Storm Fear *** (1955, Cornel Wilde, Dan Duryea, Jean Wallace, Lee Grant, Steven Hill) – Classic Movie Review 3,546

Cornel Wilde’s low-budget 1955 black and white film noir thriller Storm Fear is mean and moody. The screenplay is by double Oscar-winning script-writer Horton Foote.

Cornel Wilde, Lee Grant and Steven Hill star in the low-budget 1955 black and white film noir thriller Storm Fear as a gang of bank robbing crooks who hide out in the New England mountains. Soon, tensions mount, the cops are on their trail and there is a storm on its way.

They hove up at the mountain retreat house of the bullet-injured Charlie Blake (Wilde)’s brother Fred (Dan Duryea) and his wife Elizabeth (Jean Wallace), who are not exactly thrilled at their arrival. Charlie has previously had an affair with Elizabeth, whose son David (David Stollery) is actually their child. However, Charlie rekindles his romance with Elizabeth and reconnects with David.

Director Wilde’s low-budget 1955 black and white film noir thriller is mean and moody enough, though perhaps unfortunately not quite magnificent enough, with a downbeat climax that fails to appeal fully. However, the screenplay is well honed by double Oscar-winning script-writer Horton Foote, the actors give eye-catching performances, especially Duryea, and director-star Wilde handles the film with some flair, and attention to detail and tension. Joseph LaShelle’s cinematography and Elmer Bernstein’s score are other advantages. It runs a swift-moving 88 minutes.

It is Wilde’s feature directorial debut after an episode of TV’s General Electric Theatre. He had set up his own company Theodora Productions with his wife Jean Wallace. Their first film together was Joseph H Lewis’s classic 1955 B-movie film noir thriller The Big Combo and this was to be their second.

Also in the cast are Dennis Weaver and Keith Britton.

The film is based on a novel by Clinton Seeley, told in the first person of 12-year old Davie, and published in November 1954. Wilde bought the film rights in December 1954 and hired Horton Foote in January 1955.

Wilde recalled: ‘The weather was a big problem and we had to adjust our schedules to it, jumping from scenes requiring bright sunlight to moody stuff as the sun played hide and seek with the clouds.’ Filming in Sun Valley was brought forward 10 days to 5 April 1955 to capture the snow-topped mountains.

Lee Grant (born Lyova Haskell Rosenthal).

Wilde cast Lee Grant (born Lyova Haskell Rosenthal in New York City on 31 October 1925) even though she had been blacklisted for refusing to testify against her screen-writer husband at the House Un-American Activities Committee. Storm Fear was her first movie role since her début in Detective Story (1951) for which she won an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress as well as the Best Actress Award at the 1952 Cannes Film Festival.

Kirk Douglas, who starred with her in Detective Story, recalled that blacklisted director Edward Dmytryk had named her husband at the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC): ‘Lee was only a kid, a beautiful young girl with extraordinary talent and a big future. She was so good that she earned a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her very first film role. But because Eddie Dmytryk named her husband, she was blacklisted before her film career even had a chance to begin. Of course, she refused to testify about the man to whom she was married, and it took years before anyone would hire her for another picture.’

The cast are Cornel Wilde as Charlie Blake, Jean Wallace as Elizabeth Blake, Dan Duryea as Fred Blake, Lee Grant as Edna Rogers, David Stollery as David Blake, Dennis Weaver as Hank, Steven Hill as Benjie, and Keith Britton.

Lee Grant, Best Supporting Actress Academy Award winner for Shampoo (1975), celebrated her 90th birthday on October 31 2015.

Films directed by Cornel Wilde: Storm Fear (1955), The Devil’s Hairpin (1957), Maracaibo (1958), Lancelot and Guinevere (1963), The Naked Prey (1965), Beach Red (1967), No Blade of Grass (1970), and Sharks’ Treasure (1975).

Horton Foote (March 14, 1916 – March 4, 2009) received Academy Awards for his screenplay for the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird and his original screenplay for Tender Mercies (1983). His screenplay for The Trip to Bountiful (1985) received an Academy Award nomination. He adapted Faulkner’s short story Tomorrow as a 1972 film starring Robert Duvall. Lillian Hellman adapted his play and novel for the 1966 film The Chase, with Marlon Brando, Jane Fonda and Robert Redford. He won the 1995 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for The Young Man From Atlanta.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3,546

Link to Derek Winnert’s home page for more reviews: http://derekwinnert.com/