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Suddenly (1954 film)
Encyclopedia
Suddenly is an American
film noir
directed by Lewis Allen
with a screenplay written by Richard Sale. The drama features Frank Sinatra
, Sterling Hayden
, James Gleason
and Nancy Gates
, among others.
The tranquility of a small town is jarred when the U.S. President is scheduled to pass through and a hired assassin takes over the Benson home as a perfect location to ambush the president.
is scheduled to journey through the small town of Suddenly, California. Claiming to be checking up on security prior to his arrival, a group of FBI agents arrive at the home of the Bensons, which neighbors the station where the Presidential train is due to stop. However, they soon turn out to be assassins led by the ruthless John Baron (Frank Sinatra
), who take over the house and hold the family hostage.
Sheriff Tod Shaw (Sterling Hayden
) arrives with Dan Carney (Willis Bouchey
), a Secret Service
agent in charge of the President's security detail. When he does, Baron and his gangsters shoot Carney and a bullet fractures Shaw's arm.
Baron sends one of his two henchmen to double-check on the President's schedule but he is killed in a shootout with the police. Jud (James O'Hara), a television repairman, shows up at the house and also becomes a hostage. Pidge (Kim Charney) goes to his grandfather's dresser to fetch some medication and notices a fully loaded revolver which he replaces with his toy cap gun.
Baron is confronted by the sheriff on the risks and meaning of killing the President and Baron's remaining henchman begins showing some reluctance. For Baron, however, these are the very least of his concerns and it soon becomes clear that he is a psychopath whose pleasure comes from killingwho and why he kills being the least of his problems.
A sniper's rifle has been mounted on a metal table by a window. Jud discreetly hooks the table up to the 5000 volt plate output of the family television. Pop Benson (James Gleason
) then spills a cup of water on the floor beneath the table. Although the hope is that Baron will be shocked to death, his remaining henchman touches the table first and is electrocuted, firing the rifle repeatedly and attracting the attention of police at the train station as he struggles to free himself. Baron shoots Jud, disconnects the electrical hookup and aims the rifle as the president's train arrives at the station, but to his surprise, doesn't stop (having been alerted to the risk). Ellen Benson (Nancy Gates
) shoots Baron in the chest and Shaw shoots him again. Baron's last words are, "Don't... please."
Suddenly became part of the colorization
controversy in the mid-1980s when the movie was colorized for home video by Hal Roach Studios in 1986, turning Sinatra's famous blue eyes brown. A second and far superior newly remastered colorized version by Legend Films
was released to DVD on June 16, 2009 which also includes a newly restored print of the original black & white film. This colorized version also restores the color of Sinatra's blue eyes back into the film.
The film's copyright was not renewed and it fell into the public domain
. Hence, prints became widely available from a number of discount/public domain distributors. The picture can also be downloaded and viewed for free online.
(1951) and Kiss Me Deadly
(1955). Moreover, the themes of violence, sense of claustrophobia
and despair mark the film as completely amoral, and, as such, Suddenly is quite opposite of non-noir films like The Desperate Hours
(1955).
film critic Bosley Crowther
, liked the direction of the film and the acting, writing, "Yet such is the role that Mr. Sinatra plays in Suddenly!, a taut little melodrama that... [it] shapes up as one of the slickest recent items in the minor movie league... we have several people to thank- particularly Richard Sale for a good script, which tells a straight story credibly, Mr. Allen for direction that makes both excitement and sense, Mr. Bassler for a production that gets the feel of a small town and the cast which includes Sterling Hayden, James Gleason and Nancy Gates." Crowther especially liked Sinatra's performance. He wrote, "Mr. Sinatra deserves a special chunk of praise...In Suddenly! he proves it in a melodramatic tour de force."
The staff at Variety
magazine also gave the film a good review and praised the acting. They wrote, "Thesp inserts plenty of menace into a psycho character, never too heavily done, and gets good backing from his costar, Sterling Hayden, as sheriff, in a less showy role but just as authoritatively handled. Lewis Allen's direction manages a smart piece where static treatment easily could have prevailed."
