Sweet Smell of Success

SPOILER ALERT! The plot of the movie will be discussed.

I regret that I only came to this film recently. I sought it out after seeing other great motion pictures, such as All the King's Men, and A Face in the Crowd, which deal with power and celebrity in America. The film has some of the qualities of the film noir genre, such as numerous dark scenes which reflect the sleaziness of the underbelly of society, and witty, stylized dialogue. But it connects more with the tone of a film noir by showing how corruption has poisoned the human souls of some people. 

It is amazing how one little line can carry so much weight. Early on in this movie, Tony Curtis' Sidney Falco, a lowly press agent in New York, goes to a restaurant to ask Burt Lancaster's J. J. Hunsecker, a powerful NY columnist, for resumed plugs in his writings.  At the table, Hunsecker, holding up a cigarette, says to Falco, "Match me, Sidney." Falco says not right now. Hunsecker, probably modeled after gossip columnist Walter Winchell, wields so much power that he can exalt or destroy anybody with his words. For example, at the table he humiliates a U.S. Senator into submission by exposing his lust for a young female wannabe sitting next to him. Falco wants, as he says later, to use Hunsecker to climb "the golden ladder to the place I want to get." So, "match me" isn't just about lighting a cigarette, it's about a fight, like a match in a ring. And, it can be a question, as "Can you match me?"  Falco can't "match" Hunsecker at this point in his cold hearted manipulations. That is why he can't respond to the request. There is a scene which shows their contrasting levels of “success.” Hunsecker receives a phone call from Falco while sitting in a luxurious room in his apartment. He is in a comfortable bathrobe while sipping coffee at a well- appointed table. Falco talks from a dingy room next to a bottle of Alka Seltzer, illustrating that he is the one under pressure to please J. J. Their relationship approaches one of sadomasochism.

Hunsecker has given Falco the cold shoulder because the latter hasn't quashed a budding romance between his sister, Susan (Susan Harrison), and a jazz musician, Steve Dallas (Martin Milner), who is a decent man in contrast to J. J. Now Hunsecker's feelings toward his sister are way beyond the normal bounds of brotherly protection. He wants her for himself, and the subtext is incestual.  There is one point where Susan seems to cringe at his closeness. It may be that she represents the one part of innocence in his past life that he is reluctant to leave behind.  Hunsecker uses Falco to discredit Dallas at a distance through a rival writer. Falco lures a cigarette girl, who thinks he is attracted to her, into sleeping with the other columnist, because she has a boy in military school and needs the money. He gives the girl to the writer so that the columnist will write that Dallas is a Communist. This last point stresses the McCarthyism at the time in which the film was made, and how people seeking power used the media to slander others so they could gain notoriety. Hunsecker also has the goods on a crooked cop, and uses him to plant marijuana on Dallas, which again emphasizes the corrupt nature of this part of the urban world represented by New York City. 

Falco initially cringes at Hunsecker's extreme ways of going after Dallas, but gets on board when Hunsecker promises him the chance to write his column while he is away. Falco has descended so low in the end that when Susan is contemplating suicide by jumping off of Hunsecker's high rise apartment, (the opening credits of Mad Men come to mind), his only concern is that he will get blamed for her death. Falco grabs her before she leaps, and Hunsecker enters, seething because Falco is holding his sister. It is then that Falco lets out of the bag that Hunsecker was framing Dallas, leading to the break with his sister. The Hunsecker-Falco relationship reminds me of the Gecko-Fox one in Wall Street, only Fox realizes the evil of his ways. Success in this film has a smell, for sure, but it is not sweet.

Early on in the film, Falco won't wear an overcoat, to save hatcheck tips. But, at the end, he is wearing a coat, just like Hunsecker, because he has graduated to that level of "success." Susan through most of the film is cloaked in the mink coat that her brother gave her, symbolizing his dominion over her. But, once she breaks with him, she walks out of his life without the weight of that coat. Since the story centers on J. J.'s attempt to dominate his sister, and depicts the abusive way Hunsecker  and Falco treat women, the movie exposes how men demean and exploit women around them. Also noteworthy is that the film is shot mostly at night. Men like Hunsecker and his minions are predators who do dark deeds, preying on the hidden secrets of others. But, the last scene has Susan walking away from the black world of her brother into the dawn of a new day. She will probably be joining Dallas, a name that suggests the idealistic Old West, far away from the sinful city, and the two may ride off, not into the sunset, but into the sunrise toward a bright future. 

Next week’s movie is Marathon Man.