The Coming Darkness
I. A. Introduction to the Film Noir Genre,
B. Includes Exotic Noir
II. Early and Wartime Noir, Late ’30s-1946.
III. City of Nine Nightmares, the Golden year of Film Noir, 1946-1954.
IV. Late and Retro Noir, 1955-1966, and 1966 and up.
We have the French to thank for appreciating American art that we sometimes bypass in its day: most notably, Edgar Allan Poe; and Film-Noir, the dark film we developed during WWII, and saw through the early postwar period.
Poe, had he lived a hundred years later, might’ve seen his themes of psychological terror, deception, death, and claustrophobia, not to mention variants on the detective story, recast as the movies from c. 1941-1953 that have been considered noir. Nonetheless, there’s also what I’d like to call late noir--c. 1955-1966; and, more familiarly, retro-noir--anything since the mid-’60s but set in the ’30s or ’40s. That includes both remakes, of course, and new titles like Mulholland Drive.
Unlike other movie genres: musicals, Westerns, science-fiction, etc., film-noir wasn’t really planned, it just happened. But not from nothing. The mystery had been carried from print to film from the inception of motion-pictures. Many of these silent-era and early talkies (teens to late twenties) were either of British origin of were influenced by the old-dark-house plots.
In fact, The Old Dark House is a British mystery movie title from the ’30s. And what do we find in these spooky places? A castle/mansion, a bunch of people usually stuck there, a curse, a secret or two, and, oh, yeah, a dead guy (maybe more). The police come around, and nab the perpetrator, unless that dude is actually fingered by a detective, or some other meddling genius.
Unrelatedly, and stridently American, the straight gangster movie was meanwhile ascending the marquees here. Little Caesar and the Roaring Twenties, Edward G. Robinson and James Cagney, tommyguns, bootleggers, mafioso, the legendary Prohibition Era. The emphasis here, as expected, was on action. Gun battles, car chases, fistfights, etc. Sometimes the bad guys had some class or nobility, but everyone, themselves included, knew who they were.
With threads from the mystery movie’s convoluted plots, and the gangster’s ubiquitous mayhem, another sort of movie gathered steam. Maybe because of WWII, although some noirs predate our participation in the War (it had been going on in Europe since 1939 and Asia since 1931 or so), the rottenness of the Depression was still with us. The war became our new destructive crisis.
Into this breech, the highly-regarded The Maltese Falcon and High Sierra date from 1941; both feature Humphrey Bogart, though each stakes out its own path in this seminal year for film-noir. In the Maltese Falcon, we skulk around San Francisco, with its transitory and shifting urban atmosphere; this remains the habitat (as with New York City, L. A., and Chicago) of that noir creature, like a rat in a maze, the hero/anti-hero scurries about a familiar but often hostile, even nightmarish city-scape.
By contrast, High Sierra, opens up a rustic view. This usually proves to be a deceptive sort of liberation from the urban jungle. Bogart’s character ends up cornered, falling from a precipice different only in detail from the city’s rooftop or fire escape.
During the War, there was an intensification of noir. Double Indemnity (1944) gives us a female antagonist (Barbara Stanwyck) who schemes with Fred MacMurray to kill her husband and bilk his insurance company into the bargain--thus the title. Interestingly, Edward G. Robinson, of intense gangster movie roles from the previous decade, has become the savvy mentor to MacMurray. Robinson’s unable, however, to stop the beguiled younger man’s wayward attempt to cheat the system and win his lover.
From the same year, Laura gives us a mystery with its noir. Gene Tierney has to deal with two questionable suitors, Clifton Webb and Vincent Price, while detective (Dana Andrews) throws himself into the ring. That’s a lot of guys, but Tierney accomplishes quite a lot, considering that she spends a good part of the movie being dead (she’s surprised to learn that Andrews is investigating her ’murder’).
The immediate Postwar period (although 1946 includes many movies made in ’45) is laced with noir: from 1946, The Postman Always Rings Twice catches Lana Turner teaming up with John Garfield to off her husband. With a plot similar to Double Indemnity, the setting moves from the toney suburbs of the earlier movie to a semi-rural roadside diner.
