The Killing (1956)

Kubrick directed 15 odd movies in half a century (let's exclude Spartacus). His skills as an auteur may not have been recognized till Strangelove but they were on display in films like Lolita, Paths of Glory and of course The Killing, his first certified classic.

The Killing is about an intricate race-track heist involving a group of non-professionals with clean records. The mastermind, Sterling Hayden, has however spent some time in prison. The unique thing for the time is the non-linear structure of the film - particularly the heist sequence. This was probably Hayden's finest role - yes, better than Jack D. Ripper of Strangelove or Altman's The Long Goodbye - as the doomed hero, Johnny Clay. He is very tall and physical and quite brilliant in this role. He is well-supported by an old favorite of mine from The Maltese Falcon, Elisha Cook Jr. whose venomous wife, Marie Windsor plays a femme fatale of sorts. There is also the cult favorite Timothy Carey as the person assigned to shoot Red Lightning. Reservoir Dogs, a cult film inspired by The Killing is dedicated to Carey.

While The Killing is certainly noirish, it does not have the pure noir look - well, pretty much most of it is filmed in the daytime. In fact, if Kubrick was inspired, it would have been more by Hitchcock's tight pacing than by Chandler or Cain's hard-boiled dialog. The camera-work and editing are brilliant - for me even better than later Kubrick classics. Kubrick was forced to add a voice-over by the studio - something he really wasn't inclined towards. His ingenious solution was to have the VO not directly comment on the movie, but to add another layer to the films structure. It works! This film is not dated, although the Marie Windsor character is a bit one-dimensional and what is visible in the short length of the movie is the tight pacing.

Fmovies: Stanley Kubrick is one of the greatest directors of all time. He's made some of the greatest, thought provoking, controversial films of all time, and his style is out of this world. But before The Shining, before A Clockwork Orange, before 2001, before Dr. Strangelove, even before Spartacus, there was The Killing. It's a very good movie, but it's not one of Kubrick's best; and I was sort of expecting that. Rarely is a director's first movie his best, and even though it has some flaws, it's still a great movie. One problem I have with this movie is the unnecessary narration. I know that wasn't Kubrick's idea, but it's bad, and it's noticeable. It's actually pretty insulting to the audience's intelligence. I think Kubrick trusted his audience to be smart enough to follow the film, and I wish they would just remove it from the film. Another thing is that the movie feels very lopsided. The first half isn't bad, but the second half is definitely stronger. We get a lot of dialogue for the first half, and then we see the action in the second half. It's very well written, and it does keep my interest, but the scale is totally tipped. It's similar to Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill movies. The first movie is non-stop action and wildly entertaining, and the second movie has very minimal action, and is mostly talking. Like I said, I love dialogue (especially when it's well written), but I wish it was more balanced with the action. So what's good about this movie? Well, the characters are great. You can tell Tarantino took a lot of inspiration from this movie when he made Reservoir Dogs. It's one of the first instances where the main characters are bad guys, they're very mean spirited, but you cheer for them anyway. Also, the ending is unique for the time. Just like I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang, the ending is just very haunting, and leaves you with a dark feeling. I think the best thing about this movie is the cinematography. Kubrick is known for his incredible cinematography, and it's really cool to see where it all started. You can just see the future genius that lies within. The Killing isn't a perfect movie, but it's still really good. For a low budget crime drama from the 1950s, it's amazing. And even though it's so low budget, you can still see that Kubrick style slowly growing. It may not be one of his best, and it does have its flaws, but it's still an engaging, dark, intelligent movie.

Film noir in all its splendor, with a very dynamic rhythm, far from '2001, a space odyssey': an audacious burglary seems perfectly orchestrated and prepared with a surgical precision, until a minor glitch transforms a 'Symphonie fantastique' in a 'Descente d'Orphée aux enfers'.

