Landing in theatres two years before "Airport", this seems, at times, to be a template for the later, more glossy film. Where "Airport" dealt with the myriad problems of the airport manager and one of the pilots (including the halting of a deranged bomber), this film covers the myriad problems of a police commissioner and one of the detectives (including the capture of a deranged killer.) It also has the similar elements of a secret affair with a younger girl and a dissatisfied, social-climbing wife. Widmark even looks through a curtain the way Dean Martin did during one sequence. All that's missing is Helen Hayes in a tweed coat and a brown hat with a pom-pom! (This comparison actually sheds less favorable light on "Airport" since IT came later and was clearly inspired in it's direction and format by this film.) Widmark plays the title role, a detective who, with his partner Guardino, allows an unbalanced killer to steal his gun and break free from custody. The pair have 72 hours to bring the guy in or face reprimands. This does not sit well with Widmark's bored wife Stevens, who has been planning to make a splash at a party which falls during this 72 hour period. Presiding over the department is Fonda, who is worried that a long-time cohort (Whitmore) has gone dirty and who drowns his sorrows in the cleavage of young, married Clark. The story threads take place separately until, like "Airport", they converge at the end. The film opens excitingly enough with a showdown leading to an NYC rooftop. Location work throughout adds to the aura of the film. Widmark and Guardino (in the last glory days when detectives still wore suits, ties and HATS!) make an intriguing pair of cops, with Guardino coming off especially authentically. (In a less authentic moment, the film asks the audience to believe that a woman pushing 30, and in bed with the suspect, is really jailbait.) Things quickly get bogged down when Widmark comes home and has to deal with the lovely, but shrewy Stevens. Her role is horribly cliched by today's standards. Maybe it was less so then. Still, Stevens manages to inject some degree of empathy along the way and even gets to wear one of those sky-high, late '60's hairdos that defy gravity. Meanwhile, Fonda wrestles (tiresomely) with his doubts about Whitmore, all the while maintaining a stoic, one note expression and seemingly walking through the film. His icky relationship with Clark (35 years his junior!) provides neither titillation, nor insight into his character. Clark's role is pretty thankless and she still has some unaccounted-for residual British accent leftover from her studies in England prior to this. There are small, but solid turns from various other character actors including North as a torch singer and Warren Stevens as a bachelor on the make. Stroud gives a hammy, bizarre performance as an informant, but even he is outdone by Ihnat as the killer. Ihnat's loud, inexplicably salivating character is never adequately explained and is under-presented to the point where his apprehension isn't as climactic as it ought to be. Incidentally, the ending of this film could not be more telegraphed. Clues are dropped in the audiences lap, one after another, like breadcrumbs as the climax approaches. In all, it's a slick, visually interesting film with some good acting, tempered by some vague scripting, alternately hammy/wooden portrayals and a layer of rigor mortis over it. It came at a time when police dramas had one foot in the "Dragnet" door and the other pointing towards "Dirty Harry". The conglomeration of the two approaches isn't always a comfortable one.
Review of Madigan
