The Big Heat (1953)

Director:

Fritz Lang

Writers:

Sydney Boehm (screenplay)
William P. McGivern (Saturday Evening Post serial)

Release Date:

14 October 1953 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Film-Noir | Mystery | Thriller

Tagline:

A hard cop and a soft dame!

Plot:

Tough cop Dave Bannion takes on a politically powerful crime syndicate.

Plot Keywords:

Vigilante Justice | Anonymous Phone Call | Suspended Policeman | Coffee | Mob Boss

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Glenn Ford	...	Det. Sgt. Dave Bannion
Gloria Grahame	...	Debby Marsh
Jocelyn Brando	...	Katie Bannion
Alexander Scourby	...	Mike Lagana
Lee Marvin	...	Vince Stone
Jeanette Nolan	...	Bertha Duncan
Peter Whitney	...	Tierney
Willis Bouchey	...	Lt. Ted Wilks
Robert Burton	...	Det. Gus Burke
Adam Williams	...	Larry Gordon
Howard Wendell	...	Police Commissioner Higgins
Chris Alcaide	...	George Rose
Michael Granger	...	Hugo (police clerk)
Dorothy Green	...	Lucy Chapman
Carolyn Jones	...	Doris
Ric Roman	...	Baldy
Dan Seymour	...	Mr. Atkins
Edith Evanson	...	Selma Parker
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Phil Arnold	...	Retreat waiter (uncredited)
Linda Bennett	...	Joyce Bannion (uncredited)
Charles Cane	...	Police guard outside Lagana home (uncredited)
Phil Chambers	...	Hettrick (uncredited)
John Close	...	Policeman (uncredited)
Sidney Clute	...	Retreat bartender (uncredited)
John Crawford	...	Al (Bannion's brother-in-law) (uncredited)
John Doucette	...	Mark Reiner (uncredited)
Kathryn Eames	...	Marge (Bannion's sister-in-law) (uncredited)
Al Eben	...	Harry Shoenstein (uncredited)
Douglas Evans	...	Councilman Gillen (uncredited)
Jimmy Gray	...	Man (uncredited)
Byron Kane	...	Police surgeon (uncredited)
Donald Kerr	...	Cabby (uncredited)
Lyle Latell	...	Moving man (uncredited)
Harry Lauter	...	Hank O'Connell (uncredited)
Celia Lovsky	...	Lagana's Mother in Portrait (uncredited)
Herbert Lytton	...	Martin (uncredited)
Mike Mahoney	...	Dixon (uncredited)
Laura Mason	...	B-girl (uncredited)
Paul Maxey	...	George Fuller (uncredited)
Joseph Mell	...	Medical Examiner (uncredited)
John Merton	...	Man (uncredited)
Patrick Miller	...	Intern (uncredited)
William Murphy	...	Reds (uncredited)
Ezelle Poule	...	Mrs Tucker (uncredited)
Norma Randall	...	Jill (uncredited)
Michael Ross	...	Segal (uncredited)
Ted Stanhope	...	Lagana's butler (uncredited)
Robert Stevenson	...	Bill Rutherford (uncredited)
William Vedder	...	Janitor (uncredited)

Directed by
Fritz Lang

Writing credits (in alphabetical order)
Sydney Boehm		screenplay
William P. McGivern		Saturday Evening Post serial

Produced by
Robert Arthur	....	producer

Original Music by
Daniele Amfitheatrof		(uncredited)
Arthur Morton		(uncredited)
Henry Vars		(uncredited)

Cinematography by
Charles Lang		(director of photography)

Film Editing by
Charles Nelson

Art Direction by
Robert Peterson

Set Decoration by
William Kiernan

Costume Design by
Jean Louis		(gowns)

Makeup Department
Clay Campbell	....	makeup artist
Helen Hunt	....	hair stylist

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Milton Feldman	....	assistant director

