Bigger Than Life

+ intro by Geoff Andrew, Programmer at Large

James Mason is superb in Ray’s powerful expressionist melodrama about a middle-class teacher monstrously transformed by the side-effects of cortisone.

  • Director

    Nicholas Ray

  • With

    James Mason, Barbara Rush, Walter Matthau, Christopher Olsen

  • USA 1956. 95min

  • Digital

  • Certificate

    12A

Prescribed cortisone for a dangerous medical condition, a middle-class teacher (Mason) becomes addicted to the new drug and his character – not to mention his attitude to the world around him, including his son – changes dramatically. Ray’s extraordinary blend of social critique, domestic melodrama and expressionist suspense benefits from a superb lead performance, memorably eloquent compositions in ‘Scope and colour, and a sharp, provocative script.

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