Violent Saturday

The wide-screen format was at most only two years old when this film was made. Yet, Charles G. Clarke's shot composition in the new wide-screen format is beautiful. This alone makes the film worth watching.

This is a good example of a color film noir; perhaps not as good as Niagara (1953) or Leave her to Heaven (1945), which were made by the same studio by the way (20th Century Fox), but still a good example from the noir cycle in color.

One way to understand film noir is that it is simply violent melodrama. Look at The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946) for example. Violent Saturday (1955) is steeped in melodrama, but there is also some extraordinary violence. And the violence here--in typical noir fashion--is the resolution--however bleak--to some of the melodramatic conflict.

The film has a profound cynicism grinding beneath the surface of the beautiful color photography. And this cynicism remains at the end of the film.

If you haven't seen this film and you are interested in film noir or film of this period, then I would highly recommend the Violent Saturday.

This is a gem, an excellent little picture, smart and menacing. If you're a fan of '50's pictures, particularly crime melodramas then this is a must-see. The plot is simple. A small town is visited by three hoods (Stephen McNally,Lee Marvin,J.Carroll Naish) intent on holding up the bank. The film revolves around their plans and folowing the lives of the townsfolk, who, oblivious to the villains in their midst, go about their mundane, everyday problematic lives until the saturday the two worlds collide. Richard Fleischer made an excellent job of this potboiler,which manages to sustain the tension managed in more celebrated films(High Noon) as the villains arrange their plot to rob the town. There's a stellar cast on display, McNally, Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Sylvia Sidney and even the normally lifeless performances given by the film's principal, Victor Mature, doesn't happen in this case. It's shot in terrific colour and has a genuine air of small town claustrophobia and menace. Check it out.

And tough hold-up picture with insignificant small-town stories erupt into drama . A competent bank job film that takes place in the burning light of the Midwest noonday without a shadow in sight , when a gang of hoodlums decides to steal the local bank . It results in a violent and lethal conclusion . Along the way , a number of otherwise insignificant small-town stories erupt into drama when the bunch of henchmen , often with quirky behavior , decides to rob the local bank . A father (Victor Mature) looking for pride in his child's eyes , a shy bank clerk (Tommy Noonan) who is a peeping Tom by night , a man (Richard Egan) striving to rewin his spouse's (Margaret Hayes) love , an Amish farmer (Ernest Borgnine) to defend his family has to face off the violent reality , and a proper older woman (Sylvia Sidney) become crook , all find themselves entangled with the bank thives .

This interesting movie contains marvelous performances from all concerned , suspense , thrills , exciting situations and some action . The film is part thriller , part Film Noir and part Melodrama resulting in an attractive and well-shot blending. An enjoyable caper movie adding some depiction of local characters with some really soapy elements tossed in for good measure and winding up in a peaceful weekend becomes violent . Compact drama : intense , well-made and acted , but not as incisive as it should have been . But here the really poignant and moving final half hour really stands out , as opposed to other more boring parts of the story . Any movie which features tough actors as Lee Marvin , Richard Egan , Ernest Borgnine, Victor Mature has to be some kind of primer in slobdom , but in fact Ernest plays a religious fundamentalist farmer and hero Mature soon becomes marginal when up against Marvin as a loose-lipped with a permanent head cold . Director Fleischer takes attention away from the thriller and into a moral battleground back at the farm where Borgnine faces with viciousness and ultimately gets his pitchfork . However , too much conversation and too little action bogs down this thriller , although the plot and intrigue is nice . There are excellent acting from some Hollywood's best players , including prestigious secondaries , such as : Stephen McNally , Virginia Leith , Tommy Noonan , Margaret Hayes , J. Carrol Naish , Brad Dexter , Dorothy Patrick and veteran Sylvia Sidney and brief role for Lee Marvin , being one of his several early roles where he perpormed a nasty gangster or a bad guy , before he eventually became a brave good guy/action hero.

It packs brilliant and glamorous cinematography in CinemaScope and De Luxe color by great cameraman Charles G. Clarke . Likewise , sensitive and rousing musical score by Hugo Friedhofer . One of the medium-budgeted films ever shot by Buddy Adler/Twentieth Century Fox and this motion picture was well directed by Richard Fleischer , though being marred by excessive family drama . Craftsman Richard Fleischer was a prolific filmaker with successes and flops , as he has an important , long and uneven career . The last fifteen years the Richard Fleischer's films were not exactly very bright , filming Charles Bronson or Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicles , but in his first twenty-five years had proved his own right as one of the most interesting directors of American commercial cinema . He was an expert director , including classy adventures (Vikings, 20.000 leagues under sea) , noir cinema (Narrow margin , Clay pigeons , Trapped) , Terror (Amityville 3-D) , Sci-fi (Soylent Green) , Sword and witchery (Conan the Destroyer , Red Sonja) , among others .

Thanks to FXM we can now see the widescreen version of Violent Saturday. Its a terrific, tense crime drama that must have been somewhat controversial in 1955. Certainly the onscreen violence is stronger than anything else I've seen from the period, except possibly Richard Widmark shoving the wheelchair down the stairs in Kiss of Death. There are definitely some hints of the future Hollywood of Sam Peckinpah--the sadistic Lee Marvin grinding a little boys hand into the ground, and a bearded Ernest Borgnine using a pitchfork on Lee towards the end of the film. Well worth catching.

Three hoodlums plot to rob a bank in a small town. But the town has secrets of its own: The bank president is a Peeping Tom. The librarian is a petty thief. The son of the strip-mine owner is an alcoholic; his wife is openly carrying on an affair with the local golf pro. The son of the strip-mine foreman is ashamed of him because he didn't fight in Word War II. The strip-mine nurse is the object of several men's sexual fantasies.

With a great tough guy turn by Lee Marvin as one of the bank robbers, alternately sniffing an inhaler and stomping on kids' fingers, and Ernest Borgnine as an Amish farmer (!) who isn't completely pacifistic. (Inspiration for WITNESS?) The strip-mining is a wonderful metaphor for the secrets that lurk just underneath the surface of a seemingly placid small town. Would be good on a double bill with BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK.