Movies - Nightmare Alley

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	Movies - Nightmare Alley

Nightmare Alley is a 20th Century Fox film noir released in 1947. The movie rights for the 1946 novel of the same name, written by William Lindsay Gresham, were bought by actor Tyrone Power who planned on starring in the film. Power was attempting to expand his limited range playing romantic swashbuckler types in movies by playing the unsavory lead, "The Great Stanton". To make the film look believable, the films producers built a full working carnival on 10 acres (40,000 m²) of the 20th Century Fox back lot. They also hired over 100 sideshow attractions and carnival men in an attempt to make the film look authentic.

Plot

The movie follows the rise and fall of a con man—a story that begins and ends at a seedy traveling carnival. The fallen carny suffers the ultimate degradation: he finds himself playing the geek in a sideshow.

Critical reaction

In 1947, Time Magazine film writer James Agee found the film's cynical humor and sharp social observation praise-worthy while Variety found it both grimly realistic and horrifyingly fantastic.

Today, the film receives mostly positive reviews. A 2000 review of the film in the Village Voice, writer J. Hoberman commented "This 1947 account of an archetypal American's rise and fall is neither a great movie nor even a classic noir but it has a great ambition to be daring and, once seen, is not easily forgotten. The movie suggested far more than it showed but what it showed, including the climactic degradation of 20th Century Fox's then-major star Tyrone Power, was remarkably sordid for so high-profile a release."

Also in 2000, New York Times reviewer Elvis Mitchell praises normally stiff leading man Power "The vivid, hard-boiled dialogue of Alley,... allows Power to use his charm ruthlessly. Here the actor traded on the public perception of him as a handsome wind-up hero to play a calm opportunist. Like Tom Cruise
, Power started his career as a sleek hood ornament who made his way through the movies on his charisma and good looks. And like Mr. Cruise, he learned to act, using his career as on-the-job training."

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