THE RECKLESS MOMENT (1949)

Columbia Pictures, 81m 59s

The sleaziness of urban noir characters and situations creeps into suburban upper middle-class America in THE RECKLESS MOMENT, an extremely competent if flawed noir melodrama that aired on Turner Classic Movies recently.

Joan Bennett shines a light on James Mason in this publicity photo.

The film is set in and around the beach community of Balboa in southern California, where location footage was captured. Lucia Harper (the great Joan Bennett, SCARLET STREET, 1945) travels to LA to confront Ted Darby (Shepperd Strudwick, CHICAGO DEADLINE, 1949), a greasy middle-aged man who has been seeing Lucia's impetuous 17-year-old daughter Bea (Geraldine Brooks, POSSESSED, 1947). After Darby admits he could be persuaded to forget about Bea for the right price, Lucia returns home to let her daughter know how little the teen means to Darby. Understandably concerned, Bea meets clandestinely in the boathouse with Darby, who certifies the story while trying to explain his situation. In a (reckless) moment of anger, Bea clocks Darby with a flashlight. The blow causes him to lose balance and awkwardly fall to his death, which gruesomely involves an anchor.

Lucia Harper (Joan Bennett) must do some quick thinking in THE RECKLESS MOMENT

After Lucia discovers the lifeless body of Darby, in Mildred Pierce-like devotion to her daughter, she sticks her own neck out—in broad daylight—and dumps Darby elsewhere. Predictably, the corpse is discovered, and troubles surface rapidly for Lucia, who unwittingly assumes Darby's debt. Blackmailing Irishman Martin Donnelly (James Mason, LOLITA, 1962) appears and eloquently requests the hefty sum of $5,000 for the return of incriminating letters penned by Bea to Darby. Donnelly suggests Lucia pays up rather than face his not-so-nice associate Nagel (Roy Roberts, HE WALKED BY NIGHT, 1948).

The complications that arise for Lucia are blamed on the combination of decadent urban influence and the absence of the family patriarch. It is explained Lucia's husband Tom is away on business, coordinating the design of a bridge in Berlin (an interesting location for such endeavors). Lucia notes her husband was against the idea of Bea attending art school in LA, where she would encounter the shady Darby. This same decadent locale is also where Darby became indebted to loan sharks, who swim in the same polluted sea as Darby, surrounded by struggling musicians, chronic gamblers, and fast-talking prostitutes.

The time of year is just before Christmas, when most adults are stressed-out as it is with time and money situations that seem to work against us. Early on, Lucia begins to write a letter to her husband in frustration of his absence, then thinks better of it and discards the letter-in-progress. Instead she writes a more pleasant note, and does not register any worry about their daughter's choice for a boyfriend. To see Lucia shake off her instincts to play the role of submissive housewife is an empowering moment for woman as capable leader and main problem-solver. But without her husband able to assist in her time of need, Lucia is able to come up with only a fraction of the money demanded of her. In a particularly dispiriting sequence, she learns she will be unable to get a loan without her husband's signature. "There's nothing wrong that Tom's coming home won't cure," assures Lucia, confirming the necessity of Tom's return as head of household.

My favorite of all actresses that frequented the noir landscape, Bennett delivers an outstanding performance as the bespectacled, chain-smoking woman in peril. Unfortunately the romantic angle does not quite click. Donnelly's attraction to Lucia manifests itself too suddenly to be convincing, especially in light of the narrative's homoerotic subtext. "You have your family, I have my Nagel," reveals Donnelly. Tellingly, Donnelly goes after his “partner” only after Nagel has expressed disappointment that Donnelly has "gone soft."

