Lively, entertaining reviews of, and essays on, old and newer films and everything relating to them, written by professional author William Schoell.

Thursday, August 7, 2014

NO PLACE TO LAND

John Ireland and Mari Blanchard
NO PLACE TO LAND (1958). Director: Albert C. Gannaway.

"Come over and give daddy a big goodbye kiss." -- Buck

"I don't want to spoil my breakfast." -- Iris

Super-tramp Iris (Mari Blanchard) is married to the portly and dangerous Buck (Robert Middleton), but she has a thing for a crop-duster named Jonas (John Ireland) and won't give him up. In her schemes to get him she uses other men as her pawns, employing both her body and blackmail to get her ends. Meanwhile, Jonas and his pal Swede (Jackie Coogan) go to work for a drunk named Roy (Douglas Henderson) and Jonas and Roy's wife, Lynn (Gail Russell), who is not a tramp, wind up falling for one another. Then things get even more complicated ... No Place to Land has an interesting plot with lots of possibilities, but the execution is strictly mediocre, although Blanchard [The Crooked Web] offers a zesty performance and Middleton is excellent. Robert Griffin [Monster from Green Hell] is fine as a grocer who admires Iris a little too much, and both Bill Ward and Burt Topper make an impression as two lover boys that Iris beds for her own purposes. Ireland looks disinterested most of the time, but Coogan has his moments. William Peter Blatty, who later wrote "The Exorcist," plays a cop. Burt Topper later directed The Strangler.

Verdict: Simmers but never quite smolders. **.

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