Nick-Davis.com: Days of Wine and Roses (1962)

Days of Wine and Roses (1962)
Reviewed in April 2010

Director: Blake Edwards. Cast: Jack Lemmon, Lee Remick, Charles Bickford, Alan Hewitt, Jack Albertson, Jack Klugman, Debbie Megowan, Katherine Squire. Screenplay: J.P. Miller.

Some kind of croony, Ray Conniff-style Mercer-Mancini ballad about the days of wine and roses and a door marked nevermore; "Friend of Abe Quine's in executive suite"; "he sugg that you like to have a good time"; his job to pimp for "potentates"; insufferable grin followed by petulant, smug frown; 1618; in this one he DOES teach her to drink; JL's muggy reaction to her refusal to invite him up; flashback structure gone; JL heavy-lidded lascivious; whiskey bottle gets its own low-string chord as JL plops it in the ocean, light dancing on their faces; sort of a sad kiss, c/o her and music; JL not censured for bad work but for reluctance to procure; LR to JL: "You realy are too much"; bizarrely overdone scene of neighbors compl about roach spray; Bickford scary through his screen door, learning they were married two hours previously; @ which point she'd like to go have a drink!; 4824; weak-willedness of Edwards, Lemmon, Mancini: playing the walking into the glass wall as farce, the roses getting caught in the elevator, all very haha; 5440; 10114; I thought, I wonder who that bum is, and then I realized it was me; you just know he'll oversell the striptease; cam in bed: long shot observing behavior in a proscenium way, instead of pulling us into their desire for drink; 11320; JL v.g. in nursery scene, though he still can't disguise that the goal is to wreck the nursery; an Arthur Penn energy to the direction; swoops into cam, rapid pans; LR POV on shower head x JL bugging out in DT house; 13821, 13839; bizarre liquor store owner pours booze on cam/JL's face after he's drunkenly tried to rob him, madly cackling?; 14241 on table; $750 in '58 to $500 in '62?; CB angry that he started her drinking, less sad than in '58; added speech: "she needs to get well before she can come home," most of the way toward reassuring daughter ("I did, didn't I?"), but he's got a teary, furrowy scowl on as the BAR sign flickers across the street;

L E E R E M I C K
Rusing to ferry, dress insuff "peekaboo," very blonde; LR boss's secretary, but JL thinks she's a hoochie; chomping chocolate bar, "you're forcing me to be rude, I *hate* peanut brittle," whisks out; practically nutty about chocolate; IMPOSSIBLE to make the curve of wanting to have dinner with JL; "you're pretty, you're pretty, and here you are"; brightens at choc martini (brandy alexander); 1922; water filthy unless you look far off (sea monster speech); she's insecure about why pier guys don't interfere with her, whereas PL knew she was too imposing or unsettling; parents had a favorite toast (Norweg); total mismatch between JL's obvious catastrophe and LR's pristine innocent; her first, well-played scene of unstoppable laughter, then first kiss actually sober, re: roach neighbors; recasting of LR as the dewy stay-at-home in a much more upscale apt, tearing and recoiling at JL's misogyny and HIS problem; certainly her concern about the room getting too stuffy in THIS apartment seems silly; he concedes it's stuffy, so she obliges him by having a nightcap? and Mancini colludes?; 13256, as she's far gone in Shore Motel, resenting that he's abandoned her alone to drink; mad about that AA place, "I'm a woman, can't you hear me?"; mouth stuck on "mmmmealy-mouthed"; slurring, "I don't care about any of this anymore" - "I don't care about anybody who dudn't have the guts to take a drink"; 15213 she shows up with a tougher, firmer commitment to not wanting to NOT drink, even as she permits fragility and cracks into her voice - it's a more plaintive appeal with steel resolve to her right to drink right underneath her (even with lachrymore Mancini underneath?); 15310; she's as shocked by his non-craving at 15335 as she was earlier by his craving, during baby scene; B–

Academy Award Nominations and Winners:
	Best Actress: Lee Remick
	Best Actor: Jack Lemmon
	Best Art Direction (Black & White): Joseph C. Wright; George James Hopkins
	Best Costume Design (Black & White): Donfeld
★	Best Original Song: "Days of Wine and Roses"

Golden Globe Nominations:
	Best Picture (Drama)
	Best Director: Blake Edwards
	Best Actress (Drama): Lee Remick
	Best Actor (Drama): Jack Lemmon

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