Despite this being a long film, this will be a short blog. Let’s talk about determination in a writer.
This comedic masterpiece directed by Blake Edwards is meant to be a nod to the melodramas of the silent era. The Great Leslie (Tony Curtis is a master of all trades with a dazzling smile and his perfectly clean clothes. As its the turn of the century full of new innovation, Leslie has agreed to an automobile race against his rival, the mustached Professor Fate (played by my classic Hollywood crush - Jack Lemmon) from New York to Paris. Keenan Wynn and Peter Falk play their assistants respectfully. Still, it is Natalie Wood’s character Maggie Dubois that I’m going to talk about.
Miss Dubois is a suffragist attempting to live an “emancipated” life full of smoking cigars and making grand speeches. She bullies her way into a job on a newspaper and enters the race in order to report on it. This is after both Leslie and Fate refuse to take her with them in their cars. She brings carrier pigeons with her to send her stories and photos back to the newspaper office in New York. This woman is so dedicated to proving her skills as a writer, she literally works on a news story about a bar fight while standing in the middle of bar fight. Each time she meets with a problem that will keep her from getting her scoop, she fibs and cheats in a most charming ways possible. Granted, by the end of the movie, it’s more about just finishing the race than the story, but her determination until she no longer has her pigeons is admirable.
Plus, she kicks ass in the massive pie fight in the movie and I’d like to think that is a secret writer skill we never get to explore.
