SIDE STREET (1949)

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 82m 57s

As director Anthony Mann's opening credits unspool before a God-like perspective of New York City, it is made abundantly clear SIDE STREET will be the sort of urban story that could not take place anywhere else. According to our narrator Captain Walter Anderson (Paul Kelly), 8 million people call this huge city home. A suitable setting for film noir preoccupations, the sprawling streets of NYC are for many a place of anonymity and unimportance, an environment where people who live close together might hardly know one another. It is an atmosphere of unusual and sometimes frightening statistics, too, such as one murder per calendar day. Given the large number of people who populate “the city that never sleeps” and the economic circumstances that differentiate them, it seems self-evident some folks might feel excluded. That sense of economic dislocation is alluded to through occasionally erratic camera movements that give additional dimension to the opening credits sequence. I suspect the sometimes unsteady camerawork is more a reality of location shooting via helicopter than anything put fourth intentionally to convey thematic weight, nonetheless it is an effect that injects nuance into the distinctly big city noir story about to be told.

The major protagonist is a poster boy for the pronounced class differences that define large urban areas. Joe Norson (Farley Granger) is a failed businessman who now drudges around town as a letter carrier. Like scores of film noir characters, he dreams of material plenty, but more for his pregnant wife Ellen Norson (Cathy O'Donnell) than himself. He adores Ellen and thinks she deserves a floor-grazing mink coat. For the time being, however, the cash-strapped couple resides at the home of her parents, where it appears money problems are generational. Mr. and Mrs. Malby (Harry Antrim and Esther Somers) bicker over money and the impossibility of retirement. Joe's own shaky financial position changes due to his chance connection to a blackmail scheme. Prosperous broker Emil Lorrison (Paul Harvey) is the noir sap ensnared in a sex scandal engineered by scumbag attorney Victor Backett (Edmon Ryan) with help from his shady accomplices Georgie Garsell (James Craig), a violent ex-con, and Lucille "Lucky" Colne (Adele Jergens), who sarcastically calls her mark "grandpa." The extraction of money from the broker leads to the discovery of Lucille's lifeless body floating in the East River. As the singularly noir element of fate would have it, Victor’s office happens to be part of Joe's delivery route. When Joe notices Victor's door ajar, Joe seizes the opportunity and swipes a folder from the lawyer's file cabinet. Expecting to have made off with $200, Joe is stunned to realize he has taken possession of $30,000.

With no believable explanation for his newfound wealth, Joe tells his wife he has secured a new job via a trusted old friend. But in compliance with a durable Hollywood tradition, abrupt prosperity brings Joe nothing but misery. He is reduced to a state of paranoia the instant he steals the money. As he feigns respectable employment, he incongruously relocates to a fleabag hotel that is in dire need of renovation. Uncomfortable with holding the large sum of stolen money, Joe unwisely leaves the cash in a small package explained as something else at the bar tended by Nick Drumman (Edwin Max). Business is not exactly booming, and Nick claims turning the neon on will not help matters (even though in theory such basic marketing only could help). He seems oddly defeated, perhaps even more oppressed by the city than Joe, who does not recognize Nick might be susceptible to the identical impulses that converted a humble mail carrier into a thief. Nick is too much like Joe to be entrusted with money storage, especially the heavy coin dropped off by Joe. After Nick attempts to start a new life with the hot money he rips off from Joe, the barkeep is corrected in about the worst possible way. Nick's death by strangulation, triggered by his own greed, causes Joe to become a suspect on the run from local authorities. Greed not only is punished in SIDE STREET, the penalty has a compounding effect for the instigator.

The little man's desire for more stifled by the oppressor's unwillingness to share

"Lucky" becomes a statistic

Joe is framed in this composition to suggest he is about to make a mistake

What was thought to be a mere $200 is in fact life-changing money

The duality of man:  this mirror emphasizes Joe's potential to be two different
people:  both harmless letter carrier and a man capable of gun violence

The wife doesn't get the truth

A core essence of the film noir is the idea that an ordinary person could become a criminal sought by authorities, the criminal underworld, or both. Just one wrong step might be all it takes to go from law-abiding citizen to wanted man (or, less often, woman). That is the indefatigable engine that drives many of the most thematically rich noir films, which include the likes of DOUBLE INDEMNITY (1944), DETOUR (1945), SCARLET STREET (1945), THE BLUE DAHLIA (1946), THE BIG CLOCK (1948) and GUN CRAZY (1950), along with an assortment of others. SIDE STREET really promotes the idea that Joe's personal trap could be stumbled into by anyone. The narrative is carefully sympathetic to Joe, who is presented as not a bad person, just a good fella who made a poor decision. And boy does he have to pay after he steals for (in his mind, anyway) altruistic reasons. He convinces himself an extra few hundred dollars would make a significant difference to his emerging family. The level of hardship he then encounters underscores the perennial Hollywood theme that money cannot buy happiness. One fateful mistake, brought about by a feeling he and his wife should live better than they do, paves the road toward Joe sought as a clothesline murderer. In the process he endures not only psychological pain, but plenty of physical abuse. In an especially tense moment while he is absorbing punishment from the thugs from whom he stole, Joe makes a leap of faith to escape from their vehicle. He barely avoids getting flattened by a formidable oncoming vehicle. Everywhere he goes seems fraught with danger, and Joe's misfortune is not atypical of the many returning soldier characters that appear in film noir. The WWII vet alienated from a society he risked his own life to defend is a stock component of noir mechanics. Men struggle to re-enter society in a positive way or get pulled into a sordid criminal underworld in THE BLUE DAHLIA, THE KILLERS (1946), SOMEWHERE IN THE NIGHT (1946), CROSSFIRE (1947), OUT OF THE PAST (1947), RIDE THE PINK HORSE (1947), THE CROOKED WAY (1949), THE SNIPER (1952) and THE KILLER IS LOOSE (1956).

