Ace in the Hole

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Ace in the Hole ★★★ The Big Carnival 1951

Moralist Wilder brilliantly captures a cynical media circus. Alcoholic SOB reporter Chuck Tatum (Douglas) is bored crazy working a podunk paper in New Mexico when he gets a big scoop. Unhappy Lorraine (Sterling) tells Tatum her husband Leo (Benedict) was searching for Indian artifacts and is now trapped in a cave-in. Tatum teams up with corrupt local sheriff Gus Kretzer (Teal) to delay rescue operations to milk the story for maximum exposure while poor Leo suffers and the public come to gawk. Based on the Floyd Collins mining disaster of the 1920s. 111m/B DVD . Kirk Douglas, Richard Benedict, Ray Teal, Jan Sterling, Robert Arthur, Porter Hall, Frank Cady, Gene Evans, Lewis Martin, Harry Harvey, Richard Gaines; D: Billy Wilder; W: Billy Wilder, Lesser Samuels, Walter Newman; C: Charles B(ryant) Lang Jr.; M: Hugo Friedhofer.