Ace in the Hole (1951)

Directed by Billy Wilder. Starring Kirk Douglas, Jan Sterling, Richard Benedict, Robert Arthur, Porter Hall, Ray Teal, Lewis Martin, Frank Cady, Frances Dominguez, John Berkes, Harry Harvey.

Acidic harangue against the power of the press in unscrupulous hands was considered by many critics at the time of its release to be a mutilated distortion, but seen today after so much of the news media has become corporatized and driven by partisan rhetoric, it’s practically genteel (though no less cynical). Reporter Douglas, a real nasty piece of work, has been bounced from so many major newspaper jobs that he has to settle for cajoling the editor (Hall) of a small paper press in Albuquerque for work, eager to find the big story that can launch him back up to the big leagues. Said story arrives in the form of a poor man (Benedict) who gets trapped inside a collapsed cave, an event he can prolong and milk for all its worth, creating a (literal) circus of publicity. Douglas, in one of his best (and meanest) performances, is surrounded by a flock of idealistic fools and fellow moral deviants, including the victim’s heartless wife (Sterling) and a corrupt sheriff (Teal), and their vicious edge has lost none of its bite today. Marred by a few convenient contrivances and the Hays Code requirement that no one can get away clean (if only real life had such stipulations…), but otherwise a first-rate effort from Wilder, serving as producer in addition to director/co-writer for the first time in his career. Also released under the alternate title The Big Carnival.

86/100