This Special Edition Blu-ray release from Arrow Academy will be available for purchase (www.arrowvideo.com – www.facebook.com/ArrowVideo/) on December 11th.
When you look back at some of the most popular and well-received filmmakers of all time, Billy Wilder is a name that often comes up. This immigrant from Sucha Beskidzka (once considered Austria-Hungary, but now part of Poland) made his mark after moving to Hollywood and becoming a director, writer and producer. Any one of his features, including Double Indemnity, The Lost Weekend, A Foreign Affair, Sunset Boulevard, Ace in the Hole, Sabrina, The Seven Year Itch and Some Like It Hot would be a career highlight for any moviemaker. It’s remarkable that the artist created so many beloved classics.
This week, Arrow Academy are releasing yet another one of his titles as a Special Edition Blu-ray. The Apartment is an unusual satire that features a nebbish office worker dealing with unusual events at both his place of business and Manhattan residence. The film attempts to mix humor with more serious material as the story progresses. While the film ruffled feathers during its initial release, it did end up garnering attention and eventually earning numerous Academy Award nominations. It won Wilder a Best Picture, Best Director and Best Screenplay statue. This marked the first time that an individual Oscar nominee had walked away from the ceremony with three trophies.
“Bud” Baxter (Jack Lemmon) is a lowly, lonely employee at an insurance firm whose genial nature has worked against him. In an effort to move himself up the corporate ladder, the worker agrees to loan his apartment to company bosses. It becomes clear that the married executives are using his place for romantic rendezvous’ with secretaries and other ladies. Still, Baxter rationalizes his actions, also knowing that refusing his superiors could result in his firing. In the meantime, the protagonist yearns for the company’s elevator operator, Fran Kubelik (Shirley MacLaine). He discovers that she is attached to married, high-ranking executive (Fred MacMurray), and that the pair use his apartment for their trysts. So even after his stock begins to rise within the company, Baxter becomes more and more conflicted about the situation.
The film marks two star-making turns for leads Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine. While Lemmon had earned raves for his work on Some Like It Hot the year previous, he hadn’t been considered a traditional leading man. Wilder thought his everyman appearance would add a likable quality to the ethically compromised character and thus gave the actor his first headlining role. MacLaine was also a relatively fresh face and this marked her debut appearance as a leading lady. She shows a great range in her role, effectively delivering some humorous lines while also ably tackling dramatic moments.
This movie looks great as well. The office environment is incredible. It appears both chilling and impressive, with its unending row of desks that stretch into the horizon. Some of the jokes (including a running gag about Baxter’s neighbors thinking he is a playboy) aren’t as amusing as they might have played back in the day. However, the satire of the business world and the awful, self-centered bosses is quite effective and the skewering of their actions and behavior still works. The movie also effectively depicts the lonely life of a sad sack in the big city, as the protagonist is often sent away from his own apartment and forced to wander the streets alone. There’s a great shot early in the film of Baxter dejected and sitting on a long, empty park bench that really sells the isolation of his existence.
Still, these moments are also funny. And the movie offers Baxter the chance to awkwardly ingratiate and transform himself into the executive world. This even includes failed attempts to update his wardrobe. Yet the movie takes a much darker, more dramatic turn in its second half, completely shifting gears. While the more serious turn really shouldn’t work given what precedes it, the two main performers are so charming that their struggles pull viewers in and make the audience empathize with their plights. This is a skilled and accomplished film that not only delivers laughs, but also provides plenty of food for thought about the consequences of selling out for money and position.
The Blu-ray features a film historian commentary with critic Bruce Block. He goes over the production in great detail, describing various myths about the production, as well as correcting and clarifying several details. He also analyses the themes of the film and the ways in which Wilder uses the camera and framing to both tell the story and get his ideas across. It’s an incredibly detailed and enlightening track that will impress and inform fans of the movie. The historian also defends Wilder himself, who was often criticized by critics as being too cynical and harsh. This critics explains that while his movies were often unsentimental, they certainly weren’t heartless. And he accurately claims that the approach lends a more convincing sense of realism to the proceedings.
This disc also includes a new appreciation of the movie from film historian Philip Kemp and his commentary on two specific scenes from the feature. Viewers will also discover an informative featurette on the frequent film collaborations between Billy Wilder and Jack Lemmon and how their working methods. Additionally, there is an interview with cast member Hope Holiday in which she describes her experiences during the shoot and suggestions/help the filmmaker provided on set.
Also included is an extended archival interview with Wilder in which he explains his writing process and how he developed the plot as well as directing techniques. And there’s a vintage and detailed making-of that includes interviews with Shirley MacLaine and even more historians who go over the production. And you’ll also get feature on the career of Jack Lemmon, highlighting his working relationship with Wilder. There’s definitely hours of material here that is insightful and presents more details on the production. It’s great stuff.
Finally, something should be said about the image quality on this Blu-ray. In fact, there’s even a segment included that details the restoration work on this release. It’s quite remarkable. The work itself was done by Arrow Films, who took the original camera negative and rescanned it at 4K, before extensively working it over to remove thousands of tears, scratches, blotches and debris. There is a comparison of cleaned up film with the version previously available and frankly, the difference is stunning. The widescreen frame now appears crisp, clean with deeper tones and the wide shots of the office and the aforementioned park bench are really striking. More than likely, the movie looks even better than it did during its original run and Arrow should be praised for their restoration work.
Yes, The Apartment is an old film and there are a few dated aspects, but one can really see why it still speaks to so many people. It has great performances, looks incredible and manages to subtly work in plenty of satire and criticism about the evils of corporate America. It deftly presents several upper management business types as narcissistic and uncaring, ultimately willing to do anything in their selfish quest for prestige and corporate power. It’s these kinds of points that still resonate today. The Blu-ray is superb and is the best way possible to catch up with or revisit this classic.