THE MAJOR AND THE MINOR: Blu-ray (Paramount, 1942) Arrow Academy
Based on Fanny
Kilbourne’s enchanting little story, ‘Sunny Goes Home’ – later
translated into Edward Childs Carpenter’s play ‘Connie Goes Home’ –
Billy Wilder’s The Major and the Minor (1942) is an enormously delightful
light comedy of errors that continues to amuse, primarily due to Ginger Rogers’
convincing portrayal of an adult revisiting her second childhood out of
necessity. In retrospectives, Rogers’
career has been rather unfairly summarized almost exclusively as the ‘other
half’ of Fred Astaire’s tenure at RKO. Rogers in her golden years, indeed,
took umbrage to this myopic view of her talents. “I did a lot more than
that,” she once told a reviewer. And most definitely she had. Rogers, who
began her career as a common hoofer and chorine in movies like 42nd
Street (1932) and Gold Diggers of 1933, before finding ever-lasting
recognition as Astaire’s revived dance partner, would move into a spate of
superb roles, including an Oscar-winning turn in Kitty Foyle (1940), and
far better performances (the Academy overlooked) in Stage Door (1937), Vivacious
Lady (1938), Roxie Hart (1942), I’ll Be Seeing You (1944),
and Storm Warning (1951), to name but a handful of her 94 film credits.
The truth is Ginger Rogers was already a star before she met Fred Astaire, an
independent and her own woman while making the Astaire/Rogers pictures, and
afterward, remained the epitome of ole-time Hollywood glamour and
professionalism until her death in 1995; a great lady to the last. Perhaps the
most incredible thing about her performance in The Major and the Minor
is that, at age 31, Rogers manages to convince not only co-star, Ray Milland,
but also the audience she can pass for a love-struck girl of barely thirteen.
I am not
entirely certain by what actor’s osmosis this metamorphosis works. But it does,
and, to utterly marvelous effect; Rogers, indulging in a sucker, or making one
out of Milland and his male cohorts, thoroughly true-to-life as she convinces
us she can barely tie her own shoes, much less share in the full-bodied
affections with the forthright mature male of the species. The part was, in
fact, very dear to Rogers' own heart, reminiscent of those early hard years
when money was tight and, while touring in Vaudeville with her mother, Rogers had
to feign the pallor of youth to escape paying full fare when travelling. To add
to the authenticity of her chameleon’s turn, Rogers would roll down her
stockings and clutch a tattered dolly. Meanwhile, by 1942, co-star, Ray Milland
had amassed a decade’s worth of impressive credits to his name. Prior to
becoming an actor, Milland served in the Household Cavalry as an expert shot in
his company’s rifle team. The acting bug bit after he was introduced to
American actress, Estelle Brody in 1928; his meager first appearance on film
marked one year later in E.A. Dupont’s Piccadilly (1929). Within the
year, Milland had achieved a six-month contract. Then, in 1930, Milland was
offered a nine-month contract at MGM; Hollywood’s beckoning, leading to minor
parts in the studio’s homegrown product and several loan outs to Warner Bros.
Alas, when MGM elected not to renew, Milland discovered the cruel pall of unemployment.
It lasted 5 months, with a move back to Britain; then, another back to the U.S.
and the real kick-start of his rise to prominence at Paramount Pictures. Signed
to a 7-year contract, for the first little while, Milland split his time
between Paramount and loan outs to Universal. As his popularity with audiences
blossomed, so did his salary.
Arguably, what
made Milland so utterly appealing during these early years was his
adaptability, as easily ‘at home’ in romantic comedies as period dramas and
congenial to a fault, never upstaging the many leading ladies – some more
temperamental than others – with whom he was paired. Everyone like Ray Milland
and by the time of The Major and the Minor, he was considered Grade ‘A’
Hollywood beefcake, to be peddled and paraded at a premium on the screen. As the U.S. entered WWII, Milland was slightly
unsettled by his rejection from enlistment due to an impaired left hand. Nevertheless, he did his part as a civilian
flight instructor for the Army. If anything, one can see a certain ambivalence
in Milland’s Maj. Phillip Kirby – a sort of reluctance to appear in the uniform
he would never ‘officially’ wear in life. Nevertheless, Milland’s giddiness
plays exceptionally well against Rogers’ adolescent confidence in the picture –
their playful sparring reaching its zenith of awkwardness during the cadet’s ball,
where Kirby clearly feels a sense of duty to protect Rogers’ Susan Applegate,
not only from the roués and cads, but also his own uncertain, yet burgeoning
feelings of a love most improper between a teenager and an adult, but
absolutely acceptable between a full-grown woman and a man. Reportedly,
director, Billy Wilder, having already observed Milland’s work on the screen,
made the impromptu offer for him to co-star in the picture while catching up to
his automobile at a red light. Startled by the proposal, Milland agreed to read
the screenplay by Wilder and Charles Brackett, telephoning the director later,
after having read it, with eagerness to play the part originally scripted for
Cary Grant. Initially, Wilder planned to cast noted actress, Spring Byington as
Susan’s mother. Rogers, instead, suggested her real-life mama play the part.
