NFR Project: 'Edge of the City' (1957)

NFR Project: “Edge of the City”

Dir: Martin Ritt

Scr: Robert Alan Aurthur

Pho: Joseph Brun

Ed: Sidney Meyers

Premiere: Jan. 29, 1957

82 min.

This film is another classic New York movie. Made on location, it’s a gritty urban drama that preaches racial tolerance, and the courage to stand up for justice despite its possible negative outcome. The lessons that Italian neo-realism taught are on display here.

It’s the first feature film of director Martin Ritt, who had been a prominent TV director until he was blacklisted in 1952. Taking five years off to teach acting, Ritt finally got his chance to direct again with this film. It’s based on a 1955 teleplay by Robert Alan Aurthur.

In it, a young John Cassavetes, using the false name of Alex North, gets a job as a longshoreman on the city docks. He is on the run, being a deserter from the Army. A work gang leader, Charlie (Jack Warden) recommends him for a job but demands a kickback from Axel’s paycheck. Alex is soon befriended by Sidney Poitier’s character Tommy, another gang leader who takes him under his wing.

Tommy is a ray of sunshine – wise, upbeat, and honorable. He doesn’t care about Axel’s past and draws the insecure young man out. However, Charlie has it out for Alex, and when he finds out his secret, he ups the take he is getting from him, as well as bullying him unmercifully. Tommy steps in to deflect Charlie’s anger, which provokes a fight with cargo hooks between the two. Charlie murders Tommy.

No one at the work site will testify as to what really happened. Tommy’s bereaved widow excoriates Axel for knowing the truth, but being unwilling to go to the police about it. Axel then marches to the job site, tells Charlie he’s turning him in, and then battles him on the dock, eventually beating him and dragging him to the police.

It’s a simple story. The real star of the show is Poitier, who portrays an almost saintly character. The depiction of a black/white friendship was unheard of at the time, and this was lauded by activist organizations. It was not so long ago that Black characters were portrayed as feeble stereotypes. Poitier was the Jackie Robinson of the motion-picture industry; he played exemplary roles and integrated the screen. It’s also good to see Cassavetes in an early role. A fine little tale.

The NFR Project is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: A Face in the Crowd.

NFR Project: 'The Bridge on the River Kwai' (1957)

NFR Project: “The Bridge on the River Kwai”

Dir: David Lean

Scr: Carl Foreman, Michael Wilson

Pho: Jack Hildyard

Ed: Peter Taylor

Premiere: Dec. 14, 1957

161 min.

This is the first of director David Lean’s big-budget, epic film masterpieces. Prior to this, Lean was known for his collaborations with Noel Coward, and for his Dickens adaptations. His incredible visual sense is borne out in all his films, but his last five would cement his reputation as a master filmmaker.

Each epic is set in a different environment – this film, the jungle; Lawrence of Arabia, the desert; Doctor Zhivago, a snowscape; Ryan’s Daughter, the edge of the sea; A Passage to India the landscape again. In each he asks probing moral questions. What is identity? What is integrity? How does the heart cross paths with the mind?

Here, he takes up, in Technicolor and CinemaScope, the plight of British prisoners of war in World War II. The script was written by two blacklisted screenwriters, Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson. The Oscar for Best Screenplay was given, not to them, but to the author of the novel, Pierre Boulle. In fact, the film won seven Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor for Guinness, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, and Best Score.

Under the guns of their Japanese captors, the soldiers are forced to help build a railway – one known as the Death Railway -- between Bangkok and Rangoon. In particular, they must build a bridge across the river Kwai. Into the prison camp marches Col. Nicholson (Alec Guinness) and his men. The Japanese commanding officer, Col. Saito (Sesue Hayakawa), orders the officers to work on the bridge beside their men. Nicholson refuses, as it is against the rules of battle, the Geneva Convention.

Saito strikes him and orders him and his officers to sweat it out in “ovens,” corrugated tin boxes exposed to the brutal jungle sun. Days go by, and Nicholson refuses to give in. Finally, Saito, facing an ominous deadline to get his bridge built, acquiesces. Nicholson recovers – or does he? Soon he has conceived of a plan to take over the construction of the bridge, claiming that his men could do a much better job than their captors, seeing it as a morale-building exercise. The cautiously friendly doctor (James Donald) asks whether this behavior is treasonous, but he is scoffed at.

Meanwhile, an American sailor pretending to be an officer (William Holden) escapes the camp and makes it to safety – only to be found out and ordered to go on a mission back to the Kwai, to destroy the bridge.

The intersection of the fates entangling Guinness, Hayakawa, and Holden are fascinating. How comfortably can a man live with delusion? What does a code of honor imply? Once Nicholson is given command of the bridge, he persuades the officers to work alongside the men, and even recruits the men in hospital to help out. His consuming passion is the completion of the bridge, and against all true logic his deranged logic drives him and his men onward.

The conclusion is spectacular, and equivocal. The last words in the film are aptly uttered by the good doctor – “Madness! Madness!”

The NFR Project is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: Edge of the City.

Just for Halloween: The 100 (OK, 113) Greatest Horror Films

 

OK, I finally did it! I forced myself to identify the strongest 10 horror films from each decade, then listed them all in chronological order. You will find some favorites. You will scratch your head at some of the choices. You will miss some that you think should be on there. I did my best, and left a lot of my personal favorites off the list. Trust me, if you watch all these, you will be a movie horror expert.

