Awful
Worst Hawks film I've ever seen, stilted dialogue, the pits.
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He had a higher estimation of Johnny Guitar than I do as well. I love Marty, but he does get a bit carried away at times, IMO.
shareI find this film very enjoyable -- no classic, but well done and consistently fun and interesting. I'm also a huge fan of Howard Hawks, but I can think of several films he made that were a lot worse than this one: Monkey Business, Hatari, Man's Favorite Sport?, Red Line 7000, El Dorado, Rio Lobo, for starters. All derivitive, silly or with other issues, though they also have their fans. There are others from his early work as well I don't find as good. (I've never been a fan of Bringing Up Baby or I Was a Male War Bride, for example.) I guess it's all just a matter of personal preference.
shareIsn't there a rumor that Hawks directed the Thing from Another World?
shareMore than a rumor. Most of the cast of The Thing From Another World had no hesitation in stating that Hawks actually directed that film. Christian Nyby was on set and in effect either watched Hawks direct, or took direction (about how to direct) from Hawks.
Nyby was Hawks's longtime film editor and Hawks had promised him he'd give him a directing job one day. Somewhat uncharacteristically, Hawks kept his promise. In the early 50s he made a deal with RKO, which called for him to make three pictures, two as director-producer and one as producer only. (In the end, Hawks made only two films for RKO, this and The Big Sky.) Hawks allowed Nyby to take the credit as director of The Thing, mainly so that Nyby could get his card with the Director's Guild, but in fact he directed virtually all of it himself. His contract with the studio allocated around $125,000 to be paid to Hawks, out of which he was to pay both himself as producer and Nyby as "director"; it was left to Hawks to decide how to split it. I don't recall the precise figures, but Hawks took about $120,000 and gave Nyby about $5000...another indication of who actually did what.
Neither Nyby nor Hawks was ever straightforward about who directed the film. Nyby said things like, "You don't take over from the master" and Hawks acknowledged that Nyby asked him for help the first day and Hawks stepped in to aid him by "suggesting" how to shoot the scenes. Even so, in later years Nyby was always extremely defensive about his one claim to fame. But all anyone who knows both men's work has to do is look at the film: it was plainly and obviously Hawks's, with every trademark of Hawks's direction clearly evident. By contrast, Nyby directed only four more scattered films (plus a lot of TV), none memorable and none remotely showing the directorial traits evident in The Thing From Another World. The film itself is proof of who directed it. Still, while Hawks never completely denied directing The Thing, he did remain loyal to Nyby to the extent of never explicitly acknowledging that he had in fact directed it himself.