Iloved this movie at the time. it seemed to be about real life in the USA and there weren't many movies like it at that time. The leads;Garfield and Palmer were superb,the former a graduate of Yiddish theatre, the latter a refugee from Hitler's Europe. the melodramatic roots were there from which 'the method' later grew, with performers like Brando, Dean and Poitier portraying the wounded and suffering hero.(Did Mel see this movie?} it also anteceded 'Marty' the quintessential realist U.S.struggling migrant antihero movie Where are you Paddy Chayevsky now that we need you? Perhaps what was most striking were the heroes who spoke articulately using words of more than two syllables, reaching its acme in 'Streetcar named desire' where Brando's character refers to 'The Napoleonic code' when he rages about his sister-in-law's possessions. Was the subversive element the depiction of working class heroes who could reason? and whose language had a poetic,almost Shakespearian ring to it? No longer the inarticulate (Tarzanic brute) but someone who could debate issues in the corridors of power: a noble and sexually attractive savage?