More recently, film critic Dennis Schwartz also reviewed the film favorably, writing, "Lewis Allen (The Uninvited
) directs this fast-paced crime thriller, a minor film written by Richard Sale, about a violent incident that interrupts the tranquil life of a middle-class family and changes their life significantly. Frank Sinatra stars and delightfully shows up for the part, while Sterling Hayden helps with a fine supporting role performance and the gritty 80-year-old James Gleason provides some laughs for this grim narrative...What I liked best was that Frank Sinatra wore a fedora throughout, even indoors. It's interesting to note that it was filmed years before the Kennedy assassination, but there are many similarities between the Sinatra character and Lee Harvey Oswald."
written by Richard Condon
, a former Hollywood press agent recently turned novelist. His book also features a mentally troubled former war hero called Raymond Shaw who, at the climax, uses a rifle with scope to shoot at a presidential candidate. Because of such strong similarities, it is now thought that Suddenly was one inspiration for Condon's Manchurian Candidate.
The Manchurian Candidate was released as a film in 1962
, again starring Sinatra, but this time out to prevent an assassination being committed by Laurence Harvey
.
Another person who was certainly aware of Suddenly, whether or not he ever saw it, was Lee Harvey Oswald
, the assassin of President John F. Kennedy
in 1963. The movie played at several New Orleans theatres for two months in the winter of 1954-55, at a time when Oswald was living there and was a 15-year-old borderline juvenile delinquent. In his teenage world, Oswald cannot have been ignorant of such a violent and sensational movie.
It was long thought that Oswald actually saw Suddenly on television in October 1963 (one month before the assassination of Kennedy), but an investigation of that claim eventually revealed that he did not. The confusion arose because Oswald actually saw another presidential assassination film, We Were Strangers
, not once but twice on one weekend in October 1963. His twofold viewing of that film came to be understood, in all the chaos immediately following the assassination of Kennedy, as his having seen two different assassination films at that time. Suddenly was naturally but mistakenly believed to have been the "second" one. Vincent Bugliosi, in his 2007 work Reclaiming History, claims that Oswald did see Suddenly on television in October 1963, but Bugliosi misquoted and ignored several other findings, and his claim is not correct.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
film noir
Film noir
Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as extending from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
directed by Lewis Allen
Lewis Allen (director)
Lewis Allen was an English film and television director. Allen worked mainly in the United States, directing 18 feature films between 1944 and 1959...
with a screenplay written by Richard Sale. The drama features Frank Sinatra
Frank Sinatra
Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became an unprecedentedly successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, after being signed to Columbia Records in 1943. Being the idol of the...
, Sterling Hayden
Sterling Hayden
Sterling Hayden was an American actor and author. For most of his career as a leading man, he specialized in westerns and film noir, such as Johnny Guitar, The Asphalt Jungle and The Killing. Later on he became noted as a character actor for such roles as Gen. Jack D. Ripper in Dr...
, James Gleason
James Gleason
James Austin Gleason was an American actor born in New York City. He was also a playwright and screenwriter.-Career:...
and Nancy Gates
Nancy Gates
Nancy Gates is a retired American film and television actress.-Film:Gates, born in Dallas, Texas, entered acting at a young age, receiving a contract with RKO at the age of 15. Her first screen appearance, uncredited, was in the 1942 film The Magnificent Ambersons. That same year she had her first...
, among others.
The tranquility of a small town is jarred when the U.S. President is scheduled to pass through and a hired assassin takes over the Benson home as a perfect location to ambush the president.
Plot
In post-war America, the President of the United StatesPresident of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
is scheduled to journey through the small town of Suddenly, California. Claiming to be checking up on security prior to his arrival, a group of FBI agents arrive at the home of the Bensons, which neighbors the station where the Presidential train is due to stop. However, they soon turn out to be assassins led by the ruthless John Baron (Frank Sinatra
Frank Sinatra
Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became an unprecedentedly successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, after being signed to Columbia Records in 1943. Being the idol of the...
), who take over the house and hold the family hostage.
Sheriff Tod Shaw (Sterling Hayden
Sterling Hayden
Sterling Hayden was an American actor and author. For most of his career as a leading man, he specialized in westerns and film noir, such as Johnny Guitar, The Asphalt Jungle and The Killing. Later on he became noted as a character actor for such roles as Gen. Jack D. Ripper in Dr...
