The Killer Is Loose (1956)
- General info
- Available formats
- Synopsis:
- A savings-and-loan bank is robbed; later, a police wiretap identifies teller Leon Poole (Wendell Corey) as inside man. In capturing him, detective Sam Wagner (Joseph Cotten) accidentally kills Poole's young wife, and at his trial Poole swears vengeance against Wagner. About three years later, Poole (until then a model prisoner) abruptly takes his chance to kill a guard and escape. It's clear during the ensuing manhunt that Poole is obsessed in pursuit of a single end; but not quite the end everyone supposes.
- Actors:
- Joseph Cotten, Rhonda Fleming, Wendell Corey, Alan Hale Jr., Michael Pate, John Larch, Dee J. Thompson, John Beradino, Virginia Christine, Paul Bryar, Stanley Adams, Leon Alton, Don Beddoe, Gail Bonney, John Cliff, Richard Collier, Martha Crawford, Richard H. Cutting, John Dennis, Lawrence Dobkin
- Directors:
- Budd Boetticher
- Producers:
- Robert L. Jacks
- Writers:
- Harold Medford, John Hawkins, Ward Hawkins
- Aka:
- Blutige Hände
- Genres:
- Classics, Drama, Thrillers
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Reviews (1) of The Killer Is Loose
Fifties Noir - The Killer Is Loose review by Steve
Effective hardboiled crime picture which suggests western specialist Budd Boetticher might have operated just as profitably on the mean streets of noir. It was made cheaply and quickly, but there’s a decent cast and the slender yet compelling story is told with suspense. It’s High Noon done as pulp fiction.
Wendell Corey is ultra-intense as an introverted bank worker who is found guilty of being the inside man on a violent robbery. When a detective (Joseph Cotten) kills the crooked clerk's wife by accident, the prisoner swears to execute the cop’s wife (Rhonda Fleming) in revenge. And then he wastes a guard and breaks out of jail…
The dialogue might have been edited, but this is still a spare and tense thriller, with good LA noir locations. Corey is scary as the avenging psycho-killer, and there is plenty of disturbing violence- for the period. OK, the narrative is underdeveloped, but then this is a low budget B picture.
Though any credibility- and fun- is eventually sunk by the ridiculous role of the detective's unhappy wife. When it turns into a home invasion/woman in peril film, she is too erratic to be credible. Or tolerable. Which is implied to be because she is pregnant! Still, its punchy noir aesthetic has a way of staying in the memory.