The constellation of recurring female archetypes in film noir tends to be small. The genre is heavily reliant upon the diametrically opposed categories of Madonna and whore, and that is what is going on in SIDE STREET to a large degree. Even so, the film grants some discernible textures to these often too rigid character types. Ellen is the supportive domestic figure who unconditionally loves her husband Joe, though she inadvertently puts pressure on him to keep the sort of cash rolling in not possible via letter delivery. In that sense she contributes to her husband's errant decision to steal money. Almost always there is a sense of blandness about the domestic woman, who offers stability but little in the way of excitement. Across from Ellen stands Lucille, who exudes bold sexual confidence just by standing a certain way. No doubt she delivers enjoyable nights to male company, but she is a manipulative woman of scorn whose callous deception will make any man wish he never saw her. More sympathetic is the hard-drinking night club singer Harriet Sinton (Jean Hagen and her unmistakable speaking voice), who tolerates an abusive relationship with the always dangerous goon Georgie. Though Harriet reveals more capacity for decency than Lucille, both women are shown to be completely disposable when of no further value to Victor and his gang. SIDE STREET veers into misogyny when a milkman (Ralph Montgomery) witnesses Georgie strangling Harriet, only to mistake the brutish murder for playful romance. There is a similarly creepy moment in MYSTERY STREET (1950), when the just murdered Vivian Heldon (Jan Sterling) is held upright as if in a loving embrace. The intermingling of sex and death is another trope that adds a layer of darkness to an already gloomy genre. Film noir carries a shadowed legacy that closely associates sex with death, especially sex outside of marriage. The tradition was established properly in DOUBLE INDEMNITY, in which sex anticipates murder. It can work the other way, too; the same year, LAURA (1944) entangles sexual longing with a man's unrelenting gaze at a portrait of a woman thought to be dead.

Attached to its compliance with established film noir gender roles, SIDE STREET challenges the sustainability of the nuclear family. Beyond the financial issues that plague Joe and Ellen Norson, there are related difficulties they face. For example, Joe's son is born while he is away from his wife, and later an on-the-run Joe must make a clandestine visit to her hospital bed. Joe thinks money will bring he and his wife closer together, but naturally the opposite is true. The film concludes with the narrator's assurance that Joe can be rehabilitated into decent society, but that assumption is called into question as Joe is driven away in an ambulance with his onlooking wife not along for the ride. It is a telling choice in terms of camera placement; the implication is Joe is a basically good guy worth preserving, but his relationship with his wife might take time to restore. In contrast to the somewhat fragile but repairable union between Joe and Ellen is the alternate noir family created by the lawyer Victor, career criminal Georgie and cab driver Larry Giff (Harry Bellaver), a sinister merger between white-collar and blue-collar criminals. Though I do not see a strong homoerotic subtext between the members of this alternative family, here again is a case where a crime network's crucial long-term players all happen to be male, with women only making supportive contributions as required before being discarded. In the gritty urban locale with all its complexities, could it be the all-male criminal family is the easier family unit to get kickstarted? The generous, legitimate job-giver related by Joe to his wife is in fact a fictitious person. But as it turns out, the masculine criminal family is not built for long-term success. Most interesting, the ultimate disruption of the alternate family emerges when Larry panics during the climactic getaway sequence. He cites his biological family as important to him, which prompts his partner in crime Georgie to execute him! Few sequences better establish the noir film's framing of family maintenance as difficult or impossible. As Nick the bartender puts it, "...I never got married. Raising a family makes a guy jumpy."

Granger exceeds the requirements of this scene with his grabby handling of O’Donnell

After Joe receives a gentle kick from his wife to be a consistent
provider, he is framed to suggest entrapment in the ensuing scene

Environmental danger that is uniquely urban

Stolen money leads to the demise of an opportunistic barkeep

Everyday household items within the frame sometimes cover more ground than the main
protagonist, a cinematic tactic that suggests the unimportance of the average person

Shadows threaten to consume everyman Joe Norson

I consider SIDE STREET an underrated film noir, in part because Granger and O’Donnell were paired more memorably in THEY LIVE BY NIGHT (1948). What the newer film certainly has going for it is a lot of convincing NYC location footage, along with early use of helicopter footage. The climactic car chase that plays out in Lower Manhattan is well constructed by director Anthony Mann and relays a splendid sense of desperate speed. Director of photography Joseph Ruttenberg was not often connected with productions that have a noir flavor, though he did handle the cinematography for GASLIGHT (1944), THE BRIBE (1949), CAUSE FOR ALARM! (1951) and KIND LADY (1951). Ruttenberg shows good understanding of the film noir visual delivery mode with frequent oblique camera angles that suggest an atmosphere of oppression, along with entrapping shadows that illustrate a character's slippery situation. Original story contributor and screenwriter Sydney Boehm worked for wire services and newspapers before his transition to screenwriting. His film noir writing credits include HIGH WALL (1947), MYSTERY STREET, UNION STATION (1950) and THE BIG HEAT (1953), one of the finest of all film noirs. Not sure whose idea it was, but I like the way the newspaper headlines persistently portray shameless exploitation, i.e. Lucille's "love diary." The staple film noir narration seems mostly unnecessary as employed here; the visual information related to the viewer could be understood were the film a silent movie. Noir fans are sure to appreciate the iconic presence of Charles McGraw as cop Stanley Simon, as well as film noir regular Whit Bissell as the milquetoast Harold Simpsen. SIDE STREET did not become a box office moneymaker for MGM. Box office receipts totaled $448,000 in the U.S. and Canada and $323,000 in other markets. The end result was a $467,000 loss.

Now available on Blu-ray as part of the Warner Archive Collection, SIDE STREET looks smooth in motion with solid contrast, framed at the original theatrical aspect ratio of 1.37:1. As the screen captures within this review testify, the film grain looks natural enough. The dual-layered Blu-ray contains the audio commentary track contributed by Richard Schickel for the DVD edition of SIDE STREET issued by Warner Home Video in 2007. The longtime film critic for TIME magazine notes the film under review reflects the presence of Dore Schary at MGM, who favored unflinching material over the escapist subject matter for which Louis B. Mayer was well known. Schickel spends a good amount of time on the uniquely urban aspect of SIDE STREET and how that element is portrayed. From the opening credits, the large city oppresses small people as carefully chosen camera angles stress the imposing size of the area buildings. A terrific example of this involves the car chase that closes the film, during which overhead shots convey a rats-in-maze effect. Schickel employs accepted cultural/historical film noir analysis for those who might be new to the genre, as when he mentions typical noir protagonists are indebted to hardboiled characters created by American crime novelists such as Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler and W. R. Burnett. And for those already familiar with the film noir origin story, he shows a good eye for noir tropes that might not jump out at everyone. For instance, Joe Norson covers the same territory as many film noir protagonists in that he passes between every imaginable American social stratum, a journey that makes class distinctions more conspicuous. Another insightful Schickel observation is that people who populate film noirs often cling to people they would be better off without. A prime example in this film involves Harriet's ill-fated attraction to Georgie. Schickel finds a strong sense of authenticity to Cathy O'Donnell's presence, that there is something inherently girl-next-door about her. I cannot argue that, but at times I find her performance a little off-putting, especially when her feminine gaze at Farley Granger looks annoyingly vacuous. Also ported from the DVD is the featurette "SIDE STREET: Where Temptation Lurks" (2007, 5m 49s), which commends the location work captured by cinematographer Joseph Ruttenberg while giving a succinct overview of the production and its relevance.

