tavm In continuing to review movies featuring African-Americans in chronological order for Black History Month, we're once again at 1965 with another of Sidney Poitier's releases from that year. Here, he's Alan Newell-one of his few roles in which race is not an issue, a lone operator at the crisis prevention center in Seatle, Washington. He doesn't expect much service since the initial call is some barber complaining about his job but suddenly a woman who we find out is one Inga Dyson (Anne Bancroft) is on another line and talks about ending it all. I'll stop there and just say this was quite a compelling drama with excellent performances by both of the leads and crisp direction by Sydney Pollack on his first feature film. And they're surrounded by many good supporting turns by Telly Savalas as Dr. Joe Coburn, Edward Asner as Det. Judd Ridley, and Steven Hill as Inga's husband Mark. Other faces you may be familiar with that appear in smaller roles include Jason Wingreen and Dabney Coleman without his famous mustache. Other than a couple of extras in a dance scene, the only other person of color involved here is composer Quincy Jones on his first Poitier project. He work is excellent throughout the film. So on that note, I highly recommend The Slender Thread. P.S. Jones, like me, is a Chicago native.

BaronBl00d Sydney Pollack's first feature directorial debut after years of directing episodic television is crisp, tense, and generally very well-acted. Anne Bancroft plays a woman facing a turning point hard to cope with in her life and Sidney Poitier plays a young college student raking in hours at a suicide hot-line extending a figurative helping hand. Though the two great actors share no scenes together - they have a certain chemistry as they talk, talk, and talk on the phones, and we are given flashback sequences showing us how and why Bancroft is fighting her new found depression. Though the story itself is rather mundane in terms of the impetus for her disposition, the dialog and performances easily make up for any inadequacies. Both Bancroft and Poitier really shine in their roles and the rest of the cast - especially Telly Savalas do fine work. It is evident that Pollack was honing his craft but also possessed a great deal of ability in terms of framing a shot and creating a strong pace and presence throughout the picture.

theowinthrop Last week, as I mentioned in my review of THE WAY WE WERE, director and actor Sidney Pollack died of cancer. Pollack was known as an actor's director because of his own experience as a performer. I chose THE WAY WE WERE as the film by Pollack most destined to be considered great, but TOOTSIE, OUT OF Africa (his Oscar winner), JEREMIAH JOHNSON, and several others are worthy of consideration too. So is this, the first film Pollack directed, which is both an emotion churning drama regarding two people trying (one desperately) to relate to each other, and also a police procedural in tracing a missing person.Sidney Poitier has just begun manning a 24 hour suicide prevention phone, and is working alongside Telly Savalas (as a psychiatrist here - rather interesting casting that), Indus Arthur and Jason Wingreen. There is a phone call from a woman (Anne Bancroft) who has just swallowed nearly a dozen sleeping pills. Poitier and the others are aware that she is going to be dead in less than two hours unless she reveals where she is or the police (who are notified) are able to trace her phone call. There is a problem - they can't tap the phones in Poitier's office without her noticing, so the Police are forced to depend on information Savalas or Wingreen manage to relate to them quietly from a distant corner. The police (one hand tied behind their backs) try to quickly analyze each clue with their most up-to-date (c. 1964) equipment, but find it nearly impossible. One cop who has been watching the work going around (his shift being over) is Ed Asner. He decides to drive in the approximate area that the call might have come from - looking for Bankroft's distinctive car.While the police struggle onward Poitier and Bancroft continue their long phone conversation. The movie is unique as the two stars never actually appear in one scene together (the script, by the way, is by Sterling Silliphant) but are heard talking on the phone. Poitier is slowly losing his cool trying to coax enough information out of Bancroft about the reason for the suicide and where she currently is.In the course of the conversation we learn (through flashbacks) that Bancroft's marriage to Steven Hill is getting sour because of a past indiscretion he cannot bring himself to forgive. Her sense of growing isolation from Hill, from her son (Greg Jarvis), and from her job and the world. The crisis occurs after a dinner with her husband does not lead to a better sexual relationship, and when he returns to his job (he's the captain of a fishing trawler) her isolation pushes her over the edge. The breaking point deals with her failure to save a little bird. Shortly after she decides on suicide.The conclusion is whether Asner and the cops will find Bancroft in time, or is she going to succeed in killing herself. All the actors acquit themselves well in the film, particularly Bancroft as a woman who sees no chance to regain what she lost. Poitier's intensity struggling to pull Bancroft from the edge is quite good as well, as is Asner's realistic cop (bucking his own reputation and the way he's viewed by his fellows) to try to find the woman before it's too late. Hill too comes out well - no Adam Shift here, no grizzled veteran who has seen it all (as he was on LAW AND ORDER) but a simple man who loves his wife, but feels she has disappointed him and God. Yet in the crisis he too regains his true sense of how he does not want to lose her.Pollock in his first film showed an artistic flair as well, particularly (in my opinion) the sequence on the beach with the injured bird and the children. Stark and stripped of anything relieving the gray and blackness of the scene, it bodes ill even when Bancroft wrongly thinks she can save the little creature. Also note the final scenes where Asner and the cops have to push through crowds of people (who have no reason to understand why they are there) to try to find Bancroft. He certainly showed he had an eye for the construction of his scenes, and the film was an Oscar nominee for best costume design (black and white) and best art (black and white). It was a very promising start to a fine directing career.

ivan-22 I saw it years ago (because they don't show it anymore) and I loved it. This is one of the best films I have ever seen. I am not such a big fan of drama, but this mixture of drama and suspense, coupled with a touching homage to the selflessness and compassion of the suicide prevention workers, is simply breathtaking. I also liked the fact that race is never an issue, yet it does loom between the lines (she can't see his color, so, in what sense does it even exist?). Bancroft and Poitier are among my favorite stars because so many of their films are so good. I always want to know: what role does an actor have in selecting his movie roles? Actors are - I hope - not only actors, but selectors of roles. That is a critical role, because there is no good acting in a bad movie.