The Cyclops Directed by Bert I. Gordon Written by Bert I. Gordon 1957/USA B&H Productions
First viewing/Amazon Instant
[box] The first monster you have to scare the audience with is yourself. — Wes Craven [/box]
Bert I. Gordon specialized in giant creatures. This fun movie features several.
The story is set in Mexico. Susan Winter (Gloria Talbott) is searching for her fiance, whose plane crashed in an inaccessible valley three years ago. The Mexican government denies her permission to land her own plane there, partially due to the somewhat shady group of men that accompany of her. One of them is Marty Melville (Lon Chaney Jr.), who has taken his “scintillator” along to explore for uranium.
The party evades the government and makes an emergency landing in the valley. Marty immediately discovers that the place hides a massive radioactive deposit. He does everything possible to sabotage the rest of the mission so he can return to the city and file a mining claim. Susan and the others have bigger troubles, however. The radioactivity has caused all the fauna to grow uncontrollably.
This is an entertaining lark for fans of the genre. We get a giant eagle and mouse and a battle between giant lizards, along with the title creature.
The Joker Is Wild Directed by Charles Vidor Written by Oscar Saul from a book by Art Cohn 1957/USA AMBL Productions
First viewing/Amazon Prime
[box] A fella came up to me the other day with a nice story. He was in a bar somewhere and it was the quiet time of the night. Everybody’s staring down at the sauce and one of my saloon songs comes on the jukebox, “One for My Baby”, or something like that. After a while, a drunk at the end of the bar looks up and says, jerking his thumb toward the jukebox, “I wonder who he listens to?” — Frank Sinatra[/box]
This OK biopic features Sinatra at the top of his game.
The movie begins in 1920’s Chicago where Joe E. Lewis (Sinatra) is a popular singer in a speakeasy run by the mob. He gets an offer from a rival saloon and accepts it. This does not sit well with his current boss who makes an overt death threat if Lewis defects. His faithful accompanist Austin Mack (Eddie Albert) counsels against the move. But Lewis is stubborn and insists on opening at the other club. Soon he is beaten within an inch of his life and his vocal cords are slashed. He disappears from view. His friends Austin and Swifty Morgan (Jackie Coogan) go off to search for him in New York, where Austin gets work with Sophie Tucker.
After a long search, they find Lewis working as a second banana in a burlesque house. He is not pleased to be found. But when Austin gets Sophie to embarrass Lewis into performing, the audience responds well to his improvised stand-up comedy routine. He also can sing, though not as well as before. He still refuses to be persuaded to take up the offer of an agent until he finds a supporter and love interest in the form of socialite Lettie Page.
The rest of the film follows the ups and downs of the romance as well as Austin’s progressive drinking problem. With Mitzi Gaynor as a dancer who is crazy about the comic.
This is entertaining enough for what it is but the real reason to watch is to listen to Sinatra belt out “All the Way” several times, as well as a number of other tunes. He is also convincing as a comedian.
The Joker Is Wild won an Oscar for Best Music, Original Song for “All the Way”.
Men in War Directed by Anthony Mann Written by Ben Maddow and Philip Yordan from a novel by Van Van Praag 1957/USA Security Pictures
First viewing/Netflix rental
[box] Lt. Benson: Battalion doesn’t exist. Regiment doesn’t exist. Command HQ doesn’t exist. The U.S.A. doesn’t exist… We’re the only ones left to fight this war.[/box]
Here is a really excellent, if unsung, Korean War drama.
It is 1950 somewhere in Korea. Lt. Benson Robert Ryan) leads a troop of less than 20 men. All of them are dead tired. The communicator is unable to contact the battalion. Their truck has broken down. They keep on plugging but are more or less preparing to die.
A jeep approaches. It is driven by Sgt. Montana (Aldo Ray). His passenger is a colonel (Robert Keith). The colonel seems to be profoundly shell-shocked, is unable to speak and requires assistance to walk or even stay erect. But Montana will take orders only from him. Benson commandeers the jeep and fills it with the hardware his men are too weak to carry, a wounded man, and the colonel. The group presses on.
Things don’t get any better. Montana continues to be insubordinate. He really cares only about the welfare of the colonel, whom he sees as a father figure. The enemy is all around them. We watch the unit battle various forms of adversity.