The wrong man becomes front-page material

Shadows that resemble prison bars mark Joe

The WWII vet accused of a crime he did not commit

Noir city as fitting backdrop for the man in hiding

Noir lighting kept to a bare minimum

After Larry expresses family concerns, he is stopped by Georgie

New supplemental material for this Blu-ray edition features the sardonically entitled MGM short film "The Luckiest Guy in the World" (1947, 21m 9s), directed by Joseph M. Newman, who later helmed some respectable noirs, including ABANDONED (1949), 711 OCEAN DRIVE (1950) and DANGEROUS CROSSING (1953). With this short film, Newman needs just over 20 minutes to cover what most noir films explore in 80 minutes. Charles Vurn (Barry Nelson) is one of those dreamers who thinks he is one lucky dice roll away from easy street. He accidentally kills his wife Martha (Eloise Hardt) as he forcefully confiscates her inheritance money, then ironically learns he did not need her cash as desperately as he thought. He then assumes the identity of another man, only to learn he must resurrect the former self he destroyed. Also selectable is a pair of classic MGM cartoons:  "Polka-Dot Puss" (1949, 7m 45s) and "Goggle Fishing Bear" (1949, 7m 21s).

A theatrical trailer (2m 25s) is the last of the extras.

MYSTERY STREET (1950)

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 93m 13s

An early example of a purposefully scientific exercise in police procedure long before such material was commonplace, MYSTERY STREET stands as a foundational forensic film noir. A crime thriller that predates the CSI era by 50 years, the story's brutal crime scene is explained only through meticulous technical study of evidence, with a university intellectual in partnership with a lawman who otherwise would be in way over his head. Especially in light of the narrative's resolution, the day of the rugged flatfoot solving the serpentine case through sheer persistence was transitioning to his necessary partnership with Ivy League university analytical science.

Like so many proper noir stories, MYSTERY STREET begins in the past, which is to say it is obsessed with the past. A distressed blonde Bostonian B-girl who works at a bar called The Grass Skirt, Vivian Heldon (Jan Sterling) senses her elusive significant other wishes to distance himself from her just when she needs him most. Stood up at her place of employment, Vivian instinctively transitions her focus to Henry Shanway (Marshall Thompson), an obviously vulnerable man who has had a few too many. Vivian takes advantage of the situation and steals his car in the interest of meeting up with her mysterious man on a nearby oceanfront beach. That individual is James Joshua Harkley (Edmon Ryan), who promptly puts a bullet through Vivian. After he discards her naked body on the Cape Cod dunes, her skeletal remains are discovered three months later by a local ornithologist (Walter Burke). Portuguese-American Lieutenant Peter Moralas (Ricardo Montalban) from the Boston Detective Bureau finds himself assigned to his first murder case. Inexperienced in such matters but obviously determined, Moralas begins his rather cryptic assignment with only a human skeleton and a lengthy list of missing females for reference. The parameters of the investigation are narrowed by Dr. McAdoo (Bruce Bennett), a forensic criminologist at Harvard Medical School, where cases that are seldom what they seem get solved. Through measured scientific analysis and efficient law enforcement protocol, Vivian's remains are identified correctly. Chillingly, it is also determined she was pregnant.

Steeped in fatalism, the noir film emphasizes the structural power of the past

The doomed B-girl Vivian Heldon (Jan Sterling)

A birdwatcher makes a grotesque discovery

This shot recalls cinematographer John Alton's work in
HE WALKED BY NIGHT (1948), when Richard Basehart's
character disappears into a massive storm sewer system

The healthy compendium of noir themes and motifs is structured around the classic noir "wrong man" concept that had gathered plenty of steam in the mid-to-late 1940s. Such narratives examine the considerable downstream effects of either poor choices or bad luck, sometimes a little of each. Film noir permutations with "wrong man" relevance include genre staples such as PHANTOM LADY (1944), THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW (1944), BLACK ANGEL (1946), THE BLUE DAHLIA (1946), CROSSFIRE (1947), DARK PASSAGE (1947), DESPERATE (1947), HIGH WALL (1947) and THE BIG CLOCK (1948). The "wrong man" premise often comes shackled to an unreservedly conservative viewpoint, and that theme applies here. After the beleaguered Mr. Shanway complains about his perpetual bad luck ("I'm always where I shouldn't be."), he instantly is targeted by an opportunistic Vivian. And in the grandest of film noir traditions, it seems he must be fated to become entangled with this troubled woman. Had he been with his wife like any honorable man should have been, it is implied, he never would have become linked to Vivian's murder case. His wounds are, at least in part, self-inflicted.

Embroidered within MYSTERY STREET's tightly woven storyline is an unmistakably anti-elitist slant. Much of this ideological mood is communicated through Harkley, a yacht designer who personifies the inequalities commonly attached to capitalism. The charmless manner of the arrogant aristocrat emerges upon his introduction, when the socially prominent man coldly eliminates his lover, a woman of far lower social stature. His family business established in 1832, Harkley is a scion of generational wealth and privilege. His class-based sense of superiority is made manifest when Lieutenant Moralas drops by Harkley's office. Under the xenophobic assumption Moralas must be inferior based upon his noticeable accent, Harkley calls attention to his own family's supposedly superior bloodline:  "There was a Harkley around these parts long before there was a U.S.A....but from the way you talk, you haven't been around here long." Rather than leave it at that, Harkley continues, "You know I'm used to respect. People looking up to me." Of course a central idea upon which the United States was built is that each citizen should be treated the same by law. The smug Harkley does not appear to harbor any appreciation for rule of law. He believes in special treatment for elite individuals, that his family heritage sets him apart from other Americans, including the cop investigating him. In truth Harkley is far less an American than the Portuguese-American Moralas.

