NIGHTFALL (1956)

This Columbia Pictures B-movie stars Aldo Ray, James Gregory, Anne Bancroft, and Brian Keith. Rudy Bond has a standout role, one of several films he made, three of which starred Marlon Brando. His sister, Jocelyn Brando, plays Gregory’s wife. However, the film may be best remembered for the camera work of cinematographer Burnett Guffey. Directed by Jacques Tourneur, his use of seamless flashbacks provides the most interesting segments of this film. Despite his success with Out of the Past, his directing here can be uneven. One cannot fault the studio art department for pumping up the promotion of this seventy-nine-minute film---note the yellow teaser text in the poster.

I found Stirling Silliphant’s script ponderous at times. Many segments go by slowly with a lot of character development dialogue. The title, as near as I can figure, refers to the opening night scene between Ray and Gregory. It took a while to figure out what was up with Ray's character, whether he was innocent or guilty of something. His incessant, vague comments about the source of his troubles barely squeeze through. The homey scenes with Gregory revealing to his wife how his insurance investigation is progressing ate up a lot of film for a character not in need of so much background. Then, Keith’s extended cat-and-mouse verbal threatening of Ray is also a frame-eater. Thankfully, the flashbacks make sense of why Ray is being hunted, how he, Keith, and Bond collided, and why the latter two cannot find their stolen loot.

I was not buying the World War II veteran, Ray, as a freelance commercial artist. Artistic people exist in all walks of life, but Ray seems better suited as a professional truck driver. Barry Sullivan, one of the original choices, would have been ideal. I could have supported Bancroft as a Montgomery-Ward catalog model, though not a high-fashion model. The novel that the film is based on may be the culprit. Bancroft's first appearance with Ray in a local bar is also a wee cumbersome until thieves and noir-do-wells, Keith and Bond, enter the picture. He thinks his abduction was set up by Bancroft. 

Keith once again seems to be holding himself back from a sudden outburst of violence. A one-dimensional character played well with clamped jaw. But Bond...Rudy Bond, (second from left above) steals the film as the sadist who enjoys killing people by games of (no) chance. His laugh from an individual with a screw loose upstairs. I imagine him watching Wile E. Coyote cartoons endlessly―as an adult―always laughing hysterically at every pratfall, however repetitive. His demise is well worth waiting for. Then, there is a lot of waiting in this film. Waiting for Ray and Bancroft to become an item. Waiting for Gregory to explain himself to Ray. Waiting for Keith and Bond to come to an understanding, and waiting for that snowplow to make itself useful. 

BEHIND THE HIGH WALL (1956)

You will want to overlook the familiar script in this Universal-International production. Just enjoy the superb acting of the lead actors. It is another prison break story of a good guy gone bad, destroyed by temptation, and a doomed driveway. More about the latter, later.

Accomplices on the outside facilitate a prison escape, kill a guard and kidnap the warden, Tom Tully, and force an inmate, John Gavin, to accompany them. A car crash kills everyone except the aforementioned. Considering their short screen time, the other actors were just happy to be paid scale. Before the police arrive, Tully buries the gang's money with a plan to finally live in financial peace. If that is not dishonest enough, he shamefully attempts to pin the guard’s murder on Gavin by uncomfortably never coming to his defense.

Flawlessly, Tully catapults from supporting to lead actor without a hitch. He is excellent as a prison warden with financial problems, a crippled wife, and decisions that change his life through layers of lies. Tully’s understated and subtle performance―his tender voice when trying to comfort his wife―reflected an actor of great range. Sylvia Sidney's role as the wheelchair-bound wife seems a good choice. An interesting detail is that she is able to drive her car equipped with handicap controls. Sidney's flexibility as an actress attests to her longevity and was never confused with any of her more attractive peers. Even though her wrinkles had multiplied twelve-fold―oddly, still wheelchair-bound―she carried on forty years later as a loopy grandma in Mars Attacks!

