Town without Pity

[JadeTomZ]

one of the all time great recordings...you can feel the fight...between good and evil

[jimbowie09]

I liked it. Thanks for the entertainment.

[zaranine]

OLD IS GOLD  !!!! this song is one of the most beautiful from the 50's ! this music is just so sexy ^^ at 1 min 57 ! awesome!

[issurchaim]

love diane varsi

[fossefan]

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: "Ours is not an easy age/we're like tigers in a cage" is one hell of a metaphor.

[Billysues]

I love this song. Makes me want to learn the tango! It's sexy! Lets dance!

[Muirmaiden]

Susan Kohner and George Hamilton were engaged briefly during the times they costarred together in films (they played brother and sister in "All The Fine Young Cannibals" co-starring Natalie Wood). I love these types of films - great song choice too!

[WALTERBROADDUS]

The video has nothing to do with the film. Boooooo!

[homosapiens1960]

Ms. L,

You know your old films. Very nice selection and editing.

[denny49511]

Best song ever by Gene!!! 

[baginamonolog]

Winnipeeegggg!!!

[palatinesouth]

WONDErFUL!

[OlRetro]

Excellent video concept for this classic song. Very well done!  Regards, '62 Mathew St. (Total Retro Rock)

[oldblueeyesuk]

gene,s best song ever

[Alikeforguns]

LETS HAVE RESPECT FOR PITNEY, AND NOT TALK ABOUT STUPID GAY SURVEYS ! PITNEY PROBABLY WOULD THINK YOUR GAY ! RIP PITNEY, YOU WERE THA BEST, HANDS DOWN ! NO 1 ELSE COMPARES !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IF NO 1 EVER DOES, I WILL BUMP YOUR MUSIC VERY LOUD IN MY CAR, FOR EVERYONE TO HERE AND REMEMBER !!! YOU WERE MY FAVORITE SINGER...!

[2009Denisem]

Timeless Classic & Masterpiece...Love it! What a PITY they DO NOT make music like this NO MORE!!!!

Thank you laylacalif for posting a great classic and memory

[tman12563]

They had so much class in those days. Look at the clothes, hairstyles and the passionate acting.

[edwardjames50]

I've loved this song since I was a kid, and you've added clips from some of my favorite movies into the mix. superb job!

[naid1111]

SUPERRRR!!!

[OrigNeedlzSWDetroit]

Nice montage. I always thought that Susan Kohner and Natalie Wood could pass as siblings.

[ChrisCurtisFan]

I loved the 'weepy soap opera movies' from the 50's. Different strokes for different folks! :-) Gene Pitney had a perfect voice for this genre!

[bobaloo47]

LOVE IT

[44skins]

Freakin great song man,.....freakin ledendary is much more like it!!!!!!!

[reliablebow]

Natalie Wood...Now there is a Woman!

Great song!

[kickassfan]

precious

[zaranine]

this song is amazing i've listen it all night long! i'v dance too. awesome moment old is gold.

[solodiego90]

I wachted a very sad movie in 60 year, with Christen Kaufman perfermer a young was girl who was raped and killed. This song at the end

[TunnelRat6667]

It was from the movie of the same name -"Town Without Pity"-and was released in 1961. I don't know why it's hardly ever shown on TV (TCM....are you listening?), but I always liked it, & thought it was a very powerful and well-acted movie. Amoung the outstanding cast in it were Kirk Douglas, E. G. Marshall, Frank Sutton, Richard Jaeckel and Robert Blake; outstanding in the role of a young, naive and disturbed Soldier. Blake was around 28 years old at the time of this films release.

[swertman1]

You did a great job on the video, I love all these movies, with this song. There was a movie called "A town without pity" which used this song also. Thanks for the memories.

[LADYSEASTAR]

What a great song... just like the movie

it was featured in - sad ending, but it

was incredible! Love ya, Gene!

Robert Blake was in that movie, too.

Interesting, huh?

[bon1042]

I have By Love Possessed on VHS, bought lots of classics 30's thru 60's on Ebay and Hollywood Video. Great for my cozy retirement. A quality VHS is better than most DVD transfers. Don't care if Ingrid's tears look like crystals in HD, as a reviewer said on Amazon. He said overall transfer was grainy, better a high quality video. So I have the Hitchcock set on Anchor Bay, Notorious, Rebecca, Spellbound and The Paradine Case, in creamy velvety black and white !

