Last Chance...Film Noir HoF V

Wilder is one of my favorite all time directors. Love his films!

I expect three of them to make the noir countdown!

Double Indemnity and Sunset Boulevard are locks

The first time I watched The Night of the Hunter I was unaware of it's fairy tale quality, and wasn't expecting the sojourn into expressionism and religious analogy - my mind was primed for a straightforward serial killer thrill ride. As far as Robert Mitchum is concerned, I'd grown up with his Max Cady in Cape Fear and seen him menace Dean Martin with his other preacher-killer Reverend Jonathan Rudd in 5 Card Stud. He outdoes them both here, with Harry Powell one of his crowning achievements performance-wise - but I was thrown by how unusual this movie is. Going into it again, fully forewarned and ready to embrace the enchanting, lyrical quality it has made for a thrilling experience. It has some of the best visual moments in the history of cinema as far as the use of silhouette goes, and one of the cutest little girls I've ever seen in a movie - little Sally Jane Bruce, whose facial expressions are quite simply adorable enough to make me melt.

The film itself features serial killer turned faux-preacher Powell (Mitchum) finding out about a $10,000 cash stash waiting at the home of Ben Harper's (Peter Graves) family, while in prison. A family that consists of mother Willa Harper (Shelley Winters), young John (Billy Chapin) and little Pearl (Sally Jane Bruce). Once out, Powell heads for the small town they live in, ingratiates himself with the locals, and soon persuades Willa (whose husband has since been hanged for murder) to take him on as a supposedly caring husband. Shortly after marrying him, Willa discovers that he's a cruel man - intent on twisting her psyche to match his before dispatching her and working on finding out the money's hiding place from the two kids, who promised their father they'd never tell. The kids flee in a boat, and Powell hunts them down across a great distance before the kids find refuge with Rachel Cooper (Lillian Gish) - a finder and protector of lost children. Will she be able to withstand this killer's psychotic rage and determination?

One time director Charles Laughton, cinematographer Stanley Cortez and art director Hilyard M. Brown do wonderful work with this film, creating angular sets surrounded by darkness, using shadow to great effect in providing Powell with a great sense of menace, and especially making fearful images with the use of silhouette. It all combines in a film noir way that also gives us a sense that this is a fairy tale in full motion - everything stripped back to it's bare elements. Cortez described his work with Laughton on the film as him having a tremendous feeling of "sympatico" with the director - and it's clear everyone was on the same page for what was required. Every shot has it's aim which is squarely achieved to the highest degree of impact, and there are images that chill - such as when the shadow of Powell's head appears next to John in the children's bedroom. That's the first moment the two children become aware of the evil presence that will soon be haunting their lives - the "preacher" just "passing by" a lamp, stalking his prey.

The Night of the Hunter also has some chilling moments I would never have expected a mid-50s film to have - for example that amazing under-water shot of the dead Willa Harper, her hair wispily flowing in the river current. Her eyes closed and puffy face impossibly still - still stuck in the car that's been submerged with her. Or the phallic symbolism which just explodes onto the screen as Harry Powell sits watching the exotic dancer onstage, and we see his switchblade jut upwards, the erect blade tearing through the pocket it's in. To Powell, arousal means something to be stifled - not within himself, but via the eternal stillness the subject of arousal will maintain after he's "quietened" her with his knife. We begin the movie itself by seeing the still legs of his latest victim, discovered by children who will no doubt be forever traumatized by their discovery. Powell's switchblade will become a recurring motif throughout the film - a symbol of his presumed power, small but no less deadly.

One aspect of the story I don't fully connect with though - mostly through ignorance of the subject matter - are the Biblical connotations it has, and although direct references are made and explained to us throughout, I've heard that reading certain chapters of the Bible make it all clearer. It's a two-sided street, for Powell himself uses religion to prey apon unsuspecting people who are forever trustful of a man purporting to be one of faith. The famous quotation “Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly they are ravening wolves," comes from Christ himself in Matthew, and Lillian Gish's Rachel Cooper reminds us of not only that, but of the special place children, and their ability to abide, have in the Christian faith. I find it often depends on who's viewing it as to how it's seen - the Roman Catholic Diocese of Cheyenne denied the film's release, even though the message I see in the film is a very positive one. It's all a matter of perspective.

Apart from all that, this is a film experience that has to be seen to be appreciated, as it tells it's story very much visually - and it brings forth some utterly unforgettable and enduring imagery. On it's surface it feels like a familiar fairy tale - with two lost children being chased by the big bad wolf in sheep's clothing across the land until they find refuge with a kindly old lady who protects them and tells them tales of scripture. (I can't forget to add the infuriating Icey Spoon (Evelyn Varden), who the wolf tricks so easily.) Under it's surface it's full of allegory, film noir visual brilliance, and a filmmaking technique from Charles Laughton that I wish we'd seen some more of. At times it feels like your ordinary every-day crime drama, until the night falls and the shadows increase in length - and we're once again hedged in by darkness, Robert Mitchum's daunting visage never far away from pouncing on those unaware of who he really is - a monster based on real-life serial killer Harry Powers, who murdered those victims that had the misfortune of answering his "lonely hearts" advertisements. A real monster hidden in the dark shadows of our collective fear.

