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Sadly Over-hyped

Good concept, poorly executed.

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

In Mexico, Helen (Barbara Stanwyck) and Doug Stilwin (Barry Sullivan) are driving down the desolate Baja California with their young son Bobby. He has brought along his gun from the Army. Doug gets trapped by falling piling and has only a few hours before incoming tides drown him. Helen drives off in search for help. She finds Lawson (Ralph Meeker) but he's actually a murderous escaped convict.Director John Sturges constructs a pulpy thriller from this simple story of wide-eyed Americans caught up in a dangerous foreign land. It's a slow build at first. Sturges lays down little ominous nuggets along the way. He raises the tension at very spot. I love the Mexican peasants. Stanwyck is always capable of making that turn. This may not be a classic but there is real skills at work here in this high level B-movie.

Jeopardy is directed by John Sturges and adapted to screenplay by Mel Dinelli from Maurice Zimm's radio play "A Question of Time". It stars Barbara Stanwyck, Barry Sullivan, Ralph Meeker and Lee Aaker. Music is by Dimitri Tiomkin and cinematography by Victor Milner.Running just shy of 70 minutes, Jeopardy is a classic lesson in how to garner great suspense from a small cast and set-up. Beginning with jaunty music and the scene setting of a family of three off for a vacation, it's all Americana bliss, but it's not long before fate deals the family some bad cards and we land firmly in thriller territory. The dialogue is safe and assured, with the stars turning in rich characterisations as written, particularly a wonderfully oily Meeker as the villain of the piece. Though very much plein air as a production, a claustrophobic and fraught air grips the play and drags the viewer in wholesale, a sense of cruel luck, danger and ironies hold things in a noir realm. While a turn of events in the narrative is deftly played, the sub-text shattering to the point we don't need to see it to feel it.Unfortunately some irritants stop it from hitting the top end of the scale. Daft ironies and highly improbable contrivances chip away at the pic's other strengths, one scene has the son (Aaker) trapped on a dilapidated pier, to which his dad calls out "stay right where you are", I mean really, what else was the lad going to do?! Some crude back projection work also dampens down some otherwise nice production touches (Calif locales just lovely), while the ending kinda dilutes a previous moral kicker. But irritants aside, this holds its head up high as a picture well worth investing time in. 7.5/10

While on a fishing trip in Mexico, a family man with wife and child gets his foot caught underneath a broken timber from a collapsed jetty; his wife goes for help (after busting the car-jack) and manages to get herself kidnapped by an escaped murderer on the lam! Barbara Stanwyck always prided herself on being a resourceful and reliable screen actress, so the ninny-spouse she plays here doesn't sit too well (husband Barry Sullivan tells her to keep a calm head, but by the next scene she's driving frantically all over the road). "Jeopardy", written by Mel Dinelli from a story by Maurice Zimm, is the kind of quickie 1950s back-end attraction used for double features; it has interesting locations and good cinematography, but was most likely an inexpensive way to use contract talent on a tight schedule. The actors are far better than the material, particularly Sullivan playing the most hapless husband in memory. **1/2 from ****

I found this movie to be suspenseful almost from the get-go. When Miss Stanwyck starts her narration it's only a few minutes until you realize that trouble is coming. The deserted area, the lock on the deserted gas station door, everything sets you up to wait for it...here it comes. At first you think it will be about the little boy, but all too soon you start holding your breath watching the tide coming in. I found this movie to be really stressful, even though I had watched it before and was prepared for the denouement. Now a movie that can keep you in suspense even when you have seen it before deserves some sort of special rating, maybe a white knuckles award?