Harrison's Reports (1958)

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May 17, 1958 HARRISON'S REPORTS 79 fight breaks out when Lord accuses Tina of infidelity with Ray and when Fuller brashly tells her to abandon Lord and come live with him. Ryan manages to stop the fight, blames the family troubles on his greed for gold and restores peace and harmony by devoting the efforts of himself and his sons to farming the land. It was produced by Sidney Harmon and directed by Anthony Mann from a screenplay by Philip Yordan. Strictly adult fare. "Maracaibo" with Cornel Wilde, Jean Wallace and Abbe Lane (Paramount, May; time, 88 win.) A pretty good romantic adventure melodrama, photo' graphed in Technicolor. The story is a rather fanciful mix' ture of heroics and romance, set against colorful scenic backgrounds in Caracas and Maracaibo, and centering around a dashing American adventurer who is as adept with the ladies as he is in extinguishing disastrous oil-well fires. The ingredients, however, are of a type that should go over with the general run of audiences, for it offers plentiful sex appeal and more than a fair share of thrills in the sequences concerning the hero's underwater efforts to douse the raging oil fire in an off-shore well. The direction and acting are competent, and the photography excellent:— When a disastrous oil-well fire breaks out in Maracaibo, Joe E. Ross, an oil expert, tries to locate Cornel Wilde, a dashing adventurer, who was an expert at extinguishing such fires. He finds him vacationing in Maracaibo, where he had met and become smitten with Jean Wallace, a famed novelist. Rose arranges to fly Wilde to Maracaibo, and Jean, on the spur of the moment, asks to go along. In Maracaibo, both are welcomed by Francis Lederer, a wealthy and kindly mute who owned the oil field and who invites them to be his guests at his palatial estate. Michael Landon, Lederer's devoted young companion, serves as a means of communication between Lederer and his guests. Arriving at the estate, Wilde discovers that Abbe Lane, a former sweetheart of his with a shady past, had become engaged to Lederer and was on the verge of marrying him. Landon, who had discovered the truth about Abbe's past, had threatened to inform Lederer unless she left him of her own accord. Abbe appeals to Wilde to help her start a new life, but he does not trust her and warns her not to take advantage of Lederer. Meanwhile Jean notices the meetings between Abbe and Wilde and suspects that he had resumed his affair with her. After much difficulty and almost at the cost of his life. Wilde quenches the gigantic fire, but in the process Landon is killed accidentally. Abbe comforts the saddened Lederer and, in fairness to him, reveals her past and tells him of her decision to leave. He insists, however, that she become his "voice" and wife. Meanwhile Wilde and Jean straighten out their misunderstandings and look forward to a new life together. It was produced and directed by Mr. Wilde from a screenplay by Ted Sherdeman, based on a novel by Stirling Silliphant. Unobjectionable morally. "Hot Spell" with Shirley Booth, Anthony Quinn and Shirley MacLaine (Paramount, June; time, 86 min.) Moody but fairly interesting dramatic fare is offered in "Hot Spell," which centers around the emotional upheaval in the lives of a Southern Family whose members are plagued by individual problems, particularly the mother, a doting, middle-aged woman, who refuses to face realities and suffers the vagaries of a crude and wayward husband who carries on an open love affair with a young "chippie." The story has a brooding, off-beat quality and, as such, seems more suited for the classes than for the masses. The acting is superior to the material, with Shirley Booth contributing an outstanding characterization as the gentle wife and mother who is unable to cope with her large and unruly family. Anthony Quinn turns in his usual fine acting job as the unsympathetic father and husband who comes to a tragic end, and competent work is done by Shirley MacLaine, Earl Holliman and Clint Kimbrough, as the family's grown but unhappy children. The story, which covers a two-day span in the life of the family, opens with Miss Booth taking special pains to celebrate Quinn's birthday at a family dinner that evening. She knew he was cavorting around with a 19-year-old "chippie" and hoped that the party would bring him back into her arms. The dinner starts pleasantly enough, but it breaks up under an emotional strain when Quinn gets into a violent argument with Holliman, his eldest son, who worked with Quinn and wanted to start a business of his own. Later, as he prepares to leave the house, Quinn discovers Shirley necking on the porch with Warren Stevens, her boyfriend. He castigates the young man and puts an end to the romance when he practically demands that he marry Shirley. Changing his mood, Quinn suddenly decides to take Kimbrough, his sensitive, teen-aged son, to a pool room to teach him how to play the game. They find being together awkward and he leaves the boy there to keep a "business appointment," but the youngster follows him and dies a little when he sees his father go off with Valerie Allen, the "chippie." In the events that follow, Quinn decides to go off with Valerie, despite Miss Booth's pleas that he return with her to New Paris, a small town, where they had spent the happy years of their early married life. En route to Florida, Quinn and his girl-friend are killed in an automobile crash. Miss Booth arranges for Quinn's burial in New Paris, where she comes to the realization that she must stop living in the past and determines to make a new life for herself and her family. It was produced by Hal B. Wallis and directed by Daniel Mann from a screenplay by James Poe, based on a play by Lennie Coleman. Adult fare. "Vertigo" with James Stewart, Kim Novak and Barbara Bel Geddes (Paramount, June; time, 123 min.) Brilliantly photographed in Technicolor and VistaVision against authentic San Francisco backgrounds, this latest Alfred Hitchcock "thrillorama" offers further evidence of his mastery in mystery and suspense, for, despite its flaws, not the least of which is a far-fetched, unbelievable story, it grips one's attention from start to finish. Hitchcock's expert handling of the story and the players wrings every ounce of intrigue and suspense from the action, which centers around a retired detective who becomes an unwitting tool in a bizarre murder plot when he is hired by a friend to shadow his beautiful wife, supposedly a neurotic with suicidal tendencies. James Stewart turns in a top-notch portrayal as the detective who suffers a shattering emotional experience, and a surprisingly good job is done by Kim Novak who plays sort of a dual role to trick him and to prevent him from learning that he had been tricked. It is a contrived story and much that happens is illogical, but the treatment is so good that one does not seem to notice this. The running time, incidentally, is much too long for what the story has to offer: — Fear of height, brought about by the death of a fellow officer, causes Stewart to resign from the San Francisco police department. Barbara Bel Geddes, his girl friend of many years, consoles him. Shortly thereafter, Tom Helmore, a rich college chum, hires Stewart to shadow and protect Kim Novak, his wife, whom he describes as a suicidal neurotic, possessed by the spirit of an insane great-grandmother who had committed suicide. Stewart follows Kim to a number of strange places, including a graveyard and an art gallery, and they meet for the first time when she throws herself into San Francisco Bay and he rescues her. A strong love develops between them, and one day, while they visit an old mission in an effort to clear up the mystery concerning her condition, she breaks away from him, runs up to the mission belfry and leaps to her death. Stewart, unable to stop her because of his fear of height, suffers a mental breakdown. Upon being released from the sanitarium, he wanders around the streets and one day encounters a girl who bears a striking resemblance to Kim (also played by Miss Novak) even though her hair, makeup and speech were different. He cultivates her friendship and in a series of suspense-laden incidents discovers that she really is Kim and that she, in league with Helmore, had worked out a scheme whereby Helmore had hurled his real wife from the belfry when Kim ran up into the tower, thus establishing Stewart as a witness to her "suciide." Stewart confronts Kim with this discovery after bringing her up to the belfry again and the shock causes her to fall tragically to her own death. It was produced and directed by Mr. Hitchcock from a screenplay by Alec Coppel and Samuel Taylor, based upon the novel "D'Entrc les Morts," by Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejec. Adult fare.