FILM RUN DOWN –
May 29, 2026 – Charles Jackson’s most famous novel, The Lost Weekend (1944), is emblematic of this changing landscape of alcohol-forward literature. Billy Wilder’s film adaptation in (1945) scrutinizes and sympathizes with people suffering from alcoholism. Ray Milland is phenomenal as the alcoholic. He speaks eloquently of his own depravity…describing the water underneath glass cups as “vicious circles,” and characterizing his alcoholism as having “no end, no beginning.” Milland glides through the film with a magnetizing force, something like a proto-1970s Al Pacino; his mannerisms have a kitchen sink realism that makes one think, “I know someone like Don Birnam,” or, “I know someone who knows someone like that.” Contemporary critics were quick to note the power of Milland’s performance. André Bazin wrote in L’Écran français:
“The difficulty of the leading role resides in the subtlety, even ambiguity, of the figure that Ray Milland so admirably embodies. It is rare to witness such an identification of the actor and his character. A Cary Grant or a Gary Cooper in America, a Jean Gabin in France, always more or less absorbs the character he plays into his star persona. But because we know little of Ray Milland at this point, it is not possible to say whether he is really like Don Birnam, whether Don Birnam is like him, or if there is no resemblance between the two at all. Commanding the screen uninterrupted for nearly two hours, Milland manages to sustain with consistent probability a role of acrobatic difficulty, so much so that the viewer experiences the chimerical impression of familiarity with an actor he otherwise does not know.”
