NFR Project: 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' (1956)

NFR Project: “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”

Dir: Don Siegel

Scr: Daniel Mainwaring

Pho: Ellsworth Fredericks

Ed: Robert S. Eisen

Premiere: Feb. 5, 1956

80 min.

First, read the definitive essay on this film, by the great Robert Sklar, at the National Film Registry.

To it I can only add:

Here is a portrait of an alien invasion, insidious and silent. The many vectors of interpretation of the political or social ramifications underlying the movie simply prove the universal terror of being taken over by The Other, any other, of being reduced to something less (or even more) than human. It resonates with all manner of people, in all sorts of ways.

A small-town doctor notices a bunch of appointments being made at his clinic and then cancelled. Citizens stumble in, claiming that their relatives and loved ones are not themselves anymore. The doctor (Kevin McCarthy) tries to rationalize his way through the problem – until he encounters large seed pods that spawn identical copies of their intended human hosts.

From that point on, it’s a race for survival that is, again, nightmare fodder. Imagine a whole town turned against you, seeking to change you into one of them. Their reasonableness. Their persistence. Mainwaring and Siegel evoke the fight-or-flight impulse straight to the reptile brain. Our hero is prey for an alien race. And there is no mercy for Miles.

The source material is impeccable. The original novel The Body Snatchers was written by Jack Finney, a noted science-fiction writer. Daniel Mainwaring, who wrote the screenplay, had crafted such excellent scripts as his noirs Out of the Past, The Big Steal, and The Phenix City Story. Here he captures Cold War paranoia in a crisply-moving succession of uncanny setups in a nondescript rural town in California.

The protagonist, Miles Bennell, is played by the iconic Kevin McCarthy, whose reputation rests largely on his accomplishments here. He plays the hero as a reasonable man driven to madness as he warns an oblivious world of a conspiracy against its very human soul. The original ending of the movie has him ranting in the midst of traffic. “You’re next! You’re next!” he roars, and we drive past him, sheepishly. What does he know that we don’t?

Considering the lack of A-list resources at their creation, the results achieved with light, analog special effects, and subtly pitched performances make this a believable and haunting classic, a common nightmare brought to life. Ellsworth Frederick's cinematography is beautiful and well thought out. The score by Carmen Dragon is surprisingly top-notch.

The studio intervened and had them construct a framing story, a la The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Miles is brought into the nuthouse as he’s been found wandering in traffic. After the film originally ends, a scene informs us that Miles’ worst fears have root in reality.

The authorities react appropriately. Miles is left gasping as they sweep into action. He is disoriented, grieving (despite gobbling speed, his lover Dan Wynter falls asleep and instantly transforms into the Other). He lost everyone he cared about. The End. A bitter note seeps into the finale despite the studio’s rewrite. Body Snatchers resonates because it’s about first being swept away by the majority – and then hunted by it.

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

NFR Project: 'High Society' (1956)

NFR Project: “High Society”

Dir: Charles Walters

Scr: John Patrick

Pho: Paul C Vogel

Ed: Ralph E. Winters

Premiere: July 17, 1956

111 min.

The premise was golden. Remake the classic screwball comedy The Philadelphia Story (1940) as a musical. Get Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra, the two greatest singers of their respective generations, to act and sing together. Have Cole Porter write the songs. Throw in Louis Armstrong. Throw in Grace Kelly in her last starring role.

Fortunately, it works. An excellent screen adaptation by John Patrick draws on both the Oscar-winning original screenplay and the original 1939 Broadway play, written expressly for Katharine Hepburn by Philip Barry.

The story is this: young socialite Tracy Lord (Kelly) in fashionable Newport, Rhode Island is on the eve of her wedding to an earnest dullard (John Lund). Her ex-husband, songwriter and incidentally crooner C.K. Dexter Haven (Crosby), decides to woo her back. Added to this is an intrusive reporter, Mike Connor (Sinatra), who also falls for Tracy. Complications ensue. Safe to say all is sorted out by film’s end, which culminates in the remarriage of Dexter and Tracy.

Now, the plot is shoehorned into the frame of a musical fable narrated by none other than the immortal Louis Armstrong. With his sidemen, he introduces the story, comments on it, and wraps it up at the end. It’s always a pleasure to watch him play and sing, and the movie captures his performance with Bing of “Now You Has Jazz.”