John Gavin gives a solid performance, but the handsome actor, with a face fresh from a J.C. Leyendecker's Arrow Shirt illustration, seems out of place in this role of a down-and-out loser. With his snarling upper lip, Elvis Presley would have worked better. If Gavin was ideally cast, then his girlfriend should have been Elizabeth Taylor and not Betty Lynn, playing Tully's daughter. She was attractively cute but not a classic beauty. For the record, I have no idea who the lady in the poster with the red skirt is since she was not in this movie. But her face, if not her hair color, has an uncanny resemblance to Miss Taylor.

The dependable and versatile actor, John Larch, is on hand as a prison inmate who sticks close to Gavin until the end, implausible as it is. In order to flush out both men hiding in Tully's garage, he confesses his sin over a bullhorn―in the formerly quiet neighborhood―and testifies to Gavin's innocence. Larch wants no part in any surrender and blasts through the garage door without opening it, hitting Tully in his escape. How anyone so near the garage―on that driveway of doom―could not hear the engine start and accelerate is beyond reasoning.

BEYOND THE TIME BARRIER (1960)

On a test flight, Robert Clarke pilots his X-80 (Convair F-102 interceptor) through a time barrier then returns to the airbase finding it deserted with buildings showing decades of neglect. He wanders alone from one building to another. What the...hey! Check out his expression below. Doh! He looks off into a distant forest to see a dark projected painting...uh...futuristic city. He is soon captured and taken to an underground city called the Citadel. Triangles are the dominant architectural theme in this dystopian society. A fantastic city right off a 1938 Popular Science magazine cover. Tall beacons use the pulsating sound effect of the Martian's laser ray appendage from the original The War of The Worlds. The not-so-special effect of what sounds like a sophisticated party favor slide whistle is used for an elevator’s ascent and descent. This was probably not included in the budget.

Vladimir Sokoloff, in one of his last movie roles, plays the Supreme of the Citadel who is suspicious of any outsiders. His muted granddaughter, played by Darlene Tompkins has the singular ability to read minds and affirms Clarke is quite a catch. The Supreme trusts her telepathy. Planning to stay at least overnight, Clarke is provided sleeping arrangements in an open-concept area the size of a small airport terminal. The bed is an enormous, double-queen-sized mattress placed on the floor. A servant brings him dinner, for which he is grateful because he has not eaten since who knows when. He takes a bite out of something and proceeds to explore his surroundings. He is stuffed and never eats again. Clarke and Tompkins get along triangularly. So well, she slaps him for what he is thinking after their first kiss. At least she is not sterile like all the others. 

Wait?!

Apparently, America’s nuclear bomb testing in the Seventies damaged the Earth's atmosphere, letting dangerous cosmic rays fall back to Earth, causing a plague of massive mutants and stupendous sterility. Tompkins somehow escapes the latter part and the Supreme hopes Clarke can regenerate their society. Nudge, nudge. Wink, wink. Speaking of sterile—unfortunately, not mute—Boyd “Red” Morgan’s performance as the Captain is just that. A former NFL player and Hollywood stuntman, his delivery lacks any professionalism. What better film to showcase his talent.

To help him understand the year 2024―no wonder he was starved―the Citadel’s complete history is stored in a Zenith record player console cabinet painted in sterile white. A chronicle only a few geniuses could ever possibly interpret. Tompkins pulls out shoulder-width portrait images, which Clarke, without hesitation, nails the detailed story behind each. She nods excessively in approval. He is so dreamy! Oh, he has more questions. She brings out another portrait to remedy his curiosity. She nods excessively. I was getting a headache watching her head shake so enthusiastically.

Other time-travelers are revealed to be living in the Citadel, which conflicts with Clarke’s plan. Each wants to return to their time and will stoop low enough to make it happen. One traveler releases underground mutants who look hilariously harmless with choreographed attacks resembling a Kung Fu gymnastics event. The bare-footed bald mutants, with pant legs, slit from ankle to knee, laugh maniacally. The Supreme helps Clarke escape, albeit alone, via the X-80 and return to his airbase with a hard-to-fathom story to log. Time travel is risky business. In a popular Twilight Zone twist, Clarke ages, mysteriously, only on his return trip. He warns them about the dangers of nuclear testing and, of course, man-made climate change.

