The Big Knife
"One of the wickedest instruments ever plunged into Hollywood's heart." --TIME
Academy Award winners Jack Palance, Rod Steiger and Shelly Winters deliver knockout performances in this vicious "poison-pen letter to the movie business" (American Cinematique) that's an extreme close-up of greed, lust... and murder!
Hollywood superstar Charlie Castle (Palance) has it all... except a way out. When he tries to leave show business, his tyrannical studio boss Stanley Hoff (Steiger) blackmails him with a lethal, covered-up secret that could land him in jail. A loose-lipped starlet (Winters) also knows too much, and when she starts talking, Hoff plans murder. Now Charlie is more cornered than ever - on the brink of losing his wealth, his power... and his soul!
Member Reviews
some striking performances - a strong person fighting being made into an empty symbol - Moir
I was really intrigued by the presentation of the tension between Palance's character's projection of personal muscular virility and his fragility in the face of domination by the ruthless manipulative producer played so strikingly by Rod Steiger; the contrast between the sensitivity of the human being the actor is and the coarseness of the life he seems trapped in; the values of the individual and the environmental pressures to make him or her no more than one ant in a colony whose values he or she personally despises.
Member Reviews
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some striking performances - a strong person fighting being made into an empty symbol - Moir
I was really intrigued by the presentation of the tension between Palance's character's projection of personal muscular virility and his fragility in the face of domination by the ruthless manipulative producer played so strikingly by Rod Steiger; the contrast ...