Sunset Blvd.

UK Release Date: 17 August 1950

Certification: PG

Director: Billy Wilder

Cast: William Holden, Nancy Olsen, Erich Van Stroheim, Gloria Swanson

Rating: 13%

An awful waste of my time. 

Review:

I'll start this off by saying I know this review may be controversial as Sunset Blvd. received a total of ten Oscar nominations winning three. That praise for the noir film has continued onwards over seventy years later being present in both IMDB's and Letterboxd's top 100 films of all time. However, for me, Sunset Blvd. is a dated self-glorifying look at 1950's Hollywood. 

Continuing on from that point, movies in general that praise Hollywood - essentially appealing to the masses for Oscar shouts - don't work for me. It's filmmakers making films that almost praise their own work and accomplishments. To me that's arrogant and pretentious. Because with  Sunset Blvd. there is near to no plot, the main driving force of the film is a trip down Hollywood memory lane. The plot synopsis for Sunset Blvd. is 'A Hollywood Story'. This means no time is put in to character development and by the time the film takes a few twists and turns they're pretty much random. I was perplexed as to how Billy Wilder could honestly believe that he could flip the film on its head in the last ten minutes with zero build up. 

Gloria Swanson's performance is the aspect of the film that often receives the most praise. Her performance is practically the same as Vivien Leigh's as Blanche is A Streetcar Named Desire, a role which won her an academy award. But for me both performances are so over the top. Swanson is deranged not only physically but also mentally. It could come of across as a masterclass in acting but to me it's so overly exaggerated to the point where her performance didn't feel believable. William Holden felt a bit stiff. Likewise, to his character in the film, Holden looks as if he has absolutely no interest in being there whatsoever. Erich Van Stroheim's character was just a bit weird and Nancy Olsen's character didn't help further the plot at all. 

I do think the film would've benefited from colour. You can see the attempt to create striking visuals but unfortunately I just don't think it works with the black and white in Sunset Blvd.. Norma Desmond's mansion in particular would've appeared as a special set-piece with a diverse colour palette. Yet, that wasn't the case.