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I watched Sweet Smell of Success again last night, still finding it just as fun to watch and full of smart and snappy dialogue - all great film noir classics from this era have that coolness about them. Great music from Elmer Bernstein throughout. I was struck by how unusual it was for both Tony Curtis and Burt Lancaster to both be playing such slimy lowlifes as Sidney Falco and J. J. Hunsecker - great performances though. Alexander Mackendrick didn't make many other great films after this - but when you've got one as great as Sweet Smell of Success on your resume, you can pretty much retire with your immortality assured. This may not have been a big hit on release, but it's widely regarded as a great film now - and I definitely concur with that opinion. I've reviewed this in a previous Hall of Fame, so I'll post that previous review below :

I own Martha Ivers so I will start that up tonight.

I watched Double Indemnity again last night - always an enjoyable undertaking. It's almost the ultimate film noir masterpiece, with a perfect screenplay full of crisp and witty dialogue, a pounding and thumping score, a trio of great performances from Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck and Edward G. Robinson plus peerless direction from Billy Wilder. I particularly notice how rapid the fire of dialogue is in this film - while at the same time being clear, cool and very clever. I don't think I've ever leveled any criticism at it, but if there was one very small thing it's Barbara Stanwyck's wig - it distracts me a little, and doesn't suit her - but then again, it does help to give her an air of being a phony, so perhaps it's doing exactly what it's meant to be doing. Anyway, below is a review I wrote around 18 months ago. It's an extraordinarily long one - I guess there's a lot to talk about when it comes to Double Indemnity :

The Strange Love of Martha Ivers


The films starts with a runaway girl, captured and brought back to her overbearing and demanding aunt. In a final act of defiance, the girl murders her aunt, thinking she’ll be free, but in truth, creates another prison of sorts for herself.

Fast forward to 18 years. This girl has married the only witness, a boy whose father had already suspected the truth and used it to their own advantage.
All seems well, to the casual observer, but the guilt and the stress of being in a unloving marriage has eaten away at the young man, now a DA. He drinks often, and a lot.

One faithful night, an old friend of the woman, a young boy who helped her escape the last time and who himself was also in the house at the time of her aunts death, returns to the town. He meets a girl, who’s later thrown in jail for trumped up charges and he decides to visit his old friend the DA for a favor. Suspicious, the DA and his wife suspect he has arrived to blackmail them.

Without going too far into this story, it does a great job of showing how they bring about their own demise by miscalculation and assumption. The whole mess could have been avoided, but proves to the their undoing when things escalate.

A young Kirk Douglas was lays the DA, struggling with his guilt, and is perhaps the best performance in the movie, second only to Van Helflin as the man who inadvertently gets mixed up in this.
Douglas is able to convey both sadness and a weariness to his character that almost makes one pity him.

Van Helflin is also pretty great in his role. The streetwise gambler wandering from town to town with suspicion following him where ever he goes, only to end up back at his own hometown, where it all began. But even he has morals.

Stanwyck is kind of weak in this film. Far too subdued for my liking, bit like her performance in Double Indemnity.

Great pick, and one I’ve opened for a few years is and has been meaning to watch.

It might be my favorite noir. Everything was perfect. Chandler's dialogue was memorable. I liked that he had a small cameo appearance near the beginning of the film when Neff is exiting Keyes' office. Chandler is seated outside the door as Neff passes.

And Stanwyck's wig was pretty bad. Once Wilder realized the bad choice, too much of the film had already been shot. Wilder claimed that it was one of the biggest mistakes of his career, although he later claimed he used the bad wig to make Stanwyck look cheap. I think it was simply bad judgement-- the only instance in the film.

Double Indemnity
According to Ebert, "Double Indemnity” has one of the most familiar noir themes: The hero is not a criminal, but a weak man who is tempted and succumbs. His weakness gets him in over his head. As they say in the film the two main characters are stuck on the train, together, until the end of the line (The graveyard). I thought the filming, directing, and the acting was all very good. One of my favorites so far.

I’ll need links for The Breaking Point and Kiss Me Deadly, please.

Looking right now for them.

I agree. That is one of the major defining themes of classic noir: someone makes a decision to do something (usually illegal) that he knows that he ought not, and then ends up paying a price for it (often jail or death).

The Sweet Small of Success (1958)

This is the third time I've watched this film. Some people obviously like it and frankly it's a film that you can watch on repeat. The film is the story of a grubby two bit publicity man and a high level New York columnist. Funny how in todays world the people who provide the content are the grubby ones and the people in charge of publicity are the gatekeepers. This is a parallel world one of it's time.

This film has a lot of things going for it. To start off with the shot compositions and blocking in this film is first rate. This new york world feels real and lived in. The camera feels like it's own character which is what the best films have. The film also does a great job setting up Lancaster's character...we don't really see him until the end of the first act. Curtis is a hustler and one of the things that this film does that a number of modern films don't is we see him lose. He comes up with a clever plan and it blows up in his face and then he's on to the next one.

