The Naked Edge - Gary Cooper's last film...any good? in The Psycho Ward Forum

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The Naked Edge - Gary Cooper's last film...any good?

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bgart13.thelatarniaforums	The Naked Edge - Gary Cooper's last film...any good?	Lead	[-]
Aug 29 10 5:50 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Saw this is coming out on dvd in the UK and since it has Peter Cushing in it, I'm interested in learning more about it. That is, is it worth the few bucks to pick it up? http://www.amazon.co.uk/N...id=1283121988&sr=1-1 Ben Kundun Rat Terrier: 8/16/02 - 3/26/11. RIP, Ku.
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Rick		#1	[-]
Aug 29 10 6:22 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	It's distressingly poor, actually. I wanted to see this movie for almost 50 years because it was Cooper's last and because of Cushing and because what little I read of the plot sounded intriguing. It does have a patina of quality, after all it was a big movie star movie, so it's not some bottom-dragging dog. But it's not good, not mysterious, not creepy, not believable, and, worst of all, not really even well-acted. Cooper seems awfully out of place and uncomfortable. Peter Cushing, as I recall, is in one scene, maybe two. It's a small role. For curiosity's sake, it's worth a look. But I see no reason to buy it, unless one is a Cooper or Cushing completist.
clore103051		#2	[-]
Aug 29 10 6:50 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Rent it, but don't buy it. It comes off as a poor man's SUSPICION and Cooper was in such sad shape at this point that it's tear-enducing.
bgart13.thelatarniaforums		#3	[-]
Aug 29 10 7:23 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Eek! Ok, shall pass on it for now, lol. Thanks, you two. Kundun Rat Terrier: 8/16/02 - 3/26/11. RIP, Ku.
Rapfred		#4	[-]
Aug 29 10 9:08 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Big disappointment back in the day. Co-written by Joseph Stefano, THE NAKED EDGE was touted as a PSYCHO-like thriller, with a marketing campaign that included a gimmicky seating policy complete with a proto-fear flasher ("Stop! Flashing red light means no one seated during the last 13 minutes!") and even a jagged line slashing across the word "Naked." Cheers to the Mad Men; phooey on the film itself.
Monsterpal		#5	[-]
Aug 29 10 9:57 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I remember seeing this when it was new, but I remember nothing about it except Bergman being stuck out on a ledge in one scene, unsure if Cooper was going to push her off. I knew he was a big movie star, but he looked like an old, old man to me.
Monsterpal		#6	[-]
Aug 30 10 12:19 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Sorry, just got a PM from Rapfred kindly pointing out that it was Deborah Kerr, not Ingrid Bergman.
davlghry		#7	[-]
Aug 31 10 7:42 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Gary Cooper and Deborah Kerr, two of the biggest stars in the world and the copy line is: "Only the man who wrote PSYCHO could jolt you like this!"
Rapfred		#8	[-]
Sep 1 10 1:39 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	davlghry wrote: Gary Cooper and Deborah Kerr, two of the biggest stars in the world and the copy line is: "Only the man who wrote PSYCHO could jolt you like this!" The power of PSYCHO's enormous box office success compelled them. Throughout the '60s, studio marketing folks tied their coattails to the Hitchcock film whenever and wherever possible. A la THE NAKED EDGE, the poster art for VICTIM, a socially conscious melodrama about blackmailers preying on homosexuals, employed a PSYCHO-like jagged line across the title letters. Especially influential was Hitchcock's DIABOLIQUE-influenced seating policy gimmick. For the initial engagements of THE GUNS OF NAVARONE, movie patrons were not only urged to "See it from the Beginning" but were warned that "No one will be seated during the last 20 minutes." Similar ballyhoo found its way into ad mats for 36 HOURS, THE INNOCENTS, THE THIRD SECRET and NIGHT TIDE. For Otto Preminger's BUNNY LAKE IS MISSING, admission was restricted "while the clock is ticking." For Jacques Becker's prison break classic LE TROU, there was "no seating during the last 18 minutes." But THE CABINET OF CALIGARI trumped them all: "No one permitted OUT or IN during the last 13 nerve-shattering minutes!"
