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The Sweet Smell Of Success on DVD (1957)

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Average rating: 77%
1111271120613
3.5
from 569 members
 
Starring: Burt Lancaster | Tony Curtis | Susan Harrison | Martin Milner | Sam Levene | Barbara Nichols
Director: Alexander Mackendrick
Studio: MGM ENTERTAINMENT
Run time: 92 mins
Certificate: PG
User collections: The South by Southbank Film List | Groovy Movies That You May Have Missed | Don't like these? I pity you. | Must See Classics | Welcome to the Monkey House | My Top 20 | Cinema Fatale
Genres: Drama
Languages: English
Released: 15/04/2002

Brief synopsis of The Sweet Smell Of Success

Director Alexander Mackendrick breaks away from black comedy (THE LADYKILLERS) and goes for full-fledged noir in this spectacular hard-boiled tale of greed, corruption, and brutality. In the flashing neon nighttime of NYC, grasping press agent Sidney Falco (Tony Curtis) trawls the city's toniest nightspots--21,the Elysian--searching for the king of celebrity columnists, J.J. Hunsecker (Burt Lancaster). Falco is on the outs with Hunsecker because he hasn't successfully broken up the romance between Hunsecker's sister, Susie (Susan Harrison), and straitlaced jazz guitarist Steve Dallas (Martin Milner). The all-powerful Hunsecker is punishing Falco's failure by not printing any of the publicist's items. Desperate to make a living, Falco reveals a dirty plan to separate weak-willed Susie from her beau. While disgusted by Falco's slimy trade, the threatening, malicious columnist is determined to keep Susie for himself, so he agrees. In this jazzily scored, seamy nocturnal world, everyone is expendable as Hunsecker pushes for his twisted desires and Falco grasps for success. With their machine-gun dialogue and despicable behavior, Hunsecker and Falco are as dangerous as gangsters. The person who comes out on top when the sun rises, however, is a true surprise.

Related

Critics Reviews

Rating of 5 stars out of 5 Radio Times

Not a box-office success in its day, this mordant satire has rightly picked up admirers over the years, and is at long last recognised for the classic that it is. It contains key career highs for Burt Lancaster, as vicious Broadway columnist JJ Hunsecker, and Tony Curtis, as Sidney Falco, the hustling press agent totally under Hunsecker's all-powerful thumb. Lancaster's relationship with his sister Susan Harrison is particularly perverse and provides the plot thrust for the Faustian pact, which is still relevant in an era of dubious media ethics. Diamond-hard photography from the great James Wong Howe and a sizzling Clifford Odets screenplay contribute immeasurably to this film's brutal quality, and it remains a milestone tribute to its canny British director Alexander Mackendrick. It also contains one of the classic lines of cinema dialogue: “Match me, Sidney”.

Rating of 4 stars out of 4 Halliwell's Film Guide

Moody, brilliant, Wellesian melodrama put together with great artificial style; the plot matters less than the photographic detail and the skilful manipulation of decadent characters, bigger than life-size.

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Members Reviews

Reviews Voted Most Helpful

Rated - 3 starsThe sweet smell of quality

johnnyfraudster from greater london , 23/04/2004

This is a class act from start to finish. It is a very dark morality tale revolving around two despicable characters in career defining performances by Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis.

It is utterly refreshing to have the two central leads play people with no redeeming qualities whatsoever; their hearts are black to the bone and all the film is all the better for it.

The themes of the film are also highly pertinent for today's audiences, as it revels in the sick, exploitative world of sleazy tabloid journalism. This film also contains some of the greatest dialogue ever written.

You should not be wasting your time watching turgid modern-day Hollywood drivel and watch a film that's not afraid to deliver something dark and daring. Avoid mediocrity and see something with substance, and that would be this.

  6 out of 6 people found this review helpful
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Rated - 5 starsSweet Smell of Cynicism

Ewen Robertson from London, England , 28/09/2004

Alexander Mackendrick may be best known in this country for Ealing Comedies, but this, his first foray into Hollywood, is surely his Greatest Achievement. The sly wit shown in The Ladykillers is let off the leash and the result is an astonishing (typically English?)broadside on ambition-at-all-cost American Culture. Tony Curtis is perfect as a sleazeball press agent, but top marks surely to Burt Lancaster, chilling and hateful as the (incestous?) newspaper columnist JJ Hunsecker. A lot of the film is shot on location and only Woody Allen's Manhatten has made New York look so damn alluring (albeit in a very different way.) Fantastic Bernstein score to boot. Absolute Bloody Classic.

  5 out of 5 people found this review helpful
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Rated - 4 starsTheatrical but worth the trip

A customer from Birmingham , 14/03/2005

Echoes of 'Citizen Kane' in the portrayal of a tyrant who wields great power but who is ultimately flawed. Yes, it isn't pacey, but who needs speed for speed's sake? This is an intelligent and gripping film with weighty characters - the slippery Curtis contrasts well with the slow-moving but threatening Lancaster. Better than O.K

  2 out of 2 people found this review helpful
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Rated - 5 stars

mark#16 from WALTON ON THAMES , 12/12/2003

Quite simply the finest film noir ever made. Tony Curtis is the lowlife agent who has to grovel to Burt Lancaster's gossip columnist. Both actors give sterling perfomances, especially Lancaster as the seemingly inhuman JJ. The cinematography and the score are both absolutely searing, with late night New York being transformed into a seething mass of jazz bars, philandering politians and tough men wearing great hats. The real start of this movie, though, is the dialogue - concise, tough as hell and untouchably cool. That the plot is as merciless as the protagonists and dialogue really means this is a noir movie which is unlikely to ever be bettered.

  1 out of 1 person found this review helpful
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Most Recent Reviews

Rated - 5 starsSweet Smell of Cynicism

Ewen Robertson from London, England , 28/09/2004

Alexander Mackendrick may be best known in this country for Ealing Comedies, but this, his first foray into Hollywood, is surely his Greatest Achievement. The sly wit shown in The Ladykillers is let off the leash and the result is an astonishing (typically English?)broadside on ambition-at-all-cost American Culture. Tony Curtis is perfect as a sleazeball press agent, but top marks surely to Burt Lancaster, chilling and hateful as the (incestous?) newspaper columnist JJ Hunsecker. A lot of the film is shot on location and only Woody Allen's Manhatten has made New York look so damn alluring (albeit in a very different way.) Fantastic Bernstein score to boot. Absolute Bloody Classic.

  5 out of 5 people found this review helpful
Report offending content.

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Rated - 3 starsThe sweet smell of quality

johnnyfraudster from greater london , 23/04/2004

This is a class act from start to finish. It is a very dark morality tale revolving around two despicable characters in career defining performances by Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis.

It is utterly refreshing to have the two central leads play people with no redeeming qualities whatsoever; their hearts are black to the bone and all the film is all the better for it.

The themes of the film are also highly pertinent for today's audiences, as it revels in the sick, exploitative world of sleazy tabloid journalism. This film also contains some of the greatest dialogue ever written.

You should not be wasting your time watching turgid modern-day Hollywood drivel and watch a film that's not afraid to deliver something dark and daring. Avoid mediocrity and see something with substance, and that would be this.

  6 out of 6 people found this review helpful
Report offending content.

Read all highest rated reviews