A year later, with Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, Virginia Huston, and Kirk Douglas, we’re back in the California Sierra Nevada mountains with Out Of The Past, with a long flashback, in which Mitchum finds himself in Mexico, looking for the alluring Greer, at his client’s (gangster Douglas’s) behest.
Out of the Past shows several noir motifs: exotic locales (Acapulco, Mexico and Lake Tahoe), an ex-private eye, hiding out (in a picture-perfect small-town life), until his past comes back with a vengeance, thanks to the devious deadly Greer who contrasts utterly with sweet, pleasant Huston. Throw in a labyrinthine plot and a slippery lawyer, aptly named Eels, and Mitchum has his hands full.
We see that whichever side of the law our guy is on, he’s usually on the wrong side of the tracks, with the wrong people, and time stops until he can out-wit, out-fight, or simply out-last his nemesis. He’s not always alone; he often gathers determination, and even owes his survival to a loyal friend, trusty girlfriend or spouse and maybe just a savvy cab driver.
By the early ’50s, this sort of movie, while it didn’t disappear (1958’s Touch Of Evil is widely-regarded as the last of the noirs), became gradually overtaken by social commentary (On the Waterfront) and political intrigue/ espionage crime movie (North by Northwest).
That’s not to say that these, and many other titles of the ’50s and ’60s didn’t have noir traits; the thematic emphasis, however, was usually elsewhere. By the ’70s we began to get remakes of noir classics (The Big Sleep from 1975), and a retro-noir trend (1974’s Chinatown, set in the late ’30s). In an hallucinatory, hypnotic world, David Lynch’s Blue Velvet from 1986 seems to bring the noir ’50s back in one incredibly staggering nightmare.
For about a dozen years that shadowed WWII, faceless cities with numberless dark streets were haunted by lonely, desperate men and women, out to avenge themselves on criminals, or escape those who would hunt them down. For the most part, film noir is a depressing and restlessly violent world. Facts and characters abound, but all is contingent, unreliable.
What’s unexpected about many of these movies, apart from some terrific performances, clever plots, and excellent cinematography, are the uplifting moments in which the hero knows he’s ok, has his/her love, or understands what he’s doing in life. Maybe those revelatory scenes are what the French film critics latched onto; film noir is the cinematic equivalent of an existentialist essay or novel.
The world is not only a difficult, dangerous place, it can destroy our will as well as our person. But to recognize that, and deal with life on these terms, makes us hold on to what we have, or at least, value what we are left with.
B. Exotic Noir:
Foreign settings for most of the film, if not for its entirety--usually Mexico, but could be anywhere. A sub-genre would be rustic/scenic settings with the U.S. there’s quite a few films that are partly exotic, but are primarily concerned with an urban environment. (Out of the Past is unique in that has long scenes both in Lake Tahoe and Mexico, as well as its urban roots in San Francisco.
Well, let’s sidestep to the Canadian border, for an ’exotic resort’ noir
Niagara, 1953.
******** 8.0
"Light Me Up Too, Georgie"
Very entertaining scenic film noir. There’s an interesting doubling motif with the two couples. The nice, decent Cutlers (Max Showalter’s Ray and Jean Peter’s Polly), and the sketchy Loomis’s (Joseph Cotten’s George and Marilyn Monroe’s Rose) move in and out of each other’s lives. They’ve got not one thing in common. But they’re destined to meet, thanks to an initial mix-up at the Niagara Falls resort. Ray and Polly are on their honeymoon; George and Rose are on the skids; Patrick (Richard Allen), Rose’s lover, lurks about.
Monroe does a great job as a femme fatale; Cotten does his noir manic, bitter, loose-cannon role nicely. Out of all of their time together there’s only a few light moments--they start and finish snarling at each other; except for George’s pause to ruminate over her trinkets--just as he kills her. Rose’s only true bit of fun, enjoying her favorite song at a dance, brings on George’s biggest fit; he hates whatever memory the song dredged up for him so much that literally attacks the record. Polly can’t help helping even the humbug George. I disagree with those who say that Polly’s too friendly. Her pleasant, common sense approach acts as a foil to Rose’s and George’s selfish natures. The weak link is Ray, who’s unfortunately a bit bland.
