Epic True Story, Excellent Film

Rating: 10/10 (6 December 2019)

This is for once a well made, reasonably accurate film made about a true story.
With True Stories what usually happens when a film is made about them, is either they look good but get panned for not being accurate and taking liberties with real events. Or they are poor but accurate, only on odd occasions do we get true stories and great films in the same sentence, this is one of them.
Usually in a true story we know all the details, but by sticking to them it can create a dull movie, The good thing about this story is we don't know all the details, just the main events so Hollywood can do what it does best and fill in the details with drama, and on this occasion it does it very well.
Stanley Kubrick is a renowned director, and this proves why, the screenplay by Dalton Trumbo is excellent, the photography also excellent. Kirk Douglas is brilliant as the star, with Laurence Olivier proving what everyone says about his acting in a movie, Jean Simmons is the beauty, and what a beauty. When you hear about who are the greatest beauties in movies, her name seldom comes up ? Marilyn Monroe, Joan Collins, Elizabeth Taylor, Raquel Welch, Vivien Leigh, Hedy Lamarr, Rita Hayworth etc. but Jean Simmons ? To me she is up there, one of the most beautiful and sexy of all time, and also a very good actor, and you can see why I think that with this film. The supporting cast are also excellent, Peter Ustinov easily being next best and almost steals it from Kirk and Larry, Charles Laughton, John Ireland, Woody Strode, Herbert Lom, and Charles McGraw are all very good, John Gavin is a bit wooden and unusually Tony Curtis plays it down, possibly under orders not to distract attention from the other stars, but apart from those 2 all the rest are on form.
And that is why it makes a great film, because all (or most) are on the same song sheet, and everything comes together, usually the mark of a great director.
With Epic films which last over 3 hours or more they can become a bit boring, but this does not, even after watching it about once a year over the last 40 years when I know the story like the back of my hand, it still is not boring.
I have noticed that in films with a good guy and a bad guy, if the bad guy is a great actor it makes for a better film, and this has one of the very best as a the bad guy, also it has one of the saddest endings, other than the usual, these are 2 of the points that made it one of the very best.