Now it’s a little creepy as Bing was 53 when he made this film, and Grace Kelly was 26. He’s old enough to be her father. (Evidently the two did have an affair.) Still, the Old Groaner aka Der Bingle floats easily through the film, exuding quips and serenely taking Tracy back. Sinatra is fine as Mike – and who wouldn’t want to have a record of Crosby and Sinatra singing together? Celeste Holm and Louis Calhern have fun with their respective characters as well.

The biggest surprise is that Grace Kelly can do comedy. It’s not something she was called on a lot to do in her brief career (she married Prince Rainier III of Monaco in April), but she handles the gags with charm, and reacts splendidly throughout. The songs are good, of course, especially “True Love” and “Well, Did You Evah!” Director Charles Walters seems to have trouble with the broad VistaVision format. He divides the screen into thirds, and places something in each third. The scenes are static. The performers stand in their places and crack wise and sing soulfully.

So the movie rests on the charisma of the three primary players. Crosby, Sinatra, and Kelly manage to put the thing over.

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

NFR Project: 'Giant' (1956)

 

NFR Project: “Giant”

Dir: George Stevens

Scr: Fred Guiol, Ivan Moffat

Pho: William C. Mellor

Ed: William Hornbeck, Philip W. Anderson, Fred Bohanan

Premiere: Nov. 24, 1956

201 min.

It’s a big, giant film. Unfortunately, it’s boring as hell.

It’s a three-and-a-half-hour epic that covers decades in the lives of rancher Bick (Rock Hudson), his wife Leslie (Elizabeth Taylor), and rival Jett Rink (James Dean in his last role). The setting is the bare plains of Texas, where Bick runs cattle on more than half a million acres. Bick initially dismisses his wife’s attempt to take part in male conversation; she leaves him for a while, but they get back together.

Then Jett strikes oil on a small plot bequeathed to him by Bick’s sister. He becomes unbelievably, obnoxiously rich and soon becomes an annoying drunk as well. Bick tries to get his children interested in running the ranch, but they all want to lead their own lives. Bick drills for oil too.

Later, Bick’s son Jordan is incensed by Jett’s orders that no Hispanic people be served at his big new hotel; Jordan’s wife is Mexican-American. The two fight, and Jordan is hauled out of the banquet hall where they confront each other. Bick realizes that this prejudice is unacceptable. On their way home, the family stops at a diner where the owner refuses to serve Bick’s daughter-in-law and son. Bick fights him and loses. Leslie declares how proud she is that he stood up for Hispanics. The end.

It’s all delivered in a long, slow, casual, soap-opera style. Hudson can’t act; Dean mumbles. We are supposed to watch the characters age, but they never really evolve. Director Stevens is at his best when he is composing images of great depth and beauty – an elaborate mansion sitting by itself on the empty plains, a seething, churning roundup, a soldier’s coffin returned home. Unfortunately, the movie is not worth the effort.

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

NFR Project: 'Forbidden Planet' (1956)

 

NFR Project: “Forbidden Planet”

Dir: Fred M. Wilcox

Scr: Cyril Hume

Pho: George J. Folsey

Ed: Ferris Webster

Premiere: March 2, 1956

98 min.

This is the first epic science-fiction film to be made since Things to Come in 1936, the first in color, the first in CinemaScope – one of the first in the genre to really to be conceived of as an A-list picture.

Read Ian Olney’s excellent essay on this film at the National Film Registry here.

No expense was spared to tell this outer-space tale. The sets were designed by Cedric Gibbons and Arthur Lonergan, who created a vast alien world for our protagonists to explore. A key character is Robby the Robot, who was created by industrial designer Robert Kintoshita at a then-astronomical cost of $125,000. Disney animator Joshua Meador created the at-times invisible monster of the film. All in all, every effort was expended to make this film look convincing.

It’s the story of a United Planets space expedition to the distant planet Altair IV, on which a ship crashed 20 years before. The crew seeks the survivors. There they find only a scientist, Dr. Morbius (Walter Pidgeon) and his grown daughter Altaira (Anne Francis). Morbius warns that an unknown power slaughtered everyone in his expedition save himself, his late wife, and his daughter. Soon an immense, invisible creature starts attacking the crew, killing them off one by one and damaging their spaceship.

