The Great Moment Details

How do you make an entertaining tribute to the forgotten dentist who first discovered the anaesthetic? The great comedy writer/director Preston Sturges had the answer, but audiences didn't want to know, giving him his one flop among a string of hits that included The Lady Eve and The Palm Beach Story. Without sacrificing scientific detail, Sturges embellishes the situations with valid slapstick humour, conveying the horror of an amputation before anaesthesia through the fainting of an unprepared onlooker (William Demarest). According to Sturges, the great moment in the life of the dentist, sensitively portrayed by Joel McCrea, is not his discovery, but a gesture of great humanity which ends the film on an upbeat note.

Curious biopic of Dr W. T. G. Morgan, poised somewhere between utter seriousness and pratfall farce. The beginning of its director's decline, but always interesting in itself.