[LADYUK127]

its a shame the conversation that is going on over this video the song was beautifully done by a master reagardless of the meaning behind it it tells a story we can all relate to bi homo or whatever so just enjoy it for what it is

[pixies4u]

57highland has it right, except the rapists are in the military and there is the question of the impotence of one of the accused so many of societys preconceived notions come into play. The movie still stands as groundbreaking today

[pixies4u]

People please, watch the movie first before you try to understand the song !!

[sharx35]

The "minx" in your name fits you. Look it up in a good dictionary, then get laid. You need it badly.

[laylacalif]

Getting laid "badly" is what drives a number of people to go to the other side.

[sharx35]

Hmmm. So I've heard said. I've also heard that only another women REALLY knows how to orally satisfy a woman. True?

[skaha77]

@laylacalif Rubbish

[sharx35]

98% of the world is NOT GAY. Most of the time what happens has NOTHING to do with faggotry.

[laylacalif]

Dunno about the WORLD but in the late 40s, Kinsey was able to say it was closer to 10%. Accounting for lying to the surveyors and with more freedom today, the percentage is much higher. Bisexuals make up still another percentage which if known would likely surprise many folks.

[sharx35]

If you count anyone who has EVER had a homosexual experience, yeah, I'd grant you a figure higher than 2%. But I believe that only 2% of the population is actively/exclusively involved sexually ONLY with a member of the same gender. I wouldn't be surprised if 20% of the population is bisexual, even if not actively involved. Can we agree that Pitney's TWP is one helluva good record?

[DottyDotDitto]

@laylacalif You know, thats the first time I've heard the B word on you tube. lol

[skaha77]

@laylacalif Kinsey was a lying bastard. Social engineer. Manipuator of minds.

[knightoftheroze]

Kinsey did not do a lot of the empirical research he claimed to have done.

Much of his "data" was gleaned from conversations he had had with Gregory

Corso and Alan Ginsberg. Kinsey encouraged them to "ask your friends" about

various sexual activities.

[skaha77]

@knightoftheroze Yeh and I almost got booted from school because of a 'survey' that was passed around to us students. I got mad as hell and went nuts right in the classroom.. sort of. as in WHO ARE THESE NOSY BUGGERS? I refused to answer the Q and urged the class to do likewise. Gutsy for a 16 yr old, but damn, I HAD no sex life. I was 16... I got the q's to my Dad and he went and raised hell with the school. (Dad was 6-2, 205 and kind of scary if mad) I grad' anyhow, in '63

[musicalidea]

And even fewer have the privilege of living with intelligence.

[musicalidea]

The only disappointment is that there isn't a homosexual subtext...the words would fit better. The same applies of course to the song "I think we're alone now."

[MyrnaMinx1]

I agree with you about the lack of gay subtext. This is such a magnificent gay anthem.

[sharx35]

98% of humans are NOT gay. Deal with it.

[MyrnaMinx1]

sharx35 - There's nothing for me to "deal" with - I merely made an observation. I really enjoyed this video and thought it was well edited, but I thought that the teen angst of the lyrics and the music was conducive to a gay or lesbian anthem. If you don't care for my opinion, that's your issue. *shrug*

[sharx35]

Fucking LIEbrawls--they think that EVERYTHING is about minority/politically correct issues. Well, it is NOT! Sometimes, as Freud put it, a cigar is just a cigar.

[MyrnaMinx1]

sharx35, again, I was expressing my opinion about something that you obviously disagree. It's a free country - I may have an opinion just as you do. If you feel the need to make silly purposeful mis-spelled ad hominem rejoinders (since it wasn't directed at me but at "LIEbrawls") , by all means do so, but it doesn't add to your argument. Since you "quoted" Freud, you are aware of projection, are you not?

[57highland]

It sounds like it COULD be (conducive), but if you ever saw the movie, it's about a teen-age boy and girl, and the boy's mother doesn't want him seeing the girl, and there's a sexual assault issue (teenage girl is the victim; boyfriend is not the perpetrator) and there's a trial and it all gets rather messy.

