Brave, bold, innovative and influential but not an easy watch. The location shooting, Times Square and 42nd Street are amazing, particularly on Blu-ray with vivid b/w images of the neon and signage of cinema and strip club fronts. Even here though we have grown men behaving like young boys, running around and jumping on each other. The inside sequences are more restrained and here for good or bad the improvised dialogue comes into its own. There is an authenticity but little cohesive narrative flow and we get the impression, probably unfairly, of an insufferable bunch of rich guys having a good time with no regard for anyone finding their antics interesting. Time has been both kind and unkind here, it is fantastic to see these late 50s New York streets and catch a flavour of that jazzy moment just after the War but at the same time, we have seen all the French New Wave and other European efforts at cinema verite and some of this now seems just a little tiresome.
Review of Shadows
