Star in the Night opens with cowboys, but it’s not a cowboy story. It’s a nativity told at a roadside motel. The dialogue for the cowboys is so bad, one has to wonder if they’re just cowboy impersonators and that detail got cut.
The film proper begins when J. Carrol Naish meets up with angel-in-disguise Donald Woods. Naish is indifferent to Christmas because he thinks people are lousy. Woods disagrees, using Rosina Galli (as Naish’s wife) as an example. But once the pregnant girl goes into labor, everyone pitches in, proving Naish wrong.
Except, of course, it doesn’t. Because they’re only nice after finding out about the expectant mother. They’re perfectly terrible until they find out.
Besides the message failing, it’s generally all right. Naish and Woods are great. Virginia Sale is pretty bad, so are the cowboys.
Siegel does well except in close-ups, where he fumbles.
Not Recommended
CREDITS
Directed by Don Siegel; screenplay by Saul Elkins, based on a story by Robert Finch; director of photography, Robert Burks; edited by Rex Steele; music by William Lava; produced by Gordon Hollingshead; released by Warner Bros.
Starring J. Carrol Naish (Nick Catapoli), Donald Woods (Hitchhiker), Rosina Galli (Rosa Catapoli), Anthony Caruso (José Santos), Lynn Baggett (Maria Santos), Irving Bacon (Mr. Dilson), Dick Elliott (Traveler), Claire Du Brey (Traveler’s Wife), Virginia Sale (Miss Roberts) and Richard Erdman, Johnny Miles and Cactus Mack as the three cowboys.
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