Young Man with a Horn (1950)

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

This is based on the life of Bix Beiderbecke. It was one of my Great Grand dad's books I read the summer I turned 13. Loved it! This movie is a pale shadow. Smoke , in the book , is black. He is also Rick's best friend since boyhood. This not treated as an aberration. There was no smarmy songstress. The character of Amy had a phi beta kappa key. But they just wanted her to be a stereotype rich, bored socialite . They wanted a "good girl/bad girl " dichotomy ". Ladies who sang with bands were not virginal and demure. Not an indictment , just a fact. And , of course, Rick and Bix died of alcoholism . The novel is brilliant. Poor Rick. Poor Bix. Mediocre movie.

I grew up in the 80s loving jazz and swing. I still do. I've never cared much for rock. Sometimes looking at the schedules for cable arts channels and music channels full of documentaries about the history of rock and great rock performers I wish there was as much attention paid to jazz performers. "Young Man with a Horn" captures its era with its portrayal of large working bands, the promotion of star singers, and the band members longing to play the jazz and bebop they love rather than marketable dance music. When I watched it last night on TCM here in the UK I thought about how much has changed since it was made. There's little live music now in pubs and clubs compared to back then, no large dance halls. My father said he loved the 50s when they had pretty girls singing songs in pretty dresses like Doris Day. Today women performers can't just be girls in pretty dresses- so many of them are pressured to sell their music through exploiting their sexual appeal."Young Man with a Horn" - or "Young Man of Music"- (I always think of it with its original title) doesn't flinch from showing the dark side of the musicians' lives. Kirk Douglas' character is often broke, has to live in flop house accommodation, and work in seedy strip joints. He is frequently on the move from one town to another, harassed by gangsters. There is a tension in some movies about musicians that choosing to make a life playing music will lead a person to being without a family, like Art Hazzard expresses to the young Rick Martin. My father is a professional pianist. He saw this movie was as a parable about how wanting to play music that is different not appreciated by the general public will lead to being outcast and alienated. (For him "Round Midnight" had the same message). I don't see that. Kirk Douglas' character is fired from jobs for wanting to play his way, but his self destruction isn't caused by his search for the ideal high note that eludes him, as Hoagy Carmichael's narration says. It's triggered by rejection from Amy, the high society girl who marries him because she wants to be a person with a great gift like his talent for music.The ending's been criticized as a corny cop out, especially since Doris Day, Hollywood's perennial good girl, stands by Rick at the end. Watching the movie again I didn't see it as a contrived tacked on happy ending. It shows him finding his way to a life where he could accept himself, was appreciated by others, and could express himself through his craft. "Young Man with a Horn" is a love letter to jazz musicians, both the stars who gained recognition for a while like Art Hazard and the players who never received a share of the spotlight.

Kirk Douglas is a "Young Man with a Horn" in this 1950 film that supposedly is based on the life of Bix Biederbeck. It is highly fictionalized, and while very good for what it is, it doesn't really tell us much about Bix or jazz, though Harry James on the trumpet dubbing for Douglas is fantastic. The film also stars Hoagy Carmichael (who narrates as well), Doris Day as a band singer, and Lauren Bacall as the woman that Douglas falls for.Douglas is Rick Martin. As a child, he is sent to live with his sister, who ignores him, so that Rick is off on his own most of the time. He discovers music and becomes interested in the trumpet. He turns out to be supremely gifted and ends up connected to the great jazz trumpet player of the day, Art Hazzard (Juano Hernandez) who teaches and mentors him. Rick becomes famous and respected, and all goes well until he falls madly in love with a psychiatric student Amy North (Bacall) though a better choice for him might be the understanding band singer (Doris Day). Once in love with Amy, Rick loses his focus.I really enjoyed this film but I had a few problems with it. First of all, what year was this supposed to be set in? Before jazz, there was dixieland and the predominant black influence, yet we don't really see Rick listening to dixieland or becoming involved with it. The jazz in the film is the big band jazz that my dad listened to.Secondly, and here is the real problem, is the script. This purports to be the story of a man who is so emotionally damaged and so isolated and torn up inside that he can only express himself through the trumpet. Anyone get the impression that Kirk Douglas could only express himself through the trumpet? He seemed pretty chatty, charming, in touch with his anger, and passionate to me. I'm not blaming Douglas. He gives a terrific, honest performance of the script he was given. But the situations and dialogue have nothing to do with how the character is actually described in the film. Had the script been more reflective of the character, an actor who was more in his own head could have been cast - actually, someone like Montgomery Clift. Or don't describe him that way in the narration and in everyone's lines.A final word on probably the best performance in the film, that of Juano Hernandez as Art Hazzard. Hernandez is underrated and a footnote in Hollywood history, but a darned important one - his work paved the way for actors like Sidney Poitier. Here he gives a dignified, strong performance. A wonderful actor well worth seeking out in other roles.Doris Day is lovely and sings like an angel; Lauren Bacall, in an unusual role for her, does a good job as a cold woman who, in modern sensibility anyway, seems like she may have been gay. She doesn't like her husband touching her and she's ready to go to Europe with some woman she just met, so you tell me. The easygoing Hoagy Carmichael adds his smooth style to the proceedings.The music is heavenly in this film, and the story is interesting with excellent performances. In spite of some of my misgivings, this is well worth seeing.

***SPOILERS*** We get the story of confused and wayward trumpeter Rick Martin, Kirk Douglas, straight from the horses mouth Rick's good friend and pianist Willie "Smoke" Willoughby,Hoagy Carmichael. It was Willie who witnessed as well as suffered through Rick's greatest and worst moments in the movie. By the time Willie starts talking, at the start of the film, were not quite sure that by the time he finishes his monologue that Rick would be either alive or dead to hear it!As well soon see Rick Martin was in love with music and the music of his choice was jazz. Blowing up a storm with his trumpet Rick made heads turn not in how good he played his trumpet but how he put a little bit of heart & soul into it that most true and traditional music lovers found to be almost blasphemous! It was his good friend and mentor jazz trumpeter Nat Hazzred Juano Hernandez, who took a young Rick under his wing and taught him everything that he knew about playing the trumpet. In the end Rick, who was too into himself to care about anyone else, turned his back on an old and sickly Nat that had the old guy aimlessly walk into a major thoroughfare in midtown Manhattan and end up getting himself killed!What really shook Rick up was his strange attraction to collage psychology student Amy North, Lauren Bacall, whom he ended up marrying. Amy a closet lesbian was not in love with Rick but only interested in his success in the music world and wanted some of it to rub off on her! When Martin found out that Amy was having an affair behind his back not with another man but woman young art student Miss.Carson, Katherine Krasch,he completely flipped out! By then Rick's music career was already on the skids in him alway doing it, playing his trumpet, his way or no way at all. But in the fact that he was dumped by Amy for another woman was just too much for Rick to take!***SPOILERS*** It was Amy's friend who in fact introduced her to him band singer Jo Jordan, Doris Day, together with Willie who came to Rick's rescue when he was on both life support and in the drunk tank at Bellevue Hospital. Looking as if he was on his deathbed Rick managed to pull himself together and finally get off the sauce,liquor, and went back to playing his trumpet that he in a drunken stupor had earlier discarded. As the movie ends we see Rick, as a member of the band, belting away with his trumpet and hitting the both high and low notes as band singer Jo Jordan or Doris Day sings a sweet and beautiful rendition of "With a song in my heart".P.S "Young Man with a Horn" is one of the few if not only movies, that I can think of, made over 60 years ago that still has it's top or leading actors-Kirk Douglas Lauren Bacall & Doris Day-still alive with us today!