Director: Allen Baron
Year Released: 1961
Rating: 3.5
Scenic tour of 60's New York City that's also an intense story about a hit man (played by Baron, who wanted Peter Falk for the role) and his preparation (and mindset) before and after knocking off a gangster. Though the set-up is generic, the execution is anything but - Baron's direction is surprisingly confident and the husky voice-over (written by an unbilled Waldo Salt and spoken by unbilled Lionel Stander) lends to the noirish comic book feel. The Baron character runs the risk of being a caricature (he's an orphan, he doesn't have friends, he's brooding, he doesn't know how to interact with women) but his performance is very strong, and I find it surprising he didn't eventually find work as a character actor (he ended up a TV show director instead). Part of the pleasure of sifting through old B-pictures that show at 3 in the morning on Turner Classic Movies or trade bootlegs with other collectors is to find the next great lost film that came and went and should never have been ignored in the first place - lucky for Mr. Baron, Criterion was smart enough to unearth this one for home release.
