Wizard of Oz and possibly Stagecoach and Mr. Smith but in terms of story and more importantly filmic qualities Gone with the Wind wins hands down.

Ceremony 13: 1941
Winner: Rebecca
Nominees I've Watched: All This and Heaven Too, Foreign Correspondent, The Grapes of Wrath, The Great Dictator, Kitty Foyle, The Letter, The Long Voyage Home, Our Town, The Philadelphia Story
Did the Right Film Win: Yes
This was a tough one as I really enjoyed The Great Dictator and felt that it was really ahead of its time in terms of satire and pastiche but I do love a bit of Hitchcock and as Rebecca is the only Hitch film that ever won an Oscar I feel that its win is justified and it is a brilliant film anyway.

Ceremony 14: 1942
Winner: How Green Was My Valley
Nominees I've Watched: Blossoms in the Dust, Citizen Kane, Here Comes Mr. Jordan, Hold Back the Dawn, The Little Foxes, The Maltese Falcon, One Foot in Heaven Suspicion
Not Available to Me: Sergeant York
Did the Right Film Win: No
I know in the early days of the Academy there was a lot of love for John Ford but I think they'd be forced to admit that the Welsh mining drama wasn't his finest hour. I think the award rightfully should've gone to a little movie called Citizen Kane which has had much more of a lasting effect than the winner that year.

Ceremony 15: 1943
Winner: Mrs. Miniver
Nominees I've Watched: 49th Parallel, The Magnificent Ambersons, The Pied Piper, Pride of the Yankees, Random Harvest, The Talk of the Town, Wake Island
Not Available to Me: King's Row and Yankee Doodle Dandy
Did the Right Film Win: Maybe
This is another case of a film winning in a year where there isn't a clear film better than the victor however there are a lot that would match Mrs. Miniver personally I enjoyed Random Harvest more as a Greer Garson vehicle and as Welles lost the year before maybe The Ambersons should've taken it this year however there isn't one film that jumps out as an alternative winner so I'll let Miniver have it this time around.

Ceremony 16: 1944
Winner: Casablanca
Nominees I've Watched: For Whom the Bell Tolls, Heaven Can Wait, The Human Comedy, In Which We Serve, The More the Merrier, The Ox-Bow Incident, The Song of Bernadette, Watch on the Rhine
Not Available to Me: Madame Curie
Did the Right Film Win: Yes
Nothing much to say here while there are some strong contenders Casablanca still stands up today as a brilliant film.

Ceremony 17: 1945
Winner: Going my Way
Nominees I've Watched: Double Indemnity, Gaslight, Since You Went Away, Wilson
Did the Right Film Win: No
This ceremony saw the field slimmed down to five nominees which would stay that way until 2010 and while I'm aware that in the final year of the war it was nice to have a Bing Crosby film to cheer everyone up however Going my Way is such a cheesy film that just looks a bit dated as compared to the classic that is the gripping Double Indemnity or the ensemble wartime drama Since You Went Away both of which would've made ideal replcamenets for Crosby's singing priest.

Ceremony 18: 1946
Winner: The Lost Weekend
Nominees I've Watched: Anchors Aweigh, The Bells of St. Mary, Mildred Pierce, Spellbound
Did the Right Film Win: Maybe
I do feel that The Lost Weekend had a lot going for it in terms of style and message howevr cinematically speaking Hitchcock's Spellbound was better while Mildred Pierce had a more interesting story. But as Billy Wilder lost the year before I think he deserved a win and The Lost Weekend is by no means an average film it just doesn't have that quality about it that I feel a Best Picture winner should.

Ceremony 19: 1947
Winner: The Best Years of Our Lives
Nominees I've Watched: Henry V, It's a Wonderful Life, The Razor's Edge
Not Available to Me: The Yearling
Did the Right Film Win: Yes
There are probably a lot of people that are startled here that I didn't pick It's a Wonderful Life as this year's worthy winner however I feel The Best Years of Our Lives is a film that a lot of people forget about which is a shame as it is full of stunning performances and a good overall feel to it, it has that big film quality to it that a Best Picture Winner deserves.

Ceremony 20: 1948
Winner: Gentleman's Agreement
Nominees I've Watched: The Bishop's Wife, Crossfire, Great Expectations, Miracle on 34th Street
Did the Right Film Win: No
Again this is a year in which the winner just doesn't cut it for me and as a replacement surely David Lean's adaptation of Great Expectations is worthy full of elegance and cinematic brilliance this is one Lean that didn't get the love that Lawrence of Arabia or Bridge on the River Kwai did but deserves it just as much.

Ceremony 21: 1949
Winner: Hamlet
Nominees I've Watched: Johnny Belinda, The Red Shoes, The Snake Pit, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
Did the Right Film Win: No
A year in which there are two films which better deserved the award. I would call out The Red Shoes as it is one of the first films to use the techincolour concept to its advantage, as one of these films however the best film from this year has to be The Treasure of the Sierra Madre which uses a very slight story to build up into a tense psychological drama and all three leads are terrific.

