A staid Kansas town prepares for its annual Labor Day picnic. On the surface, this town is idyllic Americana, but beneath the how d'ya-dos, gingham, and pie-eating contests, seethe not-so-bucolic desires-in an aging school teacher (Rosalind Russell), a distraught teenager (Susan Strasberg), and the town's beauty, Madge (Kim Novak), longing for love. Then a drifter (William Holden) appears whose own yearnings roil the serene surface of this rural enclave. The great cinematographer James Wong Howe captures this intimate tale in widescreen CinemaScope, filling the frame with pastoral aplenty, but the stifling detail makes it seem like Norman Rockwell on the rocks.