) arrives with Dan Carney (Willis Bouchey
Willis Bouchey
Willis Ben Bouchey was an American character actor who appeared in almost 150 films and television shows. He was born in Vernon, Michigan, but reared by his mother and stepfather in Washington State....
), a Secret Service
United States Secret Service
The United States Secret Service is a United States federal law enforcement agency that is part of the United States Department of Homeland Security. The sworn members are divided among the Special Agents and the Uniformed Division. Until March 1, 2003, the Service was part of the United States...
agent in charge of the President's security detail. When he does, Baron and his gangsters shoot Carney and a bullet fractures Shaw's arm.
Baron sends one of his two henchmen to double-check on the President's schedule but he is killed in a shootout with the police. Jud (James O'Hara), a television repairman, shows up at the house and also becomes a hostage. Pidge (Kim Charney) goes to his grandfather's dresser to fetch some medication and notices a fully loaded revolver which he replaces with his toy cap gun.
Baron is confronted by the sheriff on the risks and meaning of killing the President and Baron's remaining henchman begins showing some reluctance. For Baron, however, these are the very least of his concerns and it soon becomes clear that he is a psychopath whose pleasure comes from killingwho and why he kills being the least of his problems.
A sniper's rifle has been mounted on a metal table by a window. Jud discreetly hooks the table up to the 5000 volt plate output of the family television. Pop Benson (James Gleason
James Gleason
James Austin Gleason was an American actor born in New York City. He was also a playwright and screenwriter.-Career:...
) then spills a cup of water on the floor beneath the table. Although the hope is that Baron will be shocked to death, his remaining henchman touches the table first and is electrocuted, firing the rifle repeatedly and attracting the attention of police at the train station as he struggles to free himself. Baron shoots Jud, disconnects the electrical hookup and aims the rifle as the president's train arrives at the station, but to his surprise, doesn't stop (having been alerted to the risk). Ellen Benson (Nancy Gates
Nancy Gates
Nancy Gates is a retired American film and television actress.-Film:Gates, born in Dallas, Texas, entered acting at a young age, receiving a contract with RKO at the age of 15. Her first screen appearance, uncredited, was in the 1942 film The Magnificent Ambersons. That same year she had her first...
) shoots Baron in the chest and Shaw shoots him again. Baron's last words are, "Don't... please."
Cast
- Frank SinatraFrank SinatraFrancis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became an unprecedentedly successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, after being signed to Columbia Records in 1943. Being the idol of the...
as John Baron - Sterling HaydenSterling HaydenSterling Hayden was an American actor and author. For most of his career as a leading man, he specialized in westerns and film noir, such as Johnny Guitar, The Asphalt Jungle and The Killing. Later on he became noted as a character actor for such roles as Gen. Jack D. Ripper in Dr...
as Sheriff Tod Shaw - James GleasonJames GleasonJames Austin Gleason was an American actor born in New York City. He was also a playwright and screenwriter.-Career:...
as Peter "Pop" Benson - Nancy GatesNancy GatesNancy Gates is a retired American film and television actress.-Film:Gates, born in Dallas, Texas, entered acting at a young age, receiving a contract with RKO at the age of 15. Her first screen appearance, uncredited, was in the 1942 film The Magnificent Ambersons. That same year she had her first...
as Ellen Benson - Kim Charney as Peter Benson III (Pidge)
- Paul FreesPaul FreesPaul Frees was an American voice actor and character actor.-Biography:He was born Solomon Hersh Frees in Chicago...
as Benny Conklin, Baron's Accomplice (also TV announcer voice) - Christopher DarkChristopher DarkChristopher Dark was an American actor.Born Alfred Francis DeLeo in New York and died in Hollywood, California .Dark is best remembered as Hank Jaffe in the film World Without End ....
as Bart Wheeler - Willis BoucheyWillis BoucheyWillis Ben Bouchey was an American character actor who appeared in almost 150 films and television shows. He was born in Vernon, Michigan, but reared by his mother and stepfather in Washington State....
