John Kullers Movies

John Cassavetes wrote and directed this look at three middle-aged men thrown into a midlife crisis when one of their mutual friends dies. Harry (Ben Gazzara), Archie (Peter Falk) and Gus (John Cassavetes) attend the funeral of their buddy David Rowlands (Stuart Jackson); all three are starting to feel the pressures of their advancing years, while Harry is having serious problems with his marriage. After the funeral, the three men decide that they need to get away from it all for a while, and they spend the next two days getting drunk, shooting hoops, playing cards, sleeping on the subway, and pretending that they're teenagers again. After 48 hours of irresponsibility, Archie and Gus decide that fun is fun but it's time to go home. But when Harry goes back to his wife, they have a huge argument; Harry storms out and decides to fly to England, persuading Archie and Gus to tag along. They get dressed up, visit a casino, and pick up beautiful women, but while Archie and Gus, as before, look at this as a brief vacation from their lives as loyal husbands and fathers, Harry doesn't want to go home, even though he seems more troubled by his infidelity than do his two friends. Cassavetes' first directorial project after his critical breakthrough with Faces, featuring intense, largely improvised performances by two of his most consistent collaborators, Ben Gazzara and Peter Falk, Husbands was originally released in a cut running 154 minutes, but was trimmed to 138 minutes for general release. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

The Golden Gloves Story is the sort of heartwarming fare that MGM used to turn out once a week in the 1930s. Though this 1950 film was produced by pinchpenny Eagle Lion Studios, director Felix E. Feist manages to perform miracles on a tiny budget. Dewey Martin stars as Nick Martel, a tough tenement punk on the road to perdition. As he competes in the Golden Gloves boxing competition, Nick cleans up his act, but it takes him nearly eight reels to do so. Romance enters the picture when Nick falls for Patti (Kay Westfall), the daughter of referee Joe Riley (James Dunn). A surface reality is maintained by the inclusion of clips from actual Golden Gloves bouts, and by the presence in the cast of boxing champ Tony Zale and veteran sports announcer Jack Brickhouse. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Based in part on a true story, Kiss of Death is given a veneer of reality by being filmed on location in New York, per the insistence of director Henry Hathaway..Victor Mature plays Nick Bianco, a cheap crook who commits a Christmastime jewelry store heist with his gang, and manages to get the rap while the others slip by the police unnoticed. Nick refuses to testify on the others, and gets sent up the river for 20 years for robbery. Before he goes to prison, he's assured by the criminal element that his wife and children will be taken care of while he's behind bars (thanks in no small part to his refusal to testify), but this is a blatant lie: during his incarceration, he learns that the family has gone broke, his wife committed suicide and his children have been sent to an orphanage. Furious, Nick summons district attorney Louie d'Angelo (Brian Donlevy) and makes an unusual deal: parole, in exchange for his willingness to squeal on the others. Louie expresses particularly strong interest in nabbing sadistic mob torpedo Tommy Udo (Richard Widmark, in his chilling screen debut), and helps secure Nick's release with the understanding that Nick will ingratiate himself with Tommy. This he does, spending inordinate amounts of time with the psychopath and earning the man's trust. Meanwhile, Nick also falls in love with Nettie (Colleen Gray), marries her, and regains custody of his two young daughters. The family moves to a small house together (with Nick living under an assumed name), but Louie realizes that his cover will soon be blown. To make matters even more complicated, Louie soon comes calling and pressures Nick into testifying against Tommy. Nick hesitates, given his concern that Tommy will come after him as soon as police surveillance lifts. Moreover, Tommy has a few nasty tricks of his own, however, and vows to make life as difficult as possible for Nick. This is the film in which Widmark's character gigglingly pushes a wheelchair-bound old lady down a flight of stairs. Reviewer James Agee said it best: "You feel that murder is the kindest thing he is capable of". The film made Widmark a star--and also convinced him to start lobbying immediately for good-guy roles so that he wouldn't be typecast as maniacal killers for life. Kiss of Death was remade as the 1958 western The Fiend Who Walked the West, then re-remade under its original title in 1994, with David Caruso in the Mature role and Nicolas Cage in the Widmark part, and the violence and nudity dramatically elevated to conform with the times. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi