Gun Crazy

This article is about the 1950 film. For other uses, see Gun Crazy (disambiguation).

Gun Crazy
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Joseph H. Lewis
Produced by	Frank King Maurice King
Screenplay by	Dalton Trumbo MacKinlay Kantor
Story by	MacKinlay Kantor
Starring	Peggy Cummins John Dall
Music by	Victor Young
Cinematography	Russell Harlan
Editing by	Harry Gerstad
Studio	King Brothers Productions
Distributed by	United Artists
Release date(s)	January 26, 1950 (1950-01-26) (United States)
Running time	86 minutes
Country	Template:Cinema United States
Language	English

Gun Crazy is a 1950 film noir feature film starring Peggy Cummins and John Dall in a story about the crime-spree of a gun-toting husband and wife. The film was directed by Joseph H. Lewis, and produced by Frank King and Maurice King. The screenplay by Dalton Trumbo (credited to Millard Kaufman because of the Hollywood Blacklist), and MacKinlay Kantor was based upon a short story by Kantor published in 1940 in The Saturday Evening Post. Gun Crazy was selected for the National Film Registry, and is also known as Deadly Is the Female.^[1](1950)

Plot

Bart Tare (John Dall) is an ex-Army man who has a lifelong fixation with guns—they make him feel good inside. The drama opens with Tare, age 14, being grilled by a judge because he had been arrested for breaking and entering and stealing a gun. In flashbacks his friends say that while it's true that Tare loves guns, he would never kill anything. They tell the judge the number of times he's refused to kill animals. Nevertheless the judge sends him to reform school.

The next time we see Tare, he's grown up and back in town. He's also left military service behind. He reunites with his childhood friends and they decide to go to a carnival.

There he meets a kindred spirit in sharpshooter Annie Laurie Starr (Peggy Cummins) and goes to work at the carnival. They are attracted to one another and after upsetting the carnival owner who lusts after Starr, they both get fired. Soon, on Starr's behest, they embark on a crime spree for cash. Subjects of a manhunt, they are tracked by police in the hills Tare enjoyed as a boy.

Cast

• Peggy Cummins as Annie Laurie Starr
• John Dall as Bart Tare
• Berry Kroeger as Packett
• Morris Carnovsky as Judge Willoughby
• Anabel Shaw as Ruby Tare
• Harry Lewis as Sheriff Clyde Boston
• Nedrick Young as Dave Allister
• Russ Tamblyn as Bart Tare, at age 14

Production

The screenplay was credited to Kantor and Millard Kaufman; however, Kaufman was a front for Hollywood Ten outcast Dalton Trumbo, who considerably reworked the story into a doomed love affair.

The picture was originally slated for Monogram release, yet the producers, the King Brothers Productions, chose United Artists as the distributor. As such, Gun Crazy enjoyed wider exposure.^[2]

In an interview with Danny Peary, director Joseph H. Lewis revealed his instructions to actors John Dall and Peggy Cummins:

I told John, "Your cock's never been so hard," and I told Peggy, "You're a female dog in heat, and you want him. But don't let him have it in a hurry. Keep him waiting." That's exactly how I talked to them and I turned them loose. I didn't have to give them more directions.^[3]

The bank heist sequence was shot entirely in one long take in Montrose, California, with no one besides the principal actors and people inside the bank alerted to the operation. This one-take shot included the sequence of driving into town to the bank, distracting and then knocking out a patrolman, and making the get-away. This was done by simulating the interior of a sedan with a stretch Cadillac with room enough to mount the camera and a jockey's saddle for the cameraman on a greased two-by-twelve board in the back. Lewis kept it fresh by having the actors improvise their dialogue.

Reception

Critical response

Critic and author Eddie Muller wrote, "Joseph H. Lewis's direction is propulsive, possessed of a confident, vigorous simplicity that all the frantic editing and visual pyrotechnics of the filmmaking progeny never quite surpassed."^[4]

Sam Adams, critic for the Philadelphia City Paper, wrote, "The codes of the time prevented Lewis from being explicit about the extent to which their fast-blooming romance is fueled by their mutual love of weaponry (Arthur Penn would rip off the covers in Bonnie and Clyde, which owes Gun Crazy a substantial debt), but when Cummins' six-gun dangles provocatively as she gasses up their jalopy, it's clear what really fills their collective tank."^[5]

The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 96% of critics gave the film a positive review, based on twenty seven reviews.^[6]

Honors

In 1998, Gun Crazy was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

American Film Institute Lists

• AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies - Nominated^[7]
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Thrills - Nominated^[8]
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions - Nominated^[9]
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Movie Quotes:
  • "We go together, Laurie. I don't know why. Maybe like guns and ammunition go together." - Nominated^[10]
• AFI's 10 Top 10 - Nominated Gangster Film^[11]

References

1. ^ Gun Crazy at the TCM Movie Database.
2. ^ Erikson, Hal. Gun Crazy at AllRovi.
3. ^ Peary, Danny. Cult Movies, Delta Books, 1981. ISBN 0-517-20185-2.
4. ^ Muller, Eddie. Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir, St. Martin's Griffin, 208 pages, 1998. ISBN 0312180764.
5. ^ Adams, Sam. Philadelphia City Paper, film review, July 29-August 4, 2004. Last accessed: January 5, 2008.
6. ^ Gun Crazy at Rotten Tomatoes. Last accessed: December 3, 2009.
7. ^ AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies Nominees
8. ^ AFI's 100 Years...100 Thrills
9. ^ AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions Nominees
10. ^ AFI's 100 Years...100 Movie Quotes Nominees
11. ^ AFI's 10 Top 10 Ballot

External links

• Gun Crazy at the Internet Movie Database
• Gun Crazy at Rotten Tomatoes
• Gun Crazy at the TCM Movie Database
• Gun Crazy at Film Site
• Gun Crazy at 10 Shades of Noir
• Gun Crazy title film clip at Veoh
• Gun Crazy film clip at YouTube (the bank heist scene)