FRANKENHEIMER FAVOURITES Part One

SEVEN DAYS IN MAY (1964: Dir. John Frankenheimer)

There are few directors in Hollywood today who can compare with the generation that learned their craft in the pressure cooker of live dramatic television. Legendary names such as Arthur Penn, George Roy Hill, Franklin Schaffner, and Sidney Lumet were all veterans of this unique school of directing where mistakes were made in public and spontaneous inspiration could make the difference between mediocrity or artistic success. Although primarily remembered as a breeding ground for great writers like Rod Serling and Paddy Chayevsky, directors who initially worked in this exciting live medium went on to become some of the great filmmakers of their era. John Frankenheimer was only a kid in his early twenties when he went to work as an assistant to Sidney Lumet, consequently graduating on to direct his own acclaimed productions for such award-winning series as Playhouse 90. Early acclaim lead to his feature film directorial debut The Young Stranger (1957), a failure Frankenheimer acknowledged due to his lack of big screen directorial experience. Disillusioned he returned to TV, but within a few years and after careful study of cinematic technique including the use of camera lenses and film editing, he easily made the leap into quality motion pictures. The intensely productive period that followed showcased his newly assured talent for movie storytelling. The Young Savages (1961), All Fall Down (1962), The Birdman of Alcatraz (1962), and most importantly The Manchurian Candidate (1962), demonstrated Frankenheimer's unique visual point-of-view, employing deep focus foreground close-ups to startling dramatic effect. His next project Seven Days in May was a novel brought to him by Edward Lewis, the producing partner of Kirk Douglas, with Kirk starring as a bellicose General plotting to overthrow the government of a controversial Democratic President. Frankenheimer suggested his old friend Rod Serling to adapt the book, with Douglas' Gunfight at the O.K. Corral co-star Burt Lancaster as the staff officer who uncovers the coup. Sensing an opportunity to play a role at odds with his public persona as a liberal progressive, Lancaster, who had just completed two previous projects with Frankenheimer, insisted on swapping roles with Douglas. Eager to reprise their previously successful partnership, Kirk gave into his friend's demands, but acting as Burt's less charismatic whistle-blowing adversary, was a decision he soon regretted after filming began. An added bonus came with the tacit support of Manchurian Candidate fan President John F. Kennedy, who gave Frankenheimer permission to film a political riot in front of the White House. Literate dialogue combined with a strong directorial eye culminated to produce a vividly topical thriller much in the same style as such other recent Washington exposés as: Otto Preminger's Advise and Consent (1962), Franklin Schaffner's The Best Man (1964) and Sidney Lumet's Fail Safe (1964). Providing stalwart support to the two leads are a peerless troupe of talent who bring verisimilitude to every scene, most memorably Martin Balsam, Edmond O'Brien, and in his acting debut, former producer John Houseman. Frankenheimer's greatest casting coup was that of the magisterial Frederick March as an embattled Commander-in-chief, representing the very embodiment of humanistic morality in the face of Lancaster's swaggering military martinet. Apart from a lethargic performance by an ailing Ava Gardner, Frankenheimer always maintained that Seven Days in May contained the best cast he ever had to work with, the only exception being his epic length 1973 adaptation of The Iceman Cometh, featuring March's valedictory performance.  A curious addendum to the filming came many months later when Frankenheimer was filming The Train in France also with Burt Lancaster. After after an unsuccessful preview screening of Seven Days in May with an ending where Lancaster's villain is killed in a car crash, Frankenheimer chose to re-shoot a new version with Burt's character surviving instead. Given the logistics of the situation, the Washington locations had to be doubled in Paris, a nearly impossible task but accomplished with a seamless result. Now with the film closing on a less sensational note, it went on to become one of his biggest popular successes, auspiciously inaugurating a most productive partnership with Edward Lewis that spawned some of the most undervalued films of John Frankenheimer's career. DVD & Blu-ray