Il ricatto più vile

This film was more or less taken from a famous midwest case of a boy kidnapped from a rich auto dealer's family in K. C., Mo. He was taken from a private school by a woman in a nurses uniform and the press in K. C. did hold off on the story until the ransom had been paid. The kidnappers were caught within 4 days, and the little boys body was found soon after. He had been killed the day he was kidnapped.

Now to the film. The point of the story is that it is 50-50 whether you get the victim back or not. Glenn Ford as the father who makes his decision to not pay but offer the whole ransom as a bounty on the kidnappers head, was very pertinent in 1956. There had been other cases like this, but the K.C. case was so brutal that it made headlines all over America for months.

As a woman who is old enough to have read about the case, and seen it on the new medium of TV for months, while it was going on, this film is heartbreaking and to me, almost perfect.

The mother and father and their anguish, the servants, who love the family, and the police and other people who interact with the family, and the company people, all are first rate. It is a slice of life as lived in an affluent mid-American family crisis, and all the principle actors are fine. The criticism I have read here does not stand up because the film is a thoughtful and serious look at a dilemma and not a flashy showcase for action fans. 9/10

Restrained performances and confined locations make this a powerful thriller. Glenn Ford is superb in the role, Leslie Neilson however is a tad over the top. Where this film succeeds is in sticking with the main character and never straying from his confinement or his pain, and when it comes to the hardest decision of his life, you're battered by the argueing group. Gritty and thought provoking.

Ransom is emblematic of the little, B&W films of the 50s that made up for their low budgets with high mindedness. In a similar context, it reminds me of Twelve Angry Men, made the following year. Both films expanded a profound human dilemma (how to resolve a kidnapping in one case, how to judge the guilt or innocence of a man regardless of popular consensus in another) into a cinematic drama that leaves a greater imprint on your mind than the slam-boom special-effect films of today can possibly accomplish. You leave the theater (or your home TV) thinking over and over, "What would I have done if I were in that situation?" Because of the kiddie-market mentality of modern film producers and the international demand for plots that are high in action and low in thought content, we will never see films of this kind being produced again (at least not by the majors). Savor this film and others like it.

Having seen the mediocre remake of Ransom, starring Mel Gibson, I was intrigued when I came across the original from 1956 that featured the always great Glen Ford. I'm glad I did, because now I know how the film was supposed to be made.

Ransom! is the story of the wealthy Mr. Stannard (Ford) and his wife (Donna Reed) who are devastated to find out that their son has been kidnapped. Stannard immediately agrees to the kidnapper's terms, but at the last minute turns the tables when he goes on television and announces that the 500,000 ransom is now a price on the kidnapper's head, a decision which shocks the local townspeople and especially his wife.

I have a feeling this film was innovative using television as a platform, it had to have been based on the year the film was made - 1956. Although I had seen it played out before in the more recent version of Ransom, with a mild effect, the use of the medium in this manner was extremely powerful, even slightly shocking. Ford made his career playing fairly tough characters; even his roles in comedies had a slightly rough edge. I have to say that this was the best I have ever seen him. He was steely, yet desperate in his resolution that he was making the wisest decision, no matter what the consequences - and when his vulnerability finally cracked through the surface, you cannot help but absorb some of his pain. Donna Reed was a fairly minor character as the mother - she helped set the tone in the beginning, but was basically used later in the film as fuel for Ford's guilt. Leslie Nielsen was also featured as a newspaper reporter who becomes a kind of sounding board for Ford's character, and did a decent dramatic turn at it. It's still interesting to see him as a dramatic actor when we are so used to seeing him only in comedies for the last twenty years.

While Akira Kurosawa's "High and Low" still remains my favorite film in the "kidnapped" genre, this is definitely a close second. The kidnapping of a loved one has been a pretty common plot device in the first century of cinema, but when a film adds to or even transcends the genre it becomes distinct. Ransom! does just that, and I highly recommend it.

--Shelly

After viewing the film and reflecting on what made the film tick, my kudos do not go to the actors, who appear to be the backbone of the film, but to a solid script and screenplay.

For the first half hour the movie seems to be making inane statements about bringing up children. But those early conversations become meaningful after the movie is over as the choices the father makes have much to do with the parallels in teaching the son early lessons in life--"stealing" planks from your parents' bed to make a toyhouse is to be viewed in comparison to "stealing" stockholder wealth to regain personal property.

At another level, the story is a mirror of Job's dilemma--standing steadfast on principles when all his earthly possessions (including his wife) are being taken away. It is to the credit of the script and the director that the tormentors (the kidnapers) remain unseen and the battle is merely relegated to one man's internal moral turmoil.

Was Glenn Ford's performance creditable? Yes and no. At the end of the film you tend to think it was a memorable performance. But think of replacing Ford with any good star of the day and the effect could have been much the same, thanks to the script.

I feel this was a good film because it did not lapse into trivial confrontation with the kidnapers as most contemporary movies do. It was good because the film avoided pitfalls, while adding color to fringe characters by providing them with short punchy lines such as the lines of the school headmistress, the journalists, the ice-cream vendor, the pedestrian who wonders how speeding police cars don't get tickets, and last but not least the Afro-american butler.