The Bizarre Late Night Sequence with Chatty Bank Robbers in Their Pajamas

Violent Saturday suffers from what happens in a lot in movies made in the 1950s: its a photo finish between really banal, overwrought and sappy 50's writing (in the scenes of soap opera among husbands and wives, fathers and little boy sons) and some interestingly offbeat noir elements.(the murderous bank robbers come to town, the adulterers and peepers among "the regular folk.)

But there is just something about how the movie handles the "bad guys" side of the equation in an interesting way. THEY are never banal and sappy.

They are played by three actors: Stephen McNally, J. Carroll Naish, and Lee Marvin. In 1955, McNally's name is over the title, and Naish had some 30s and 40's experience with his somewhat homely character guy face...but Lee Marvin stands out among them as the star he was clearly going to be, doing his early "paying dues work."

Something seems clear watching Lee Marvin in Violent Saturday. He would need that premature white-gray hair in the 60's to achieve stardom. It made him distinguished. It softened the simian ape-like features of his face. In 1955, he was tall and muscular and drew the camera to him ...but he was a bit too ape-like. He needed a decade to soften. Visually.

But he already had that VOICE in 1955. Deep and resonant and a bit self-amused. The star was there.

But here's the weird part. The movie posits the three bank robbers as "good business partners" -- polite to one another, with the two hirelings(Naish, Marvin) obedient to their boss(McNally.) And to the "outside world" of this Arizona mining town filled with middle-class Americans, they are unfailingly polite, too -- until it comes time to rob the bank.

But the WEIRDEST part comes late at night in the downtown hotel where the three bank robbers have their sleeping arrangements. We see them all sleeping in the middle of the night. Whereas the boss man has his OWN room, his hirelings must share a room and twin beds. Modernly, yes, it looks just a bit gay. Then, it was a reflection of military-based life: men slept side by side, in the same room if necessary.

And then the funny part. Lee Marvin -- big, mean, sadistic Lee Marvin -- in his neat little pajamas, can't sleep, even as his partner Naish is snoozing away(good thing he doesn't SNORE.)

So Marvin goes into the big boss man's room and WAKES HIM UP...just like a scared little boy invading his daddy's room after a nightmare. Marvin hasn't had a nightmare, but he's antsy, he can't sleep and he wants to talk to "Daddy" about his problems.

"Daddy"(McNally) dutifully and politely listens to Marvin and tries to downplay his concerns about the bank robbery they are going to execute the next day. And like "daddys" everywhere, McNally eventually tires of humoring Marvin and urges him to go back to bed and let him get to sleep.

Weird. Funny.

But, wait, there's more: Marvin uses his time in his pajamas with "daddy" to review his various bad troubles with women and how -- even with a tough gangster -- they can ruin your life and leave you wanting them forever. Marvin's PARTICULAR wife "kept giving me colds" and that has led to an addiction where he sticks and inhaler up his nose to get a bendrine hit.

But wait, there's more: Marvin in his pajamas looks out the window and sees wimpy Tommy Noonan below -- in the dead of night -- staring at the building and walking his dog. "He's watching us!" Marvin yells. "He's just walking his dog," Daddy barks.

Well, neither, really. Later on, we will learn that what Tommy's doing is "peeping Tom stuff" -- watching a local nurse strip down to her undies in her room in the hotel (which evidently has boarders.) THIS will be revealed later.

Marvin eventually pads out of McNally's room and McNally goes back to sleep but -- WHATTA SCENE. In Technicolor and Cinemascope yet, with clearly delineated blue night sky and bright golden light when the lamps go on (I was a bit reminded of the gorgeous color scheme in QT's The Hateful Eight.)

This whole "bedtime interlude" -- with hardcore robbers in pajamas, a Peeping Tom outside the window, and tales of womanly betrayals past -- is one reason that Violent Saturday remains a bit of a B sleeper in movie history, I'd say.

And by the way, though Lee Marvin seems like a rather nervous, regular guy in his pajamas, elsewhere in the movie, he steps on a boy's hand and crushes it (for reaching for his Benzedrine inhaler on the sidewalk) and during the bank robbery itself,he goes "mad dog" (ala Michael Madsen's Mr. Blonde in Reservoir Dogs) and shoots to kill.

..which makes his after-bedtime puttering around all the more bizarre.