Customer Reviews

Sudden Fear

5 star:		(36)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This flawless piece of 1950's film noir is only undone by how badly it has been transposed onto DVD. Such a treasure should have been fully restored and digitally transferred yet it seems to have been hurriedly recorded directly from the grainy VHS original and the result is a fine film that just doesn't look right.
That said if you're a lover of great film noir, a fan of Joan Crawford or simply nostalgia itself don't miss the chance to see and own this gem of a movie. Joan was one hard-working and dedicated performer who never 'slummed it' as she used to put it. Forget about all that Mommie Dearest drivel and enjoy the greatest female star of all time's finest hour!

This movie is one of Joan's best films. She made it in the 50's during a slow time in her career after "Mildred Pierce". This was sort of Joan's come-back picture of the 50's. And boy did Joan know how to come back with a vengeance!

Joan plays Myra Hudson (I wonder if she's related to Blanche Hudson?) a successful (and rich) playwright. Myra is re-introduced (she recently fired Lester as lead-actor from her previous Broadway play) to Lester Blaine (played by the very handsome Jack Palance) on a train trip back to her home, from NY.

Myra and Jack soon fall in love and quickly marry. Their marriage seems perfect. Joan's character is an older, successful, beautiful, and highly intelligent women. And Lester wasn't at all intimidated Myra's successes.

...In fact Lester welcomes her success and her money. He soon meets up with his former flame, Irene Neves (played by Gloria Grahame). Irene and Lester plot to murder Myra so they can run away with all of her money.

Myra inadvertently learns of their deceitful plot and thus the title "Sudden Fear" is born! It's now a race against time to see if Myra can sidestep the murder plot.

Joan is absolutely devastatingly beautiful in this picture, and she had such a graceful and elegant presence that always took center stage in this picture. This movie is a must-see for any Joan Crawford fan. I have seen all of her movies and this is right up there with the very best films she made during the 30's & 40's.

This is a first-class thriller based on the novel by Edna Sherry of an affluent playwright who discovers her new husband is planning to kill her. You see, she done him wrong at an earlier date. Now it's retribution time. But who is outdoing whom? Twists abound. Joan Crawford (Oscar nominated) and Jack Palance (his first Oscar nomination) are excellent. The cast also includes Gloria Grahame, Bruce Bennett, Virginia Huston and Touch (Mike) Connors. The effective Black and White cinematography is by Charles Lang (also Oscar nominated). This film also boasts one of Elmer Bernstein's earliest scores. Bernstein has been a leading writer of film scores since the mid-1950s, when his work on THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM (1955) and THE TEN COMMANDMENTS (1956) elevated him into the front rank of Hollywood composers. His score for THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1960) made him immortal and launched him into a string of successful Western scores through that decade. However, he highly has been noted for his strong use of solo instruments and his facility with the jazz idiom. 1999's WILD, WILD WEST returned him to his beloved Western.

One of the best Joan Crawford movies I have ever seen. It really kept me interested the entire time (but to be honest, I could watch her do the dishes and be pleased!) Myra Hudson overhears her husband, a man she has adored, plot her murder with his mistress. Using her ingenious mind, she plots her own revenge against her unfaithful husband and his mistress. Not one minute of the movie is wasted. She honestly deserved the Academy Award nomination she received. Sit back! Watch the show! Be thoroughly entertained by one of the best!

i love this movie, but when i watched this dvd version of it, i thought for a moment that my tv was playing up.
the sound and image are dreadfull !!!! adjusting sound and vision on tv doesn't help either, i prefer copying a video tape on dvd myself.
that's not all, nowadays we expect a dvd to come with trailers, documentarys etc.. you know some extras to enjoy the whole surrounding that made the movie. here: NOTHING ! nothing at all
compare this with dvd of "mildred pierce" or "straight jacket"
they come with FAB extras.
this dvd version is done with no effort at all.

The movie is a masterpiece of noir with performances that are superb. However, the grainy gooey VHS-like picture quality can only be attributed to a very poor and shoddy transfer by KINO.

Kino Video ought to be embarrassed to release such a poor quality print on DVD. What everyone has said about the transfer is true. It is truly dreadful. There are better copies of this film on VHS. At one point Joan backs away from the camera in horror until her performance is nothing but a fuzzy blur.

Joan Crawford's work deserves better treatment. Hopefully the upcoming Crawford boxed set from Warner Bros will include a better version of this film. Keep your fingers crossed.

That said, I love this movie, even with it's ridiculous ending. That milk! Those eyes! But why does Joan's character cry out in warning at the end of the film only to smirk pridefully as she walks away?

