The Stop Button
blogging by Andrew Wickliffe
Category: Directed by Nicholas Ray
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Overall disappointing noir about down-on-his-luck screenwriter Humphrey Bogart getting his mojo back thanks to fetching neighbor Gloria Grahame taking an interest. Unfortunately they’ve just met because Bogart’s a murder suspect and, despite falling for him, Grahame isn’t exactly sure he didn’t do it. The leads are far better than the script, just never at the…
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Despite producing the film himself, top-billed James Mason doesn’t have the best part in Bigger Than Life. Instead, Barbara Rush–as his suffering wife–gets it. Mason’s a man with a life threatening chronic illness who has to take special medication. Slowly–though not too slowly–that medication starts making him psychotic. Rush is the faithful wife who ignores…
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Knock on Any Door opens with Humphrey Bogart, then heads into a lengthy flashback detailing the life of young thug John Derek. Bogart’s his attorney, defending him on a murder rap; Bogart’s opening statement leads to the flashback. It’s a lengthy flashback, introducing not just Derek but Bogart and the assorted Skid Row denizens who…
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For a film with pioneering use of widescreen composition–the shot with the cars moving past Natalie Wood–and one of the better film performances (James Dean), Rebel Without a Cause is a curious failure. It’s loaded with content–there’s the stuff with Dean and his parents, the stuff with Wood and her father, the gang, Sal Mineo,…
The Stop Button 