Why are you all floating heads? Am I in heaven?
Patterns (1956), outside of some of its cinematography, is an excellent study in how corporate behavior changes in response to changes in scale. Fred Scales has been newly promoted to a junior VP slot, reporting to senior VP Bill Briggs, who in turn reports to company President and owner Walter Ramsey. Briggs knew the founder of the company, who was the father of Ramsey, and has slowly come to loathe Walter Ramsey. In turn, Ramsey is trying to ease Briggs out.
Staples, an engineer and expert in industrial relations, proves quite competent, but refuses to take credit where credit is not due, while Ramsey would prefer that he do so. Soon, Staples finds himself in a bind, with his sense of ethics on one side, and Ramsey and even his own wife on the other. Meanwhile, Briggs, who lost his wife, is counting the cost of his own position in life: a lost wife, a son who struggles to support his decisions, and a health condition.
So when Ramsey eventually advances the next outrage, Briggs is lost and gone. But when Staples is faced with deciding if it’s up or out, things get really interesting.
Backed with excellent acting, a plot that treats everyone of importance, even Ramsey, as a human, and at least one surprise, it’s an exploration, from the time of the 1950s, of what the oncoming age of huge corporations may mean for humanity.
Both methods and soul.
