Big City (1937 film)

Big City
Theatrical release poster
Directed byFrank Borzage
Written byNorman Krasna
Dore Schary
Hugo Butler
Produced byFrank Borzage
Norman Krasna
StarringLuise Rainer
Spencer Tracy
CinematographyJoseph Ruttenberg
Edited byFrederick Y. Smith
Music byWilliam Axt
Production
company
Distributed byLoew's Inc.
Release dates
  • September 15, 1937 (1937-09-15) (Los Angeles)[1]
  • September 16, 1937 (1937-09-16) (New York)[2]
Running time
80 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$621,000[3]
Box office$1,601,000[3]

Big City is a 1937 American drama film directed by Frank Borzage and starring Luise Rainer and Spencer Tracy. The film was also released as Skyscraper Wilderness.[4]

Plot

Joe Benton and his wife Anna are suspected of starting a taxi war. Although innocent, they are blamed for everything that has happened and the officials demand that Anna be deported from the United States. While trying to prove their innocence, the couple feels forced to hide.

Cast

The film also casts a number of popular sports figures including Jack Dempsey, James J. Jeffries, Jim Thorpe and Frank Wykoff in minor comic roles.

Reception

In a contemporary review for The New York Times, critic Frank S. Nugent called Big City "casual, superficially diverting, singularly unimportant stuff" and wrote: "By any other names, except possibly those of Luise Rainer and Spencer Tracy, the Capitol's 'Big City' would be Class B melodrama and nothing more. With them, it becomes a trifle more, but still not enough to justify more than a passing glance."[2]

Critic Edwin Schallert of the Los Angeles Times called Big City "almost delirious fun" with "ingenious sequences" and wrote: "Matching up performers in the movies can be a fine art, and occasionally one sees the demonstrating of such art. Premier example of the moment is the film 'Big City', which finds Spencer Tracy and Luise Rainer cast together—an acting combination as good as anyone could request. They have much to do with the appeal of this story of poor struggling married folk."[1]

Writing for Night and Day in 1937, Graham Greene gave the film a poor review, describing it as "just possible to sit through". Greene's primary complaint was about the acting, which he found to be "heavily laid on" with "people in this film [being] too happy before disaster: no one is as happy as all that, no one so little prepared for what life is bound to do sooner or later". The only consolation for Greene was that of Borzage's direction, which Greene described as "sentimental but competent".[5]

Box office

According to MGM records, the film earned $906,000 in the U.S. and Canada, and $695,000 elsewhere, resulting in a profit of $462,000.[3]

References

  1. ^ a b Schallert, Edwin (1937-09-16). ""Big City" Presents Spencer Tracy and Luis Rainer in Rare Acting". Los Angeles Times. p. 14.
  2. ^ a b Nugent, Frank S. (1937-09-17). "The Screen". The New York Times. p. 29.
  3. ^ a b c The Eddie Mannix Ledger, Los Angeles: Margaret Herrick Library, Center for Motion Picture Study.
  4. ^ The Great Depression in America by William H. Young, Nancy K. Young. p. 560
  5. ^ Greene, Graham (14 October 1937). "Big City/Tales from the Vienna Woods/Children at School". Night and Day. (reprinted in: Taylor, John Russell, ed. (1980). The Pleasure Dome. Oxford University Press. p. 173. ISBN 0192812866.)
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