Cast:
Louis Hayward (Barney Page), Joan Leslie (Sheila Page), Richard Basehart (William Williams), Virginia Field (Paula Costello), Tom Conway (John Friday), Natalie Schafer (Eloise Shaw), Benay Venuta (Bess Michaels), and Ilka Grüning (Mattle) Directed by Alfred L. Werker #676 - Shock, #721 - The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and #947 - He Walked by Night)
Review:
Admittedly, some film directors stay anonymous when it comes to directing, even if there is some sort of promise with select film assignments. But Alfred L. Werker had a consistent career to give himself credit for, because it spanned four decades from his work as an assistant director in the silent era all the way to becoming a director by the time the 1920s ended. He even got to direct within the more noted studios such as 20th Century Fox for a time, and he was the one who directed the second of the Rathbone-Bruce series of Sherlock Holmes films in 1938. Strangely enough, his career saw him on both sides of the coin when it came to directors replacing directors without credit: he was brought into doing a re-shoot and re-editing on Erich von Stroheim's troubled Hello, Sister! (1933) and he was given credit for He Walked by Night (1949) although Anthony Mann contributed a certain amount of input as director. For this film, oddly enough, Werker was brought in by Eagle-Lion Films to do it over Jules Dassin (don't worry about Dassin, he got to direct useful efforts in that time with Brute Force (1947) and The Naked City (1948), so there's that). The film is based on the 1942 novel of the same name by William O'Farrell, with a screenplay by Walter Bullock that reversed the character traits of the lead characters (the man was the troubled shooter while the woman was an alcoholic, but the poet character was, well, a crossdresser); this change was done apparently because when they casted Leslie, they thought she would be more suited for a not-alcoholic role. It was one of the first releases from the studio of Eagle-Lion, who released a considerable number of films that year (no need for coincidences, but one of those features...was T-Men, by Mann), one that would not be a mere cheapie to be paired on package films.
Okay, here's a film noir that could throw you for a loop: a movie that takes place over the course of 1946 where the lead character is reliving that year all over again after killing their husband on New Years Eve. It may very well be one of the first films to feature a time loop, although obviously it is certainly something to try and make an act out of one person trying to avoid destiny with twelve months to plan that happens to involve her as a stage actor. Apparently, there exists a restoration (as done in the mid-2000s, because it nearly languished in complete obscurity) of the film out there in the markets, which is possibly more intriguing than trying to search for it on the Internet, where at least one version has a "Nick at Nite" bumper at times or happens to have burned-in subtitles (TCM, if you were curious, only showed it first in 2019). The 92-minute runtime is perhaps a bit too long to truly hold up its premise, but it is a curious achievement. Hell, I suppose there are more stories and films about time loops than I thought there would be, aside from that one time you could see it on The Twilight Zone. It begs for some sort of suspense here, but instead it mostly goes about with the air of inevitability more than anything, which is only mildly involving. But one can at least see why Leslie, in the first of two films she did with Eagle-Lion (Northwest Stampede was done the following year), is a worthy presence to set the table in trying to avert a fait accompli. Try as she might in a knowing sense of vulnerability, her realization in the gut-churning countdown to December 31. Hayward is perhaps a bit overextended in trying to play this raving man of drunken bitterness, which results in a bit of hammy acting when it comes to the final setup of a guy doomed to be shot. So confident was Eagle-Lion with the audience reviews about Basehart was that they gave him better billing, which is pretty impressive for a guy going from stage work to his film debut. There is an alluring quality to him as the only one who goes with this idea of destiny, albeit as an eccentric (so yes, instead of cross-dressing, he just gets roped into the asylum because of a girl). The rest of the players do just fine in routines as the film eventually makes its way around what can and perhaps cannot be changed when it comes to thinking about looking at the past a certain way twice. As a whole, it is more curious than anything, but it makes at least some use of its premise with a few decent performances to make a useful recommendation.
Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.
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