John Frankenheimer commenced his career in the glory days of live television, working on such classic shows as Playhouse 90 with sharp screenwriters like Rod Serling.
Frankenheimer again teamed up with scribe Serling for the 1964 motion picture Seven Days in May. With the film now available in a DVD release, you can enjoy this black and white masterpiece in its original widescreen (1.85:1) glory, all the while enjoying Frankenheimer's informative, newly-added optional narration track.
As the director says on the voiceover track, black and white offers unique opportunities for creating a mood on film. This movie takes a no-nonsense visual approach, almost, at times, verging on a film-noir look. Without being melodramatic, Frankenheimer builds up an atmosphere of tension which works well with the plot of a weak president battling the takeover plans of a self-aggrandizing general.
Actually, it appears that Seven Days in May was influenced by 13 days in October, by which I mean October of 1962, the month of the Cuban missile crisis. In the voiceover track, Frankenheimer says the renegade general character was partly inspired by Kennedy nemesis and pro-bombing Air Force General Curtis "Bomber" LeMay.
Frankenheimer also says the movie is supposed to be set "in the future." While he uses a few foreign cars and then-newfangled gadgets such as videophones, he doesn't do quite as well making us feel the movie is at some point in time well past 1964 as he does in keeping up the taut narrative pacing.
However, by trying to make things look new, the director succeeds in painting a portrait of the cutting edge of modern life, circa 1964. It's amazing how many of the things which were quite new then are still staples of life in the 21st Century: jet travel, network video feeds, and nuclear war.
Take advantage of the DVD version of Seven Days in May to see this Frankenheimer classic, as the director intended, in all its black and white beauty. Oh yes, and don't forget you'll have an opportunity to work out your sound system with its Dolby Digital mono soundtrack. Yup. That's right. Dolby Digital 1.0.
The Coen Brothers must have seen this movie too. If you are familiar with the script of Fargo, you may notice an apparent reference it makes to Seven Days in May (hint: remember the name of the guy who keeps calling Jerry Lundegaard).
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