The Killing fmovies. Stanley Kunbrick was still in his twenties when he made this film, yet his confidence and self-assurance are all over it. It is a well-written story, co-written by Kubrick (based on a novel called "A Clean Break"), about a meticulously planned horetrack heist told from the point of view of the several people who were in on the plot. Most of these guys weren't professional criminals, but otherwise honest men who were down on their luck and needed a break. They turned to this audacious plan in desperation, thinking they could do some real good in their lives with their share of the money. I won't give away the ending of course, but keep in mind this is a Kubrick film. That's all I say about that.

Standouts include Sterling Hayden as the ringleader, Marie Windsor as a snide, manipulative woman, Elisha Cook as her milquetoasty husband, Timothy Carey, as creepy as ever, and Kola Kwariani, the thinking man's Tor Johnson, as a chess expert/hired thug.

Speaking of chess, this is the first movie I've ever seen with a scene taking place in a chess parlor. Being from a provincial New England town, and not being a chess afficionado, I never knew such places existed.

The story of a meticulously-planned race track hold-up is a stunner in every minute you watch it, and the film's progressive use of a partly documentary style has often been acclaimed as uniquely supporting the dramatic goings-on. It definitely put a modern touch to the somewhat out-of-fashion film noir in 1956, but still greatly relied on its basic rules.

A fine new note was the neat distinction between the gang's members' motives, ranging from repaying underworld debts (De Corsia) and hope of offering a better life for his ill wife (Sawyer) to the vain ambition of pleasing his vamp wife by doing something special (Cook).

Despite the film's qualities, Kubrick's treatment of the women's rôles seems more than old-fashioned today. Women here are either the homely and sweet type (Coleen Gray) or the Bette-Davis-eyed and cherchez-la-femme type (Marie Windsor). Both are accordingly taller or smaller than their respective partners by a head.

I should like to mention one of my favourite pans: that's when the bald philosopher-catcher walks up to Joe Sawyer's bar. Lucien Ballard's camera follows him all across the crowded tote hall, a take which must have been very difficult to organize and shoot. Later, the scene is repeated with Sterling Hayden.

This motion picture is also a monument for the great histrionic art of Elisha Cook, Jr., in a stand-out performance as the born loser. (German dubbing gives him the apt voice of Stan Laurel's speaker Walter Bluhm.) This little man never just did his job in unnumerable supporting rôles but has rendered effective homage to the tragic figure on the silver screen more than any other (non-comical) character actor I can think of. Regardless of his versatility in lots of different films, his impersonations of a likeable man who is doomed to fail make him unforgettable: take his lethal parts in "Phantom Lady" (1944), "Shane" (1953) or the likes, the audience's sympathy was always with this fine actor.

Everything about this movie fascinates me. Even the unexpected ending has a compelling and unique flavor to it. Sure, it looks like many crime dramas of the 50's. But we are talking about of a movie with a director of the prodigious talents of Stanley Kubrick.

Sometimes you wonder which genre Kubrick could not have handled brilliantly. He seems to know exactly what to do in such a wide variety of movies...Crime, Drama, War, Surreal, Historical Epic, Science Fiction and Black Comedy. My only wish would have been if Kubrick could have made MORE movies. When he died, that left only Woody Allen as the only major director who is working as a pure artist in the film medium.

THE KILLING is filled with crime-noir touches that form an absorbing whole that is hard to beat. The acting is top-notch, the scenes are set in gold taking from every crime movie and creating a whole that could not have been done so well by just any director - perhaps only Hitchcock could have pulled this off. Then there's the jazzy score that underlines the action which punch and atmosphere that just curdles off the screen.

Even if you're not a Kubrick fan (which might surprise many people when they find out he was the director) you will enjoy this movie.

Right to the end...which I won't reveal...but has an inevitability written with classical balance and a submission to fate that leaves a wry smile on your face.

Sterling Hayden is great in this role and he populates this character with just the right sort of mystery to keep you guessing until the end.

Recommended without reservation.