Morbius explains to the ship’s captain (Leslie Nielsen) that the planet was the home of the late Krell, a civilization wiped out in one night 200,000 years ago. The Krell were incredibly advanced, and eventually they figured out how to make any thought in their minds real using their superior technology.

It turns out that the Krells, in creating their mind machines, unleashed the contents of their subconscious minds. These “monsters of the id” wrought havoc, destroying everything. Morbius had tinkered with the Krell’s technology, and Morbius’s subconscious created a monster that destroyed everyone around him save his daughter. Now the monster is out to kill off the rescue mission, and even Altaira, who falls for the captain and plans on leaving the planet with him.

Horribly, inexorably, the monster advances on the remaining individuals. Only the collapse of Morbius, who finally realizes it is he himself who is the monster, makes the monster disappear. Knowing that the power the Krells wielded is deadly, Morbius sets off a self-destruction device and urges the survivors to flee. They escape, and the planet is vaporized.

It’s intelligent and interesting stuff, to be sure, well thought out – not the usual juvenile content of most sci-fi films of the era. The top-notch production values sell the film, taking us into outer space and onto Altair IV. The suspense and thrills of the story are intense, leading to a satisfying conclusion. Forbidden Planet set the bar for the science-fiction genre, and was not equaled for many years.

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

NFR Project: 'Disneyland Dream'

 

NFR Project: “Disneyland Dream”

Dir: Robbins Barstow

Scr: Robbins Barstow

Pho: Robbins Barstow

Ed: Robbins Barstow

Premiere: 1956

35 min.

The home movie is one of the most common means of self-expression in America. As early as 1898, people were beginning to record their significant events and family portraits on film. It’s an amateur art form that almost anyone in America can find the resources to practice. (I used to work on a local broadcast TV show, “Homemovies,” that highlighted the artistic efforts of aspiring rookie filmmakers. The efforts ranged from fascinating to awful.)

One of the more extraordinary home movie efforts is highlighted here. Disneyland Dream is the brainchild of the enthusiastic dilettante Robbins Barstow, who plied his hobby in his off hours. In 1956, he and his family won a contest sponsored by the Scotch adhesive tape company, which awarded 25 families with a trip to the then-new Disneyland amusement park in Anaheim, California.

Read Liz Coffey’s excellent summation of this entry at the National Film Registry here.

The Robbins family were an extroverted bunch, unafraid to stage antics for the camera. This 35-minute epic covers everything from their entry into the contest to the trip itself. Their exuberant behavior is charming in a hokey kind of way; they react to winning the contest in slapstick manner. The film then shows them leaving for the flight to California, then traveling via plane.

Their vacation lasted almost a week; they document their trips to other Los Angeles-area attractions and then segue into their adventures in the Magic Kingdom. They visit Fantasyland, Adventureland, Tomorrowland, and Frontierland. This documentation of what was then considered the premier family vacation experience is a remarkable, giving us a slice-of-life record of an average American middle-class family at play in mid-century.

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

NFR Project: 'The Court Jester' (1955)

 

NFR Project: “The Court Jester”

Dir: Norman Panama, Melvin Frank

Scr: Norman Panama, Melvin Frank

Pho: Ray June

Ed: Tom McAdoo

Premiere: Dec. 24, 1955

101 min.

“The pellet with the poison's in the vessel with the pestle; the chalice from the palace has the brew that is true!”

Norman Panama and Melvin Frank got their start as gag writers in 1935. Gradually, they worked their way up the food chain, becoming screenwriters – and finally getting a contract to write and direct films in tandem. Their third film in this collaboration was The Court Jester.

It is an amusing starring outing for Danny Kaye (1911-1987), a multitalented comedic presence in the American culture in the mid-20^th Century. Kaye was renowned for his tongue-twisting Tverbal acrobatics and his ability to improvise using all manner of accents. He got his start in clubs in the Catskills and rapidly moved into stage work, more club work, radio, and finally film. Much of his material was written by his brilliant wife, Sylvia Fine.

