L'assassino viene ridendo

Pat Boone is a world-famous singer. He's opening at a major venue in Los Angeles. The crowds adore him. Wife Barbara Eden is divorcing him, and they come home to find their baby has been kidnapped.

I don't think of good acting when it comes to Boone, and Miss Eden, while a fine performer, is usually notable for her lighter work. Yet Boone gives a fine performance here as a man who thinks he has millions of friends until he discovers he doesn't have any. Miss Eden also gives a fine performance, and so does Jack Klugman as the police detective who initially browbeats the information about the kidnapping out of Boone. There are also good roles for Jesse White and a small one for Boone's acting teaching, Jeff Corey. If the ending is a bit discordant, the script by Rod Serling gets the audience there in a good fashion.

I was a fan of Kenyon Hopkins, who wrote the music. Came across the soundtrack album at an Army post exchange on a mono LP and bought it. I've been curious ever since about the movie. Big stars Pat Boone, Jack Klugman, Barbara Eden, big name screenwriter, a favorite composer. Someone saw fit to produce a music soundtrack album and press LP records for sale. My rating is based purely on the music soundtrack.

Where is this movie? I've searched the usual places, but all I've found so far have been well known scammers. We now have probably 50 streaming movie/tv services. You'd think someone would find this and run it!

Hey Amazon, how about it. If not for Prime, how about for FeeVee? There might be a whole new generation waiting to discover Pat Boone!

I saw this movie when I was just 13 years old, and it scared me to death. I remember that the movie theater had trouble opening the curtain all the way at the beginning of the movie, which only made the whole experience even more bizarre, and it was one of the opening scenes that really freaked me out. I can still see it in my mind today, some 40 years later. From what I remember, I would compare it to "Cape Fear" and "Wait Until Dark" for comparable chills. I suspect that it would play pretty innocently these days, but I would love to see it again just to see how much of what I remember was really there. Anybody have any leads on where to find this, contact me at wsjo69@yahoo.com.

Pat Boone plays a popular male crooner (with the silly, generic name of Andy Paxton) who is callous to his estranged wife and indifferent to their baby boy, but who jumps into action once the infant is kidnapped for a ransom of 200 G's. Whether he's resisting police lieutenant Jack Klugman's help or comforting stressed spouse Barbara Eden, real-life vocalist Boone turns in a surprisingly strong performance; he handles the s.o.b. stuff at the beginning quite well, and his on-stage numbers are flawlessly rendered. Klugman and Eden are also solid, which is a good thing because the midsection of this melodrama is definitely not. Rod Serling, adapting Whit Masterson's novel "Evil Come, Evil Go", writes some crisp, crackling dialogue--but the trouble is, there's too much of it. Serling forgets that a heated crime scenario such as this has to flow with a little action. Things get bogged down once Boone suspects one of his entourage of the kidnapping, doing his own detective work in-between bouts of the bottle. When the tense climax finally arrives and one is filled with questions pertaining to motive...Serling suddenly clams up! The finale is satisfying only on the most basic of levels, with point and purpose left strangely unresolved. ** from ****

I agree 100% with Jonboy1 from Texas. Pat Boone gives a very credible performance as the smooth nightclub singer, Andy Paxton. He teams again with Barbara Eden (together first in "All Hands on Deck - 1961?) who plays his wife, and is the "yellow canary" who like the proverbial worm, turns. Jack Klugman, always a welcome presence on screen appears as the probing Lieutenant Bonner. 1950s film luminary, Jeff Corey also makes an appearance. I cannot understand why this film has been canned when many less deserving films appear on DVD. Another of Pat's efforts "Never Put It In Writing" is similarly discarded while the nonsensical "The Horror of it All" is available. Strange! If anyone knows where I can buy a copy, I would be obliged.