as Dan Carney, Chief Secret Service Agent - Paul Wexler as Deputy Slim Adams
- James O'Hara as Jud Kelly
- Kem Dibbs as Wilson
- Clark Howat as Haggerty
- Charles Smith as Bebop
- Dan WhiteDan White (actor)Dan White was an American actor, well known for appearing in several Western films.-Early life:Dan White was born to George and Orpha White in Falmouth, Florida, one of twelve siblings. The Whites moved to Lakeland during World War I. By age 14, White was in show business...
as Desk Officer Burg
Background
Film colorization
Film colorization is any process that adds color to black-and-white, sepia or monochrome moving-picture images. It may be done as a special effect, or to modernize black-and-white films, or to restore color films...
controversy in the mid-1980s when the movie was colorized for home video by Hal Roach Studios in 1986, turning Sinatra's famous blue eyes brown. A second and far superior newly remastered colorized version by Legend Films
Legend Films
Legend Films, a San Diego-based company, was founded in August 2001. The company specializes in the conversion of feature films, both new release and catalog titles, and commercials from their native 2D format into 3-D film format utilizing proprietary technology and software...
was released to DVD on June 16, 2009 which also includes a newly restored print of the original black & white film. This colorized version also restores the color of Sinatra's blue eyes back into the film.
The film's copyright was not renewed and it fell into the public domain
Public domain
Works are in the public domain if the intellectual property rights have expired, if the intellectual property rights are forfeited, or if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all...
. Hence, prints became widely available from a number of discount/public domain distributors. The picture can also be downloaded and viewed for free online.
Noir analysis
Film critic Carl Mazek makes the case that the "Machiavellian attitude" of John Baron links the picture with the brutal films noir of the 1950s like The Big NightThe Big Night
The Big Night is a 1951 black-and-white film drama starring John Drew Barrymore . The film, directed by Joseph Losey, is considered to be film noir.- Reception :...
(1951) and Kiss Me Deadly
Kiss Me Deadly
Kiss Me Deadly is a 1955 film noir drama produced and directed by Robert Aldrich starring Ralph Meeker. The screenplay was written by A.I. Bezzerides, based on the Mickey Spillane Mike Hammer mystery novel Kiss Me, Deadly. Kiss Me Deadly is often considered a classic of the noir genre. The film...
(1955). Moreover, the themes of violence, sense of claustrophobia
Claustrophobia
Claustrophobia is the fear of having no escape and being closed in small spaces or rooms...
and despair mark the film as completely amoral, and, as such, Suddenly is quite opposite of non-noir films like The Desperate Hours
The Desperate Hours (film)
The Desperate Hours is a 1955 film from Paramount Pictures starring Humphrey Bogart and Fredric March. The movie was produced and directed by William Wyler and based on a novel and play of the same name written by Joseph Hayes which were loosely based on actual events.The original Broadway...
(1955).
Critical reception
When the film was released, New York TimesThe New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
film critic Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...
, liked the direction of the film and the acting, writing, "Yet such is the role that Mr. Sinatra plays in Suddenly!, a taut little melodrama that... [it] shapes up as one of the slickest recent items in the minor movie league... we have several people to thank- particularly Richard Sale for a good script, which tells a straight story credibly, Mr. Allen for direction that makes both excitement and sense, Mr. Bassler for a production that gets the feel of a small town and the cast which includes Sterling Hayden, James Gleason and Nancy Gates." Crowther especially liked Sinatra's performance. He wrote, "Mr. Sinatra deserves a special chunk of praise...In Suddenly! he proves it in a melodramatic tour de force."
The staff at Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
magazine also gave the film a good review and praised the acting. They wrote, "Thesp inserts plenty of menace into a psycho character, never too heavily done, and gets good backing from his costar, Sterling Hayden, as sheriff, in a less showy role but just as authoritatively handled. Lewis Allen's direction manages a smart piece where static treatment easily could have prevailed."
More recently, film critic Dennis Schwartz also reviewed the film favorably, writing, "Lewis Allen (The Uninvited
The Uninvited
The Uninvited is an ITV science fiction television mini-series first shown in 1997 as four fifty minute episodes. The series was made by Anglia Television. It was created by Leslie Grantham, who also features as a police officer with a secret....
