Dangerous Mission (1954)

Wonderful character development!

I have absolutely never seen anything like this movie before. You have to see this movie.

The movie is wildly uneven but lively and timely - in its own surreal way

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

This is a good movie.It's the story of a good guy cop going West to find a killer. Mature is the good guy, and Price is the killer. The killer is also trying to execute a witness to a murder (Piper Laurie). Any male watching will be sure to notice the heroine's perfect looking girl friend, played by Betta St John. One watches this film and wonders how this eye popper didn't become the centerfold girl of all time.But enough about going gaga over Betta. This is a good old fashioned, rootin tootin film. There's a lot we'd probably all like to change. For instance, I notice many say Bendix as the park ranger should have had more to do, and I certainly agree with that. It looks like maybe some of his lines were cut, or perhaps it was just a hastily put together job. Price, as the killer, probably wasn't the best choice, but as an icon, it's good to see Price in the role.The action sequences and adventure are well thought out, and it has a little something for everybody. It just seems like a lot was cut out. Still, the cinema scenery is excellent, and it is a great popcorn and soda film.

The film begins with some sap getting blasted by a hood. Unfortunately, a woman witnessed the killing and the murderer knows he faces serious jail time unless she can be located.The scene abruptly changes to Glacier National Park as Victor Mature is heading into the park. As he reaches for the glove box, you see a gun but really don't know why he has it--perhaps he's a cop or perhaps he's a killer on the trail of the witness.Much later, after some mushy romance between Mature and a gorgeous Piper Laurie, an assassin sent by the murderer makes his move and tries to kill Piper. However, when it's unsuccessful, the law is after the man and this leads to a very exciting chase through the mountains and onto a glacier.While the plot is apparently recycled from a Gene Autry film according to one of the reviews, I felt that the action and suspense were good and setting most of the action in beautiful wilderness was a very nice touch. This might not have been the most surprising suspense movie I have seen, but it did deliver a pretty good punch and is well worth seeing.

Did the State of Montana invest a huge chunk of money in Dangerous Mission? We see, in brash Technicolor, the snow-capped mountains and crystalline lakes of Big Sky country; we even get to see a forest fire and a couple of avalanches, one of which seems to have something to do with a plot. There's not much else to divert the attention, except the spectacle of white actors "made up" to impersonate native Americans (they look as though they'd been steeped in Paas Easter-egg dye). A fine cast --Victor Mature, William Bendix, Vincent Price and the very young Piper Laurie -- is thrown to the winds in a wisp of a story that seems left over from the final days of film noir, reworked as a Western, and finally released as this mash-note to mountain lodges and dude ranches. It concerns a woman (Laurie) who witnessed an execution back in the evil east and is being tracked down to insure her silence. The song "It's A Quarter to Three" keeps cropping up as though it had great thematic relevance, but it doesn't. Dangerous Mission has no theme, let alone thematic relevance.

"Dangerous Mission" probably occupied the bottom half of double bills, back when they had such things. The mission referred to in the title: find a missing witness (Piper Laurie) to a gangland murder. The cops want to put her in protective custody; the hoods want to shut her up (accidently on purpose).The first half of the picture tries to suggest that the unidentified hitman is actually leading man Victor Mature, but it's pretty easy to spot the fact that he's actually our hero. No, the villain in this piece is an unctuous Vincent Price, a "dangerous gunman from NYC". Having yet to perfect his evil leer, employed with ease in his many later horror pictures, Vinnie is still pretty smarmy in a greasy sort of way.Mature always seems to be reading his lines from well-placed cue cards and never works up too much of a sweat while he's tailing (in more ways the one) our wayward witness. He soon saves the day, rescuing our damsel from the clutches of the killer as well as saving her from a fall into a glacial crevasse. Price gets his in the end, thanks to his own misguided ineptitude!An avalanche & forest fire are thrown in to pad the running time, but little tension or suspense is generated during the thankfully short running time. The film is poorly edited (via "a chainsaw", according to Leonard Maltin)& the performances are uniformly trite (led by William Bendix' customary wooden performance in a supporting role).If it's on past 11:00 PM, don't bother! You'll never stay awake.