So there you go the 1940s did give us some classic winners such as Casablanca, Rebecca and Gone with the Wind but we also got How Green was My Valley and Going My Way anyway now onto the less demanding 1950s a time where film-making was getting better more colour, more depth and unfortunately a lot more singing and dancing.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 125: The Bette Quartet Part Four

So we've finally made it, its the last film in the 1940s section of the Big Oscar Challenge and it ties in nicely with the end of the Bette Davis quartet however in Watch on the Rhine she is less of the star and more part of an ensemble including an Oscar winning turn from Paul Lukas as her German husband. The film, based on a succesful broadway play, sees Lukas and Davis' Kurt and Sara journey from Germany to Washington to stay with Sara's mother and brother. Kurt is a staunch anti-Nazi and had been involved in resistance work in both Germany and Spain and he, Sara and their three children had hoped to lie low but because of Sara's mother Fanny's other houseguests that wasn't the case. Also staying with Fanny were the Romanian count Tec and his young wife Marthe who is secretly in love with David. Tec consorts with Nazi Officers and plays poker with them and threatens to reveal Kurt's whereabouts and his desire to return to Germany unless he is given money. Instead of paying off Tec, David shoots him and then flees to Germany after not hearing from his for five months, Sara's eldest Son Joshua reveals his plans to return to their homeland and find his father and asks his mother to prepare his younger brother for the time where he may be called to do the same thing.

As always seems to be the case Bette Davis was at war with most of the people involved in the film from the very beginning. She didn't like the fact that Herman Shumlin, who had originally directed the play, had never directed a film before and also fell out with Lucile Watson who played her mother as they shared different political views. I was shocked that Davis agreed to take the role as it is so small, other actresses such as Irene Dunne had turned it down as they saw it as a supporting role, but she agreed so much with the politics and the staunch anti-facist message that she was prepared to take the role. She also didn't agree with the fact that she was promoted as the star of the film as the role was so small and indeed I feel that we didn't see the best of Davis in this film even though she did bring her larger than life acting style to an understated role. But it is Lukas who really stood out here and did deliver a worthy Oscar nominated performance however whether it is better than Humphrey Bogart's in Casablanca is questionable. As a film itself I found it very much a piece of two halves, the first half introduces the characters and is mainly involved with getting Sara and her family to Fanny's house there is a lot of small talk about dresses, opening other people's post and polishing silverware. However when the film really gets going is when Tec gets mainpulative and especially in the final scenes involving the blackmail and the shooting, which again was another contenious point for the critics as they thought Kurt should've been killed by the Nazis as revenge to get his commeuppance but eventually agreed that Tec deserved. Not so much a Bette Davis film as a Paul Lukas one this film, involving the Nazi movement, the war and how it affects the family, is a very strong one throughout the 1940s ouvre and is a perfect way to end the Davis selection and indeed the 1940s portion of the Big Oscar Challenge.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day One Hundred and Twenty Five: Over Your Dead Body

A few weeks ago I wrote my review of Heaven Can Wait in it I stated that the 1978 film starring Warren Beatty was a remake of a different Oscar nominated film - Here Comes Mr. Jordan which I am next to watch. In the film Robert Montgomery plays the prize fighter Joe Pendleton who crashes his plane on his way to his championship fight as he was too busy playing with his lucky saxaphone. He is transported to heaven by one of the many messengers whose job it is to transport bodies from this life to the next however when the messenger tells his boss Mr. Jordan about Pendleton's arrival it seems that he is fifty years too early. Jordan, Pendleton and the Messenger then have to find a new body for him as his remains have been cremated by his manager Max. Finally Pendelton's spirit is repackaged in the body of millionaire Farnsworth who has just been murdered by his wife and his business secretary who are conductin an affair. As Farnsworth, Joe falls for the beautiful Miss Logan and helps get her father out of jail before convincing Max that he is still Joe and helping him train 'Farnsworth' up for a prize fight. Before he can carry on his fight Jordan warns him that his time as Farnsworth is up as he gets shot again and this time killed by his wife. Eventually Joe is able to inhabit the body of his rival Murdoch who has been shot by gamblers during his title match. After winning the title Joe as Murdoch is able to tell Max about the murder and Farnsworth's wife is murdered. Jordan than eliminates any memories of Joe from Murdoch's mind but he still hires Max as his manager and goes off with Miss Logan at the end of the film.

Here Comes Mr. Jordan is an enjoyable and lightweight comedy whose main strength is its cast. Although his performance is slightly grating at times, Montgomery is fine as the man who keeps jumping from body to body trying to find his identity. However it is Claude Rains' performance as Mr. Jordan which really did it for me being both sensitive and charming as well as witty Raines is able to explore his range. Jordan never shouts but is always present when Joe needs some advice this is a good plot device which is used very well. The one thing I had a problem with is there is not enough information about Farnsworth the motivations that his wife wants to kill him apart from his money or the romance with Miss Logan to find myself caring about either of these relationships. However the film mainly is about the bromance between Joe and Max and I found myself really routing for these two to come good and in the end Max got to manage the champion in Joe as Murdoch. While it doesn't really feel like a worthy Oscar contender Here Comes Mr. Jordan is an easy watch but at the same it is a little frustrating and wraps everything up very quickly but not as neatly as it wants to but at least its less offensive than the 2001 Chris Rock remake Down to Earth, whether Beatty's remake is better will have to be seen when we get to the 1970s.