GUYS AND DOLLS
***1/2 out of *****

Genres
Comedy
Crime
Musical
Romance

1955
Directed by
Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Written by
Damon Runyon (story The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown)
Abe Burrows & Jo Swerling (book for musical play)
Joseph L. Mankiewicz (screenplay)
Ben Hecht (screenplay, uncredited)
Cast
Marlon Brando .... Sky Masterson
Jean Simmons .... Sergeant Sarah Brown
Frank Sinatra .... Nathan Detroit
Vivian Blaine .... Miss Adelaide
Robert Keith .... Lieutenant Brannigan
Stubby Kaye .... Nicely Nicely Johnson
B.S. Pulley .... Big Jule
Johnny Silver .... Benny Southstreet

Bad news first for Simpsons fans: the song “Guys and Dolls, we’re just a bunch of crazy guys and dolls” is not really from this musical. And “Luke be a Jedi tonight”, sorry, not that one either. Guys and Dolls is a musical though, an upbeat one about gamblers and their girlfriends with a typically convoluted musical plot. Nathan Detroit (not played by Mark Hamill) is trying to make a killing running an illicit crap game, while Officer Brannigan is trying to shut it down. Big shot gambler Sky Masterson and a whole bunch of high rollers are in town, but Detroit doesn’t have the money to pay for a location to hold the game and he’d told his girlfriend Adelaide that he’d stopped running the game, so he bets Masterson (who’d bet on almost anything) that he can’t take missionary Sarah Brown to Havana so he can win money for a location, but Masterson does and so on and so forth.

There’s a lot to recommend in this film if you’re a fan of musicals. The songs by Frank Loesser are excellent. Even the sentimental numbers (usually the ones I start fidgeting in) have amusing lyrics and a jazzy feel. You can even see Jerry Orbach sitting in a barber’s chair. For a fan of musicals (which I am)  the 150 minute running time passes by pleasantly. But for all this, it just isn’t that great as a film.

If you’re not a fan of musicals but are a film buff there are two reasons to see this film (or not see it, as long as you know about them for the pub quiz); 1. the only on-screen pairing of Frank Sinatra and Marlon Brando; 2. to see Marlon Brando singing and dancing. Brando’s singing isn’t bad (i.e. not out of tune). Well, more accurately, what they managed to piece together from several takes isn’t out of tune. The entertaining thing about his singing is that while some people’s singing voice doesn’t sound like their talking voice, Brando’s sounds exactly the same. His drawling low-energy version of “Luck be a Lady” is sung with this feeling that he really, truly wanted luck to be a goddamn lady for one evening or he’d have her kneecapped, and that’s pretty unique. He doesn’t do that much dancing, if you were wondering. What he does do is a lot of acting.

Normally I wouldn’t complain about Brando doing acting in a movie (The Island of Dr Moreau not withstanding). But a lot of Guys and Dolls seemed to be taken up with long dialogue scenes. I didn’t find it too plotty, just too talky. It felt like they’d paid all this money to get Brando in the film so they had to get lots of scenes of him acting. No sooner had the momentum got going in a big dance number than it stopped for some more talking. Would anyone really miss the whole “Daddy, I’ve got cider in my ear” nonsense? The level of dialogue is probably the same as the stage version, but this is a movie: you don’t have to keep yapping while the stagehands change the background and the chorus change their costumes.

I felt the slow burn of tedium most in his scenes with Sarah Brown (Jean Simmons). She runs a failing religious mission in New York. She’s uptight, maybe unrealistic about life and love, and all that. Brando tries to convince her to take a chance, the usual. And man, some of this stuff goes on and on. On and on for too long before she loosens up and becomes unannoying. See comment above about the background and costumes.

Sinatra acts the way he always acts. His love interest, Miss Adelaide, is a character type that has grown less and less funny as people like her have stopped existing, denying us the “oh, she’s just like so-and-so in accounts” enjoyment. She’s the not-quite-pretty comedy relief show girl with the nasal voice and abrasive-yet-needy demeanour. And I had no idea why Nathan Detroit was hooked on her, making one large part of the movie a bit of a mystery. And really, Nathan Detroit isn’t that much of a prize catch either. Maybe that explains the whole thing.

I’ve spent a fair number of paragraphs complaining, but Guys and Dolls is enjoyable. But there are reasons the film version hasn’t become a classic like Singin’ in the Rain, despite its Broadway pedigree and star cast. The film just doesn’t quite fit together. Some of the backing dancers seem to be in a different movie to the main characters. It doesn’t help that neither Sinatra, Brando, or Simmons are dancers as they often seem quite static against a hyperactive backdrop. Guys and Dolls is just one of those musicals you see after you’ve gone through the classics. And if you want to check out Brando singing, of course.

Discuss this article on the forums. (0 posts)