Just perfect...

i must have seen a different film!!

Fantastic!

Watching it is like watching the spectacle of a class clown at their best: you laugh at their jokes, instigate their defiance, and "ooooh" when they get in trouble.

Aldo Ray is being followed. Is he wanted by the law? Is he a criminal? Has he killed somebody? James Gregory is watching him and talks to him on the street corner trying to make casual conversation. Who is James Gregory? What does he want with Aldo Ray? Brian Keith and partner are also following Aldo. They obviously look like real bad guys. Anne Bancroft is introduced into the mix, but is it innocent? Does she have ulterior motives? Who can Aldo trust? By way of a flashbacks we see him and friend Frank Albertson (who's a doctor) on a fishing trip. When a car goes out of control and off the road, the doctor aids the hurt Brian Keith and they find out that they stole money and now they know too much. Aldo obviously gets away and due to a mistake they made (in leaving the money behind), they have to find Aldo and their money. With excellent use of time and place; good character actors; and good use of their environment in telling the story, we feel we are there ourselves and really sympathize for Aldo and the characters become so real and well defined that I felt I knew them all. The viewer never second guesses the film, as it plays out very logically and realistically and does not suspend disbelief. Nothing but praise for this short little film long on entertainment.

Nightfall is directed by Jacques Tourneur and adapted to screenplay by Stirling Silliphant from David Goodis' novel. It stars Aldo Ray, Brian Keith, Rudy Bond, James Gregory and Anne Bancroft. Music is by George Duning and cinematography by Burnett Guffey.A pretty model, an insurance investigator, two thugs, an innocent man on the run and a bag of stolen money buried out in the Wyoming snow. Destiny awaits with devilish glee.It resembles the earlier Tourneur classic Out of the Past, so loses a bit of freshness, it hinges on a major contrivance involving the bag of money and it's more blanc-noir than film noir, but Nightfall rounds out as being a well executed paranoid thriller. Pulling it into the film noir universe is the protagonist played by Aldo Ray (a mighty physical presence), he's the victim of mischances and coincidences, his situation worsening because of paranoia and the inability to comprehend how the vagaries of fate have put him into a life and death predicament. With Tourneur using a flashback structure to dizzy up the story and Guffey operating on high contrast for imagery, film doesn't lack for atmospheric fret, but having held the audience in a grip, the makers fail to deliver a satisfactory ending worthy of the build up. Though it's noted that a pretty gruesome death does precede the outcome.As has been noted by many observers, the interesting trick here is that Ray's man on the run is exposed and in real harms way when in the brightly lit wilderness, his safety net comes via the dark shadowy streets and bars. This two-fold setting allows Tourneur and Guffey to craft some terrific compositions to frame the characters. These characters are always interesting, the thugs played by Keith & Bond are unusual because they need the help of Ray's protagonist, thus having to rein in murderous tendencies, Gregory's investigator is like an impartial observer on the periphery and Bancroft's babe starts out cold but becomes a woman prepared to go on the lam with a guy who clearly has issues to be resolved! All are well delineated. Ultimately, and rightly so, it's Ray's movie, his Vanning character is a haunted figure, the world weighing heavily on his huge gait, with gravel in voice and bemusement in eyes, it's a true film noir character that is excellently portrayed.Interesting if a mixed bag, Nightfall is however comfortably recommended to those interested in noir cinema. 7/10

Someday, this taut little noir will be acknowledged as the blueprint --- unconscious or not --- for Alfred Hitchcock's and Ernie Lehman's "North by Northwest." NxNW, released 2 years after Nightfall, features a number of strange similarities to Nightfall, too many to be considered coincidental.For starters --- 1.) Both films have protagonists who are "kidnapped" by hoods, and it appears that there are cases of mistaken identity or misunderstood information in both situations.2.) Both protagonists fight off the hoods and escape in a car.3.) Both protagonists appear to have been set up at some point by a beautiful femme fatale.4.) Both protagonists return to the femme fatale to demand an explanation.All right, perhaps one could argue that these 4 similarities are merely coincidental, or "standard thriller fodder." But wait -- there's more ! Both films also feature: 5.) An older, paternal "watchdog" or "shadow" who is aware of the problems of the hero, watches from afar, and yet eventually becomes involved in the chase process.6.) A shaving scene in a public washroom --- played for tension and then comic effect in NxNW, but as an opportunity for the older "shadow" to chat with the hero in Nightfall.7.) A scene in which the hero buys a ticket (bus in Nightfall, train in NxNW) in order to get to the bottom of the mystery.In both scenes, the whereabouts or destination of the hero is revealed to the pertinent authorities who are present at the stations. Also in both scenes --- we see the hero mostly head-on, to the left of the scene, while we see the ticket clerk mostly from the back, to the right part of the scene.8.) Romance and smooching between the hero and the femme fatale during a cross-country trip --- by train in NxNW, and by bus in Nightfall.9.) Chicago plays a major role in both movies.....and perhaps most revealing of all......10.) A very public scene in which both the hero and the purported femme fatale are placed in danger with the bad guys. Tension and comedy both are played out in each scene. There is even a "voice-over" in each scene --- the voice of the auctioneer in NxNW, and the voice of the fashion show emcee in Nightfall. IMDb poster hisgrandmogulhighness has uncovered these other similarities, some present in the original book Nightfall, by David Goodis, and some present in the movie Nightfall as well --- 11.) Hero in Nightfall is named Vanning; villain in NxNW is named VanDamm.12.) Both men, Vanning and Thornhill, through widely different circumstances, are wanted for murder . . . both, indirectly, cause the death of the victims . . . both, for whatever reason, leave the murder weapon at the scene of the crime, and, most conveniently for law enforcement, leave their fingerprints all over the murder weapon . . .13.) (In the book Nightfall and in the movie NxNW): Both men, Vanning & Thornhill, have a liquid forced down their respective throats in the houses the thugs have taken them.14.) (In the book Nightfall and in the movie NxNW): Both Vanning and Thornhill are in hotel rooms they're not registered for . . .While leaving the hotels, both are followed out by thugs, or a thug . . .Both are in taxicabs looking at the back of the head of the taxi driver . .15.) In the book "Nightfall," James Vanning is already using an alias, "Rayburn." In NxNW Thornhill takes on the trappings of the non-existent "Kaplan." 16.) . . . trout shows up in both works . . .Once you've watched both movies, these numerous plot similarities will become evident. The sheer number of plot similarities indicates that it is likely that Sir Alfred and / or Ernie Lehman used Nightfall as a skeleton, onto which they fashioned their masterpiece, NxNW. The fact that Nightfall has been out of the public eye for 40 years or so may explain why no one has yet caught up with one of the main sources of NxNW.Enjoy !(AJD)

Aside from some of the black-and-white photography and a sexy turn by Jocelyn Brando, there is nothing interesting about this movie. The "plot" is one stupid contrivance after another, all adding up to pretty much nothing. The sappy, dippy happy ending ("and they all went to the seashore") denies it any standing as a "noir" film, never mind a "noir masterwork" like the clunks at Film Forum in New York call it. It is kind of fun to see a really good print of one of these old clunkers, but I can't help wondering why anybody bothered. Now I am wondering why I bothered to write this review; maybe to keep just one person from wasting a trip down to Houston St.