Posted on 10/11/2026 3:17:10 PM PDT by Twotone
After making All About Eve, receiving twelve Oscar nominations and winning six (including best picture and best director), writer and director Joseph Mankiewicz directed a film that got no Oscar nominations and has languished in the back forty of his career. It's a comedy where one of the leads attempts suicide and characters spend long stretches discussing death and morality.
You might say that they don't make them like this anymore but the truth is that they do – there's no shortage of modern comedies where the tone lapses all over the place (Downsizing, Don't Look Up, JoJo Rabbit) and the filmmaker's intentions seem inscrutable, if not perverse.
Perhaps it's proof of the adage "Dying is easy, comedy is hard" (attributed to the character actor Edmund Gwenn, though the origin remains obscure) though maybe it has more to do with ego and overconfidence. To be sure, there weren't too many people in Hollywood who had a higher estimation of themselves than Joe Mankiewicz (except perhaps his brother Herman and every man who ran a studio) and that might be the reason why People Will Talk works when it really shouldn't.
The movie begins with shots of a college campus as they used to be – landscaped lawns, sun-dappled paths and neo-gothic halls, not a shred of brutalism in sight – under titles that introduce our protagonist, Dr. Noah Praetorius, as the sort of doctor who might be a myth while most people would fondly wish him to be real. "Our story is also – always with high regard – about medicine and the medical profession."
(Excerpt) Read more at steynonline.com ...
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Thank you-I am going to check it out-maybe even tonight!
I saw it on youtube a few years ago. Total cringe. The “good doctor” gave me the creeps.
After reading Steyn’s review I’m still not sure if he liked it or not, but in all the years of reading Steyn I think I know his taste and he couldn’t possibly approve of this film.
Don’t take my word for it. Seeing is believing.
“Dying is easy, comedy is hard” (attributed to the character actor Edmund Gwenn, though the origin remains obscure)
As quoted by Alan Swan (Peter O’Toole) in “My Favorite Year”
The movie is about human frailty, mistake, guilt, depression, love, forgiveness, and redemption.
So, what’s the problem?
I am so glad that I didn't have to take your word, as I have seen it many times and have loved it more and more each time.
It's an odd duck of a movie but I enjoyed it. I've seen it several times. I'll never turn off a Grant movie.
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