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A well directed, well photographed little known gem of a film.

Great role for Quinn who would have made a great Mike Hammer. His primitive face and huge hands seem prepared for instant violence.

In spite of being a low budget film, the directing, acting and photography seems superior than that better known B classic 'Detour'. Gene Evans and Charles Coburn always took their character roles seriously and seemed incapable of bad performances. The lovely ballad that plays over the credits 'Once' is appropriately used throughout the movie and deserves to be a standard.

The scene where a bound-up Peggie Castle crawls to a bound-up Quinn (to get her hands on his hidden pistol under pretense of a final kiss) would have made a great paperback cover for a Spillane Novel.

Once the dreadful title song is over this proves a surprising but welcome departure by Victor Saville into Mickey Spillane territory, which shares with 'Kiss Me Deadly' a formidable foursome of females (one of whom actually tells the hero "Oh mister! I haven't been kissed like that for a long, long time!" and a sense of humour that somewhat disqualifies it as a bona fide film noir.

Anthony Quinn (who inevitably turns out to be called "Johnny" and finds himself surrounded by guys in big suits shooting at him) gains in assurance as the film progresses back in the days before winning his first Oscar turned his head.

It's worth every minute of the long wait in order to experience one of film noir's most indelible moments. A single, unforgettable set piece - stark, surreal, sensual and sadistic in equal measure. Opening with a crane shot, Anthony Quinn and Peggie Castle, battered and bruised by brutal bad boys (Gene Evans and Bruno DeSota), with no means of escape, seem about to bid a torturous farewell to the game of life. Castle, in particular, is stunning as the used and abused moll, bloodied and beleaguered, but demonstrating unquenchable defiance...... and it's not even the climax, which, when it arrives delivers an ironic twist, prior to the movie's playful romantic joker in the final scene.

Quinn is the ultimate three time loser. Following a horrific road accident, he temporarily loses the use of his hands, loses his memory and discovering that he is a murder suspect, stands to lose his life.

Fortunately, he hasn't lost his marbles. Moreover, having a head that's emptier than a hermit's address book, strangely works in Quinn's favour, quickening his thoughts, sharpening his awareness and heightening his survival instinct. His grim, relentless determination to clear his name, break the web of corruption which is strangling the town and find the killer, leads to close involvement with beautiful women of varied repute and to the bank where he was previously employed as a teller.

A sadly neglected and under appreciated picture, of genuine weight and substance, my one minor misgiving is that so momentous a movie be marred by so mundane a moniker. Still, at least it's better than: The BIG Wait.... Just!

The Long Wait is directed by Victor Saville and adapted to screenplay by Alan Green and Lesser Samuels from the Mickey Spillane novel. It stars Anthony Quinn, Charles Coburn, Gene Evans, Peggie Castle, Mary Ellen Kay and Shirley Patterson. Music is by Mario Castelnuovo- Tedesco and cinematography by Franz Planer.

Johnny McBride (Quinn) is a amnesiac who manages to get back to his home town of Lyncastle where he hopes to unravel who he is. But pretty soon he finds himself in a quagmire of trouble and strife...

Every once in a while I come across an instance like this, where a film noir picture's reviews back upon its release were savage, and yet today the more modern noir lover is mostly positive about the pic. In fact IMDb's rating sits currently at 7.2, which as the site's users will attest to, is pretty good going. So where we at with this Spillane revamp?

The complaints back in the day about it being dull and boring smack to me of writers back then not exactly understanding the noir ethos, though it's noted that there is the odd modern reviewer sharing the same complaint. It's a film very much erring on the side of bleak and moody, dabbling in the complexities of the human condition, and it's done very well, though the screenplay is hardly minus plot holes and is full of incredulous set-ups.

We also have to buy into Quinn being catnip to the dames, four of them no less! But Quinn does angry and broody very well, and he gets to do lots of both here. The aura of a town paddling in its own muck is evident, the amnesia angle merely an excuse to keep things on the side of murky, for it's imperative that we feel Johnny McBride's confusion and mistrust, and we do. All of which is framed superbly by Planer's (Criss Cross) photography, which never misses a chance for shadows and low lights.

With salty villains and sultry dames, violence and choice dialogue, and a few superb scenes (one sequence in an empty warehouse is stunning), this is very much a noir for noir lovers to sample. But with that in mind, these warnings should be noted, that as is often the way in noirville, the ending is divisive and the overt misogyny could well offend. 6.5/10

I see by the credits that this gem of a noir was filmed by Franz Planer, who did many classics. I've seen most of the Mickey Spillane movies, and this one has the most distinctive photography. The director Victor Saville seems to have been a better producer than a director. he also had an affinity for Mickey Spillane; he produced nearly all the Mike Hammer movies in the 1950s.

The cast is outstanding; besides the great Anthony Quinn, there are several lovely girls, the best being Peggie Castle. Even the trampy woman at the beginning who gets a rude kiss-off from Quinn plays her small part to perfection.

The doctor who treats Quinn's hands at the beginning has a familiar face. I've seen him in many TV shows as well as movies.

It's impossible to make a bad movie when you have Charles Coburn and Gene Evans backing you up.