After ending her 1940's Warner Bros. contract due to dissatisfaction with the caliber of the roles she was being offered Joan Crawford moved into the next phase of her illustrious career as an independant performer choosing her own scripts. The first film she chose to undertake was "Sudden Fear" based on a famous novel by Edna Sherry that she very sensibly optioned and saw as a perfect showcase for her by now mature talents as an actress. "Sudden Fear", offered Crawford a terrific and most welcome change of pace from her last largely lacklustre efforts at Warners such as "Goodbye My Fancy", and "This Woman is Dangerous", and could be seen as the next installment in the continual redevelopment and redirection that Joan seemed to undertake careerwise at roughly 10 year intervals and the end result was truly remarable here. Providing Joan with her third well deserved Academy Award Nomination "Sudden Fear", gave her the perfect transitional role into the more assertive characters she undertook through the 1950's and never has she been a more dynamic presence on screen than here where within the course of the action she evolves from potential victim to the one pulling the strings in a complex tale of cat and mouse intrigue and murder. Crawford for once in her mature career has a vehicle worthy of her talents and is tremendously aided by a wonderful script that contains nail biting suspense, melodrama, murder, and interesting characterisations by the supporting cast.

After Joan Crawford's career slump in the late 1940's "Sudden Fear" proved to be a big success at the Box Office and certainly helped pave the way for the many "take charge", characters that became her trademark from then on. Joan Crawford plays Myra Hudson a wealthy and highly successful playwright who as the story begins we find in a dilemma over what she feels is a wrong choice of actor. Feeling that actor Lester Blaine (Jack Palance) is definately not the type of leading man she had in mind she gets him fired from the production. Thinking that that is the end of the situation the play eventually opens to great acclaim however when Myra travels alone on the train to the West Coast for the plays opening there she encounters Lester again on the train and very soon a quite unexpected romance springs up between the former adversaries. After a whirlwind courtship Myra marries Lester and the pair settle down to domestic life in her San Francisco mansion. However Myra's happiness is short lived when by accident she overhears a conversation that was recorded on her copying machine between Lester Blaine and his old girlfriend Irene Neves (Gloria Grahame). Having heard that Myra intends to donate most of her fortune to charities Lester's real intent comes out and is unfortunately captured unbeknownst to him and Irene on Myra's tape. The pair intend to murder Myra before she gives away her fortune with Lester then inheriting her entire fortune after which he will marry the wily Irene. Overcoming her initial panic and heartwrending sense of betrayal by Lester, Myra composes herself and utilizing her playwright's experience and imagination begins to concoct and then put into action an involved and utterly fascinating sequence of events to outwit the would be murderers at their own deadly game. Secretly fearing her devious husband but trying not to show her true feelings Myra continues to play the loving wife while putting her plan into action. Over the course of one evening Myra manages to evade being alone with Lester by pretending to be sick and leaves the house to set in motion her plan to frame Lester and get rid of Irene into the bargain. All does not go exactly as Myra plans however and she has to endure a terrifying pursuit by Lester through the deserted late night streets of San Francisco before a case of mistaken identity and a matching fur coat and scarf makes Lester believe he is just about to run down Myra in his car when in fact he is mistaken. The conclusion sees tragedy of a different kind result but which sees a shaken Myra able to walk away from the situation to a new life without her menacing husband.

There are those that dismiss "Sudden fear", as a "camp", thriller however I feel it has its genuine moments of nail biting suspense that gives it its own corner in the noir thriller genre. Joan Crawford of course dominates the proceedings and her development of her character from trusting middle aged wife into first class schemer equal to her devious husband is a great achievement. Through much of the climax of the story once Myra puts her plan into execution Crawford uses her hugely expressive eyes to great effect which is best illustrated in the scene when she breaks into Gloria Grahame's apartment and is almost caught by her husband and has to hide in the closet. Crawford here is superb in conveying much of her feeling and emotions with very minimal dialogue. It's hard to imagine now but Crawford campaigned heavily for long time costar Clark Gable to play the role of Lester however the younger Jack Palance is perfect for this role ( he was also Oscar nominated here) as the younger man being supported by his wealthy older wife and his very distinctive looks make him an ideal villian in the story. He actually works very well with Joan Crawford despite their reported off screen lack of chemistry. Perrenial bad girl Gloria Grahame is superb in her role of Lester's trouble making old girlfriend out for a larger slice of the pie and prepared to murder for it. Grahame's distinctive speaking voice and hard exterior also add much to the role and she is perfectly deceitful in her scenes where she supposedly is being a new friend to the older Myra while secretly plotting her death. Grahame was so effective in the role that she too was rightly nominated for an Academy Award for her performance. Director David Miller gets well rounded performances from what is essentially a three character study in "Sudden Fear" with the emphasis being on things not really being what they appear to be with any of these three main characters. Miller's direction of Joan Crawford in particular is especially effective and he manages throughout the story to keep her character just on the edge of potential tragedy then in the next instance brings the character full circle so that she is again in control of the stories proceedings. Another of the strong selling points of "Sudden Fear" is its beautiful look with the strong elements of black and white light and shade courtesy of gifted cinematographer Oscar nominated Charles Lang, greatly enhancing the films look and feel and it works superbly in the moments of high tension such as Lester's pursuit of Myra through darkened streets lit only by dim far off lamp lights. Along with the superb lighting the great use of many San Francisco locations for the exterior shots also adds greatly to the films overall look.

