Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Must See Movie...

Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

Copyright 4 December 1941 by Paramount Pictures Inc. New York opening at the Paramount: 28 January 1942. Sydney opening at the Prince Edward: 31 July 1942 (ran 3 weeks). 8,251 feet. 91 minutes.SYNOPSIS: A successful Hollywood film director who has made nothing but lightweight films such as "So Long, Sarong", suddenly gets the notion that he should make a searing drama about human suffering.COMMENT: Most critics feel that the message of this comedy is simply that expressed by the hero at the fade-out, namely that making people laugh is more important than dishing out a "message". So far as it goes, that's true. Notice, for instance, how the guy twisting out a sermon to all the captive bums in the mission house is so cleverly lampooned as the camera devastatingly tracks back from his harangue to the rows and rows of poor souls forced to listen to him.But the film is more than an artist-be-content-with-thy-lot. It's an attack on poverty itself and the sort of society in which it breeds. It's significant that, aside from the stars McCrea and Lake, the only actor who gets a really close, dialogue close-up in the movie is Robert Grieg: "You see, sir, rich people and theorists — who are usually rich people — think of poverty in the negative: as the lack of riches; just as disease might be called the lack of health. But it isn't, sir. Poverty is not the lack of anything, but a positive plague, virulent in itself, contagious as cholera; with filth, criminality, vice and despair as only a few of its symptoms. It is to be stayed away from, even for purposes of study. It is to be shunned!" What few critics have noticed is that the movie is also an attack on America's class-rigid society. "I'm a motion picture director," exclaims Sullivan, on finding himself in a chain gang. "They don't sentence motion picture directors to six years in prison for a little altercation with a yard boss." — "They don't?" questions the little trusty (Jimmy Conlin) most dubiously. And that so-called "little altercation" put the yard boss in hospital with a cracked skull and lacerated face. A "vicious assault", as the judge properly describes it. Yet Sullivan is freed with remarkable celerity as soon as his claim is verified. Someone as important in society as a motion picture director is above the law. Another example occurs earlier on in the movie when McCrea, pretending to be an ordinary member of the public, is rudely rebuffed by a railroad information clerk. However, when his valet, Eric Blore, putting on his smarmiest accent, announces that "A few of us down at the club were having a little bet...", the information is readily forthcoming. The rich man's foibles are instantly catered for.

I think all film junkies have a few films they hate that nearly everyone loves. So, while "Sullivan't Travels" is considered a classic and has an extremely high rating of 8.1, when I last saw it I was terribly disappointed and didn't understand all the hoopla about the film. That was years ago and I decided to do something I rarely do...see the film again to see if perhaps my original IMDb review (which I have since deleted) was right or wrong. Here is what I think of the film on a second viewing....The first thing that really stood out in my mind when I watched the film was Preston Sturgis' casting for the movie. Veronica Lake was very popular in Alan Ladd pictures because he was a very short man...and she was a rather tiny actress. Yet, in spite of this (or, most likely because of this), Sturgis paired her with one of the largest leading men of his day. The 15 inch difference in height was NOT typical at all of Hollywood...but more typical of real life and I can only assume the famed writer/director deliberately was resisting traditional casting decisions since the movie is a critical look at Hollywood and its clichés. I appreciated this more the second time viewing the picture.The story finds the famous Hollywood director, John L. Sullivan (Joel McCrea) in a funk. While he's successful in his career, he also worries that his films lack a connection to the common man and might not be representing real life. This is a reasonable concern-- especially since most films of the preceding decade portrayed very rich, happy and fashionable folks...all during the Great Depression!! So, Sullivan decides to try living incognito-- traveling the country dressed like a hobo to see the other side of America. Along the way, he meets an adorable lady (Veronica Lake) and they decide to go slumming together. The problem is that no matter how bad life is living in the gutter, they can always elect to return home to comfort and a good meal...and Sullivan finds out the hard way what it's like NOT to be able to just go home when he's tired of slumming it.Overall, I was MUCH more positive to the film the second time around. Now I am not saying I loved the movie but I did love much of it. Like many Sturgis pictures, the dialog was the best part...and it was snappy and enjoyable. My reservations for not giving it a higher score are that the story seems, at least today, a bit contrived. Also, the Mickey Mouse cartoon segment STILL seems way overdone (NOTHING is that funny)...my biggest complaint the first time. But on balance, the good far outweighs the bad and I am glad I decided to give it another try. I still think it's a bit overrated but an excellent film nonetheless.