TomWeaver999		#9	[-]
Sep 1 10 1:51 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	The story of THE NAKED EDGE might have made for a good 60-minute B-movie or TV episode (a SUSPICION ripoff done in jig time) but it's dragged out mercilessly because the producers were able to hire Stars with a capital S (Cooper and Kerr), and by 1960, Stars Just Didn't Make tight, compact little movies. So a situation established in the first 15 minutes into the movie (Kerr thinks Cooper might be a killer) gets talk-talk-talk-talked about for the next hour or more, at which point we're really kinda still where we were at the 15-minute mark. Yaaaaaaaawn! Ronald Howard and Peter Cushing play courtroom lawyers, and Cushing is so hyperactive (rolling his r's, waving his hands, the whole bit) that Howard acts rings around him. Last Edited By: TomWeaver999 Sep 1 10 1:53 PM. Edited 1 times.
davlghry		#10	[-]
Sep 1 10 3:56 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Rapfred wrote: "No one permitted OUT or IN during the last 13 nerve-shattering minutes!" It reminds you there was a time when people sauntered in and out of movie theaters regardless of the starting times.
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CapnDunsel		#11	[-]
Sep 1 10 6:09 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	davlghry wrote: Rapfred wrote: "No one permitted OUT or IN during the last 13 nerve-shattering minutes!" It reminds you there was a time when people sauntered in and out of movie theaters regardless of the starting times. Thank god for supersized concessions food/drink and adult-Depends diapers - no need to move from your seat...but seriously, in what years and circumstance did people treat a movie theater like it was a TV in a living room? Was it only in dense cities? During high unemployment or when expenses were low enough that you didn't need to work full-time? There's a cinema scene in "2 Guys from Milwaukee"(1946) and you get the impression it was like going out to the Opera.
davlghry		#12	[-]
Sep 1 10 11:24 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I grew up in a Chicago suburb and remember going to the local movie house in the late 50's and early 60's. The theatre played double features, there was a short break in between and people came and went as they pleased. They also smoked. No usher ever came in after a feature and cleared the house. You simply sat and waited for the second feature or went out for refreshments or left. The next show started with a newsreel, a cartoon and coming attractions. Like a lot of old theaters, there was a luminous clock just left of the screen. I assume it was there to remind people if they needed to leave for another appointment or something.
Bill Warren		#13	[-]
Sep 2 10 12:43 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	CapnDunsel wrote: Thank god for supersized concessions food/drink and adult-Depends diapers - no need to move from your seat...but seriously, in what years and circumstance did people treat a movie theater like it was a TV in a living room? Was it only in dense cities? During high unemployment or when expenses were low enough that you didn't need to work full-time? There's a cinema scene in "2 Guys from Milwaukee"(1946) and you get the impression it was like going out to the Opera. In those days, it seemed to me that most people did try to arrive when the movie started, but punctuality wasn't a must. People rarely seemed to enter during the last half-hour or so, preferring to wait until the second feature started (double bills were the norm all across the country, except for the Very Big Deal movies, and then mostly in the largest cities. Except for that, some people simply bought their tickets and went in when they arrived at the theater. A VERY common phrase used by moviegoers in those days was "this is where we came in." Leonard Maltin had an article about that very phrase in either his online or on paper magazines. As I say, most tried to arrive before the movie started, but a few people entering or leaving during the movie was so common the other audience members rarely found this an annoyance, except on a scene-by-scene basis--that is, it was annoying when someone entered as a gunfight, car chase or musical number was in progress, that sort of thing. Sometimes ushers would politely hold newcomers back until a less engrossing moment came along. And yes, if you wanted to, you could sit through the movies more than once; I did that on occasion--I suppose many people did. I believe I read an interview with Martin Scorsese in which he said he sometimes sat through movies three times. In a big city, or in smaller theaters on weekends, this was relatively easy to do; as davlghry points out, ushers didn't clear the house. I think the first time I saw that happen may have been with PSYCHO. The timing of other events took precendence over starting times of movies. When Richard North and I drove 35 miles (for Richard it was more like 50 miles) down to west of Coos Bay to see ATTACK OF THE CRAB MONSTERS and NOT OF THIS EARTH, we entered when Mr. Johnson and the parking lot attendant (wasn't that what he was?) are exchanging telepathic messages. When my mom dropped me off at the Port Theater in North Bend one Saturday (while she went shopping), I entered WAR OF THE COLOSSAL BEAST during one of the flashbacks featuring footage from AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN. I went out to complain--I thought AIP had simply retitled the earlier movie--and was told it was "a sequel or something." But that kind of thing wasn't uncommon for the majority of moviegoers in the 1950s, and I presume the 1930s and 40s as well, though it was for me, as I was usually pretty diligent about enterting the theater at the starting time of one of the features. Last Edited By: Bill Warren Sep 2 10 12:47 AM. Edited 1 times.
