The Killing

 (1956)
Directed by Stanley Kubrick
Written by Stanley Kubrick (story), Jim Thompson (dialogue), Lionel White (novel)
Starring Sterling Hayden, Coleen Gray, Vince Edwards, Jay C. Flippen, Ted de Corsia, Marie Windsor, Elisha Cook, Jr., Joe Sawyer, Timothy Carey, Kola Kwariana 
IMDB Entry

It's aways fun to watch a great director's earlier work, to see how they started to develop. Stanley Kubrick -- one of film's truly great directors -- wrote and directed The Killing, a top-notch example of film noir.

Johnny Clay (Sterling Hayden) is a crook working on one last job before marrying Fay (Coleen Grey) that will set them up for good. It's a racetrack robbery that is worth at least $2 million, involving a sharpshooter (Timothy Carey) shooting the favorite in the backstretch. Others in on the plot include a bartender (Jay C. Flippen), a dirty cop (Ted de Corsia), a wrestler who set up a diversion (Kola Kwarani), and George Petey (Elisha Cook, Jr.), a betting window clerk who has access to the nonpublic areas of the track.

Everyone is supposed to keep quiet, except that Petey gives in to his Sherry (Marie Windsor) nagging him about how they don't have any money. He tells her about the plot and she reveals it to her lover Val (Vince Edwards). It turns out to be a fatal error.

The film is noir through-and-through, with a femme fatale and a dark and ironic ending. Kubrick put together the story* and hired Jim Thompson to write the dialog, which crackles. Kubrick also wanted to do the cinematography, but guild rules stopped him. Even so, he kept his cinematographer on a short leash. One innovation in the story is that it's not told chronologically, jumping back to show what each of the plotters is doing to prepare for the heist.

Hayden is best known for his tremendous performance as General Jack D. Ripper in Dr. Strangelove. Elisha Cook was also great in the type of role he was born to play ever since The Maltese Falcon. The entire cast puts on strong performances and much of the cast had strong careers as character actors.

The studio didn't know what to do with the film. It was dumped into neighborhood theaters with very little publicity. It got good critical reviews, but that didn't help.

The next year, Kubrick was tapped to direct Spartacus, and his career took off. But The Killing by rights should have been just as successful.

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*The plan is clever, if perhaps a bit overcomplicated. But the complications don't come up as expected.