Christopher Knight got fifteen minutes of fame portraying the title character in this Irish-based, coming-of-age melodrama. It's expectantly episodic, and overplayed by all. The unnerving urge to rise from lower to middle-class by our puzzled pilgrim is rightly discomforting, and the cryptic finale seems to suggest it is the inevitable punishment of all dumb, working-class studs to listen to their priests and find a wife, have a family, and pursue monotonous, middle-class monogamy. The only thing of interest in the film are the fates of Stud's pool-hall cronies (one of which is an engaging Jack Nicholson). A ludicrous product of its time, albeit with a stirring, early music score by Jerry Goldsmith.
Review of Studs Lonigan
Studs Lonigan
(1960)
Philip Yordan's crass version of the Farrell trilogy
20 August 2011
Warning: Spoilers