George sort of latches onto Polly. Maybe he feels that Polly represents the stability he’s never had with Rose; he tosses off the basis of their relationship with "maybe I liked the way she served beer." Polly goes through her own insecure phase as no one will believe that she’s seen George after he’s mistakenly assumed dead. It’s a touch of the Hitchcock-style female who ’loses it’. What’s even more in the Hitchcock vein is Rose’s murder; the seemingly endless staircase, the huge array of bells tolling, the shadows, and George’s sense of entrapment. Here the color is put to good use too.
I’ll disagree also with those reviewers who feel that the long ’death ride’ at the end is histrionic. It’s a wild scene alright, but done believably. George is simultaneously going nuts and trying to help Polly, even though he’s put her in danger in the first place. He needs her; but when he knows he’s doomed he gets her more or less safely off the boat. The location pays off if for no other reason than to make this denouement possible.
Interestingly, Patrick’s murder is off screen. That makes it relatively easy to use the noir device of mistaken identity--George passing as Patrick--to give George a short-lived fresh start. I wish we’d seen more of Patrick, though. Presumably, he’s supposed to be a younger, more virile replacement for George. If Ray, and even Rose, are two-dimensional, Patrick’s notable only as a cipher. On the other hand, I can’t see the point of including the buffoonish Ketterings. They add nothing to the plot, and no one pays much attention to them anyway.
For all of the attention that Monroe gets when she’s on-screen, Rose’s role is underwritten. She has no real redeeming qualities. Well, George, a double-murderer, is beyond redemption. But as a character, he shows plenty of personality. Polly is at the center, holding everything together. My version of Niagara would have Polly running off with George, and Ray getting smitten with Rose. Patrick could be Rose’s ex, winds up dead anyway, this time at Ray’s hands.
Some feel that the plot is too simple; I’d say that what might be too simplistic is some of the characters. Despite an odd bit here and there, Niagara is well-worth watching--especially for Cotten’s and Peter’s performances. 8/10.
More exotic resort-style noir, with a disaster twist.
Key Largo, 1948.
********** 10
An array of stars in this sub-genre of noir with a disaster premise. Since most film noir assumes that fate plays a (often decisive) role in life, a natural disaster is great device to drive that theme home. Actually, the criminal element (Edward G. Robinson’s Rocco, Claire Trevor as his ’dame’ Gaye, and hopefully-named underlings) usually represents the agents of fate; the hurricane in Key Largo adds another fateful dimension. Also it brings the noirish atmosphere of isolation and claustrophobia.
The innocent folks are represented by the Temples--Lionel Barrymore as the father James and Lauren Bacall as his daughter-in-law Nora. Everyone else is pretty much on-the-level too; Bogart, as war buddy to the dead George Temple is a little harder to classify. Why exactly does he show up at the remote Temple family hotel? He says he wants to settle in there.
Actually, there’s two criminal plots. Aside from Rocco’s mob trying to escape to Cuba with some counterfeit loot, there’s a couple of escape prisoners on the lam from the two local cops Wade (Monte Blue) and the unfortunate Sawyer (John Rodney). First Sawyer is ambushed by Rocco’s guys, then shot by Rocco in an unfair game of chicken. Given the chance, Frank is unwilling to shoot Rocco in cold blood--although he risks instant death from the underlings, plus his gun isn’t loaded. Sawyer gamely gives it a shot, so to speak, but draws blanks.
At the height of the storm, James is able to unnerve Rocco with tales of previous hurricanes, probably embellishing a bit with 200mph winds, derailed trains, and floating corpses,etc. Rocco’s the only one to show obvious fear of the storm; his type fears anything they can’t control. In an odd way, the hurricane is a positive force; bottling up the criminals, and distracting them as well.
When Wade shows up after the storm abates, Rocco is able to finger the Native-American prisoners for Sawyer’s death. By the time Wade figures out the whole deal, it’s too late to save the prisoners. Rocco’s accomplice Ziggy (Marc Lawrence) pops up, setting the end-game in motion. Fittingly, Gaye is the one to get the drop on Rocco; she’s the one who knows and hates him the most.
