Wednesday Minute
No. 44 | March 3, 2010

Oscar Déjà Vu

Our theme this week (theme introduction)
Film titles with two Oscar nominations for Best Picture

Featured this week
Monday         —   Moulin Rouge (1952, 2001)
Tuesday         —   Cleopatra (1934, 1963)

Heaven Can Wait (1943, 1978)

Heaven Can Wait (1943)
Director:  Ernst Lubitsch
Writer:  Samson Raphaelson; based on the play Birthday by Leslie Bush-Fekete
Cast:  Don Ameche (Henry Van Cleve), Gene Tierney (Martha), Charles Coburn (Hugo Van Cleve), His Excellency (Laird Cregar)
Oscar Summary:  3 nominations, including Picture, Director; no wins

Heaven Can Wait (1978)
Directors:  Warren Beatty, Buck Henry
Writers:  Elaine May, Warren Beatty (and Robert Towne, uncredited); based on the play Heaven Can Wait by Harry Segall, adapted by Segall for the film Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941)
Cast:  Warren Beatty (Joe Pendleton), Julie Christie (Betty Logan), Mr. Jordan (James Mason), Jack Warden (Max Corkle), Charles Grodin (Tony Abbott), Dyan Cannon (Julia Farnsworth)
Oscar Summary:  9 nominations, including Picture, Director, Actor (Beatty), Supporting Actor (Warden), Supporting Actress (Cannon), Adapted Screenplay; 1 win (Art Direction)

The essentials
Of all the twice-nominated titles this week, the Heaven Can Wait connection is the loopiest.  The Warren Beatty-Buck Henry comedy is a remake of an early-1940s movie, but not the 1943 Ernst Lubitsch comedy of the same name.  The 1976 film is a remake of Here Comes Mr. Jordan, of 1941, which is based on a play called Heaven Can Wait.  The 1943 film is based a play called Birthday.  So the two films are not related, except this:  the plot hooks for the two stories are nearly flip sides of each other.  The earlier film has a dead man petitioning Satan to be admitted into hell.  The later one has a dead man who wants to go back to his life on Earth.

Ernst Lubitsch was a master of Hollywood’s golden age, and Heaven Can Wait was one of his later films.  Don Ameche is a playboy who expects to go to hell on the day that he dies.  Greeted by the always-courteous His Excellency (i.e., Satan), he must recount his sins to gain admission.  The film is a look back at the events of his life, especially the trouble he caused for his wife.  Across the decades he had his share of flirtations and indulgences, though they were mostly harmless.  The question is whether he was bad enough for Hades.  The film may not rank with Ninotchka or The Shop Around the Corner or Trouble in Paradise as the best of Lubitsch, but that’s a high standard to meet.  Lubitsch didn’t know how to make a bad film, and as always, this one’s a classy production, delivering some good laughs along the way.

The later Heaven Can Wait is an enjoyable movie from Warren Beatty and company.  It’s one of two films (along with Reds) for which Beatty received four Oscar nominations (as actor, director, writer, and producer).  He plays L.A. Rams quarterback Joe Pendleton, who dies before the Super Bowl.  Joe gets a reprieve, however, when his angel fumbles the assignment, and he returns to the living in the body of a murdered millionaire.  Getting back in the game is no easy task, as he faces skeptics about his identity and a wife who tries to kill him again.  Meanwhile, he falls for a British ecologist played by Julie Christie.  The movie’s got charm, mischief, satire, and one funny cast.

Beyond the final credits
Here Comes Mr. Jordan, the 1941 film, was about a boxer who’s taken to heaven before his time.  Warren Beatty first wanted the remake to be about a boxer, starring Muhammed Ali.  Those plans didn’t work out, so the boxer was changed to a football player and Beatty played the role himself.  Another remake of the story, Down to Earth (2001), starred Chris Rock as a comedian who dies before his time.

Heaven Can Wait (1943)
Ernst Lubitsch, director

Heaven Can Wait (1978)
Warren Beatty, Buck Henry, James Mason

Quote of Note
Daniel Miller:  Is this heaven?
Bob Diamond:  No, it isn’t heaven.
Daniel Miller:  Is it hell?
Bob Diamond:  Nope, it isn’t hell either.  Actually, there is no hell.  Although I hear Los Angeles is getting pretty close.
—Daniel Miller (Albert Brooks), Bob Diamond (Rip Torn), Defending Your Life(1991)

…58…59…60.