Linkshoch Wonderful Movie

Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good

Gurlyndrobb While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

ActuallyGlimmer The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

sol- Three criminals plan how they intend to rob a small town bank while the unsuspecting local citizens deal with their own personal problems, all of which results in a violent weekend full of men trying to prove their worth in this slow burn thriller starring Victor Mature. Shot in CinemaScope with glorious, rich colours, 'Violent Saturday' is an incredibly good-looking film and the vivid nature of the images suits the gradual build-up of tension very well; grumpy men step on kids' hands, solemn women offer piercing glares, etc. When push comes to shove though, the build-up occurs for far too long. It is over an hour in before the heist actually takes place and while a subsequent barnyard show down rates among the most intense sequences that director Richard Fleischer ever filmed, one has endure over an hour of (at times) histrionic melodrama before any such tension finally erupts. And yet, while it may have been a more effective film at half its length, the overall impact of the movie is hard to shake. The supporting characters vary in how engaging they are, but Mature is excellent throughout as the emotionally torn protagonist, resentful of the fact that he is not the war hero that his impressionable preteen son wants him to be. The film also benefits from one of Hugo Friedhofer's most powerful scores and seeing Ernest Borgnine as an Amish farmer has definite curiosity value alone.

krocheav As a school kid, my Grand-dad took me to see this picture, and it stayed in my mind. BUT, only for the rather undesirable nastiness. Revisiting it again years later, it's hard to believe we managed to stay awake back then! (my wife quite justifiably fell asleep within the first 20mins) This was Hollywood in decline.When television took off and theatres began to close, 20th Century Fox foolishly decided that all their productions would be in CinemaScope and garish DeLux color...even when the subject did not call for it! This decision would see many of their 50s-60s productions filled with artless images ~ this is just one of them. What might have been a tight little B/W crime melodrama gets 'Lost in Gloss' and GIANT screen vistas (mostly shot in pokey little hotel rooms!) The unfortunate Director of Photography: veteran, Charles G. Clarke, and Director: the checkered careered, Richard Fleischer (son of famous Animator Max) had to place and actor in each corner of the room, with one in center just to fill the unnecessary spaces. This often gave many films an empty feel.Then came the change in writing style. Film companies were looking towards TV production for fast profits on small budgets, and because everything made for cinemas would end up on TV, they began making 'BIG' screen TV style movies. Many movie makers and writers had crossed over to TV anyway, and sooner or later it would all look the same. Many viewers didn't seem to know what constituted quality, so on it went.Now we have 'modern' critics looking for all kinds of hidden meaning in these cheaply scripted 50s works ~ along with 'modern' movie makers copying the so-called 'new trend' in violence. Mostly, it simply added up to 'cheap and fast'. 'Violent Saturday' was also treated to overwrought 50s style mellow-drama, a style largely made famous by W.B. TV, and other endless series like Peyton Place, etc, etc...As for performances, we have the capable Stephen McNally wasted in yet another type cast thuggish role ~ Tommy Noonan playing an outlandishly wimpish perv of a bank Manager --a role so hokey it creaks!-- Richard Egan again type cast in a part he's played endlessly ~ Acting honors probably go to veteran Sylvia Sidney in a part that amounts to little more than an unnecessary sub plot. The rest of the women do what they can with thankless roles ~ Victor Mature does what he does best...with a character who talks to his son about 'fear being nothing to be ashamed off', and 'decorated heroics' as not essential in general life --who is then made 'hero' to the towns kids for having killed the most villains-- Lee Marvin just plays Lee Marvin all over again, this time, showing delight in being violently cruel to kids. So this was the so-called bold new 'adult' approach to film-making. This same juvenile 'adult' approach, has continued to fester in movie making today. Screenplay Writer: Sydney Boehm had done better with Fritz Lang just two years earlier with "The Big Heat". Forget "Saturday" look to the "Heat" if you want a better example of low cost 50s Noir that largely still holds up today. Disc quality note: The Bounty DVD copy I bought a few years ago, has poor image quality, regardless of having the Fox logo on the cover. Subsequent re-issues may be better (?)

pdmh48 I liked it. Those '50's melodramas/dramas-they were so great. Lee Marvin is always interesting. I liked his monologue about his "skinny ex-wife, her colds, and his inhaler." By the way-my small hometown Ohio bank was open until noon on Saturday up until the mid-seventies-until ATMs, of course. They were closed on Wednesdays. So a "Violent Saturday" (when most people did their grocery shopping, made deposits, etc.) made sense then. Some of the characters were strange; the librarian, and the Tommy Noonan character for sure. The nurse is very forgiving of him. I've always liked Richard Egan and thought his last scene was well-acted. Victor Mature is not one of my favorite actors, but this is one of his better roles. If you like '50's dramas/melodramas, check it out!

aimless-46 "Violent Saturday" is like a tricked-out CinemaScope (2.55:1) version of "Desperate Hours", both films were released in 1955. Add in a lot of the small town angst ("Picnic" and "Peyton Place") that 1950's moviegoers were seeking for some reason. Richard Egan, Steven McNally, and Victor Mature are the featured actors in a large cast of character actors who were not likely to generate much action at the box office. Whether by coincidence or design the three look very much alike with the same lack of subtlety in their acting techniques. If this casting unity was by design, the interchangeability might be intended to convey the same quality in the three characters; implying how it is fate that determines who becomes a criminal, a coward, and a hero. And maybe not.Director Richard Fleischer and screenwriter Sid Boehm have made an entertaining picture that moves along nicely until the wheels fall off in its climatic action scene. The bank robbery itself is more Hitchcock McGuffin than central focus; mostly it is in the story to provide some motivational elements for the overwrought melodrama and as a way to pull back out of the muck of petty small town life for brief periods. It is certainly anti-climatic. This is mostly due to inconsistencies in the scripting of Ernest Borgnine's character, plus some extremely lame action elements. But this was not a film noir feature so much as a pontification to the Hays Code and the need to artificially inject some "crime does not pay" comeuppance into a story that should have stuck to its "post-WWII veterans vs those who did not serve" theme.Tommy Noonam, Sylvia Sidney, and Egan are actually quite good. It was a good part for Egan whose tendency to seem disconnected from his material serves him well in this part. His final scene outside the hospital is extraordinary; by far the best material in the whole screenplay and a nice reflection on Fleischer's acting for the camera direction.Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.