Phantom Lady

 

Ella Raines, Franchot Tone, and Alan Curtis star in this 1944 murder mystery directed by film noir master Robert Siodmak. After a quarrel with his estranged wife on their anniversary, a man goes to a bar to drown his sorrow. He meets a woman, equally downcast, and invites her to attend a Broadway musical with him since his wife has declined. When he finally gets home, he discovers that his wife has been murdered and the police suspect him. He is quickly tried, convicted, and sentenced to death since he doesn’t even know the name of the woman who could be his alibi. Then, his secretary gets on the case.

Ella Raines, a personal favorite, plays the secretary as a smart, attractive professional with class and clothes to match. Alan Curtis and Franchot Tone are fine as her boss and his best friend, but supporting players also stand out. Thomas Gomez is solid as a police detective. Aurora plays a fiery Latin American singer who sings and acts with real intensity. Elisha Cook Jr., a film noir regular, plays a hopped-up jazz drummer. His solo in an after-hours jam session with Raines acting like a tart egging him on is unforgettable.

The movie has holes you could drive a truck through, but it still is a suspenseful and enjoyable thriller with great camera work by Woody Bredell. Eddie Muller regards Robert Siodmak as the best of all film noir directors and rates this film right up there with other 1944 standouts like Double Indemnity, Laura, The Woman in the Window, and Murder, My Sweet. ###

Thomas Gomez, Ella Raines, Franchot Tone 

Murder, My Sweet

Murder, My Sweet.  Dick Powell stars as private eye Philip Marlowe in this 1944 film adaptation of a classic LA crime novel by famed writer Raymond Chandler. Director Edward Dmytryk used all the film noir trappings starting with the the darkened police interrogation room with the single light glaring into the suspect's eyes, after which the story enfolds in flashback.

Dick Powell departs from the boyish musical roles that made him a star in the 30s to play a hard boiled, wise-cracking private eye who is tough but vulnerable at the same time. This film revitalized his career. Claire Trevor, an always excellent actress, revitalized her own career playing the femme fatale, and Anne Shirley is fine as the"good" woman. 

I love Mike Mazurki in this film. This Ukrainian immigrant somehow managed to graduate from Fordham Law school, but then become a professional wrestler before gravitating to Hollywood where his craggy face and large body enabled him to carve out a career as a tough, menacing figure. He is unforgettable as Moose Malloy.

Here is a link to Eddie Muller's informative intro.

Dick Powell and Claire Trevor

 

The Woman in the Window

 

Edward  G.  Robinson and Joan Bennett star in this 1944 film noir directed by Fritz Lang. Robinson plays a criminal law professor attending an academic convention in New York city who one night meets the model for a beautiful portrait displayed in his hotel window. This chance encounter leads to murder, blackmail and a very suspenseful climax. 99 minutes. 

Despite a long and brilliant film career, Edward G. Robinson never received even a nomination for an Academy Award. His Romanian Jewish family had settled in New York City before WWI, and he was educated in City schools where he developed an interest in acting. Eventually, he became a star during Hollywood’s Golden Age despite his small, stocky body, and unattractive looks. He burst into prominence in 1931 playing a snarling, vicious Italian gangster in Little Caesar. It was a role that would forever mark him as a tough guy, but unlike most stars he was able to have more than one film persona. 

Joan Bennett is a fine femme fatale in this film, and Dan Duryea establishes his own screen persona as a smarmy blackmailer. In his intro on TCM's Noir Alley Eddie Muller places this film with the wonderful crop of crime dramas from 1944 like Double Indemnity, Laura, Murder My Sweet, and Phantom Lady that established film noir in film history. ###

Edward G. Robinson and Joan Bennett

 

Christmas Holiday

Christmas Holiday. Deanna Durbin and Gene Kelly star in this 1944 film noir set in New Orleans during the Holiday season. Durbin’s personality and singing voice made her a box office sensation but here she appears in a serious role as a night club singer with a dark history who meets a stranded soldier, played by Dean Harens, on Christmas Eve. Directed by film noir master Robert Siodmak, the film is based on a Somerset Maugham novel. 93 minutes. 

The film makes many changes to Maugham's novel. The setting is not a Paris bordello but a thinly disguised one in New Orleans where Durbin works as a singer but is obviously one of the girls. Here is a link to her singing "Spring Will Be a Little Late This Year," while the club's business goes on in the back ground. 

Still, the film is remarkably true to the novel's core with its emphasis on tragic love, sin, suffering, and  redemption. Christmas Holiday is a dark film superbly directed by Siodmak, one of the great masters of what would later become known as film noir. The writer, Herman Mankiewicz of Citizen Kane fame, produced a brilliant script full of rare depth and meaning. The screen play is supported by a musical score created by Austrian Hans Salter that ranged from Durbin’s rendition of Irving Berlin’s ballad, Always, to a magnificent orchestral version of Wagner’s Liebestod performed in a packed concert hall, and again at the film’s finale. 

Speaking of the finale, the film’s creators dramatically changed what I consider to be Maugham’s very weak and ambiguous ending. The ending is still somewhat ambiguous but like the rest of the film, the direction, the acting, the writing, and the musical score transcend the novel on which it is based.

Deanna Durbin regarded Christmas Holiday as her best performance. She certainly demonstrated that the child singer had become a fine mature actress. Five years later she would leave Hollywood for good, and retire to a farm in France with her French husband. I don't think Gene Kelly ever played another dark role like this one. His great career as a dancer was still in the future. 

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Deanna Durbin and Gene Kelly

I'll Be Seeing You

 I’ll Be Seeing You. Joseph Cotton and Ginger Rogers star in this 1944 Holiday drama with film noir trappings. Two strangers meet on a train, but she is a woman with a past and he is a soldier suffering from war trauma. Director William Dieterle not only brings out the chemistry between the two stars, but also gets the most out of a fine supporting cast, including a teen-age Shirley Temple. 85 minutes. CC.

 Ginger Rogers turned to dramatic roles after the break-up of her great dancing partnership with Fred Astaire in the 1930s. Rogers had won a Best Actress award in 1941 for her performance in Kitty Foyle, but I believe she is much better in this film. Joseph Cotton, fresh off his roles in Citizen Kane, and The Magnificent Ambersons, is equally fine. The film’s theme song, the popular wartime melody, “I’ll Be Seeing You,” helped make it a huge hit at the box-office, but it is largely forgotten today. Here is Jo Stafford's rendition.

Joseph Cotton and Ginger Rogers