L'assassino della Sierra Nevada

Sometimes it's as if we can forgive the most trying stretches of believability, just because a film was made in an era like the 50's with a shoestring budget. I don't like that. Good, believable films were made at this time as well as clinkers. This has some things going for it, but the way these nasty characters behave is beyond imagination. They wave their guns around, threaten, but don't seem to want to act. Hostages are left to wander all over the place. There is tension among the thieves, but it is dealt with in such a silly, haphazard way, it doesn't work. A slip up of any kind, and their whole project is down the chute. If we are to believe the whole business about being locked up in the woods in the winter, it seems at some point, someone would begin to make realistic plans to get on their way. Are they already murderers? I don't know, but they could have certainly done a better job of getting on with their plot. Then there is the ending (I'm not going to do any spoilers). This is the most ho-hum, contrived mess I've ever seen. It's as if they ran out of time and just decided to create this ending. Judge for yourself. The bottom line is, people just don't act this way--they just don't.

This is quite an unremarkable 50's crime flick. It's about a gang of armed robbers who take a young hotrod hostage and hide out in the mountains in an isolated weather station, taking a further two innocent people hostage.

The whole thing is quite contrived and although it's not particularly interesting it's not that bad either. It's a pretty cheap production but the cast acquit themselves OK, and the story moves along at a decent pace. Things are ultimately wrapped up what is close to a non-ending. It's a half-hearted resolution at best.

Overall it's really not that strange an adventure. But, you know what, I've seen a lot worse.

Colorized? Republic stagey look instead of Sierras stopped making films 1958

"A Strange Adventure" is a film made by Republic Pictures shortly before the studio stopped making movies in favor of TV programs. As the studio was having financial trouble in 1956, it's not surprising that the film has no major stars and a relatively low budget. Also, while supposedly set in the Sierras, the film appears to have been made in a sound stage.

A trio of crooks have committed an armored car robbery. However, the leader, Al, is a real head case. He kills the armored car driver for kicks and it's obvious he just enjoyed killing. So, when they capture three people along the way, it's soon apparent that he'll eventually kill them as well...so it's a case of the kidnapped folks biding their time to see if there's any chance of escape in their mountain hideout.

So is it any good? Well, it's partly good. Jan Merlin is great as the psychotic boss. And, the story is GENERALLY good...but also falls apart at the end due to some serious logical errors...too many just to ignore.

"A young man with a passion for hot rods and pretty girls finds himself in trouble when he gets mixed-up with some criminals. A pretty border at his mother's motel talks our hero into a drive that ends up as a part of her gang's armored car robbery. Forced to drive them to a remote cabin to hide from the police, our hero must think of a way to save he and his fellow hostages, and foil the plans of the bank robbers," according to the DVD sleeve's synopsis.

A dullish 1950s "rebellious youth" film. Ben Cooper (as Harold Norton) is the passionate hot rod man. Marla English (as Lynn Novak) is the beautifully built gangster's "Doll", who lures innocent Mr. Cooper into the fold. She alternates between Cooper and gang leader boyfriend Jan Merlin (as Al Kutner). Later on, the sweet sister and brother team of Joan Evans and Peter Miller (as Terry and Luther Dolgin) are taken hostage by Mr. Merlin. Nick Adams (as Phil Davis) fights off a cold, and assists Merlin.

**** A Strange Adventure (1956) William Witney ~ Ben Cooper, Marla English, Jan Merlin

This poor attempt at producing a movie fails over and over. Terrible bursts of music that might wake up the sleeping audience. Dumb characters. Good people are dumb and bad people are dumb. The music should have been dum, dum, dum, dum.

This could have been a sexy, robbery gone wrong, cute good girl, beautiful bad girl, even prettier young guy male lead, Ben Cooper action suspense adventure. My guess is the director was spending too much time studying for his grade school graduation test and he could not devote enough focus to this. Hey, the viewer can't focus on this either.

Beautiful cars in the first half of the movie. A bit of a look at a supermarket of the 1950s. Good hairstyles and make up for all the cast. They don't ever look stupid. That's just the way they act. They are all good actors, but this contrived bunch of nonsense never gives anyone a hint of reality or danger or intelligence.

What happened to the money? They needed a few more scenes when they ran out of film. I know where it was when we last saw it, but what happened to the money? Where's the money? Ben could have done so well if he could have rewritten each of his scenes. He should have been shirtless in the snow with the girl searching for the dough. Ben never got his Bonnie and Clyde role. This could have been like that with just a few changes on each page.

Tom Willett