| Second Chance | |
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Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Rudolph Maté |
| Produced by | Executive Producer: Howard Hughes Edmund Grainger Producer: Sam Wiesenthal |
| Written by | Sydney Boehm D.M. Marshman Jr. Oscar Millard Robert Presnell Sr. |
| Starring | Robert Mitchum Jack Palance Linda Darnell |
| Music by | Roy Webb |
| Cinematography | William E. Snyder |
| Editing by | Robert Ford Albrecht Joseph |
| Distributed by | RKO Radio |
| Release date(s) | July 18, 1953 |
| Running time | 82 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Second Chance is a 1953 American color film noir, directed by Rudolph Maté. The picture, shot on location in Mexico in 3-Dimension, features Robert Mitchum, Linda Darnell, and Jack Palance.[1] It is notable as the first RKO film produced in 3-D.
The story tells of Russ Lambert (Robert Mitchum), a prizefighter with a lethal right-handed punch, who through no fault of his own, killed a fighter in the ring. Since the fight his life has gone downhill.
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To forget the tragedy Lambert heads to South America (the exact country is never mentioned). Heading there as well is singer Clare Shepperd, using the alias Clare Sinclair (Linda Darnell). She's running away as well—not from her memories—but from her boyfriend Vic Spilato, a vicious gangster who just had his bookkeeper Edward Dawson (Milburn Stone) murdered and is under investigation by the U.S. Senate.
Lambert takes up fighting once again and, as he prepares to fight his south-of-the-border challenger named Rivera, Shepperd seeks out her boss, a bar owner named Felipe, and sells him a valuable pair of earrings. She then watches as Lambert wins the match.
Newly arrived to South America is Cappy Gordon (Jack Palance), Spilato's cold-blooded button-man looking for Clare. When he finds her he expresses his love and tells her that he'll spare her life if she runs off with him. Instead, Clare jets and heads for Felipe's bar. By threatening to expose Felipe to Cappy, Clare convinces him to persuade Lambert to meet her at the secluded Posado de Don Pascual. There, Clare encourages Lambert's romantic interest, but does not tell him about Cappy nor Spilato.
They take a tramway to La Cumbre, an isolated mountaintop village, and the couple enjoy a stroll through the town, unaware that Cappy knows their whereabouts. They watch a sexually provocative dance, performed by a young man and woman, whose older husband Vasco (Rodolfo Hoyos Jr.) drags her off in a jealous rage and kills her. Upset by the event, Clare and Lambert head toward the hotel where they spend the night, and in the moonlight, he kisses her. Lambert reveals that he's aware of Spilato and Clare confesses that she's attracted to him but isn't free of her past.
The climax of the movie takes place on an aerial cable car high above a deep abyss which malfunctions midway through its journey, threatening to send Lambert, Shepperd, and Gordon smashing into the rocks below.
Second Chance is RKO Radio's first foray into the world of 3-D film, a prevalent cinema fad in the 1950s, and it featured their top stars. Bad guy Jack Palance is fresh from his critically well-regarded work on Shane (1953). The picture is also the first Hollywood 3-D feature shot on a foreign location.[2]
Critic Jeff Stafford believes the 3-D format was often unjustly maligned and in the early 1950s, was on the verge of "moving beyond the exploitable 'in your face' aspects" into more creative uses of the technology when the fad died. He makes the case that the final scenes of Second Chance were "much more intense in 3-D when the depth of field and spatial relationships create[d] a genuine sense of vertigo."[3]
According to critic Bosley Crowther, the screenplay was inspired by an aerial tramway accident that occurred in Rio de Janeiro circa 1951. Crowther wrote, "Except for one man being killed in an attempt to go for help via a rope and the slugging melee on the platform, this could almost be the Rio episode."[4]
Filming locations
The film was shot entirely in Mexico, including: Cuernavaca, Morelos and Taxco, Guerrero.
Bosley Crowther, film critic for The New York Times, was not impressed with the film's underlying story but was captured by the film's thrilling ending, writing, "The build-up to the aerial adventure is not only synthetic but slow...the development of a romance between Mr. Mitchum and Linda Darnell...is mechanical and routine. But once they get aboard that tramway—-Mr. Mitchum and Miss Darnell, coming down off the mountain and trailed by Mr. Palance—-the drama begins to crackle. And once that cable snaps, the picture becomes a welter of cliff-hanging terror and suspense. Every little movement of the tramway, hanging up there by a thread, causes the acrophobe to tremble. And there is plenty of movement, indeed."[5]
The staff at Time magazine, while calling 3-D "a novel gimmick" lauded the performance of Jack Palance, writing, "This man Palance keeps the show as well as Linda on the move. A rivet-eyed, onetime prelim fighter from the Pennsylvania coal country, Palance (né Palahnuik) [sic] gave terrifying performances in Shane (1953) and Sudden Fear, (1952) has since become the hottest heavy in Hollywood. His face alone, as thin and cruel as a rust-pitted spade, is enough to-frighten a strong man; and to make matters worse, he seems to emit hostile energy, like something left overnight in a plutonium pile."[6]
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