Copyright 1954 by 20th Century-Fox Film Corp. New York opening at the Roxy: 27 October 1954. U.S. release: November 1954. U.K. release: March 1955. Australian release: 28 May 1955. Sydney opening at the Regent. 8,520 feet. 95 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Murder mystery in which a Broadway producer is suspected of strangling a girl he had befriended. A moderately ingenious but disagreeable story, tamely developed. — "Sight & Sound".
NOTES: Fox's 18th CinemaScope feature and the first to return only a modest profit (on what was a very modest investment at that). CinemaScope was already losing its box-office lure.
COMMENT: A murder mystery in CinemaScope certainly sounds novel and promising, but alas this movie gives the idea such an indifferent work-out it's impossible to reach any conclusion as to the Scope screen's effectiveness in dramatizing this sort of entertainment. The whodunit aspects are indifferently, even perfunctorily handled, and the characters are so one-dimensional that little if any suspense is generated.
True, Ginger Rogers plays her vindictive actress with a certain amount of bite and sparkle, and Peggy Ann Garner is briefly effective as the "All About Eve" clone and victim, but the rest of the players come nowhere near these standards. George Raft just rattles off his lines, while Van Heflin as usual seems to go out of his way to be plain dull. Reginald Gardiner is handed some pungent lines, but he is so unbelievable that his observations count for little. In fact, all the pretentious allusions in the dialogue generally fall flat.
Production values are minor, CinemaScope being poorly utilized, while a most incompatible and obvious stand-in pretends to be Van Heflin in the New York location shots.
SYNOPSIS: Murder mystery in which a Broadway producer is suspected of strangling a girl he had befriended. A moderately ingenious but disagreeable story, tamely developed. — "Sight & Sound".
NOTES: Fox's 18th CinemaScope feature and the first to return only a modest profit (on what was a very modest investment at that). CinemaScope was already losing its box-office lure.
COMMENT: A murder mystery in CinemaScope certainly sounds novel and promising, but alas this movie gives the idea such an indifferent work-out it's impossible to reach any conclusion as to the Scope screen's effectiveness in dramatizing this sort of entertainment. The whodunit aspects are indifferently, even perfunctorily handled, and the characters are so one-dimensional that little if any suspense is generated.
True, Ginger Rogers plays her vindictive actress with a certain amount of bite and sparkle, and Peggy Ann Garner is briefly effective as the "All About Eve" clone and victim, but the rest of the players come nowhere near these standards. George Raft just rattles off his lines, while Van Heflin as usual seems to go out of his way to be plain dull. Reginald Gardiner is handed some pungent lines, but he is so unbelievable that his observations count for little. In fact, all the pretentious allusions in the dialogue generally fall flat.
Production values are minor, CinemaScope being poorly utilized, while a most incompatible and obvious stand-in pretends to be Van Heflin in the New York location shots.