This film is a vehicle for Kaye, who plays Hubert, a noodnik in medieval England. A follower of a Robin Hood-style crusader named the Black Fox, he is ordered to safeguard the travel of a baby who is the rightful King of England. By way of various machinations, Hubert takes on the identity of Giacomo, a jester who is also a secret assassin. Hubert must negotiate his way between the forces of the usurper (Cecil Parker), a haughty princess (Angela Lansbury), an evil lord (Basil Rathbone), and a witch (Mildred Natwick).

This he does with his usual Kaye goofiness – stuttering, double-taking, gasping, and gulping. Naturally a coward, he is hypnotized by the witch into thinking of himself as a great lover and swordsman. Her spell can be broken and re-applied through the snapping of fingers; needless to say, there is a lot of amusing back and forth on this premise.

Is it a classic? It’s OK.

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

NFR Project: 'Rebel Without A Cause' (1953)

 

NFR Project: “Rebel Without A Cause”

Dir: Nicholas Ray

Scr: Stewart Stern, Irving Shulman

Pho: Ernest Haller

Ed: William H. Ziegler

Premiere: Oct, 27, 1955

111 min.

“Why do we do this?”

“You got to do something.”

The last, a rejoinder from Buzz the teenage bad guy, and nearly his last words. A minute later, he’s plunging off the edge of a cliff to his doom, screaming.

The mood of Rebel Without A Cause is nihilistic. In the American society of the time, it judged that nothing the adult world had to offer was worthwhile. Their hypocrisy and self-involvement invalidated them from being able to lead their families. Teens were cut loose from both dependency and responsibility, living in an intense, confused time when everything was unsatisfactory, crazy-making. Being a teenager was a curse. A naturalistic drama that plays out like a horror movie, Rebel persists because of its incredibly well-written script and enthusiastic and innovative direction from Nicholas Ray. (Ray started making it as a black-and-white B movie; when Dean became popular, the studio decreed he remake it in color and in Cinemascope.)

The movie was supposedly based on Robert M. Linder’s 1944 book of the same name, a case study of a criminal psychopath. Stern’s screenplay is vastly different and, fortunately, brilliant. It outlines and justifies the alienated feelings of its teenaged central characters, drawing us into compassion for them as the adult world contracts around them, literally killing their souls.

It’s the swan song of actor James Dean, his only starring role (he died at age 24 in a car crash a month before the movie’s premiere), and his charisma and appeal cannot be understated here. Whatever one may say about his Method approach to the role, he shows that he was rapidly understanding film acting in a fairly profound way. It would have been fascinating to watch his progression as an actor. He remains a perpetually youthful teen icon, largely because of this film.

Here he is Jim Stark, the teenage Everyman, a would-be knight of maturity and compassion who just wants to be left alone. His Jim has just moved to town after moving away from trouble somewhere else. His parents are well-off; his mother is castrating, his father is impotent. Seventeen years old, he starts his first day at his new school, and is immediately picked on by the cool kids, who happen to be brain-dead thugs.

Jim makes friends with Plato (Sal Mineo), a not-so-repressed gay fellow classmate. An outing to the planetarium ends up with a knife fight, and a pledge to race later in the evening. Jim looks for guidance from his parents, but they are useless. Jim lashes out angrily, and drives away furiously.

At a nearby cliff overlooking the ocean, Buzz challenges Jim to a chicken race in cars to the cliff. First one who jumps out is chicken. Buzz gets stuck inside his car, falls off the cliff, and dies.

Now his friends are after Jim. They attack his house, track him down. Meanwhile, Jim falls for the late Buzz’s girlfriend Judy (Natalie Wood). Jim tries to turn himself in, unsuccessfully. Jim and Judy escape to an abandoned house where they meet up with Plato, who unknown to them is packing a gun. The bad kids go after Plato – and he shoots one of them.

The cops and the parents show up. Plato is trapped inside the observatory; Jim goes in to get him out peacefully. He takes Plato’s bullets away. They walk out, but Plato panics, running and brandishing the gun. The police kill him. Jim grieves; he’s assured by his dad that he did “all that a man can do.” He introduces his parents to Judy.

Rebel can’t give us a happy ending. Jim and Judy’s troubles, we feel, are just beginning. Buzz dies following the code; Plato dies because he can’t follow the code. There’s no way to win.

