I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

This is vintage Tony Curtis when he acted in notable films like "Sweet Smell of Success" with Burt Lancaster and "The Defiant Ones" with Sidney Poitier, and this is perhaps the best of them. It all happens in San Francisco, when a Catholic priest is brutally murdered by getting knifed in the back, and immediately the mystery arises: whoever would want to do so such a thing to a priest who was beloved by all? And there are no clues to the mystery whatsoever. Tony Curtis is a cop and has been raised as a an orphan by the murdered priest, he carries the coffin at the farewell service and there meets a fellow Italian who appears to be burning in hell. Curtis immediately gets a hunch, the faintest of leads by a mere feeling, and lays down his badge to start a private investigation of his own.What follows is a Dostoievskian psychological drama. Gabriel Roland plays the Italian father who welcomes Curtis as one of the family, and he finds happiness and even a perfect fiancée in the family (Marisa Pavan, like another Natalie Wood as the West Side Story Maria). The character and development of this film is very much like Edward Dmytryk's "Give Us This Day" about Italian immigrants in Brooklyn 1929, but this is more interesting psychologically. The crisis is inevitable, which breaks out into a total tragedy - which proves to have been the only happy solution.It's a tremendous film, and it will remain actual forever and of as lasting an interest as any Dostoievsky novel.

While "The Midnight Story" is not among Tony Curtis' more famous films, it is among his better films. The fact that it's a story told without spectacle (such as in "The Vikings") might just account for it being lesser-known...but it deserves to be seen and appreciated.Joe Martini (Curtis) is a cop who is incredibly upset following the brutal murder of a local priest. This kindly man had helped Joe when he lost his family and Joe is determined to investigate the murder on his own when the detectives can find no leads. So he takes a leave of absence and follows up his one very tenuous lead...a man he saw at the funeral who seemed more affected by the priest's death than anyone else. So, Joe befriends Sylvio (Gilbert Roland) and tries to slowly and casually investigate Sylvio's actions the night of the murder. However, something unexpected happens...Sylvio is so taken with his new 'friend' that he invites Joe to live with him and his family. Now, Joe's in a bind...as he's practically family with the man who MIGHT have killed the priest!The acting is very good in this one and Gilbert Roland and Tony Curtis put in really nice performances. Additionally, the story is well written--with a dandy finale. Well worth your time.

Noir films don't come much better than this modest little 'B' thriller from 1957. Every department is in top form - casting, direction, acting, locations, photography - even the music. A youthful-looking Tony Curtis plays an (ex-)cop on the trail of the killer of his boyhood-idol priest, with Gilbert Roland (outwardly, a calm, assured typical San Franciscan Italian family member) his chief suspect. Curtis moves in with the family, then spends almost the entire film veering wildly between believing Roland totally innocent or guilty, producing all sorts of wild mood swings & unstable behaviour in him (Curtis). The final dramatic scene in Roland's store-hut will have you riveted to your seat! Like other reviewers, I recommend this movie wholeheartedly, although currently (January, 2015), it is not officially available on DVD.

In an unusually deep performance, Curtis plays a cop who goes undercover to try to find a priest's murderer. At times, the story seems to teeter on the precipice of turgid melodrama, but Curtis and Roland are always there to right the course. Roland is magnificent as the Italian patriarch whose family Curtis invades. The painstaking attention that the film gives the Italian neighborhood and its collective perspectives pays handsome dividends. Worth a look.