Note: This American-International film will not be on many must-see lists. Directed by Edgar Ulmer, of “Detour” movie fame, every penny of its $125,000 budget can be accounted for. And much of the expense went into hiring actors. Handsome Robert Clarke, with his commanding voice, is well known for his low-budget science fiction movies of the Fifties. He was a busy actor on television who seemed to love acting, no matter what the project. This film being a good example.

THE VIOLENT ONES (1967)

The first thing of note about this Madison Productions, Inc. production, aside from the production company name itself and a misplaced detail of a steam locomotive whistle in 1967, is a driving score by Marlin Skiles befitting a major military operation with tanks rumbling through the North African desert. Yet what we see is a sheriff’s 2-door Impala Sport Coupe---first-class all the way---being driven within the speed limit through town and country. A lengthy segment that eats up enough film to include all the credits and then some. The film was not expected to be a Golden Globe nominee, but the star and director, Fernando Lamas, managed this drama fairly well despite some unlikely sequences and a clichéd script. Perhaps to ease some directing complications, there is plenty of driving in this film. Used once during a road sequence---perhaps to break the monotony---is a strangely-used, and totally ineffective, vignette. This ninety-five-minute film is about twenty minutes too long.

The low-budget melodrama, set in a New Mexico border town, concerns three apprehended white men: Aldo Ray, Tommy Sands, and David Carradine. One is guilty of rape and the death of a local girl. Lamas, no fan of gringos, is the deputy sheriff who interrogates each individually, starting with a big smile and cordial questions as if he intends to release them once he hears their story. In reality, he is waiting for each one to say something to set him off so he can verbally assault or slap each one around. Also on his conscience is the possible lynching of the three prisoners by the townspeople. The “mob” seems particularly uncommitted to string up anything as they sheepishly gather in small groups around the jail, quietly discussing what to do next.

With a lynching imminent, Lamas and his chained-together prisoners escape out the back as no one covered that exit. I mentioned the mob was not very committed. However, a very committed carload of locals tries to bump Lamas’ two-ton truck off the road. Traveling around twenty-five miles per hour, the sequence is not very believable or plausible. They constantly lay on their horn as if taunting them like high school rivals. The truck moves off-road, and their slow, synchronized chase in the desert is pretty silly. Not being a fair fight, the truck maneuvers to ram the car, flipping it over. The truck soon runs dry, with their subsequent escape through the desert on foot being tedious and time-consuming for them and viewers alike. Seizing an opportunity to overwhelm Lamas, the four-man choreographed fight scene is supported by solo piano and percussion, looking a bit like a halfhearted Keystone Cops routine in slow motion.

All three prisoners eventually feel their lives slipping away from dehydration, and each one's story begins to reveal the murderer through a process of elimination. An injured Lamas gets flanking leg support as he proudly hobbles toward a nearby town. The three now appear to be buddies as if they were successful in their defeat of Rommel. 

DIAL 1119 (1950)

Some today find this film a sort of lost treasure, but it is not innovative. It is well-acted with enough mystery to hold the viewer in suspense for the usual Hollywood hostage staging. The script bounces around the subject of mental illness in mid-century fashion. Critics of the day generally seemed to like it. This MGM features a powerful opening score by André Previn, suggesting a winner. But despite an obviously low budget, the movie still lost money at the box office. There were no big-name stars to draw an audience, and it is almost entirely filmed on a studio backlot. I also wonder if audiences accepted a nice-looking boy, Marshall Thompson, in this early lead role. He gets on a bus with its scrolling destination sign above the canted windshield to Terminal City, a name associated with New York's Idlewild Airport. That might have been an omen, yet hardly justifies shooting the bus driver with his own personal security device.

