Wednesday, February 02, 2022

Movie review - "The Burglar" (1957) ***

 Entertaining little B picture, the feature debut of Paul Wendkos, with a decent cast: Dan Duryea in the lead, Jane Mansfield de glamorised as the female lead, Mickey Shaugnessy, Martha Vickers from The Big Sleep as a gal who hangs out with Duryea.

It's a B but it has charms of the time - the black and white photography, jazz music, police procedural scenes (sketching and so on).

It's fun to see Mansfield dressed down, still hot, playing quite a meaty role - she's one of Duryea's gang, who harbours incestuous feelings for him (she's his foster sister).  I wish I could say she was good in the role - she's not, she's amateurish... but also effective. She does have star power. She made this just before her stage success in Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?

Full of nice touches: the opening fake newsreel, location footage, finale in a fun house. And the film doesn't whimp out.

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