Ace in the Hole

US 1951

Director Billy Wilder
Written by Billy Wilder, Lesser Samuels, Walter Newman
With Kirk Douglas, Jan Sterling, Bob Arthur, Porter Hall, Frank Cady, Richard Benedict

Produced, directed and co written by Billy Wilder in 1951, Ace in the Hole (also sometimes called the Big Carnival) is the story of a big city reporter (Kirk Douglas) who cynically exploits the plight of of a man trapped in a cave on the Navajo reservation in New Mexico.
Today reporters are generally portrayed in films as well-intentioned, saintly characters, and it's a great pleasure to see one here who's totally self serving. Of course, he's not alone in this: under Wilder's merciless pen and directorial baton, all the characters get taken to the cleaners. They're all making money or a reputation out of this - including the man who's trapped - because 'everybody likes a break'.
Wilder is the cinematic equivalent of Vladimir Nabokov. He's completely cynical, without sentimentality, without remorse, and he's as great a craftsman with film as Nabokov was with words. Everything about his films- this one, Some Like It Hot, The Apartment and, of course, Sunset Boulevard - is tuned to perfection. They are films with perfect symmetry.
It's not just that Wilder did everything himself - writing, producing and directing is enough - but he chose his collaborators with such skill that everywhere you look - at the acting, the editing, the art direction - and everything you hear (listen to the music) appears flawless. This is also the film that teaches you how to strike a match with a typewriter.