The Yellow Canary ** (1963, Pat Boone, Barbara Eden, Steve Forrest, Jack Klugman) – Classic Movie Review 13,691

The 1963 American thriller film Yellow Canary stars Pat Boone, Barbara Eden, Steve Forrest, and Jack Klugman.

Director Buzz Kulik’s 1963 American thriller film The Yellow Canary is a middling-to-adequate murder mystery, in which Pat Boone is on shaky ground as Andy Paxton, an odious singer unpleasant to his estranged wife (Barbara Eden), who goes good when his baby son is abducted by a killer and he tracks him down.

Highly competent director Buzz Kulik stirs up just a modicum of style and tension, but far, far more are needed, and the three main star cast’s performances are very ordinary. However, the always reliable Jack Klugman helps out greatly as the police officer on the case, Lieutenant Bonner.

Also notably aboard are Milton Selzer as Vecchio, Jeff Corey as Joe Pyle, Harold Gould as Ponelli and John Banner as Skolman. So it is yet another case of character actors at the defence of the stars. They weren’t called supporting actors for nothing, though they may have got paid for nothing, at least compared to the star names.

The screenplay, better on dialogue than plotting, is written by Rod Serling, based on Whit Masterson’s novel Evil Come, Evil Go. Whit Masterson also wrote the 1956 novel Badge of Evil that was the basis for Orson Welles’s 1958 film Touch of Evil.

Also on the plus side, Floyd Crosby’s black and white CinemaScope photography is quite dazzling, and Kenyon Hopkins’s jazz score glorious. So the film definitely has its moments and its points of interest. Its low-budget, B-movie vibe is also on it side.

Cast: Pat Boone, Barbara Eden, Steve Forrest, Jack Klugman, Jesse White, John Banner, Jeff Corey, Milton Seltzer, Harold Gould, Steve Harris, Jo Helton, Joe Turkel, Charles Keane, Vici Raaf.

The Yellow Canary is directed by Buzz Kulik, runs 93 minutes, is made by Cooga Mooga Productions, is released by 20th Century Fox, is written by Rod Serling, is shot by Floyd Crosby, is produced by Robert L Lippert and Maury Dexter, is scored by Kenyon Hopkins, and is designed by Walter M Simonds.

© Derek Winnert 2025 – Classic Movie Review 13,691

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