Initially, Thompson appears only to be a chronic sleepwalker. His cold, unemotional search for his former psych doctor, Sam Levene, goes nowhere, and he eventually wanders into a bar where we meet a slice of society with their own personal foibles. Virginia Fields, Leon Ames, and Keith Brasselle (bartender) are the more notable actors, along with the bar owner, William Conrad, who knows each patron well, holding contempt for a few regulars. On the bright side, his bar is equipped with a state-of-the-art, remote-controlled television monitor suspended over the counter that would be the equal of most sports bars today. This had to cost a pretty penny. And for what? Wrestling. And the newsbreak about an escaped mental patient whom Conrad recognizes at the end of the counter. When he calmly goes to the back to call the police, Thompson is right behind him, putting Conrad’s life on permanent hold with a bullet. This instantly gets the attention of all the patrons, and the previously invisible young man becomes larger than life itself. This innocent-looking, unassuming, and perspiring man happens to have no regard for human life. Especially his own. This initiates the stereotypical hostage situation with the police plotting their next move to end the situation.

Through clichéd interaction between the killer and hostages, Thompson lays out his mental disqualifications, blaming the military for teaching him to kill. The Army was referring to the enemy, by the way. In his eyes, all the patrons are pitiful excuses, and he is not impressed with their petty problems. His comments put the patrons in a reflective, albeit terrifying mood. His only demand, other than having the patrons not move a muscle, is that he talks with Dr. Levene. Though unadvised repeatedly by the police, Levene sneaks inside the bar where Thompson confronts him about his historically bad advice. The doctor’s blunt assessment quickly reduces Thompson to a frightened child. He shoots Levene when pushed too far (below).

The revolver that Conrad kept behind the counter is spotted by Fields, whose character seems to know her way around firearms. She wounds Thompson, who then tells her she had no right to do that. The patrons disagree wholeheartedly with his assessment. After a seventy-five-minute running time, all hope was seemingly gone with the words, “The End” approaching. He slowly escapes out the back entrance and well covered by armed police. Welcome to Terminal City.

CITY OF FEAR (1959)

This is a decent, eighty-one-minute Columbia Pictures film that hides a limited budget from a week's worth of filming. Director Irving Lerner creates a fast pace from a script that lacks total believability. A creative score by Jerry Goldsmith adds excitement, bringing the crime thriller up a notch or two. The middle of this thriller is filled with the usual angst in trying to track down an escaped convict. An eighty-four-hour search unfolds with the police, a nervous environmental authority, and a scientist working in concert to find him and his stolen canister. A suspense drama that bears a striking similarity to so many later television disaster-of-the-week movies. For the automobile historian, there are in-car cameras that put the viewer in the back seat. Several competent actors with familiar faces lend their credibility. The director brings together Vince Edwards, Cathy (aka Kathie) Browne, and screenwriter Steven Ritch from Murder by Contract, the prior year.

A night scene opens the film with a speeding ambulance driven by a known drug pusher, the aforementioned escaped convict, wanted for murder, and especially a stolen canister from the prison hospital. The driver is annoyed by the constant moaning from his mortally wounded partner, who dies in transit. Edwards actually stars as Vince, whose only interest is a sealed canister that he figures is worth a million dollars of experimental heroin. In reality, it is a radioactive synthetic, cobalt-60. Unless in a lead container, it is highly contagious. It appears in this film as aluminum. Opened, it could wipe out a city, according to the film. See my note below on cobalt-60.

Edwards’s acting solidifies the movie as he becomes completely drained from fits of coughing, sweating, and feeling stupid for not getting a seasonal flu shot. The character is as one-dimensional as can be mustered. He is despicable in every scene, trusting no one who does not appreciate the beauty of a stainless steel canister. Edwards feels rotten and wants to be left alone. With the canister. Which cannot be opened without special tools. Few things can put one in a bad mood more than not being able to open a simple jar from the supermarket.

