The Greatest Show on Earth

Starring: Betty Hutton, Cornel Wilde, Charlton Heston, Gloria Grahame, Dorothy Lamour, James Stewart, Bing Crosby (cameo), Bob Hope (cameo)
Directed by: Cecil B. DeMille
Rating: Not rated
Genre: Drama, Romance
1952

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: A circus manager (Charlton Heston) tries to hold the circus together and put on the greatest show on Earth, despite the colorful cast of characters and challenges he faces.

Review:

Tim: The Greatest Show on Earth is widely regarded as one of the worst films to ever win the Academy Award for Best Picture. I honestly do not agree with this assessment. I thoroughly enjoyed the spectacle of this movie, and I found it an entertaining, fun film. I admit that this movie has flaws, but it's still a solid movie.

Now, I'm not suggesting this movie should have won Best Picture. While this is a very good movie, there were certainly better films released in 1952 (High Noon was better, but I would have awarded Best Picture to Singin' in the Rain, most likely). Still, the Academy could have done worse than give Best Picture to this movie. I can think of quite a few winners less deserving than The Greatest Show on Earth.

Now, one of the big criticisms of this film is a legitimate one- the movie is incredibly bloated. Cecil B. DeMille wanted to create a massive spectacle with this film, and he certainly achieved that. He blends the main story with documentary footage of actual Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey circuses. This is certainly a spectacle- the colors, the acts, the excitement, everything. However, it goes to pretty huge lengths. At 152 minutes, this is a very, very long film. The actual story isn't epic in itself, but all the documentary footage surrounding it does contribute a bit to the bloatedness of the whole thing. This hurts the movie some, but the spectacle is certainly entertaining to watch.

I thought the various storylines were pretty good. Charlton Heston gives a very strong performance as the circus manager, desperate to hold everything together. He is quite controlling and it's very apparent he has "sawdust in his veins". He was believable in this role, and I enjoyed his career-launching performance. That being said, he did have a tendency to overdo it a bit with his performance. I wished he would have shown a little more restraint. Betty Hutton was mostly good, but her performance tended to straw into the melodramatic a bit too much for me. I liked her quiet moments more than the over-the-top theatrical ones, which pervaded her performance. I really liked Gloria Grahame in this film. I completely overlooked her during the first half of the movie, but by the end, I was very impressed with her remarkable supporting role. I thought she was pretty fantastic in the role. Finally, I loved James Stewart as Bubbles the Clown. It felt like an odd role for Stewart- his face is completely covered in clown makeup the whole film. However, he brought his charismatic charm to the role, and the clown's story was one of the most interesting of the entire film. I felt like the cast worked well together, and they were one of the strongest aspects of the film.

One thing that truly impressed me with this film is that Cecil B. DeMille required his actors to actually learn the circus stunts they were performing. Many of the actors performed a great deal of their own stunts- this adds to the realism of the film, and is quite exciting to watch. I actually found myself wondering if DeMille cast circus performers, or if they were actors who learned the stunts themselves- that's how impressive they were.

Now, I understand that this movie gets a bad rap, but it's quite fun to watch. The documentary scenes do get a bit overwhelming and at times overshadow the main story, but this is still a good film. While it may not deserved to win Best Picture, it's still a remarkable achievement, and a film I thoroughly enjoyed. I recommend watching The Greatest Show on Earth with an open mind, because it's far better than many people claim.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating- 7.5


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