review for Ceiling Zero on AllMovie

Ceiling Zero is a film that only Howard Hawks could have made. Though it's based, and apparently quite faithfully, on a play by Frank Wead, the whole set-up has an unmistakable Hawks-ian feel to it. First, there's the eternal male camaraderie thing, with its spoken and unspoken codes of conduct. There's the importance of honesty and maturity. And there's a rapid-fire delivery to much of the dialogue that could only come from the man who helmed His Girl Friday. Indeed, the first half of Ceiling feels like a dry run for Friday, with quips flying left and right, actors practically falling over themselves to get one line out right on top of the other and a constant feeling of one-upmanship. But the tragic centerpiece of the film changes the tone, and while the switch is convincing, it doesn't feel right; Hawks did not yet know how to pull it off with 100% success. The sequence itself is masterful; it's just the way it fits into the film that doesn't feel totally right. The dramatic aftermath of that centerpiece is also a trifle mechanical, more due to the writing than anything else, and this keeps Ceiling from being as fine a film as it could have been. But there's no faulting the lead performances, with James Cagney and Pat O'Brien practically perfect, and valuable support from Stuart Erwin and June Travers.