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One of my all time favorites.

It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

I haven't seen this film until now because, like the recent Hunger Games, the premise seemed repulsive to me. Since most of the key events were off screen I managed to plow through it. First, the basic story is ridiculous. Why would a telegram boy or anyone eat a sandwich with broken glass in it? Second, the $80,000 budget is too much when we see the phony quality of the sets, always indoors, and an alleyway that doesn't even have a real-looking car that can move without a tow chain. I could've made a more realistic film using a super 8 camera and giving all the parts to my friends and relatives. This was a lot of money back in 1959. Peter Falk is fine in the lead part, Nico, a gangster who uses his beatnik friends to commit the perfect unsolvable crime. I suppose the money ran out after he and Barbara Lord collected their salaries.

This film aged about as well as a used diaper at the bottom of a garbage can. The dopey hipster dialogue, complete with daddy-o's, "kicks", and nonsensical philosophizing gets old real quick. I understand this is a movie about the beatnik culture it's just the fact that it doesn't hold up very well in the twenty-first century. What's even more grating is the fact that I'm supposed to believe that Peter Falk as Nico is this Svengali-like stud whose every syllable is regarded as pure brilliance to these hapless dopes. After watching an old man die and doing nothing to help him except watch like a soulless goon, Nico gets the bright idea to kill somebody just for kicks as the kids like to say and when I say kids I mean adults who should know better. While racking up a huge long distance phone bill at somebody else's apartment Nico and his companion/possible love interest Francis discuss who their victim should be when a young telegram boy comes to the door. Telegram. Ha! Send a text message you cavemen! The messenger's name is Roy and he is invited into the swinging par-tay for a bite to eat by Nico. The next scene shows Roy calling his older brother Cliff complaining of a pain in his stomach until he finally collapses in death thanks to a burger laced with crushed glass that raptured his intestines. Wouldn't you know something was wrong after the first bite? Thinking they got away with an anonymous crime both of the thugs return to their too-cool-for-school lives like nothing happened. When Cliff hears the details about his brother's death he immediately suspects that he was murdered and begins his own investigation with the blessing of Detective McLeod who obviously has more important things to do. After checking Roy's last delivery list Cliff is brought to the apartment that the party took place at and the fact that it was Nico who was in charge there. While trying to infiltrate the world of these dolts he meets Ellie who pegs him for a square and wonders what his interest in Nico is. Once all the facts fall in to place it becomes apparent who was behind his brother's death. Cue the bongo solo.Thankfully this was only sixty-eight minutes long as I don't know how much of this I could have handled. I spent my formative years in the eighties so I can understand if someone today watched a movie that constantly used "gnarly" and "radical" and "totally tubular" over and over again would eventually become sickened with what was considered cool way back in the day. Just try to imagine your grandfather chain smoking with his goofy chin beard and waxing poetic about nuclear war while banging inharmoniously on the bongos. Not a pretty sight? Well then spare yourself the agony of watching this. I get my kicks above the waistline sunshine.

This movie is good. The beatnik scene, with its pseudo-intellectualism, is played to the hilt. The atmosphere brought to life via a knowledgeable use of black and white, with good sets and staging, helps a lot. Peter Falk ( and I'd never seen him play a role quit like THIS one before ) comes across as wonderful talent. Frankly, his portrayal of Nico has Oscar nominee written all over it. I've said it before and I say it here again ... Low budget doesn't mean no quality. This movie is good quality. Its a credit to the crime drama genre. And there is a sound psychology to both the plot line and the character development that I liked very much. Think: Peer pressure. The part I thought both funny and prophetic ... Heres the future Colombo with a detective on his tail. The name of the detective? McLeod.

******SPOILERS****** "The Bloody Brood" is a far better movie despite of how it's been packaged, something like "Psycho Beatnik Killers". It's a fairly good story about a thrill killing by two unstable as well as homicidal lunatics much like the infamous case back in Chicago in 1924 of Leopold & Loeb. The two thrill killers who murdered a young 14 year-old boy for kicks as well as trying to commit and get away with the perfect crime. Nico, Peter Falk, is a small time hood who supplies drugs to clubs that are patronized by mostly Beatnik types. Nico at the same time likes to hang out in the clubs to talk wisdom and philosophy to an admiring group of Beatnik's. The Beatnik's think that Nico is not only super cool but a genius as well. Nico's sidekick Francis, Ron Hartmann, is a disgruntled director of commercials on TV who feels that the world doesn't see and appreciate his great talent as a film-maker. Francis feels that The only one who's hip enough to see his great cinematic skills is non-other then the ultra-cool and super intelligent Nico. One evening at the club "The Diggs" as Nico was talking about the world situation and how screwed up it's because men like him aren't in charge old man Diogenis collapsed and fell dead. Nico is fascinated by Diogenis' death thinking that someone would die and then be totally forgotten like he never existed at all? All of a sudden an idea hit Nico about getting a real kick or high. Why not kill some nobody who'll never be missed!Later that night at a party at a friends apartment a messenger boy Roy, Bill Kowalchuk, arrives with a package and Nico sees in the messenger boy the nobody that he was looking for. Nico invites Roy into the party and gives him a hamburger to munch on thats laced with ground. Later Roy later fell ill and died of internal bleeding. There's one thing about Roy that Nico's gargantuan brain overlooked, Roy had a brother Cliff, Jack Betts, and that would turn out to be Nico's undoing. Cliff would leave no stone unturned until he found and then brought those that murdered his kid brother Roy to justice.What I liked about the movie is that it didn't put the Beatnik's in a bad light like you were led to believe by it's advertisements. Nico and his weak willed accomplice Francis were anything but Beatnik's but criminals and sick malcontents who used the unsuspecting as well as innocent Beatnik's for their own personal gains. Jack Betts was very good as Roy's big brother getting to the bottom of the matter and finding out who killed him. Barbara Lord as Ellie more then personified the kind of young people who fell into the beat generation back in the 1950's because of their alienation from their families as well as from society. Also effective in the movie was Nico's two drug suppliers Studs, Bill Bryden, and Weasel, Mitchell Zenon, who got too greedy and had to be terminated by Nico's boss Mr. Stephanex, Rolf Golstan. In the end Studs and Weasel ended up terminating Nico. But the best acting of all in the movie was that of Peter Falk. Falk at that time, 1959, in his career looked so much like one of todays top culinary stars of the Food Network Emeril Lagasse. If Emeril Lagasse were to kill someone with a hamburger it wouldn't be because he put ground glass in it, it would be because he packed it with too much salt and spices.