I just saw Sullivan's Travels last week. I wish I had seen it at age 11. Back then, when my mother would take me to New York, I wouldn't photograph the skyscrapers or the Hudson River or Central Park--I would take pictures of abandoned buildings and garbage in the streets. You see, I wanted to capture something "real." I was, in other words, a pretentious little twerp.To a certain extent, so is John L. Sullivan, though I defy you not to fall in love him by the end of this film (and not just because he was played by the--ahem--not exactly unattractive Joel McCrea). He's a privileged Hollywood director whose past credits mainly include lowbrow comedies, but he yearns to do something more meaningful. So he decides to go on the road disguised as a hobo, though the real rail-riders are able to spot the clueless amateur from a mile away.Sullivan's journey takes him in gradually expanding concentric circles. At first, even his best efforts land him right back in Hollywood, and he can't seem to shake the coterie of publicists and caretakers that are always trailing two inches behind him. He even finds himself with an additional hanger-on, a failed starlet played with a sharp, worldly-wise sensibility by Veronica Lake. Eventually, though, Sullivan really does find himself far away from home and in deep trouble. It's one thing to sleep in shelters and rail cars when you know you can always return to your cushy home base; it's quite another when there's no way to escape the cruelties faced by the truly destitute. At this point the film suspends its comedic tone, though comedy will end up playing a crucial role at this dark moment in Sully's life. In the process, he becomes a better man. Sully may have had the best intentions when setting out on his journey, but his utter cluelessness would have made him a pretty unworthy spokesperson for the poor. After getting a taste of what it truly means to suffer, he realizes that the way he can best serve those with nothing is not to wring tears from moviegoers on their behalf, but to lessen their burden a little by making them smile. I hope I haven't been too ponderous about what really is a fantastically funny film, the definition of G.K. Chesterton's quote "Angels fly because they take themselves lightly." I guess that earnest ponderousness is a habit I still find hard to break. Hopefully a few more viewings of Preston Sturges' masterpiece will set me straight.

Going from nothing to AFI's top 100 in 2007, Sullivan's Travels is an achievement in cinema worth the recognition. The film is about a comedy director named Sullivan who wants to make a dramatic film about poverty, but having no experience with it, goes out as a tramp with only 10 cents. Everyone warns him of the misguided nature of that experiment; eventually he runs into a down-on-her-luck girl (Veronica Lake) who accompanies him.At first a light comedy with plenty of wit and enjoyable physical humour, Sullivan's Travels admires the commentary films can make on social systems. Sullivan praises a film symbolizing capitalism and labour destroying each other, and wants to make a film like it. It also explores, fairly extensively, how the rich can sympathize for the poor not knowing what the conditions are actually like. The butler condemns such rich people as morbid for glamourizing poverty. Sullivan, in fact, has great difficulty really getting into the feel of it, as he keeps ending up back in Hollywood, back at his mansion, back in the hands of his staff. He receives some sympathy he doesn't need. He asks tramps how they feel about the labour situation (how are they supposed to feel about it?). When Lake pushes him into the pool, one feels he deserves it.That's until the last third of the film, which turns much darker. After Sullivan is robbed and knocked out by the only villainous poor person in the film, he, in a dazed state, hits a railroad worker with a rock and goes to prison. No one knows who he is. Now he's really facing harsh reality, beaten, in chains, unable to access the quality defence he needs. When he, fellow-prisoners and a black congregation watch a comedy film in a church, Sullivan sees first-hand what comedy can give these people. Once let out, he goes back to making comedies- everything's come full-circle, but now he has more purpose than ever.This is a movie that adeptly balances comedy and drama, to examine comedy and drama. Two things particularly stand out- one is Lake, with her sultry voice and jaded character which are simply irresistible. The other is the scene in the church, where comedy unites and uplifts the downtrodden. This is movie magic.