"Sudden Fear", is one of my favourite later Joan Crawford vehicles and despite losing the Oscar that year I feel she was most deserving of a second nod after her earlier win in "Mildred Pierce". I can't say that Jack Palance is really a favourite actor of mine but I feel he made ideal casting here and "Sudden Fear", really helped in setting him along in the successful career he had later on. Joan Crawford I always find a terrific performer and too often she seems to be relegated into the "camp", school of acting by critics and public alike. Here she does have a character worthy of her considerable and often underrated talents and she makes the most of it in "Sudden Fear". For all lovers of suspense and nail biting tension "Sudden fear", makes a great addition to any film collection and is an important film to look at when seeking to understand the enduring popularity of movie legend Joan Crawford.

Probably the best of Crawford's 50's vehicles, "Fear" is a very good noir thriller on it's own terms. Director David Miller reportedly fought Crawford to get a realistic performance out of her instead of her just waltzing through the film on star power which was how she usually operated. It's still a Crawford performance but it works. A playwrite/heiress marries an actor she recently fired from one of her plays (Jack Palance). He has a trampy girlfriend on the side (Gloria Grahame) who plots with him to dispose of Myra, the playwrite, and when she finds out--after much terror-emoting---she plots to trip them up. Tension is nicely built up and the performances by all are first-rate. The noir b&w photography is great and on-location shooting in San Francisco gives it a gritty feel. DVD is fine thanks to Kino/Image providing a good, once obscure movie that had nominations for Oscars for Crawford(!) and Palance. At the time, early 50's on, it was said that Crawford was better when she was "menaced in mink". This film is a fine example of that remark. If you're a fan of Crawford, Palance or Grahame don't pass this one up.

Most of the previous reviewers have done an excellent job of outlining the plot details of this fine older film. I have just a few comments to add.

Since DVDs have arrived and video has become a stepchild, we have an excellent opportunity to view old favorites with little impact on the purse. Sometimes a visit to old haunts proves our memory a little faulty or shows the film itself just hasn't aged well.

I loved this movie that first time around and it proved to be just as wonderful in a recent memory lane visit.

Joan Crawford, never one of my favorite actresses, deserved the Oscar for this performance, not just a nomination. It was definitely one of her best. She was able to convey the 'fear' without making one groan at any overacting. She portrayed a bright woman with a fear, a plan, a conscious, and a heart with brilliance and with just the right amount of conviction.

Jack Palance, conversely always a favorite of mine, was his menacing best in this performance without having to overact for a second. The perfect role, played to perfection.

It is always enjoyable to see the work of stars you have forgotten were in favorite old films. Touch (Mike) Conners (TV's Mannix) played Sonny in this film, which didn't rumble back into memory when I watched him each week on TV, but I recognized his name in the opening credits immediately this time. It was very interesting to watch him in retrospect in an early effort (perhaps his first?).

Hollywood in their infinite wisdom seems to have decided that today's audiences are too jaded, too sophisticated, too juvenile, or too something to enjoy a simple thriller in the ilk of 'Sudden Fear', 'Midnight Lace', or other great 'woman-in-distress/woman-with-a-plan films, unless they modern-it-up as in 'Panic Room'. Perhaps they know a thing or two, since they are wealthy and I work a 9-to-5 job and post reviews on a website.

However, speaking for myself, and hopefully for other viewers who still enjoy; a simple plot with character-study, suspense, b/w beauty, and pleasure while viewing, 'Sudden Fear' tells a great story in a suspenseful manner. I still makes for great viewing. Grab yourself a bargain and enjoy!