Wilder agreed and Lela was cast.
As a neophyte
director, Billy Wilder was to place his faith and trust in editor, Doane
Harrison who was then editing Hold Back the Dawn (1941) – the picture Brackett
and Wilder had written just prior to this one. Incidentally, The Major and
the Minor contains a hilarious moment where a young girl at the train depot
shows her mother a newsstand magazine with the gripping headline reading, ‘Why
I Hate Women: by Charles Boyer’ – a snub at Boyer who, having co-starred in
Hold Back the Dawn had used his considerable clout to get a particular
scene of which Wilder and Brackett were proud, excised from its final cut. It
was precisely this sort of sardonic sweet revenge for which Billy Wilder’s
latter-day films would be celebrated. If Wilder cared not for Boyer, he would
go on after The Major and the Minor to sing Harrison’s praises; the
editor affording Wilder a backstage glimpse into the ‘technical’ side of
film-making and the strengths of ‘cutting in camera’ to hasten the spontaneity of
the editing process. This not only expedited post-production considerably, but
it also saved money on film stock during principle photography, and such
economizing highly pleased the executive brain trust running the studio.
Harrison would remain Wilder’s ‘go-to’ on every picture from The Major and
The Minor, right on through to 1966’s The Fortune Cookie.
Since Rogers’
Oscar-win for Kitty Foyle she had been afforded director approval on all
subsequent projects. As Leland Hayward represented both Rogers and Wilder, he
interceded on Wilder’s behalf to arrange a luncheon appointment to discuss this
project with Rogers. To say Rogers found Wilder charming during this initial
meeting is an understatement. "I've always been a good judge of
character,” Rogers later recalled, “He was a real European gentleman and
I decided then and there…Wilder had the qualities to become a good director. (He)
certainly understood how to pay attention to a woman.” Despite his lack of
experience, Ginger Rogers’ admiration for Billy Wilder only continued to grow
as production commenced. “We had a lot of fun making the picture. It was
that kind of story. And even though it was his first film, from day one I saw
that Billy knew what to do. He was very sure of himself. He had perfect
confidence . . . I've never been sorry I made the film. The Major and the Minor
really holds up. It's as good now as it was then.”
In The Major
and The Minor, Rogers is a New York scalp massage treatment therapist,
Susan Kathleen Applegate. Assigned to a private session at the apartment of
wily middle-aged playboy, Albert Osborne (Robert Benchley), Susan quickly
discovers Al wants a lot more than his scalp massaged. After assaulting him
with some raw eggs, Kathleen makes haste to Grand Central Station – resigned to
give up the big city and go back home to Iowa. One problem, the original fare
she saved for this rainy day has since been increased by the railroad. However,
Susan gets the bright idea to impersonate a child of twelve, thereby only
having to pay half fare for her trip. Cleverly disguised sans makeup and with
pig tails, bobby-socks and a balloon no less, Susan convinces a conman (Tom
Dugan) to impersonate her father and buy the ticket. He does – then absconds with
the remainder of Susan’s money leaving her penniless. After some awkward business
with the conductors, Susan hides in the traveling compartment of Major Philip
Kirby (Ray Milland at his most aimable and charming). Alas, he buys into Susan’s
act, lock, stock and barrel. She is a 12-year-old child and he takes pity on
her, offering his lower berth for the night. Philip even encourages Susan to
call him ‘uncle.’ However, when the train becomes stranded in the middle of
nowhere, Philip is retrieved by his fiancée, Pamela Hill (Rita Johnson), who
first ‘mistakes’ Susan for his love interest, then accepts the aptly nicknamed
‘Su-Su’ as a child and moves her into her home until suitable
transportation can be arranged to get her home.
