Jeopardy

"Jeopardy" is a fun, punchy noir that finds Barry Sullivan trapped underneath a collapsed pier while his wife, Barbara Stanwyck, goes off to get help before the tide comes in and drowns him. Because this movie must earn its noir credentials, she can't simply find help without some complications. No, first she has to run into escaped con Ralph Meeker, who takes her hostage and doesn't care much about her doomed hubby.

This movie is a lot of fun, with assured direction by John Sturges and a jaunty score by Dmitri Tiomkin that doesn't fit what's happening on screen most of the time but is still fun to listen to. Though Stanwyck and Sullivan are paired in this one, it's Stanwyck and Meeker who have all the chemistry. Good grief, the erotic undertones are off the charts in their scenes together. Meeker is just dripping with raw sexuality anyway, and nobody could smoke a cigarette more suggestively than Stanwyck. After all, she'd do anything to save her husband........anything.

Grade: A-

Leonard Maltin must've been watching some other movie. (Though I find his Guide to be quite a valuable resource, please disregard his comments on this one.) He states "starts off well then fizzles" when it's really the reverse - "starts off tepid then catches fire". The plot is about as simple as it gets. Happy Mom, Happy Dad and Happy Son take a vacation at an isolated beach, Dad incapacitated in accident, Mom runs off to get help, meets up with dangerous escaped convict. Mom tries to trick convict into helping while Dad waits and hangs on for dear life.

Good white-knuckler given an electric jolt by Ralph Meeker, appearing suddenly (the director, John Sturges, films it in a clever way that will make you gasp) around halfway through as the cunning, desperate criminal. Meeker is an unusually flippant, reckless actor (at least here and in the classic "Kiss Me Deadly") and he happily snatches the keys to the film's narrative and speeds off with the top down. His character has a habit of grinning childishly and saying "Pretty neat, huh?" when he's especially pleased with his misdeeds. There is a funny break in the action when they get a flat tire and he tersely instructs his hostage, Barbara Stanwyck, "Don't go away". She fires back "Where would I go?" (they're in the middle of nowhere) and he realizes sitcom-ishly "Yeah, that's right". The friction between them is a hoot.

There are flaws, somewhat ridiculous ones. There's one scene where the police, who have been chasing after Meeker for some time, stop Stanwyck's car and to evade detection Meeker rests his head on her shoulder like a loving husband supposedly would, and pretends to be asleep as she's being questioned. A. He looks conspicuously un-masculine in this pose and B. I think it's safe to say that any adult who appears to be asleep during an encounter with law enforcement would certainly arouse suspicion.

Still a sturdy thriller which builds to an exciting and edifying conclusion.

Jeopardy (1953)

*** (out of 4)

John Sturges directed this intense thriller about a wife (Barbara Stanwyck) and husband (Barry Sullivan) who take their son on a vacation to Mexico so that they can go fishing but an accident happens and the husband gets his leg caught under a log. With the tide coming in, the wife has to try and get help before it's too late but she gets kidnapped by an escaped murderer (Ralph Meeker). This film seems to get mixed reviews and while it's not classic Sturges I still felt there was enough suspense packed in the 67-minute running time to make the film highly enjoyable. I've never found Stanwyck to be sexy so that takes away from some of her roles for me but she's terrific when playing it tough and that's the case here. She's really good in the tough role and Meeker is the perfect snake to go against her. Sullivan is also very good in his moments with his son played by Lee Aaker. There are a few flaws throughout the film and the ending is pretty weak but there's still plenty to enjoy here. The score by Dimitri Tiomkin also adds to the suspense.

Jeopardy is a tense, satisying thriller, a cut above a B but not really a major production. It qualifies as almost an experimental film, as the studio that produced it, Metro, was desperately looking for new kinds of films, stars and directors to compete with the then new medium of television. The director, John Sturges, was an up-and-comer whose best years lay ahead. He had just recently begun directing A level films, and had already proved himself a most capable craftsman. Stars Barbara Stanwyck, Barry Sullivan and Ralph Meeker, were at very different phases of their careers. Stanwyck's glory years were behind her, and yet she could still carry a film, as she proves here. Barry Sullivan, as her husband, was one of a dozen or so leading men who got started in films in the forties who never quite achieved the success many had hoped for him. He was a fine, low-key actor, poised, but in an upper middle rather than upper class way, which made him excellent in professional roles. As the escaped convict who is the only person around who can save Sullivan's life (he is trapped under a pier, and the tide is rising), Ralph Meeker is more energetic than usual. This excellent actor had the misfortune of having come to films after Brando and Clift. He was in his way as good an actor as either of them, but he lacked charisma. His bargaining with Stanwyck, which comes down to his demanding sex in exchange for saving her husband (by implication only, as this is 1953), makes for an intriguing premise which, had this been a different kind of film, could all raised all sorts of interesting questions about Stanwyck's character. Meeker is indeed a more exciting character than Sullivan; and in her scenes with him Stanwyck is livelier than she is with her husband and son. But as this is a formula picture, not a Strindberg play, the possibility that Stanwyck might want want to have a fling,--leaving aside the question of her husband's predicament,--remains unexplored. In this sense the incoming tide doesn't quite have the effect one might have wished, though the movie remains tense and highly entertaining thanks to excellent acting, fine location photography, nearly all of it outdoors, and excellent direction by the woefully underrated Mr. Sturges.

JEOPARDY doesn't deserve the brickbats it's getting from other viewers who think of it as little more than a B-film, a quickie in the career of Barbara Stanwyck.

Nonsense. Stanwyck was still a terrific actress and uses all her skill to keep this a taut woman-in-peril kind of story that starts out innocently enough but then shifts into high gear the moment her husband is trapped under some rotten pilings from a pier.

Nor is the plot a foolish one. Clearly, it's the kind of incident that could easily have happened on an isolated beach in Mexico, with Stanwyck unable to find an English-speaking person to help her when she and her small son are unable to free Sullivan as the tide rises.

It just so happens the only person able to understand her predicament is an escaped convict running from a murder charge (Ralph Meeker). The moment Meeker appears he lifts the film into a new realm of suspense, so convincing is his portrayal of a Stanley Kowalski-type of character without anything but self-preservation (and sex) on his mind. Meeker never had a better showcase for his machismo appeal.

Because of production code rules, the film fails to make more of the sex angle including Stanwyck's decision to be more cooperative with the man who clearly might do her a favor if she does him one. By glossing over this angle and merely showing Meeker grab her in a couple of tight clinches, the film loses some of its impact when she returns with him to help her husband.

Nevertheless, it's a brisk, tightly constructed story around a simple theme and it works beautifully. John Sturges doesn't waste a moment of the film on any sub-plots but stays firmly fixed on the woman's dire predicament and all of the tension the viewer must feel watching Stanwyck's distress mount, knowing that her husband is in even more peril than she is.

It's a much better film than cited here--definitely worth a look.