Re-animated

A sensational headline for any era

The wrong man

John Sturges and John Alton team up for some great minimalist setups, like this one

A routine criticism often wielded at the film noir is that women do not receive enough positive representation. With that assumption in mind, let's take an analytical glance at Vivian Heldon. Two weeks behind on her rent, the 24-year-old Vivian is a streetwise B-girl doing her darndest to look out for her impregnated self. That she has resorted to prostitution is not exactly a murky subtext; it is revealed there are 86 mostly male names in her little black book. Ultimately her demand for hush money gets her silenced. In fact she and her unborn child are reduced in social status to about the lowest level imaginable:  skeletal remains in need of identification. Just after Vivian's murder, her lover-turned-killer embraces her lifeless body in an upright position to convey the impression of moonlight romance before a bypassing vehicle. This macabre moment of death imitating life has its correlation to a long list of noir films that generate a "walking dead" theme. In dead-man-walking noir, as I call it, major characters roam toward doom, sometimes already dead or as if already dead, in variants such as DOUBLE INDEMNITY (1944), THE MAN IN HALF MOON STREET (1944), DETOUR (1945), SCARLET STREET (1945), THE DARK CORNER (1946), DECOY (1946), THE KILLERS (1946), OUT OF THE PAST (1947), RIDE THE PINK HORSE (1947), ACT OF VIOLENCE (1948), ASPHALT JUNGLE (1950), D.O.A. (1950), GUN CRAZY (1950), NIGHT AND THE CITY (1950), SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950) and TOUCH OF EVIL (1958). A similarly morbid connection with Vivian involves a mortician (Willard Waterman) who describes an obviously intimate encounter with her in one of his trade vehicles! The much-utilized "walking dead" noir theme gets a jolting twist in MYSTERY STREET with Vivian in essence restored to life via forensic science, which is to say she must rise back to life for her killer to face justice. Vivian's landlady Mrs. Smerrling (Elsa Lanchester) intimates the presence of Vivian in front of Harkley when she tells him, "Perhaps she's listening to us right now." Smerrling suggests Vivian is still around, or perhaps in some realm between life and death. Though defeated by evil masculine authority, Vivian's pseudo-reincarnation suggests stubborn feminine resourcefulness that should not be taken lightly. Far less appealing than Vivian, Smerrling is the sort of busybody woman nobody likes. She is an eavesdropper, a blackmailer, an alcoholic. Thanks to her self-serving behavior, the hapless Henry Shanway faces a murder charge. But in spite of some pretty undesirable qualities, she is no fool. Smerrling outsmarts the villain on his own turf, though she does pay dearly for it later.

In close conjunction with female noir archetypes is the inference that within noir atmospherics traditional family values are under severe duress. The strained or absent family often serves as one of the crucial dynamics of film noir narrative framework. Notice how the seductive barstool alure of Vivian throws a stick in the spokes of the Shanways, a family already faced with unfair difficulties. Suddenly Henry's wife Grace Shanway (Sally Forrest) must review the character of her husband while recovering mentally and physically from a miscarriage. Though ultimately her husband's reputation is restored, their future in terms of family development remains in question:  women who have experienced a miscarriage are at a slightly higher risk to endure another. In a fascinating parallel in terms of noir family dynamics, it is disclosed Vivian was with child when murdered. Naturally Vivian never had a chance with the elite boat designer Harkley, a married man with three daughters, not that his family will be very well preserved. Harkley's girls are destined to see their father only during appropriate visiting times. His last ship has sailed.

The energetic and very diligent cop Peter Moralas (Ricardo Montalban)

Prison bar blues

Visual entrapment of a killer

Moralas closes in on the worthless aristocrat in a decidedly
blue collar environment:  a railroad car

In terms of scope, ambition and scale, MYSTERY STREET ventures beyond other genre films of its era, but it did not succeed commercially at the time of its original theatrical run. According to The Eddie Mannix Ledger, a reference for budgets and box office receipts for MGM films produced between 1924 and 1962, the groundbreaking forensic film noir earned $429,000 domestically and $346,000 in international box office totals, which was not enough to label it a moneymaker for MGM. Deservedly, its reputation has grown to cult film status over the years, with most critics and noir fans in alignment on the film's artistic merit. MYSTERY STREET was a product of the Dore Schary phase at MGM, a period of major transition for the studio. Schary joined MGM in 1948 as head of production, working for Louis B. Mayer at the time. In direct opposition to Mayer's costly escapist musicals and glossy melodramas, Schary favored gritty social realism that could be produced with modest funding. Along with MYSTERY STREET, other noteworthy film noirs that emanated from MGM under Schary's leadership included BORDER INCIDENT (1949), SIDE STREET (1949), TENSION (1949), THE ASPHALT JUNGLE and CAUSE FOR ALARM! (1951). MYSTERY STREET's semi-documentary approach to police procedure can be traced back to HE WALKED BY NIGHT (1948) and THE NAKED CITY (1948).

Director John Sturges is not remembered for his work in film noir, though he did helm THE SIGN OF THE RAM (1948) and JEOPARDY (1953). He would become far better recognized for his work in meaningful Westerns and action/adventure titles such as BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK (1955), GUNFIGHT AT THE O.K. CORRAL (1957), THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA (1958), LAST TRAIN FROM GUN HILL (1959), THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1960) and THE GREAT ESCAPE (1963). Sturges should be credited for bringing a deeply noir sense of indiscriminate mortality to MYSTERY STREET, with the Vivian character reduced to a statistic for study. Few film noirs go down quite this cold; a beautiful woman dies young yet there really is no discernible sentiment of loss. The same minimalist sense of compassion is apparent when Mrs. Smerrling gets clunked over the head. The caged bird chirping afterward is a telling touch; no doubt animals have more respect for life than humans. The screenplay credited to Sydney Boehm and Richard Brooks was based upon an unpublished story by Leonard Spigelgass, who earned an Oscar nomination for "Best Writing, Motion Picture Story" at the 1951 Academy Awards. His story was based at least in part on the unsolved case of Irene Perry, whose body was discovered in the summer of 1940 in Dartmouth, Massachusetts. A Harvard Medical School team determined Perry was strangled to death. Fetal bones were present in her abdominal cavity.

Famed cinematographer John Alton brings credibility to any production, though his presence behind the cameras that covered MYSTERY STREET is less obvious than in his more expressionistic work for which he has been memorialized by film noir followers. T-MEN (1947), HOLLOW TRIUMPH (1948), RAW DEAL (1948), BORDER INCIDENT and THE CROOKED WAY (1949) all are characterized visually by dramatic interplay between darkness and light, with a frequent tendency toward oblique camera angles designed to comment on the action. In MYSTERY STREET, Alton leans into more realistic lighting schematics and camera setups, not to suggest his work here is necessarily less expressive or artistic, just less stylized than his previous work that tends to define his Hollywood career. Beacon Hill, Cape Cod, Hyannis, Harvard Medical School and Trinity Station were among the Massachusetts filming locations selected to convey an East Coast sense of verisimilitude.

