I found this portion of John Frankenheimer‘s commentary track for a DVD of Seven Days in May on my iPhone this morning. I know this 1964 thriller fairly well, and can confirm without hesitation that this apartment scene between Kirk Douglas and Ava Gardner is the flattest and least interesting in the whole film. Frankenheimer is nonetheless saying that movies can’t be entirely composed of jolt-cola, narrative-propulsion moments. They need to be quiet and meditative and meander from time to time, and even allow for a little “boredom.” The late director is saying that the research-screening process had, in his experience, led to such moments being cut out in order to keep the story tension at high levels.