An adaptation of Elisabeth Sanxay Holding's "The Blank Wall," published in LADIES HOME JOURNAL STORY, THE RECKLESS MOMENT is photographed skillfully by Burnett Guffey, who also handled the cinematography for some of the greatest film noirs, such as IN A LONELY PLACE (1950), THE SNIPER (1952), and NIGHTFALL (1957). Director Max Ophüls (credited here as Max Opuls) also helmed the noir film CAUGHT, released the same year, again featuring Mason. THE RECKLESS MOMENT would be the final American effort from Ophüls before his return to Europe, where he created his most revered works (LOLA MONTÈS, 1955, THE EARRINGS OF MADAME DE..., 1953, LA RONDE, 1950). THE RECKLESS MOMENT was remade as THE DEEP END (2001) starring Tilda Swinton and Goran Visnjic.

Though currently unavailable on domestic home video in the US, THE RECKLESS MOMENT can be acquired as an all-region DVD import, or have your DVR ready the next time it plays on TCM.

THIS GUN FOR HIRE (1942)

Paramount Pictures, 81m 17s

In his first featured role, Alan Ladd portrays Philip Raven, a hard-boiled contract killer. Introduced in a fleabag rooming house in San Francisco, Raven reveals a fondness for stray cats, who survive much the way he does. That fondness, however, absolutely does not extend to humans. He shows a quick temper when he backhands the maid Annie (Pamela Blake), but demonstrates a more calculated manner when completing that day's major assignment:  the elimination of chemist Albert Baker (Frank Ferguson), who had become a threat to the anti-American activities of LA-based Nitro Chemical Corporation. With a no-choice second killing, Raven takes out Baker's secretary (Bernadene Hayes) in a prototypical film noir murder, suggested by the sound of a lifeless body hitting the floor after Raven fires his weapon through a closed kitchen door. Mission accomplished, Raven is paid for his services via marked tens from Nitro executive Willard Gates (Laird Cregar), who promptly reports the money stolen, thus causing Raven to seek revenge. Meanwhile, elegant blonde night club entertainer Ellen Graham (Veronica Lake) is recruited to spy on Gates, and her fiancé Michael Crane (Robert Preston) is the lawman in pursuit of Raven.

Philip Raven (Alan Ladd) is ready to become THIS GUN FOR HIRE

An adaptation of Graham Greene's 1936 novel A GUN FOR SALE, co-written for the screen by Albert Maltz and W.R. Burnett, THIS GUN FOR HIRE is one of the early noir films that mapped out the territory of an emerging American film movement. The Raven character in many ways is the definition of the classic alienated noir protagonist, a complete outcast who lives by a moral code that makes sense to him. "I'm my own police," he observes. His tough-cookie moments are plentiful:  he rancorously shoves Gates's adjutant Tommy (Marc Lawrence) down a basement staircase (noir staircases tend to be dangerous), at one point prepares to shoot Graham in the back, and later in self-preservation mode, kills a cop.

Branded with a troubled past, Raven was among the first of many dispassionate loners to surface during the WWII-noir era, a time when many returning US vets would find adjustment to civilian life difficult. A Freudian angle is used to explain Raven’s temperament; he endured vicious beatings from the aunt who raised him. One particularly nasty incident left the young Raven with a badly deformed left wrist emblematic of deep psychological scars; notice Raven shows a certain kinship with a young girl (Virita Campbell) restricted by leg braces who asks for his help. The film's other cripple is far less sympathetic. Nitro president Alvin Brewster (Tully Marshall) is the devil in a wheelchair, a man selling out his country. The crippled male would become a common noir trope (i.e. DOUBLE INDEMNITY [1944], THE BIG SLEEP [1946], GILDA [1946], THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI [1947]). Wheelchairs, crutches and canes imply that the men dependent on them are effectively impotent.

