The most self-aware of all the Classic Hollywood directors is Preston Sturges. Making your work meta and self-conscious is one of the most modern things you can do on TV and in the movies today, despite the fact that not all of Sturges’ films have aged as well as those of some of his peers.
His film “The Palm Beach Story” is so knowing of the time period it exists in and the films that were popular in its day that although it remains as sharp and as biting as ever, the audience has changed and is less familiar with the screwball comedies Sturges is poking fun at.
From the opening credits Sturges toys with his audience. A couple has an obvious meet cute, she’s seen tied and trapped in a closet, and he’s running to the alter before a frazzled and confused looking priest before a set of intertitles announces, “And they lived happily ever after… Or did they?” Is this a movie we need to have seen? Will this summary flashback be critical to the understanding of the movie?
Of course not. But everything in these images looks pulled from some mediocre screwball comedy Hollywood had been churning out in droves. It’s Sturges’ way of winking to his audience that although this movie isn’t going to look or feel different than any other popular genre movie like it, this movie knows better. It knows Hollywood leans on the crutches of its obscenely attractive leads and stereotypical character actors needlessly inserted for comic relief. “The Palm Beach Story” will do the same, but there’s an added layer of depth and observance here that everyone seems to know. Continue reading “Rapid Response: The Palm Beach Story”