Leading man Ricardo Montalban is well known to Gen Xers like me for his iconic work in the TV series FANTASY ISLAND (1977–1984) as well as memorable supporting work in STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN (1982) and THE NAKED GUN: FROM THE FILES OF POLICE SQUAD! (1988). Before MYSTERY STREET, he appeared in the memorably gritty film noir BORDER INCIDENT, which I recommend highly. Just after MYSTERY STREET he was effective in the boxing drama RIGHT CROSS (1950, also directed by Sturges). Sadly, Montalban's life took a turn for the worse during the filming of ACROSS THE WIDE MISSOURI (1951). He was thrown from his horse and trampled by another horse, which left him with a permanent spine injury. Despite the chronic pain he tolerated for the remainder of his life, he continued to work on television and movie productions with an emphasis on voice work in the last stage of his incredible career. Bruce Bennett, well known to film noir fans for his supporting role in MILDRED PIERCE (1945), is well cast as Harvard medical examiner Dr. McAdoo, the calm voice of reason who employs toxicology, forensic anthropology and spectrographic reporting to steer the police investigation led by Moralas in the appropriate direction (the film concludes with a direct reminder that Harvard ingenuity makes the arrest of dangerous criminals possible). And I always have loved Jan Sterling, a talented film noir veteran who appeared in APPOINTMENT WITH DANGER (1950), CAGED (1950), UNION STATION (1950) and the Billy Wilder genre classic ACE IN THE HOLE (1951). From an appearance standpoint, Sterling had that rare ability to look ordinary and super-hot at the same time.

With gratitude to Warner Archive, we now have a dual-layered Blu-ray interpretation of MYSTERY STREET that film noir aficionados are advised to add to their collections. Framed at the original theatrical aspect ratio of 1.37:1, this new presentation contains more information on the left and right sides of the frame, along with markedly improved clarity compared to standard definition. Supplemental material begins with the audio commentary track by Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward that was ported from the Warner DVD version issued in 2007 as part of the Film Noir Classic Collection Vol. 4 box set. The commentary flow is informative though sometimes grinds to an occasional halt. With the film audio muted for the duration of the commentary, those moments of silence ring particularly empty. Most of the noteworthy bullet points are voiced by Silver, who observes MGM was a little late to the docunoir subgenre established in earnest by Universal Pictures with the release of THE NAKED CITY. There is a palpable irony in the uneven police work of Moralas, who is unable to find any proof of wrongdoing in his thorough search of Harkley's office. Mrs. Smerrling proves herself more adept at uncovering incriminating evidence during her visit. Silver also calls attention to the career of Betsy Blair, who plays Jackie Elcott, the most durable female character in that she is comfortable around guns. Blair was blacklisted for four years in response to her activism for women's rights. Her husband at the time Gene Kelly was able to leverage her out of professional exile.

Another bonus item culled from the 2007 DVD is the brief featurette "MYSTERY STREET: Murder at Harvard" (4m 54s), which includes archival footage with John Alton and the assertion that MYSTERY STREET was the first fiction film shot in Boston during Hollywood's Golden Age. Rounding out this Blu-ray release are two Tom and Jerry animated shorts from 1950:  "Little Quacker" (7m 11s) and "Tom and Jerry in the Hollywood Bowl" (7m 26s). The theatrical trailer (2m 24s) includes a shoutout to Harvard from actor Marshall Thompson.

THE BIG HEAT (1953)

Columbia Pictures, 89m 46s

As a person born long after the end of the film noir movement, I view everything noir through a retrospective lens. I sometimes imagine what it would have been like to have seen some of my favorite film noirs at the time of their respective theatrical runs. Some of the most dynamic wish list titles that leap to mind include DETOUR (1945), GILDA (1946), NIGHTMARE ALLEY (1947), KISS ME DEADLY (1955), THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER (1955) and TOUCH OF EVIL (1958). I think all of these movies pack a pronounced punch today, so the shared experience of the past must have been exceptional. But perhaps more than any other noir film, I wonder what the general audience takeaway was from THE BIG HEAT, one of the most bitterly cynical and unpleasantly misogynistic of film noirs.

Directed with vigor on a 24-day shooting schedule by the estimable Fritz Lang, our American crime story opens on a tragic note with the suicide of Detective Sergeant Thomas Duncan, which leaves the opportunistic Bertha Duncan (Jeanette Nolan) a widow. Bertha archives Tom's incriminating notes on the area's resident crime boss Mike Lagana (Alexander Scourby) and secures a schedule of blackmail payments. Sergeant Dave Bannion (Glenn Ford in a disciplined performance) is assigned to the case and quickly is faced with conflicting information between Bertha and her late husband's side piece Lucy Chapman (Dorothy Green). After Lucy is eliminated "prohibition style," Bannion is warned repeatedly to distance himself from the case, which of course he does not. His persistence leads to the death of his wife Katie Bannion (Jocelyn Brando) and his suspension from the police department. Now more avenging angel than cop, the alienated, tight-lipped loner Bannion swings a wrecking ball at the fractured system of authority that permits the city to be controlled by an arrogant crime lord.

Life of a gangster moll: Debby Marsh (Gloria Grahame)

Sergeant Dave Bannion (Glenn Ford)

The evil queen

Filmmaker and film historian Paul Schrader recognized there was a difference between the major protagonist of later film noir compared to the noir films produced earlier. With his cornerstone article "Notes on Film Noir" (FILM COMMENT, Spring, 1972), Schrader asserts, "The third and final phase of film noir, from 1949-'53, was the period of psychotic action and suicidal impulse. The noir hero, seemingly under the weight of ten years of despair, started to go bananas." (p. 12) That description applies to the major protagonists who appear in GUN CRAZY (1950), IN A LONELY PLACE (1950), WHERE THE SIDEWALK ENDS (1950), ON DANGEROUS GROUND (1951) and THE PROWLER (1951). Sergeant Bannion also conforms to Schrader's noir psycho archetype, if not exactly from the get-go. Bannion's placid nature on display early in the film swerves into the pathological after his wife is killed by the car bomb intended for him. His determination to restore order to a compromised city is alluded to when Bannion knocks down the miniature police station constructed by his young daughter Joyce (Linda Bennett, uncredited). The fallen pieces cause the girl to cry, and for good reason:  stabilization of core police department functions and the removal of disruptive crime figures will require considerable female sacrifice.

