Evengyny Thanks for the memories!

VeteranLight I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Chirphymium It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Lollivan It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Martin Bradley Lewis Allen's "Suddenly" is no masterpiece but it's a great little B-Movie. It's about an assassination attempt on the life of the US president during a stopover in a small Californian town. It was written by Richard Sale and it's a nice, tight little suspenser. Part of the appeal is that the assassin is none other than Frank Sinatra, (very good, a year after he won the Oscar for "From Here to Eternity"). The good guy is Sterling Hayden, more often cast as the villain. He's the town sheriff and the last thing he needs is for the president to be killed in his town. A lot of it takes place in the house Sinatra and his fellow assassins hole up in and which, coincidentally, is also the home of Hayden's love interest, Nancy Gates, and her father-in-law James Gleason, himself a former secret service agent. There are holes in the plot but they are easily overlooked. This is one film that deserves its reputation.

atlasmb In a town called Suddenly--which might pass for any small Midwestern town--little of note happens. But the normally quiet Mayberry gets more than its share of action and attention on this Saturday.The President of the U.S. is scheduled to arrive via train, so the Secret Service get there first to reconnoiter the train station and the properties that overlook it.It would be a shame to reveal too many details, but some locals get involved in a suspenseful showdown that might easily serve as the basis for a Hitchcock film.I would not call this film noir, but it is filmed in B&W. It is a psychological drama which delves into post-war issues.Frank Sinatra turns in a rare performance as the villain and he's rather good at it. Nancy Gates plays a widow who inadvertently enters the cross-hairs of the villain's plan. She delivers a strong performance as a mother whose primary motivation for living is the protection of her young son.Various political messages can be read into the plot. No matter which subtext one advocates, this is a story about courage. Maternal courage. Patriotic courage. And the behaviors that are often mistaken for being courageous.

movie reviews This is a painful dog to sit through. There is the 50s corny crap and an incredibly stupid script that is more talky than any French movie.Sinatra must be the stupidest assassin alive in this; any ordinary one would have simply killed everyone in the house or tied them up and gagged them!!....no, he engages in constant blather with the hostages. The hostages cleverly play on Sinatra's vanities and psychology to get him to become unglued.You can see the ho hum plot tricks a mile away. The gun in the top drawer of a dresser that looks like the toy gun the kid has etc....The actor playing the kid immediately got on my nerves with in the first 2 minutes of the show and half way through the film I began to hope all the hostages would be shot--starting with him and the old man. Unfortunately only the TV repair man got it.The denouement was actually funny....when the TV repairman has wired the table with 4,000 volts and the helper of Sinatra gets electrocuted and starts firing the gun like a machine gun from electric shocks to his convulsing fingers.As another reviewer stated garbage like this ages badly....since you not only have garbage but the 50s corny blather with it.DO NOT RENT DO NOT WATCH unless you want to be tortured for an hour and 15 minutes (it's only good point it is short).

arfdawg-1 The tranquility of a small town is marred only by sheriff Tod Shaw's unsuccessful courtship of widow Ellen Benson, a pacifist who can't abide guns and those who use them. But violence descends on Ellen's household willy-nilly when the U.S. President passes through town.And a slightly psycho hired assassin John Baron finds the Benson home ideal for an ambush. It's a pretty tight movie that keeps your interest.In a way it foreshadows the Kennedy assassination.The movie also wouldn't find funding today.Too many cray no gun activists who don't get the concept of guns saving lives.Sinatra was short. And thin.He's decent in the movie, but as as good as some say.