Legendary filmmaker Preston Sturges, the writer/director of The Great McGinty, Christmas in July, The Lady Eve and Sullivan’s Travels, turns to a more serious subject matter focusing on one of the great medical discoveries in modern history. The Great Moment takes inspiration from the true-life story of Dr. William Morton (Joel McCrea, Union Pacific, The Palm Beach Story), a dedicated dentist who discovers ether, otherwise known as anesthesia, in 1846. The doctor’s great contribution to humanity, the tribulations he later faced sharing his knowledge, and his reluctance to capitalize on his discovery, are meticulously laced with typical Preston Sturges humor and drama. The stellar cast includes Betty Field (The Shepherd of the Hills), Harry Carey (The Spoilers), William Demarest (Easy Living), Franklin Pangborn (The Bank Dick) and Porter Hall (Murder, He Says).
For thoughts on The Great Moment, please check out our discussion on The Video Attic here.
Video Quality
The Great Moment makes its Blu-Ray debut thanks to Kino Classics with a brand new 1080p master that looks fantastic despite not being advertised from a 2K or 4K scan. While the occasional speck pops up, the film is largely free of any blemishes which allows it to look the best it ever has. The black-and-white photography shot by Victor Milner wows in high definition with natural grain intact. There are not very many moments where anything appears clumpy or unnatural. There is a pleasing amount of detail present with nice textures on the clothing and within the production design. The transfer shows off a great amount of depth and enhanced detail within the film’s composition. Black levels are very deep with no noticeable occurrences of black crush or compression artifacts. The contrast is well defined, and the track only experiences a minor amount of density fluctuation in the print. Kino Classics has done some marvelous work here.
Audio Quality
The Blu-Ray comes with a pretty decent DTS-HD 2.0 Master Audio track that serves this movie well for what it is trying to accomplish. This track does present a minor amount of age related wear and tear including some faint hissing that likely date back to the source elements. Dialogue and background noises are represented in pleasing harmony with all competing elements. The music never overpowers the dialogue or other important information, but it does sound a little fragile at its highest peaks. There are optional English (SDH) subtitles included for the feature film. The good folks at Kino Classics have done their best to provide the most stable track possible for this one.
Special Features
- Triumph Over Pain – A Celebration of Preston Sturges: A nearly 39-minute conversation between Preston Sturges’ Son Tom Sturges, Acclaimed Filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich and Documentary Filmmaker Constantine Nasr. This is a really great piece for film fans as they discuss the film’s troubled production, how Sturges felt about the film, the career of Preston Sturges, how he fits in alongside his contemporaries, the popularization of writer-directors, finding the balance of tragedy and comedy, and more.
- Great Without Glory – Introduction By Film Historian Constantine Nasr: A 14-minute audio introduction from Nasr in which he begins by reading a passage from Preston Sturges before exploring the feature in greater detail. In this piece, the historian talks about how this feature fits into the career of Sturges, how the finished film compares to the original vision, the complicated release history and butchering of the film and more.
- Trailers: The two-minute trailer for The Great Moment is provided here. There are also trailers provided for The Great McGinty, Christmas In July, Union Pacific, The Great Man’s Lady, The Virginian and The Shepherd of the Hills.
Final Thoughts
The Great Moment is overall an enjoyable film which tells the story of a very important person who changed modern medicine as we know it today. That being said, there is no doubt it could have been another Preston Sturges classic if it had not been taken away from him and completely decimated by the studio. As it stands, the film falls on the lower-end of his output which is still good entertainment thanks to his prowess behind the camera. Kino Classics has released a Blu-Ray featuring an A/V presentation that more than gets the job done and a few really great special features. If you are a fan of Preston Sturges or just curious about the story, it is still worth checking out. Recommended
The Great Moment is currently available to purchase on Blu-Ray.
Note: Images presented in this review are not reflective of the image quality of the Blu-Ray.
Disclaimer: Kino Classics has supplied a copy of this disc free of charge for review purposes. All opinions in this review are the honest reactions of the author.
Dillon is most comfortable sitting around in a theatre all day watching both big budget and independent movies.