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

NFR Project: 'Oklahoma!' (1955)

 

NFR Project: “Oklahoma!”

Dir: Fred Zinnemann

Scr: Sonya Levien, William Ludwig

Pho: Robert Surtees

Ed: George Boemler, Gene Ruggiero

Premiere: Oct. 11, 1955

148 min.

The opening of Oklahoma! on Broadway in 1943 marked a new chapter in the history of the American musical. With a few exceptions, musicals in the first half of the 20^th century were scattershot affairs – the songs usually had nothing to do with the story. Now, numbers grew organically out of the plot and out of the characters’ development. You can read my notes on that original production here.

It’s a simple story. Cowboy Curly (Gordon MacCrae) loves Laurey (Shirely Jones in her film debut). However, Laurey is claimed by hired hand Judd (Rod Steiger). This romantic triangle takes up the bulk of the film, although there is a second one involving Ado Annie (Gloria Grahame), peddler Ali Hakim (Eddie Albert), and cowboy Will Parker (Gene Nelson).

When time came for a film version, no expense was spared. Utilizing Technicolor and wide-screen filming, the story takes on an epic quality. This was director Fred Zinnemann’s only musical; he was also challenged by shooting in 70mm. His compositions are awkward, and many times he simply resorts to shooting the singer statically in the center of the screen.

Neither Steiger nor Grahame can sing, which retards the movie’s appeal. The real highlight of the film is Laurey’s dream sequence, in which she vacillates between Curly and Judd. It’s danced out in an elaborate number choreographed by Agnes DeMille. Inserting a ballet into the middle of a musical was unheard of before this; fortunately, the movie preserves this innovation.

The NFR Project is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: Rebel Without A Cause.

NFR Project: 'Night of the Hunter' (1955)

 

NFR Project: “The Night of the Hunter”

Dir: Charles Laughton

Scr: James Agee

Pho: Stanley Cortez

Ed: Robert Golden

Premiere: July 26, 1955

92 min.

This haunting, barely redeemed nightmare of a film is a Southern Gothic horror story/fairy tale that registers as the only directorial outing of actor Charles Laughton. It’s an extraordinary movie that makes me wonder what other wonders Laughton might have produced if he had been given the chance.

Read Peter Rainer’s comprehensive essay on this entry here at the National Film Registry.

The story is shot plainly and given a heavily shadowed, storybook-like illumination filled with resonant images. We are introduced to the story by Mrs. Cooper (Lillian Gish), who speaks to us suspended in the starry sky. She is telling a group of children a story, and she warns of wolves in sheep’s clothing – and the camera swivels down to earth and shows us the deranged and murderous “preacher,” Harry Powell (Robert Mitchum) in flight. He likes to kill widows and steal their money and belongings. He converses with God, convinced that his homicidal impulses are blessed by Him.

Powell has a complex about sex. He sits with the crowd at a burlesque show, inwardly disapproving of the goings-on there. (His switchblade knife protrudes its blade from his pocket as he watches – an obscene erection.) He is nabbed by the police for stealing a car and goes off to jail.

We move on to the children John and Pearl, whose father Ben Harper (Peter Graves) has killed two men and made off with $10,000. He is hunted down by the police, but he manages to hide the money in Pearl’s doll. He makes John swear to protect Pearl and to never reveal the location of the money, then is hauled away to jail.

In jail, Powell and Harper bunk together. Powell tries to get Harper to tell where the money is, to no avail. Harper is hanged – and when Powell is released, he heads down to Harper’s place to find the money. Flashing in and out of bouts of anger, Powell harasses and cajoles the children, trying to find out where the money is. He courts John and Pearl’s mother Willa (Shelley Winters), mouthing sanctimonious sentiments that fool all the adults, but not the children.

Powell and Willa marry; Powell withholds sex from her and convinces her that she is a woeful sinner. She takes his condemnation to heart, and testifies at his revival meetings. She prepares herself for him with prayer at night, but he cuts her throat and sinks her body in the river.

He takes control of the children and torments them into confessing where the money is. However, the children escape him via the river and float downstream in a skiff. Finally, they wash up at the home of Mrs. Cooper, a saintly but tough woman who takes in stray children. Powell follows them and finds them, but Cooper holds him off with a shotgun. Powell returns at night to kill everyone and grab the money, but Cooper shoots him. He hides in the barn and is rousted out by the police. Upon his arrest, John inadvertently reveals the money.

