Movies - The Front

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	Movies - The Front

The Front is a 1976 film directed by Martin Ritt and starring Woody Allen and Zero Mostel. The film presented one perspective of the United States entertainment industry in the days of McCarthyism when many actors were blacklisted for their supposed "subversive" activities following an investigation by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. The screenplay was written by Walter Bernstein, himself a victim of the Hollywood blacklist, as was Ritt and cast members Mostel and Herschel Bernardi. Walter Bernstein was blacklisted after his name was listed in the “Red Channels,” which was a journal put out by the FBI that listed names of Communists or Communist sympathizers.

In the film, Woody Allen plays a small-time bookie who lends his name to the writings of his blacklisted friend, a tactic used by several of the Hollywood Ten. Possibly to protect itself, the film concerned blacklisting in the television and nightclub industries rather than the movies; surprising since the credits listed half-a-dozen Hollywood artists who had suffered through the blacklist. The Front takes place in the early 1950’s in New York. Howard Prince (Woody Allen) works as a cashier in a restaurant and also works as a bookie for some extra money. A friend of his, Alfred Miller (Michael Murphy) is a screenwriter who has been blacklisted and is out of work. Miller approaches Howard and proposes that he becomes a front and places his own name on scripts to present to a television station. Howard is presented as a man without political interests in need of money so he immediately agrees to help Miller. As Prince becomes more of a success in the television world of the fifties, Miller’s other friends use him as a front as well. The film also depicts the tragic demise of Hecky Brown (Zero Mostel) a well established actor and comedian who is blacklisted and left with no money and no respect in the entertainment industry. As Howard witnesses the terrible actions of the “Freedom Information Services” and is bombarded with the harsh realities of his friends who must live in secrecy for their past and at times present involvement with leftist political groups, Howard himself is put to the test. He must go in front of the “Freedom Information Services” committee and name names and the audience witnesses Howard’s valiant response to the commitee’s insulting mental tortures.

Walter Bernstein was nominated for the 1977 Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay and Zero Mostel was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Beginning in 1947, the House Committee on Unamerican Activities (HUAC) began official investigations on the penetration of the Communist Party of the United States into the film industry in Hollywood. These investigations were comprised of major hearings in 1947 and 1951, along with numerous smaller hearings throughout the fifties and continual harassment by the FBI of actors, directors, and writers. The most infamous group of those denounced became known as the Hollywood Ten; they were the original group of “unfriendly” witnesses who did not provide political information about themselves to the Committee. It is important to note that HUAC not only targeted members of the communist party, but also socialists, radical leftists and anyone who had been involved in some way or another with a political group that spoke against those in power at the time.

Response From Critics

Much critical response to "The Front" was mixed between those who felt that the film effectively dealt with the political topic at hand, and those who felt that it glossed over its potential to make a strong statement about the McCarthy era. In his 1976 review for the New York Times, Vincent Canby acknowledged the movie’s lack of intense political commentary. He wrote, “"The Front" is not the whole story of an especially unpleasant piece of American history. It may be faulted for oversimplification. Mr. Ritt and Mr. Bernstein, both veterans of the blacklist, are not interested in subtleties. Yet even in its comic moments "The Front" works on the conscience. It recreates the awful noise of ignorance that can still be heard” (Canby,1976). Canby felt that while the film may not directly attack or address the political era, it still managed to get its message across - the message, it seems, being not to rat people out. Furthermore, Canby emphasized that the film managed to encourage the audience to understand the emotional effects of blacklisting and finger-pointing through its concentration on single characters’ experiences. On the other hand, Roger Ebert, in his 1976 review of the film, dismissed the political value of "The Front", stating instead that “What we get are the adventures of a schlemiel in wonderland”. Ebert felt that Woody Allen’s character was too comedic and unconvincing as a writer to really represent the true nature of “front” writers. Ebert wrote that it would be unrealistic to think that Howard Prince could ever be taken seriously as a writer by those in the television industry. However, Ebert did write that the Hecky Brown character was a worthwhile element of the film - “The tragedy implied by this character tells us what we need to know about the blacklist's effect on people's lives; the rest of the movie adds almost nothing else” (Ebert, 1976).

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