This is a gritty and powerful tribute to the foot soldier. As by now is well-known, I love Robert Ryan and he is superb here. Aldo Ray can be something of a lightweight but he is also first-rate in this. Both actors are helped by the spare but pungent script and Mann’s striking direction. Recommended.
All at Sea (AKA Barnacle Bill) Directed by Charles Frend Written by T.E.B. Clarke 1957/UK Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/Ealing Studios
First viewing/Amazon Instant
The Royal Navy of England hath ever been its greatest defense and ornament; it is its ancient and natural strength; the floating bulwark of the island. — William Blackstone
I would have watched this just to see Alec Guinness jitterbug but it’s not a bad light comedy either.
As the film begins, Capt. William Horatio Ambrose (Guinness) is receiving an award from Lloyds of London for rescuing his sinking vessel and saving its contents. He repairs with a reporter to a bar where he tells his unlikely story.
Ambrose came from a long line of navy men. Unfortunately, he himself was cursed with sea sickness and spent the entire war testing remedies, none of which worked on him.
After retirement from the navy, Ambrose spends all his money purchasing a ramshackle amusement pier in the seaside resort of Sandcastle. He proceeds to run it on strictly naval principles. He needs to make money though and pursues the idea of opening a dance hall (this is where the jitterbugging comes in) and a pub on the premises. The strictly moral City Council blocks his every move. Secretly, they plot to condemn the pier and build a seaside promenade profiting mightily in the process. Ambrose gets the best of them by cutting the pier from its moorings and drifting off to sea.
This is a pleasant light comedy. There is quite a bit of physical humor, at which Guinness excels as he does at everything else.
Raintree County Directed by Edward Dmytryck Written by Millard Kaufman from a novel by Ross Lockridge Jr. 1957/USA Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
First viewing/Netflix rental
[box] Susanna Drake: Johnny, I had to come back. I’m going to have a baby.[/box]
Epic-length melodramas aren’t my thing. This one is just tedious despite Liz Taylor’s Oscar-nominated performance as a crazy lady.
It is the 1850’s in Raintree County, Indiana. As the film begins, a high school class is graduating. The professor makes a speech about a magical rain tree that has the answers to all the questions of life. Idealistic John Shawnessy (Montgomery Clift) decides he will go off and find it. His sweetheart Nell (Eva Marie Saint) is a kindred spirit. But John meets Southern belle Susanna Drake (Taylor) by chance and is overcome by her beauty. They have a tryst by the river. She goes back home and John takes up with Nell once again. Susannah returns to announce she is pregnant and John marries her.
The twists and turns of this plot are too many to relate. Suffice it to say that Susannah proves to be not a little insane, with a deep dark secret. She doesn’t mesh well with John’s abolitionist views either. Her initial pregnancy turns out to be a lie but John sticks with her and they eventually have a son he dotes on. Meanwhile, Nell remains a spinster and becomes a journalist. When Susannah returns South several years into the Civil War, John joins the Union army. With Lee Marvin as John’s friend and rival.
Taylor is at her most lovely and her performance isn’t bad. For me, though, Lee Marvin was by far the best thing about this movie. The plot, while full of incident, got old before it ever really took off and the big reveal of the secret was an anti-climax.
Montgomery Clift suffered his disfiguring automobile accident early in the shooting of this movie. His appearance varies throughout. While he was still presentable his lost beauty in his only Technicolor outing is sad to see.
Raintree County was nominated for Academy Awards in the categories of: Best Actress; Best Art Direction-Set Decoration; Best Costume Design; and Best Music, Scoring.
Tammy and the Bachelor Directed by Joseph Pevney Written by Oscar Brodney from a novel by Cid Ricketts Sumner 1957/USA Universal International Pictures
First viewing/Netflix rental
[box] Tambey ‘Tammy’ Tyree: Just think, Miss Renie, that same moon that’s shinin’ down on me this very moment, is shinin’ down on Pete’s tomatoes![/box]
“Cute” is a good one-word review for this romantic comedy.
