Key Witness

I think that people miss the historical aspect of this movie. It was 1960 and Hollywood was just figuring out how to make a "real" and gritty crime drama. Yes the film is bizarre - Father Knows Best meets The Wild Ones or The Blackboard Jungle. The average scriptwriter probably wasn't real familiar with the daily life of street criminals and the language would have gone right over their head.

But the movie shows the by 1960 crime was becoming more of a concern for the average middle class American family. People were starting to learn that their safe, secure little worlds, weren't and that the crime of the "lower class" neighborhoods was moving into their daily life.By 1970 middle class America would be much sadder and wiser, but this film shows that crime was a concern in during the good old days of President Ike.

Basically it's an interesting look at the time.It's one of the few older movies I've come across in which there is a reference to a character, even a villain, using Cocaine. Yes the thugs are too clean and they don't look like they smell. As a cop I can tell you the one thing that movies don't convey is the smell of that world. How can they?The only movie that I can think of that came the closest was "Training Day".

Don't compare this movie to modern productions, it isn't fair. Overacting and melodramatic scripts were normal and expected. Just watch shows like Star Trek,Route 66, The Big Valley and The Fugitive. Those shows were over the top by our standards, but not back then.It isn't that bad.

While it's true that the plot is frequently hampered by preposterous turns, this emerges as a genuinely harrowing thriller, largely owing to Jeffrey Hunter's conviction in the title role, as well as comely Patricia Crowley's interpretation as his panicked suburban wife.

It is to director Karlson's credit that he can take the improbable and still draw one in, such as the scene where Mr. Hunter's young son is shot by one of the thug's on the school playground--and one goes quite limp with horror.

And for all those doubting the veracity of witness retribution--try reading the daily newspapers.

However, Cinemasope is inappropriate for such an intimate story, and the cinematographer here is usually incapable of effectively composing for such a wide frame.

Look for Ted Knight in a bit as Dennis Hopper's defense attorney.

This movie really had me laughing and rolling in my lounge chair. The corny lines and predicaments the main characters were faced with let you know how advanced the screenplay writer was in the 50's & 60's. The so-called "hip-talk" was so funny that I know the actors probably had to do several takes to keep from laughing at themselves saying the lines. This movie believe it or not touches on the urban social conscience of the world too.

I thought Key Witness was interesting. The characters were of different genders, race, class and creed. It also also gave you an understanding about life in East L.A. during the late 50's & early 60's.

If Key Witness was re-made to reflect the times of today, the following actors should be cast in the character roles: Mr. Morrow - David Hasslehoff or Rob Lowe, Mrs. Morrow - Christina Applegate, Cowboy - Brad Pitt, Apple - David Alan Grier or Micheal Beach(Third Watch), Ruby - Christina Applegate, Carmen Electra, Madonna or Melissa Milano or Melissa Rivers (first acting gig) Muggles - Brad Pitt, Vince Vaughn or Colin Ferrell, Det. Turno - Obba Obatunde, Giancarlo Espisito, Charles S. Dutton, Magician - Vince Vaughn . The plot would be the same only updated to reflect the times. Its a classic for any young filmmaker to use as a guide and training tool. Check it out!

By the late 1950s film noir was dead but the juvenile delinquent thriller, originally inspired by the novels of Hal Ellson from ten years earlier ("Duke," "The Golden Spike," etc), was thriving on the B-movie circuit. But MGM and producer Pandro Berman, perhaps hoping to repeat their 1955 success with "Blackboard Jungle," tried to blow "Key Witness" up into an A-movie, widescreen Cinemascope, "Rebel Without a Cause" alumni (Hopper, Corey Allen), and all. Though the plot relies on sometimes ridiculous turns (in one maddening scene, a deputy runs into a courtroom interrupting testimony) and the characters are mostly cartoons (Muggles certainly lives up to the first syllable in his name), director Phil Karlson's decision to shoot on the streets of Los Angeles keeps everything moderately realistic. The opening scene, set in a hilly slum neighborhood just north of City Hall in the Chinatown area (though it looks like old Bunker Hill and is referred to as "East L.A." in the film), immediately puts the viewer into the middle of the action and the period. If this film had been shot on a soundstage, as "Blackboard Jungle" was, it would have fallen apart within the first ten minutes, but once again L.A. saves the day. If you love the atmosphere of on-location films from this era, you'll enjoy the sensation of sitting through "Key Witness."

KEY WITNESS, based on Frank Kane's novel of the same name, is sort of the successor to MGM's 1955 BLACKBOARD JUNGLE, but with more acting flourishes (mostly by the supporting cast) and realistic settings. By 1960, delinquency and gang violence were recognized as an unpleasant reality outside of "old" urban centers such as New York -- but also not always (or often) involving such well-scrubbed suburbanites as those depicted in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE. Though its script stumbles in some notable places (a few involving basic logic -- except that this was a new world for many of the people who would have been watching in 1960), KEY WITNESS is a good depiction of the law abiding running up against the sociopathic lawless, with horrendous consequences for all concerned. The movie also plays, in somewhat naive fashion, on a racial angle in its plot and characterizations -- this is an odd touch, considering that the entire gang in Kane's book, if memory serves, was African-American. (Additionally, the book is more violent and also a lot more raunchy in terms of the Ruby character, who alludes to the idea of explaining her assault on the witness's wife because of a (rejected) lesbian overture in a courthouse ladies' room). The movie ends a little too squeaky clean and optimistically, not that differently from THE BLACKBOARD JUNGLE, but is more harrowing along the way. Along with releases such as THE SUBTERRANEANS, which was done around the same time, it was all a really interesting venture by MGM into territory far from its roots in high art and Americana, and an admission that the 1940s were long-gone. And anyone who likes the movie should check out the novel.