Menace dans la nuit

John Garfield stars as low-life crook Nick Robey. He takes part in an armed robbery that leaves a cop dead. Nick befriends Peg Dobbs( Shelley Winters) who thinking this may be the love interest she has been waiting for, invites him to her family's apartment. Peg, along with her father (Wallace Ford), mother (Selena Royle) and little brother (Bobby Hyatt), become terrified hostages, never knowing if or when Nick may blow-up and kill them all.

This small-scale, modestly-budgeted independent production does a tremendous job of evoking the nervous, sweaty environment of its characters. Garfield is terrific as usual, playing a very unsympathetic character with surprising honesty and no glamor. Winters and Ford are also very effective. This film marks the last movie of John Garfield, an amazingly gifted actor, who never had a breakthrough film. While his body of work is substantial, the elusive blockbuster remains just that. Good performances all around, but the screenplay and the setting make for a claustrophobic experience.

Just an aside, but Ford's character's name is Fred Dobbs, Bogie's character in Treasure of the Sierra Madre made three years before. I found that very distracting.

John Garfield's character in this movie makes his character in THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE look like Mr. Easy Going. He's tight as a drum from the opening scene with his nasty mother, through the holdup (with snaky Norman Lloyd as his partner), his flight, and the long scenes with Shelley Winters' family.

Winters is appealing in her role as the plain girl who can't find a man. She falls for the dangerous and casually violent Garfield; but is she really in love with him or trying to assist in his capture? That's where the tension lies in this short thriller. Dalton Trumbo (uncredited as screenwriter) creates good dialog for all the cast members, and pulls together an exciting final 5 minutes with a few plot twists and a gut-wrenching ironic final shot. Catch it if you can, if you're a noir fan.

The picture starts with Nick (this is last movie of John Garfield ) and his colleague Al Molin (Norman Lloyd) stage a payroll holdup . Al is murdered, along with a police officer . Nick hides out in a plunge , and into a locker hides the robbed cash ; later on , he meets Peg Dobbs (Shelley Winters) . They go out from a public pool and return to her apartment and then Nick forces her family , father (Wallace Ford , John Ford's brother) , mother (Selena Royle) and child to hide him from the police chase .

This enjoyable film contains a relentless manhunt , thrills , suspense , violence and some elements of Noir cinema . Most actors , screenwriters , director were pursued by American government during ominous period of Mccarthismo. Interesting writing credits , written under pseudonyms , by Dalton Trumbo and Hugo Butler , front Guy Endore ; being based on a novel by Sam Ross . Very good acting by John Garfield as a violent and desperado delinquent . Garfield had a sad as well fruitful life , as he signed a contract with Warner Brothers, who changed his name to John Garfield. Won enormous praise for his role of the cynical Mickey Borden in Four Daughters (1938). Appeared in similar roles throughout his career despite his efforts to play varied parts , being his best film : Body and soul . Active in liberal political and social causes, he found himself embroiled in Communist scare of the late 1940s. Though he testified before Congress that he was never a Communist, his ability to get work declined. While separated from his wife, he succumbed to long-term heart problems, dying suddenly in the home of a woman friend at 39. His funeral was mobbed by thousands of fans, in the largest funeral attendance for an actor since Rudolph Valentino.

Atmosheric and appropriate cinematography in black and white by James Wong Howe who along with John Alton and Nicolas Musuraka are the main cameramen of Noir genre . Thrilling as well as evocative musical score by the classic Franz Waxman . The motion picture was well directed by John Berry . Director John Berry and co-scripter Hugo Butler's names were removed from the credits for a time after release, due to the blacklisting of supposed Communist sympathizers at the time. Assistant director Emmett Emerson is thus often credited as the film's director . Berry Was named as a member of the Communist Party by Hollywood 10 member Edward Dmytryk in Dmytryk's 1951 testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee, when the blacklisted director "named names" to revive his Hollywood career and effect a return from exile in Europe. After Dymytrk's testimony, the formerly disgraced director, who had served a prison term for defying HUAC in 1947, was allowed to resume his Hollywood career and direct movies in America, but Berry was blacklisted and went into exile in France. Ironically, Berry had directed the documentary The Hollywood Ten . Berry directed interesting films , such as 1955 Headlines of Destruction , 1949 Tension 1949 , 1948 Casbah ,1946 Cross My Heart and 1946 From This Day Forward , among others .

John Garfield's last film was "He Ran All the Way," about a payroll robber who hides out at a young woman's apartment, frightening and intimidating her family. Shelley Winters, Gladys George, Norman Lloyd, and Wallace Ford also star. This looks to be a small film, written by blacklisted Dalton Trumbo under another name, but I found it very tense and very good with a wonderful performance by Garfield. He's an unwilling robber due to a scary dream the night before, but his friend, Norman Lloyd, forces him to go through with it on the day planned. When Garfield shoots a policeman, he runs to an indoor public swimming pool to get rid of the briefcase and hide. There he meets Shelley Winters. He sticks with her, ends up in the apartment she shares with her parents and her brother and decides to stay.

Ruggedly handsome Garfield portrays a man capable of brutality due to his fear but who is basically good. Unfortunately the family doesn't understand how unloved he feels, and his friendly signals are rejected, causing him to act out. Winters handles a difficult role beautifully - a young woman without much life experience, attracted to this man and terrified for her family. Is her goal to get him away from them, or does she really care for him? Wallace Ford, as the frustrated father who is unable to protect his family, is excellent.

Like another poster, I would have wished for a bigger film as Garfield's last, but in the end, he handed in another excellent performance and elevated the movie. What was ahead for him? Well, he was blacklisted - perhaps his friend Clifford Odets' affirmation that Garfield had never been a member of the Communist party would have helped him, but we'll never know. Garfield died the day after Odets' testimony.

Worth seeing if for no other reason than Garfield's frantic, breathless performance. The storytelling is unsure at times, but his acting sure isn't. The guy performs as if he's looking straight down the barrel of a loaded shotgun. He really lets it fly over the film's very powerful last ten minutes. Also, Shelly Winters is much more effective here, in a role she virtually perfected (as the lonely, whimpering victim) than she was in the classic "A PLACE IN THE SUN", which also came out that year.