TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

Softwing Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

PlatinumRead Just so...so bad

Fairaher The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

poe-48833 Newspaper editor Bogart, approached by a young graduate fresh out of journalism school, sizes the kid up. "So, ya wanna be a reporter, huh...?" He seems more than a bit bemused. "It ain't the world's OLDEST profession," he tells the kid: "But it is the BEST." Unfortunately, Bogart's paper is about to go under. "A free Press is like a free Life," he muses: "It's always in danger." Considering the gutless state of most of Today's Fourth Estate, it's not only in danger, it's all but dead and buried. In a fact-free society like this one, who needs a newspaper...? (That's a rhetorical question, by the way.) Oh, there are still a handful of newspapers capable of shaking up the Powers That Be, but the clock seems to be ticking ever so inevitably toward a time when all NEWS will be determined by Corporations. Listen closely and you can almost hear it: tick, tick, tick...

writers_reign Although he wrote and directed several films with much higher profiles Deadline USA is, in my opinion, far and away the best movie both written and directed by Richard Brooks, scoring as it does on several fronts. Brooks wrote an original screenplay based on his own experience of how newspapers of the era worked and drew brilliant performances from a top-of-the-line cast and not just the likes of Ed Begley, Paul Stewart, and Kim Hunter but also people like low profile Audrey Christie and Martin Gabel, whilst the two Bs, Barrymore and Bogie are superb with Bogie especially beyond excellent. Jack Webb also directed a similar film with a similar title and in common with this one it remains both fine and neglected but in the long run as far as movies about newspapers go this is the one they all have to beat.

edwagreen Humphrey Bogart tries to avert The Day, the paper he is head of, from being sold. The film brings out the importance of competition within newspapers as The Day tries to expose the gangster Rienzi, nicely portrayed by Martin Gabel. Had the latter's part be enlarged, Bogart could have easily played that part.Why did Ethel Barrymore, who plays Mrs. Garrison, the widow of the owner of the paper, change her mind about selling the paper. She had two selfish daughters who only saw the gaining of money in the scheme of things.Rienzi is ruthless and will go to any length to keep his crooked enterprises thriving. This includes murdering his mistress when her own brother turns her in to the mob, and then he makes sure to eliminate the brother. Their poor elderly mother defies this gangster and gets the newspaper to print its final edition with her diary being used by the paper.The picture really brings out the tragedy of when a newspaper is sold and the new owner has the intentions of running it to the ground.We have an excellent cast here supporting Bogart. Kim Hunter is effective as his ex-wife, who still loves him. Ed Begley and Audrey Christie, both of whom would appear together 12 years later in "The Unsinkable Molly Brown," are appealing as dedicated staff members, as does Jim Backus and others.

Gavno Have you noticed that almost all of Bogie's very BEST and most gritty performances were when he played characters that were dedicated to a noble cause? Rick Blain in CASABLANCA goes without saying... even tho Rick doesn't admit until the end that he IS dedicated to ANY cause.Charlie Allnut in THE African QUEEN once again became dedicated (at the insistence of Kate Hepburn) to the cause of sinking the Louisa.Tho his cause was a twisted one born of psychosis, Lt. Commander Philip Francis Queeg was utterly committed to the cause of making the USS Caine acceptable to his impossible standard of perfection.In his last film THE HARDER THEY FALL we again see the cynical, world weary Bogie who seems to be part of the problem, but who in the end lets his conscience and character win out; he does what he sees as RIGHT, no matter what the personal cost.Even in his most underrated performances in the cheap, throwaway films like BATTLE CIRCUS, Bogie was at his hard boiled best as a dedicated MASH surgeon. Alan Alda probably took a lot of his character Hawkeye from Bogie's performance.Playing the crusading newspaper editor Ed Hutchinson in DEADLINE USA Bogie gives us a tour de force performance, clothed in the utter, incorruptible purity of an honest man who is fighting naked evil in the form of corruption by a gang boss who controls a city's underworld... as well as some of it's most prominent public institutions.In this one I'm strongly reminded of Jimmy Stewart's hard boiled, cynical reporter in CALL NORTHSIDE 777; Stewart was another actor who really got his teeth into a part where he was on a crusade of some sort.Bogie hated phony movie tough guys, but oddly he came off as one in a lot of non-gangster roles; his demeanor was so imposing that without violence he could radiate strength and integrity... along with a world weary cynicism that made him seem all the more powerful. In DEADLINE USA we get it FULL STRENGTH and undiluted as he opposes Tomas Rienzi. Violence directed AT him makes him appear all the stronger; the sequence in Rienzi's car where Bogie gets struck across the face with the newspaper shows it; Hutchinson never even flinches at the blow. He only smiles and sneers "THAT'S the Rienzi I like to see".Bogie's at his BEST in the final scene in the press room... there's BEAUTY in the utterly cynical contempt in his voice as he answers Rienzi's phone call with "Hello Baby..." . We KNOW that Bogie has all the cards in his hand now, and Rienzi's threats are meaningless when Bogie says "That's the PRESS, Baby, the PRESS... and there's NOTHING you can do about it. Nothing". That line makes us want to stand up and CHEER... no matter what may happen to Bogie, he's left us a gift. Right has triumphed.This is one of his BEST films. It's a great example of why Humphrey Bogart is still, 50 years after his death, one of Hollywood's brightest shining stars.