Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #27564 in DVD
• Released on: 2001-05-08
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Black & White, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 103 minutes

Amazon.com
Howard Hughes produced this first film version of the Ben Hecht-Charles MacArthur play, fresh from its wildly successful Broadway engagement; it's at once a close transcription of the stage piece and, under Lewis Milestone's aggressively inventive direction (which includes using a bouncing camera to underline the rapid-fire dialogue), a typically eccentric, anything-goes bit of early sound filmmaking. Pat O'Brien, in one of his first films, flies through the role of Hildy Johnson, the ace tabloid reporter with dreams of getting married and going straight; sleek Adolphe Menjou is his boss, the wily editor Walter Burns, who's desperate to keep Hildy on staff to cover an upcoming execution. Director Howard Hawks added whole levels of thematic depth and dramatic tension when he made Hildy a woman (Rosalind Russell) in his 1940 remake, His Girl Friday, but the Milestone version has its own gritty integrity and even manages to challenge Hawks in the strength of its supporting cast: Mae Clarke, Walter Catlett, Frank McHugh, Edward Everett Horton, Slim Summerville, and George E. Stone. --Dave Kehr

Customer Reviews

Below '0'....
...is the rating for Madacy releases. Whatever low is the price, it's still too high, regarding the ultimate lack of quality in their products, and I will wait for a real production of this movie on DVD by people knowing their trade and having some respect for their customers.
Pleaaaaaase, change the rating, and allow for "0 -or under- to 5' option, because if I don't want to put '1' (which is far too much in this case) my review won't be accounted for, and the likes of Madacy (I never met worse) should be prevented from releasing such crap.

Unintelligible sound
The sound was so distorted neither of us could understand the dialog. We gave up watching it after 15 minutes.

The Front Page (DVD 1931)
A really great movie (five stars for content), but unfortunately the DVD is as unrestored as is the VHS tape version. Accordingly, I give the physical medium only one star, which averages out to an overall rating of three stars.