La muralla de cristal

This film is a tribute by the amazing cinematographer, Joseph Biroc, to New York of the 50s. It's a movie that is stunning to watch as it serves to document the fun that New York was in that period after WWII. The splendid night photography of the Times Square area before the arrival of the seediness of the ensuing years, and today's theme park feeling, makes us forget that that it served as the mecca of entertainment and night life in Manhattan. We get to watch the crowds and some of the films that were playing at the time.

The director, Maxwell Shane, presents a story that might have been dramatic at the time, but in the global village, where illegal aliens are all over the city and the country, this movie shows a dated take on things since everything is different now. This is the era that Arthur Miller presented in "A View from the Bridge" about the illegal immigrants. America wasn't a tolerant nation at the time!

Vittorio Glassman, one of Italy's best actors, plays the stowaway that comes to America only to be refused entrance. No one can believe his story of survival in the European concentration camps. When he escapes into the streets of Manhattan we get the feel of what the town was like. Mr. Glassman whose body of work in the Italian cinema was unique, shows an interesting portrait as the man who is not wanted in America.

Gloria Grahame, as the girl out of luck in the naked city, plays the woman who befriends Kaban and believes him. Jerry Paris is Tom, the former G.I. who was helped by Kaban in Europe. Robin Raymond is Tanya the stripper with a heart of gold who takes Kaban home out the kindness of her heart.

The scenes at the United Nations are magnificently staged. The chase to a recently inaugurated building is one of the best things of the movie. Finally, everything that went wrong is put to order and Kaban is redeemed as a hero and a man who has told the truth from the beginning.

Peter ( Vittorio Gassman) and Maggie (Gloria Grahame) show what can happen to immigrants that arrive here without proper papers. He has a loophole that he thinks he can use to be admitted to the country, but without enough information, this plan isn't going to work... Grahame had JUST made "the Bad and the Beautiful, which won her an Oscar; she often played the rough, gritty, sexy type that seemed to find trouble of some sort. Keep an eye out for Jerry Paris (we all know him as Dick Van Dyke's next door neighbor/dentist), directed a whole lot of TV shows in the 1960s and 1970s. Here he plays "Tom", someone from Peter's past who can help him if he can be located. Also some great photography (real or stock footage...?) of the crowded, rough and tumble, glizty well-lit Times Square from the 1950s, before Disney bought the whole block. A good, well told story, even if there are a couple of unbelievable moments here and there, like in the taxi cab.... Written and directed by Maxwell Shane, who mostly stuck to writing, but also produced and directed a few things from 1930 - 1960.

The movie came as a rather pleasant surprise. I wasn't expecting much, not having heard of it among Grahame's usual list of noirs. Nonetheless, it's imaginatively directed and generally suspenseful, despite a one-note plot. Refugee Kaban (Gassman) arrives in New York as a stowaway, but will be deported if he doesn't track down a musician friend. So he searches the dives along Times Square looking for the guy he last saw in Europe. While he's tracking his friend, however, the cops are tracking him. There's also a number of sub-plots concerning people he meets on the way, who sort of drift in and out.

There's atmosphere a-plenty as director Shane takes the camera crew along Times Square's night beat, which amounts to a dazzling b&w light show. At the same time, Gassman's gaunt frame and few words add to the carnival of characters. Grahame has a sympathetic role, for a change, which may be why the film remains obscure. Here, she's mostly a tag- along with Gassman and then with the cops. But I really like the unknown Robin Raymond as the personality-plus stripper who lights up the screen in a brief role.

At first, I thought "the glass wall" referred to Kaban's inability to enter the country as a stowaway. But then, the many imposing shots of the glass slab of the UN building changed my reference. Nonetheless, it looks like a number of scenes were actually filmed in the UN, lending the story even more visual appeal. All in all, the movie's a pretty good dramatic travelogue of downtown NYC, slim on plot and dialog but fat on inventive visuals. It's also reminiscent of a time when Europe's post-war DP's (displaced persons) were much in the news.

I'm no authority on the film noir genre, but Glass Wall had enough of the elements as I understand them -- gritty, urban streets; smoky, downstairs jazz rooms; beaten-down characters with nothing to lose; an urban milieu that suggests a struggle for existence; and the overbearing presence of authority -- to be a very satisfying film for me. The plot is simple, has elements of suspense, and is a bit contrived at times, particularly near the end, but I found it easily sustained my interest throughout the film. In a nutshell, a Hungarian refugee, Peter Kaban, who has stowed away on a ship docked in New York's port, is denied entry, and thus escapes into the streets of NYC where he must find the man (now a club musician) whose life as a soldier he saved in Europe during the war, and he must find him before the immigration authorities, supplemented by the police, find him, and before 7:00 AM the next day when the ship leaves port and his legal status becomes such that he would then never receive legal permission for entry into the U.S. New York's gritty survivors either aid him or exploit him, and nobody's life looks easy.

Much of the film, particularly the street scenes, were said to be filmed with hidden cameras, and that touch gives an active, life-like realism to Glass Wall. The city looks so vibrant and active at night with the various types of humanity jostling each other for a good time, companionship, or just simple survival, economic or otherwise. Vittorio Gassman plays the Kaban role, and perhaps he looks too delicately good-looking to suggest the utter determination of his character as he roams the streets of New York, while severely injured and harassed by almost everyone, to prevent deportation back to Hungary; but for sure,a handsome face on a character hardened by concentration camp experiences can mask an iron will. You have to root for Peter Kaban because despite the horrendous experiences of his brief life, his personality retains a decency and kindness that eventually wins over his initial, also desperate, female accomplice and also helps with his other female helper. Eight points for making Times Square look again to be a social magnet on what has to be a bustling Saturday night!

An excellent piece of American neo-realism by the Shane brothers. (The Cohens could learn a thing or three from these boys from Patterson, NJ.) New York City becomes an "open city" worthy of Rosellini, et al -- with a wonderful mix of documentary and theatrical footage, quite an innovation for 1953. And, just so you'll get the connection, they imported an Italian to play the lead, the wonderful Vittorio Gassman, (although the Anna Magnani roll is filled by that B-Babe fave Gloria Grahame). The vintage Times Square sequences alone are worth a look. A must see for film buffs and movie lovers alike. I'm sure it's on Martin Scorcese's list.