The Glass Wall (1953)

March 20, 1953, release date

Directed by Maxwell Shane

Screenplay by Maxwell Shane, Ivan Tors

Music by Leith Stevens

Edited by Stanley Frazen, Herbert L. Strock

Cinematography by Joseph F. Biroc

Vittorio Gassman as Peter Kuban

Gloria Grahame as Maggie Summers

Ann Robinson as Nancy

Jerry Paris as Tom

Douglas Spencer as Inspector Bailey

Robin Raymond as Tanya/Bella Zakoyla

Elizabeth Slifer as Mrs. Hinckley

Richard Reeves as Eddie Hinckley

Joe Turkel as Freddie Zakoyla (as Joseph Turkel)

Else Neft as Mrs. Zakoyla

Ned Booth as Monroe, the cab driver

Michael Fox as Inspector Toomey and the film’s narrator

Kathleen Freeman as Zelda

Musician Jack Teagarden as himself

Musician Shorty Rogers as himself

Distributed by Columbia Pictures

Produced by Columbia Pictures

Every once in a while, I see a film noir released decades ago whose theme seems oddly contemporary, and The Glass Wall is one of those films. It is the story of a refugee, a displaced person, from war-torn Europe who seeks asylum in the United States and is denied entrance because of a technicality. The details of The Glass Wall could be updated from March 20, 1953 (the film’s release date almost exactly sixty-five years ago), to current events of today (think the immigration debate in general and the Dreamers’ dilemma in particular) and the story would resonate with today’s viewers.

Click here for more information about displaced persons (DPs). Click here for more information about the U.S. executive branch policy called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).

The opening credits start over an expanse of sea. The screen is split by the horizon line between the sky and the sea. As the credits progress, the film cuts to a ship in the distance and then to subsequent shots of the ship coming closer and closer to viewers. A voice-over narrator starts a description of the ship arriving in New York Harbor: 1,322 displaced persons were rescued by the International Refugee Organization of the United Nations. They had escaped the war (World War II) and concentration camps.

One of those displaced persons is Peter Kuban. He is denied entrance to the United States because he stowed away on the ship, an illegal act that disqualifies him from entry to the United States. He protests the decision of the immigration officers on board the ship, telling them about his wartime experiences of torture in concentration camps. Peter Kuban is no slouch. He invokes Statute 6, the Displaced Persons Law:

A person bearing arms for the Allied cause in World War II has the privilege to come into America without a quota number, before others.

Peter had escaped Auschwitz and found an American parachute soldier during the war. He saved the American from pursuing Nazis and took the soldier to an Allied hospital so that he could recover from his injuries. All Peter knows now is that the soldier’s name is Tom; he is a musician who plays the clarinet; and he works in New York City, in Times Square. Tom is the person who can prove Peter’s story and vouch for him.

(This blog post about The Glass Wall contains spoilers.)

Rather than face being sent back to Hungary, his home country, Peter jumps ship. He is injured in his fall to the dock, but he makes it to Times Square. Immigration sends out officers looking for Peter in Times Square, in case his story is on the up and up. From this point onward, viewers follow Peter as he struggles to find Tom and to evade the authorities.

I had seen bits and pieces of The Glass Wall on television and I have to confess that I wasn’t very impressed at first, maybe because I usually caught the last scenes and thought the film seemed awfully melodramatic. But judging a film after seeing a few scenes here and there is not very credible or accurate, so I decided to see the entire film. Besides, Gloria Grahame costars, and Jerry Paris (of The Dick Van Dyke Show fame) does, too. Jerry Paris in a film noir?

Gloria Grahame plays Maggie, who helps Peter. They meet when he observes Maggie taking a table that someone just vacated in a coffee shop and eating the leftover food on the table. Then he watches her steal someone’s coat. Maggie runs out of the coffee shop, and Peter follows her and helps her escape. Jerry Paris plays Tom, the musician Peter helped during the war. Tom is a man with a conscience who feels that he must help Peter once he reads about his plight on the front page of a New York City newspaper. Grahame was great, as I expected; Paris was better than I expected in a noncomedic role, although I didn’t believe for a minute that he actually played that clarinet!

Near the end of the film, Peter decides to seek asylum at the United Nations. (The title of the film refers to the glass façade of the UN headquarters in New York City.) By this point, he has become thoroughly desperate (this is probably the point in the story where I started watching the film on television). Peter delivers an impassioned plea to an empty room at the United Nations, which is apparently not in session on the day that Peter enters the building:

Somebody. Somebody listen. You . . . you come here to bring peace to the world. But what is the world? As long as there is one man who can’t walk free where he wants, as long as there is one displaced person without home, there won’t be peace! Because to each man, he’s the world! . . .  Nobody listens!

After watching The Glass Wall from beginning to end, Peter’s plea and his desperation are perfectly understandable. In context, his actions and his words are moving, not melodramatic. His words could apply to people struggling—after World War II, in 2018, or at any point in history—to make their way to a safe place in the world.

