Something Wild

1961

1h 52m

Drama

List

50%

8 Reviews

Tomatometer

42%

250+ Ratings

Audience Score

When college girl Mary Ann Robinson (Carroll Baker) is attacked and raped, her world is shattered. Unable to carry on a normal routine with her critical mother, Mary Ann takes a room in a New York City hovel and accepts a job at a dime store as she struggles to come to grips with her ordeal. Sinking into isolation, she attempts suicide and is saved by a concerned bystander, lonely auto mechanic Mike (Ralph Meeker). Mary Ann moves in with Mike but soon questions his motives for wanting to help.

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delysid d

a movie that makes you say WHAT??

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

03/10/22

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jim b

WORST MOVIE EVER. *EVER*! Stockholm Syndrome movie. Rape victim runs away then is held hostage by a man who saves her from possibly drowning herself. I won't go further. This has the *single worst* ending in movie history.

Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars

03/30/23

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Audience Member

A Stockholm Syndrome love story as odd as that seems. Sixty years has not aged this film well. It starts out as a sympathetic portrait of a young woman who suffers depression and alienation after a brutal rape. A young man rescued her from an attempt at suicide, then locks her up in his apartment - it's his "last chance" and the young lady suffers under the confinement (but is not raped). At last she is set free and her freedom leads her ... back to her captor whom she marries. I, for one, would like to see a feminist retrospective on this film. Johnny C sez check it out from a then and now perspective.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

02/17/23

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Audience Member

Amazingly raw film. Wonderful location filming. Stark and haunting. Carroll Baker and Ralph Meeker both give heartbreaking performances.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

02/12/23

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Audience Member

At least Carroll looked great.

Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars

02/01/23

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Audience Member

Not to be confused with its namesake film of a quarter century later (the 1986 "Something Wild" directed by Jonathan Demme and starring Jeff Daniels, Melanie Griffith, and Ray Liotta), this offbeat indie is directed by Jack Garfein (who also co-wrote the screenplay) and stars his-then wife Carroll Baker as Mary Ann Robinson, a young Bronx-dwelling college student who is raped on her way home from the subway one night. She covers all traces of the crime committed against her from her neurotic mother (Mildred Dunnock) and stepfather (Charles Watts, not The Rolling Stones drummer) and attempts to get on with her life, but is soon overwhelmed by her trauma and drifts away from home and college, renting a room in a shoddy boarding house in Lower Manhattan and working in a five-and-dime store, until the chaos of her life again proves overwhelming and she tries suicide by throwing herself from the Manhattan Bridge; she is prevented from doing so by the enigmatic Mike (Ralph Meeker), an auto mechanic who takes her to live in his basement flat. From there the film becomes a two-person drama in a claustrophobic setting, with the protagonists alternately attracted to and repelled by one another based on their own histories of pain and trauma and suffering. The conclusion of Mary Ann and Mike's story is not conventional and has proved unsatisfying to many critics and viewers, but I find the movie- in which the cacophonous, crowded city itself, with its nonstop noise and off-center visuals is a featured player in the dramatis persona played out by Mike and Mary Ann. Superbly and aptly jarring score by none other than Aaron Copland, perhaps the most prominent American classical composer of the mid-20th century, and a characteristically stunning opening title sequence by the master of cinematic titles himself, Saul Bass. Look for Doris Roberts as one of Mary Ann's snarky co-workers and future-Edith-Bunker Jean Stapleton as a boozy, promiscuous co-boarder at Mary Ann's boarding house. This film is not to be missed.

Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars

02/07/23

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Jack Garfein

Director

Carroll Baker

Mary Ann Robinson

Ralph Meeker

Mike

Mildred Dunnock

Mrs. Gates

Charles Watts

Warren Gates

Jean Stapleton

Shirley Johnson

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Ed Gonzalez

Slant Magazine

An obscure blast from the past, Something Wild is a narrative precursor to Roman Polanski's Repulsion.

Rated: 2.5/4

Jun 17, 2007

Full Review

J. Hoberman

Village Voice

The movie's uneasy blend of symbolism and naturalism might have worked better onstage.

Dec 29, 2006

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Sean Axmaker

Stream on Demand

... a character drama about two damaged people unable to articulate or communicate their feelings to others, which puts the focus on the physical performance: gestures, expressions, body language, the unexpected reaction to situations.

Aug 19, 2023

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Nicholas Bell

IONCINEMA.com

Something Wild lives up to its name, a psychologically ambitious creature unable to conform to the sensibilities of the period in which it was made.

Rated: 4/5

Sep 15, 2020

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J.C. Maçek III

PopMatters

Something Wild ultimately comes off as incomplete and, perhaps even misogynistic and mean-spirited.

Rated: 4/10

May 23, 2017

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James Kendrick

Q Network Film Desk

a daring and provocative look at identity, violence, and the need for human connection

Rated: 3.5/4

Jan 17, 2017

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Synopsis

When college girl Mary Ann Robinson (Carroll Baker) is attacked and raped, her world is shattered. Unable to carry on a normal routine with her critical mother, Mary Ann takes a room in a New York City hovel and accepts a job at a dime store as she struggles to come to grips with her ordeal. Sinking into isolation, she attempts suicide and is saved by a concerned bystander, lonely auto mechanic Mike (Ralph Meeker). Mary Ann moves in with Mike but soon questions his motives for wanting to help.

Director: Jack Garfein
Production Co: Prometheus Enterprises Inc.
Genre: Drama
Original Language: English
Release Date (DVD): Dec 23, 2011
Runtime: 1h 52m