not surprised it never got much at all of a theatrical release

Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA

Joan Hickson in Miss Marple: The Moving Finger (1985)

William Campbell and Lisa Gaye in Night of Evil (1962)

Sheila Bromley, Verna Hillie, and Marjorie Reynolds in Rebellious Daughters (1938)

George Sanders and Wendy Barrie in The Saint in Palm Springs (1940)

Marcello Mastroianni and Elaine Taylor in Diamonds for Breakfast (1968)

Miss Marple: The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side

Joan Hickson in Miss Marple: The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side (1992)

Stanley Baker, Tom Bell, and Helmut Schmid in A Prize of Arms (1962)

King Moody in Five Minutes to Love (1963)

Robert Livingston, Wanda McKay, and George Zucco in The Black Raven (1943)

I'm a realistic phony. I know I'm a phony. I don't pretend.

I'm Standing On The Outside Of Your Shelter

Lionel Stander

Barbara London

Art Smith

Charles R. Allen Jr.

Robert Cordier

Richard Dowling

A rare beatnik artifact of the early 1960s, one of only a few such films made before the hippies took over Hollywood. Low budget and in b&amp;w, it&apos;s set in Greenwich Village, with what seems like a mostly improvised script. It begins...

Larry Moyer

The Moving Finger

The Moving Finger, the &apos;plus&apos; feature on a DVD featuring Brian De Palma&apos;s Murder a la Mod, was made by Larry Moyer, a strictly independent/B-movie director who apparently never really directed again after this (he has one animation co-direct credit on a short). Not too surprising why; his film is a blend of even-for-then tired clichés between a heist plot and the swarm of the Beats down in the Village in the late 50s and early 60s. It&apos;s about a bank robber who gets shot, and is somehow able to make it on a bus down to Greenwhich village and hide out among a group of bum-beatniks who are allowed to stay as long as they appease the man who owns a dingy poetry club (inimitable, gravel voiced Lionel Stander, like Mickey from Rocky with &quot;poetry in &apos;im&quot;).

Not much happens really, and despite Moyer&apos;s attempts to capture some reality of the squalor of the village scene at the time he doesn&apos;t get enough. He&apos;s tethered to a bad plot with crummy actors (save for Barry Newman, star of Vanishing Point, who oddly enough is here almost as a goof in the midst of the &quot;tea-heads&quot;), and long stretches of dancing and dialog to B-movie music that doesn&apos;t stick well. With more creative direction, and maybe more of an attempt to go with style as do the poetic bums of this world, this premise could have some lift. As it is, it&apos;s barely a half step above Mystery Science Theater status.

It&apos;s not a movie to seek out specifically if you&apos;ve never seen it, and I wouldn&apos;t go out of my way to watch it again if I rent the Murder a la Mod DVD again. Only redeeming quality is a scene with a cockroach race.

The Moving Finger, the 'plus' feature on a DVD featuring Brian De Palma's Murder a la Mod, was made by Larry Moyer, a strictly independent/B-movie director who apparently never really directed again after this (he has one animation co-direct credit on a short). Not too surprising why; his film is a blend of even-for-then tired clichés between a heist plot and the swarm of the Beats down in the Village in the late 50s and early 60s. It's about a bank robber who gets shot, and is somehow able to make it on a bus down to Greenwhich village and hide out among a group of bum-beatniks who are allowed to stay as long as they appease the man who owns a dingy poetry club (inimitable, gravel voiced Lionel Stander, like Mickey from Rocky with "poetry in 'im").

Not much happens really, and despite Moyer's attempts to capture some reality of the squalor of the village scene at the time he doesn't get enough. He's tethered to a bad plot with crummy actors (save for Barry Newman, star of Vanishing Point, who oddly enough is here almost as a goof in the midst of the "tea-heads"), and long stretches of dancing and dialog to B-movie music that doesn't stick well. With more creative direction, and maybe more of an attempt to go with style as do the poetic bums of this world, this premise could have some lift. As it is, it's barely a half step above Mystery Science Theater status.

It's not a movie to seek out specifically if you've never seen it, and I wouldn't go out of my way to watch it again if I rent the Murder a la Mod DVD again. Only redeeming quality is a scene with a cockroach race.

A rare beatnik artifact of the early 1960s, one of only a few such films made before the hippies took over Hollywood. Low budget and in b&w, it's set in Greenwich Village, with what seems like a mostly improvised script. It begins as a late film noir crime tale involving a bank robbery where only one of a group of thieves escapes with his life, as well as $90,000 in loot. Injured and on the run, he hides in a local tour bus and is soon taken in by a group of bohemians who shoot him full of morphine to ease his pain and let him sleep it off on a mattress. Mason is the head beatnik. There's also the owner of both an upstairs coffeehouse and garret, where these beatniks hang out. They, in turn, bring the tourist trade in. Although the robbery is supposed to be the main focus of the plot, it quickly turns into more of a character study featuring these rebellious bon vivants and their odd lifestyle, which includes smoking and selling dope, mooching at art galleries, long conversations about all sorts of things and a beat shindig, shot Cinema Verite style in the director's actual apartment. Along the way, they do things like shower together at the home of an heiress and mostly plot ways to get the bank heist money away from Mason, who's too clean-cut to be one of them, but wins us over with his naturally arrogant charisma. The whole thing climaxes at the Feast of San Gennaro, in a typically documentary style conclusion.

bappamtv

The Moving Finger

🎭 Top Cast

🎬 Technical Specs

🏷️ Keywords

🎯 Categories

⭐ Featured Review

💡 Did You Know?

🎬 More Like This

📖 Synopsis