) directs this fast-paced crime thriller, a minor film written by Richard Sale, about a violent incident that interrupts the tranquil life of a middle-class family and changes their life significantly. Frank Sinatra stars and delightfully shows up for the part, while Sterling Hayden helps with a fine supporting role performance and the gritty 80-year-old James Gleason provides some laughs for this grim narrative...What I liked best was that Frank Sinatra wore a fedora throughout, even indoors. It's interesting to note that it was filmed years before the Kennedy assassination, but there are many similarities between the Sinatra character and Lee Harvey Oswald."
Influence
In 1959, five years after the release of Suddenly, a novel was published which had a remarkably similar ending. This was The Manchurian CandidateThe Manchurian Candidate
The Manchurian Candidate , by Richard Condon, is a political thriller novel about the son of a prominent US political family who is brainwashed into being an unwitting assassin for the Communist Party....
written by Richard Condon
Richard Condon
Richard Thomas Condon was a prolific and popular American political novelist whose satiric works were generally presented in the form of thrillers or semi-thrillers...
, a former Hollywood press agent recently turned novelist. His book also features a mentally troubled former war hero called Raymond Shaw who, at the climax, uses a rifle with scope to shoot at a presidential candidate. Because of such strong similarities, it is now thought that Suddenly was one inspiration for Condon's Manchurian Candidate.
The Manchurian Candidate was released as a film in 1962
The Manchurian Candidate (1962 film)
The Manchurian Candidate is a 1962 American Cold War political thriller film starring Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey, Janet Leigh and Angela Lansbury, and featuring Henry Silva, James Gregory, Leslie Parrish and John McGiver...
, again starring Sinatra, but this time out to prevent an assassination being committed by Laurence Harvey
Laurence Harvey
Laurence Harvey was a Lithuanian-born actor who achieved fame in British and American films.- Early life :Harvey maintained throughout his life that his birth name was Laruschka Mischa Skikne. However, his legal name was Zvi Mosheh Skikne. He was the youngest of three boys born to Ber "Boris" and...
.
Another person who was certainly aware of Suddenly, whether or not he ever saw it, was Lee Harvey Oswald
Lee Harvey Oswald
Lee Harvey Oswald was, according to four government investigations,These were investigations by: the Federal Bureau of Investigation , the Warren Commission , the House Select Committee on Assassinations , and the Dallas Police Department. the sniper who assassinated John F...
, the assassin of President John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
in 1963. The movie played at several New Orleans theatres for two months in the winter of 1954-55, at a time when Oswald was living there and was a 15-year-old borderline juvenile delinquent. In his teenage world, Oswald cannot have been ignorant of such a violent and sensational movie.
It was long thought that Oswald actually saw Suddenly on television in October 1963 (one month before the assassination of Kennedy), but an investigation of that claim eventually revealed that he did not. The confusion arose because Oswald actually saw another presidential assassination film, We Were Strangers
We Were Strangers
We Were Strangers is a 1949 adventure–drama film directed by John Huston and starring Jennifer Jones and John Garfield.The film, set in 1933, concerns a group of revolutionaries attempting to overthrow the Cuban regime...
, not once but twice on one weekend in October 1963. His twofold viewing of that film came to be understood, in all the chaos immediately following the assassination of Kennedy, as his having seen two different assassination films at that time. Suddenly was naturally but mistakenly believed to have been the "second" one. Vincent Bugliosi, in his 2007 work Reclaiming History, claims that Oswald did see Suddenly on television in October 1963, but Bugliosi misquoted and ignored several other findings, and his claim is not correct.
External links
- Suddenly at DVD Beaver (includes images)
- Suddenly segment by Tim Estiloz on You Tube (Backstage - seen on the Comcast NetworkComcast NetworkComcast Network is a cable television station that is shown mostly in parts of Comcast Cable services in the Eastern part of the US. Viewed in four states and 20 television markets from New Jersey to Virginia on Comcast cable systems. The main focus of the network is Philadelphia although they...
) - Suddenly film on You Tube (complete in WidescreenWidescreenWidescreen images are a variety of aspect ratios used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than the standard 1.37:1 Academy aspect ratio provided by 35mm film....
)