The FRiday Night Movie (double feature) - Compulsion (1959)

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[DemforBush]

Our second film tonight presents a different take on the same subject as our first film - the Leopold-Loeb Murders. This time, two wealthy law school students (played by Dean Stockwell and Bradford Dillman) in 1920's Chicago are intent on doing in a fellow classmate in order to commit the perfect crime and flaunt their superiority over the law. The perfect crime never is, however...

Co-starring Orson Welles, Martin Milner, E.G. Marshall, and Edward Binns.

[DemforBush]

Thought it would be kind of interesting to present two very different films dealing with the same subject matter. I prefer Hitchcock's Rope, but Compulsion is also a well-done film. Stockwell gives one of the better performances of his career, IMHO.

[DemforBush]

ping.

[lee martell]

Such senseless murders by the upperclass were rare back then, or perhaps just under reported. Today’s internet makes it difficult to keep such crimes totally hushed up.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

Wow! What a great film.

Great performances all around by Milner, Dillman, Stockwell, Marshall and Welles.

To see Marshall and Welles going toe-to-toe in a taut courtroom scene was truly unique and amazing.

I recently got a chance to see Rope. It was more refined and tension-filled than Compulsion, but this was thoroughly entertaining as well.

[DemforBush]

Glad you enjoyed it! One of the real joys I get from posting these old movie links is finding a good movie that not everyone might have seen or heard of before. :-)