Les inconnus dans la ville

Thanks to FXM we can now see the widescreen version of Violent Saturday. Its a terrific, tense crime drama that must have been somewhat controversial in 1955. Certainly the onscreen violence is stronger than anything else I've seen from the period, except possibly Richard Widmark shoving the wheelchair down the stairs in Kiss of Death. There are definitely some hints of the future Hollywood of Sam Peckinpah--the sadistic Lee Marvin grinding a little boys hand into the ground, and a bearded Ernest Borgnine using a pitchfork on Lee towards the end of the film. Well worth catching.

And tough hold-up picture with insignificant small-town stories erupt into drama . A competent bank job film that takes place in the burning light of the Midwest noonday without a shadow in sight , when a gang of hoodlums decides to steal the local bank . It results in a violent and lethal conclusion . Along the way , a number of otherwise insignificant small-town stories erupt into drama when the bunch of henchmen , often with quirky behavior , decides to rob the local bank . A father (Victor Mature) looking for pride in his child's eyes , a shy bank clerk (Tommy Noonan) who is a peeping Tom by night , a man (Richard Egan) striving to rewin his spouse's (Margaret Hayes) love , an Amish farmer (Ernest Borgnine) to defend his family has to face off the violent reality , and a proper older woman (Sylvia Sidney) become crook , all find themselves entangled with the bank thives .

This interesting movie contains marvelous performances from all concerned , suspense , thrills , exciting situations and some action . The film is part thriller , part Film Noir and part Melodrama resulting in an attractive and well-shot blending. An enjoyable caper movie adding some depiction of local characters with some really soapy elements tossed in for good measure and winding up in a peaceful weekend becomes violent . Compact drama : intense , well-made and acted , but not as incisive as it should have been . But here the really poignant and moving final half hour really stands out , as opposed to other more boring parts of the story . Any movie which features tough actors as Lee Marvin , Richard Egan , Ernest Borgnine, Victor Mature has to be some kind of primer in slobdom , but in fact Ernest plays a religious fundamentalist farmer and hero Mature soon becomes marginal when up against Marvin as a loose-lipped with a permanent head cold . Director Fleischer takes attention away from the thriller and into a moral battleground back at the farm where Borgnine faces with viciousness and ultimately gets his pitchfork . However , too much conversation and too little action bogs down this thriller , although the plot and intrigue is nice . There are excellent acting from some Hollywood's best players , including prestigious secondaries , such as : Stephen McNally , Virginia Leith , Tommy Noonan , Margaret Hayes , J. Carrol Naish , Brad Dexter , Dorothy Patrick and veteran Sylvia Sidney and brief role for Lee Marvin , being one of his several early roles where he perpormed a nasty gangster or a bad guy , before he eventually became a brave good guy/action hero.

It packs brilliant and glamorous cinematography in CinemaScope and De Luxe color by great cameraman Charles G. Clarke . Likewise , sensitive and rousing musical score by Hugo Friedhofer . One of the medium-budgeted films ever shot by Buddy Adler/Twentieth Century Fox and this motion picture was well directed by Richard Fleischer , though being marred by excessive family drama . Craftsman Richard Fleischer was a prolific filmaker with successes and flops , as he has an important , long and uneven career . The last fifteen years the Richard Fleischer's films were not exactly very bright , filming Charles Bronson or Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicles , but in his first twenty-five years had proved his own right as one of the most interesting directors of American commercial cinema . He was an expert director , including classy adventures (Vikings, 20.000 leagues under sea) , noir cinema (Narrow margin , Clay pigeons , Trapped) , Terror (Amityville 3-D) , Sci-fi (Soylent Green) , Sword and witchery (Conan the Destroyer , Red Sonja) , among others .

The wide-screen format was at most only two years old when this film was made. Yet, Charles G. Clarke's shot composition in the new wide-screen format is beautiful. This alone makes the film worth watching.

This is a good example of a color film noir; perhaps not as good as Niagara (1953) or Leave her to Heaven (1945), which were made by the same studio by the way (20th Century Fox), but still a good example from the noir cycle in color.

One way to understand film noir is that it is simply violent melodrama. Look at The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946) for example. Violent Saturday (1955) is steeped in melodrama, but there is also some extraordinary violence. And the violence here--in typical noir fashion--is the resolution--however bleak--to some of the melodramatic conflict.

The film has a profound cynicism grinding beneath the surface of the beautiful color photography. And this cynicism remains at the end of the film.

If you haven't seen this film and you are interested in film noir or film of this period, then I would highly recommend the Violent Saturday.

"Violent Saturday" was not an outstanding movie, nor very original, but that is not to say that it had no merit. Richard Fleischer's direction goes much farther than skin-deep. From one angle, "Violent Saturday" is about a hold-up and the normal guy (Victor Mature) who tries to stop the criminals. That's fine, and there are some very exciting moments toward the end of the film. But another angle is more interesting: it's a study of what normal small-town-folks do in secret. Indeed, in comparison to the unscrupulous dealings of a voyeuristic bank manager, a larcenous librarian, and a trampy wife and her alcoholic husband, the sadistic bad guys (including a memorable Lee Marvin) seem less sinister. In its studies of the dynamics between husband and wife, parent and child, and its Everyman hero and hard-bitten villains, "Violent Saturday" is half a tribute to noir tradition, half a fifties family-drama. The mixture is sometimes uneasy. Particularly annoying are the conversations between doofy dad Mature and his cute little son who wishes his dad was more of a hero. But the drama between the weirder citizens of the little town is intriguing. A masterful use of the camera and Hugo Friedhofer's strident score are other assets. All in all, "Violent Saturday" is worth a look.

Combination crime-drama and soap opera, presumably a contract picture from Fox with many familiar faces (and Ernest Borgnine inexplicably cast as an Amish farmer!), turns out to be a pretty exciting movie. Three hoods plot to stick up a small town bank; meanwhile, hormones are boiling over at the new copper plant where the foreman's son is drinking himself into a stupor while his cheating wife runs around on the golf course ("You're an alcoholic," she tells him, "and I'm a tramp!"). There's also a married banker who lusts after a shapely nurse, a librarian with sticky fingers, and Victor Mature as a graduate whose oldest child is ashamed that his father never served his country. Director Richard Fleischer sets up the pieces of this story almost sluggishly, yet after about an hour of exposition the plot really starts cooking. There are some strong images here, and vivid cinematography by Charles G. Clarke (with excellent location shooting in Bisbee, Arizona and terrific usage of De Luxe color stock). The ensemble cast works admirably together, no one person upstaging the other; however, crooked Lee Marvin makes a fantastic entrance into town stepping on a child's hand in the street! Gripping, tense, and surprisingly well-written, with Richard Egan getting an emotional monologue at the end about the unfairness of death. An injured Amish child is forgotten about in the rush of excitement, and Borgnine in an Abraham Lincoln beard strains credulity, but the technical aspects and direction of the film are top-notch. *** from ****