Contentar Best movie of this year hands down!

Breakinger A Brilliant Conflict

Humbersi The first must-see film of the year.

Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

JohnHowardReid Copyright 28 April 1945 by Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc. New York opening at the Strand: 20 April 1945. U.S. release: 28 April 1945. Because the studio thought its commercial prospects were so poor, the film was never released in the U.K., one of the few major Hollywood studio "A" features to be voluntarily denied a British release in the 1940s. Australian release: 22 November 1945. 7,144 feet. 79 minutes.SYNOPSIS: A good-natured but not overbright angel is despatched to Earth to sound the Last Trump.VIEWER'S GUIDE: The film could be accused of irreverence and certainly its conclusion is morally up in the air. Dolores Moran is perhaps too vampish for family viewing.COMMENT: This highly amusing entry in Hollywood's visiting angels cycle puts the lie to claims that action director Raoul Walsh was out of his element with comedy. Not only is Walsh's timing perfect but every laugh, every wisecrack and comeback, every double take, every bit of lunatic slapstick is forcefully yet deftly put across with maximum audience impact. Of course on the technical side Walsh was helped no end by his astute film editor Irene Morra who cuts away or dissolves from the action at precisely the right second, not allowing any scene to drag or end on too high a punctuation of slow burns and/or expressions of surprise. Photographer Sid Hickox is also a major contributor to the film's success, as is art director Hugh Reticker. The costumes designed by Milo Anderson are really stunning (especially a gown that Dolores Moran models for the finale), while the elaborately contrived, stupendous special effects are absolutely out of this world.Jack Benny is a riot as the none-too-bright angel who yet has some neat lines in snappy comebacks. His run-ins with slow-minded, self-important cop James Burke and fallen angels (with twitching spasms) Allyn Joslyn and John Alexander are especially comical. Alexis Smith is suitably statuesque as the harpist who sets her mind to advancing Benny's career, though she is outclassed in the glamor stakes by Dolores Moran who has one of the best roles of her life here. Reginald Gardiner is also perfectly cast, as is Guy Kibbee and Make Mazurki - to single out but two names from a brilliant roster of support players.Walsh has stated that he enjoyed making this movie, and had a stimulating rapport with producer Mark Hellinger ("an intelligent man") and photographer Sid Hickox. Unfortunately it was not successful on first release, either with critics or public, although it has now amassed a considerable cult following. Contemporary audiences doubtless found the movie too unusual, too barbed, too lunatic, perhaps even too irreverent.

Laurence Tuccori Comedian Jack Benny spent the second half of his long career poking fun at this film, disparaging it at every opportunity and mocking his performance in it. For the longest time I believed this was just a joke and that the film wasn't nearly as bad as Jack made it out to be. Oh boy, was I wrong. THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT is possibly the most ill-advised project Benny ever signed up for, and I say that as a die-hard Benny fan and proud owner of every episode of his radio show.He plays Athaneal, third trumpet player in a radio orchestra, who falls asleep during a broadcast and dreams that he's an angel sent to Earth to blow the last trumpet, signaling the end of the world, at exactly midnight. But a couple of fallen angels, who'd previously failed to do the job, are determined to stop him. Confusion ensues as the inept Athaneal attempts to complete his mission, oblivious to the deceitful wiles of his opponents. Given the premise, the fine supporting cast (Reginald Gardner, Franklin Pangborn, Alexis Smith, Margaret Dumont,Guy Kibbee, Mike Mazurki) and veteran director Raoul Walsh at the helm, this should have been a surefire hit. So why does the entire project fall flat on its face? There's several reasons. The script is terrible,the supporting cast is wasted and the comedy is lame in the extreme. Neither of the credited screenplay writers demonstrate the slightest talent for writing comedy above a fifth grade level, and it's directed with a complete absence of style. An overwhelming sense of desperation pervades every scene involving bits of business that might very - very - loosely be termed comedy, and the story's climax is so crudely constructed as to be downright embarrassing. On their own these failings cripple the film, but what really sabotages any chance of success for THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT is the casting or - more accurately - the miscasting of Jack Benny. By 1945 Benny's character was firmly established in the American psyche thanks to his long running and immensely popular radio show. As far as the public was concerned Benny was vain, penny pinching, petty, frequently exasperated and eternally 39 years old. He was a consummate comedian who didn't tell jokes but allowed himself more often than not to be the butt of jokes set up by the talented cast of characters he surrounded himself with on his weekly show. He could get a bigger laugh out of his patented pause than any punchline, and he was - despite his many apparent character flaws - universally loved by radio audiences.THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT takes advantage of exactly none of these traits, choosing instead to have Benny play a thinly sketched character who looks like Jack Benny but doesn't resemble him at all. There's nothing in the part of Athaneal that contemporary audiences could identify with, and nothing in this new Benny character that's funny enough to elicit a laugh either. Why have him be a trumpeter when he was universally known as a (very bad) violin player is a mystery. The sum total of these misjudgments is a film that's a major disappointment.I'm not surprised that Benny mocked it for the rest of his days. What else could he do? He had to have recognised it was an incredible career misstep and one which he was lucky to recover from because he didn't depend on films to sustain his popularity. Had his radio show writers been similarly dumb enough to tamper with a winning formula we probably wouldn't remember him today as one of the greats of American comedy.Check out more of my reviews at http://thefilmivejustseen.blogspot.com/

winter24601 This movie is very mediocre. Jack Benny isn't used nearly as well as he could be, and the script is very weak. I can't stand any movie that uses the "it was just a dream" cheat to get the hero out of a difficult situation, and this one does it very poorly. We're told at the beginning of the movie it's a dream, and I quickly lost interest from that point onward.On the other hand, Jack Benny made a 1-hour radio version of this movie for The Ford Theater in 1949. That version isn't great; it's like most comedy from that era that hasn't worn as well as those from earlier or later time periods. However, it has a better script, and it is NOT a dream! More importantly, whoever did the update was able to come up with a pretty good ending for a story that sets up an impossible situation (destroying the world isn't typically considered a good ending in a comedy). The radio version's ending was very timely for 1949, and a little sad listening to it today.If you want to hear it, the radio version is relatively easy to locate on the internet. Just search for "The Horn Blows at Midnight" and "Ford Theater", and you should be able to find multiple sites with the mp3.

blanche-2 Jack Benny was a fabulous comedian who was very successful in radio and television, and made a few films. This one, "The Horn Blows at Midnight," was one that apparently wasn't a big hit - one hears everything from it bombed to did okay but no smash. Benny, however, made a lot of jokes about how it died at the box office.Maybe the film works better today than it did toward the end of World War II, but it's fun to watch. Benny plays a trumpet player stuck on a harpist (Alexis Smith). She helps him get a radio job playing during the "Paradise Coffee Program." The coffee, instead of keeping you awake, however, advertises that it helps one sleep and have pleasant dreams. During a broadcast, Benny falls asleep and dreams he's an angel dispatched to earth to blow a trumpet and start the world's end. Being Jack Benny, he has a few problems.The film has some very funny sections, including Ethanael (Benny) in a huge cup of coffee, nearly drowning. Elevators are used to transport the angels (and there's a shortage of them in heaven, by the way), and when the angels land on earth, they're in the lobby of a New York hotel. Benny and Smith costar with Franklin Pangborn, Margaret Dumont and Guy Kibbee, all extremely talented at comedy. The script, unfortunately, doesn't support them as much as it should, so the overall effect is spotty.Nevertheless, this is a very entertaining movie for the most part with some good ideas and good direction. If only the script had been a little stronger - it would have been a classic.