Word: melodrama
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...most of these flaws are appropriate to the special Hellinger brands of friendliness, boyishness and sentimentality that pervade the picture. It would be hard to imagine a movie melodrama less cynical, less brutal and cheaply hardboiled, more essentially kindly and sweet-tempered. And it would be hard to beat the setting and handling of the chase which climaxes the film by pulling the hair up on your head and keeping it there...
Author Louis Chavance, who developed this cruel design for drama from an actual incident, and Henri-Georges Clouzot, who directed the film, have taken shrewd advantage of rich possibilities. They have put such intelligence into their melodrama that it often gives the illusion of transcending melodrama. Their film has speed, energy and tension that are rare in French movies; their character sketches are deft, searching and resourcefully visualized. Their keyhole portrait of a community is a caricature, but a remarkably effective...
...bodily from the files of the U.S. Narcotics Bureau. What is more, it carries through it a Moral Principle, hidden by the plot, to be sure, as cleverly as the smuggled opium is hidden from Customs, but which still serves to elevate the movie above the level of common melodrama...
...Based" is such an elastic word, it is hard to distinguish fact from fiction. Everybody (especially Vladimir Sokoloff) acts like a character in a half-believable movie melodrama. But some of the things they do are so incredible that they are obviously current history...
...Treasury Agent Dennis O'Keefe in a busy, biting melodrama (TIME...