The denouement involves a sting of finely-crafted noir scenes. The boat, itself a very confined space, its the interior a maze of shadows and compartments; and topside in the fog, Frank bides his time with his concealed gun. As the long shoot-out develops and Rocco’s guys start hitting the deck, Rocco starts panicking. He lamely tries to negotiate with Frank. But, solid noir hero that he is, Frank doesn’t bite, and, though wounded, manages to plug Rocco, call for help, and presumably make it back more or less in one piece.
Nora and Frank’s romance is implied by her opening up the curtains to the returning sunshine. key Largo doesn’t miss a step: the pacing and tension are palpable, and everything’s lit-up by some great performances--especially Bogart, Robinson, and Trevor. Barrymore’s and Bacall’s roles are more passive, but their scenes finish off what the other three don’t chew up.
Not to be missed; one of the best film-noirs.
Macao, 1952.
******** 8.0
Macao is an entertaining exotic-noir. Nice pacing, simple, but interesting plot, cool atmosphere, and some convincing performances help it overcome some tone issues. Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell are great as the thrown-together couple Nick and Julie. William Bendix makes a good partner for Nick as the mysterious salesman Trumble. Their gangster nemesis, Halloran, is underplayed by the unfortunately rather passive Brad Dexter. Gloria Grahame plays the foil to Russell as Halloran’s girl Margie.
A whole lot of nuance comes from Grahame’s moon-faced stares and Russell’s snarly upper lip. Not to mention shards of crisp dialogue.I’d rather have seen someone like Raymond Burr or Robert Ryan play the gangster; Dexter just doesn’t have the presence of the other principle characters. And Thomas Gomez’s Lt. Sebastian borders on the buffoonish.
In fact, the first part of Macao threatens to slip us into a slightly classier Bob Hope/Bing Crosby Road Movie. There’s too much “Chop!Chop!” pidgin Chinese. Things get a lot better once the gambling gets going. Still, how do Julie, Nick, and Trumble afford the fairly swanky hotel when they’re all pretty much broke? And it doesn’t add up that Julie would be jealous of Margie, who’s obviously under Halloran’s thumb, and, at most, only a reluctant witness to his plot against Nick.
Two plot aspects keep our interest: the Nick/Julie/Halloran triangle (sometimes including Margie’s corner too), and the jewel heist, which drags Trumble in, along with the authorities.Nick is the wild card, as he’s assumed to have an agenda, but really doesn’t. Trumble’s sacrifice in the quest to capture Halloran is artfully done, as he’s mistaken for Nick.
The chase scene leading up to that takes full advantage of the exotic flair of the waterfront. Not to mention the requisite noirish rooftops, alleyways, and streets. And, the climactic fight scene wraps up this whirlwind of action in the last sequences.The opening narration isn’t objectionable; I’d rather have that sort of introduction than just a haphazardly transplanted L.A./N.Y.C. crime drama.
As others have noted, however, there’s not enough Asian characters to completely sustain our suspension of disbelief. The blind guy actually has a meaningful role, even though his character is arguably stereotypical as a loyal, selfless, ‘wise peasant.’
Some of Macao’s goofy scenes work: the shoe fight near the beginning, as we’re introduced to Nick and Julie; and, near the end, a bizarre fight as Julie goes after Nick with an electric fan. This is a fairly slick movie that occasionally gets too clever, but it’s well worth a watch, especially for Mitchum and Russell’s performances.
Bad Day At Black Rock, 1955
********* 9.0
Sort of a western film noir. The dusty desert town is just as forbidding as the gritty urban film noir settings. The mystery involves how Spencer Tracy’s McReady will survive to tell the tale of the murder in Black Rock.Robert Ryan as Reno Smith is the ringleader of the group (with Ernest Borgnine and Lee Marvin) who killed a Japanese-American farmer during WWII.
The rest of the townspeople are conflicted; they’re afraid to reveal the town’s secret to McReady, and try to deflect his questions about the victim. It’s very much like a crime boss controlling a city; the townspeople are weak and seemingly apathetic. After McReady decks Borgnine, showing that the bad guys aren’t so tough after all, Walter Brennan’s Doc takes the lead turning the tables against Smith.The only issue I have with the premise is that it’s much easier to accept that a bunch of desert yokels, living in what’s essentially a ghost town, can be racist murderers.