Apart from the seemingly incorruptible Bannion, the local police force has been emasculated from top to bottom by the ruthless city kingpin Mike Lagana and his brutal shadow government. Both a symbol of cultural decline and the immigrant's perseverance, Lagana maintains a tight grasp on the city's business and political activity. His corrosive influence extends throughout the police department, which ensures an appalling lack of law enforcement ethics. Feckless police officials primarily act out of self-preservation, worried more about their pensions than anything else. Bannion's steadfast professionalism is met with resistance by Lieutenant Ted Wilks (Willis Bouchey), under direct pressure from Lagana. Wilks admonishes Bannion for following basic police procedure and strongly encourages him to forget about a brutal homicide with obvious connections to the Duncan case. After Bannion rightly calls out Commissioner Higgins (Howard Wendell) as a pathetic puppet of Lagana, Higgins immediately suspends Bannion. That sequence of events transforms our lead protagonist into a laconic loner, isolated from his own colleagues, booted to the curb by his superiors. Disgusted by spineless cops on the take, Bannion embodies resilient stoicism when confronted with provocation, a model of composed resolve determined to defeat widespread corruption. In one of the great film noir traditions, bringing down Lagana becomes Bannion's obsession. Director Fritz Lang had presented obsessed main protagonists, both portrayed by Edward G. Robinson, in THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW (1944) and SCARLET STREET (1945), two of the crucial film noirs of the 1940s. Similarly obsessed lead or major characters provide the backbones for many of the most famous of film noirs, including DOUBLE INDEMNITY (1944), LAURA (1944), GILDA, OUT OF THE PAST (1947), GUN CRAZY, IN A LONELY PLACE and SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950).

Though the period of time Lagana has been a major influence in the city never is specified, it has been long enough for some truly deplorable characters to feel at ease in the system. A city beast of unparalleled nastiness, Vince Stone (Lee Marvin) is a thoroughly reprehensible personality construct that poses a threat to anyone in his vicinity. A top-tier henchman for Lagana with a nonstop proclivity for gambling, Stone demonstrates his impatience and a rotten mean streak at The Retreat when dice girl Doris (Carolyn Jones) grabs the dice too quickly for his liking:  he callously burns her hand with his cigar. One gets the sense Stone is prone to vicious outbursts whenever a woman annoys him. Perhaps he even takes a sadistic pleasure in hurting them. "You like working girls over, don't you?" Bannion cannot help but observe. Stone assumes he can repair his psychopathic outburst with a little bit of money and a kind word. Presumably such compensation has been sufficient to cure his more impulsive transgressions historically. With miserable thugs in positions of power like Stone, an abhorrent psychotic with shocking disdain for human existence, one wonders if there is any going back to how things might have been prior to Lagana's ascension to the rank of crime boss.

Bannion surveys his empty home,
a place rendered meaningless by the Lagana syndicate

Debby repeatedly reviews her obvious charms in the mirror,
unaware she will not make that a habit much longer

This shot implies a rigid division between the humble working class
and the corrupt, expansive urban world under investigation by Bannion

Psychological warfare between rogue cop and the city's creeps:
Bannion addresses the menace presented by Larry Gordon (Adam Williams)

Underworld objectives that incapacitate the city's essential public services bring corresponding complications for the traditional American family and its support structure. A foundational tenet of the film noir is the notion that the nuclear family has passed its expiration date as basic social unit. Sylvia Harvey explored this recurring theme in her essay, "Woman’s Place: The Absent Family of Film Noir" (WOMEN IN FILM NOIR, E. Ann Kaplan, Ed., 1978]). Harvey explains:

"It is the representation of the institution of the family, which in so many films serves as the mechanism whereby desire is fulfilled, or at least ideological equilibrium established, that in film noir serves as the vehicle for the expression of frustration." (p. 23) She goes on to write, "One of the fundamental operations...has to do with the non-fulfilment of desire." (p. 23) and "...if successful romantic love leads inevitably in the direction of the stable institution of marriage, the point about film noir, by contrast, is that it is structured around the destruction or absence of romantic love and the family." (p. 25)

Harvey's observations provide a helpful prism through which to view THE BIG HEAT, a study in urban decadence that offers little room for the sort of domestic way of life portrayed in TV programming of the day like I LOVE LUCY (1951–1957) and FATHER KNOWS BEST (1954–1960).

The status of the noir family crystallizes in the opening sequence, when a suicide brings the Duncan marriage to its abrupt conclusion. To begin the film in such a manner immediately questions the strength and validity of the American household. Then we are brought to the Bannions, the ostensible antithesis of the Duncans and seemingly idyllic family setting, at least upon an initial inspection. But so ideal is the introduction of the Bannion household the viewer senses difficulties must be fermenting. Displayed in a prominent position in their home is a photograph of policemen in uniform, Dave presumably among them, which suggests a permanent encroachment on his private life. Though the couple enjoys dinner together in their modest middle-class home and appear perfectly content with one another, the first sign of trouble emerges when their steak dinner is interrupted by Bannion's police work. The following day, after learning of the murder of Lucy Chapman, Bannion is disturbed enough to bring his work home with him, which his wife cannot help but notice. In another key segment, Dave and Katie share a close moment that might have ended in sex had they not been interrupted by their daughter (kids are never conducive to intimacy). The Bannion marriage appears to be loving and functioning on the surface, but in truth falls short of mutual fulfillment thanks mostly to Bannion's demanding profession, which offers a minimum of separation between his professional and personal affairs. And from an economic perspective, glaring class distinctions isolate the Bannions from an affluent person like Lagana. A place where jokes are made about the limitations of a policeman's salary, the small rooms and low ceiling heights of the Bannion home differ sharply from the materialistic plenty that distinguishes Lagana's lifestyle. The police department even offers public security for private parties at the Lagana home. It feels as if the principles and obligations meant to keep the nuclear family intact allow for far less accumulation of wealth.

