What qualities make a powerful movie comedy?
Humor in Billy Wilder’s One, Two, Three
A good film comedy needs more than just funny lines and humorous situations to work well from beginning to end. Although comedy is relative to each and every person, there are some sure-fire techniques to guarantee the most possible laughs from an audience. In his 1961 film One, Two, Three, director Billy Wilder ambitiously uses four techniques to heighten the level of comedy.
The one aspect to the film that not only leaves the viewer breathless from laughing by the end but also makes its unique blend of comedy really stand out is the fast-paced dialogue. It is rare for one to have to watch a comedy a second time because there may have been funny lines of dialogue he or she missed the first time around, but in the case of One, Two, Three, second viewing is practically a requirement due to the wealth of information given in dialogue.
Wilder has all of the actors — James Cagney to the greatest extent — say their lines as if they are in a rush to finish each conversation so that they can move on to the next problematic situation. It feels in the beginning that Wilder is trying to cram a 180-page screenplay into a two-hour movie. However, the intensity and speed of the dialogue eventually becomes the charm of the film. Uproarious lines of dialogue are…