The Iceman Cometh (1973 film)

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The Iceman Cometh
Poster of the movie The Iceman Cometh.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by John Frankenheimer
Screenplay by Eugene O'Neill
Thomas Quinn Curtiss [a]
Based on The Iceman Cometh
(1946 play)
by Eugene O'Neill
Produced by Ely Landau
Starring Lee Marvin
Fredric March
Robert Ryan
Jeff Bridges
Bradford Dillman
CinematographyRalph Woolsey
Edited by Harold F. Kress
Production
company
Distributed by American Film Theatre
Release date
  • October 29, 1973 (1973-10-29) [1]
Running time
178 minutes (theatrical)
239 minutes (director's cut)
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$800,000 [2]

The Iceman Cometh is a 1973 American drama film directed by John Frankenheimer, based on the 1946 play by Eugene O'Neill. The film was produced by Ely Landau for the American Film Theatre, which from 1973 to 1975 presented 13 film adaptations of noted plays. [3] The principal cast stars Lee Marvin, Fredric March, Robert Ryan, Jeff Bridges, and Bradford Dillman, with supporting roles played by Sorrell Booke, Martyn Green, Moses Gunn, Clifton James, Tom Pedi, and George Voskovec.

Contents

The film was screened at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival, but it wasn't entered into the main competition. [4] It received positive reviews from critics, who praised both the performances and the film's faithfulness to its source material. Frankenheimer considered it his best work as a director. [5]

This was the last film for both Ryan and March. March developed prostate cancer in 1970, causing him to retire from acting. Ryan died before the film's release. Ryan posthumously won the National Board of Review Award for Best Actor for his performance.

Plot

The film follows a group of regulars at Harry Hope's bar and boarding house. All are satisfied with their present drunken state. Each are anticipating the arrival of a salesman named Hickey who has subsidized their pipe dreams, and each year celebrated owner Harry Hope's birthday. But when Hickey arrives, he proclaims their dreams the enemy and begins to preach a better, sober life in the name of friendship. At first the regulars reject their delusions, but in the end reject Hickey, who eventually admits he murdered his wife. After Hickey is taken away by the authorities, the regulars label him insane rather than deal with their own weaknesses and return to their previous lives.

Cast

Casting notes:

Several of the cast had previous experience with O'Neill. Tom Pedi (Rocky) originated the role 1946 New York stage production and reprised it in the 1960 television version. [6] Sorrell Booke (Hugo) played the same role in the 1960 version. [6]

Bradford Dillman and Robert Ryan had both starred in productions of Long Day's Journey into Night, Dillman in the 1956 Broadway premiere [7] and Ryan in a 1971 Off-Broadway revival. [8]

Production

Development

Ely Landau had began developing adaptation of Eugene O'Neill's play had been in development since the early 1960s. [6] After the success of 1962's Long Day's Journey into Night, directed by Sidney Lumet, Landau announced a film directed by Lumet and starring Rod Steiger. [6] However, both dropped out before production began.

John Frankenheimer came aboard in 1972. Much like Lumet, Frankenheimer called upon his experience directing live television broadcasts when conducting rehearsals, and shot the entire film in-sequence. [6]

Writing

Rather than write a new screenplay for the film, Frankenheimer intended to do a direct adaptation of the stage text, without major revisions or alterations. O'Neill historian and theatre critic Thomas Quinn Curtiss was hired as a "text editor" (rather than a screenwriter), with Edward Anhalt as a "story consultant." [6] Nonetheless, in order to fit the typically four-hour-play into a cinematic runtime, dialogue was trimmed for time, and the character of Ed Mosher was excised entirely, with his lines given to other characters. [6]

According to Frankenheimer, he and Curtiss initially trimmed 75 minutes from the text, but these were re-incorporated into the script during rehearsals. [6]

Casting

Both Marlon Brando and Gene Hackman were approached to play Hickey. [6]

Fredric March came out retirement to play Harry Hope. He initially declined, since the shooting schedule overlapped with prostate surgery, but Frankenheimer convinced the producers to delay filming by several months until after March recovered. [6]

Ryan was terminally ill with lung cancer while shooting, this would prove his final film role, as well as March's

Filming

Filming took place at the 20th Century Fox studio lot in Century City. [6]

Frankenheimer later said:

It was a marvelous movie – up til now (1974) my best experience. We were like a repertory company; we never wanted it to end. I tried to show Hickey as sane and not the way I've seen him interpreted, as insane. I think you have to live your life without illusions, not with them. Pauline Kael said in her review that you only have to look at photos of O'Neill to see this was a face with no illusions. [5]

Editing

The final theatrical runtime ended up being 2 hours and 58 minutes. The director's cut of the film, running 3 hours and 59 minutes, has two intermissions. Frankenheimer said:

