Suddenly

1954 "A cold-blooded thriller!"
6.8| 1h17m| NR| en| More Info
Released: 17 September 1954 Released
Producted By: Libra Productions Inc.
Country: United States of America
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
Synopsis

The tranquility of a small town is marred only by sheriff Tod Shaw's unsuccessful courtship of widow Ellen Benson, a pacifist who can't abide guns and those who use them. But violence descends on Ellen's household willy-nilly when the U.S. President passes through town... and slightly psycho hired assassin John Baron finds the Benson home ideal for an ambush.

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Reviews

Linbeymusol Wonderful character development!
Flyerplesys Perfectly adorable
KnotStronger This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.
Billie Morin This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows
melinmo Full disclosure, I didn't make it all the way through this film. Thirty minutes was all I could stand. The acting by all concerned was very much like a high school play (and not a good one). The dialogue was ridiculously silly. I am mystified by all the reviews of how Sinatra saved the film with his "brilliant" performance. I have never seen a brilliant Sinatra performance...no, not even the Oscar one in Eternity. But even Olivier could not elevate this putrid screenplay. Aaron Sorkin has ruined me for other screen writers.
Tad Pole . . . the U.S. Secret Service failed to cancel the President's visit to a Western whistle-stop hamlet when dying Los Angeles Stool Pigeon "Smiley Bitters" told them that a mob-connected gunman was going to pop the Commander-in-Chief there within a few hours. If you consider that "John Baron's" Real Life mob buddies actually DID rub out our beleaguered JFK less than a decade later from behind the Grassy Knoll, should SUDDENLY be seen as a dress rehearsal for the Debacle in Dallas? Perhaps it is Standard Operating Procedure for the taxpayer-funded Presidential Protectors NEVER to bow before any threat--foreign or domestic--but rather to trot out our Oval Office Occupants like so many dead ducks in a shooting gallery, knowing that there are plenty more billionaires available who'd be only too eager to have "Hail to the Chief" played for themselves. Probably any prudent Leader should carry an "insurance policy" in the form of a back-up detail of Mossad or KGB agents, so as not to become just another road-kill statistic like JFK.
jc-osms Once you get past the cliche one-joke title, this is a taut little thriller with Frank Sinatra diversifying his range by playing a near psychotic soldier-of-fortune, who with his rather simple-minded gang-of-two seeks to collect a big payday from an unknown employer by assassinating the unnamed and unseen President of the United States when the presidential train makes a need-to-know stop at a typical small-town U.S.A.Over a brief 75 minute duration, a fair amount of tension is built up as Sinatra and his gang take over a house containing a young war widow, her slightly brattish infant son and cantankerous old father in law because it apparently provides the perfect vantage point for the kill-shot though how they know that in advance I couldn't say. Also on the scene is a new suitor for the young mum, Sterling Hayden's straight-arrow peacetime cop who unfortunately gets caught up in the hostage situation when he accompanies the incoming FBI chief on a routine check of the house.What's surprising is the sheer viciousness of Sinatra's character, killing the FBI chief in cold blood, brutishly aggravating Hayden's injured arm, smacking the plucky kid about and even threatening to kill the boy. An innocent young TV repair man also finds himself in the wrong place at the wrong time as he too is inveigled into the action. The plot denouement is signalled well in advance as the countdown to the fateful train arrival of the train at 5 p.m. nears.It was certainly unusual to see Sinatra play such an unredeeming character with any resemblance to Richard Widmark's early psychopathic roles no doubt being more than coincidental. It's a pity that much of the rest of the playing by the cast is rather wooden and under-rehearsed looking. The direction is rather stolid and set bound too but none of these things can stop the inexorable rise of tension as the story progresses.Frank was to make a markedly superior movie about a presidential assassination around 10 years later but this B-movie feature would have made for a watchable second feature alongside that following masterful political thriller, "The Manchurian Candidate" of course.
Rainey Dawn The first thing you'll notice about this film is the first 10 minutes or so where the boy wants a cap gun and his mother does not want him to have one because his father was killed by gunfire in the military. She wants to basically keep the kid in a bubble or well protected from such things. Her boyfriend, the town sheriff, tells her that "guns aren't good or bad it's the people that use them". Well, the theme of guns will continue throughout the film and plays in important role in movie - and not just the assassination attempt on the president in the film.The movie does have some very intense moments and Frank Sinatra delivers a lot of those moments in his role as the villain John Baron. A very good role for Sinatra - and the rest of the cast was good too.A very good thriller if you like these type of films - worth watching.8.5/10