Listonixio Fresh and Exciting

SparkMore n my opinion it was a great movie with some interesting elements, even though having some plot holes and the ending probably was just too messy and crammed together, but still fun to watch and not your casual movie that is similar to all other ones.

Sameer Callahan It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Lidia Draper Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

JohnHowardReid Copyright 11 March 1954 by 20th Century-Fox Film Corp. New York opening at the Roxy: 12 March 1954. U.S. release: March 1954. U.K. release: August 1954. Australian release: 3 June 1954. Sydney opening at the Regent. 11 reels. 8,359 feet. 93 minutes.SYNOPSIS: When Corporal Johnny Leatherby (Ted Avery) is kidnapped by East Berlin Reds after saying goodnight to his German sweetheart, Kathy Gerhardt (Marianne Koch), trouble really begins. His father, Charles Leatherby (Broderick Crawford), a tycoon from Toledo, Ohio, arrives in Berlin to get his boy back through his powerful political influence. State Department's Fred Hobart (Casey Adams) takes him to see the C.I.C. man working on the case, Colonel Steve Van Dyke (Gregory Peck), in whose office works a U.S. secretary, Ricky Cates (Rita Gam), and M/Sergeant Eddie McColloch (Buddy Ebsen).NOTES: Fox's 7th CinemaScope feature. Jed Harris and Tom Reed were nominated for an Academy Award for Best Motion Picture Story, losing to Philip Yordan's Broken Lance. Producer/screenwriter Nunnally Johnson's debut as director. COMMENT: A dull slice of Cold War propaganda which forces the viewer to sit still while the players ping-pong incessant information dialogue across the CinemaScope screen. Almost no action, despite actual location filming in Berlin. A dull, cliché-ridden, jingoistic and simplistic script, compounded by even duller direction. Peck is dull too. And with lines like he has, who can blame him? But we expected more from Sweden's top actress Anita Bjork, here making her Hollywood movie debut. "Miss Julie" is wasted in a thankless role. The Broderick Crawford character holds out a promise of bombastic fireworks, but even this fizzles out. Miss Gam is likewise not utilized, whilst Peter Van Eyck is made to mark time in an equally small, utterly thankless role. At least Buddy Ebsen is occasionally if rather mechanically amusing, especially given the uninspired and even embarrassingly trite material he's forced to work with. Walter Abel is also cast for comic relief but he performs consistently poorly. Clarke's photography is early CinemaScope grainy, whilst the music is appropriately flag-waving.

john-harry-adams This film is so well crafted that it still can't be faulted - 60 years later. There's not a weak player in the cast - and this must be the film to remember both Peck and Crawford by. Peck by his mastery of the very complex character he has to play, Crawford by the masterful way in which he plays his usual, boorish, stereotype - but then brilliantly wises up to reality. The scenes where Peck and Crawford interact are electric.The plot is very, very complex. Even if you pay full attention to every word and every character nuance, you'll probably still be unprepared for the twists and turns of Nunnally Johnson's subtle and complex story.On this topic, you'll note some reviews criticising the plot for weaknesses. Not So. It is a foolhardy reviewer who goes up against a Nunnally Johnson script! To elaborate I'd have to spoil. Suffice it to say that this story is a wild horse - and you'll have one heck of a job staying on its back as it bucks, twists and cavorts.Worth seeing - has to be seen, some might say - more than once!

RanchoTuVu A film that starts out innocently enough and is shot in Technicolor doesn't hold out much hope of being much of a tough Berlin Cold War drama like Carol Reed and James Mason might have made. Nonetheless, Night People gets pretty engrossing as the story unfolds. What it lacks in shadowy black and white photography and bleak ambiance, it makes up for in a couple of cool plot twists and attention to keeping the story moving. Gregory Peck bites off his lines as if he really means them as the colonel who's trying to get the young corporal who was kidnapped from the US sector after he kisses his German girlfriend good night, to the Russian sector and held for the ransom of an elderly couple, the wife of whom is part of a cool scene in a big beerhall restaurant where Peck is chewing the scenery and German sausages with Broderick Crawford. Crawford's character as a rich Toledo industrialist and well connected father of the kidnapped corporal gets pretty interesting as well as he's bent on throwing as much of his considerable weight around as he can in order to expedite his son's return. But this is international intrigue which requires a lot of preparation while the go-between German ex-mistress of Peck who likes absinthe, gets slowly revealed. Actually, the story is mostly top-notch, though with sergeant Buddy Ebsen's numerous humorous observations and overall casualness, the film is a lot lighter though not necessarily less smarter than some the of black and white classics.

luciferjohnson Maybe not a barn-burner, but definitely worth seeing because of Peck. The movie actually captures quite well the tradecraft and moral dilemmas of counterespionage, and the scenes between Peck and Crawford are first-rate. Berlin locations add to the authenticity of this forgotten little movie.