Heat of Anger (TV Movie 1972) Poster

(1972 TV Movie)

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6/10
His Own Worst Enemy
bkoganbing26 February 2011
Although Susan Hayward is good in anything she does and she's been in a few films that were less than classics, she does all right in this film, Heat Of Anger. In this Hayward is at her professional best as an attorney going into practice with nephew James Stacy.

Her first client is contractor Lee J. Cobb who is accused of murder when a man falls off a steel girder at a job Cobb was bossing. As Cobb was the only other one on the girder he gets arrested for murder. That and the fact that Cobb is known as a roughneck helps put him in a jackpot.

The ending is strictly on a minor key, the solution is a simple one that I won't reveal, but let's say Cobb is his own worst enemy.

This was one of two made for television films that Hayward did at the end of her career. The second, Say Goodbye Maggie Cole is far better than Heat Of Anger. This one is all right though.

Ironically both Cobb and Hayward would be gone in three years and Stacy had his career cut short in a bad motorcycle accident where he became a multiple amputee.

This might have been a good TV series.
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9/10
Susan Hayward The Only Actress in Academy History toGet A Curtain Call After Her Oscar Win
adventure-219039 November 2019
Susan Hayward was a fundamental star of the movie industry for 30 years branching out into television was a logical step.

Ms. Hayward inherited this role from another great actress Barbara Stanwyck who fell ill and in fact and one legendary exchange Miss Hayward sent a dozen roses to Ms. Stanwyck " from one 'Brooklyn broad to another"

Susan Hayward is very fine in this realm and co-starts with attractive James Stacy*; this would've been a good television series.

Ms. Hayward's early death deprived us of many years of fine work. Note that Ms. Hayward was Greta Garbo's favorite actress. Katherine Hepburn made personal visits to Susan's home as she lay dying of brain cancer. Stanwyck was a friend as was Roz Russe, Loretta Young , Paulette Goddard Joan Fontaine, Olivia to Haviland , Heddy Lamar. Hayward worked with the great male stars of the era Clark Gable, John Wayne Gary Cooper Gregory Peck, Richard Wilmark, close friend William Holden, nd her most attractive co star John Gavin in the great "Back Street" Hearing of Susan's death, Syanwyck sent flowers "From One Brooklyn Broad To Another"

Years after her death someone placed an unsigned notice in Variety re Hayward " A Star Is A Star Is A Star"

Susan is the only actress in Academy Award history to get a curtain call for her Oscar winning, shattering performance in O Want To Live

RIP Susan. Hayward

*Stacy once married to Connie Stevens had a great Western :"Lancer" and was slated to be a big star. Stacy lost an arm and a leg in a motorcycle accident and then went to Prison for a few years. Sad.
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5/10
Mundane TV drama brightened by Hayward and Cobb
mls41822 December 2021
Susan Hayward gives her all in this little movie. She's great and looks wonderful. Poor Lee J. Cobb looks very ill and would also pass a few years later.

This was the last project Stacey worked on before his horrific motorcycle accident. Strangely, the character who is killed in this movie was a daredevil who loved motorcycles.

This is worth a watch. An entertaining time capsule.
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5/10
Once again, a red-headed lioness commands as she roars.
mark.waltz25 June 2020
Warning: Spoilers
Of the two TV movies that the Oscar Winning Susan Hayward made in her last year on screen, the possibility that one would be picked up as a series was sadly ended by the fatal illness that would take her two years later. "Say Goodbye Maggie Cole" is the much better of the two films, and in that one, she's a kind-hearted, no-nonsense doctor. Here, she's a high end attorney, easy going enough to work in the gardens with the hired help, but a bear in the courtroom if the case calls for it. This was initially planned for Barbara Stanwyck who had to bow out due to her own illness, and Hayward took the part so the movie wouldn't be shelved. What results is a complex, interesting case that is flawed because of some technical decisions that may have seen unique in choice but in reflection nearly 50 years later seem a bad decision.

Hayward is assigned to defend powerful Lee J. Cobb, a wealthy contractor who rules his company and family with an iron thumb. Upset of the fact that his daughter (Jennifer Penney) is involved with the married Ray Sims, Cobb confronts him high up on a construction site, and Sims ends up dead. Hayward is seen questioning various witnesses, and then ends up in court where she presents the prosecutor, Fritz Weaver, with a tough case. Among the witnesses are Cobb's elderly old schoolteacher (a lovable Lucille Benson) and Sim's widow (a young Tyne Daly), and there are also moments with Cobb's long-suffering wife, Bettye Ackerman. The problem isn't with the actors or even the script, but with the execution of the film, using bizarre freeze frame flashbacks to things that happened either months before or moments before, and various characters are speaking as those flashbacks occur. That makes this a very strange film visually, but Hayward rises above the film's flaws to create a memorable leading character who is commanding indeed.
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2/10
Really only for Susan Hayward fans
HotToastyRag12 August 2018
If you think Susan Hayward can pull off being a lawyer, by all means, go out and rent Heat of Anger. She's one of my favorite actresses, but I just couldn't imagine her with that much intelligence, keeping her temper down, and putting together logical arguments in front of a jury. And, now that I've seen the movie, I still can't.

Lee J. Cobb has been accused of murdering his daughter's married boyfriend, and since he can't remember what happened at the time of the murder, he's not much help to his lawyers, Susan Hayward and James Stacy. Throughout the course of the movie, Susan and James work to put together the pieces and find out everyone's secrets. Unlike many courtroom dramas that are actually entertaining, this one has no surprises, uninspired dialogue, and the star power behind the cast isn't enough to save it. Only die-hard fans of Susan Hayward are going to sit through this one. The only consolation is how pretty she looks, but since she always looks pretty, that's not really a reason to watch it.
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