What's host hilarious these days is the astonishing amount of alcohol consumed onscreen. Remember the scene where Nick is hung over to the point of paralysis, shooting Christmas ornaments of the tree with a pellet gun?
Balb, about the alcohol thing. Don't forget that it's set in the prohibition-era and concerned with the demimonde of the time. Nick is a former hardboiled dick. Alcohol, the demimonde and hardboiled dicks were all things with which the author of the original story, Dashiell Hammett, was intimately familiar. Nick and Nora are pretty much Hammett and Lillian Hellman. Alcoholics they may be, yet still uber-witty, urbane and debonair. Yes, the on-screen chemistry between Powell and Loy is incredible. (hmmmm.. now how about John Steed and Emma Peel for near identical chemistry, witty repartee etc..?)
Yeah, I could go for a Nick and Nora marathon right now.
I'm a huge fan of the hardboiled detective genre, and books from the prohibition era in general and actually have the complete Hammett.
Ever read the original story, Hammett's last novel, LuLu?
They're certainly not unique in their consumption for the time. I'm thinking of all those great Preston Sturges scenes where everyone is completely smashed, without a hint of moral reproach. Joel McCrea trying to help a hopelessly pissed Claudette Colbert out of her clothes in "Palm Beach Story", the Ale and Quail Club, the setup scenes in the bar in The Great McGinty...clearly a more bibulous age.
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We really must have inherited the same film gene.
What's host hilarious these days is the astonishing amount of alcohol consumed onscreen. Remember the scene where Nick is hung over to the point of paralysis, shooting Christmas ornaments of the tree with a pellet gun?
Whoops, that scene is actually one of the clips, except they don't show the Christmas tree.
Count me as another huuuuuuge fan.
Balb, about the alcohol thing. Don't forget that it's set in the prohibition-era and concerned with the demimonde of the time. Nick is a former hardboiled dick. Alcohol, the demimonde and hardboiled dicks were all things with which the author of the original story, Dashiell Hammett, was intimately familiar. Nick and Nora are pretty much Hammett and Lillian Hellman. Alcoholics they may be, yet still uber-witty, urbane and debonair. Yes, the on-screen chemistry between Powell and Loy is incredible. (hmmmm.. now how about John Steed and Emma Peel for near identical chemistry, witty repartee etc..?)
Yeah, I could go for a Nick and Nora marathon right now.
I'm a huge fan of the hardboiled detective genre, and books from the prohibition era in general and actually have the complete Hammett.
Ever read the original story, Hammett's last novel, LuLu?
They're certainly not unique in their consumption for the time. I'm thinking of all those great Preston Sturges scenes where everyone is completely smashed, without a hint of moral reproach. Joel McCrea trying to help a hopelessly pissed Claudette Colbert out of her clothes in "Palm Beach Story", the Ale and Quail Club, the setup scenes in the bar in The Great McGinty...clearly a more bibulous age.
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