1941 | 90 mins | Rated G
With Joel McCrea and Veronica Lake
Written and directed by Preston Sturges
Sullivan’s Travels is one of the most celebrated of American comedy-dramas from the Depression years (rated the rare 100% on the Rotten Tomatoes platform). To quote Time Out (London): “An irresistible tale of a Hollywood director, tired of making comedies and bent on branching out with an arthouse epic called O Brother, Where Art Thou?, who sets out to research the meaning of poverty. Suitably costumed as a hobo, he becomes to all intents and purposes a stateless person. … Sullivan’s Travels is a gem, an almost serious comedy not taken entirely seriously, with wonderful dialogue, eccentric characterisations, and superlative performances throughout”. An homage, using the same title as Sullivan’s film-within-the-film, was made by the Coen Brothers in 2000. Bosley Crowther in the New York Times in 1942 ranked Sullivan’s Travels as one of the year’s 10 best films and described it as “a beautifully trenchant satire … A truly brilliant serio-comedy … it crackles with extraordinary humor.”