THE RACKET (1951)

RKO Radio Pictures, 89m 25s

The ordinary American citizen probably has questioned the integrity of government elites at least since the Vietnam War, when the truth of that extended conflict's progress was obscured by elected officials hideously out of sync with the views of their constituents. Fast forward over 50 years and that erosion of credibility persists in a more open environment, as smug political figures and parasitic lobby groups barely make an effort to hide the presence of unspeakable corruption. Perhaps the major players involved sense the public has grown to accept the self-serving functionality of federal institutions, which allow a shadowy underworld of highly effective lobbyists and wealthy uber-rich influencers to manipulate the taxpayer-funded public system that supposedly serves common people. How can a representative democracy possibly reflect general public sentiment when everyone knows political power can be bought? We now live in an America in which lobbyists sit down with our politicians and write laws for our elected officials to enact.

Compared to the United States that chugs along today, THE RACKET reflects a time when prominent public officeholders were more likely to be trustworthy, sturdy individuals immune to corruption, the sort of men determined to sound the death knell for any percolating nefarious forces. At the same time, the timing of THE RACKET's release was intended to exploit public concern about a sprawling criminal underworld, and it was among the first Hollywood products to do so. Public awareness of crime machinery was heightened by the Kefauver Hearings, led by Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver, that appeared on national broadcast television from 1950—1951. One of the earliest congressional investigations to be televised, the "Special Committee to Investigate Crime in Interstate Commerce" exposed the degree to which sophisticated criminal networks had merged with political authority and legitimate business. The sobering realities of organized crime were made clear:  untaxed revenue was massive, crime operations crossed state lines, and local police and politicians were harnessed to suit formidable criminal hierarchies.

Easy does it

This will make you feel a whole lot better

As always, for a man to rise, another man must fall - in this scene,
the corrupt official Mortimer X. Welsh (Ray Collins) rises above
the fallen man Roy Higgins (Howland Chamberlain)

THE RACKET advances the established tradition of the film noir city as ideal playground for the devil’s entertainment. The city’s name is never specified, which transmits a discernible level of pessimism to be sure. By inference, this environment could stand in for any American urban center, always vulnerable to noxious criminal enterprises that pass through the arteries of the city's anatomy. The story opens with the introduction of a crime commission ready to leap into action against illegal interstate racketeering. The individual long aligned with local crime maneuvers is Nick Scanlon (Robert Ryan), an old-school gangster prone to wild physical outbursts. A holdover from an earlier time, Scanlon is now associated with a national outfit run by an unseen person mentioned only as "the old man." The crime syndicate seeks dominion over the city's government and already has compromised the state investigator Turk (William Conrad) and D.A. Mortimer X. Welsh (Ray Collins). Opposed to the gangsters are Captain Thomas McQuigg (Robert Mitchum), an incorruptible public servant if ever there were one, and Officer Bob Johnson (William Talman), a beat cop with an excellent eye for unwelcome hoodlums. The good guys have their work cut out for them now that crime has become dangerously intertwined with legal business ventures:  the Acme Real Estate Company conceals unlawful activity behind a facade of respectability.

The narrative is constructed primarily around Nick Scanlon, whose time is running out on him. The last of his era, Scanlon is an ill-tempered, crude personality of limited education. All of those things pile up against him. The Scanlon character arc anticipates the dynamics of crucial Westerns like THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE (1962), THE WILD BUNCH (1969), PAT GARRETT & BILLY THE KID (1973) and THE SHOOTIST (1976), all of which showcase aging rugged individualists who face displacement in a world primed to move on without them. It seems the Acme Real Estate Company's attempts to preserve Scanlon amount to catastrophic strategic failure. Far less disciplined than his more composed contemporaries, Scanlon proves he is more trouble than he is worth. He habitually comes off as a relic in need of replacement, as when he orders the elimination of Roy Higgins (Howland Chamberlain), who has leaked info to the crime commission. R.G. Connolly (Don Porter) correctly sees Scanlon as a fossil, an artifact of a bygone age. Scanlon's singular impulses are best demonstrated when he beats down his own employee and then brazenly shoots Officer Johnson inside the 7th District Police Station during a needlessly clumsy confrontation. Improbably, Johnson somehow never received a briefing in regard to the notorious Nick Scanlon's appearance, yet Johnson's keen eye identifies one of Scanlon's thugs early in the film. The downfall of Scanlon and everything he represents is well implied when D.A. Welsh's outdoor marketing campaign for county judge is taken apart by an impatient police vehicle. Though evil is contained at the film's conclusion, Captain McQuigg is so selflessly dedicated to his job that he finds no time to celebrate his hard-fought victory over Scanlon. McQuigg concludes the film with full awareness that significant new challenges will emerge to replace old ones.

