Five Miles to Midnight

1963 "The Suspense Begins...From the Very First Second!"
6.2| 1h50m| NR| en
Details

Immediately after Lisa declares that she is leaving her immature, abusive, but easy-going husband Robert, he is reported dead in a plane crash. Secretly still alive, he convinces her to collect his life insurance, although she knows that it's a bad idea. Lisa must contend with the complications of the scheme, which involve an aggressive suitor, Robert's jealousy, and her own guilt.

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Reviews

Exoticalot People are voting emotionally.
ReaderKenka Let's be realistic.
SteinMo What a freaking movie. So many twists and turns. Absolutely intense from start to finish.
StyleSk8r At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.
filmalamosa Anthony Perkins and Sophia Loren Paris 1962....insurance fraud thriller... sounds good? WRONG.Anthony Perkins was ruined by Psycho...after his success there he seems to be used for only one role:a weird creepy out of control character--certainly the case in this movie.The story is so unlikely and Perkins so unlikeable both factors make this movie a dud. What can I say it is poorly written not suspenseful. It has lots of very boring or irritating plot mechanisms and red herrings that fall flat. Mostly I think though that it is Perkin's chemistry that wrecks it.Sophia Loren 28 being chased by 55 year old male heroes somehow is just irritating too....I was so glad when Loren murdered Perkins. Both the hero and antihero are repulsive in this thing.God this thing was awful...DO NOT RECOMMEND--you will regret watching it.
Wizard-8 The first thing that will strike viewers as strange is the title. Is "Five Miles To Midnight" a common expression? If so, I've never heard of it before. Anyway, placed next to the movie, it doesn't make that much sense, even though a character in the movie does say the title out loud at one point. If they had used the Charles Bronson title "10 To Midnight", it would have made a bit more sense.The second thing that will be strange to viewers is the pairing of Anthony Perkins and Sophia Loren. True, they were paired together as a romantic couple a few years earlier in "Desire Under The Elms", but reportedly that worked as well as it does here. How a beauty in the form of Loren could be attracted to the nervous, boyish Perkins is hard to swallow, to say the least.But even if the title was fixed AND they got two lead actors with better (and believable) chemistry together, I think the movie still wouldn't have worked. I could see this story being told as a short graphic story in the comic "Tales From The Crypt". I could see this story working as a half-hour episode (with commercials) of a show like "Alfred Hitchcock Presents". Or even as a full hour. But this telling of the story lasts about 110 minutes. It's VERY slow-moving, full of padding like the stuff with the little nosy boy. Plus, the ending of the movie is very predictable - I guessed what would happen after reading the plot synopsis before actually starting the movie.Far from the worst movie I've seen, but still not worth seeing. Trust me, you've seen this story before one way or another.
macpet49-1 This is a miscasting masterpiece. Tony Perkins is still the perpetual troubled youth with the reed-like body. First, he is never believable as a married straight man, even in a good film. He is at his best playing neurotic boy men who cannot find their way. Here he is up against the sensual earth mother, Sophia Loren, of all people. Sophia does her best to raise Tony to her level but all for naught. He tries to mentally abuse Sophia and physically gets in a few jabs, slaps mostly. Sophia is much larger than Tony so it all comes off as absurd. She could take him with one punch. Don't tell me a savvy Italian woman like herself didn't shove around a few over zealous American soldiers during the war. She can take care of herself. Tony is only terrifying when he has a weapon and in this one he's weaponless. It's just too dull for words. He looks like he needs to be put to bed with a story and glass of milk. Thank God they didn't waste any technicolor on this one.
mdm-11 Anthony Perkins is not exactly the abusive husband type (especially to an ever-beautiful Sophia Loren). Add to it the plot elements of master-minding an insurance fraud, and the odds of good-natured Perkins pulling it off become immeasurable. The sole survivor of a plane crash, Perkins was fortunate to have taken out a special insurance policy (even if the odds of dying in a crash were 1 in 1,000,000). Good wife Loren, already prepared for widowhood by the "news", gets a good shock when Perkins shows up, pressuring Loren to play along with the hoax to collect the insurance money.Although the ending is somewhat of a surprise, the time spent getting there seems like an endless and tiresome walk through the woods, only to arrive at a run down greasy spoon as a reward. Without any frills or glamour, even shot in b&w, this is a less than average vehicle for either of the stars. Look for a young Tommy Norden (of TV's "Flipper" Fame) in a minor role. Otherwise, skip it altogether