In terms of marriage and family, the women who inhabit the fictional American city of Kenport are marked by an unsuitability for that pathway. Moreover, a hefty sample of female sacrifice is required to make the city's transition to moral normalcy possible. Although Katie Bannion is put forward as the supportive, respectable housewife and nurturing mother, she is destroyed by the mob that seeks to keep her bothersome husband in check. Beyond Katie comes a discernible downgrade in female representation. All of humble origins, we have so-called barflies, a mature woman who requires a cane for mobility, the quintessential gangster moll and a scheming widow. Connected with this all-female group is an unrelenting physical disfigurement theme (burns, impaired mobility, victims of gunfire or strangulation). Each of them is somehow less than what they once were, destined for the morgue, or both. Tom Duncan's mistress Lucy Chapman is tortured before she is strangled to death, her discarded body found repeatedly burned by cigarettes. Bannion inadvertently (or perhaps, carelessly) gets her killed. Doris, the dice girl at The Retreat, is savagely burned on the hand by Stone. Selma Parker (Edith Evanson), an administrative assistant at the local salvage yard, bravely agrees to help Bannion's investigation. He absolutely puts her in a dangerous spot in front of a suspected killer, especially when one considers her dependence on a cane. Stone's girl Debby Marsh (Gloria Grahame) is a childish but street-smart urban beauty who defines herself by her attractiveness; every mirror she encounters activates her narcissistic impulses. When not reviewing her appearance, she spends her time making drinks, relaxing on the couch and shopping. Bertha Duncan is also associated with mirrors, though in not quite the same context. The mirrors that reflect Bertha seem to comment on her complexity, her duplicitous, self-serving nature. The implication that seems unavoidable within the text of THE BIG HEAT is that women fundamentally exist in their capacity to serve some masculine need in an ongoing pattern of systemic misogyny. By inference, the most viable family structure might be the ersatz support network created by Bannion's brother-in-law Al (John Crawford, uncredited), who with his old army buddies forms an alternative family of masculine protection that watches over Bannion's vulnerable daughter Joyce, who is left to grow up without her mother. Given the most common fate of the narrative's adult females, what the future holds for Joyce is a troubling thought.

So if women all are subject to the control of egocentric men, one might ask what happens when women are not held in check by entrenched patriarchal power? That answer surfaces when Bannion visits Lagana to review the gangster's well-earned reputation. Bannion soon encounters a depiction of the ultimate monstrous feminine. Lagana's beloved mother, deified within a massive framed portrait, might be considered one of film noir's most malevolent femme fatales. The recently departed Lagana family matriarch, who resided with her son until her death, is positioned well to oversee and no doubt approve of all of her son's sordid business affairs. The woman idealized by her son in THE BIG HEAT might be dead, but her legacy lives on in the form of her likeness and offspring. Interestingly, in a homoerotic subtext probably too conspicuous to be referenced as an undertone, when Lagana is introduced in his bed during the opening sequence, his male servant/bodyguard/companion George Rose (Chris Alcaide) is present. A gay man with a mother complex, Lagana is never shown with a woman (though he does have a daughter named Angela), other than beneath his mother's all-knowing portrait. Otherwise he is the archetypal crime boss surrounded by men. Presented here as both a threat to the basic nuclear family and an invasive criminal force, the homosexual villain was a signature element of the film noir. Such character tropes populate celebrated noir titles such as THE MALTESE FALCON (1941), THE GLASS KEY (1942), LAURA, GILDA, THE BIG CLOCK (1948), FLAMINGO ROAD (1949), THE RECKLESS MOMENT (1949), STRANGERS ON A TRAIN (1951) and THE BIG COMBO (1955).

Debby sulking in darkness,
a scarred victim of savage patriarchal authority

Debby gets her revenge

Can he do it? Not with the PCA watching his every move

Redemption

THE BIG HEAT is well remembered for its unsettling hot coffee scene, so much so that the (now defunct) boutique label Twilight Time re-issued the film on Blu-ray in 2016 with a steaming coffee pot as the focus of the packaging. The hot coffee sequence deserves review from multiple angles. The scene is set up in an earlier segment when Stone assures Lagana that Debby is out on the street if she ever disappoints her benefactor. Later, after Stone fears Debby has gotten overly friendly with Bannion, Stone douses her with scalding hot coffee. The appalling attack is witnessed by Commissioner Higgins, a regular at Stone's endless poker games. Higgins is a weak, submissive man, monumentally unfit for his job. His embarrassing lack of authority certifies just exactly how in charge the Lagana group has become. Stone is free to leave a trail of dehumanizing violence without fear of retribution, even with a policeman of high rank onsite. Exactly half of Debby's face is scarred permanently by the coffee, evidence that both Freudian female archetypes (Madonna/whore) exist in one female body in roughly equal parts. During her dying moments, Debby's redemption is granted by Bannion, who recognizes her signature vacuity has been overcome by sympathetic thoughtfulness. As she dies, Debby only wishes to know what Bannion's late wife was like. Unfortunately, neither female archetype is able to survive Kenport, where masculine needs reign.

The film closes on an uncomfortable note when Bannion formalizes his commitment to keeping city crime in check. “Keep the coffee hot,” he requests. That line carries some ugly connotations about what likely will be required going forward to prevail against disorder in a volatile urban milieu, a figurative hell, always susceptible to the rising force of another criminal upstart. In such an environment, the coffee never cools. Early in the film it is mentioned "there were four Lucy Chapmans," which is to imply there is more cannon fodder available for the police department's town maintenance. Tellingly, multiple posters are attached to the walls of Bannion's workplace that read "Give Blood Now" and "Blood Means Life." Such marketing signals ongoing sacrifice for the greater good. Although Bannion endangers all the women with whom he communicates, the narrative never vilifies him, his methods never really are called into serious question. In another line of analysis regarding Lucy Chapman's horrific demise, does a certain amount of contributory carelessness facilitate her downfall? How could she talk to a cop at her place of employment, a known gangster watering hole, without worry that she was planing the planks for her own coffin? How could the supposedly streetwise dame make such a catastrophic mistake? In the filmic universe of THE BIG HEAT, only men know how women are supposed to behave.

The film noir movement responded to heightened public awareness of organized crime that resulted from The Kefauver Hearings (1950–1951). Chaired by first-term Tennessee senator Estes Kefauver, the hearings were televised and consumed by a large US audience. Noir films that exploited the public's new consciousness of mob activity were plentiful, including 711 OCEAN DRIVE (1950), THE MOB (1951), THE RACKET (1951), THE CAPTIVE CITY (1952, endorsed by Senator Kefauver), HOODLUM EMPIRE (1952), KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL (1952), THE SELLOUT (1952), THE TURNING POINT (1952), THE SYSTEM (1953), THE MIAMI STORY (1954), CHICAGO SYNDICATE (1955), NEW ORLEANS UNCENSORED (1955), NEW YORK CONFIDENTIAL (1955), THE PHENIX CITY STORY (1955) and TIGHT SPOT (1955). I consider THE BIG HEAT the grittiest of this prolific noir subgenre. Erstwhile crime reporter Sydney Boehm's screenplay has its roots in William P. McGivern's Saturday Evening Post serial (December, 1952). The serial was published as a novel in 1953. For the uninitiated, "big heat" is slang for the police bringing the hammer down on crime. But in light of the film's most famous sequence, the "heat" comes in various forms.