Of course, it’s the setting and characters that give Bad Day At Black Rock its iconic feel. McReady in his suit has a sort of mythic stature compared to the locals with their well-worn cowboy gear.Smith’s red cap is about the only definite color we see in the town; no one really seems very much alive. It’s as though the crime has stunted or gutted the spirit of the place.
The atmosphere is claustrophobic, despite the wide-open spaces. For dramatic purposes, however, it might’ve been interesting too see a more typical early post-war setting–maybe in a bigger town or suburb. The result of the all-encompassing scenery makes for a good vs. evil contest that’s a bit too obvious. There’s more to see than the sand and dust, though.
The great cast gives us Ryan’s flair for edgy, unsteady villains, Borgnine’s smarmy bully character, Marvin’s laconic creepiness, and Tracy’s steady, quiet strength. Brennan is surprisingly good; for once he’s not playing a hapless fool.A Bad Day At Black Rock is a unique movie with a lot to like. As others have said, nothing is wasted. Well worth more than one viewing.
House of Bamboo, 1955.
******* 7.0
Exotic late-noir.
Robert Ryan and Robert Stack star in an exotic film noir set in postwar Tokyo. Sandy Dawson (Ryan) runs a black market gang which has taken the life of Mariko’s (Shirley Yamaguchi’s) husband. She teams up with Stack’s military cop character Eddie Kenner against the underworld.
Rounding the cast of good and bad guys are Brad Dexter as Captain Hanson, Sessue Hayakawa as Inspector Kito, Cameron Mitchell as Sandy’s second-in-command Griff, Bill Elliot as Mariko’s husband, Webber. there’s Coram (Sandra Giglio), and Charlie (DeForest Kelley).
Eddie goes undercover in Sandy’s gang as Spanier, falls in love with Mariko, and gets in the crosshairs himself., Well we’re stuck with a narrator for a while, but, on the plus side, we get an amusement park denouement, ala Strangers On A Train.
We first have a train heist; the only one in history with the picturesque Mt. Fujiyama in the background. The contraband is unloaded by the gangsters onto a waiting truck. A woman sees the body of her husband lying in the snow.
From police HQ Hanson goes out to the hijack site. Ceram, a journalist, accompanies them. Three weeks later, they discover that Webber was shot by a gang member using the same gun as that from the train incident. Webber won’t finger anyone; they mention Spanier; Webber doesn’t cop to that guy, but does admit that Muriko’s his wife.
Another three weeks on, we get Eddie as Spanier–looking into a theatre. He wants to talk to Muriko, but she’s not to be found. Look here, she’s at a seaside wharf area. Definitely the Ugly American, he bullies his way around. Still, she eludes him.
Kind of a foot chase ensues (strangely there’s some people wearing masks, just like right now). Finally he corners her. I guess he hasn’t got the memo, cause he doesn’t know that her husband is dead. She thinks he’s in the gang too; actually, he was looking for a cut of the racket. On the other hand, she doesn’t know that the cops know about her.
She tells him that her husband was secretive about his business. “I didn’t figure he was in that deep” Eddie remarks. He tells her there’s nothing to sorry about. Anyway, he goes to a pachinko parlor and demands protection money–probably Webber’s old job.
He makes the rounds demanding to meet “the number one boy” for a shakedown. He finally gets his comeuppance, as Dawson is in charge of Eddie’s next mark. Griff and Charlie are his lieutenants. Anyway, he gives Eddie back the bribe, with the advice to try another town for his Pachinko racket.
He stops in for a plate of octopus–he’ll just have the tea. He’s practically lynched for stealing some jewelry; “the American army has quite a history on you” the cops say. Charges were dropped. That mess over, he’s next rousted by Sandy’s gang. He’s offered a more promising job “I’ve got other interests” Sandy says enigmatically.
The gang doesn’t like Eddie; sarcastically, Sandy goes over his war, err, criminal record, and characterizes him as a “stockade hound.” The big guy gives Eddie some get-cleaned-up money. Now he’s a gentleman of means, as it were. Aha! Eddie reveals to us what he’s really up to; he’s meeting with the Captain and the Inspector to discuss Dawson.
