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The Girl in Lovers Lane
Two drifters contend with love and murder in a small town.
Release : | 1960 |
Rating : | 3.1 |
Studio : | The Filmgroup, Robert Roark Productions, Brigadier Pictures, |
Crew : | Art Direction, Set Decoration, |
Cast : | Brett Halsey Jack Elam Joyce Meadows Emile Meyer Bill Coontz |
Genre : | Drama Crime Romance |
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Reviews
This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.
In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.
It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.
There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.
I have watched this through Mystery Science Theater 3000. This movie starts out with a kid running away from thugs. After he is beaten up he is carried to the nearby train by a hobo by the name of Bix Dugan. Sooner or later they arrive at a small town. Bix then falls in love with a waitress. Then - afraid of him getting too attached to this place he decides to leave. Then he reconsiders, then the girl dies by the jealous-creepy-guy-with-crush-on-her cliché. Bix then gets accused of murdering her. Soon they find out the truth, Bix broods and the person at the beginning phones home and invites Bix for dinner over there.Now, this is worthy of MST3K. The acting is weak at it's very best and the writing is also flat. Although when fair is fair this is extremely easy to make fun of and Joel and the Bots do it well. If you watch it with them it will be a great old laugh for you to have.
Like probably 90% of the people writing reviews for this movie, I saw this on "Mystery Science Theater 3000." Joel and the bots did an excellent job of riffing on this movie, and I thought that it was one of the funnier episodes.This being said, however, this wasn't a particularly horrible movie. Especially compared to some of films they ran on MST3K.It had it's weaknesses: the movie had about zero budget and so things like the costumes and set design were horrible. The plot, also, digressed in spots. On the whole, though, the acting was competent and the story held my interest. I actually found myself caring about the characters.It wasn't a perfect movie, but it was nowhere near as bad as the usual MST3k fare such as "Giant Gila Monster" and "Manos Hand of Fate." As such, it doesn't really deserve to be mocked as much as it has been. It was a B-Movie from the 50s, but it was a watchable one.
The Girl in Lovers Lane is one strange little low-budget film. On its surface, the movie tells the story of a tough drifter named Bix (Brett Halsey) who spends his time looking out for a young kid named Danny (Lowell Brown) and the girl, Carrie (Joyce Meadows), that Bix meets who would like to look out for him. Nothing overly interesting happens (Bix goes out with Carrie, Bix gets Danny out of trouble, Carrie's father drinks a lot, etc.) until about 10 minutes to go in the movie when Carrie is murdered. Her father blames Bix, pulls him out of a jail cell, and just about beats him to death. Now their roles are reversed and Danny has to save Bix.Until I read the reviews on IMDb, I thought that maybe it was just me reading more into Bix and Danny's relationship than was really there, but I see now that I'm not alone. It was quite obvious to me early on that Bix and Danny had more of a relationship than you usually see in a movie from 1959. The homosexual nature of their relationship, while never openly expressed, is still quite obvious. Their living and sleeping arrangements, Bix's reaction to finding Danny in bed with a prostitute, Bix's inability to commit to Carrie, and that phone call at the end when Danny tells his parents he's "brining home a friend" are a few examples of moments that lead to the inevitable conclusion that there's more to their relationship than initially meets the eye. I'm sure they exist, but I can't think of any movies I've seen from the 50s that scream homosexual quite as loudly as this one.As for the movie, I don't know any other way to put this – it's boring. As I wrote earlier, nothing much at all happens for 90% of the run time. The characters are dull and the actors aren't good enough to give The Girl in Lovers Lane much of a spark. The lone exception is Jack Elam. His crazy Jesse is the one character interesting enough to be worth watching. Elam had creepy down pat! But I guess the biggest problem I had with the movie was with character motivation and logic. Carrie is killed and Bix is immediately blamed? What about crazy Jesse who has been stalking Carrie for probably her whole life? Anyone think to ask Jesse where he was that night? Her father has seen him bother Carrie at the diner, yet he never considers that the leering Jesse might have something to do with his daughter's death? Not a lot of logic there. And what about Jesse's confession? Danny grabs Jesse by the lapel and this is all it takes to force a confession out of Jesse? Real tough guy, huh? Why would he confess so easily? And after he confesses, no one thinks to grab him? It's awfully nice of Jesse just to stay put and not run off. In any other reality, he would have never spilled his guts and would have run like a rabbit if he had been fingered for the murder. The fact that The Girl in Lovers Lane asks me to accept these ridiculous actions on the part of the characters is something I'm not willing to do. Overall, I'm giving The Girl in Lovers Lane a 4/10.
This is a film I would have thought I would be seeing as part of one of those Something Weird Video double feature disc's. Pretty much your typical 1950's "troubled youth" films. Though this one is a bit talky and light on the action, I did enjoy it somewhat. I guess I have a soft spot in my heart for these kinds of films. Basically you have this young guy who leaves home in order to come to terms with the fact that his parents have decided to get a divorce. He meets Bix, a road weary and very experienced drifter. They end up in a small town and stay longer then they expected which leads to romance, complications, confrontation, rape and murder. Brett Halsey stars as Bix and gets fine support from Joyce Meadows and a perfectly cast Jack Elam as the town letch. All in all, it's no great shakes but it is entertaining enough.