Once a Thief (1965)

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

Blistering performances.

The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

In the wake of having watched Alain Delon in Joseph Losey's THE ASSASSINATION OF TROTSKY (1972), I decided to check out three other vehicles of his I had taped off TV over the last few months – beginning with this one, which emerges to be just as pretentious as Losey's film! Best described as a beatnik noir, we've seen this film's story told a million times before – that of a criminal who can't escape his past, dogged as much by old associates as by an obsessive police nemesis. Consequently, director Nelson and cinematographer Robert Burks (best-known for his longtime collaboration with Alfred Hitchcock) handle the generally clichéd material for more than it's worth – even if my viewing was somewhat compromised by the film being panned-and-scanned.Delon and Ann-Margret make for a handsome couple - although she occasionally tries too hard and her histrionics seem more at home in a Tennessee Williams melodrama; Van Heflin is appropriately world-weary as the aging cop, Jack Palance is typically intense as a crime boss and Delon's elder brother. The rest of Palance's gang is made up of the odd-looking and memorably creepy John Davis Chandler and Tony Musante – while Jeff Corey appears as Heflin's irate superior. The film's screenwriter Zekial Marko (adapting his own novel) is featured in an unintentionally hilarious supporting role as a druggie who shares a cell with Delon – we follow his case intermittently throughout (for no very good reason other than to justify the similarly hapless Delon's pursuit of crime) via newspaper clippings, denoting Marko's conviction to the gas chamber and eventually his suicide! The film is aided by a jazzy score courtesy of Lalo Schifrin, who seemed to specialize in crime/police dramas. The elaborate heist half-way through is an expected highlight, which then leads to a predictably downbeat and body-strewn climax.

Lets face it. The 'film-noir' period was already over its peak and as good as death already in 1965, when this movie was released. This movie is a late attempt to revive the film-noir genre, with some big names involved. They partly succeeded. The movie works quite well as a crime/thriller movie but it lacks the certain style, characters and subtle style of film-making to consider this movie a good attempt at the film-noir genre.All of the classic ingredients are present here but everything doesn't always connect very well. Some of the story lines are underdeveloped and it often leaves more questions than answers. I still don't fully understand what the point was of the robbery/killing in the beginning of the movie. Some of the events in the movie feel silly but it luckily doesn't make the movie any less pleasant to watch. So even though everything in the movie is far from flawless it still is a good enough crime/thriller to watch.The main plot line isn't anything too terribly exciting but it's told in a good way. Director Ralph Nelson brought the standard and thin story well to the screen and even manages to make the movie look exciting, thrilling and surprising.The musical score by Lalo Schifrin is quite odd but its suits the movie very well and therefor I liked it.The characters and cast are good and interesting. OK so Alain Delon might not be the best leading man but the supporting cast certainly compensates for this. Ann-Margret shows she is a great actress although she mainly only does some screaming and crying in this movie. It gets a bit too much after a while. Van Heflin and Jack Palance were also great and John Davis Chandler beautifully plays a ruthless villainous looking villain. He absolutely stole the show in most of the sequences he was present in.A good enough crime/thriller that deserves to be seen.7/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

Ordinary crime plot, written by Zekial Marko from his novel "Scratch a Thief", is given vivid, hyperkinetic Ralph Nelson direction, beginning in a jazz club with a drum solo that is crazy-cool. Marko and Nelson really lay on the mid-'60s jive, but Nelson's quasi-European handling and groovy cinematic tricks make the film visually arresting. Story concerns ex-thief in San Francisco, trying to lead a clean life with his wife and little girl, fingered for the murder of a Chinese storekeeper by the police sergeant who hates him; worse, his shady older brother is in town wanting his help in pulling off a job. Interesting characters (one of the villains is a fey platinum-blonde punker years before his time) and performances, with Ann-Margret doing some of her best dramatic work as Alain Delon's wife. The talky lulls are given a boost by Marko's slangy, hip dialogue and by Nelson's fervent rhythm, but some may see all this as just ridiculous. It's certainly amusing, and the San Francisco locales are a big plus. *** from ****

Even when it was first released ONCE A THIEF was one of those movies whose cack-handed attempts at hip-ness doomed it to be badly dated within a few years of its release. The opening scene, over which the credits stutter and blink, is set in a jazz nightclub in which a black musician plays a manic drum solo. We are made privy to snatches of conversation that bear no relevance to the plot, held between characters that are never seen again. In many ways this jarring opening sequence is all too symptomatic of the film failings as a whole. The narrative falters badly as an already thin plot is stretched to breaking point to fill 105 minutes of screen time. It's inevitable, therefore, that the story becomes hopelessly bogged down and tedious. Characters such as Luke, Eddie Pedak's (Delon) jailbird buddy (played by screenwriter Zekial Marko) serve little purpose other than to pad out the running time and provide ‘symbolic' signposts to anti-hero Eddie Pedak's downfall and (partial) redemption. Pedak himself is not particularly likeable: he sulks, yells at his small daughter, and repeatedly assaults his wife when the going gets tough. Director Nelson seems to be trying to combine ‘gritty' noir with domestic drama, a strange marriage for anyone to enter into, and ends up making a total hash of both. To be fair, his efforts aren't assisted by an amateurish performance from poor Ann-Margret who is hopelessly out of her depth, her big emotional scene (when hubby Delon returns to a life of crime) is truly excruciating to watch. Alain Delon also struggles to do justice to a dramatic role that proves too complex for his heavily accented English. There are a couple of jewels in the mud, however. The employment office scene holds up well, and John Davis Chandler is agreeably chilling as Sargatanas, possible paedophile and albino henchman to Jack Palance, Pedak's criminal brother. Palance, too, puts in a typically professional performance. Unfortunately, such rare highlights are not enough to hold the viewer's interest, and the movie labours towards its inevitable conclusion with minimal style and zero substance. It is all too sad and obvious from this effort why Nelson, who once showed so much promise (check out REQUIEM FOR A HEAVYWEIGHT and FATE IS THE HUNTER), ended his career directing TV movies.