The Sound of Anger (1968 TV Movie) User Reviews (2)

I Remember It So It Must Be Memorable

[jimtheven · 8/10 · 12 June 2002]

I have a special fondness for those great TV movies of the late 60s and early 70s which actually had original plots and fully developed characters. (The Plug-in-the-B List-Actress into the True Crime or Medical Drama Syndrome began later.)I can get pretty nostalgic about them, probably because it's unlikely I'll ever see them again. The snows of yesteryear... Because they are kind of obscure yet memorable in the best sense of the word it's fun to list and describe some of them with fellow TV and movie fans when you're just hanging out, with beers on the patio on a summer night... "I LOVED that one! It was on, like, every Wednesday night on the Late Show until 1978!" Much more fun than analyzing Nick Ray's use of POV...

THE SOUND OF ANGER, a crime drama about a young couple accused of cutting wires or something to cause the crash of the girl's disapproving (and very wealthy) father's private plane, was one of the best. I must have seen it five times. I think it WAS on every Wednesday night in the 70s. It's been too long for me to critique the performances or the film editing: What has stayed with me is its unusually trenchant and realistic (for TV anyway)view of the Jury System, in which the Quest for Truth can get lost in the shuffle of petty local politics. Also, the sun-baked dreariness of the desert locale. The twist ending (is it a POSSIBLE SPOILER even to say there's a twist ending? Somehow, I don't think it'll matter much to anyone in this case...)is a beauty.

A Landmark TV Movie

[mackduff · 10/10 · 15 December 2007]

"The Sound of Anger"'s shooting title was "The Adversarys" and was a pilot for a series which eventually became "The Bold Ones". The only character, in the proposed continuing cast, to make it to the series was Burl Ives.

It was the first TV Movie based on a true story and had the nerve to take a swipe at right wing politics controlling the justice system in Orange County which is referred to in the film as "Citrus County".

The Roy Hugins script is smart and involving. Michael Richy's direction and editing is inventive and exciting. The sound, photography and music are a 10.

Burl Ives is wonderful and David Macklin and Linda Day George make a terrific MacBeth like couple. Macklin has a strident scene near the end that really scores.

This film is still fresh and cogent today.