Review of The Most Dangerous Game (1932) by Jennfier C — 05 Oct 2007

8/10 (A precursor to excellence that is quite dated).

I watched this movie last night, after watching Le Samourai, and I must say that the stark contrast between the two just shows how much the medium changed in such a short time. Even Duck Soup, which came out only a year later, is in a dramatically different class. But this movie is clearly important to film history, as it represented the formation of the later "King Kong" team, and was at the time a spectacular, fascinating retelling of a great story. The transition to film retains a great deal of the suspense of the short story, and Leslie Banks is quite scary as Karkoff (although even scarier is Ivan/Igor/whatever the servant's name was). Wray is pretty and talented, McCrea was a solid cast as the hunter who learns the error of his ways. There are some cool visual effects such as the crashing of the yacht, and the ridiculous use of stock footage during said scene was one of the funniest things I've witnessed on film.

But there are also some major flaws, flaws that truly show the dated style of the movie. The acting is "good" for the time, but today everything seems incredibly overacted and the impossible amount of foreshadowing would be openly mocked by even the dumbest audiences of today. There are some scenes that seem to clearly result from animal cruelty, which isn't all that hard to believe considering when the film was shot. And Robert Armstrong is terribly annoying as the drunken idiot brother of Wray, which was clearly the intent of the directors but still more irritating than even Mos Def in 16 Blocks. It's clear that this movie is a classic, and it will always have a very important place in film history, which is why its flaws are not enough to keep it from being a watchable and enjoyable (and certainly fast-paced) movie.