What makes a picture timeless? Is it the driving storyline, the fantastic performances, or the sweeping accolades from critics and fans alike? Most assuredly these are all excellent reasons. But I would submit another reason that movies such as The Wizard of Oz, The Godfather or Casablanca are timeless is because, while sometimes depicting a specific era, they manage to transcend their "dated"ness over other movies from their era.
1945's The Lost Weekend, a mesmerizing tale of one man's descent into alcoholism, is another example of a film that transcends any dated sources. Alcoholism is an illness that continues in the year 2001 and will most likely continue for decades to come. Yet as Billy Wilder presents it, the subject is important and carefully portrayed with an urgent kind of tact not seen in today's movies about "issues".
The film stars Ray Milland, in one of the best performances I've ever seen. He's Don, a man who always seems to know his drinking is a problem, but doesn't really seem to have developped a reason to care. Don is an everyman in the sense that he is a no-man. He's an author who hasn't really written anything of value yet, a drifter who has an exceptionally supportive girlfriend, yet makes dates with hookers and forgets about them because of his blackouts.
The art of drinking has never looked more frightening or less appealing. Don lies and steals to get his next drink, whether in restaurants, bars, or at the liquor store (one scene has him holding up the liquor store cashier with no weapon except a sinister threat to do bodily harm if he isn't given a bottle of rye immediately). He can't even find solace at the opera; all of the characters onstage are enjoying a glass of champagne. Eventually, Don has shut out everyone in his life and is temporarily hospitalized after he falls down a set of stairs. His recovery in the final act has the faint scent of a Hollywood Ending, but it is still a plausible conclusion to an intricate film.
I suppose for its time, a character like Milland's must have been anti-protagonistic for all the deceitful acts he commits. But today, in an age where Tarantino characters are the heroes, Don illicits perhaps even more sympathy now. Indeed for this reason, and for many, many others, The Lost Weekend is truly a timeless film.