I’m so glad that I decided to watch the film in its entirety. The Glass Wall is a great film noir whose theme applies to events today.

I Soliti Ignoti (Big Deal on Madonna Street) (1958)

June 30, 1958, release date

Directed by Mario Monicelli

Screenplay by Age-Scarpelli, Suso Cecchi D’Amico, Mario Monicelli

Based on a story by Age-Scarpelli

Music by Piero Umiliani

Edited by Adriana Novelli

Cinematography by Gianni di Venanzo

Vittorio Gassman as Peppe

Renato Salvatori as Mario Angeletti

Memmo Carotenuto as Cosimo

Rossana Rory as Norma

Carla Gravina as Nicoletta

Claudia Cardinale as Carmela Ferribotte

Carlo Pisacane as Capannelle

Tiberio Murgia as Michele Ferribotte

Gina Rovere as Teresa

Gina Amendola as Nerina

Marcello Mastroianni as Tiberio

Totò as Dante Cruciani

Distributed by Lux Film

Big Deal on Madonna Street is a charming film noir: a heist film with a lot of humor and the most likable burglars. They are living in postwar Rome, struggling to get by in uncertain times. They bungle almost everything they plan together, however, like young boys who don’t know any better and are probably not the best influences on each other. With all the good humor and camaraderie, it’s difficult to find any angst in this film. The jazz score by the composer Piero Umiliani keeps the mood light, too.

The film opens with a nighttime city street scene. As the credits roll and the wonderful jazz score plays, two men (Capannelle and Cosimo) walk down the sidewalk and away from the camera. Cosimo keeps looking over his shoulder: He is waiting for the right moment to steal a car while Capannelle acts as a lookout. Cosimo finds his chance, but he botches the job by accidentally turning on the car’s horn, which he cannot turn off. The jazz horn from the film’s score blends into the sound of the car’s horn, and then the sound of the car’s horn blends into the sound of a police siren. The two arriving police officers size up the situation and start a foot chase. Cosimo gets out of the car and gets his coat stuck in the car door, making it easy for the officers to catch up with him. This first sequence in the film sets up humorous expectations for viewers about the main characters at the outset.

(This blog post about Big Deal on Madonna Street contains spoilers.)

While in prison for auto theft, Cosimo learns about what he thinks will be an easy heist of a pawnshop on Madonna Street. A series of double dealings result in others learning of the plot and taking it over from him. Cosimo is forced into petty crime, which leads to the one point in the plot without humor: Cosimo is run over by a streetcar when he runs in front of it after trying to steal a woman’s purse.

The remaining friends (Peppe, Capannelle, Michele Ferribotte, and Tiberio) continue with their plans to break into the pawnshop on Madonna Street. Anything and everything thwart the group’s planned heist. They break down the wrong wall: They’ve gone from the dining room to the kitchen in the same apartment, not to the pawnshop next door. They become distracted and start eating the food, including the pasta and beans, left behind in the apartment. Capannelle accidentally sets off a small explosion because the others nicked the gas pipe. All of them live their lives at the whim of fate and at the mercy of their good-natured ineptitude. But audiences at the time might have found it especially easy to identify with them: Many of the scenes in Rome show the effects of war in the background, and everyone at the time probably had to make do with what they could find.

Events go well for these friends only when they give in and accept the circumstances that fate hands to them, which usually involves falling in love when they didn’t expect it or landing a job they didn’t realize was available. Big Deal on Madonna Street ends with a shot of a newspaper article with the following headline:

I SOLITI IGNOTI

Col sistema del buco rubano pasta e ceci

PERSONS UNKNOWN

Bore a hole to steal pasta and beans

The police are still investigating a strange burglary from last night. A group of thieves broke into an apartment in Via delle Madonna, through a window overlooking the . . . .

Almost sixty years after the release of Big Deal on Madonna Street, I read this newspaper excerpt on the screen secretly hoping that the group of friends were never found by the police and could continue with their lives, happy and prosperous. My guess is that the director Mario Monicelli felt the same way, too.

According to Wikipedia, two sequels to Big Deal on Madonna Street were released. Audace colpo dei soliti ignoti (released in English as Hold-up à la Milanaise) was released in 1960; it was directed by Nanni Loy. Another sequel, I soliti ignoti vent’anni dopo, was released in 1987; it was directed by Amanzio Todin. The latter was released on DVD in the United States as Big Deal on Madonna Street—20 Years Later. Two remakes of the film were shot in the United States: the 1984 film Crackers directed by Louis Malle, and the 2002 film Welcome to Collinwood, directed by Anthony Russo and Joe Russo.

I guess these sequels and remakes are a testament to the success of the original. I haven’t seen them, but I wonder if they can recapture the bonhomie of the original because Big Deal on Madonna Street really is charming.