The Wild One (Laslo Benedek, 1953)

Mary Murphy and Marlon Brando in The Wild One

Cast: Marlon Brando, Mary Murphy, Robert Keith, Lee Marvin, Jay C. Flippen, Peggy Maley, Hugh Sanders, Ray Teal, John Brown, Will Wright, Robert Osterloh, William Vedder, Yvonne Doughty. Screenplay: John Paxton, based on a story by Frank Rooney. Cinematography: Hal Mohr. Production design: Rudolph Sternad. Film editing: Al Clark. Music: Leith Stevens.

The best performance in The Wild One isn't Marlon Brando's, it's Lee Marvin as Chino, the head of a rival motorcycle gang. Marvin brings a looseness and wit to the role that is lacking in Brando's performance, though the role itself calls on Brando to do little but act sullen. He also looks a little porky in his jeans and leather jacket, and his somewhat high-pitched voice gives an epicene quality to Johnny Strabler, leader of the Black Rebels Motorcycle Club. Brando does, however, get the film's most familiar line: When Johnny is asked what he's rebelling against, he's drumming to the beat of the music on the jukebox and retorts, "What've you got?" But it's a measure of the general mediocrity of The Wild One that this exchange is immediately reprised by someone telling others about Johnny's retort, essentially stepping on the line. There are a few good moments in the film, mostly contributed by Marvin and by some effective choreography of the motorcycle riders, as in the scene in which good girl Kathie Bleeker (Mary Murphy) is menaced by the gang and then rescued by Johnny. But censorship sapped the life out of the film: The motorcycle gangs are scarcely more intimidating than fraternity boys on a spree. There's an attempt to spice things up with a scene between Johnny and Britches (Yvonne Doughty), a female hanger-on with the rival gang, suggesting that they once had something going on, but the bit goes nowhere and seems mainly designed to allow the actress to display her perky breasts in a tight sweater. As with any of the countless biker movies that capitalized on the box office success of The Wild One, there's a queer subtext to be explicated in all this male bonding, but it doesn't add much to a movie that now seems as dated as the flaming youth films of the 1920s.

The Lineup (Don Siegel, 1958)

Eli Wallach and Robert Keith in The Lineupw

Cast: Eli Wallach, Robert Keith, Richard Jaeckel, Warner Anderson, Mary LaRoche, William Leslie, Emile Meyer, Marshall Reed, Raymond Bailey, Vaughn Taylor, Cheryl Callaway, Robert Bailey. Screenplay: Stirling Silliphant. Cinematography: Hal Mohr. Art direction: Ross Bellah. Film editing: Al Clark. Music: Mischa Bakaleinikoff.

The Lineup is a police procedural based on a popular radio and TV series that centers on uncovering a drug-smuggling ring that uses unwitting tourists to bring in heroin concealed in works of art and toys sold to them in Asian countries. The title seems to be a bid to draw in viewers of the TV show: The one lineup in the film is incidental to the procedural part of the story, which is really the less interesting part of the movie. Actors Warner Anderson and Marshall Reed play the detectives in charge of things with the stiff "just the facts, ma'am" manner characteristic of cop shows of the day, but things only begin to get interesting when we meet the villains. Eli Wallach gets top billing as Dancer, a twitchy psychopath under the guidance of the more cerebral Julian (Robert Keith), who doesn't like to get his hands dirty and has never shot a gun, but collects people's last words, reported to him by Dancer. They're joined by Sandy McLain (Richard Jaeckel), the driver supplied to them by the head of the operation, known as The Man (Vaughn Taylor). Sandy is an alcoholic -- Julian refers to him as a "dipsomaniac" -- who keeps a pint handy in his suit pocket, but knows how to drive a car fast through San Francisco streets. And it's those streets that perhaps supply the most interest in the film today, with fascinating location shots including some now-vanished landmarks: the Embarcadero Freeway, which was never finished and was torn down after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, and the Sutro Baths, a museum and ice-skating rink that was destroyed by an arsonist's fire in 1966. Hal Mohr's camera and Don Siegel's direction make the most of these and other settings. Sometimes the settings seem to drive the plot: There's not much reason to have one of the victimized tourists be an administrator of the San Francisco Opera other than to have a scene shot in the handsome lobby of the Opera House, and Dancer and Julian have a hideout in Daly City that affords a sweeping view of the San Francisco airport and the bay beyond. Still, The Lineup is a swift-moving entertainment with a lot of action and suspense.