Checking in with Dawson, he has to tell them about Muriko. So Dawson hauls him over to Muriko’s, telling her “you came close to losing him permanently.” Eddie’s actually able to fix the situation; Sandy’s none the wiser. Later, she and Eddie meet up privately; amazingly, she wants to help him.
He thinks about it… she’ll hang out with him anyway. He’s such a great guy: rude, crude, and a quasi-criminal. Well, he cracks a smile when she him coffee in the morning, and the bath…and, y’know. C’mon where’s the cops and robbers?
She tells him that it’s dishonorable to live with a foreigner; “It was a bad idea from the start” he says. Agreed. Oh, man, one of Sandy’s mugs come to summon him. But back at Dawson’s HQ we join a meeting in progress; they’re talking about a cement plant for some heist. “The fog lifted, we’re all set.”
Near the site, it’s time to pass out the weapons. So what? Anyway, we see the bad guys arrive at the plant and take their positions; a payroll job. They get the loot, but a gunbattle ensues. No mercy for the wounded bad guys. The smoke bombs cover their escape, though. Dawson’s actually pissed that they saved the wounded Eddie.
Muriko comes to tend to him. She’s compromised now; he tells her that Spanier is still in jail in the States, he’s taken his identity for the other side. Now, there’s more unconvincing romantic crap. Charlie comes around to tell them that Dawson’s having a party to celebrate the successful payroll job.
Nice party, who cares? Some stereotypical cultural stuff as Eddie and Muriko chat on the veranda; a massage, then, blah, blah. At last, we get the set up for the next job: Bank of Tokyo. Griff is wondering why he’s being sidelined; “you’re just about ready for a Section-8.” Anyway, now it’s Eddie’s turn to flip the switch on the gang.
He tells Muriko to call Hansen; they fix to meet at a hotel. Unfortunately, Charlie is at the bar. But she’s able to give the layout to Hansen. When she goes home, though, Dawson’s waiting for her. He feigns to have a chummy tea party with her. Charlie saw her with Hansen; is she “two-timing” Eddie, or…worse?
Dawson’s got a nice mobile HQ. Good and bad guys converge on the bank; some cool back alley and side street stuff. Cleverly, the van has loudspeakers–one tune means to call of the heist, etc. Meanwhile, Reason takes care of loose ends by draining Griff’s bathwater with bullet holes–it’s going to be a gooey rinse now.
Dawson blames Griff for tipping off the cops. Ceram comes to see Dawson–Ceram knows who really fingered him “you killed the wrong man!” Hmm…now what? Well, in the deliberate way that everyone acts here, it takes a whole set of speeches for Dawson to explain things to his crew. But he tells them the informer was Griff! What’s he up to?
So, he takes Charlie and Eddie out on a new job. Back to the pearl business; ok, it’s a slam dunk to rip off these chumps. It’s only now that the ultimate plan becomes clear; Dawson’s going to finger Eddie for the robbery. So, Dawson calls the cops to take their own position, so to speak. He says he’ll leave killing Eddie up to the local police. Nice.
Charlie jabs Eddie with his gun butt; they figure if they prop him up the cops will just shoot him when they burst in. Might’ve worked, but the cops get the jump on them and start shooting while the three of them are still in the room. Charlie gets it, but Dawson tries to lose the cops in an amusement park. Weird juxtaposition of him getting in the way of the rides. He can’t really get away; ending up in a whirling globe ride.
The cops have a good position in the ride’s control tower. In a long scene reminiscent of the merry-go-round denouement in Strangers On A Train , but with tons of shooting, they manipulate the ride to flush out Dawson. Eventually, Eddie, revived once again, brings Dawson down. That’s it. Done. Thankfully.
Ok, this was an exciting noirish crime drama, with a good plot, and two tough guy leads. But, the romance, which is never convincing, bogs this down and draws it out. The setting, which is certainly picturesque, with a boatload of local nuance, nonetheless seems wasted.
Tokyo would’ve been an exotic, romantic location for a romance; but there’s really nothing that helps what is essentially an urban crime premise. In any big American city, this might’ve seemed grittier and more focused. Several noirs make use of a Mexican setting as an escape, a place to make deals or something in between; most notably, Mexico works well as a episode in Out Of The Past.