So, what, or who, is to blame for all of these hobbled men? Frequently, a woman is responsible, such as Raven's cruel aunt. In THIS GUN FOR HIRE's crucial noir moment of fate, Raven takes a train seat next to the femme fatale who will finalize his condemnation. The danger associated with the noir female, well embodied here by Lake, is suggested during her first musical interlude (dubbed by Martha Mears), when Graham sings, "next moment, instead of her heart, the ace of spades is there." This somewhat comical performance might be overlooked as harmless fun, and of course the female club singer would become a tiresome Hollywood trope; it is a chore to name a significant amount of important film noirs that do not feature a female character who is a night club performer of some sort. But Graham is no ordinary entertainer—she's working as an informant for Senator Burnett (Roger Imhof), and while forced to stick close to Raven, she cleverly leads police to him with her monogrammed playing cards. Raven is not alone in his fascination with Graham—like Raven and so many other male noir characters, the cultivated man Gates has what proves to be a fatal weakness for complex women like Graham (Gates hires her for his Neptune Club, but obviously is more interested in wining and dining her). Graham closes the film with one of the greatest "WTF" lines in cinema history. After Raven takes his final breath, she responds with, "Oh Michael, my darling, hold me!" THIS GUN FOR HIRE makes a strong appeal to the viewer's sense of patriotism, and the necessity of human sacrifice for the greater good. Graham really is speaking to the audience when she says, "This war is everybody's business, yours too."

Ellen Graham (Veronica Lake) on the run with Philip Raven (Alan Ladd)

Rather oddly with hindsight, Lake shared top billing with the incredibly bland Preston, who brings an annoying textbook-acting quality to each scene in which he is featured. Stranger still, director Frank Tuttle had given thought to casting Preston to play the Raven character. Lake and Ladd worked well together and became Paramount's most bankable couple, paired in two other noir classics:  THE GLASS KEY (1942) and THE BLUE DAHLIA (1946). They also appeared in STAR SPANGLED RHYTHM (1942), DUFFY’S TAVERN (1945), VARIETY GIRL (1947), and SAIGON (1948), all Paramount productions.

Studio and LA location footage are blended well by cinematographer John F. Seitz, who went on to lens some of the most well-regarded of all noir films, including the great DOUBLE INDEMNITY (1944), THE BIG CLOCK (1948), NIGHT HAS A THOUSAND EYES (1948), SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950) and APPOINTMENT WITH DANGER (1951, with Ladd). Tuttle also helmed other noir films, i.e. SUSPENSE (1946), HELL ON FRISCO BAY (1955, again starring Ladd), and A CRY IN THE NIGHT (1956).

THIS GUN FOR HIRE is available on a no-frills DVD as part of the Universal Noir Collection. It was remade in 1957 as SHORT CUT TO HELL, the only film James Cagney directed. A made-for-television version was broadcast in 1991, with Robert Wagner cast as Raven.

DESPERATE (1947)

RKO Radio Pictures, 73m 11s

WWII veteran Stephen Randall (Steve Brodie) is happily married to Anne (Audrey Long); so much so that a 4-month anniversary demands celebrating. The couple's plans for the evening take a detour when Reynolds (William Challee) pledges $50 for Randall's immediate attention as a truck driver. It turns out Randall has been recruited for a warehouse robbery masterminded by Walt Radak (Raymond Burr). When Randall is able to alert police while the crime is in progress, an ensuing shootout claims the life of a cop, and Radak's little brother Al (Larry Nunn) is left behind—deservedly— to take the murder rap. Soon Randall and his pregnant wife find themselves on the run. Sleazy PI Pete Lavitch (Douglas Fowley) is enlisted by Radak to track down the Randalls, and Detective Lieutenant Louie Ferrari (Jason Robards Sr.) also becomes connected.

Stephen Randall (Steve Brodie) and wife Anne (Audrey Long) in DESPERATE

In the tradition of Fritz Lang's M, the film noir DESPERATE follows the movements of a man wanted by both police and criminals. As often is the case of the "wrong man" noir, unfortunate occurrences have a cascading effect. For instance, a used car dealer (Cy Kendall) reneges on his deal with Randall, who in an act of desperation steals the vehicle he had restored to working order. After the clunker dies, the couple-on-the-run accepts a ride from a pleasant man who just happens to be the local sheriff (Dick Elliott). When the sheriff's car crashes, suddenly the hapless couple is off in another stolen ride.

