Quartile rating: 7.5/10 · 1 rating
Walter Burns is an irresistibly conniving newspaper publisher desperate to woo back his paper’s star reporter, who also happens to be his estranged wife. She’s threatening to quit and settle down with a new beau, but, as Walter knows, she has a weakness: she can’t resist a juicy scoop.
His Girl Friday is a landmark screwball comedy celebrated above all for its breakneck overlapping dialogue delivery — a genuinely novel technique that set it apart from virtually every other film of its era and remains distinctive today. Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell deliver performances of extraordinary comic precision, earning a well-above-average acting score. The plot, adapted from The Front Page, is witty and well-constructed but ultimately a theatrical adaptation with a fairly conventional remarriage-comedy arc, landing above average but not exceptional. Howard Hawks shoots efficiently and inventively in tight interior spaces, but the cinematography is functional rather than visually ambitious — serviceable black-and-white newsroom photography that doesn't aspire to artistry. The ending resolves satisfyingly within genre expectations but offers no great surprise or resonance beyond the formula.