Audience Member
"Monster from the Ocean Floor" director Wyott Ordung spent his life in Hollywood working on one grade-Z movie after another. For example, he served as the assistant director on a couple of schlocky sagas "Navy Vs. the Night Monsters" (1966) and "The Mummy and the Curse of the Jackals" (1969). He penned the screenplay for the so-bad-it's-good science fiction film "Robot Monster." He wrote the John Ireland backlot Korean War epic "Combat Squad" and the not-quite-as-bad sci-fi flick "Target: Earth." Later, he wrote the Robert Day directed sci-fier "First Man into Space," a generally respectable effort. Surprisingly enough, Ordung (talk about a self-prophesying surname) wrote and directed a real diamond in the rough with his 1956 outing "Walk the Dark Street" that toplines Chuck Connors of TV's "The Rifleman" fame. The psychotic that Connors plays in this film noir entry has little in common with Lucas McCain. Indeed, both carried rifles, but the comparison ends at the hardware. Connors plays big-game safari hunter Frank Garrick in "Walk the Dark Street." With a title like "Walk the Dark Street," you'd expect this breezy low-budget thriller would take place under street lamps, but it doesn't. The action transpires at night and during the day, but the use of 'dark' in the title is more metaphorical than literal. Ordung has cleverly put a fresh spin on the vintage Richard Connell short story "The Most Dangerous Game" that won O. Henry Memorial Prize when Colliers magazine published it back in 1924 and done an efficient job of it. Mind you, this survivalist thriller differs enough from the usual item to stand out on its own with more than a modicum of merit. Some of the things that Ordung tries to get away with probably wouldn't have flown back in the 1950s, but "Walk the Dark Street" doesn't seem too far-fetched by today's standards.
Revenge lies at the heart of "Walk the Dark Street." Frank Garrick dearly loved his good-for-nothing little brother, U.S. Army Sergeant Tommy Garrick (Eddie Kafafian of "Flesh and the Spur"), and he cherishes a hand-written letter that little brother sent him from Korea. Apparently, the military handed out a battlefield commission and chose another sergeant, Dan Lawton (veteran TV guest star actor Don Ross), over him. One day, Tommy goes berserk and disobeys Lawton's orders and is riddled by sniper fire. Before Tommy died, he wrote Frank about Lawton and assured him that if he died, Lawton would be the prime suspect. Of course, Lawton had no control over Tommy's demise. The insubordinate fool got himself killed with his impulsive behavior. After the war, Lawton comes home to find his sporting goods store in the doldrums because of his business partner's inability to manage it. Meantime, he pays Frank Garrick a visit and explains the circumstances surrounding Tony's unfortunate death. Garrick treats Lawton with courtesy, pours him a drink, and even shows him some 16mm film of a safari that he went on in Asia. Interestingly enough, the footage of a crocodile and later a python look better than anything from "Wild Kingdom." Frank explains that he suffers from a poor heart and his physician prohibits him from hunting. Nevertheless, Frank wants to go on a different hunt. He wants to hunt a man. Initially, Lawton is dubious about such an endeavor until Frank explains that he has perfected a cartridge that takes a picture of his target rather than blowing it to smithereens. Lawton would like to oblige him in the hunt, but he is wrestling with his business woes. Frank offers to pay Lawton the sum of $10-thousand dollars if he can out-hunt him. Lawton doesn't have that kind of cash and he is $5-thousand in the hole as it is with his business. Frank dismisses the inequality of the deal and convinces Lawton to compete with him. He prepares a map and confines the hunt to the concrete jungle of Los Angeles, California. Writer & director Ordung delivers modest gem with a couple of twists that make it a good movie to watch. The only other character of any substance is Helen Leyden (Regina Gleason of "Speed Crazy") who was Tommy's girlfriend that Frank hated. Mind you, "The Most Dangerous Game" has been remade many times, but "Walk the Dark Street" qualifies as one of the better variations.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
01/17/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Chuck Conners (The Rifleman TV show of the sixties) stars in this rather weird crime drama. Here as a hunter, he "aims" to kill his prey, a human, claimin his rifle is just a camera.
See it here for free:
http://www.archive.org/details/WalkTheDarkStreet
Weird action drama starring Connors as a somewhat crazed big-game hunter who challenges Army officer Ross (whom he blames for his soldier-brother's death from a heart attack to a duel by giving each man a camera-gun he has invented and forcing each to defend himself in the streets of Los Angeles during a simulated manhunt.
While not your top pick for movie of the year, this non-the-less interesting film has a rather novel twist in it. While a tale of revenge, the hunter becomes the hunted... oh gee, haven't we seen that one before?
I do have one real criticism of this film. These two guys carry rifles in full view (in their cases of course) all over the city. While one of them is stopped by police, it doesn't raise an eyebrow by anyone! It gets rather tiresome for these actors to have this anchor on them all the time.
Cast
Chuck Connors ... Frank Garrick
Don Ross ... Dan Lawton
Regina Gleason ... Helen Leyden
Eddie Kafafian ... Sergeant Tommy Garrick
Fred Darian ... Nightclub Singer
Vonne Godfrey ... Frank's French Girlfriend
Director: Wyott Ordung
Writer: Wyott Ordung
Runtime:73 min
Sound Mix:Mono
Color:Black and White
NOTES about the film:
1 Best known for some classic "B" science fiction films of the 1950s such as MONSTER FROM THE OCEAN FLOOR, writer/producer/director Wyott Ordung attempted to work in the LA film noir/psychological drama vein with this 1956 rarity, taking the classic "Most Dangerous Game" scenario as a starting point, but reinventing it in a very novel way.
2 see the entire film here:
http://www.archive.org/details/WalkTheDarkStreet
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
01/19/23
Full Review
Audience Member
A noir that is inadvertently hilarious. It involves the central idea of a camera in the shape of a gun, with the subtext of revenge. Surely a camera itself could perform the required function. However this is developed in the film and made obvious with a bullet that has a piece of film around it. The main character describes these as the only guns of the kind in the world, yet when the police confiscate one of the guns, they seem less than surprised.
The film is effectively one massive chase scene, where in a large city the
main characters seem to serendipitously be in the same area, yet inexplicably avoid each other at will.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
01/16/23
Full Review
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