In a further convention of the noir form, the traditional family struggles to find its place. When a man on a train comments that the Randalls behave like honeymooners, the man's shrewish wife replies "They'll soon get over that." That statement applies well to the Randalls, who find themselves in one unenviable situation after another. A turning point takes place at a Minnesota farm, the antithesis of the tumultuous urban scene, where Aunt Klara (Ilka Grüning) insists the Randalls be married more officially than they had been. The upbeat conclusion emphasizes a new beginning for the featured couple, made possible through the elimination of the evil family represented by the Radak brothers.

Walt Radak (Raymond Burr) belongs behind bars in DESPERATE

DESPERATE is strikingly stylish noir, rich in sinister atmosphere, perhaps highlighted by a climactic stairway shootout. Cinematographer George E. Diskant stresses an appropriately hazy environment when focused on Walt Radak and his cohorts, particularly when the unsavory thugs mercilessly beat down Randall. Diskant's skill set was put to good use in other noteworthy noir stories, including THEY LIVE BY NIGHT, THE RACKET, ON DANGEROUS GROUND, and THE NARROW MARGIN, to name just several.

1947 was an exceptional film noir year for the principals. Director Anthony Mann also helmed two other terrific examples of the genre:  RAILROADED! and T-MEN. Brodie appeared in CROSSFIRE and OUT OF THE PAST, and Audrey Long starred in BORN TO KILL.

DESPERATE is part of Warner Home Video's 4-disc Film Noir Classic Collection: Volume Five.

BLAST OF SILENCE (1961)

Universal Pictures, 77 minutes

As part of The Criterion Collection, the film noir straggler BLAST OF SILENCE is now available on domestic home video in a restored digital transfer worthy of the film’s revered status. Even with its absolute minimum of plot, the taut 77 minute production offers considerable depth to its characterization of one of the cinema’s definitive outcasts, orphaned as a child and completely ostracized in adulthood.

The film’s writer/director Allen Baron also stars as lead character Frank Bono, a hitman who returns to New York City on assignment around Christmastime. He arranges his murder weapon through Big Ralph (Larry Tucker), an overweight, unkempt man Frank strongly dislikes. As Frank dutifully studies the pattern of behavior associated with his target, “second string” crime boss Troiano (Peter H. Clune), Ralph deduces the intent of Frank’s contract and threatens blackmail. As Frank struggles with his professional commitment, he also must sort out his feelings for Lori (Molly McCarthy) in his private life.

Lionel Stander, blacklisted at the time, delivers the hard-boiled narration so critical to our understanding of the existentialist Frank, who has condemned himself to a life of solitude. The fairly constant narration stresses Frank’s hatred of everyone and everything, most memorably observing that intended mark Troiano sports “a moustache to hide the fact he has lips like a woman.” As Frank’s hate manifests itself, he can kill in good conscience, even while most New Yorkers busy themselves with holiday-related concerns, as Meyer Kupferman’s jazzy score provides musical accompaniment to the urban mise-en-scène. Frank’s isolated character, though, receives more appropriate commentary via the song “Dressed in Black,” performed by a nightclub bongo player (Dean Sheldon, I suppose enlisting Johnny Cash was out of the question due to budget constraints). Frank’s perpetual need to manufacture hate keeps him excluded from mainstream society, where presumably an assassin functions best, though even his professional communications are limited and impersonal. Baron expresses Frank’s dark nature quite bluntly, as when Frank forces himself on Lori, and most definitely when he attacks someone with a fire axe in a surprisingly protracted outburst of violence. The stark conclusion, among the most thematically (and environmentally) cold of films noir, dovetails instructively with the film’s opening sequence, in which the literal “light at the end of the tunnel” proves to subvert the usual connotation of that phrase.