Sound Department
George Cooper	....	sound engineer

Music Department
Mischa Bakaleinikoff	....	musical director
George Duning	....	composer: stock music (uncredited)
Fred Karger	....	composer: stock music (uncredited)
Hans J. Salter	....	composer: stock music (uncredited)
Ernst Toch	....	composer: stock music (uncredited)

Production Companies

• Columbia Pictures Corporation (presents)

Distributors

• Columbia Pictures (1953) (USA) (theatrical)
• Columbia Film-Verleih (1954) (West Germany) (theatrical)
• Columbia Pictures (1959) (USA) (theatrical) (re-release)
• Columbia TriStar Home Video (2001) (USA) (DVD)
• Sony Pictures Home Entertainment (2006) (Germany) (DVD)
• Warner-Columbia Filmverleih (1990) (West Germany) (theatrical) (re-release)

Runtime:

89 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

West Germany:18 (nf) (original rating) | UK:X (original rating) | Canada:G (Nova Scotia/Québec) | UK:15 (re-rating) (1988) | Norway:16 | Germany:16 (nf) (re-rating) | Finland:(Banned) | Finland:K-16 (re-rating) (1966) | Spain:13 | Sweden:15 | USA:Approved (certificate #16549) | Australia:PG

Company:

Columbia Pictures Corporation

Trivia:

The fictional city where the story takes place is named Kenport.

Goofs:

Continuity: Near the end of the film, Dave Bannion has an altercation with his brother-in-law's old army buddy in the stairwell. When he enters the apartment a second later, the sleeves of his suit are suddenly rolled up.

Quotes:

Lt. Ted Wilks: It was bad judgment to bother a cop's widow about the love life of her husband.
Dave Bannion: Good or bad, it was my judgment.
Lt. Ted Wilks: You're missing the point. I'm the one that gets the pressure calls from upstairs. I'm the one that has to explain. You don't keep an office like this very long stepping on a lot of corns.
Dave Bannion: You want me to go upstairs and explain?
Lt. Ted Wilks: Not you. You're a corn stepper by instinct.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Finding Forrester (2000)

"The Lid's Off The Garbage Can"

In The Big Heat, Fritz Lang by casting Glenn Ford against type, probably directed Ford to his greatest screen performance and one of the best noir films ever done.

Ford is a homicide cop in an unnamed big mid-western city which is in the grip of systemic corruption from organized crime. Remember The Big Heat came out only two years after the Estes Kefauver hearings and stories like these were topical. Another veteran police sergeant has committed suicide and Ford's called in. The widow, Jeanette Nolan, appears to be cooperating, but when the late cop's mistress contacts Ford and is later found murdered, this sets off a chain of events that brings tragedy to Ford personally, but also lead to the cleaning up of the town.

Normally the kind of part that Ford is cast in would go to someone like Kirk Douglas who would explode with all kinds of rage on the screen. What Lang did was cast Glenn Ford, known as one of the cinema's nicest men and squarest shooters. When the gangsters accidentally kill his wife, Jocelyn Brando, with a car bomb meant for him, Ford goes off on a rage and you know there is no force that will stop him without killing him. His performance is effective precisely because of Ford's nice guy image, the viewer identifies with him as Mr. Average Man. Think of Ford as Atticus Finch as cop instead of a lawyer and something happening to kill one of his kids. Gregory Peck as Atticus would react the same way.

The movie rises with what is arguably Ford's greatest screen role. But Glenn gets nice support from Gloria Grahame as the good time gun moll who also comes in for tragedy because she's a flirt and Lee Marvin the number one button man for syndicate head Alexander Scourby. Marvin had done several roles before The Big Heat, but it was in this film that he got his first real critical notice.

Carolyn Jones has a small part as a woman who Lee Marvin beats up and my favorite small role in the film is from Edith Evanson as a shy crippled woman who gives Ford his first real lead in tracking down his wife's killers. By the way Jeanette Nolan is one truly evil woman as the late sergeant's widow, one of her best screen roles.

The Big Heat is one of Fritz Lang's best at what he does best, delve into the dark side of his hero/protagonists.