Crisis (1950)

A renowned American brain surgeon (Cary Grant) is on a vacation with his wife (Paula Raymond) in a Latin American country. But political tensions and a brewing revolution of its people against their dictator (Jose Ferrer) cause them to change their plans and leave the country. But they are forcibly detained and taken to the presidential palace where the doctor is ordered to perform delicate surgery on the dictator in order to save his life. But anti-government factions, lead by Gilbert Roland, threaten to kill his wife unless he allows the tyrant to die during surgery. The directorial film debut of screenwriter Richard Brooks (ELMER GANTRY), this is a taut compact thriller with Cary Grant in a very different kind of role. Perhaps politically simplistic, it nevertheless casts a cynical eye on both tyrants and revolutionaries, each cut from opposite ends of the same cloth. Grant shows that he could do more than just be debonair and charming and Brooks admirably restrains Ferrer's tendency to ham. The score by Miklos Rozsa is mostly a solo guitar by the Spanish guitarist Vicente Gomez. With Signe Hasso (very good as the Lady MacBeth-ish wife of Ferrer), Leon Ames and Ramon Novarro.