I'm a thousand-dollar-a-day newspaperman. You can have me for nothing.
#385 - Ace in the hole Director - Billy Wilder I have yet to watch Sunset Blvd, and therefore this is the first of Billy Wilder's films I've watched which isn't a comedy. And yet, it begins in a comically jolly way, with lively 50's music and a wonderful shot of our lead - Charles Tatum (played by a young Kirk Douglas - who looks a lot like Alex Winter in the 80's) - reading the paper in his car as it is towed. Tatum is a typical New Yorker. Fast talking, aggressive and brash. However he is also reckless and arrogant - and this is how he finds himself fired from all the big city papers and working in a small local paper in Albuquerque. His motivation for the entire film is simple: find a story which is big enough to get him noticed and get his old job back in New York. After a tedious year on the paper, Tatum gets his wish. En route to a rattlesnake hunt with his photographer he stumbles upon a man called Leo trapped in a cave-in. To make matters worse, none of th...