[exackerly]

Love the song, love all those old movies about teens who go crazy because they can't go all the way... WEHT them?

[cheyenne86]

A very far away song it is scary sorta

[kiddio1231]

Thank you for sharing. I will always Love Mr. Gene Pitney. His songs always touched me deep in my Soul. RIP Gene.

[laylacalif]

The young have problems, many problems We need an understanding heart Why don't they help us, try and help us Before this clay and granite planet falls apart? Take these eager lips and hold me fast I'm afraid this kind of joy can't last How can we keep love alive? How can anything survive When these little minds tear you in two? What a town without pity can do. How can we keep love alive?

[StewedTomato]

Good Job!!

[TeeBeeBad63]

StewedTomato.......You have the cooooolest screen name EVER!! I wish I'd thunk it up first!

Peace, bro

[porcelainbarbiedoll1]

Great video :)

Love this song and... oh those wonderful classics.

[homargc]

Beautiful editing,perfectly clever. Thank you for sharing all of these key moments of cinema,paired with the ideal song with us!!

[Isutsu]

yeah great song, oldies and goldies...

[louienye]

One of the best records ever made. GREAT idea to overdub this to these clips.

[57highland]

I think you've got something there. This song could actually be one of the best songs in the whole history of pop music.

[laylacalif]

Nominated for Oscar 1962

Best Music, Original Song

Dimitri Tiomkin (music)

Ned Washington (lyrics)

For the song "Town Without Pity"

"Moon River" from Breakfast at Tiffany's won that year--another song I LOVE.

[57highland]

Thanks layla; some months back, you gave me the lyrics to "mr dieingly sad" and I later carried them over to other postings of that song, and a few people were really grateful. Thanks again.

[scotpens]

It's a classic song, a universal lament of adolescent angst -- although it has practically nothing to do with the movie it was written for.

[57highland]

It actually has a lot to do with the plot of the movie. Four American soldiers stationed in Germany get drunk and rape a German girl, and their defense lawyer gets some of the local people to testify against her character, a "town without pity". Meanwhile, she's in love with her boyfriend and he too gets ridiculed during the soldiers' trial, so the song is probably given from the point of view of a teen-age girl and boy.

[laylacalif]

How can anything survive

When these little minds tear you in two?

What a town without pity can do.

No, it isn't very pretty what a town without pity can do!

[scotpens]

Yes, now that I think about it, the song is more relevant to the movie than I remember. It's been a while since I saw the picture. It's a serious and well-acted adult drama, with Kirk Douglas giving one of his best performances.

[57highland]

Hi scot: Yes, the song and the movie DO match, pretty much. The first time I saw it, I was 11 and it made quite an impression (with sex and scandal as the theme) at that age. The young couple really did get victimized by everyone from the soldiers to the townspeople to their own parents. The German newspaper reporter told Major Garrett (Kirk Douglas) after a day in court that made the girl look slutty, "The ugly made a fine case against the beautiful today."

"They generally do", he said.

[EmiliaDantes]

@57highland That's what I remember I was nine than, I love that time period, and see that evil is every where

[57highland]

@EmiliaDantes -- I think I first saw this on TV (late movie, of course) some time in 1968 or 69 (when I was 10 or 11).

[skaha77]

@57highland NOW I remember it. Thanxx

[laylacalif]

Admittedly, there are only a FEW teens in the clips but, REGARDLESS, they're all going through SOMETHING! When you're young and so in love as we And bewildered by the world we see Why do people hurt us so? Only those in love would know What a town without pity can do. If we stop to gaze upon a star People talk about how bad we are Ours is not an easy age We're like tigers in a cage What a town without pity can do.

[Sheliabluerose]

There is nothing like the late fiftys melodrama

[AGONY62]

i fuckin love this song:)

[57highland]

you got good fuckin taste in songs:)

[oooowwwwdddd]

I know, fuckin I wasn't even fuckin born yet but this song fuckin rocks!

My friends think I'm fuckin weird cause my fuckin parents weren't even fuckin born yet..... fuckin lol :D

[skaha77]

@AGONY62 I saw the movie when i was a kid. Can't remember the plot though.

[porcelainbarbiedoll1]

lol. I really like it.

nice work