Powell is tried and found guilty. A lynch mob comes after him, and he barely escapes a necktie party. The children settle into life at Mrs. Cooper’s, and enjoy Christmas with her.

Laughton creates a mythic dream world, shooting a majority from the viewpoint of the children, turning us into their accomplices. They get a crash course in the battle between good and evil, and good wins out – this time.

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

NFR Project: 'Marty' (1955)

 NFR Project: “Marty”

Dir: Delbert Mann

Scr: Paddy Chayefsky

Pho: Joseph LaShelle

Ed: Alan Crosland Jr.

Premiere: April 11, 1955

93 min.

Paddy Chayefsky (1923-1981) was a genius writer. Acclaimed with three Oscars, he is still considered one of America’s outstanding dramatists.

After serving in World War II, Chayefsky went to work in the new medium of television. Beginning in 1949, he cranked out scripts for what then were uniformly live broadcasts. The challenges of creating compelling drama in a studio, live, with limited resources did not daunt him. He was a master of naturalism, of “real-life” dialogue that was informal, direct, and elegant. Chayefsky reached people.

On May 24, 1953, “Marty” premiered on The Philco Television Playhouse. It starred Rod Steiger in a career-making performance, and featured Nancy Marchand as well. The broadcast made such an impact that a plan to make a movie of the script went into development immediately. It was the first time television impacted the world of moviemaking.

Chayefsky demanded creative control, consultation on casting, and the use of the broadcast director Delbert Mann as the film’s director. He got what he wanted.

Ernest Borgnine took over the role of Marty, and Betsy Blair played his date Clara. Filming took place in the Bronx for 16 days, another boost for New York City as a viable filming center. Such was the power of the result was that the film earned Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor for Borgnine, and Best Screenplay at the Oscars that year.

It’s a simple story, really. Marty is a butcher, 34 years old, still living with his mother in the Bronx, his brothers and sisters all married. It seems that everyone he runs into nags him about getting married. Marty bears this harassment patiently, until his mother questions him and he loses his temper.

He calls himself “a fat, ugly man.” He continues, “Ma, sooner or later, there comes a point in a man's life when he's gotta face some facts. And one fact I gotta face is that whatever it is that women like, I ain't got it. I chased after enough girls in my life, I went to enough dances. I got hurt enough, I don't wanna get hurt no more.”

Still, he is persuaded by his buddy Ange (Joe Mantell) to go with him to the Stardust Ballroom and look for women to pick up. He reluctantly complies. There he is accosted by a guy who wants to give him five bucks to take his date home, as he thinks she’s homely. She is Clara, 29, a sensitive single teacher. Marty declines – but he looks at Clara, goes over to her, asks her to dance.

They start talking and talk for hours. Marty takes her to his home, and briefly tries to kiss her. She rebuffs him, but she makes it very clear that she wants to see him again. Marty’s mother comes home and tries to interrogate her. Marty takes Clara home, promising to call her the next day.

The next day, he has second thoughts. His pal Ange and his mother both speak out against Clara, dismissing her and her impact on Marty. The butcher stews quietly until the early evening, when he cuts loose.

“You don't like her. My mother don't like her. She's a dog. And I'm a fat, ugly man. Well, all I know is I had a good time last night. I'm gonna have a good time tonight. If we have enough good times together, I'm gonna get down on my knees. I'm gonna beg that girl to marry me. If we make a party on New Year's, I got a date for that party. You don't like her? That's too bad.”

He goes to the pay phone to call her, and the film ends.

Borgnine, after playing villains and brutes for years, finally gets to ACT, and he does wonderful job as Marty, who is gentle, thoughtful, shy, and painfully polite. Betsy Blair was not the choice of the producers for Clara – she was a leftist, and this being the Red Scare – but, being the wife of Gene Kelly, she got her way.

Extra kudos to Esther Minicotti as Marty's mother, and Augusta Ciolli as the perfectly bitchy Aunt Katherine. 

It’s a great story about two lonely people. We watch Marty and Clara fall in love, and this beautiful, quiet little drama touches our hearts.

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