Movies - Walk on the Wild Side

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	Movies - Walk on the Wild Side

Walk on the Wild Side is a novel by Nelson Algren, best known today by way of a 1962 film of the same name directed by Edward Dmytryk. Despite its scandalous story, "Walk on the Wild Side", the title song of the film, has become something of a gospel standard.

The film had a star-studded cast, including Laurence Harvey, Capucine (Germaine Lefebvre), Jane Fonda (in one of her first roles, age 24), Anne Baxter, and Barbara Stanwyck. Nonetheless, it was not well-received at the time. When it premiered, Bosley Crowther of the New York Times called it a "lurid, tawdry, and sleazy melodrama."

Set in New Orleans, the story centers around a naive young man (Dove Linkhorn, played in the film by Harvey) who finds himself in a milieu of far more sophisticated women, including Hallie Gerard (played in the film by Capucine). Hallie is a prostitute. When Dove becomes aware of this, he decides it is his mission to "rescue" her. It is said neither Harvey nor Capucine found the other at all appealing. IMDB reports that "Capucine objected to filming kissing scenes with Laurence Harvey, feeling that he was not manly enough for her. Harvey reportedly replied, 'Perhaps if you were more of a woman, I would be more of a man. Honey, kissing you is like kissing the side of a beer bottle.'"

Algren noted, "The book asks why lost people sometimes develop into greater human beings than those who have never been lost in their whole lives."

In the 2001 documentary Classic Albums: Lou Reed: Transformer, musician Lou Reed says that Algren's 1956 novel was the launching off point for his song, "Walk on the Wild Side".

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Movies - Walk on the Wild Side

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