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 

The Maltese Falcon

Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor star in this 1941 film that some consider the best detective drama ever, as well as the first true film noir. Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre and Elisha Cook Jr. are featured as the criminals who will stop at nothing to get their hands on a priceless, jewel encrusted statuette. John Huston directed and wrote the screenplay based on the Dashiell Hammett story. 101m. CC.

Director Huston's version is a very faithful adaptation of Hammeth's 1929 story, and is extremely well written and photographed. The DVD comes with two earlier adaptations that are virtually unwatchable today. Credit must go to Huston and the unforgettable cast he assembled.

Humphrey Bogart became a star with this film and his portrayal of Sam Spade established his screen persona. Mary Astor was at the top of her form in 1941. She garnered no awards for her portrayal of the femme fatale, but her performance was as spectacular as her Best Supporting Actress performance that year in The Great Lie with Bette Davis.

Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre, and Elisha Cook Jr. made up one of the quirkiest, most unforgettable trio of villains in film history. Greenstreet, in his screen debut, excelled as the Fat Man, Casper Guttman. Who can ever forget his voice or mannerisms? Equally unforgetablel was Peter Lorre's portrayal of the obviously effeminate shady character, Joel Cairo. Finally, Elisha Cook Jr. establishes his own screen persona as the perennial "fall guy", playing a young gunman who is repeatedly slapped around by Bogart.

Eddie Muller, host of Turner Classic Movies' Noir Alley has a fine intro to this film, the first he ever presented on Noir Alley. ###

  

Humphrey Bogart, Peter Lorre, Mary Astor, Sydney Greenstreet

  

The Big Sleep

The Big Sleep.  Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall star in this 1946 adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s crime novel. Bogart plays Chandler’s famous private eye Philip Marlowe on the trail of killers, pornographers, gamblers, and a bevy of beautiful young women. 

In this film and in the earlier Maltese Falcon Bogart created the private eye. No one else ever came close. This was the second film pairing of Bogie and Bacall and director Howard Hawks really brought out the chemistry between the famous couple. The plot is convoluted but the writing is superb. 114 minutes. CC.

The stars are supported by a fine cast that includes Martha Vickers as Bacall's nymphomaniac sister, former cowboy star Bob Steele as a sadistic killer, and Elisha Cook Jr. as his victim. A special shout out should go to a young Dorothy Malone who plays a sexy book store clerk in what is perhaps the best scene in the film. ###

Bogart and Bacall

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I Wake Up Screaming

I Wake Up Screaming.  In a rare dramatic role Betty Grable plays the sister of a beautiful, murdered model in this 1941 film that some consider to be the first film noir. While police search for the murderer, Grable is falling in love with the prime suspect played by Victor Mature. The many plot twists and turns of this film leave viewers guessing right to the end. Carole Landis, Laird Cregar, and Elisha Cook Jr. round out a fine cast. 82 minutes. CC.

Bruce Humberstone directed this film based on a story by prolific crime novelist Steve Fisher. I would like to list some of the reasons why this film is among my favorite film noir.

First, Victor Mature is, I believe, the first Italian American leading man. Previously, Italians were usually portrayed as sleazy criminals. Mature creates an attractive and sympathetic character in this film.

Second, Betty Grable is surprisingly good in a serious role, as is Carole Landis as her sister. 

Third, It has all the basic noir elements: skewed camera angles, flashbacks, lighting, nighttime settings, contrasts between light and dark, as well as a haunting musical score that alternates between the romantic, Somewhere Over the Rainbow, and the haunting Street Scene, a melody used over and over in later film noir.

Most of all there is the great performance of Laird Cregar who plays a hulking police detective obsessed with bringing the killer to justice. I should also mention Elisha Cook Jr. who plays a creepy apartment house desk clerk.

For more information about the film, here is a link to Eddie Muller's fine intro.

Betty Grable and Victor Mature

The Killing

The Killing: Sterling Hayden and Coleen Gray star in this 1956 heist caper directed in a revolutionary way by a young Stanley Kubrick at the outset of his famed career. Femme Fatale Marie Windsor practically steals the show along with a fine supporting cast that includes Elisha Cook Jr. and Ted DeCorsia. “The Killing” is tough, taut, tense, and one of the great heist thrillers. 84 minutes. CC. Here is a link to a fine intro to the film by TCM's Eddie Muller.

Sterling Hayden plays Johnny Clay, who has just been released from prison after serving a five year sentence for robbery. While in prison he developed a plan for a really big job that would set him up for life. His plan is to steal the daily proceeds from a race track that would amount to a couple of million. For help he turns, not to criminals, but to track employees and other ordinary men down on their luck and in need of money. The plan requires split second timing and the heist is pulled off without a hitch. But then things start to go wrong.

Stanley Kubrick regarded this low-budget film as his real starting point. From there he would go on to become one of Hollywood's most noted and respected directors. The horse racing scenes are especially dramatic, and make you wonder why anyone would want to ride a race horse.

 The musical score of the film was composed and conducted by Gerald Fried, a boyhood friend of Kubrick's from the Bronx. Fried had studied oboe at the Julliard School of Music and accepted Kubrick's invitation without any prior experience. He would go on to a multi Emmy award winning career. I met the wheelchair bound Gerald Fried a few years before his death in 2023 when I presented The Killing as part of a film series at a local Senior residence. He was in attendance and we had a nice chat afterwards where he passed on a couple of anecdotes about Kubrick and the film. 

Elisha Cook Jr. and Marie Windsor