cult film freak: james gregory

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Written by James M. Tate / 8/03/2025 / No comments / aldo ray , anne bancroft , brian keith , fifties , film noir or melodrama , frank albertson , jacques tourneur , james gregory , jocelyn brando , post-heist , rudy bond

JACQUES TOURNEUR'S 'NIGHTFALL' WITH ALDO RAY & BRIAN KEITH

<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5DeCqbm7JFtbWoUmj2s_OkDcvQFyY9Eu6ZlaxkTzZShc_p8nRu6Ylu8YKkQTTESQy9ktKRWjK_n8gt-ZC8SuuQVlNsnDqNhJTiSyjousUWLUUHpfdMq4fZ1g0_JytR0SLXzBsbq1FHith2Vsbn69_IlTRajh0Ih9B4B3hTrTHpAHbetSNn10oD11GG_k8/s1906/1.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1138" data-original-width="1906" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5DeCqbm7JFtbWoUmj2s_OkDcvQFyY9Eu6ZlaxkTzZShc_p8nRu6Ylu8YKkQTTESQy9ktKRWjK_n8gt-ZC8SuuQVlNsnDqNhJTiSyjousUWLUUHpfdMq4fZ1g0_JytR0SLXzBsbq1FHith2Vsbn69_IlTRajh0Ih9B4B3hTrTHpAHbetSNn10oD11GG_k8/s16000/1.jpeg"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Title: NIGHTFALL Director: Jacques Tourneur Year: 1956 Rating: ***</u></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Perhaps one of the strangest film noirs anchored by a frame story, taking up an equal amount of time as flashbacks that Aldo Ray only half remembers: going fishing with a doctor, who's murdered by off-kilter assassin Rudy Bond under cold-blooded yet semi-charming alpha-male partner Brian Keith...<br><br>This backstory... about Ray being held captive-at-gunpoint by the two thugs who had just robbed a bank and are looking for a place to hide the money... occurs in the rural woods with beautiful mountainesque backdrops contrasting to the sparse B&W... being recalled near a dark/grainy oil-rig and, returning to the present time, in a smoky tavern under big city neon-lights, Ray's being seduced by model Anne Bancroft, just to be set up...</p><p><span></span></p>

aldo ray, anne bancroft, brian keith, fifties, film noir or melodrama, frank albertson, jacques tourneur, james gregory, jocelyn brando, post-heist, rudy bond

JACQUES TOURNEUR'S 'NIGHTFALL' WITH ALDO RAY & BRIAN KEITH

Title: NIGHTFALL Director: Jacques Tourneur Year: 1956 Rating: *** Perhaps one of the strangest film noirs anchored by a frame story, taking...

RORY CALHOUN WITH MARY COSTA & COREY ALLEN 'THE BIG CAPER'

<p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7-vA19lI3l-iuBTltkn4iyORsryuEVYzoZpcMa3cKpPaF5xJzSgTnX2xKrHEHa6ebBg6EbQVSMyI-gJufORs3s7JfkH1ZFhsr68Hk-76VTj4t-QZgijZPCi5yz7qdyF3fXVVrJd_2y13-2-3_HZxIPesiXFTbsSWobHbYVvBAPYog8W1QEDxYtiqwbS5r/s1832/Screen%20Shot%202024-03-24%20at%203.03.27%20AM.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1098" data-original-width="1832" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7-vA19lI3l-iuBTltkn4iyORsryuEVYzoZpcMa3cKpPaF5xJzSgTnX2xKrHEHa6ebBg6EbQVSMyI-gJufORs3s7JfkH1ZFhsr68Hk-76VTj4t-QZgijZPCi5yz7qdyF3fXVVrJd_2y13-2-3_HZxIPesiXFTbsSWobHbYVvBAPYog8W1QEDxYtiqwbS5r/s16000/Screen%20Shot%202024-03-24%20at%203.03.27%20AM.jpeg"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Title: THE BIG CAPER Year: 1957 Rating: ***</u></td></tr></tbody></table><p>By late 1950's Film Noir, the kind of beatnik jazz listened to by the criminals also provides the soundtrack, whether it's source music (played deliberately from a radio within the movie) or part of the overall score...</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>And the crooks are a lot stranger and eccentric, especially in THE BIG CAPER where Rory Calhoun works for James Gregory, whose boss-moll Mary Costa's planted with Calhoun to pose as a bland married couple in the suburbs... waiting to pounce on a bank job that's particularly lucrative for carrying money to deliver to the marine's Camp Pendleton in Southern California... but without the beachy establishing exterior since most of CAPER takes place indoors...</p><p><span></span></p>

film noir or melodrama, heist, james gregory, jazz-score, mary costa, paul picerni, rory calhoun, roxanne arlen

RORY CALHOUN WITH MARY COSTA & COREY ALLEN 'THE BIG CAPER'

Title: THE BIG CAPER Year: 1957 Rating: *** By late 1950's Film Noir, the kind of beatnik jazz listened to by the criminals also provide...

