THE BACHELOR AND THE BOBBYSOXER
***
THE BIG CLOCK
***
USA
A newspaper editor is
implicated in the murder of his boss's mistress.
It's a clever enough set-up, but it never gets going. The
sluggish pace gives you too much time to ponder the story's utter lack of
plausibility.
dir: John Farrow
cast: Ray Milland, Charles Laughton, Maureen
O'Sullivan, Rita Johnson, Elsa Lanchester
BLACK NARCISSUS
****
CROSSFIRE
***½
USA
Various soldiers are
interrogated and one is held as a suspect for the murder of a Jewish man
at a New York hotel.
A mature, incisive and refreshingly non-preachy condemnation of
anti-Semitism. The first Hollywood
picture to attack racist attitudes, although the victim in the source
novel was a gay man.
dir: Edward Dmytryk
wr: John Paxton
cast: Robert Young, Robert Mitchum, Robert Ryan,
Gloria Grahame, Paul Kelly, Sam Levine, Jacqueline White
DEAD RECKONING
***½
USA
A war veteran investigates the
disappearance of another.
An entertaining noir recycling with a roughly equal number of dated
patches and sharp exchanges.
dir: John Cromwell
cast: Humphrey Bogart, Lizabeth Scott, Morris
Carnovsky, Charles Cane, William Prince, Marvin Miller, Wallace Ford,
James Bell
DESPERATE
***½
USA
Anthony Mann directed this B-noir during his strongest period, though it
isn’t necessarily one of his best. He isn’t
as
interested in the story – which is quite limply patched up – as he is in
the lighting set-ups. But it’s precisely the lighting set-ups that elevate
the picture, particularly when it hits the climax.
dir: Anthony Mann
ph: George E. Discant
cast: Steve Brodie, Audrey Long, Raymond Burr, Jason Robards,
Douglas Fowley, William Challee, Ilka Grunning
LE DIABLE AU CORPS
***
France
When Truffaut et co. were bitching about le cinema du papa, they
had in mind this type of puffed up melodrama. A teenager romances a
married woman while husband is away fighting WWI. Claude Autant-Lara
directed and injected roughly equal amounts of style and gloss.
dir: Claude Autant-Lara
cast: Gérard Philipe, Micheline Presle, Denis Grey, Jacques Tati
A DOUBLE LIFE
**
GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT
**
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THE GHOST
AND MRS. MUIR
**
USA
A widow moves into a cottage by the seaside and finds it haunted by its
previous owner - a sailor.
The leads refuse to acknowledge the absurdity of the premise and opt for the
earnest approach, romancing each other completely straight-faced. Only
very rarely do they offer up a joke and they do it limply.
dir: Joseph L. Mankiewicz
cast: Gene Tierney, Rex Harrison, George
Sanders, Edna Best, Vanessa Brown, Natalie Wood, Anna Lee, Robert
Coote
KISS OF DEATH
***½
USA
A convicted thief turns
informer for the sake of his children.
A preachy crime melodrama, famous for its magnificently snickering
villain. Strong tension buildup in the closing reels compensates for the
sermonising.
dir: Henry Hathaway
cast: Victor Mature, Richard Widmark Brian
Donlevy, Coleen Gray, Karl Malden, Taylor Holmes
MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET
**½
MONSIEUR VERDOUX
****
ODD MAN OUT
*****
OUT OF THE PAST
*****
THE PARADINE CASE
**½
QUAI
DES ORFÈVRES
****
France
An early Henri-Georges Clouzot thriller, it isn't piercing like his best
work, but it's bizarrely warm and enjoyable. A bickering music hall
couple, their icy lesbian neighbour, a seasoned detective and a sticky
murder get tangled in the convoluted plot. Clouzot injects it with verve
and atmosphere.
dir: Henri-Georges Clouzot
cast: Louis Jouvet, Suzy Delair, Bernard Blier, Simone Renant,
Charles Dullin, Pierre Larguey
T-MEN
****½
USA
Two undercover treasury agents
set out to infiltrate a ring of counterfeiters.
A terrific semi-documentary noir, quintessential in many
ways: it's driven by an omniscient,
impossibly earnest narrator; it's impeccably shot; it keeps you on edge the
whole way through.
dir: Anthony Mann
wr: John C. Higgins
ph: John Alton
cast: Dennis O'Keefe, Alfred Ryder, Wallace Ford,
June Lockhart, Charles McGraw, Jane Randolph
LA TERRA TREMA
***½
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