As Good As It Gets

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

Somewhat Underrated Film-Noir, a Solid Entry, but Not as Cynical or Downbeat as the Best of Pure Noir, but contains a goodly amount of Bad Behavior and Shady Characters.John Garfield Leads an Outstanding WB Cast with Walter Brennan showing an enormous Range here as an Intelligent, Loyal, Friend of Con-Man Garfield. The Females are in direct Contrast to each other. Faye Emerson as the Unfaithful and Evil Toni, is Nasty and Unfeeling. Geraldine Fitzgerald as the "Mark", a Widowed Millionaire, Naive, Saintly, and as Warm and Cuddly as a Puppy.The Strong Script from W.B. Burnett has some Gripping Wordplay with Gangster Grit. "You bring out a gun and I'm going to make you eat it.", Garfield tells George Coulouris as a Sunken Eyed and Bitter Crook on the Skids. He looks like and Acts like a Drug Addict. Maybe that's why His Nickname is Doc.An almost Spiritual Scene in an Old Mission where Garfield has His Epiphany is Outstanding and Profound. There's Plenty of Mood and Shadowy and Sleazy Sets Populated with Low-Brow, Low-Income Regular Folks and Dregs. The Ending may be Elongated a bit but adds a Damp, Dock-Side Atmosphere to the Conclusion.Overall, an Overlooked Film that is Rich and Rewarding for Fans of Film-Noir, Garfield, WB Gangster Movies, and Anyone Interested in the Post-War Milieu.

***SPOILERS*** Originally offered to Humphrey Bogart who turned it down for the part of private eye Philip Marlow in the overly plotted and almost impossible to follow "The Big Snooze" no one could have done a better acting job portraying con artist Nick Blake as the ruggedly handsome as well as sensitive John Garfield; who was also some 15 years younger then Bogart. Nick who just came back from the war in Europe finds that his 50 G's he left with his girlfriend Toni Blackburn, Faye Emerson, was gone due to bad investments on Toni's part. It's now Toni's boyfriend grease ball Chet King, Robert Shayne, who runs the New York City night club that Nick controlled before he was drafter into the US Army. Using a little friendly persuasion, like threatening to brake his skull, Nick gets his 50's G's back and heads west with his friend Al Doyle, George Tobias, for greener and sunnier pastures in far off, from NYC, California. It's there that Nick plans to practice his craft in romancing and then conning elderly widows and end up taking them for a ride together with their deceased husbands money.It's when Nick set his sight on young & pretty recently widowed Gladys Halvorsen, Geraldine Fitzgerald, that he starts to get second thoughts about ripping her off of her's dead husbands 2 million dollars that he left to her.This doesn't go well with Nick's fellow con man Doc Ganson,George Coulouris, who never like Nick in the first place and resented Nick getting 75% of the take: Gladys' two million! What soon happens in that Nick falls in love with Gladys and decides to back out of the con and buy off Doc and his boys , from out of his own pocket, with the money that he promised them. This causes Doc to do things, like he alway likes to, his own way by kidnapping Gladys and holding her hostage until she get's Nick to pay Doc and his boys off with her, and well as his, money.***SPOILERS*** The great John Garfield was never better as Nick Blake a man with both fists of stone as well as a heart of gold which almost ends up costing his as well as Galdys' lives. with the help of Al and old friend and con artist Pop Granson, Walter Brennan, Nick goes all out to rescue Gladys. That soon ends up with a wild shootout at Doc's hideout with both Doc and Pop getting gunned down in the crossfire. As for the surviving Nick he finally saw the light and went legit and now together with Gladys put his life of crime behind him.P.S Check out Richard Erdman as the bellboy at the hotel that Gladys was staying at who's surprisingly, now, almost 70 years after the movie was made, is still around with us! Erdman was later to play the role of US POW Huffy the guy in charge of the German POW camp "Stalag 17" in the Academy Award winning film of the same name.

Nobody Lives Forever finds John Garfield as a former Broadway sharpie just discharged from Uncle Sam's Army and sort of at loose ends. He's not sure what he wants to do with himself. Personally I'm kind of surprised he's not taking advantage of the benefits of GI Bill if he's interested in starting over. That's one of the weaknesses of the film.In the meantime his girlfriend, nightclub singer Faye Emerson has given John the air and taken his money and invested it with her new boy friend Robert Shayne in a nightclub. Disgusted with the way she's two timed him, Garfield and pal George Tobias leave New York and head for the west coast and Los Angeles. They run into another old time con man Walter Brennan who's now barely scratching a living, but who's heard of big score in the making involving taking recent wealthy widow Geraldine Fitzgerald. The idea is that of another grifter George Coulouris who has no scruples at all about doing what has to be done, but he hasn't got the technique to romance Fitzgerald. That's where Garfield comes in.Of course he falls for the mark and I think you can see where the rest of this is going. It's not a bad story, but has a few glitches in the script. For one thing when Emerson is reintroduced coming west herself later and setting her to be the one to rat out Garfield's change of heart to the rest, it's clumsily done. Secondly again, not a mention of the GI bill for a returning veteran looking to reinvent himself.Garfield does make an appealing con man with a conscience and between Fitzgerald and Emerson he was certainly doing all right. Best performance in the film is that of Walter Brennan and given the wide divergence in their politics between Garfield and Brennan, it must have been an interesting set.Nobody Lives Forever is all right, but it had the potential to be so much better.

Though John Garfield and the gorgeous Geraldine Fitzgerald turn in strong performances, this film can't seem to decide whether it wants to be a film noir/gangster flick or a love story. There's even a bit of war propaganda thrown in, as we're pointedly told a couple of times that Garfield's Nick has grown in character from his service overseas. Plot-wise, not much develops, and there are few surprises along the way. Nick's old girlfriend (Faye Emerson) shows up again late in the film, but plays no real part in the action of the final act. George Tobias as Nick's sidekick is annoyingly one-dimensional, and offers little in the way of the comic relief the director intended. This movie feels like it was written by committee. It's worth seeing only for real Garfield fans.