Pamela’s home is
conveniently located near a military training academy run by her father, Colonel
Oliver Slater Hill (Edward Fielding). Philip is one of the school’s
instructors. Hence, ‘Su-Su’ quickly finds herself at the mercy of adolescent
testosterone-kicking young men eager to make her acquaintance. She is fawned
over and pawed by the cadets in some truly inspired hilarity. While the adults
are haplessly hornswoggled by Susan’s baby talk, Pamela’s younger sister, Lucy
(Diana Lynn) is not buying the act for a minute. Confessing the truth to Lucy,
Susan becomes involved in Lucy’s plan to free Philip from her sister’s clingy
reserve that has thus far stifled his desire to travel the world as part of the
Armed Forces. In the end, it ends predictably enough, with Susan, having confessed
both her age and her love for Kirby, and having it reciprocated in return.
The Major and
the Minor did more than mark Billy Wilder’s directorial debut at Paramount. It
firmly established him as a force of rare sardonic wit, amply endowed with the
spark of creative genius that could straddle two chairs at once: screenwriter,
and, director. Wilder reportedly chose to make this movie because of its
commercial viability – a ploy to win points with the studio’s top brass so he
could then pursue more ambitious projects later on. Indeed, in retrospectives
of Wilder’s career, The Major and the Minor is often, either never even
mentioned, or only briefly footnoted as the springboard for the illustrious
career that followed it – a genuine shame, since the script is a winning
succession of rare comedic twists and even more joyously unusual surprises,
freshly blended into a seemingly effortless souffle. Finding Ginger Rogers in
rare form, playing less than half her real age, and convincingly, is only part
of the picture’s enduring charm and legacy. Rogers excels so completely at
faking adolescence that she easily turns back the clock. And Ray Milland, then
something of the matinee heartthrob du jour, has never been more charismatic as
a leading man – with few exceptions, an underrated actor of considerable scope
and depth. The supporting cast all perform with great skill and agility. In the
final analysis, The Major and the Minor is a movie to be revisited over
and over again – a rare gem, warm and generous in its laughter, hewn from a
vintage when such gems were very plentiful indeed.
Arrow Academy’s
Blu-ray, derived from Universal’s alliance, reveals more information within the
frame than the DVD release from 2008. The image is also considerably brighter
and sports a heavy patina of film grain. A word on this: I am unable to completely
recommend the overall lighter image as it fails to introduce any real blacks;
the register falling between mid and high range with velvety grays and
occasionally blooming whites. Is this how The Major and the Minor really
looked in theaters in 1942? There is, I might also point out, nothing wrong
with the way this image looks. It just lacks the subtleties in lower registers
of contrast I anticipated. Age-related dirt and artifacts still appear, but are
greatly tempered. Arrow’s DTS 1.0 mono audio is satisfactory with zero hiss and
pop. Arrow packs on the extras, starting with an informative audio commentary from
film scholar, Adrian Martin who provides the most comprehensive
coverage, not only of the movie’s production but the period and climate at the
studio in which it was made. Top marks for this! We also get a half-hour
appreciation by critic, Neil Sinyard, plus another half-hour archival interview
with Ray Milland, and, the rarely heard hour-long radio adaptation from 1943
starring Rogers and Milland. Add to this, an image gallery, trailer, reversible
packaging with original and commissioned artwork, plus a 20-page collector's
booklet with photos and an essay by Ronald Bergan and, well, this is a classy
release of a great vintage comedy. Bottom line: The Major and the Minor
is a deliciously ribald comedy that turns sexual mores on their head as much as
it warms the heart with its heart-felt ‘feel good’ story. This Blu-ray exhibits
a solid, if marginally brighter than expected 1080p transfer with higher than normal
grain levels. Is it genuine to the original look of the movie? I can’t help to
think not, and would have liked to see Uni go for a full-on remastering effort
before exporting this to a third-party distributor like Arrow. Judge and buy
accordingly.
FILM RATING (out
of 5 - 5 being the best)
4.5
VIDEO/AUDIO
3.5
EXTRAS
4
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