Don't Bother to Knock (1952)

I am no movie critic, but this film showed real depth from two of the most underrated actors in the business, and this was the golden age of "hollywood", the early 50's. Richard Widmark,who somehow later became almost a caricature of himself, as an edgy, slightly crazed character actor, is in this one an ultimately almost caring character. In this movie he just barely experiences an arc, but it is better than most of the roles they threw him later on. Who can forget the number of roles where his trademark evil cackle instantly typed his character? As for Marilyn Monroe, this movie really turned me around about her ability as an actress. Anyone who can look in her eyes in the later moments of this film and not see the depth of despair and disconnection there has just not lived enough to understand human nature and the vicissitudes of living in this world. If you can just suspend cynical disbelief for a couple of hours to watch this thing, she gives a heartbreaking performance that is completely believable, and those scars on her wrists are stigmata that may well belie her future. I think she was ultimately a truly tragic figure, an innocent(in her way)thoroughly corrupted by the system that made her a star. She was not the first and she will not be the last, but somehow, her fragility makes her the poster child for avoiding the star machine at all costs if you do not have the hide, and the mind, of a predator. In her last movie(I think) The Misfits, she projected the same kind of wounded innocence.

Fmovies: Don't Bother To Knock finds airline pilot Richard Widmark flying with more than the safety of his passengers on his mind to New York. He's on a mission to confront Anne Bancroft who's given him a 'let's call it a day' letter. Anne works as a singer in a posh New York nightclub attached to one of the fancier hotels. After a nasty scene with Bancroft, Widmark's left with an itch to scratch.

The answer might be Marilyn Monroe across the courtyard looking real provocative and arousing Widmark's interest. He gives her a call and things might be going good. Then the little girl, Donna Corcoran, wakes up from the next room and Marilyn starts to act very weird indeed.

This one was one of Marilyn's first roles which exploited a little more than her beauty. She plays a troubled young lady who's just spent some time in a mental institution. Her uncle Elisha Cook, Jr., got her that job as a babysitter for Corcoran whose parents Jim Backus and Jeanne Cagney are at a banquet in the hotel. Truth be told the role was no stretch for Marilyn given her own sad history.

Widmark's not a particularly noble character here, but he's a decent enough man. He's just like millions of other men who when they lose their love, cure it with trying to love what's available. Anne Bancroft makes a nice screen debut here although I can't believe she sung those songs herself. If so, why didn't she do any more singing on screen?

Though the film gets melodramatic and the characters don't give you any real rooting interest, Don't Bother To Knock remains a landmark film for the careers of both Marilyn Monroe and Anne Bancroft.

I had not a seen a movie with the greatest myth of the big screen for a long time. I had read very little about Roy Baker's "Don't bother to knock", so I was free of prejudices when watching the movie. I felt like watching Marilyn just acting. Happily, it was a pleasant experience. I think Marilyn reacted more than acted to a plot that brought her back to her sad childhood. That is why the viewer can almost feel her emotions as real ones which is something that makes the weird and a bit slow story be much more credible. From the rest of the cast, Richard Widmark shines in spite of having to portray a rather lame, superficial character with few redeeming features. Above all, I will remember this film for portraying a different M.Monroe from the typical dumb-blonde-girl-with-strong-sex-appeal that too often the big studios wanted her to be.

Don't Bother to Knock fmovies. A hotel guest flirts with a beautiful woman after a breakup from his girlfriend. He is seduced by the woman while she is babysitting. The child wakes up and terrorizes the child and the guest. The moral to this movie is never judge a book by its cover. Marilyn Monroe give her best acting performance in the whole movie and makes you understand her character emotions through the story. Very rare to find a movie with this type of acting even today.

On so many levels. Not just because of the character Marilyn Monroe played . . . but also because of the course she afterwards chose to take, as a performer.

In life, MM was never the dumb-blonde clown she so often portrayed on film. Yet she chose to follow that path of "marketability" from her earliest days -- perhaps because of advice -- "The only thing I had on was the radio," she famously said regarding her early calendar shoot (though that quote was delivered to her by her public relations handler).

Yet, in "Don't Bother to Knock," we have evidence of a talent far deeper and more affecting than anything she ever did, before or since.

Though then, and still, a B-movie, DBTK remains a highly disturbing piece of work from a remarkable natural actress who subsequently decided to pursue -- who knows, whether from instinct, advice or "the line of least resistance" -- a career based on superficial appearance rather than emotive depth.

Finally, of course, she morphed into the silly, slithering, sewn-into-her-Jean-Louis-gown "songstress" at President Kennedy's birthday party in Madison Square Garden in 1962, all drug-addled spray-netted helmet-haired breathiness and off-key baby-voiced "vocalizing." In DBTK, however, is ample evidence of the powerfully effective actress she could have been, had she taken a different road.

This is not to criticize the choices she made as a performer.

Doubtless, she would not be the legend she remains today, had she lived into her 60s or 70s.

But DBTK remains an archive of a complex and affecting screen acting talent, caught at the fork in her career's road, who chose surface over substance.

No matter how beguiling MM will always remain as a screen icon, there is this one and only proof of a talent even more devastating -- had she the guts or the advice to honor and follow it.

Sad, and disturbing, indeed.

to be absolutely honest, marilyn monroe acted extremely well in this film. I think it was the first i had everseen of her (2001) and after all i had heard about her acting as a "blonde bombshell" this picture sent me in another direction. SHE CAN ACT!! to see marilyn play a psychotic woman may not have been completely hard for her (no offense intended) but i feel it was superb acting! Ashame she wasnt offered more roles like this one