Waiting two years for "Geigerman" is his girl, Patricia Blair, who thinks she might have better luck opening the canister. “I'm tellin' ya' honey, it can't be opened!” When later questioned by the police, she repeatedly denied any contact with Edwards amidst profuse sweating and a “smoker's" cough. We find out about a nervous shoe store owner, Joseph Mell, who has profited from Edwards’ past drug deals. Driving a 1958 Lincoln "Land Yacht" is a dead giveaway that the Buster Browns could not be moving that well.

I found the rapid ending not well thought out, but at least funny. When Edwards stumbles out of a diner and collapses, the authorities keep their distance. They fail to convince Vince that there is still a chance he could survive. Slim. At best. They actually ask for the canister. Bad idea. Though Edwards may be barely breathing, they immediately cover his body with a blanket and place a “high radiation area” sign of caution on top of it...carried in the trunk of an officer's patrol car just in case. I burst out laughing. The police captain then says to the scientist with relief, “Come on. I want to go home.” Someone will be by later to shovel him up, I guess. Dead or alive.

Note: Beginning in the 1950s, cobalt-60 was used to treat cancer and to sterilize medical equipment. It is a byproduct of nuclear reactor operations. Most exposure to cobalt-60 takes place intentionally during medical tests and treatments. Such exposures are carefully controlled to avoid adverse health impacts and to maximize the benefits of medical care. However, mishandling of a large industrial source of cobalt-60 could result in an external exposure large enough to cause skin burns, acute radiation sickness, or death. A small container would unlikely wipe out 3 million people. The bigger mystery, then, is why the drug pusher thinks heroin is kept at a hospital.

I BURY THE LIVING (1958)

Albert Band brings his long list of B-movie credits into play for this United Artists macabre tale about a man who thinks he may be affecting people’s lives by using push pins. I note the excellent cinematography effects by Frederick Gately, below. Still, the score by the award-winning composer, Gerald Fried, sets the stage for a spooky tale using a harpsichord, a frantic tempo, and dissonant chords. The movie seems like an extended episode of television’s, Night Gallery. The viewer is sucked in right from the opening credits with a statement suggesting that some men (mankind) have the ability of great mental power over events—the old “man as God” thing—and that the dead are simply biding their time underground until released back into the unemployment lines. Do not be misled by the studio's poster. There is nothing scary about this film. It is spooky, ghost-believing science fiction at best. As is typical of low-budget “horror” movies, the ending is disappointing with the outcome as expected. It may have, however, elicited some talk around the office water cooler in the era. 

Richard Boone is appointed chairman of a committee that oversees a large cemetery. His acting skill shows restraint and does not go overboard with the character’s emotions. He is quite creditable and, as usual, improves this film. A thirty-four-year-old Theodore Bikel, the caretaker, does his best old man routine with a Scottish accent in one of the more obvious wigs from makeup artist, Jack Pierce, who may have lost interest in the film at some point. Bikel is not that convincing but he had a nice limp going there for a while.

Black pins mark the filled graves on a map resembling a Picasso sketch of the cemetery grounds. The white pins indicate unoccupied graves. Boone accidentally places two black pins where they should not be and both persons mysteriously die in an automobile accident—surely a coincidence. But it repeatedly happens either through experimentation or challenges from doubters. Boone believes he is cursed and he falls helplessly into a deep depression. 

The body count is up to seven from Boone’s pin-pushing spree. In an epiphany, he decides that if black pins give him the power of death, white pins might give him the power of life. He replaces all of the black pins with white pins. He discovers that certain graves have been dug but no casket in the plots. If you believe in this preposterous scheme, the climactic finish may spoil it. Hokum has an equally powerful force over people. I should mention that Bickel’s character is nuts.

Note: Some cinematography effects are artistically well done by Gately. The map causes much distress for Boone and near the climax appears to glow, consuming  Boone. At one point, after being struck by Bikel, an overhead light swings back and forth casting light and shadows across the pins in the map creating a dizzying optical illusion. Another has Boone’s silhouette superimposed on the map as an animated graphic illustration, eliciting an out-of-body experience for him. Watching this film may have the same effect.