I first saw this particular flick at the now famous Sydney cultural icon, The Cremorne Orpheum in Sydney. I've always regarded Aldo Ray as a very good actor seeing him in Erskine Caldwell's 'God's Little Acre'and with Humphrey Bogart and Peter Ustinov in 'We're No Angels'. However, the screenplay was really pushing the envelope to achieve the 'suspension of disbelief' to make an audience accept that an American psycho who's reason for being in Australia in the first place,was never explained, could just muscle in and take over Pinchgut right in the middle of Sydney Harbour and hold the whole city to ransom by pointing a Big Bertha canon directly at a ship carrying high explosives...well, I just don't buy it. Also the coppers lining the arc of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, ready to blow Aldo Ray's head off, if he happened to show his face....well, melodramatic in the extreme. Just not going to happen. I think that even in those days, the Sydney Water Police would just seal the island off and send the equivalent of a SWAT team by helicopters or scuba divers to deal with Aldo Ray. Added to this, Matt Kirk (the Aldo Ray character) and Johnny are supposed to be older & kid brothers; Matt talks to him as if he's an infatuated homosexual which I found laughable. So there are many implausible events in this brave '59 production which I could have believed if an Australian escapee from Long Bay Gaol or Callan Park Mental Asylum pulled this stunt or Aldo Ray played a psycho U.S. Serviceman who was obsessively infatuated with the Pinchgut Island caretaker's daughter instead of his kid brother and was in a position to know first-hand that there was a ship docked in the harbour carrying high explosives to blow the Bridge, Circular Quay, Balmain and Wooloomooloo sky-high. Nevertheless, it was a fun-filled Saturday afternoon, when I saw it many years ago at the Cremorne Orpheum.
Review of Four Desperate Men