Captain Thomas McQuigg (Robert Mitchum) cannot be
bought by Robert Ryan's hoodlum Nick Scanlon

The noir stairway always suggests danger, often creeping death

Inanimate objects loom large in film noir, sometimes with
more prominence than people, like this table lamp

The bulk of THE RACKET was directed by John Cromwell, though a staggering list of uncredited directors made contributions, including Mel Ferrer, Tay Garnett, Edmund Grainger, Nicholas Ray and editor Sherman Todd. Rare is a cavalcade of directors a positive sign, and no doubt the somewhat disjointed nature of the Howard Hughes production can be attributed to that laundry list. Director of photography George E. Diskant was no stranger to film noir productions, with an impressive collection of titles to his credit such as DESPERATE (1947), THEY LIVE BY NIGHT (1948), ON DANGEROUS GROUND (1951), THE NARROW MARGIN (1952), BEWARE, MY LOVELY (1952) and KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL (1952). THE RACKET is a remake of the 1928 silent drama of the same title, adapted from Bartlett Cormack's play. The original adaptation received a Best Picture Oscar nomination in 1929. Fascinatingly, the original film interpretation of the play also was produced by Howard Hughes, the owner and controlling executive of RKO Radio Pictures from 1948 to the early 1950s. Hughes no doubt recognized the social relevance of the material would mesh well with 1950s audiences in the wake of the Kefauver Hearings. In another unusual connection, remake director Cromwell served as an actor in the stage production. The final screenplay was co-written by William Wister Haines and W.R. Burnett in their adaptation of the play by Cormack. Samuel Fuller wrote the original script.

A former drill instructor in the United States Marine Corps, Robert Ryan specialized in characters plagued by inner traumas and conflicts, i.e. CROSSFIRE (1947), ACT OF VIOLENCE (1949), CAUGHT (1949), THE SET-UP (1949), ON DANGEROUS GROUND (1951), BEWARE, MY LOVELY (1952), BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK (1955) and ODDS AGAINST TOMORROW (1959). Ryan serves as the anchor of THE RACKET, always the point of interest whenever he is in front of the camera. Robert Mitchum, RKO's other big star along with Ryan, was noted for sleepwalking through roles that he viewed as a mere paycheck. He also could dominate the screen when he felt the occasion demanded, as he did in PURSUED (1947), OUT OF THE PAST (1947), THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER (1955) and CAPE FEAR (1962). His performance in THE RACKET is closer to his "paycheck" approach, nonetheless his role as an incorruptible cop must have been interesting to theatrical audiences in 1951. Mitchum was a noted dopesmoker, famously jailed in 1948. A character similar to the real Mitchum might suit up well with a modern-day version of this material, in which one would expect the governor to be the “Old Man” behind the curtain and McQuigg’s distinguished ethics to flip somewhere along the way. Ryan and Mitchum first appeared together in CROSSFIRE and later in THE LONGEST DAY (1962) and ANZIO (1968). Female roles are relegated to conventional noir cultural archetypes:  supportive housewives and streetwise dames. Joyce Mackenzie (Mary McQuigg) and Lucy Johnson (Virginia Huston) represent the nurturing women and Irene Hayes (Lizabeth Scott) is the "canary," a nightclub singer involved with Scanlon's worthless brother Joe (Brett King). Lizabeth Scott is among my least favorite of Hollywood name actresses noted for portraying noir dames repeatedly. Her sometimes listless presence often makes me wish someone else occupied her role, though I admit she brought something to the table for her roles in TOO LATE FOR TEARS (1949) and especially PITFALL (1948). Scott does precious little to inject energy into THE RACKET. Another weakness is the reporter Dave Ames (Robert Hutton), a character that seems to have been tacked on somewhere in the course of the project's development.

As film noir as it gets

Lawmen dismantle laughably untrue political marketing

Giants of RKO

The dual-layered Blu-ray edition of THE RACKET available from Warner Archive delivers a newly remastered transfer from a 4K scan of the original nitrate negative. Framed at 1.37:1, the Blu-ray content looks more than adequate in motion, with minimal artifacts. I do think contrast looks a little soft, but this gripe is minor. The audio commentary track by film noir authority Eddie Mueller must be experienced in Standard Definition for whatever reason. It was carried over from Warner's 2006 DVD edition and remains a great listen. Mueller explains that Sam Fuller's original script made the Captain McQuigg character too flawed for Hughes's liking. The studio boss Hughes sought a more uncomplicated approach to the material. His productions often exhibited an impoverished look, as is evidenced by this mostly minimalist set design. He also had a tendency to tinker in the editing room a great deal more than any other studio head, to the point he sometimes introduced inconsistencies into the final cut. In a departure from the original material, Robert Ryan's Nick Scanlon embodies the man of violence who is about to be phased out. His methods of problem-solving have become increasingly detrimental to an outfit meant to blend in with legal business endeavors. The opening segment that features Les Tremayne as crime commission lead Harry Craig was an exposition scene added at the request of Hughes.

The only other supplement is a theatrical trailer (1m 7s) that sports serious damage.

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.