Another YouTube victory. Some kind soul posted the extremely rarely seen Four of A Crowd, Errol Flynn's only "screwball" comedy, from 1938. Immediately following The Adventures of Robin Hood, Four's A Crowd had both Flynn and Olivia DeHavilland in very unfamiliar comedic territory. Also costarring Patric Knowles (Will Scarlet in Robin Hood) and Rosalind Russell, as well as a surprising Carole Landis in a minor role. Carole Landis, by the way, who tragically died by suicide in 1948 by OD-ing on seconol at the age of 29, after a disappointing career in mostly minor film where she was prized for being better looking than a better actress).
So, why is Four's A Crowd rarely seen today? Well, it falls well into the "it could have been a lot better" category of Errol movies. It seems as if Warner Brothers was rushing to get their two lead stars Errol and Olivia, fresh off one of the greatest movies of the era, into a movie to cash in on the 'screwball' comedy trend. Alas, it didn't work out that well. First, it script seems rushed and sloppily written. Screwball comedies didn't necessarily need to have rock-solid logical premises, but at least the story had to flow well, as so much of the humor of the movie was a result of the timing of the dialogue (Laird Doyle could of pulled it off, but he was dead). Second, I personally (as others may well disagree) lay a lot of the blame at the feet of the director, Michael Curtiz. Curtiz was the directorial architect of Flynn's rise to fame, because Curtiz was an expert at making adventure movies like Captain Blood. He was also an expert at classic drama (Casablanca), but the fast pace of comedy - not so much.
Anyway, a big thanks to that kind soul on YouTube. Picture quality is a little fuzzy, but it ran seamlessly. And it was free. Cool.
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