Blast of Silence (1961)

Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Memorable, crazy movie

It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said about hard-core pornography that he could not define it, but he knew it when he saw it. I feel the same way about film noir--I cannot define it, but I know it when I see it. And, in my estimation, this movie is quintessential noir. It is the story of a self-described loner, Frank Bono, who has been hired to kill a small-time mob operative in New York City. The filming, in black and white, is in a style that perfectly matches the seedy story being told. The movie has the look of a low budget effort, which indeed it is, and this creates an ideal atmosphere for the downbeat tale that is being told. It would be hard to fake the authenticity conferred by the low production values and the use of relatively unknown actors. The filming effectively uses contrast and shadows, a hallmark of film noir. There are no self-consciously arty shots. Much of the movie is filmed against a backdrop of New York locations. The New York settings play such an import role in establishing time and place that there is an extra of the DVD presenting details on the locations with a lot of before (1960) and after (1996 and 2006) shots. The unusual second person narrative, delivered in a suitably gravely voice, allows for getting to know Frank at a depth uncommon for this type of movie. We see how Frank drifted into his profession, how he had yearnings (or fantasies) about how he could have turned out differently, such as an architect or engineer. He sees a bridge and says to himself that he could have designed that. Frank prides himself on being a loner, a quality that he feels is essential to his job; he makes comments to himself like, "If you want a woman, buy one. In the dark, so she won't remember your face." However, during the course of the movie he is challenged to examine his isolated lifestyle.The sharp, cynical dialog raises this movie several cuts above a typical B movie. The opening scene gives you an immediate insight into how Frank views the world and alerts you to memorable dialog that is to come: "Remembering, out of the black silence you were born in pain. ... You were born with hate and anger built in. Took a slap on the backside to blast out the scream, and then you knew you were alive. Later you learned to hold back the scream and let out the hate and anger another way."The jazz score is effective.This is worth viewing and is not just for lovers of film noir.

This film bridges the gap between classic 50s noir, and the more complex, improvisational dark NYC films to come, first by Cassavettes, and then by Scorsese. Very reminiscent of, if not as psychologically complex, surreal, and twisted as, the writings of Jim Thompson. A hit man from Cleveland comes to New York for one last job. The film uses 2nd person narration – 'You feel this', or 'You sense danger'. It's an interesting technique I can't remember encountering in a movie before, which plays with your head in a good way. Who's narrating the film? Obviously the 'you' is the main character, but by subtle implication it makes US him. The narration was written under a pseudonym by the great blacklisted writer Waldo Salt. Beautiful, stark and depressing photography – which I guess describes the film as a whole as well.A couple of terrific, odd supporting characters add to the nightmare atmosphere. While some of the acting is variable, and a few twists are too telegraphed, this is a film that has stuck with me.

Blast of Silence is a bargain bin noir with a lot of heart. It's sloppy in spots and paced poorly at times but writer, director, actor Alan Baron establishes a dark sinister atmosphere with effective imagery and an impressive stoic performance as Cleveland hit man Frankie Bono.Bono has come to New York to perform a contract killing on a mobster. It shouldn't be any different from any other whack but matters both professional and of the heart complicate matters. Things get ugly with an ex-girlfriend and he's double crossed by a gun runner who keeps rats for pets. Things only get bleaker for Bono whose life and outlook on it (narrated in gravelly detail by Lionel Stander) seems to be one of self fulfilling prophecy. Blast's uncompromising grim viewpoint, amoral take and style evoke comparison to Sam Fuller and the French new wave of the times (Breathless before, Shoot the Piano Player after). Substitute Stander's thick pulp with a French narrator and you have a Jean Pierre Melville and all the praise to go along with it. In its own uneven way Blast earns it. It may not be a classic but it is interesting to look at and imaginatively strung together by auteur Baron who does an admirable job of wearing many hats at once.

Allen Baron didn't make that many films (maybe only two or three at most in a career mostly dominated by TV gigs), but perhaps one near-great film is enough. There are two kinds of directors in this world, my friend: those who make one or two fantastic films that will live on and on, and then those who make several amongst many other excellent or very good films. Allen Baron falls into the former category, and his film Blast of Silence is an example of how to do something right on a super-duper low budget on the streets of New York, with no-name (or not-at-all) actors, and the one big name being Lionel Stander a at-the-time blacklisted actor who was paid $500 to speak Waldo Salt's blisteringly powerful hard-boiled narration.Indeed the narration here is so good that it at times threatens the scenes it comes in on. It's a "you know it, Frankie" type of voice, a combination of some unseen presence looking on and perhaps just a voice of conscience ripped right off the shelf of a paperback. Stander's gravel-voice, a possible inspiration for Rourke in Sin City, and the real locations and hoppy jazz score, all add to this being a delicious fear of film-making. The story itself isn't that much more different than one might see in Melville (not exactly Le Samourai but close - take away the narration, some of the dialog and chunks of the music and its about the same), as a hired gun, Frank Bono (Baron), comes into the Big Apple on a contract killing, and suddenly finds himself in one of those crises of the existential sort.Frank is all alone, and is fine that way, until he connects with a group of guys that run into him who used to be kids at the orphanage together. He sees a woman there that he wants to spend some time with, but this all just starts to mess with his head - that and a bad deal done with a shady, fat gun seller (you might remember from Shock Corridor and Angels Hard as They Come, an unforgettable presence if not great actor) that leads him to questioning the whole job he's on. Baron has some familiar ground he's dealing with, but it's all filmed carefully in Frank's following and casing of his target. The tension mounts brilliantly, and the tone is dark without being pretentious. And those shots of Frank Bono walking on the streets in mostly darkness, fedora and hat, jazz and Christmas songs, are for the film-noir fan just about perfect.If there's a minor drawback, and it should be mentioned, it's that Baron isn't entirely fit in the role of Frank Bono, and as a first time director (save for Lionel Stander and maybe Tucker) he only gets the minimum out of his low-rent cast. On the recent Criterion DVD in an interview Baron said Peter Falk was originally considered for the role. That would've put it over the top, and something out of the ordinary to see Falk in that part. With Baron, doing triple duty as writer, director and actor, he does some decent work in some scenes, but isn't entirely comfortable speaking certain lines of dialog. He works better, and perhaps he himself knew this from seeing early test footage and whatnot, as a silent figure, moving as in Melville like some lone ghost on the streets or looking with a cold, lonely stare like in the jazz club or on a dark street.Blast of Silence is terrific when it sticks to what it should: take to the streets and buildings in Greenwich Village and Harlem and the East Side in crisp black and white and give it the feel of one of the best paperback pulp books you've ever read brought to life. It's like a slightly rusty but practically unassailable ruby. 9.5/10