Wow, what a surprise. Regardless of what I expected, here is what I got...confusion, claustrophobia, tour de force acting, laughs, intrigue, action, and yes...arousal...the arousal coming from the talky kissing scenes involving the very sexy Terry Moore and her scientist boyfriend. One just wants to push him aside and take over where he started. Goofy plot, where virtually every customer in this diner seems to be somehow involved with spying. Especially puzzling is comparing the very Americany, bad boy, fun loving persona of Lee Marvin, to that of his eventually revealed, anti everything American spy. But then again, I've never met a spy. Maybe they're all fun like that! Or maybe I've seen too many 'normal' spy movies. Still, one has to see this performance by a young Marvin. He absolutely makes it clear that as an actor, he has always had it. Even as a very young man, he still has that 'voice' and can be very scary at times. While watching this movie, I found myself thinking, that when Marvin was a fighting marine in real life on those Japanese held islands, his fox hole buddies must have felt pretty safe with him around. Just a strong, strong presence. Best thing about this movie is the racy dialogue, which is mostly very believable, and truly has you wondering what they are going to say next, while trying to figure out the depth of the relationships between the main characters. Can't believe I have never heard of this movie. It's a good one.

This is one not to take seriously. I saw it a few yeas ago, but when it first came out, I missed it because I thought it was some sort of sexploitation film.There is this greasy-spoon diner near a military facility, and those at the diner may or not be involved in either espionage or counterespionage. Just what's going on is a tad murky.I can't say the film is a "must see," but I feel enriched for having seen it.(Spoiler) Some of the dialogue is priceless. My favorite is when Slob is advised, "Get back to your greasy griddle, Slob." In context, that alone is worth viewing the film.

I find it tremendously rewarding to see all these enthusiastic comments about this movie here on the IMDb. This is a film that no-one ever seems to have heard of, and it's a guilty pleasure in every way. It makes NO sense, it is essentially claustrophobically confined to one cheap set within which a stream of unlikely characters played by great quirky actors parades by. There is no narrative structure at all, and you're not even sure what the point is by the end, but thanks especially to Lee Marvin and Keenan Wynn, you're fascinated all along the way. I haven't seen it in years now (something happened to my videotape of it, recorded off of TNT many years ago), but I'd consider it one of my favorite movies on the basis of the fact that I could watch it over and over and always find it satisfying.It's hard to recommend it for any rational reason, and yet I'd urge any film buff with even a tiny sense of the absurd to watch it some time before you die. You'll never see anything remotely like it, for good reason. But it gives you faith in the concept that just about anything can get produced, if you only believe strongly enough.....

The movie starts out with a real cool jazzy score like something you would expect from a movie like "The Gene Krupa Story. The opening scene has Kotty, Terry Moore, lying on the beach getting sun and surf until Slob, Lee Marvin, who notices her from a distance starts getting fresh with her and ends up getting a couple of seashells thrown at him. You don't really know what the movie is about until the professor, Frank Lovejoy,comes on the scene and from him talking to Knotty you realize that he's working at a top secret government facility just up the road from the diner where Knotty and Slob work.The movie goes along it's somewhat comical pace with Slob acting like Ed Norton in "the Honeymooners" messing up everything that he does as a cook at the diner until we see the person delivering fish and Slob start whispering with him out of earshot of the diners owner George, Keenan Wynn, and then the fisherman slips Slob something . Later Slob all by himself in his room begins to take on a new look, not kooky and funny but dead serious, as we see him take what the fisherman gave him and put it into a viewfinder. Slob sees some kind of mathematical formula and it's then when you realize that this is a story about espionage.Not really as corny and obnoxious as most movies about the Communist threat against America was back then in the 1950's with Lee Marvin stealing every scene that he's in as the greasy cook turned top Soviet spy and being very convincing at it. Frank Lovejoy in a role very similar to his previous Communist fighting movie "I was a Communist for the FBI" is also very convincing as a man torn between the truth and a lie by trying to infiltrate the Communist spy ring led by Slob. Where at the same time not being able to tell his girlfriend, Knotty, who thinks that he's a spy for the Soviets, without blowing his cover. Terry Moore was very good as a naive girl who learned a lot during the movie about who to trust and who not to. Like in the espionage business all that you see is not what you think. All and all a much better movie about espionage during the cold war then most movies about the subject were back them with a great performance by Lee Marvin, one of his best. "Shack out at 101" sadly showed that in those troubled times the paranoia that griped the USA was so extreme that you couldn't trust anyone when it came to being a Communist spy. Even the cook serving you coffee and apple pie at your neighborhood diner.