I collect classic-movie viewing experiences on the big screen like some folks collect fine wines so as I was driving home one day past the local second-run art movie theater I could not miss the marquee: Sunset Boulevard. Not having heard of a recent revival, I pulled in to see what time the show started and to confirm that yes, this was THE Sunset Boulevard. My timing was perfect. Call it serendipity, call it fate, but I was able to spend the next couple of hours in a musty, dark, practically empty movie theater munching popcorn and willingly transported back to Billy Wilder's 1950’s Hollywood. Not just any Hollywood, but to an address on Sunset Boulevard that’s larger than life and in living black and white.
“I ‘am’ big. Its the ‘pictures’ that got small.” – Norma Desmond
Back before anyone figured out that movies would become as ubiquitous as the daily newspaper, could envision videos, cable on demand or the internet, going to the movie theater was an event. For a few hours, I tried to forget that I had ever seen Sunset Boulevard on video, on the late show or even on stage.
“ The poor dope - he always wanted a pool. Well, in the end, he got himself a pool.” – Joe Gillis
Joe Gillis (William Holden), a sometimes-talented writer with a bad case of debt and writer’s block, finds himself narrating the best story of his life from face-down in a movie star’s swimming pool. From the moment the movie opens we know Joe is doomed and by the end may wonder that the whole world that is tinsel town hasn’t gone down with him.
Fleeing repo men, when a car is as much a lifeline as his next meal in the City of Angels, Gillis hides his broken-down treasure in a deserted garage on a run-down estate on Sunset Boulevard. What at first appears to be a deserted mansion, becomes his refuge when he sees the chance to make some money by ghostwriting the eccentric and reclusive resident's screenplay. Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) is a faded silent-screen star who lives in state, buried alive in a great stage-set of a mansion, waited on by her trusted butler Max Von Mayerling (Erich von Stroheim). Convinced that her fans eagerly await her comeback, and seeing Joe as her ticket back to the screen, she makes an offer that he can’t refuse.
“We didn't need dialogue. We had faces!” – Norma Desmond
Norma, a product of the star-system that built the motion picture industry only to be forgotten with the advent of sound, sees her salvation in the production of her screenplay “Salome”.
“Audiences don't know somebody sits down and writes a picture; they think the actors make it up as they go along.” – Joe Gillis
Joe, a writer who sees his wonderful words chewed up and spit out by the Hollywood machine, longs for the chance to tell a pure story. Mortified by what he has become living with Norma he finally gets a chance to write what he believes in but only on the sly by sneaking out under cover of darkness. Ironically, to be true to himself he must lie and practice deception.
The cast list of this multi-layered classic reads like a whose who of classic Hollywood, the cameo performances alone are worth the price of admission, including Cecil B. DeMille, Hedda Hopper, Buster Keaton and H.B. Warner.
Although neither William Holden nor Gloria Swanson were the filmmakers’ first (or even second) choices for the roles, both actors names have become almost synonymous with these roles. Sunset Boulevard would not be Sunset Boulevard without either of them.
What does Sunset Boulevard have to say today? Maybe, that as long as we believe in the manufactured universe of Hollywood that the substance of reality will always seem a little shoddy. That as long as we create the illusion of stardom, someone will believe it and may just go a bit mad. That without reality, there is no room for fantasy and illusion. That there is a price to pay for selling out your dreams.
All of these things sound a bit pretentious and far-reaching to me.
What did Sunset Boulevard teach me? That they sure don’t make movies like they use to.
“...All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up. -- Norma Desmond
Billy Wilder's masterpiece SUNSET BOULEVARD a corrosive black comedy that remains the most memorable assault on the emptiness and vanity of the movie ...More at Family Video
Film legend Gloria Swanson as Norma Desmond, an aging silent film queen, and William Holden as the struggling writer who is held in thrall by her madn...More at Buy.com
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