The Fortune Cookie [Blu-ray]

Director: Billy Wilder Billy Wilder

Overview

The British title of Billy Wilder's classic comedy was Meet Whiplash Willie -- for, despite Jack Lemmon's star billing, the movie's driving force is Oscar-winning Walter Matthau as gloriously underhanded lawyer "Whiplash" Willie Gingrich. CBS cameraman Harry Hinkle (Lemmon) is injured when he is accidentally bulldozed by football player Luther "Boom Boom" Jackson (Ron Rich) during a Cleveland Browns game. Willie, Harry's brother-in-law, foresees an insurance-settlement bonanza, and he convinces Harry to pretend to be incapacitated by the accident. To insure his client's cooperation, Willie arranges for Harry's covetous ex-wife Sandy (Judi West) to feign a rekindling of their romance. Harry's conscience is plagued by the solicitous behavior of Boom Boom, who is so devastated at causing Harry's injury that he insists on waiting on the "cripple" hand and foot. Meanwhile, dishevelled private eye Purkey (Cliff Osmond) keeps Harry under constant surveillance, hoping to catch him moving around so the insurance company can avoid shelling out a fortune. Wilder and usual co-writer I.A.L. Diamond were at their most jaundiced and cynical here, even if, after a sardonic semiclimax, the last ten minutes succumb to the sentimentality that often marred Wilder's later movies.

Product Details

Release Date:	08/17/2021
UPC:	0738329254858
Original Release:	1966
Rating:	NR
Source:	Kl Studio Classics
Language:	English
Time:	2:05:00
Sales rank:	3,290

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Walter Matthau	Willie Gingrich
Jack Lemmon	Harry Hinkle
Ron Rich	Luther "Boom-Boom" Jackson
Judi West	Sandy Hinkle
Cliff Osmond	Mr. Purkey
Lurene Tuttle	Mother Hinkle
Harry Holcombe	O'Brien
Les Tremayne	Thompson
Marge Redmond	Charlotte Gingrich
Noam Pitlik	Max
Harry Davis	Dr. Krugman
Ann Shoemaker	Sister Veronica
Maryesther Denver	Nurse
Lauren Gilbert	Kincaid
Ned Glass	Doc Schindler
Archie Moore	Mr. Jackson
Dody Heath	Nun
Herbie Faye	Maury
Howard McNear	Mr. Cimoli
Bill Christopher	Intern,Intern
Bartlett Robinson	Specialist
Robert Lieb	Specialist
Martin Blaine	Specialist
Ben Wright	Specialist
Billy Beck	Locker Room Assistant
Judy Pace	Elvira
Helen Kleeb	Receptionist
Lisa Jill	Ginger
John Todd Roberts	Jeffrey
Keith Jackson	Football Announcer
Herb Ellis	TV Director
Don Reed	Newscaster
Louise Vienna	Girl in Teleblurb
Robert DoQui	Man in Bar
Jon Silo	Tailor
Sig Ruman	Professor Winterhalter
André Previn	Composer

Technical Credits

Billy Wilder

I.A.L. Diamond

Billy Wilder	Director,Producer,Screenwriter
Sass Bedig	Special Effects
I.A.L. Diamond	Screenwriter
Lynn Stalmaster	Casting
Robert Martin	Sound/Sound Designer

Editorial Reviews

Notable for contriving the first -- and one of the best -- pairings of Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon, this acerbic, late-career Billy Wilder gem marries his penchant for hand-wringing morality plays with a dark, melancholy tone reminiscent of his glum masterpiece The Apartment, made six years earlier. The Fortune Cookie actually benefits from having a villain not quite as insidious as Fred MacMurray's J.D. Sheldrake: Matthau's affable shyster Willie Gingrich. Despite his unrepentant opportunism, Gingrich serves as a benevolent life force: If not for his less-than-airtight scam, Lemmon's Harry Hinckle would never be forced to own up to the havoc that only a meek wallflower like himself could create -- almost by default. The supporting cast is no less splendid, with the under-worked Judi West making a sly turn as the alternately world-weary and kittenish ex-wife who sees Hinckle as a renewed meal ticket, and the subdued Ron Rich as the impossibly selfless football star whose generosity almost does him in -- financially as well as professionally. Wilder's career was made up of films that heartbreakingly detailed the intersection of guilt and guile, and, in its own unassuming way, The Fortune Cookie is no exception.

All Movie Guide - Michael Hastings