I Died a Thousand Times (1955)

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Simply Perfect

A lot of fun.

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

At the time it was made, this film was criticised as being an unnecessary remake of "High Sierra", which starred Humphrey Bogart and Ida Lupino. Maybe they had a point, but this version has such an interesting cast, I'm glad they did.Jack Palance plays Roy Earle, a career criminal who is released from prison through the machinations of mob boss Big Mac (Lon Chaney Jnr.) to perform one last robbery at a resort hotel.He teams up with two inexperienced and impulsive criminals, Babe and Red played by Lee Marvin and Earl Holliman. He also meets two women, one who loves him, Marie, (Shelley Winters) and one who doesn't, Velma (Lori Nelson). Eventually he ends up on that mountainside alone and pinned down by the police. What an amazing actor Jack Palance was. A big guy, he exuded a sense of danger like few others – he had been a heavyweight boxer before the war and everything about him said he was not a man to mess with. Apart from his look, he was also as intense an actor as Marlon Brando. His Roy Earl is like a coiled spring except when in the company of Velma, the girl with the clubfoot who ultimately rejects him. Shelley Winters' as Marie gives a variation on her Alice from "A Place in the Sun", but she gains sympathy as a woman who is grasping for love and security in all the wrong places.The other fascinating thing about the film is spotting stars in early roles. Lee Marvin, Earl Holliman and even Nick Adams, the future Johnny Yuma, in a tiny role as a frightened bellhop. Dennis Hopper is also there as an annoying teen. WR Burnett wrote the story. However Roy Earle's interest in the very young Velma, encouraged by her father was an off touch that remained awkward in both movie versions. "I Died a Thousand Times" is a good-looking production. In colour this time, with the widescreen process doing justice to the grandeur of the landscape. Although the film was considered outdated in romanticising a violent criminal like Roy Earle, it's really more of a study of a man whose approach to life and personal code of honour is out of step with the world he lives in.It's interesting to compare the two versions.

Unless you count the western version of this story that Warner Brothers did with Joel McCrea in 1948 entitled Colorado Territory, I Died A Thousand Times is the second version and updated remake of Humphrey Bogart's classic High Sierra. Whole scenes are lifted word for word and other than a bow to the updated technology of the Fifties, like the use of helicopter by law enforcement in the final shootout.If you are a fan of Bogey than you know exactly how this is all going to end. Jack Palance is a stellar substitute for Bogart and in the Ida Lupino part steps Shelley Winters as the hard luck girl brought along by Palance's two confederates Lee Marvin and Earl Holliman who attachs herself to Palance. Unfortunately Palance realizes too late that Winters is who he is meant for.Ironically Palance as the star here would in 16 years in Monte Walsh wind up in support of Lee Marvin as their box office positions had changed considerably. Warner Brothers didn't water down this remake an iota right down to the casting of bit players. And a good bonus is the color cinematography. Fans of the original will not be disappointed.

To begin with, I haven't seen HIGH SIERRA in years, though I do remember most of it. Therefore, I was able to watch it with an objective eye, not constantly comparing the two films.It does offer panoramic vistas of the mountains and the desolate surroundings. I think the leads, particularly the love triangle of sorts (Marie is involved in two) are to me what sets it's apart from HIGH SIERRA.SPOILER AlERT We know that Marie (a very good Shelley Winters) is a fallen angel. She's a dance hall girl who's run off to the mountain cabin resort with Babe (Lee Marvin) as the gang Red (Earl Holliman) awaits the right time to pull off it's caper once Roy (Jack Palance) arrives and assumes leadership. But Marie isn't going to be anybodies girl, she's the prize of the Alpha Male of the bunch. Even though he repeatedly tells her he doesn't want her around, lust finally wins out.In the second triangle, Marie finally meets her rival, the presumed virginal Velma, a young woman whom Roy's opened up a new life for but springing for surgery to correct a club foot. Though Velma's previously rejected him and he's on the lam, he drops in one more time. Interesting that Velma is dancing up a storm with her young friends and Marie begins to wiggle around suggesting this is the proper way to dance (and maybe do other things)? Velma is Roy's embodied fantasy, a life he's longed for while languishing for years in prison. Though, her second rejection is callous, the second time a woman tells you to get lost usually is. He fools himself into believing he can have her and provide that kind of life. He rejects, then warms to Marie because she's a reflection of him...cheap, unrefined, desperate and living for the moment.Palance reveals both Roy's foolish sentimentality and his vicious streak. When he confronts Babe for slapping Marie, he takes great pleasure in beating the daylights out of him. This act, just like in the animal world, where the strongest males will fight over who gets the female(s) confirms not only Roy's place, but Marie's too. Palance is more brutal than Bogie (who's Roy was only violent when necessary). Palance will back hand a man, rather than speak to him.These factors I feel were better expressed here.

I wanted to see it because of two reasons. One, it was the remake of High Sierra with Bogart, two, the Bogart part was played by Jack Palance, whom can play dramatic roles with some subtility, as in The Big Knife.But now I wonder why they decided to shoot this remake. The film follows the same plot as Hig Sierra; only here, the actors don't care, the director is lost in his thoughts, and who knows what the producer was thinking. Jack Palance is getting bored looking at Shelley Winters and Shelley Winters is asking herself what she's doing in this film. I don't even want to compare her to Ida Lupino in the same role. And of course, they had to use the dog story again! They surely could have come up with some different ideas. Perhaps the color makes it nice to see the same location where they shot High Sierra, but that definitely doesn't add any quality to the film.It's a waste of time if you've seen High Sierra before. Otherwise, why not see a pseudo-film noir. As for me, I'd rather die than see it one more time...