This Criterion DVD features Robert Fischer’s 60m documentary “Requiem for a Killer:  The Making of BLAST OF SILENCE.” It’s an amalgam of original footage from Wilfried Reichart’s 1990 feature “Allen Doesn’t Live Here Anymore,” which was inspired by the re-emergence of BLAST OF SILENCE at the Munich Film Festival earlier that year, along with more recent material of Baron in Beverly Hills. The re-assembled documentary, as it is, follows Baron’s return to the NYC locations where many of the key sequences from Blast of Silence were given texture. During the tour, Baron offers specifics on the making of the low budget film for which he was the only affordable star. Behind the camera, his background as a cartoonist, illustrator, and painter provided an instinctive flair for the balanced compositions and extensive location footage for which the film is noted. He also explains that one of the film’s most stunning shots, in which a large group of children form a swastika from an overhead view, was completely unrehearsed. In this one shot, Baron effectively captures the dehumanizing element of orphanage life. Other supplements include an on-set Polaroid gallery, photos of locations as they appear in 2008, an insightful essay from Terrence Rafferty, and a nifty graphic-novel adaptation by Sean Phillips.

Based on the modest success of BLAST OF SILENCE, Baron was able to work in Hollywood under contract, mostly in television. Reflecting back, he would have preferred to remain in New York, where he could have focused on projects he couldn’t seem to get going in Hollywood. Though a bit overrated perhaps, BLAST OF SILENCE displays the fascinating promise of a New York filmmaker who might have been.

LOOPHOLE (1954)

Allied Artists Pictures, 79m 56s

Film noir criminals are not always the notorious gangster types. Frequently they are unremarkable personalities; working-class stiffs who view themselves as unfairly condemned to society's oppressed underbelly. Often they come to the erroneous conclusion that a heist of some kind will provide a way out.

Herman Tate (Don Beddoe, HOODLUM EMPIRE, THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER) is the type of noir character referenced above. In the hope of securing the long-term attention of blonde bombshell Vera (Mary Beth Hughes, INNER SANCTUM), the milquetoast Tate devises a plan to pose as a bank examiner and rob a teller's drawer of nearly $50,000. The man caught short is Mike Donovan (Barry Sullivan), who not only must cope with being completely discredited, but also endure the old-school approach of bulldog investigator Gus Slavin (Charles McGraw), a cynical ex-cop determined to recover the missing funds so his bonding company does not have to cover the national bank's loss. LOOPHOLE illustrates how quickly our lives can be turned upside down, and how difficult it can be to make things right again.

Gus Slavin (Charles McGraw) is difficult to discourage in LOOPHOLE

Forty-something at the time of filming, top-billed Sullivan (THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL, CAUSE FOR ALARM!) cannot pass for a 35-year-old, but delivers an otherwise convincing performance in this "wrong man" noir film. Donovan's heart-of-gold wife is portrayed by Dorothy Malone, the book store babe from THE BIG SLEEP. The gravel-voiced McGraw (THE THREAT, SIDE STREET) is well-cast as the omnipresent force determined to make life hellish for Donovan. Slavin is a relic, a dirty badge iconic of a maturing noir movement. By the mid ‘50s, the investigator who had quit the police force in disgust was less moral and less reliable than he was depicted in the ‘40s. Slavin's instincts are dead wrong, and he is too stubborn to consider alternative viewpoints. This character anticipates similarly flawed protagonists who would emerge (and ultimately sink) in KISS ME DEADLY and TOUCH OF EVIL.

Directed by Harold D. Schuster, LOOPHOLE is set in LA and utilizes a fair amount of location footage. The flat compositions of cinematographer William A. Sickner (KIDNAPPED, CRY VENGEANCE) were the order of the day at this point in noir history. Screenwriter Warren Douglas (CRY VENGEANCE, FINGER MAN) relies a bit much on coincidence, but the end result is entertaining enough, even if the film's title is never put to use.

The DVD available via the Warner Archive is framed at 1.78:1 and looks good.