We found the most difficult thing was to cut it. We cut 1 hour and 20 minutes out of the original, but by the time we'd finished it we'd put back in an hour. [5]

Release

Home media

Both the 178 minute theatrical cut and the 239 minute director's cut were released on Blu-ray in 2019 by Kino Lorber as a 2K restoration. However, the director's cut reportedly had to be cobbled together from another print, as the extra scenes are of much worse quality than the theatrical footage. [9]

Reception

Critical response

Roger Ebert gave the film his highest possible grade of four stars and wrote: "The play was clearly too difficult to be done as an ordinary commercial movie, but now it has been preserved, with a series of brilliant performances and a virtuoso directing achievement, in what has to be a definitive film version." [10] Ebert ranked The Iceman Cometh fifth on his year-end list of the best films of 1973. [11]

Vincent Canby of The New York Times wrote in a less enthusiastic review that while watching the film "you get the feeling that you're being taken on a guided tour of one of the greatest American plays ever written, instead of seeing a screen adaptation with a life of its own." [12]

Variety declared: "The excellence of the cast alone, and the fame of the work and its author make this filmed stage play worth the ticket ... It requires stamina, of course, to sit through four hours, but the experience is very special." [13]

Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune awarded three-and-a-half stars out of four and stated: "The pleasures of this great play are so many and so strong that this frequently ordinary rendering of it on film leaves its power virtually undiminished." [14]

Charles Champlin of the Los Angeles Times wrote: "'No play is too long that holds the interest of its audience,' Eugene O'Neill once told an interviewer ... Even with editing, John Frankenheimer's filmed version of the play runs four hours plus two intermissions. But O'Neill was right and the film, like the play, holds its commanding grip on the viewer over the whole distance." [15]

Pauline Kael of The New Yorker wrote that the play "has been given a straightforward, faithful production in handsome dark-toned color" that "Frankenheimer directed fluently and unobtrusively, without destroying the conventions of the play." [16]

The film holds a score of 91% on Rotten Tomatoes based on nine reviews. [17]

Awards and nominations

InstitutionYearCategoryNomineeResult
Kansas City Film Critics Circle 1973Best Supporting Actor Robert Ryan Won
(posthumously)
National Board of Review 1973 Best Actor Won [b]
(posthumously)
National Society of Film Critics 1974 Best Actor 2nd place
(posthumously)
Special AwardWon
(posthumously)

See also

References

  1. ↑ "The Iceman Cometh – Details". AFI Catalog of Feature Films . American Film Institute . Retrieved May 28, 2019.
  2. ↑ Kilday, Gregg (October 21, 1973). "Movies: Frankenheirmer's "Iceman': Another Chance for U.S.". Los Angeles Times . p. q23. ProQuest   157474126.
  3. ↑ Benson, Raymond (April 16, 2009). "Remember...The American Film Theater". Cinema Retro . Archived from the original on June 1, 2013.
  4. ↑ "Festival de Cannes: The Iceman Cometh". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved May 10, 2009.
  5. 1 2 3 Blume, Mary (September 1, 1974). "Fathering a 'Connection' Offspring". Los Angeles Times. p. m20.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 "The Iceman Cometh (1973)". AFI Catalog of Feature Films . Retrieved January 4, 2026.
  7. ↑ "Long Day's Journey Into Night – Broadway Play – Original | IBDB". www.ibdb.com. Retrieved January 4, 2026.
  8. ↑ "Robert Ryan". About the Artists. Retrieved January 4, 2026.
  9. ↑ The Iceman Cometh Blu-ray . Retrieved March 18, 2025– via www.blu-ray.com.
  10. ↑ Ebert, Roger (December 10, 1973). "The Iceman Cometh". RogerEbert.com . Retrieved May 28, 2019.
  11. ↑ Ebert, Roger (2006). Awake in the Dark: The Best of Roger Ebert . University of Chicago Press. p.  443. ISBN   9780226182018.
  12. ↑ Canby, Vincent (November 11, 1973). "The 'Iceman' Cometh Too Close". The New York Times. Section 2, p. 1.
  13. ↑ "Film Reviews: The Iceman Cometh". Variety . October 24, 1973. 16.
  14. ↑ Siskel, Gene (December 10, 1973). "Iceman Cometh". Chicago Tribune . Section 2, p. 27.
  15. ↑ Champlin, Charles (October 29, 1973). "'Iceman' Launches Unique Film Series". Los Angeles Times . Part IV, p. 1.
  16. ↑ Kael, Pauline (November 5, 1973). "The Current Cinema". The New Yorker . 149.
  17. ↑ "The Iceman Cometh". Rotten Tomatoes . Retrieved May 28, 2019.

Notes

  1. ↑ Credited as 'Text editor'.
  2. ↑ Tied with Al Pacino for Serpico .

Bibliography

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