Four Sided Triangle (1953)

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

I would never have bought this early Hammer film but as it was included as a special feature on "The Curse Of Frankenstein" Blu Ray I thought I would give it a watch. The sci fi elements to the plot made it bearable but I thought the main cast were rather bland and uninteresting. I really didn't care about the characters or the love triangle that soon gains a fourth side. For me Hammer really begins with "The Quatermass Experiment" so this film and the one I watched the other day ("Stolen Face") are nothing more than curios that I suppose act as a prologue to the iconic run of films that the studio was soon to produce. 3/10 - Bad.

This old black and white movie is a very boring, and very solemn piece of science fiction about a scientist who when his best friend gets the girl he loves decides to build a life size replica of her. it might have been more tolerant as a comedy. That's all i have to say on the movie. God, this is really annoying having to write 10 lines about a movie, when I don't have that much too say about it, particularly when it's over 30 years (probaby) since i saw the thing. Do you really think i have nothing better to do with my time than write long reviews about movies. This is really annoying me. I'm reminded of episodes in buffy about some nerds who built a robot replica of buffy. That was much better than this.

OK, I admit that there are some aspects of this film that are actually pretty good. The male actors are likable and charming (if maybe somewhat mannered and "stagey" in their performances). Barbara Payton is reasonably hot and is a much better actress than, say, Mamie Van Doren. Some of the photography and lighting and sets are really good. And the central plot idea has some resonance...who can't identify with the wish to recapture the love that got away? Unfortunately, the screenplay's structure is a mess (beware of any film that opens up with this kind of portentous narration). And it also requires that the characters act like morons. You can get away with characters this dense and unreflective if you are doing a satire. Robert Sheckley or R.A. Lafferty would have done wonderful things with this material. But "4ST" plays things completely straight...and takes 20 minutes too long to get to the good parts.I think this is one of those cases where the material just got away from the director and wouldn't pull together no matter what they did in editing and post-production. Or maybe the director (who went on to do many of Hammer's best regarded films) just needed a lurid horror element in his films to distract the audience from his weaknesses with more straight forward dramatic material. It may be that once he had Dracula to play with, he was working with material more suited to his strengths as a director.I gave this one an extra star because I am sure that audiences back then (with 50 years less movie watching backlog) probably enjoyed this more than I did, and it is too well made to be ranked with 3 star-and-below AIP and Roger Corman dumps from the same era. After all, even mediocre British movies of that period have a certain dignity and craftsmanship that exploitation and genre directors could never hope to get.

Rather clever, perhaps over-drawn science fiction(for lack of another fitting category) about two young men who discover how to replicate any matter whatsoever. The two lads are assisted by gorgeous Barbara Payton and only one of the guys gets the girl. Soon the other pines for his lost love and tries sending live matter through the replicating devices with the express purpose of duplicating his lost love Lena. Hammer horror icon Terrance Fisher directs this early Hammer film with style albeit on a small scale with a very limited budget. The science of the film shouldn't be dwelled on too terribly long if you want to buy into the film, and it is the means to tell a story of a love triangle which soon has a fourth side - a four sided love triangle. The film has a lot of narration by James Hayter as a doctor that took in one of the men as a boy. Hayter adds some much needed credibility to the film and is a voice of reason - to a degree - and compassion. The implications of the new technology are only superficially explored and soon you see the plot turning into yet another Frankenstein -type film with man destined to try and become God and create life. What makes this film work is Fisher's low-key direction and simple yet sturdy performances by all concerned. Payton is very lovely as well. While certainly not in the ranks of great Hammer films or great Fisher films, Four Sided Triangle is thought-provoking, engaging, and predictable.