118 Sullivan's Travels

[Gregory]

I guess we just have different interpretations. To me, the film says throughout (not just at the end) that people don't need political sermons they need escapism and belly laughs, and it maintains this dichotomy throughout. That dichotomy was part of the generic structure of the Hollywood system at the time, and if there are any lines in Sullivan's Travels that challenge it I'm not remembering them.
I don't know what Sturges would have thought of Italian neorealism, if he even saw any of it, but my guess would be that he would have grouped it in with dreary "deep-dish" films rather than with joyful entertainment. But then I suspect that Sturges' actual view of art was far more complex than that presented in Sullivan's Travels, so he may have insisted that it was neither of those.

Well, I'm approaching that bit of dialogue to be addressing Sullivan's actions, or his internal decisions, rather than the ultimate plight of those in need.

The lines we've quoted, "Did you know [laughter is] all some people have" and "it's better than nothing," seem very clearly in the category of general observation rather than a stricly personal one. It's a prescriptive, other-regarding moral. After all, Sullivan's lesson isn't just an expression of Sturges' personal approach to filmmaking, it was an attempt to influence his fellow filmmakers, of whom Sullivan was an aggregate. He's telling them: you're not going to do any good that way, so just make something the people will enjoy. Sturges explained this clearly, and when the film flopped he said that perhaps his message should have been in the form of a pamphlet distributed throughout the studios rather than in the form of a film. He was being too hard on himself, but still this statement gets across that Sullivan's message was something he was proclaiming to everyone.

[Andre Jurieu]

Yeah, I guess I see Sturges attempting to add some value and credibility to the notion of comedy, rather than attempting to denounce and degrade drama. Sullivan's lines at the end seem humble and somewhat personal, in that he is saying that, despite his best intentions, the ability to make people laugh is what he does well, and though it isn't all that much, at least it's of some value to the people who don't have much laughter in their lives and can thus appreciate laughter when it arrives. It isn't the same as financial and social support (which I believe is implied to be of greater value through the use of the "isn't much" phrase), but it isn't as worthless as he initially thought it to be. Thus, it's better that he contribute laughter to the world than create and deliver something that, due to his lack of skill, would turn out to be of lesser value (ie. a contrived, excessive, issue drama rather than a sincere, subtle social drama).

If it is an instruction to his fellow filmmakers, then I think it's a statement that they aren't achieving what they intended, or that they aren't doing it well, rather than a statement that they shouldn't do it at all.

Perhaps he feels these types of messages shouldn't be delivered through insincere films from Hollywood studios that have fiscal motives, but rather explored by those with more of a personal stake within these matters that are able to deliver the message without being disingenuous. I doubt he's saying that these messages shouldn't be delivered at all. I assume his issue is with the authenticity of delivery, not the actual message. I think this view sort of mirrors the general consensus among critics today when it comes to Hollywood message movies delivered around Oscar season.

[swo17]

Reissue coming April 14

[EddieLarkin]

I wonder if the "new" transfers for these Sturges films are being created by Criterion, or Universal themselves? Because if it's the former, it would likely make the anticipated Arrow box set quickly redundant in the PQ department, as they would surely only have access to Universal's older masters, which I would not expect to hold up in comparison. It would be interesting to know who is credited for the transfer in the Palm Beach Story fold-out (hopefully Universal, as I'd much rather wait for Arrow's set, assuming they still have plans!).

[Drucker]

I thought it was mentioned on the board that sales for the Arrow were less than anticipated which is a bummer and puts the box set in doubt.

That said, I there are or soon will be hd transfers of all these films, why couldn't Arrow release a limited edition of the box set? All their ltd edition stuff seems to sell well.

[EddieLarkin]

I imagine there are HD transfers available from Universal for all of their Sturges films (how else could Arrow tease a potential Blu-ray box set of the films if there wasn't?), but my point is if Arrow used them the box set might be quickly superseded by Criterion's own brand new 4K and 2K transfers of the films (again, assuming it is Criterion doing them).

[Minkin]

Oddly, Criterion dropped the "2k restoration" bit from their website and decided to go with the same Universal print that Arrow used for their bluray.

Svet at Blu-ray.com gives his review

He gives the nod to the Criterion edition:

My actual [Video] score is 3.75/5, as it appears that some additional cleanup work has been done.

That said, the Arrow transfer / print got rather high marks everywhere but Blu-ray.com (Chris gave it a 9/10 here - and he is usually one of the toughest judges of AV quality of any reviewer) - so perhaps Criterion thought this was about as good as it was going to be (although it sounds like Criterion did their own work on Palm Beach Story, so who knows).

I never noticed that the reissue adds a special feature over the old DVD:

Ants in Your Plants of 1941 - Video Essay with David Cairns and Bill Forsyth

[tenia]

I was slightly disappointed by the visual presentation of Sullivan's Travels on the Arrow release, and would certainly never have rated it 9/10 (I was myself quite surprised by Chris' marks because indeed, he's quite tough and fair in his grades, maybe because his scale of marks is not split between Transformers 4 and Shoah).

But clearly, both Arrow and Criterion used the same "dated" source (in opposition of a brand new master). It's certainly not bad, but there's plenty of room for improvement.

[cdnchris]

Ah, now you guys make me want to go back and take another look. I haven't looked at it since and was probably going to revisit it when the Criterion came out. I remember some blemishes that weren't too big a deal so I wasn't overly concerned by that, and I thought the transfer itself looked impressive and fairly filmic, though maybe I was feeling overly generous.