Customer Reviews

Pressure Point [VHS]

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4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

"Pressure Point" is a thinking person's film, dealing with the topic of a seditious, neo-Nazi (Darin) during World War II, and the prison psyciatrist (Portier)whose job it is to determine whether the young man is sane or insane. While Portier gives an excellent, understated performance, it is Bobby Darin's film from start to finish. The young Darin (only 25 when this film was made) portrays the unbalanced, hateful neo-Nazi with a realism that is frightening. He swings from moody, pensive philosophizing to acerbic, irascible mania in the drop of a hat, without skipping a beat. At the same time, he evokes sympathy from the viewer who comes to realize that the deranged prisoner was brought up in a psychopathic family. An incredible, thought-provoking performance by a legendary talent. No wonder that Darin won the Cannes Film Festival and Golden Globe Awards as Best Actor for this performance. It was a real injustice that he was not nominated for an Academy Award. It was known in Hollywood circles that many critics who praised Darin's performance refused to push for his nomination because they were turned-off by his allegedly arrogant demeanor. Sadly, Darin's awareness of his imminent mortality instilled in him a fierce desire to succeed before his time ran out. This competitiveness was erroneously interpreted by many as "arrogance". It would take Darin another great performance the following year (1963) in "Captain Newman, M.D." for him to garner an Academy Award nomination. In this film Darin gives an equally impressive performance as a shell-shocked WWII fighter pilot. Besides being a legendary vocalist and the highest-paid Cabaret performer in the history of Las Vegas at the time of his death (Sinatra was second), Darin was also a superb actor who could do drama and comedy with equal ease. Darin's career was limited and his life was cut short by heart disease. One can only guess how far he would have gone had he not required oxogen after every performance, as well as a series of open heart surgeries. In fact, he died on the operating table on December 20, 1973 at the age of 37. A truly great talent perished on that day.

This movie should be required viewing. It is timeless. The doctor and patient talk about the overthrow of the government and hate groups. Two subjects still with us today. Maybe, just maybe, if someone had seen this they would have recognized the signs and 169 people would not have died in my city. Bobby Darin was so good in this role he should have received an Oscar.

"Pressure Point" is a deeply disturbing and compelling study of hate and the forces that breed it. The setting is World War II America. The protagonists are Sidney Poitier, who gives a top-notch performance as a prison psychiatrist, and Bobby Darin, who gives an equally top-notch performance as a hatemongering American Nazi.

Darin's Nazi is in jail for sedition; this is wartime, and he has been writing anti-Government, pro-Fascist tracts. Sidney Poitier's prison psychiatrist is assigned to work with Darin to determine if Darin is legally sane or insane. Therein sets the stage for a battle of wits and wills between the two.

Director Stanley Kramer masterfully sets up the tension. Here we have an avowed Nazi, hater of blacks, Jews, and anyone else that doesn't fit the bill as a "white Christian American" (Darin's words in the film), being treated by an African-American psychiatrist who has to get to the root of Darin's hateful feelings towards everything and everybody.

I won't be a spoiler by giving away what happens; suffice it to say that Kramer doesn't fall into the trap of making everything nice and neat and...no pun intended, black and white. One finds oneself identifying with Poitier's character as he feels a combination of revulsion towards, and sympathy for, Darin's Nazi. And Darin's Nazi is not a one-dimensional character...a great deal of mind-shattering trauma goes into making him what he is. But then, the film asks, does that excuse him? Should he be set free because his bigotry is "not really his fault," but rather the fault of the environment that shaped him? Poitier struggles with this question, as will the viewer.

And the frequently overlooked gem of this film is Darin's performance. He gives a performance that is incredibly powerful. It gets under your skin. When he screams in terror with nightmares of his past, he really evokes your sympathy, despite his hateful views...and when he spews his racial and religious epithets, he really makes you hate him and want to lock him up and throw the key away. No wonder Darin received the Cannes Film Festival Award for this performance. Anyone who is familiar with Darin's talent as a singer will no doubt be interested in his incredible range as an actor.

A must-see. And this should be released to DVD!

Typical of Stanley Kramer productions, "Pressure Point" is a fairly explosive "message" movie, and a rare one in that it does not condescend to its audience by sending the combative protagonists on their merry way at the conclusion to live in peace and harmony. Sidney Poitier is excellent as the prison psychiatrist challenged by a disturbed Nazi symphatizer played by singer Bobby Darin. It is Darin, however, who is most impressive, not only for his dynamic yet subtle performance, but for his williness to accept the role of such a bigoted, unappealing character at a time when he was still a "teen idol" married to Sandra Dee. The direction by Hubert Cornfield, the cinematography, and music are all first-rate.

Two legends--Sidney Poitier and Bobby Darin--face off in a thrilling and disturbing psycho-drama. Poitier plays an Army psychiatrist locked in a mental duel with his charge, a manipulative Nazi sympathizer played by Darin. As the two characters appear to build a mutual trust, Darin exploits that trust to convince Poitier's supervisors of Darin's sanity in hopes of gaining release. Poitier, however, sees through Darin's showmanship, realizing the danger that the patient still poses.

This film marks a great opportunity to observe Bobby Darin's acting talents. While Sidney Poiter performs excellently, as we would expect, those familiar only with Darin's music should see this film to appreciate more fully the man's broad range of abilities.

