The Fixer

M-G-M. Director John Frankenheimer; Producer Edward Lewis; Screenplay Dalton Trumbo; Camera Marcel Grignon; Editor Henry Berman; Music Maurice Jarre; Art Director Bela Zeichan

Alan Bates
Dirk Bogarde
Georgia Brown
Hugh Griffith
Elizabeth Hartman
Ian Holm

Much of the unfoldment [of this adaptation of Bernard Malamud's novel] is in the filthy prison cell of its chief protagonist, a Jew accused of the murder of a young boy but never formally charged.

Czarist Russia at the turn of the century is the period and the locality is Kiev, where a handyman is caught up in the wave of anti-Semitism. In his long suffering that follows his refusal to confess to a crime he did not commit, his case becomes known to the world.

Basic character is enacted by Alan Bates in an indefinite delineation frequently baffling to the spectator. Victim of the Russian government's persecution of all Jews and its dedication to his conviction, he is subjected to every form of mental and physical punishment to make him confess.

But reaction to violence is not alone sufficient for a fine sustained performance and overall Bates suffers from the writing.

Dirk Bogarde is fairly persuasive as a government lawyer who tries to help Bates, but his character isn't well developed.

Scoring more satisfactorily, histrionically, is Elizabeth Hartman, as a young woman who tries to seduce Bates.

1968: Nomination: Best Actor (Alan Bates)

(Color) Extract of a review from 1968. Running time: 130 MIN.

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