The Lost Weekend (1945)

User Rating:

8.2/10   

Director:

Billy Wilder

Writers:

Charles R. Jackson (novel)
Charles Brackett (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

3 September 1946 (Sweden)

Genre:

Drama | Romance

Tagline:

How daring can the screen dare to be? No adult man or woman can risk missing the startling frankness of The Lost Weekend!

Plot:

The desperate life of a chronic alcoholic is followed through a four day drinking bout.

Plot Keywords:

Alcoholic | Weekend | Drinking | Writer | Drink

Awards:

Won 4 Oscars. Another 9 wins & 3 nominations

Cast

Ray Milland	...	Don Birnam
Jane Wyman	...	Helen St. James
Phillip Terry	...	Wick Birnam
Howard Da Silva	...	Nat
Doris Dowling	...	Gloria
Frank Faylen	...	'Bim' Nolan
Mary Young	...	Mrs. Deveridge
Anita Sharp-Bolster	...	Mrs. Foley (as Anita Bolster)
Lillian Fontaine	...	Mrs. Charles St. James (as Lilian Fontaine)
Frank Orth	...	Opera Cloak Room Attendant
Lewis L. Russell	...	Charles St. James

Runtime:

101 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

Germany:12 | UK:A (original rating) | UK:PG | South Korea:15 (2003) | Argentina:16 | Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | Sweden:15 | USA:Approved

Filming Locations:

Bellevue Hospital - 550 First Avenue, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

Don quotes twice from William Shakespeare when he is in Nat's bar. The first quote "Purple the sails, and so perfumed ... " is from Antony and Cleopatra: Act II, Scene 2. The second "Yea, all which it shall inherit ..." is from The Tempest, Act IV, Scene 1.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: When Helen pours whiskey for Don near the end then divides it into two glasses, it is nowhere near a quarter of the way up the glass. When Don chooses not to drink it moments later, and drops his cigarette in the glass, it is more than half-way full.

Quotes:

Gloria: Don't be ridic'.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Mr. Warmth: The Don Rickles Project (2007)

Soundtrack:

LOUISE

more than just a simple "message" movie, Wilder tries to make addiction as human a crisis as possible

Although in some respects some of the conditions and dialog from the Lost Weekend have become dated, the performances and the ideas behind it- plus the heightened style of it- make it work many years down the line. Oscar winning director Billy Wilder makes Don Birnem's struggle something that is unmistakable, especially if you've been around these kinds of people. Most of us have seen the drunk at the end of the bar with grandiose ideas and romanticized visions amid that need (nevermind enjoyment) of the booze. But the film is successful if only because it makes this obsession with the flailing writer Don as his major internal conflict, and that it goes deeper to something that is in many of us, even if we don't drink.

Basically, Don wants to get off alcohol so he can write his great book. Despite some advice from the "friendly enemy" (as I would call one) local bartender, and the girl Gloria, there is little hope for him it seems. He goes on a four-day bender, looking frantically all over the apartment when it's not in easy reach. This all leads up to going clean, which involves a truly paranoid-filmed sequence by Wilder (one of his very best).

It is almost all harrowing drama, and only in the minute moments when Don is completely unsympathetic does the film lose some of its momentum. But really, the film is as much about the psychology of this man, of the writer in desperation (though never wanting to admit it), and Ray Milland's performance (at least for the time) was daring enough to show as much as could be shown at the time. The film probes just enough into the subject matter to not become very preachy (I don't think Wilder's message is to never drink ever as much as one of keeping control of one's life and system), and at the core is just entertaining drama.