The Greatest Show On Earth (1952)

I became intrigued with 'The Greatest Show On Earth' for two reasons, firstly I'd heard that Jimmy Stewart played a Clown with a dark past (I've only ever seen him play nice guys) and secondly this is supposedly the film that made Steven Spielberg fall in love with cinema. Despite my quibbles with some aspects of Spielberg's films (which I won't go into here, but may if I watch them again), the man is obviously a very talented film maker and one of the most important filmmakers in recent history, so to see where he gets all his inspiration from (in the initial sense) would surely be a treat. Later research told me that the film had been awarded with the Oscar for Best Picture and Cecil B DeMille at the helm it promised to be a worthy spectacle.

Well the film is definitely epic in the way that you would expect a Cecil B DeMille film to be, scenes of the construction of a circus tent, and some of the acts are impressive in their scale, as is the train crash at the finale. However, much of the film fell flat for me. I must say that I have never been to the circus myself, so I don't know if it's lack of experience, or perhaps growing up in a different era, but when the audience seemed to be in hysterics or amazement at the scenes they were viewing I just didn't get it. The one area where my own reactions mirrored those of the on screen audience were during the trapeze acts, where, swinging without a net, higher risks were being taken as the two main trapeze artists competed for audiences attention. 

At two and a half hours long the film has numerous shots of similar looking situations during the acts, which whilst impressive on a technical level, I felt detracted from the film on occasion. The film worked best for me when operating on a human level. Even then though most of the characters seemed to be highly exaggerated versions of the people they were portraying, whether it was Charlton Heston's overly stern looking circus obsessed circus manager (I'm not really a Heston fan, and this film did little to warm me to his acting ability), or Cornel Wilde playing The Great Sebastian who was just a little too free with his heart, it all felt a little melodramatic for what it was. James Stewart, however, felt like a real person, he had emotions that I could make sense of, and actual motives for his actions.

This film is neither a total failure of success. It works on a cinematic level that it is larger than life and at the time bought spectacle many wouldn't have seen on screen before. It has aged badly though and feels more like a footnote in film history, an interesting experiment rather than a bonefide classic. It tries too much, and therefore falls short in most areas.