His Girl Friday
From Free net encyclopedia
{{Infobox_Film
| name = His Girl Friday
| image = His Girl Friday poster.jpg
| director = Howard Hawks
| writer = Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur (play The Front Page)
Charles Lederer (screenplay)
| starring = Cary Grant
Rosalind Russell
| producer = Howard Hawks
| distributor = Columbia Pictures
| released = January 11, 1940
| runtime = 92 min.
| language = English
| budget =
| imdb_id = 0032599
}}
His Girl Friday is a 1940 screwball comedy, a remake of the 1931 film The Front Page, itself an adaption by Charles Lederer, Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur of their play of the same name. One major alteration was made for this incarnation: the character of Hildy Johnson was changed from a man to a woman, putting a different spin on the story.
Plot
Cary Grant is hard-boiled newspaper editor Walter Burns, Rosalind Russell his ex-wife and former star reporter. She wants to marry Bruce Baldwin (Ralph Bellamy) and settle down to a normal life, but Burns has other ideas. When a convicted murderer escapes from the bumbling sheriff (Gene Lockhart) on the eve of his execution, Burns entices Johnson to cover one last story, and then the fun begins. Image:HisgirlFriday.jpg
His Girl Friday was directed by Howard Hawks and is noted for the rapidfire wit and extremely fast pace of the dialogue.
The film is consistently on the Internet Movie Database's list of top 250 films, was #19 on American Film Institute's 100 Years, 100 Laughs, and has been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.
Some memorable moments incorporate real life references: Burns tells Ralph Bellamy's character that he looks a lot like an actor...Ralph Bellamy; later, Burns notes that the last person who crossed him and lived to regret it was Archie Leach – Grant's real name.