I began watching the 1950 movie — written and directed by Joseph Mankiewicz — "No Way Out." Sidney Poitier plays a young doctor, working in a prison ward, and Richard Widmark is his no-good racist patient. It's unfolding well enough. Here are some early scenes...
... but then a tray of medical instruments is left right next to racist Widmark so that it's easy for him to grab a scalpel. I had to turn it off. I wouldn't subject myself to the cheap suspense of waiting for Widmark to whip out the scalpel and stab Sidney Poitier!
I switched to a different movie, "Terror in a Texas Town." This is a 1958 western that's of interest because it was written by Dalton Trumbo during the blacklist days, and it stars Sterling Hayden and Sebastian Cabot. But it's an absurd refuge from that scalpel, because it's absolutely no secret — it's shown in part at the beginning of the film — that in the final showdown between hero and villain, the hero is armed with a harpoon! Watch the ending here:
I watched that entire movie. All that harpoon action. The harpoon was displayed and described again and again. It's so weird that I wouldn't put up with the scalpel business, but I watched an entire movie that was about one man harpooning another man. Unlike Sidney Poitier's character, the harpoonee deserved skewering.
Now, you're probably thinking that the harpooned villain was played by Sebastian Cabot, a fat actor who always played a fat man. He was a villain — an evil capitalist — isn't a cartoonish capitalist always fat? He's fat, and a harpoon is displayed over and over again, and Sterling Hayden is getting more and more focused and determined. Cabot must be his "whale."
If you watch the clip, you know — spoiler alert — that guess is wrong. In fact, Sebastian Cabot filmed all his scenes inside a single room — a hotel room. He didn't attend his own shootouts. He hired people, while he remained ensconced indoors with copious room service food and a beautiful secretary. Luxurious for the character and low-budget for the filmmakers.