CapnDunsel		#14	[-]
Sep 2 10 12:59 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I grew up in a Chicago suburb and remember going to the local movie house in the late 50's and early 60's. The theatre played double features, there was a short break in between and people came and went as they pleased. They also smoked. No usher ever came in after a feature and cleared the house. You simply sat and waited for the second feature or went out for refreshments or left. The next show started with a newsreel, a cartoon and coming attractions. Like a lot of old theaters, there was a luminous clock just left of the screen. I assume it was there to remind people if they needed to leave for another appointment or something. Sort of a watering hole for entertainment and socializing - a far cry from streaming video into your home. I think in "I wake up screaming"(1941) and in "Midnight Cowboy"(1969), all-night movie theaters are depicted as commonplace. Back in the 1970-80s, bus stations (some were open all night) had chairs with little pay-TV's attached. And speaking of "Midnight Cowboy," a character mentions Gary Cooper is a good looking guy except for the fact that he's dead...Getting back to the start of this thread. Last Edited By: CapnDunsel Sep 2 10 1:05 AM. Edited 2 times.
CapnDunsel		#15	[-]
Sep 2 10 1:20 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Bill and davlghry, thanks for sharing those memories and observations. So double-bills were common for decades, and not a reaction to TV or busy (or not so busy) lifestyles? Were there non-economic motives for movie theaters to stay open so much? Like for the prestige of being a popular place and/or providing a service? Or were many owned by a chain (or movie companies), and simply followed orders from the head office?
Monsterpal		#16	[-]
Sep 5 10 11:12 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I remember a homeless man sleeping in a movie theater once when I was a kid. I guess he cadged enough change to get indoors on a cold day and the management just let him sleep there until closing time out of kindness. Sometimes he'd snore during a quiet scene and kids would laugh, but otherwise he didn't bother anybody.
Rick		#17	[-]
Sep 5 10 11:43 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	In my teens I discovered a little hole-in-the-wall theatre in downtown Louisville called the Rodeo. Double-features every day, changing, if I recall correctly, three times a week. Even at that late date ('66-'68) admission was a quarter (I think it went up to 50 cents after a while). I saw lots of great stuff there from ATOM AGE VAMPIRE to HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL to MOTHRA to BLACK SABBATH. I went many times and was delighted to see a lot of stuff I otherwise would never have seen in a theatre. But there's no doubt that the main purpose of the place was to provide a warm, cheap place to sleep for folks -- for men -- who were too drunk or homeless or otherwise lost to be elsewhere. The few who were awake were usually smoking, often drinking, but, thankfully, not talking. The loudest noises they made, as MP remembered, was the occasional snoring. I believe the place was open 24 hours, but I only went in the afternoons. Didn't seem safe to be there at night. It actually was a pretty grim, grimy, sad place, and yet I remember it very fondly.
TomWeaver999		#18	[-]
Sep 6 10 5:46 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Showing up at a theater at any point in a movie and walking in and sitting down is one of the stupidest things I ever heard of. I wonder if these same people bought novels and started reading on page 344.
rockinrichard		#19	[-]
Sep 6 10 10:24 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I was usually the last person in the theater after a film ended, because I was strange enough to want to read the end credits.
Bill Warren		#20	[-]
Sep 6 10 1:01 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I see--the entire moviegoing population was stupid stupid stupid. Back then, sooner or later, everyone who went to movies came in as the movie was running, then stayed through that feature again until "this is where we came in." These folks had alloted the time to see the movie, but for reasons of their own--distance, other things to do, etc.--were unable to arrive in the fifteen minutes or so block of time between one feature and the other. So they should sit there in their cars, twiddling their thumbs, waiting for the precise moment when they could go into the theater. Riiiight.
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