Sorry, Wrong Number
|
Our Price: $34.54 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $19.95 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of Sorry, Wrong Number
Movie Review: Stanwyck is Incomparable in this Masterpiece of Isolation.
Summary: 5 Stars
In "Sorry, Wrong Number", Barbara Stanwyck turns in one of the many memorable performances that made her the Queen of Noir. Leona (Barbara Stanwyck) is the spoiled daughter of a pharmaceutical magnate, now a demanding invalid wife to Henry Stevenson (Burt Lancaster), who must live every moment to please her. One evening she overhears a telephone conversation between two men plotting a murder. Unnerved by the call, alone in her vast apartment, and increasingly worried when her husband doesn't come home from work, Leona uses the only means she has to communicate with the outside world: the telephone. She calls everyone she can think of to find her husband, but what she learns only makes her more anxious as to his fate and her own.
"Sorry, Wrong Number" is based on a popular radio play by Lucille Fletcher, who also wrote a novel based on the play and the screenplay for this film. Leona's confinement to her apartment, where her only means of figuring out what is going on is a telephone, is one of the most effective uses of isolation in cinematic history. Leona isn't a sympathetic character. But her physical and emotional isolation is so palpable that it's unnerving. She can't control what's happening to her. Her insular, dependent lifestyle has left her paranoid. So it's hard to say if anything is happening to her at all. Is paranoia with justification still paranoia? And who were the mysterious men on the phone talking about? Where is her husband? The fact that the audience doesn't know the answers to those questions any more than Leona does makes "Sorry, Wrong Number" a top-notch thriller and a masterpiece of empathy in the service of suspense.
The DVD: The only bonus feature is a theatrical trailer. Subtitles are available in English. Dubbing is available in French.
Movie Review: CLASSIC FILM NOIR THRILLER.....
Summary: 5 Stars
A powerhouse performance by Barbara Stanwyck carries this film noir suspense thriller straight to the end. She plays Leona, a spoiled pharmaceutical heiress who's bedridden due to a hypochondriatic "heart condition". Pampered by her widowed father, she's always gotten everthing she wanted by manipulating her illness to her benefit. She's married to a younger man who's poor but given a good job by her father in his company to keep Leona happy. One night, when she is left alone in her shadowy house, she accidentally overhears a murder being plotted on the phone (her access to the world) and then later discovers it's her own murder being discussed. Frantically, she tries to get help and begins piecing together the events leading up to this moment through flashbacks. Stanwyck is awesome in a performance demanding neurotic hysteria as a hypochondriac who has alienated everyone including her husband and father with her demands and behavior. She should have gotten the Oscar she was nominated for. Burt Lancaster plays the hapless husband who is driven to extreme means to achieve success on his own terms but winds up in over his head and lives to regret it. This was originally a radio thriller by Lucille Fletcher (who also did the film's screenplay) with Agnes Moorehead as Leona. The story is well transposed to the screen and is a nailbiter. The ending is surprising for the time and must have been a shocker in 1948. Under the superb direction of Anatole Litvak, Stanwyck pulls out all the stops as a woman who cried wolf once too often. A real treat on DVD as it looks and sounds fine and a great collectors' item for Stanwyck fans as well.Movie Review: "Burt-EE, Phone Home!"
Summary: 5 Stars
We realize early on that Barbara Stanwyck's character is a "little off," that she is playing her invalidcy to the hilt. What kind of a marital relationship is this? We have all seen this strange kind of co-dependency in which the invalid uses emotional blackmail on the people encompased by the small sphere around them, and those encompassed love/hate catering to them. It starts subtly, then turns literally into a "man-eating monster," wanting more, more, more attention, creating more, more, more drama to get it. The premise of the totally helpless person having to use a telephone as her only way of communicating with the outside world, or for entertainment, as there were not televisions all about then for that purpose, is a stroke of genius for the writer. It is humorous now when we have become a society, quite pitiful indeed that has cell phones glued to ears. What does that say about us? Can we not go for a 24 hour period with out phone drama in our lives? Very sad. Both Barbara Stanwyck and Burt Lancaster seem miscast. She usually plays tough, strong and often ruthless women. Burt usually plays highly macho men. In this production they play opposite roles, she is weak and helpless and pitiable, he seems to be a "kept man" by her father's pharmaceutical millions. Yet they do these roles so well, it is absolute proof of their abilities as actors. A great and sometimes mob-i-licious movie.Movie Review: Sorry, it`s too late!
Summary: 5 Stars
Leona Stevenson - an invalid heiress - is alone in her New York apartment, when she realizes through a crossed telephone wire, a woman will be killed. She overhears two men planning until she knows the truth. She will be the next one. Additionally she has developed a psychosomatic cardiac condition and her only contact with the outer world is her telephone.
The circling camera that moves from the array of useless medicines on her bedside table talks by itself about her terrible solitude. Henry is the henpecked husband who retracts himself since his original plan. Blackmailed by Morano who really wants to hasten the imminent death of his wife and so he can inherit her estate.
But, according the inherent tragic fatalism of the nor film, once the pieces moves forward, nothing can stop it and the late redemption has nothing to do about it.
Anatole Livak was one of the remarkable filmmakers who received with notable intensity, the invaluable heritage of the German expressionism, using surrealistic and expressionistic devices, the game of light and shadows with the night working out as sinister background.
Barbara Stanwyck made a towering performance who earned her a nomination as Best Actress for this tense movie that will maintain you at the border of your seat until the final statement: "Sorry , wrong number."
Movie Review: *Suspenseful* Thriller Will Have You At The Edge Of Your Seat!
Summary: 5 Stars
I saw a remake of SORRY, WRONG NUMBER that starred Lonnie Anderson and was made for TV. Anyway, that show stayed with me all these years and so when I learned that it was a remake of this psychological thriller starring Barbara Stanwyck and Burt Lancaster, I just had to check out the original. And it does not disappoint!
The movie is about a bed bound woman who over hears a plot to kill someone at 11:15 at night when her phone lines get crossed with another party. Through a serious of phone calls and flashbacks, the story builds as it pushes the viewer towards the edge finally unfolding in horrific fashion.
I really enjoyed the tension in SORRY, WRONG NUMBER and must say that it was fun to watch. Stanwyck is great as the nutty, spoiled rich wife and Lancaster is cast equally well as the hunky and kept husband.
The black & white movie is shown in full-screen format and I believe it falls under the film noir category. It also includes the trailer.
Anyway, it's a cool and creepy film! Perfect for fans of psychological thrillers and suspense movies. Watch it on a dark and rainy night with all the lights off.