Touch of Evil (1958)
Grade: 85
"Touch of Evil" is an excellent movie. It is also one of Universal Studio's strangest films from the 1950s. It is dark, lurid, and weird.
Charlton Heston plays a high-ranking Mexican law officer. He is on his honeymoon with Janet Leigh. On the American side of the border with Mexico, a car explodes. Heston becomes involved in the case, to the annoyance of local police celebrity Orson Welles (who also directed the film and wrote the screenplay). Heston accuses Welles of framing a Mexican for the bombing. Further complicating matters, the Grande family has a grudge against Heston for imprisoning their kingpin. The Grande family seeks revenge against Heston through Leigh, who has almost as bad a time here as she would in "Psycho" two years later.
Heston's intense acting style suits his character well. He is determined to seek justice, first for the framed accused, then against Welles, then for his wife Leigh.
Welles just looks awful. Corpulent, unshaven, slurring, limping and corrupt, he is grossly overweight. He is practically worshipped by his fellow officers. His "game leg" gives him "hunches" which always prove correct. This does not keep him from planting evidence to support his hunches. Welles' character grows increasingly unstable throughout the movie. This inconsistency does not harm the film, however, but increases its tension.
Marlene Dietrich has a few scenes as the owner of a... well, some kind of non-respectable establishment. Her only customer is Welles. She may represent Death.
Dennis Weaver plays a hotel "night manager". His character is so weird and quirky, it would never be credible in a conventional film. But "Touch of Evil" is not conventional, and he fits right in. His trademark expression is, "If they think I'm gonna do that, they've got another thing coming!"
"Touch of Evil" must be seen to be believed, and it is remarkable that it is a 1958 product of Universal. You would think some studio mogul would see it and say, 'What is the audience? Who would go to see this film? There's no love interest. It's not a comedy or a drama. It's not really even a mystery!' I guess "film noir" has claimed it, and we can only be thankful for its existence.
http://members.tripod.com/~Brian_Koller/movies.html
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews