Young Man with a Horn (1950)

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Michael Curtiz was a genius director, don't you agree? Masterpieces like "Casablanca" "The Adventures Of Robin Hood" "The Charge Of The Light Brigade" "Mildred Pierce" and over 150 other titles including the musical "Romance on the High Seas" which introduced Doris Day to the world. In "Young Man with a Horn" Doris Day is the luminous center, the ideal. She is photographed and framed like a reachable dream. Kirk Douglas plays the trumpet player in love with the wrong woman and Lauren Bacall here is the personification of the wrong woman, she knows it, she tells him but he goes for it like a lamb to the slaughter. "Young Man with a Horn" has some extra pluses, Hoagy Carmichel for instance and Juano Hernandez but what the film reminded me of was, Michael Curtiz's brilliance and that Doris Day was, is and always will be one of the great film actresses of all time. Regardless of the film she appeared in, she displayed an extraordinary talent to be, to be totally and if you think I'm just waxing lyrical, "Young Man with a Horn" presents indisputable evidence of her extraordinary talent.

With such blazing source material, a great director like Michael Curtiz (whose 'Casablanca' and 'The Adventures of Robin Hood' are two of my favourite films) and talent like Kirk Douglas, Lauren Bacall and Doris Day, as well as being based on an interesting man and life, 'Young Man with a Horn' had so much going for it.On the most part too, 'Young Man with a Horn' lives up to its vast potential. The only glaring fault is the ending, which felt rushed, far too syrupy and tacked on, considering the sordid and sleazy nature of the rest of the film it really jarred and quite badly. Some may be disappointed at the biographical sections being fictional (then again biopics are rarely accurate) and that the tone of the source material is softened.'Young Man with a Horn' does more right than it does wrong. It looks wonderful, with a stylish visual look with inspired film noir-ish touches. Curtiz allows atmosphere and emotional power to come through, and come through they do. The music is one of 'Young Man with a Horn's' best assets, being a singer and cellist this component has always been important to me and is always mentioned in my reviews. Not just the superb playing of Harry James, but some great songs sung by Doris Day that are also beautifully staged. "The Very Thought of You", "Too Marvellous for Words", "I May be Wrong" and "With a Song in my Heart", all terrific, as are the arrangements of "The Man I Love" and "Get Happy".The film is intelligently scripted without getting over-heated and never feels bland. The story is absorbing and enough of the sordid and sleazy nature comes through as well as the emotional power.Kirk Douglas is outstanding in the lead role, particularly in the tormented scenes. Lauren Bacall also excels as does a cast against type Doris Day. Hoagy Carmichael is smooth and warm-hearted and Juano Hernandez gives his role great dignity.All in all, very powerful even when softened in comparison to what it's based on. 8/10 Bethany Cox

More or less fictional, this film tells the story of a lonely but musically inclined kid who grows up to be an ace trumpet player. Kirk Douglas plays Rick Martin, a guy with a one-track mind ... music. But whereas he could make a steady income playing in routine dance bands with their sing-a-long songs, Martin prefers the more free-form sounds of jazz.But jazz doesn't sell records, so Martin hops from one boring band to another, never finding satisfaction except when he's engaged with other like-minded jazz musicians. It's the old conflict of commercialization vs. art. Along the way Rick meets his true love, Jo (Doris Day), but gets sidetracked by a sultry academic named Amy (Lauren Bacall). And therein lies the main problem with this film.Amy is an annoying character. Since she relates not at all to music, every time she's on screen, we have to listen to her whine. She detracts both from Rick Martin and from the film's jazzy, moody style. These plot segments, which show up in the second half take us far away from jazz and into angst filled soap opera territory.Ted McCord's terrific B&W cinematography adds a lot. The lighting and interesting camera angles amplify the moody, downbeat tone, consistent with a 1940s urban visual style, helped along by effective sets and realistic costume design. Casting is acceptable except for Lauren Bacall, who is too overbearing. Doris Day is quite good. And Hoagy Carmichael does a terrific job, both in acting and in narrating the story.A satisfying film overall could have been rendered even better had the script kept the focus on Rick Martin and his love of jazz. That "Young Man With A Horn" didn't win any kind of award is unfortunate. It's a good film, especially for viewers who enjoy jazz and can appreciate the dreary, moody ambiance of 1940s urban America.

This movie is generally described as "loosely based" on the Dorothy Baker novel, which in turn is "loosely based" or "inspired by" the career of Bix Beiderbecke. Wrong. The movie has absolutely nothing to do with Bix's life. Even the musical instrument involved is not the same--Bix played a cornet, which has a somewhat different sound quality from the trumpet "played" by Kirk Douglas here.I could list the details of the career of Rick Martin (the lead character played by Douglas)and compare them with those of Bix, but I would be here all day. There simply are no details that are similar.One good thing about the movie is the trumpet music supplied by "musical consultant" Harry James, which is dubbed for Douglas. Anyone who enjoy's Bix's wonderful solos, however, will see no similarity at all in sound or style between Bix and James. Not that it matters that much, given what I've already said about the movie.Kirk Douglas plays Kirk Douglas--not a bad thing, really. Lauren Bacall, who is really beautiful in this film, plays an unbearably self-centered, spoiled woman, and the character is really quite a bore. Every time she appears on screen, the movie grinds to a halt, unless you take all her posturing and foolish talk seriously.Bix pretty much killed himself by drinking and never developed into the great jazz master that he seems destined to have become. But even so he gained the respect of an undoubted master, trumpeter Louis Armstrong, and Bix was influenced early on by Armstrong's innovative performances, though the two men really did not play the same sort of music.In the movie, the "Armstrong" character is a trumpeter named Art Hazzard, played by Juano Hernandez. While Armstrong was a man of enormous gifts,appetites, and personality--a real force--the part written for Hernandez is more that of the "kindly Negro" favored in the 1950s by those professing to have no race prejudices. It's quite a comedown for Hernandez, who was wonderful, two or three years earlier, in his role as Lucas Beauchamp in the movie adaptation of Faulkner's "Intruder in the Dust." Hoagy Carmichael, who knew Bix Beiderbecke, does his usual shtik as the piano player who's been around. We see him at his piano, endlessly smoking. Another boring performance in the film.And then there's Doris Day--lovely and talented and delightful to see and hear. When she is on screen, this otherwise dumb movie just lights up.