Tammy Tyree (Debbie Reynolds) is a seventeen-year-old backwoods girl who associates mostly with her moonshiner Grandpa (Walter Brennan) and pet goat. One day, the two learn of a plane crash in the area and go out with hopes of salvaging some valuables. They find a survivor as well, Peter Brent (Leslie Nielsen) and nurse him back to health. He goes back to his family in ten days, but not before Tammy has fallen in love with him. He thinks of her as a child, however.
When Grandpa is put in jail for his illegal manufacturing, he sends Tammy to the Brents. There she discovers that Pete comes from a swanky Southern family that lives in an Ante-Bellum plantation mansion. Appearances are deceiving though, and the Brents are land poor. Pete has hopes of making the place pay by developing a superior type of tomato. Progress in this effort is slow.
All the Brents except Pete and eccentric Miss Rennie (Mildred Natwick), look down on Tammy and on Pete’s desire to be a farmer. They want him to marry Barbara and join her family’s advertising business. Three guesses as to how this all plays out. You will only need one of them.
This is a well-made trifle that goes down easily. Reynolds is charming as a hayseed. It has some of the sit-com feel that befits a movie that spawned several sequels and a TV series.
The title song was nominated for an Oscar for Best Music, Original song.
A Hatful of Rain Directed by Fred Zinnemann Written by Michael V. Gasso, Alfred Hayes and Carl Foreman from Gasso’s play 1957/USA Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
First viewing/My DVD collection
[box] “I have absolutely no pleasure in the stimulants in which I sometimes so madly indulge. It has not been in the pursuit of pleasure that I have periled life and reputation and reason. It has been the desperate attempt to escape from torturing memories, from a sense of insupportable loneliness and a dread of some strange impending doom.” ― Edgar Allan Poe[/box]
This entry into the addiction movie cycle of the late 50’s features some great performances.
As the movie begins, John Pope Sr. (Lloyd Nolan) travels from Florida to New York City to visit his sons Johnny (Don Murray) and Polo (Anthony Franciosa). This is the first time he is to meet Johnny’s wife Celia (Eva Marie Saint). Neither of the boys showed up at the airport to meet him and he is slightly put out. The father’s main motive is to get $2500 dollars that Polo told him he had saved and would loan to him. He needs the money to renovate a club he plans to open in Florida.
But Polo no longer has the money. There is a bitter confrontation during which Polo refuses to disclose what he did with it. Johnny was clearly always his father’s favorite and becomes only more so now. We gradually learn that Dad, a widower, put both his boys in institutions and foster homes during their youths. Johnny was the favorite there too.
But it turns out that Johnny, a Korean War hero, is also the brother with the monkey on his back. He has concealed his habit from his long-suffering pregnant wife and his unexplained absences and “long walks” have almost destroyed the marriage. Polo lives with the couple and is in love with Celia. He has also continuously enabled Johnny. Celia is so fed up she is about ready to give in to Polo’s charms.
The other conflict in the film comes from the pushers Johnny owes big bucks to. Their menace increases as the film progresses.
There are no surprises in this film but it is so well-directed and well-acted that I didn’t mind much. I especially liked that Polo’s culpability as an enabler is explored, something I don’t recall seeing before in these things. I especially enjoyed Lloyd Nolan’s performance. His long career leaves it honed to a fine edge.
Why do we never see the addicts in these things appear to be high or drugged up? They act perfectly normal when they get their fixes.
Anthony Franciosa received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor for his performance in A Hatful of Rain.
The Tin Star Directed by Anthony Mann Written by Dudley Nichols; story by Joel Kane and Barney Slater 1957/USA Persea Company
First viewing/Amazon Instant
[box] Morg Hickman: How come they picked you?
Sheriff Ben Owens: I’m only temporary.
Morg Hickman: You’re more temporary than you think.[/box]
Anthony Mann and Henry Fonda both mean quality. Here they are working together with a quality script.
The mayor appointed young Ben Owens (Anthony Perkins) as interim sheriff after his predecessor was killed in the line of duty. He is determined to prove himself and earn the permanent job despite the objections of his girl and the advice of the wise old town doctor.
As the film begins, bounty hunter Morgan Hickman (Fonda) rides into town with a dead outlaw in tow. He does not receive a warm reception, not least because local stable owner and thug Bart Bogardus (Neville Brand) is the dead man’s cousin. His first stop is the sheriff’s office to claim his reward. There he sees that Owens is hopelessly unqualified for his job. When Owens learns that Hickman is a mean hand with a gun and a former sheriff himself, he begs him to teach him the ropes. Hickman takes pity on the boy while continuously advising him to just quit.