Curtis and Lancaster are both bad men, one puts on airs while the other hustles and does some pretty low things. Lancaster's character isn't really that consistent his emotional turns are a choice and it somewhat took me out of the film at times. You wonder if the man ever tied a woman to the train tracks. The worst thing is the central plot is his "sister" has gotten involved with a guitar player. He doesn't want his sister to end up with this guy so the hope is to break them up. His relationship with his sister is creepy it feels weirdly sexual which is even worse when by the third act we find out she's a teenager(he's decades older than her).

But while I like the film, it's really what I expect from a noir. Way to much of the dialogue feels ridiculous. The characters all talk in this coded style which works when you have restraint but when it's almost every line it feels like you need a Rosetta stone to get what everyone is saying. We could have seen the valid reasons for Lancaster to not want his teenage sister to run off with a night club musician but the film plays it for melodrama. Most of the important more salacious stuff occurs off screen when we do get the violent scenes it feels cheesy and dated. I don't really consider this film to be noir but it's still good.


B+

The Strange Love of Martha Ivers

Like many film noir's, Martha Ivers main characters are prisoners of a past they can't escape. In this film the event is that Martha killed her wealthy mean-spirited aunt and was helped to cover it up with the help of her tutor and his son. Everything in the movie revolves around this event.

Years later Martha's childhood friend finds himself in Iverstown and finds that Martha has married the tutors son and he is now the towns prosecutor. Martha and her husband suspect him of returning to blackmail them, but he is ignorant of the fact that she had murdered her aunt. He leaves town with a woman he met in town, and Martha and her husband commit murder, suicide.

It was Lizabeth scots first major role and the first role for Kirk Douglass. The acting was very good, the story was good, the directing was OK, and filming was good. overall I liked this movie very much and would suggest it to others.

Night of the Hunter (1955)

I'm not sure I would classify this as a noir film, this seemed more like a gothic horror film. Night of the Hunter tells the story of a fake preacher running around the midwest finding single women and murdering them. When he gets caught for stealing a car he goes to jail where he runs into a desperate father who murdered two people in an armed robery who is sentenced to die. When Mitchem leaves the prison he tracks down the family and weds the mother and then the film goes bonkers.

Visually this movie is a delight, so many scenes have such composition to them. The best movies are the ones where you walk through them and feel like they could be paintings in a museum. Laughton's eye and flair for the visuals is impressive, it's quite sad this was his only film. The other thing that is really good about this film is the pacing, in a normal film the second act would be the climax of the film but then the story goes on and takes a left turn. Lillian Gish plays a woman who takes in stray children and she ends up with the kids. Her performance is fantastic and part of why I wouldn't consider this film tobe noir. I don't think any of the characters in the story really fall in line with what a noir protagonist/antagonist is. Mitchem's character is simply evil he's not conflicted if anything he becomes cartoonish at times.

B+ as a film

Sweet Smell of Success


While Sweet Smell of Success features many film noir tropes and actors, it is not always categorised as film noir. In fact it is not even listed in the bible of film noir, FILM NOIR THE ENCYLOPEDIA by Alain Silver, Elizabeth Ward, James Ursini and Robert Porfirio. The lack of murder and the lack of psychology, as well as the lack of shadows, horror, melodrama and paranoia, make of Sweet Smell of Success as realistic to life film noir as you might find. It can be difficult to face such an unrepentant cast of villains as these, and somewhat uncomfortable to consider that the message about personal relations and the media industry is this real. Burt Lancaster's character, Hunsecker, is based on the late Walter Winchell who was a celebrated, syndicated, American newspaper gossip columnist and radio news commentator. He was not above using the same dirty tricks and gossip to get what he wanted. Tony Curtis' character could have been one in a hundred talent agents who benefited or suffered from their relationship with a man like Winchell.

It's interesting that you mention that re its noir status. When mulling over that distinction when first considering a review, my first thought was the picture was not really noir. But the more I thought of it, the film really deeply encapsulates the noir feel.

There was not only impressive noir photography by the great James Wong Howe, but the very nature of the characters in the movie portray a thoroughly jaundiced view of society, which is at the heart of noir. And it took place in the smack dab in the middle of an unforgiving city.

Both J.J. Hunsecker and Sidney Falco make selfish decisions, and in the end each are punished for them. That's another chief noir theme.

So I've re-assessed my opinion on the subject, and now believe it's a solid noir picture. It's also likely Tony Curtis' greatest performance. Unfortunately, as you know, the public did not want to see Curtis or even Lancaster in these types of roles. The picture was a box office bomb, but has gained much stature in the years since.

Well said Doc, I'd agree on all those points about the noir-ness of Sweet Smell of Success. I haven't seen all of Tony Curtis' movies but I'd say hands down this was his best role, though I've enjoyed his performances in most all of his movies which were mostly comedies.