ROD STEIGER STARRING AS 'AL CAPONE' FEATURING FAY SPAIN

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSUHQ-ROHfRSEMHYItdbj0IegmSYi-0HXz4JeTkUH_RhXgQsTdwsy4By_CNReGATLzrJ5hrCLmldIgs7wEk6k7WUZMkrfyLHOUyk0pSHX-HiffInZPzKsEWB2zS3D-wpmpNxfr97UpzK3xaVJqZepHgK_BcLawLmCtv5XY1BC1Aw1714ebJNING_PYfA/s399/Screen%20Shot%202022-03-24%20at%208.21.40%20PM.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="261" data-original-width="399" height="261" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSUHQ-ROHfRSEMHYItdbj0IegmSYi-0HXz4JeTkUH_RhXgQsTdwsy4By_CNReGATLzrJ5hrCLmldIgs7wEk6k7WUZMkrfyLHOUyk0pSHX-HiffInZPzKsEWB2zS3D-wpmpNxfr97UpzK3xaVJqZepHgK_BcLawLmCtv5XY1BC1Aw1714ebJNING_PYfA/w400-h261/Screen%20Shot%202022-03-24%20at%208.21.40%20PM.jpeg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>AL CAPONE Year of Release: 1959</u></td></tr></tbody></table>Like Jack Nicholson (intentionally or otherwise) displayed a little of pal <a href="http://www.cultfilmfreaks.com/2013/11/the-shining.html">Bruce Dern in THE SHINING</a>, perhaps Marlon Brando was influenced by his ON THE WATERFRONT brother in THE GODFATHER since Rod Steiger had played AL CAPONE with facial contortions that seem so natural that, if done by a lesser talent, would look contrived and pretentiously overboard...<br>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Capone Scores **** Bulletholes</u></td></tr>
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In fact, this biopic is so subtle he seems more a blue collar ruffian than outright gangster: A sort of throwback to the olden days of Paul Muni and Edward G. Robinson, Steiger's performance brings the mafia henchman turned head honcho through sparse narration by James Gregory as a trailing cop...<br>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Warner Archive Blue Cover</u></td></tr>
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Although there's no suspense that he might be kept from doing what he does best: killing to climb the ladder with a string of creative <i>whacks</i>, and yet the most improbable con is landing the wife of one of his otherwise incidental hits: And in that, Fay Spain, who'd be Hyman Roth's walk-on yet memorable wife in THE GODFATHER 2, is beyond a common love interest since it <i>is extremely</i> interesting how he seduces this beautiful mother and widow with the same determination that he takes on surrounding, paranoid and lethal enemies during the superior first half while the second deals mainly with his waning popularity leading to a rushed exile in Miami...<br>
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But no matter where and how the film rides out, and along with crooked reporter Martin Balsam who verbally toys with Capone as if he were the moll instead of Fay, it's Steiger's his job alone to make an otherwise pretty-good feature pretty damn fantastic to watch, and keep rewatching again and again. You'll always see something different in his reactions to the spontaneously violent actions: He steals both the movie <i>and the story </i>that it's all loosely based upon. Forget the overrated Robert DeNiro UNTOUCHABLES Capone. It's Steiger's that can't be touched. <br><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Photos Screen Captures of the Warner Bros Neo Classic Gangster Rod Steiger starring AL CAPONE</u></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Murvyn Vye as Bugs Moran and company give quite a blasting to Al Capone</u></td></tr>
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al ruscio, biopic, fifties, gangster, james gregory, jazz score, martin balsam, mobster, nehemiah persoff, neo noir, rod steiger, sally todd, warner archives

ROD STEIGER STARRING AS 'AL CAPONE' FEATURING FAY SPAIN

AL CAPONE Year of Release: 1959 Like Jack Nicholson (intentionally or otherwise) displayed a little of pal Bruce Dern in THE SHINING , perh...

TROY DONAHUE IN RAOUL WALSH'S WESTERN 'A DISTANT TRUMPET'

<p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg-b_LPd98vxUqqzTAoBXaAsJrofREBP1C_B_PvHgvBIv2Z1xBZ_JGOdVV67-jegadMdn9sbLuRvzg4VpcmFcq09e-xkzOFHmZ6Q0IRkU1rudB1Qotk0XGG3A836mrPEuvhlGowPXAWRA43Hqv5E4g_slFccVlrQyxcbY1eyKlIKfXr0fSoTeo0CL-AzA=s1165" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="770" data-original-width="1165" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg-b_LPd98vxUqqzTAoBXaAsJrofREBP1C_B_PvHgvBIv2Z1xBZ_JGOdVV67-jegadMdn9sbLuRvzg4VpcmFcq09e-xkzOFHmZ6Q0IRkU1rudB1Qotk0XGG3A836mrPEuvhlGowPXAWRA43Hqv5E4g_slFccVlrQyxcbY1eyKlIKfXr0fSoTeo0CL-AzA=s16000"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Troy Donahue from 1964 Rating: ***1/2</u></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Raoul Walsh finished his iconic directing career providing the otherwise wooden Troy Donahue his best performance that's still kind of wooden, but deliberately since his fresh from military school 2nd Lt. Matthew 'Matt' Hazard, put in charge of a Fort that's "like a toe waiting to be stomped" by surrounding Indians, must remain hard and callous to what he feels are a troop of lax soldiers...</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Sadly, the least interesting aspect is pushed to the forefront since Donahue and Suzanne Pleshette were the melodrama Rock Hudson/Doris Day, and their contrived romance is sparked the minute Pleshette... the loveless wife of departing William Reynolds as the quirky 1rst Lieutenant... visits the new leader's quarters, filled with pictures of fiance Diane McBain, who, more classy than Pleshette, promises a kind of wistful, verbal-driven cat fight that never pans out...</p><p><span></span></p>