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Way ahead of its time in both style and substance. The Front Page is a comic look at the underbelly of the newspaper business as well as a tough commentary on the times. In a press room outside the city jail, a group of newspaper reporters idly await the execution of a communist sympathizer accused of murder. Once the story heats up though, the press room becomes an absolute madhouse. The hilariously cynical script adapted from the play by Ben Hecht pulls no punches. Politics, the justice system, communist hysteria, love and marriage are all targets for the biting wit of the author. The script is complemented by a good ensemble cast. Pat O'Brien gives a good performance as Hildy Johnson, the star reporter for The Post, who is leaving his job for marriage. Adolphe Menjou steals the show, however, as Walter Burns, the conniving editor who will do anything to keep Johnson on the job. The rest of the news hounds are all expertly played, striking us as fun loving jokers one minute, but becoming downright violent the moment they smell a story. The movie also has a rare artistic style unequaled in most films. Though most of the movie takes place in the same location, the cinematography is done so well that we never feel we are watching a stage play. The cameras constantly move around the room, effectively putting us in the middle of the action. Pretty much everything about this film is done well. It is funny, edgy, artistic and thought provoking. Movies that can do all of that are few and far in between.

The Front Page was the 12th, and 9th credited, feature film directed by Lewis Milestone, Russian Jewish emigré born in what is now Moldova in 1895 whose directing career spanned from the end of WWI to the early days of the Beatles, thus the core of the XXth Century. A director of moderate talent, Milestone enjoyed disproportionate renown in his day, directing everything from screen adaptations of Brodaway comedies, inter alia the effort under review, and musicals, to prestige literary adaptations such as All Quiet on the Western Front (1930, for which he won an Oscar for best director, which, helás, didn´t make him a better director...) or Of Mice and Men (1939), graduating in the 50s to big budget productions like Les Misérables (1952) or Mutiny on the Bounty (1962). Fun factoid: he also directed the original Ocean´s 11 (1960) the first film to feature the full Rat Pack.

The Front Page adapts to the screen an eponymous play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, about a group of hardboiled Chicago newspapermen bent on scooping on the imminent execution of a presumed subversive agitator (George E Stone), mandatory love interest provided by the scheduled wedding of journalist Hildy Johnson (Pat O´Brien, much more at ease playing Irish priests and the like) to fiancée Peggy Grant (Mary Briant), event which conflicts with the professional duties, interests and urges of Hildy.

The Front Page was one of the first films to use the rotambulator, an ancestor of the dolly, which allowed for a few press room sequences with dialogue shot in circular motion, not unlike similar scenes in much later efforts by Quentin Tarantino (viz Reservoir Dogs, 1992), providing for some relief for what otherwise comes across as excessive, undestandably in a stage adaptation and an early talkie, talkyness. The remaining relief comes from Ben Hecht´s delighful dialogue.

Supplementary sort of interest for contemporary viewers is the political and sexual innuendo, both verbal and physical, that pre-code comedy allowed. For all this, in 2010, The Front Page was included in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in consideration of it being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

All aforementioned qualities nothwistanding, the films lives of script and dialogue mostly, and direction is often unimaginative and delivery wooden. Onliners do save the show. A favourite: Hildy´s boss Walter Burns (Adolphe Menjou, best on screen) to Hildy, trying to persuade him not to folllow Cupid´s ephemeral lure and stay in the newspaper business: "Yes, I know, I too was in love once, with my third wife...".

A bustling Chicago press-room is about to lose top "Examiner" writer Pat O'Brien (as Hildy Johnson), who wants to quit reporting after fifteen years, to marry Mary Brian (as Peggy Grant). But, managing editor Adolphe Menjou (as Walter Burns) wants Mr. O'Brien to stay, and cover stories like the execution by hanging of George E. Stone (as Earl Williams). The plot thickens when Mr. Williams escapes from jail, and tightens when O'Brien meets the convicted killer.

"The Front Page" was held in high regard for the way director Lewis Milestone made a staid, one-room stage play really MOVE on the big screen. There were "Academy Award" nominations for "Best Picture", "Best Director", and "Best Actor". The later went to Mr. Menjou, although O'Brien is arguably the film's leading actor. Menjou had taken over the role when Louis Wolheim died; either man would have been up for a "Supporting Actor" award, had they been given.

"This story is laid in a mythical kingdom," by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, the writers who deserved "The Front Page" award.

******* The Front Page (3/19/31) Lewis Milestone ~ Pat O'Brien, Adolphe Menjou, Mary Brian, Edward Everett Horton

While the staging was limited, the acting was believable and the camera work was great for the technology available. After watching "Front Page" again after watching "Girl Friday", I was struck by the original's emphasis on the role of the newspaper in revealing political corruption. But, the question remains, who's the girl? Not the actress but the girl in the picture hanging on the wall in back of Adolph Menjou's head during the final scenes... Since the movie was released in 1931, it can't be Jane Russell. She's to busty to be Katherine Hepburn (Howard Hughes' friend). The only reason I noticed it was that she appears nude and Howard Hughes probably put it there to see if the 'censors' would notice.

The camera-work on this underrated beauty is breathtaking - one of the panning shots in the newsroom precedes Woody Allen's restaurant pan shot in Hannah and Her Sisters by over half a century! It is so organic, yet so breezy and alive. Don't miss the clever panning action with the gun sequence, and the mirrored room with the man getting off the elevator, which is also a throw-away gem. The actors are some of the finest character and bit players ever assembled on screen and the lightning dialog and clever editing is really quite modern in its speed and ingenuity.

I too am a devoted fan of His Girl Friday, but these are two very different films. Front Page is a masterpiece of old school ensemble character acting, and without it to break new ground, I don't believe His Girl Friday would have had nearly the breakneck pacing and out of the bottle genius that it is rightfully remembered for. The Front Page should take an esteemed place in film history for being the fertile breeding ground of screwball comedy in general and many of its masterpieces, including His Girl Friday, in particular. A must see for 1930's film buffs and screwball comedy fanatics!