But Japan isn’t really a logical stopover for American criminals; I get that there was a transitional period when a lot of our guys were there after the war. But back here the seamy underside was lurking in any big city due to a different, but nonetheless overt post-war mash-up of readjustment.
This was an entertaining experience–despite its flaws.
Suspense, 1946
******* 7.0
"He shoulda stuck to his peanuts"
A love triangle, and an Ice Parade. Sounds exotic. But it comes out gritty as well. The Leonards, Roberta and Frank (Belita and Albert Dekker) are plagued by an up and coming Joe (Barry Sullivan) in their ice-skating retinue. Starting as a scraggly-looking peanut vendor, he’s soon on the make with Roberta. Frank has to head him off at the pass, err, the avalanche--but that doesn’t work as planned.
Meanwhile, Joe’s old flame, Ronnie (Bonita Granville) is cooking up something unsavory for him; a bit of blackmail, maybe some more ingredients. Will the post-performance party bring things to a boil? Harry (Eugene Pallette), Joe’s uncle, plants himself in the scenery like an Orson Welles or two. Roberta thinks Frank survived the avalanche that he sparked--ironically in an attempt to kill Joe. In what looks like an ambush by a shadowy figure, Joe manages to turn the table on the elusive Frank. Now Frank will be buried all over again, but this time by dirt, not snow. Ronnie waits for Joe.
An unhappy camper, "I’m trying to see what made me go for you" she muses, bitterly. Hey, what’s the big deal about this roll-top desk? It’s gotta go. Burn it! Along with the evidence. Harry seems to exist to relay messages and throw out a quip now and then. "Looking for something?" Inquires Joe of Roberta, who’s going through a pile of ashes in the basement incinerator. Why did he do it? Well, Frank did try to kill him, y’know. The light from the fire flicks shadows this and that way, giving Joe a freaky cast. He composed himself in a storeroom; a bizarre prop--a giant wheel with swords as spokes--rests there. Looking at himself in a window, Joe sees Frank glaring back at him, laughing. On the street, Joe endures what looks like a London fog scene; why is the passer-by wearing a top hat?
Anyway, when he goes inside, Roberta tries to talk him into giving up: no dice. Ronnie’s bugging him again, so is Harry. We get a climactic ice parade scene: Roberta’s going to emerge from a gigantic skull and dance among surreal landscape of props. Then jump through the huge sword-spoked wheel. Thanks to Joe’s sneaky sabotage, it looks like it’s rigged to slice her up; she avoids it just in time. Taking a break outside (bad idea Joe!), Joe walks right into two bullets from Ronnie’s gun. That’s more or less the end.
The skating scenes are spectacular, not only for Betita’s athleticism and grace, but also for the stunning sets. The film is a bit long, and does slow down towards the middle; I don’t think that’s because of the skating scenes though. Especially because of the outlandish choreography (plain beautiful at first, then stranger and more menacing in subsequent performances), the Ice Parade actually compliments the otherworldly, even nightmarish atmosphere.
Harry has an interesting role as a sort of jester; in a way, he’s an observer and commentator, part of the audience. Ronnie’s a thorn in Joe’s side throughout, a fatal nemesis. It is odd that Roberta goes for Joe in the first place--Ronnie seems well-suited to him by comparison. And why would Frank listen to the peanut guy/janitor? Sullivan’s character is sly, but hardly a charmer; Montgomery Clift could pull off the steal-the-boss’s-wife angle, but not this cold fish Joe. "You must be crazy, you think you can get away with anything, don’t you?" Roberta tells him. He does.
I’m not saying Sullivan’s performance isn’t good; it is. I just don’t see the right sort of chemistry between Joe and Roberta. This is well-acted, with a new venue for an an old theme. Aside from the look and feel of the brilliant shows-on-ice within the overall show, the art-deco on display, both interiors and exteriors, is a treat. The opening credits play against one of the finest art deco creations I’ve seen. But all is not serenely futuristic. When the scene calls for it, we get stark, shadowy noir sets.
This is a versatile movie that plays with our expectations, delivering an elegantly wrapped bundle with a broken bunch of dreams inside.