- I was about fifteen minutes into Jacques Tourneur's Nightfall before I finally convinced myself that Jim Vanning (Aldo Ray) was indeed the protagonist of the film. Not to be rude, but Ray's raspy voice and bulky build both suggested a supporting role, not to mention the fact that his first scene was alongside a much more recognizable actor, James Gregory. Incidentally, Gregory plays an insurance investigator named Fraser who is monitoring Vanning in the hopes of recovering a few hundred thousand dollars that Vanning may or may not have absconded with. We gather that Vanning spends most of his time drifting around town aimlessly, although his fortunes may soon change once he runs into Marie Gardner (Anne Bancroft) at a bar.
- As we eventually learn from a series of flashbacks, Vanning and his friend Doc Gurston (Frank Albertson) were on a camping trip in Moose, Wyoming several months ago when a car crashed near their site. Stumbling out of the car were two bank robbers, John (Brian Keith) and Red (Rudy Bond), who quickly took advantage of Doc Gurston's kindness in the most extreme way imaginable. Through a series of admittedly silly occurrences, Vanning managed to escape the two crooks while simultaneously losing their briefcase full of stolen money. Now he's just waiting out the winter snow so that he can return to Moose and retrieve the loot to clear his name.
- The best part of Nightfall occurs about halfway through as Marie is participating in a fashion show when she notices John and Red in the audience. In a desparate maneuver, she flees the fashion runway halfway through modeling a caped number that surely must have made Hitchcock sorry he didn't think of that scene first. Otherwise, the film is a solid noir offering from Tourneur, who proves between this and Out of the Past that he is truly a master of the well-deployed flashback. Cinematographer Burnett Guffey has fun playing around in the dark, and John and Red make up one of the more memorable pairs of goons ever to grace the screen. Tarantino has gone on record saying this one was an influence on Pulp Fiction, which makes a certain amount of sense, although Quentin never would have cut away from the snowplow blades.
- Based on a novel by David Goodis.
- Also featuring Jocelyn Brando.
- Aldo Ray was the father of Eric Da Re, who played Leo Johnson in Twin Peaks.
