Stometer Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Onlinewsma Absolutely Brilliant!

Verity Robins Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

Raymond Sierra The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Sergeant_Tibbs Even if I've liked (Rebel Without A Cause) or disliked (In A Lonely Place, unfortunately) a Nicholas Ray film, there's no denying that they are rich experiences which make the most out of their material. Even though Bigger Than Life is clearly of its time it doesn't feel dated at all. In fact, it was recommended to me for the similarities in the protagonist and plot of Breaking Bad. What took me off guard at first with the film is the quick pacing, it made it extremely engaging, surpassing Rebel actually. The highlight is the rich cinematography. It can be a little on-the- nose with its symbolism, but it doesn't overshadow its purpose. However, the ending does leave on a little bit of a sour and unbelievable note, although the premise of the film requires a little suspension of belief anyway. Interesting premise well executed. I should check out more Ray, especially Johnny Guitar.8/10

evanston_dad How is it that I'd never heard of this movie before? "Bigger Than Life" is a dream come true for those movie fans (I count myself among them) who love the decade of the 1950s for its total cinematic schizophrenia. I can't think of another decade that created whole omnibuses of films more strongly opposed to one another. It seems that half of the filmmakers of the 50s were churning out earnest Technicolor pap that tried to sell the American public a version of the 50s that simply didn't exist yet which everyone so desperately wanted to believe did, while the other half were making movies about everything that was wrong with the very version of America the other half was clinging to. If you're a fan of subtext in films, and especially interested in seeing how filmmakers could work within the conventions of a genre while turning those conventions against themselves, the 50s are your decade. And for the ultimate master of subtext, look no further than Nicholas Ray.There isn't a Ray film I've seen that isn't dripping in subtext, socio-political, sexual, gender-based, you name it. "Bigger Than Life" stars a towering James Mason as a family man who's turned into a literal monster when he becomes addicted to a drug that helps keep a life-threatening medical problem at bay. The film goes to some jaw-dropping places, especially toward the end, as Mason's character evolves from protector to worst nightmare and the picture-perfect family life depicted in the earlier parts of the film dissolve before our very eyes. However, Ray's point all along is that that picture-perfect family never really existed in the first place, and the drug on which Mason gets hooked brings out the "id" in him and the family dynamic that's been lurking there all along.Ray was the rare director who could make the saturated Technicolor and massive Cinemascope aspect ratios of 1950s filmmaking work to his advantage and serve his artistic purposes, rather than simply be used to photograph pretty gowns and landscapes. In fact, despite its Cinemascope grandeur, "Bigger Than Life" is all about cramped interiors -- offices, bedrooms, one's own feverish mind -- and the skeletons in the closets, real and imagined, that are hiding there.Grade: A

marymorrissey this is a very fun movie, especially to see with a responsive crowd. well meaning but overheated with casting that adds to the silliness resulting in a campy drama. (and for this I compare it to Mildred P, the films aren't terribly similar in any detail. this story is far simpler)there is also a very nice score by David Raksin* who seems to have been breathing the same "Atmostpheres" as Györgi Ligeti in a tech-y EKG sequence.* whose name I always thought was "Raskin" and it seems to me that William Winant, who knew or studied with DR pronounced it "Raskin" as well, but then on NPR I kept hearing "Raksin" and then came here to check, as the NPR guide also listed the composer's name as "Raksin"(I only mention this because I didn't have enough lines to publish the review.)

secondtake Bigger than Life (1956)Tightly made, vividly acted film about a contemporary crisis--the use and abuse of a new "miracle" drug. Watching James Mason suffer, and then make other people suffer, and then face the final bells of his life, is half the movie. He's such a uniquely subtle and powerful actor (at the same time), always filled with poise and a whiff of kindly diffidence. In a way, this is a precursor to the recent movie idea in "Limitless," where a drug makes you "bigger than life," though this is no fantasy. The drug here is cortisone, ingested orally. It had been understood as a natural (adrenal gland) steroid hormone and was manufactured (by Merck) and on the market by around 1950. And by 1956 when this movie came out it was considered a new kind of penicillin, but rather than just be an antibiotic, it seemed to just make you stronger against all kinds of ailments, especially those that involved swelling of some kind.Director Nicholas Ray does his usual wonders with interpersonal drama and makes this quite believable, as well as dramatic, and Joe MacDonald does his usual wonders with the camera-work. The writing, too, is crisp and believable (both Ray and Mason helped with the screenplay). In all, it's a top shelf production and a great story.But it fails somehow to be a great film, and I think the main reason is the hook to the plot, about the wonder drug, is a little too neatly packaged, with a few scenes that are almost like public service announcements. We sort of know before we are "supposed" to know that it's going to go bad--the clues go beyond foreshadowing--and so when we find out we are right, the edge is off of the narrative. Only the very end is left hanging, though you figure, with Merck keeping an eye on things, that events really can't go too wrong. According to Wikipedia, the American response at the time was shock and the movie did poorly (I guess because it looked like an attack on the nuclear family, such was the 1950s). But the critics loved it then and like it now. A movie this well made is still a thrill to watch for all the small things--Walter Matthau in a caricatured side role as the good Uncle, the psychological effects as manifest in Mason, and even the glimpse into the attitude toward medicine at the time. I don't think it's a typical reaction to cortisone, however (from what I've read)--this is a particular case where some inherent manic-depression is triggered, and exaggerated. It would be interesting to see this re-calibrated and filmed again in modern times, but with the subtlety here, the destruction of an ordinary family without shameless excess.