Denied a room at the town’s only hotel, Hickman takes up lodging in the home of a widow (Betsy Palmer) and her half-Indian son. He forms a warm relationship with the son and later his mother.
Owen’s mettle is finally tested when some bad guys rob a stagecoach, kill the driver, and then eliminate a witness. He must control a posse that is intent on bringing the brothers in dead rather than alive. When the widow’s son decides to get in on the action, Hickman is reluctantly brought into the inevitable confrontation. With Lee Van Cleef as one of the brothers.
For some reason I thought this would be another High Noon rip-off but fortunately it is not. The plot is somewhat cliched but everything is done so well that it is totally enjoyable. I spent much of the film pondering the greatness that was Henry Fonda but the staging of the thing is fantastic as well. Recommended for Western fans.
The Tin Star was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay – Written Directly for the Screen.
Pharaoh’s Curse Directed by Lee Sholem Written by Richard H. Landau 1957/USA Schenk-Koch Productions/Bel-Air Productions
First viewing/YouTube
[box] Lo, thou trusted in the staff of this broken reed, on Egypt; whereon if a man lean, it will go into his hand, and pierce it: so is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all that trust in him. — Old Testament [/box]
Not so bad for a 1957 mummy movie.
A British officer is ordered to go into the desert and apprehend a British-American team of archeologists that is unearthing a tomb without permission of the Egyptian government. Authorities fear there will be an uproar if the expedition is discovered. The officer is also saddled with taking the wife of the chief archeologist along. Naturally, they fall in love. Accompanying the party is a mysterious young Egyptian. En route, the company meets a even more mysterious young woman who appears out of nowhere intent on sabotaging the effort.
Meanwhile, the archeologists are about to enter the tomb. When will these people ever learn that ancient curses mean business?
I wouldn’t run out to see this but it’s OK enough for its hour long running time. The print on Amazon Instant is really excellent. The film is currently on YouTube but I can’t vouch for the quality there.
Hell Drivers Directed by Cy Endfield Written by John Kruse and Cy Endfield 1957/UK The Rank Organization/Aqua Film Productions
First viewing/Amazon Prime
[box] Lucy, Hawlett Trucking Secretary: You think I’m flinging myself at you, don’t you?
Tom Yately: You’re doing a fair imitation.[/box]
This film has its merits but is not for those with even a touch of car sickness or, ultimately, for me.
Tom Yately (Stanley Baker) has been recently released from prison. He learns about opportunities for skilled drivers at Hawlett Trucking Company from a friend. He assumes a fake identity, fakes a license, passes an arduous driving test and is hired. His fellow drivers are a bunch of thugs and drifters. They must deliver 12 loads of ballast a day over bad roads or be fired. The lead driver and foreman is Red (Patrick McGoohan), a real miscreant who can deliver 18 loads a day and holds the coveted 22-carat gold cigarette case awarded to the fastest driver. Tom decides he must own that cigarette case.
Tom is assisted by his only friend, Gino (Herbert Lom) a warm Italian trucker. Tom’s efforts to keep his nose clean and best Red have earned him the ruthless enmity of all the other drivers, who do everything in their power to sabotage him. To add to his problems, company secretary Lucy (Peggy Cummins), whom Gino loves, keeps coming on to Tom. With Sean Connery as a trucker and David McCallum as Tom’s lame younger brother.
It’s a lot of fun to watch this group of British actors who would go on to major careers in TV and film starting out. I thought Lom was the highlight. Unfortunately, at least half the film is devoted to ear splitting car chases which became tedious by the end.
I’ve been a classic movie fan for many years. My original mission was to see as many movies as I could get my hands on for every year from 1929 to 1970. I have completed that mission.
I then carried on with my chronological journey and and stopped midway through 1978. You can find my reviews of 1934-1978 films and “Top 10” lists for the 1929-1936 and 1944-77 films I saw here. For the past several months I have circled back to view the pre-Code films that were never reviewed here.
I’m a retired Foreign Service Officer living in Indio, California. When I’m not watching movies, I’m probably traveling, watching birds, knitting, or reading.
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