Directed by Edward Dmytryk. Written by John Fante and Edmund Morris
Walk On The Wild Side features loves unrequited or unfulfilled and both kinds sting. They become tragic when those who feel the brood are people who’ve shown themselves capable of loving others for who they are without demands and reservations. In an ideal world, it’d be a simple embrace of happiness for all involved, but not so in Dmytryk’s movie, where life, twists of fate, and the actions of evildoers get in the way.
Laurence Harvey is Dove Linkhorn, standing thumb-out at the side of the road in Texas. He’s headed for Louisiana with a singular purpose: reunite with Hallie, the love of his life. Harvey’s slender physique is like an arrow, and true to his body, he has a one-track mind. He had to let Hallie go once, and he won’t make the same mistake, so when a teen runaway (Jane Fonda, full of moxie) makes her move, he brushes her off, and later, when a kind, maternal diner owner (Anne Baxter) makes a similar, albeit more wholesome proposition, he’s still steadfast.
What he doesn’t know is that Hallie is in New Orleans, where she works as a sex worker at a high-end establishment overseen by the stern Jo (Barbara Stanwyck, formidable). The road blocks pile up: will her work change Dove’s mind? Will Hallie’s internalized shame? Or will Jo not take kindly to the possibility of Hallie running out on her to be with Dove?
There’s plenty of opportunity for drama in this story about the tragedy of circumstances in life and love, and Dmytryk leans into it. While not oversteering, its story certainly verges on slipping into melodrama, but the performances pull it in other directions, adding grit and sensibility. Harvey’s Dove is as undramatic as they come, a tall, quiet type whose unnatural stoicism and resolve lend things a certain gravitas, and the ability to watch him work things out in his mind in real time makes everything a little more earthbound.
Fonda provides spark as a juvenile hellraiser who’ll be damned if she lets anyone get one over on her. She’s there for upheaval and comedy, providing both as a brash young woman living in a way she shouldn’t. Capucine as Hallie, shimmers as a woman of grace, intelligence and self-possession who somehow wants the worst for herself.
It’s the central performances that keep Walk On The Wild Side together as it moves through its otherwise familiar story of no-gooders and do-gooders. Fante and Morris’ script, based on Nelson Algren’s novel, has some cracking scenes that you want more of, revealing the agony that drives some of the movie’s characters. Giving time to realize every major character, even the unsympathetic ones, is an attempt at holistic screenwriting that elevates what could be predictable and mundane otherwise.
Walk On The Wild Side succeeds because of it. Its dialogue of fraught exchanges that want to explore rather than preach on human existence ties it all down and makes it feel like more of a genuine drama than a plot summary might suggest. Credit is due to Dmytryk as well, whose direction lets performances and interplay take center stage. It allows everything to still feel cohesive and impactful when the pulp of its plot threatens to gum up the works, going as far as to leave it with the potential for a teary conclusion that doesn’t feel cheap.
Mikkel Frederiksen 