Fourteen Hours

Fourteen Hours (1951)

A new element in screen suspense

A young man, morally destroyed by his parents not loving him and by the fear of being not capable to make his girlfriend happy, rises on the ledge of a building with the intention of committing suicide. A policeman makes every effort to argue him out of it.

Date of release
1951-04-01
TMDB
7.2 / 10 (54)
Runtime
1h 32m
Genres
Drama, Thriller
Director
Henry Hathaway

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Awards: 1 · Nominations: 1. Including: National Board of Review: Top Ten Films

Fourteen Hours is a 1951 American drama directed by Henry Hathaway that tells the story of a New York City police officer trying to stop a despondent man from jumping to his death from the 15th floor of a hotel.

Production

Although the onscreen credits contain a statement saying that the film and characters depicted were "entirely fictional," the film was based on the suicide of John William Warde, a 26-year-old man who jumped from the 17th floor of the Gotham Hotel in Manhattan on July 26, 1938 after 14 hours on a ledge. The character of Charlie Dunnigan was based on Charles V. Glasco, a policeman who tried to convince Warde to return to the safety of the hotel.

Writer Joel Sayre wrote about the Warde suicide in an April 16, 1949 article in The New Yorker titled "That Was New York: The Man on the Ledge". The story was purchased by Twentieth Century-Fox in April 1949 and the studio assigned Sol C. Siegel to produce the film. In August 1949, the studio announced that the team of James Gow and Arnaud d'Usseau would write the script.

In the film's original ending, Cosick falls to his death (as did John Warde in the real-life incident). However, on July 17, 1950, Fox president Spyros Skouras's 23-year-old daughter Chickie fell to her death from the roof of the Fox West Coast Building. Although authorities were unsure whether the fall was accidental, the woman had recently been treated for mental illness.

The story was originally purchased as a vehicle for Richard Widmark, with Robert Wagner to play the role of Danny, the young man in the couple. The role of Cosick was awarded to Richard Basehart, who had achieved stage fame in The Hasty Heart and had just signed a long-term contract with Fox. Paul Douglas was announced for the role of Dunnigan as early as August 1949.

Howard Hawks refused to direct the film because of its subject matter and was only interested in directing if the script could be converted into a Cary Grant comedy, but Twentieth Century-Fox declined. Henry Hathaway was assigned to the project in April 1950.

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