BLAST OF SILENCE-1961-Hit man Baby Boy Frankie Bono (writer/director Allen Baron who resembles Robert DeNiro) comes to NYC on Christmas Eve to shadow a potential hit job in this low budget film noir that for years was undeservedly over looked.
A narrator (un-billed Lionel Stander) provides cynical narration. Checking out a future hit (a minor gangster) provides great shots of New York in the early ’60’s (especially of Harlem in front of The Apollo Theater and Rockefeller Center). He buys a gun from Big Ralphie (Larry Tucker), a whispering fat guy with an apartment full of caged rats. After a Christmas walk, he meets Petey “from the orphanage”. He introduces Frankie to his sister Lori (Molly McCarthy) and he goes to their Christmas party where dances and rolls a peanut with his nose! He has a Christmas Day dinner date with Lori but kind of blows when he puts the moves on her too strongly. Meanwhile, he keeps following his prey learning his moves and routines. He then takes time to go to The Village Gate where a conga player singer named Dean Sheldon does two great songs! When Big Ralphie tries to blackmail Frankie they have a terrific, violent fight amid the escaped rats. Frankie decides he doesn’t want the hit. He’d rather make time with Lori but it turns out she has a steady boyfriend. He goes off and makes the hit but winds up shot to death on Long Island (because the mob doesn’t trust him anymore).
I really like BLAST OF SILENCE. It's gritty low budget photography really sets the mood. I read about it many years ago but never saw hide nor hair of it until it was “re-discovered” a while back. Star/director/writer Baron helmed one other feature TERROR IN THE CITY in 1964 then went into TV. The sometimes over the top narration was written by future Academy Award winner Waldo Salt. Producer/cinematographer/editor Merrill S. Brody shot CUBAN REBEL GIRLS in ‘59.
Thanks for reading!
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