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (Robert Wiene, 1920)

The Golem: How He Came into the World (Paul Wegener, 1920)

Destiny (Fritz Lang, 1921)

Haxan: Witchcraft through the Ages (Benjamin Christesen, 1922)

Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror (F.W. Murnau, 1922)

The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Wallace Worsley, 1923)

Waxworks (Paul Leni, 1924)

The Phantom of the Opera (Rupert Julian, 1925)

The Cat and the Canary (Paul Leni, 1927)

The Unknown (Tod Browning, 1927)

Dracula (Tod Browning, 1931)

Frankenstein (James Whale, 1931)

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Rouben Mamoulian, 1931)

M (Fritz Lang, 1931)

The Mummy (Karl Freund, 1932)

Island of Lost Souls (Erle C. Kenton, 1932)

Freaks (Tod Browning, 1932)

The Invisible Man (James Whale, 1933)

King Kong (Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, 1933)

Bride of Frankenstein (James Whale, 1935)

Mad Love (Karl Freund, 1935)

The Wolf Man (George Waggner, 1941)

Cat People (Jacques Tourneur, 1942)

I Walked with a Zombie (Jacques Tourneur, 1943)

The Seventh Victim (Mark Robson, 1943)

The Body Snatcher (Robert Wise, 1945)

Dead of Night (Alberto Cavalcanti, Charles Crichton, Robert Hamer, Basil Dearden, 1945)

Hangover Square (John Brahm, 1945)

Isle of the Dead (Mark Robson, 1945)

The Picture of Dorian Gray (Albert Lewin, 1945)

Bedlam (Mark Robson, 1946)

The Thing (from Another World) (Christian Nyby, 1951)

It Came from Outer Space (Jack Arnold, 1951)

Creature from the Black Lagoon (Jack Arnold, 1954)

Godzilla (Ishiro Honda, 1954)

Them! (Gordon Douglas, 1954)

Night of the Hunter (Charles Laughton, 1955)

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Don Siegel, 1956)

The Curse of Frankenstein (Terence Fisher, 1957)

The Incredible Shrinking Man (Jack Arnold, 1957)

(The Horror of) Dracula (Terence Fisher, 1958)

House of Usher (Roger Corman, 1960)

Jigoku (Nobuo Nakagawa, 1960)

Peeping Tom (Michael Powell, 1960)

Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960)

The Innocents (Jack Clayon, 1961)

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (Robert Aldrich, 1962)

Planet of the Vampires (Mario Bava, 1965)

Kill, Baby . . . Kill! (Mario Bava, 1966)

Night of the Living Dead (George A. Romero, 1968)

Rosemary’s Baby (Roman Polanski, 1968)

The Devils (Ken Russell, 1971)

The Exorcist (William Friedkin, 1973)

The Wicker Man (Robin Hardy, 1973)

It’s Alive (Larry Cohen, 1974)

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (Tobe Hooper, 1974)

Deep Red (Dario Argento, 1975)

Carrie (Brian De Palma, 1976)

Suspiria (Dario Argento, 1977)

Eraserhead (David Lynch, 1977)

Halloween (John Carpenter, 1978)

Alien (Ridley Scott, 1979)

Friday the 13^th (Sean S. Cunningham, 1980)

The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980)

The Howling (Joe Dante, 1981)

Possession (Andrzej Zulawski, 1981)

The Thing (John Carpenter, 1982)

Videodrome (David Cronenberg, 1983)

A Nightmare on Elm Street (Wes Craven, 1984)

Aliens (James Cameron, 1986)

Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn (Sam Raimi, 1987)

Near Dark (Kathyrn Bigelow, 1987)

They Live (John Carpenter, 1988)

It (Tommy Lee Wallace, 1990)

Misery (Rob Reiner, 1990)

The People Under the Stairs (Wes Craven, 1991)

The Silence of the Lambs (Jonathan Demme, 1991)

Candyman (Bernard Rose, 1992)

In the Mouth of Madness (John Carpenter, 1994)

Scream (Wes Craven, 1996)

Cure (Kiyoshi Kurosawa, 1997)

Funny Games (Michael Haneke, 1997)

I Stand Alone (Gaspar Noe, 1998)

American Psycho (Mary Harron, 2000)

Battle Royale (Kinji Fukasaku, 2000)

The Cell (Tarsem Singh, 2000)

Audition (Takashi Miike, 2001)

The Others (Alejandro Amenabar, 2001)

28 Days Later . . . (Danny Boyle, 2002)

May (Lucky McKee, 2002)

Shaun of the Dead (Edgar Wright, 2004)

The Host (Bong Joon Ho, 2006)

Pan’s Labyrinth (Guillermo del Toro, 2006)

I Saw the Devil (Kim Jee-won, 2010)

John Dies at the End (Don Coscarelli, 2012)

We Are What We Are (Jim Mickle, 2013)

What We Do in the Shadows (Jemaine Clement, Taika Waititi, 2014)

The Babadook (Jennifer Kent, 2014)

Crimson Peak (Guillermo del Toro, 2015)

Green Room (Jeremy Saulnier, 2015)

Raw (Julia Ducournau, 2016)

Get Out (Jordan Peele, 2017)

It Comes at Night (Trey Edward Shults, 2017)

The Shape of Water (Guillermo del Toro, 2017)

Hereditary (Ari Aster, 2018)

Midsommar (Ari Aster, 2019)

M3GAN (Gerard Johnstone, 2022)

Pearl (Ti West, 2022)

Late Night with the Devil (Colin and Cameron Cairnes, 2023)

The Substance (Coralie Fargeat, 2024)

Frankenstein (Guillermo del Toro, 2025)

Weapons (Zach Cregger, 2025)

Obsession (Curry Barker, 2026)