Woodyanders Review of The Incident

The Incident (1967)

A harsh, hard-hitting and harrowing knockout of a white-knuckle thriller

[9/10 · 12 October 2007]

Martin Sheen and Tony Musante are both chillingly intense and believable as a couple of nasty no-count hoodlums who terrorize a motley assortment of folks on a New York City subway car late at night. The pernicious pair force the various passengers to face up to their true (often pathetic) natures. Director Lary Peerce, working from a painfully incisive script by Nicholas E. Baehr, trenchantly uses the subway car as a microcosm of American society where all of man's worst fears and foibles come into play. Moreover, Peerce makes a grim, yet provocative statement about how most people become passive victims when thrust into a dangerous crisis situation. The sterling cast all give stand-out performances: Bob Bannard and Beau Bridges as two soldier buddies, Donna Mills as a mousy virginal blonde, Victor Arnold as Mills' amorous boyfriend, Jack Gilford and Thelma Ritter as a bickering elderly couple, a surprisingly solid Ed McMahon as a harried middle-class father of a little girl, Diana Van Der Vlis as MacMahon's wife, Robert Fields as a timid homosexual, Brock Peters as an angry white-hating black man, Ruby Dee as Peters' long-suffering wife, Gary Merrill as a desperate, down on his luck businessman, Mike Kellin as a meek school teacher, and Jan Sterling as Kellin's fed-up wife. Better still, the characters are well drawn and recognizably real human beings. This in turn makes the brutal ordeal they endure that much more potent and disturbing to watch. Gerald Hirschfeld's stark, vivid black and white cinematography, Terry Knight's rattling, rousing score, and the plausibly grungy Big Apple atmosphere further enhance the gritty realism and claustrophobic tension of this rough and unnerving movie. An absolute powerhouse.