This is a truly excellent & powerful film that portrays the tense therapeutic relationship between a prison psychiatrist (Poitier) and a self-exalted American Nazi upstart (Darrin). Although incarcerated for sedition, Darrin's real imprisonment is within his own mind and persecutory complexes. and he suffers agonizing panic attacks, which results in his having to submit to therapy at the hands of someone he considers his inferior. He learns that his terrors are really the eruption of PTSD symptoms, and that his whole enterprise of hatred is a compensatory mask covering his deeper feelings of rage and inferioriy. Does this knowledge change him, however? To answer that question, you'll need--and want--to see the entire film and decide for yourself.

At the same time, this couch-opera is also an allegory about race relations, and perhaps about the spiritual battle between the forces of light/truth and darkness/deception--which is NOT protrayed lining up as Caucasian = light/truth and Black = darkness/deception, quite the opposite--even if one wants to be so literal about it. This film never takes the simple way out--it confronts unsavory hatred & bigotry, tackles some very subtle points about the process of psychotherapy, and portrays in painful detail the genesis (via graphic, bizarre parental abuse/neglect/cruelty) of a young man with an Antisocial Personality Disorder. Rather ambitious, I'd say!!

There are some pretty far-out special effects in this film, and even though perhaps crude by today's standards, they are still gripping and effective. As Darrin reluctantly unfolds his story in flashbacks, there are some excellent supporting performances by the actors portraying the parents and the Darrin-as-a-youngster character. Also, look for a young, earnest, sincerely befuddled, and non-trenchcoated Peter Falk in the framing story as a novice psychiatrist confessing his professional failures to the older, more experienced Poitier as his supervisor.

While I have not heard the commentary on the DVD, I can verify one other reviewer's surmise about director Kornfeld having medical problems and speaking through an electronic voice box. In the early 90's I saw Kornfeld speak at a showing of this film and 'Night of the Following Day' and while his remarks were hard to decipher, one could not help but admire his courage and erudition that shown through his handicap. He clearly had to struggle to make these dark, non-traditional films HIS way, and some pretty choice talent was happy to go along with him.

For clinical background contemporary to the making of this film, one might read texts such as 'The Authoritarian Personality' (Adorno, et.al.), Lindner's 'Fifty-Minute Hour' or perhaps John Bowlby's 'Forty-Four Juvenile Thieves' or Aichorn's 'Wayward Youth'. This was the heyday of psychoanalysis in the US, and there are really no punches pulled between the two stars as far as the therapeutic part of the film. Part of the film's achievement is that it closely follows clinical theory while remaining a piece of riveting, vital, and still-relevant entertainment. I think any thoughtful viewer will be quite enthralled with this hidden gem.

Everyone associated with this movie was brave: Stanley Kramer the producer, Cornfeld the Director, and both stars: Poitier and Darin. I admire the effort and the finished product. The subject matter seems fresh and topical, sadly..., tho' the director's style seems a bit over the top.* And, as others have noted the director should NOT have done the commentary when he could hardly talk.

As also noted by almost every reviewer Bobby Darin was fantastic. Yeah, he really could act. Big time. And I think if he was born nowdays, after Dustin Hoffman and Al Pacino showed that men who look like normal people could become stars, he'd have been a major motion picture star. But he didn't look the part in the early 60's so he had to content himself with being a singing superstar.

Bobby's performance here was subdued yet powerful. Just stunning. He makes his character impossible to dismiss, and therefore all the more thought provoking and, as The Doctor notes, all the more terrifying.

Stanley Kramer wisely opted not to wrap this movie in a happy Hollywood bow, overruling the director by reshooting the ending (with Darin's approval and cooperation) to keep it bleak and realistic. It was a gutsy thing to do and probably lost it a lot of fans and ticket sales, but certainly earned my respect (for what that's worth).

*Spoiler Footnote:

Tho', as a cinematographer the director did have an eye for a good shot, like the one where a (fore)shadow from a window blind string hangs by The Patient/Darin like a noose as he's in a counciling session with The Doctor....

I saw this film in the 1970s and was totally drawn into the psycho-drama of its storyline. A recent viewing took nothing away from its strange power. Bobby Darin's excellent performance gives evidence to the unrealized potential of a long movie career. In my recent viewing, Darin's character reminded me of Lee Harvey Oswald. "Pressure Point" is told in a very unsensational manner which adds to its power. This manner lends added potency to the film's very disturbing bar scene, where Darin's character and a buddy matter-of-factly humiliate a woman. "Pressure Point" is a very successful film about a very disturbed mind.

Very interesting movie focusing on mental health issues and how racism comes into it. I Like Sydney Poitier very much but initially purchased same for the Bobby Darin factor. All performances were spot on!

this was one of the early starts in the buddy,buddy type of film. Sidney Poitier is one of the Greatest Actors Ever. he truly does a Great Job in this film as does Bobby Darin. the film has alot of complexity's going on. Darin's negative/hateful vibe mixed with Poitier's straight forward presentation is a interesting mix that doesn't really pick up until a good hour into the film. this film deals with Race, Sex&class. Darin's sidewalk business is interesting with the Young Lady He attracts. when he is telling Poitier his life story that is really intense.but i do feel that the film follows the blue print of what Poitier&Tony Curtis did in 'The Definat ones". seeing Peter Faulk pre "columbo" is a real eye opener as well.