The Juggler (1953)

Director:

Edward Dmytryk

Writers:

Michael Blankfort (novel)
Michael Blankfort (screenplay)

Release Date:

5 May 1953 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | War

Plot:

Hans Muller is a Jewish refugee from Germany. Relocating to Israel after World War II, he can not overcome the psychological effects of the war...

Plot Keywords:

New Country | Chase | Daughter | Concentration Camp | 1940s

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Kirk Douglas	...	Hans Muller
Milly Vitale	...	Ya'El
Paul Stewart	...	Detective Karni
Joseph Walsh	...	Yehoshua Bresler (as Joey Walsh)
Alf Kjellin	...	Daniel
Beverly Washburn	...	Susy
Charles Lane	...	Rosenberg
John Banner	...	Emile Halevy
Richard Benedict	...	Police Officer Kogan
Oskar Karlweis	...	Willy Schmidt
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Ralph Moody	...	Mukhtar (scenes deleted)
Marlene Aames	...	Hannah (uncredited)
Jay Adler	...	Susy's Father (uncredited)
Hannelore Axman	...	Telephone Girl (uncredited)
John Bleifer	...	Mordecai (uncredited)
Robert Boon	...	Samuel (uncredited)
Donna Jo Boyce	...	Daughter (uncredited)
Gabriel Curtiz	...	Doctor in hospital (uncredited)
Al Eben	...	Policeman (uncredited)
Gregory Gaye	...	Harry (uncredited)
Greta Granstedt	...	Carah (uncredited)
Carol Heath	...	Daughter (uncredited)
Teddy Infuhr	...	School boy (uncredited)
Dave Kashner	...	(uncredited)
Jack Mannick	...	Tower Man (uncredited)
Michael Mark	...	Old Man showing photo of his son (uncredited)
John Maxwell	...	Registration Official at Haifa (uncredited)
Shepard Menken	...	Dr. Traube (uncredited)
Esther Michelson	...	Woman on bus (uncredited)
Mort Mills	...	Policeman (uncredited)
Leo Mostovoy	...	Old Man in Barracks 9 (uncredited)
Kasia Orzazewski	...	Grandma (uncredited)
Lester Sharpe	...	Refugee Arriving at Haifa by Bus (uncredited)
Lia Thomas	...	Shirah (uncredited)
Carlo Tricoli	...	Old Man in Barracks 9 (uncredited)
Ernö Verebes	...	Official (uncredited)
Kaaren Verne	...	Woman whom Hans mistakes for his Wife (uncredited)
Harlan Warde	...	Police Official (uncredited)

Directed by
Edward Dmytryk

Writing credits
Michael Blankfort		(novel)
Michael Blankfort		(screenplay)

Produced by
Michael Blankfort	....	associate producer
Stanley Kramer	....	producer

Original Music by
George Antheil

Cinematography by
J. Roy Hunt		(as Roy Hunt)

Film Editing by
Harry W. Gerstad
Aaron Stell

Production Design by
Rudolph Sternad

Art Direction by
Robert Peterson

Set Decoration by
Frank Tuttle

Production Management
Clem Beauchamp	....	production manager

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Carter De Haven Jr.	....	assistant director
Irving J. Moore	....	assistant director

Sound Department
Lodge Cunningham	....	sound engineer

Music Department
Arthur Morton	....	orchestrator
Morris Stoloff	....	musical director

Other crew
David Anderman	....	technical advisor

Production Companies

• Stanley Kramer Productions

Distributors

• Columbia Pictures (1953) (USA) (theatrical)
• Columbia Pictures Corporation (1953) (UK) (theatrical)
• Columbia Film Aktiebolag (1953) (Sweden) (theatrical)
• Consorzio Cinematografico (1953) (Italy) (theatrical)
• Columbia Pictures de Cuba (1953) (Cuba) (theatrical)
• Christiaan van der Ree (1953) (Venezuela) (theatrical)
• Columbia Film-Verleih (1960) (West Germany) (theatrical)

Runtime:

84 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

West Germany:12 (f) | USA:Passed (National Board of Review) | Finland:K-16 | USA:Approved (PCA #16277) | Sweden:15

Filming Locations:

Haifa, Israel

Company:

Stanley Kramer Productions

Movie Connections:

Featured in ... A Father... A Son... Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2005) (TV)

The juggler and the juggled

One of Kirk Douglas' more intense performances,it is a pity that this movie should remain a buried treasure.

"Surviving the horror" could be another title for "the juggler" .A Jew ,who has lost all his family and who has known the concentration camps comes back to the promised land in 1949.Life during WW2 camps has often been described,but life AFTER the nightmare is a subject which has rarely been told in movies with a few exceptions ("die Morder sind unter uns ":Susanne's character and "Exodus": the young man played by Sal Mineo).But never as successfully as here.

Hans cannot forget.His psyche is shot."I'm the juggler and the juggled" . He tries to find back his dear departed although he knows they were killed.He suffers from claustrophobia and Douglas makes us FEEL his disease (the film owes a great deal to this extraordinary actor),and every time he sees men in uniform ,he thinks of his torturers.

Admirable sequences: Douglas in the desert town ,with all these walls which imprison him ,and those men around who are threats .The minefield where the distraught man and his young pal are rescued by their fellow men who form a human chain.

In his absorbing memoirs,Douglas wrote that he once helped Dmytryk who was one of the Unfriendly Tens .But when they made "the juggler" ,the director acted as if they had never met.Douglas thought he was ashamed for having been an informer.But he did not judge him at all.What would I have done if I had been in his shoes ? he wrote.

Many films might suggest that Dmytryk was suffering from of a strong guilty feeling: "the sniper" with his burned arm,José Ferrer's arm in a sling in "Caine Mutiny" .And in this film ,Douglas "gagging" his arm-mouth ,or covering it to hide his tattooed number.

I agree with all the precedent users.A film which must be restored to favor.