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Amazon.co.uk Review
"I'm not a drinker--I'm a drunk." These words, and the serious message behind them, were still potent enough in 1945 to shock audiences flocking to The Lost Weekend. The speaker is Don Birnam (Ray Milland), a handsome, talented, articulate alcoholic. The writing team of producer Charles Brackett and director Billy Wilder pull no punches in their depiction of Birnam's massive weekend bender, a tailspin that finds him reeling from his favorite watering hole to Bellevue Hospital. Location shooting in New York helps the street-level atmosphere, especially a sequence in which Birnam, a budding writer, tries to hock his typewriter for booze money. He desperately staggers past shuttered storefronts--it's Yom Kippur, and the pawnshops are closed. Milland, previously known as a lightweight leading man (he'd starred in Wilder's hilarious The Major and the Minor three years earlier), burrows convincingly under the skin of the character, whether waxing poetic about the escape of drinking or screaming his lungs out in the D.T.'s sequence. Wilder, having just made the ultra-noir Double Indemnity, brought a new kind of frankness and darkness to Hollywood's treatment of a social problem. At first the film may have seemed too bold; Paramount Pictures nearly killed the release of the picture after it tested poorly with preview audiences. But once in release, The Lost Weekend became a substantial hit, and won four Oscars: for picture, director, screenplay, and actor. --Robert Horton
Product Description
SYNOPSIS: Directed by Billy Wilder (Double Indemnity, Sunset Boulevard, Some Like It Hot), this gut-wrenching adaptation of Charles Jackson's The Lost Weekend horrified its studio, was rejected by test audiences, and was lobbied by temperance groups, yet went on to huge success and became the awards sensation of its year.
Ray Milland stars as Don Birnam, a New York author struggling with years of alcoholism and writer's block. Trying to keep him on the path to rehabilitation are his straight-laced brother Wick (Philip Terry) and devoted long-time girlfriend Helen (Jane Wyman). When Don absconds from a country excursion, he embarks on a four-day binge, spiralling towards rock bottom.
Winner of the Grand Prix at the first ever Cannes Film Festival, as well as Oscars for Best Picture, Director, Actor, and Screenplay, this brutal noir provided one of cinema's first in-depth studies of addiction. Crackling with rapier dialogue, vivid performances, and Wilder's superlative direction, The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present The Lost Weekend for the first time anywhere in the world on Blu-ray. Released in the UK in a standard edition & limited edition steelbook.
SPECIAL BLU-RAY FEATURES:
REVIEWS: "A scarifyingly grim and grimy account... Gripping." - Tom Milne, Time Out
"...ranks with the best and most disturbing character studies ever put on the screen. The Lost Weekend is truly a chef d'oeuvre of motion-picture art." - The New York Times
"Painfully sincere and uncompromising look at alcoholism ... with a superb central performance. " - Kim Newman, Empire
Ray Milland stars as Don Birnam, a New York author struggling with years of alcoholism and writer's block. Trying to keep him on the path to rehabilitation are his straight-laced brother Wick (Philip Terry) and devoted long-time girlfriend Helen (Jane Wyman). When Don absconds from a country excursion, he embarks on a four-day binge, spiralling towards rock bottom.
Winner of the Grand Prix at the first ever Cannes Film Festival, as well as Oscars for Best Picture, Director, Actor, and Screenplay, this brutal noir provided one of cinema's first in-depth studies of addiction. Crackling with rapier dialogue, vivid performances, and Wilder's superlative direction, The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present The Lost Weekend for the first time anywhere in the world on Blu-ray. Released in the UK in a standard edition & limited edition steelbook.
SPECIAL BLU-RAY FEATURES:
- New high-definition master, officially licensed from Universal Pictures
- Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hearing impaired
- Exclusive new video introduction by director Alex Cox
- The 1946 Screen Guild Theater radio adaptation of The Lost Weekend starring Ray Milland, Jane Wyman, and Frankie Faylen
- The original theatrical trailer
- PLUS: A booklet featuring rare archival imagery, and more!
REVIEWS: "A scarifyingly grim and grimy account... Gripping." - Tom Milne, Time Out
"...ranks with the best and most disturbing character studies ever put on the screen. The Lost Weekend is truly a chef d'oeuvre of motion-picture art." - The New York Times
"Painfully sincere and uncompromising look at alcoholism ... with a superb central performance. " - Kim Newman, Empire
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
30 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Gritty and great,
By
This review is from: The Lost Weekend [DVD] (DVD)
This should be in everyone's list of the greatest films ever made. It profiles the slow descent of an alcoholic into an internal hell- it doesn't show the final moments of such a descent but lets us and him see where the story might end. It offers some hope but not much. Its wonderful particularly because of its insight into the psychology of its characters. The main character, Don, knows he is an alcoholic, understands it is a problem but can't get away from the thrill of it, he wants to but can't break out of it. His mornings and Sundays are consumed by guilt, the rest of the time he cadges, steals and begs money for drinks from others. His brother and girlfriend, his barman and a local whore stand by watching his descent into torture, trying to persuade him that there is something worth saving there. You can see especially in his brother and girlfriend's eyes the expression of mingled incomprehension and love that close friends feel for those going through these experiences- incomprehension that somebody like Don with so much to live for could think they have nothing and love for Don. In a strange way by the end of the film, we who begin the film understanding his point of view- the endless quest for a drink- understand theirs too and Wilder takes us to a place that no other film about addiction has ever taken me where we sympathise with the addicted victim and yet still more with those he damages by his addiction. This is a great film- if you haven't seen it watch it now.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Gritty portrayal of life as an alcoholic till holds up,
By
This review is from: The Lost Weekend [DVD] (DVD)
Ray Milland delivers his finest performance in this 1945 drama. Even over 60 years later, it remains believable, tense and hard-hitting. A must for all Jane Wyman fans, too.
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Movies to see before you die!,
By
This review is from: The Lost Weekend [DVD] (DVD)
Alcoholism is a disease, and no other film before Billy Wilder's The Lost Weekend portrayed it as such. Like Trainspotting, that was to come along fifty years later, people were up in arms when this film came out, saying that it would encourage people to drink. The desperate journey that Don Birnam goes on throughout this film certainly would not encourage anyone to drink. Yeah, it may feel good for a fleeting moment, but it is a false and transient feeling. It is a feeling that you may crave, but how far are you willing to go get it? In The Lost Weekend, we discover exactly how far Birnam is willing to go to get his fix, resorting to petty theft and selling his typewriter, which, since he's a writer, is essential for him to earn any sort of income. Wilder again makes it clear that he does not want to tell stories of the American Dream but stories of how far this dream can go wrong when human frailty comes into play.
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