Outstanding War Time Comedy with Dark Humor

Rating: 6/10 (15 June 2005)

Ernst Lubitch's "To Be Or Not To Be"(1943) has to be the most genuinely bizarre political satire to emerge from Hollywood's golden age. It stars Jack Benny and Carol Lombard as Joseph and Maria Tura - a married couple and stage performers living in occupied Poland during WWII. Determined to alter the course of the war, the two helm a troupe of ham actors in a dead pan comic assault on the Nazis When a spy emerges who has damaging information to the Polish resistance, Joseph and Maria decide to prevent the information from being delivered to the Reich. Benny's brilliant lampoon of Hamlet's soliloquy "to be or not to be" is at the crux of a disastrous rendezvous between Maria and Lt. Stanislav Sobinski (Robert Stack).
Stan gets the hots for Maria - a passion not reciprocated. Hence, when Stan is dispatched for war, he cruelly implicates Maria with Professor Siletsky (Stanley Ridges), the real spy who has a secret plan to destroy the Warsaw resistance. The theater troupe is then forced to use their thespian skills to ensure their own survival; impersonating Nazi officers and even Hitler in order to outwit the enemy. Controversial to say the very least, "To Be Or Not to Be" opened to modest acclaim and was later remade, to limited effect, as a 1983 farce starring Mel Brooks and Anne Bancroft.
Warner's DVD treatment is middle of the road. The black and white image has been mastered from reasonably clean film elements. Contrast levels are adequate, though at times weak. There's a hint of edge enhancement and some fine detail shimmering, but nothing that will distract. Fine details are sometimes nicely realized but darker scenes suffer from inconsistent quality. Film grain is moderate. Age related artifacts are present throughout. An archival news reel and short subject are the only extras included.