Greatest Show on Earth

1927/28 through 1997
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Big Magilla
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Post by Big Magilla »

How funny - The Greatest Story Ever Told was the complete opposite - a box office bomb that nevertheless maanged a few technical nods, but no wins 13 years later.
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Post by Reza »

Big Magilla wrote:The Greatest Story Ever Told was the biggest box office hit of its year, a rare occasion in which Oscar and the public agreed - though why, I'm still trying to fathom.
Another grandiose film but here you obviously mean The Greatest Show.....
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Post by Big Magilla »

I don't know the answer to your question, but I think you are correct.

I don't think DeMille was looking for Oscars - none of his previous films came close to winning any major awards - he was interested in box office and he got it - The Greatest Story Ever Told was the biggest box office hit of its year, a rare occasion in which Oscar and the public agreed - though why, I'm still trying to fathom.
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Post by OscarGuy »

So far, I'd say Braveheart, A Beautiful Mind and Cavalcade are worse pictures.

I agree with Magilla, Stewart and Emmett Kelly were the saving graces of the film. Despite Buttons' horrendous act, he was a kind and compassionate person. He really makes us feel sympathy for his character despite all odds.

My biggest issue with the film is that it's at least 30 minutes longer than it needs to be. I don't want to watch an entire circus when I'm sitting through a film. It's also pointedly clear that C.B. DeMille was intent on getting the Academy to love his picture. What other reason is there to have a gratuitous shot of Bing Crosby and Bob Hope in the audience, feature the aging Hopalong Cassidy and fill the feature with grandiose shots of everything...and who ever thought of using the green screen to place actors in front of audiences at the big top should be shot.

BTW: No one really answered my question...
Wesley Lovell
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Big Magilla
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Post by Big Magilla »

I usually like Betty Hutton, but her "acting" in The Greatest Show on Earth is one of the worst things about the film. I still get nightmares thinking about her and Cornel Wilde sticking their tongues out at each other. The film's sole saving grace were the clowns, including the inimitable Jimmy Stewart.

West Side Story has its problems, mainly in the casting of obviously dubbed non-singers in the two leads, but is otherwise a still vibrant mid-20th Century take on Romeo and Juliet. Gotta love that opening sequence.

I am a sucker for Delbert Mann directed slice-of-life dramas of the late 50s, early 60s. Give me the heartfelt inarticulateness of the characters in Marty, Separate Tabels and The Dark at the Top of the Stairs over the ha-ha-ain't-we-better-than-these-halfwits-we-are-showing-you in any number of today's films including A Prairie Home Companion, American Dreamz and anything starring Jennifer Aniston.
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Post by Damien »

It's a terrible movie, but at least it has Betty Hutton in it, which makes it more fun and easier to sit through than Marty, West Side Story, Gladiator, Gandhi, A Beautiful Mind and Rocky.
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Post by rudeboy »

cam wrote:This was the worst BP of all time.

It's schlocky and plain embarassing at times, but I found it easier to sit through than Around the World in 80 Days or Chariots of Fire - and I've never made it past the first forty minutes or so of Out of Africa.
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Post by 99-1100896887 »

Someone who collects such trivia will find it online for you, Wes. This was the worst BP of all time.
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Post by OscarGuy »

This is gonna bother me until someone tells me.

Is the song Greatest Show on Earth the one that starts "come to the circus"?
Wesley Lovell
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." - Benjamin Franklin
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