The Front
Directed by Martin Ritt
Written by Walter Bernstein
1976/US
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Howard Prince: What are you blacklisted for?
Alfred Miller: I’m a communist sympathizer.
Howard Prince: Well, you always were.
Alfred Miller: Well, it’s not so popular anymore.
This is an OK movie which was written, directed , and performed by artists targeted by the Hollywood blacklist.
Howard Prince (Woody Allen) is a uneducated nebbish who works as a cashier in a restaurant and is a small-time bookmaker. He is always in bad financial straits and unable to cover bets he loses. His brother is his main source of funds but is fed up with him. So Howard jumps at the chance when his childhood friend Alfred Miller (Michael Murphy), a genius TV scriptwriter who has been blacklisted, approaches him about serving as a front so he can continue to work. He will pay Howard 10% of his fees.
“Howard” is a huge success and attracts the affections of editor Florence Barrett who admires his “work”. They become an item. Howard offers to front for other writers and increases his commission. He begins living the high life. In the meantime, the star of the TV show he writes for, Hecky Brown (Zero Mostel), falls to the blacklist. Florence is incensed and quits her job to write an expose of blacklisting in the industry. Howard befriends Henky who now has to work for peanuts in the Catskills to earn income.
Howard is placed in an awkward position when he is asked to do last-minute rewrites on some of his scripts. Things get even more awkward when the HUAC comes after him and asks him to name names.
Woody Allen shows himself to be a competent dramatic actor in this and the script is good if not a bit simplistic. If you are interested in the period, it is worth watching.
Director Martin Ritt, writer Walter Bernsten, and actors Zero Mostel, Herschel Bernardi, Lloyd Gough, and Joshua Shelley were all victims of the Blacklist. This was Mostel’s last feature film.
The Front was nominated for the Best Original Screenplay Oscar.
