These two movies back-to-back are a great example of both the similarities and differences of two movies written by the same guy, but in different eras. M*A*S*H was written in 1969, and was directed by a man who had a different way of telling a story than some of Lardner's chums back in the old days. Lardner wrote the movie as a tasteless screwball comedy, and in an episodic fashion, but Altman directed it as a quasi-documentary, where all the sick, and supposedly funny, jokes that Lardner wanted us to laugh at just became facts of life, brought about by the nastiness of the war around them. Lardner wrote Woman of the Year, however, in 1944, when things were less tasteless, and directors were a little more obvious and straight-forward, most often than not merely planting the camera on its tripod, and letting the actors do the work.
The movie also presented two great actors of the golden age. This was the first pairing of Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn, and as usual, they are fun to see on screen. They moved on to many other films together, including Adam's Rib and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?
As with many comedies of the era, this story involves the battle of the sexes. Both Tracy and Hepburn work for the same New York paper; he is the sportswriter, she is a diplomat's daughter who works the society pages. As the movie begins, he and his chums are at the local bar, listening to a radio panel show which includes Hepburn's character, who states her belief that perhaps games such as baseball should be halted during the war (which is still going on in 1944, of course), since there are more weightier concerns in the world than a mere sport. Tracy's character gets pretty upset, basically asking what the point of fighting a war is if not for preserving the things that makes America the way it is, so he writes a column lambasting Hepburn's comments. A war ensues, with columns and headlines as weapons, until the publisher tries to get them to make peace. The peace is a lot easier than expected, because as soon as the sportswriter walks into the room, the pangs of love ring at his heart, and about three minutes after they leave the office, he gets her to accompany him to a baseball game he's to cover.
