Pressure Point
Directed by Hubert Cornfield
Written by Hubert Cornfield and S. Lee Pogostin from a short story by Robert M. Lindner
1962/USA
Stanley Kramer Productions
First viewing/Amazon Prime
[box] Doctor: For although psychopaths are a small minority, it seems significant that whenever organized and militant hate exist a psychopath is the leader, and if, for instance, one hundred disgruntled and frustrated individuals fall in line behind one psychopath then, in essence, we are concerned with the actions of one hundred and one psychopaths.[/box]
I don’t know what is more heavy-handed in this movie, the race relations part or the Freudian psychology part.
The story is framed by a conversation between a grey-haired prison head of psychiatry, known only in the movie as “Doctor” (Sidney Portier) and a young psychiatrist played by Peter Falk. The young psychiatrist wants to quit treating a severely racist black inmate. The Doctor talks him out of this by relating the story of his treatment of a severely racist white inmate, known in the movie only as “Patient” (Bobby Darin), twenty years before.
The rest of the story explores the relationship between the Doctor and Patient, with copious flashbacks via hypnosis sequences and otherwise of the Patient’s sad childhood and psychopathic youth and adulthood. These include the Patient’s ardent support of the German-American Bund, a pre-war White Supremacist organization. There are plenty of racist tirades as well.
Stanley Kramer was a vocal supporter of many liberal causes, all of which I endorse. However, I have found that he usually drives his points home with the subtlety of a jackhammer. This movie was no exception. In fact, it was the most irritating of those I have seen to date. I seem to disagree with the raters on IMDb on this so your mileage may vary.
Trailer
