add site
services
publishers
database
health videos
toolbar
stats
live show
health store
more stuff
JOIN/LOGIN
| advertise add site services publishers database health videos
| | about toolbar stats live show health store more stuff JOIN/LOGIN |
For other uses, see Big Heat.
The Big Heat is a 1953 film noir directed by Fritz Lang, starring Glenn Ford, Gloria Grahame, and Lee Marvin. It is about a cop who takes on the crime syndicate that controls his city after the brutal murder of his beloved wife. The film was written by former crime reporter Sydney Boehm based on a serial by William P. McGivern which appeared in the Saturday Evening Post, and was published as a novel in 1952.
[edit] PlotHomicide detective Sergeant Dave Bannion (Glenn Ford) is an honest cop who investigates the death of fellow officer Tom Duncan. It would seem to be an open-and-shut case, suicide brought on by depression. However, Bannion is then contacted by the late cop's mistress, Lucy Chapman (Dorothy Green), who claims that it could not have been suicide. From her, Bannion learns that the Duncans had a second home which would not have been possible on his salary. Bannion visits Mrs Duncan (Jeanette Nolan). He asks for particulars on the second home and she resents the implication of his suspicions. The next day Bannion gets a dressing-down by Lieutenant Ted Wilks (Willis Bouchey) who is under pressure from "upstairs" to close the case. Chapman is later found dead after being tortured and covered with cigarette burns. Bannion sets about investigating her murder even though it is not his case or his jurisdiction. After receiving threatening calls to his home, he confronts Mike Lagana (Alexander Scourby), the local mob boss. It's an open secret that Lagana runs the city, even to the point that he has cops guarding his house while his daughter hosts a party. Lagana resents Bannion's accusations in his own home during such an event: "I've seen some dummies in my time, but you're in a class by yourself." Bannion finds that people are too scared to stand up to the crime syndicate. When warnings to Bannion to leave things alone go unheeded, his car is blown up and his wife (Jocelyn Brando) is killed in the explosion. Feeling that the department will do little to bring the murderers to justice, Bannion resigns the force and sets off on a one-man crusade to get Lagana and his second-in-command Vince Stone (Lee Marvin). When Stone viciously "punishes" a girl in a nightclub — by burning her hand with a cigarette butt — Bannion stands up to him and orders him and his bodyguard out of the joint. This impresses Stone's girlfriend Debby Marsh (Gloria Grahame). She tries to get friendly with Bannion who keeps pointing out that she gets her money from a thief. Marsh states: "I've been rich and I've been poor. Believe me, rich is better." But when she unwittingly reminds him of the time he courted his late wife he sends her packing, to which she retorts: "Well, you're about as romantic as a pair of handcuffs." Marsh was seen with Bannion, and when she returns to Stone's penthouse, Stone accuses her of talking to Bannion about his activities and throws boiling coffee in her face. She is taken to hospital by none other than Police Commissioner Higgins (Howard Wendell) who was playing poker with Stone and his friends at the flat. When Higgins warns that he will have to file a report, Stone reminds him that he pays him to deal with that sort of thing. With her face half-scarred, Marsh returns to Bannion who agrees to put her up for a while. Bannion's enquiries have led him to conclude that a man called Larry hired a mechanic to set the dynamite in the car that killed his wife. Marsh tells him that it is Larry Gordon (Adam Williams), one of Stone's associates. Bannion confronts Gordon and forces him to admit to the bombing of his car. This whole thing has started because Bertha Duncan, widow of the cop who committed suicide, has papers he collected that could expose Stone and Lagana. They were really intended for the DA, but Mrs Duncan has kept them for herself and is collecting blackmail payments from Lagana. Heeding Marsh's entreaties that killing for revenge would make him no better than those who killed his wife, Bannion refrains from killing Gordon, instead spreading the word that he talked. Gordon is seized and murdered by Stone's men before he can make his escape. Bannion now confronts Mrs Duncan, accusing her of betraying Chapman to her death and of protecting "Lagana and Stone for the sake of a soft plush life", but then cops sent by Lagana make him leave. Stone decides to try and kidnap Bannion's little daughter Joyce (Linda Bennett) who is staying with her aunt and uncle with a police guard outside their flat. When the guard suddenly leaves, the uncle calls in a few army buddies to take over. Satisfied that she is in good hands, Bannion sets off to deal with Stone. On the way he meets Lieutenant Wilks, who is now prepared to make a stand against the mob, admitting that, in spite of his own wife's pressure over what will happen to his pension, "It's the first time in years I've breathed good clean air." Debbie Marsh goes to meet Mrs Duncan. Noticing that they are wearing the same expensive coats, she remarks that they are both "sisters under the mink" and the fact that they have benefited from their association with gangsters. She then kills Mrs Duncan, thus starting the process that will see Tom Duncan's evidence surface and bring about Stone and Lagana's downfall. When Stone returns to his penthouse, Marsh throws boiling coffee over him just as he had done to her. Stone shoots Marsh and after a short gun battle is captured by Bannion who had followed him to the flat. As Marsh lies dying, Bannion describes his late wife to her in terms of their relationship rather than the physical "police description" he gave earlier: "You and Katie would have gotten along fine," he tells her. Stone is arrested for Marsh's murder. When Duncan's evidence is made public Lagana and Commissioner Higgins are indicted. Bannion returns to his job at Homicide. [edit] Cast
[edit] Critical reactionThe New York Times and Variety both gave The Big Heat very positive reviews. Bosley Crowther of the Times described Glenn Ford "as its taut, relentless star" and praises Lang for bringing "forth a hot one with a sting."[1] Variety characterized Lang's direction as "tense" and "forceful."[2] Today The Big Heat is considered a classic: critic Roger Ebert lists the film among his category of "Great Movies"; he praises the film's supporting actors.[3] Writer David M. Meyer states that the film never overcomes the basic repugnance of its hero, but notes that some parts of the film, though violent, are better than the film as a whole. "Best known is Gloria Grahame's disfigurement at the hands of über-thug Lee Marvin, who flings hot coffee into her face."[4] According to film critic Grant Tracey, the film turns the role of the femme fatale on its head: "Whereas many noirs contain the tradition of the femme-fatale, the deadly spiderwoman who destroys her man and his family and career, The Big Heat inverts this narrative paradigm, making Ford [Det. Bannion] the indirect agent of fatal destruction. All four women he meets—from clip joint singer, Lucy Chapman to gun moll Debby—are destroyed."[5] Bannion's one-man campaign against a major criminal organization in which he discards the rules in order to get justice done presages many action movies of later years starring Clint Eastwood, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mel Gibson and others. One major difference is that Glenn Ford's character does not actually kill anyone. The various deaths are not directly caused by him: he does not kill his wife's murderer, simply spreads rumors that lead to it. At the end of the story the main villains are still alive to stand trial. [edit] References
[edit] External links
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ↑ top of page ↑ | about thumbshots |
