Showing posts with label Aldo Ray. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Aldo Ray. Show all posts
Composer Gary Stuart (Ray Milland), who has been neglecting his wife, Connie (Jane Wyman), to go off and play drums in clubs, walks out on her when he thinks she's had an affair with a rival composer, Courtney Craig (Tom Helmore). Connie is then courted by a handsome theatrical backer named Frank (Aldo Ray), while Gary dallies with an uppercrust lady named Deborah (Karin Booth of The Unfinished Dance). It may be hard to recognize this as a musical remake of The Awful Truth, but the awful truth is that this isn't that bad a movie. What makes it most watchable is the excellent performance by Jane Wyman. The usually demure Wyman is turned into the "go girl" in this movie: she sparkles, she sasses, she sings, she dances with verve, she sintillates. She brilliantly interprets her song numbers even though she isn't really singing (Milland is also dubbed), and she does a Latin number near the end that scandalizes a whole roomful of snobbish party guests. What would Angela Channing say? Her sexy, dead-on delivery of "Slow Burn Over a Fast Man" in an earlier party scene is the movie's highlight. Milland is also quite good, as are Leon Ames as his brother and Mary Treen as Connie's housekeeper. Aldo Ray is charming and has a killer smile. Wyman is outfitted with one spectacular gown after another, and she and Gary have rather beautiful apartments. Valerie Bettis plays Gary's friend, Lilly, who has a provocative dance number of her own. Bettis was apparently a dancer who did only a couple of movies and some television work. Hall also directed the bizarre Once Upon a Time.
Verdict: Watch the "go girl" go! ***.
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| Brian Keith and Aldo Ray |
James Vanning (Aldo Ray) and his friend Doc (Frank Albertson of Man-Made Monster) are on a hunting trip when they come to the aid of two men -- John (Brian Keith of The Parent Trap) and Red (Rudy Bond) -- who, unbeknownst to them, have robbed a bank. The ingrates murder doc and try to kill Vanning, who takes off with them in pursuit. The crooks take the wrong bag and assume that Vanning has the bag with the money in it. While on the run, Vanning meets a model named Marie (Anne Bancroft of Gorilla at Large) in a bar and she becomes embroiled in his problems. James Gregory plays an insurance man who is also following Vanning, albeit with less sinister intent. Although well-acted for the most part, and well-photographed by Burnett Guffey, Nightfall is a fairly weak entry in the film noir department, only really coming alive at the climax when thieves fall out and there's a sequence involving a runaway snow plow. Bancroft is good, if miscast as a model, and Ray pretty much walks through the movie, barely getting by on a little bit of charm and showing little emotion. Given a lead role, he pretty much muffs it. He kept acting right up until his death in 1991, however.
Verdict: Not much to this cheapie. **.