Austrian director Fritz Lang built a spectacular resume for himself in both Germany and Hollywood prior to his film noir phase. His early work anticipates the American noir movement in terms of both plotting and visual schemes, i.e. DR. MABUSE, THE GAMBLER (Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler, 1922), METROPOLIS (1927), M (M - Eine Stadt sucht einen Mörder, 1931), FURY (1936) and YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE (1937). Prior to helming THE BIG HEAT, Lang's noir contributions already consisted of some of the key genre entries, including THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW, SCARLET STREET, HOUSE BY THE RIVER (1950) and THE BLUE GARDENIA (1953). Director of photography Charles Lang's achievements in cinematography are vast, with well over 100 films to his credit. He is perhaps best known for comedies that all classic film fans should be familiar with such as THE GHOST AND MRS. MUIR (1947), SABRINA (1954) and SOME LIKE IT HOT (1959). Among his noir efforts are two of my longtime favorites:  ACE IN THE HOLE (1951) and SUDDEN FEAR (1952). In THE BIG HEAT, Glenn Ford is just superb as the indefatigable cop pushed to his limits. He delivers some terrific hard-boiled lines, for instance, "Tell that to your mother," and "There aren't gonna be any coming years for you." The incomparable Gloria Grahame proves herself Ford's equal in a role that seems ideal for her, though she was not the studio's first choice (the price tag for Marilyn Monroe was too high). Notable supporting performances include Peter Whitney as the bar owner Tierney, an odious character who truly deserves a punch in the face. Dan Seymour also leaves an impression as scrapyard dealer Mr. Atkins, who puts the safety of his family (wisely, it seems) ahead of Bannion's investigation. And Dorothy Green offers a sympathetic turn in her brief role as Lucy Chapman, a “B-girl” or “barfly" whose job is to encourage male patrons to buy more drinks. As one can imagine, from that job to prostitution must be a short journey.

A tremendous addition to the Criterion Collection, THE BIG HEAT is presented in its correct theatrical aspect ratio of 1.37:1. This new 4K digital restoration was derived from the original 35mm camera negative along with a 35mm fine-grain master positive. The 4K UHD disc runs in Dolby Vision HDR, the Blu-ray version in HD SDR. All of the screen captures featured in this review were grabbed from the 4K disc. I think these images speak for themselves. This Criterion release benefits from a newly recorded audio commentary track by legendary film noir experts Alain Silver and James Ursini, the authors behind FILM NOIR: AN ENCYCLOPEDIC REFERENCE TO THE AMERICAN STYLE (The Overlook Press, 1979), one of the most oft-referenced books on my shelf. The historians consider Fritz Lang to be the most influential filmmaker in terms of film noir conventions. That is quite a statement considering genre achievements from the likes of Billy Wilder, Otto Preminger, Robert Siodmak, Anthony Mann and Jules Dassin. Silver and Ursini acknowledge the religious symbolism that comes up repeatedly throughout Lang's work, most apparent in THE BIG HEAT when Lieutenant Wilks washes his hands of the Thomas Duncan case, a gesture that recalls Pontius Pilate distancing himself from the crucifixion. Lang's depiction of corrupt politicians like Commissioner Higgins got him in trouble with The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). And while the authority of the Production Code Administration (PCA) was waning, Bannion getting others to do his dirty work for him was as much a function of the Code as anything else.

The separate Blu-ray disc houses a variety of new supplemental material, starting with "The Women of THE BIG HEAT" (28m 13s), narrated by film historian Farran Smith Nehme. According to the cinema of Fritz Lang, women often are the essential risk takers and it usually costs them dearly. Marginalized women assist Bannion in his noble quest whereas the apathetic male cops around him remain content with the way things are. "That's what we're all supposed to do, isn't it?" laments Bannion. Conversely, Lucy, Selma and Debby are anything but bystanders. Debby sacrifices her own life to bring down Lagana and his henchman Stone. Nehme notes that in fact a woman (Bertha Duncan) provides the narrative's impetus; it is Bertha's 3 AM call to Lagana that anticipates all ensuing violence.

The bonus material then shifts to vintage audio interview excerpts with Lang, the first conducted by film historian Gideon Bachmann (1956, 16m 8s). Lang left Germany soon after Adolf Hitler rose to power. Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels wanted Lang to run the Reichsfilmkammer (The Reich Chamber of Film), which would have made him the most powerful man in the German film industry. The job offer prompted Lang to flee to Paris. After 10 months, he immigrated to the U.S. Little wonder his entire career Lang maintained interest in the concept of people caught in metaphorical nets. Whether trapped through their own actions or through no fault of their own, Lang felt it is what people do to extricate themselves that makes for great storytelling. The next audio interview excerpt with Lang is administered by filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich (1965, 6m 54s). Never interested in overly stylish visuals, Lang preferred more of a flat documentary look. He believed that approach to the subject invariably led to a more truthful narrative. And like so many influential filmmakers, Lang understood suggestive shock is without fail more effective than anything explicit.

Added supplements were recycled from the Columbia Pictures Film Noir Classics I DVD box set released in 2009, a collection I reviewed for VIDEO WATCHDOG (Issue #161, March / April 2011). In "Martin Scorsese on THE BIG HEAT" (2009, 5m 49s), the respected auteur who brought us such revisionist film noir classics as MEAN STREETS (1973), TAXI DRIVER (1976) and RAGING BULL (1980) observes the flatness of Lang’s cinematography, which encourages objective viewership. Scorsese also recognizes a key noir instance of fatalism when Vince Stone is scorched with hot coffee:  the source of burning-hot liquid is off-camera, as if the fatalistic noir universe itself were in control. With "Michael Mann on THE BIG HEAT" (2009, 10m 58s), the master of the neo-noir (THIEF [1981], MANHUNTER [1986], HEAT [1995]) notes that THE BIG HEAT both opens and closes with the assertiveness of the female. Mann connects this feminine trait with the progression of post-WWII American life, during which women were more willing to speak their minds than ever before. Apart from Bannion and the criminals, the average male citizen of Kenport is shown to be less self-confident than his female counterpart. This was not typical of filmmaking of the early 1950s. The elimination of the Katie Bannion character must have come as a surprise to audiences of that time as well (THE BIG HEAT predates PSYCHO [1960] by seven years). Also selectable is a trailer (1m 44s), and the packaging includes a booklet with the essay "Fate’s Network" by author Jonathan Lethem.

The Academy Film Archive preserved THE BIG HEAT in 1997, and the Fritz Lang noir classic was inducted into the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress in 2011.