Cast:
Jack La Rue (Slim Grisson), Hugh McDermott (Dave Fenner), Linden Travers (Miss Blandish), Walter Crisham (Eddie Schultz), MacDonald Parke (Doc), Danny Green (Flyn), Lilli Molnar (Ma Grisson), Charles Goldner (Louis, Headwaiter), Zoe Gail (Margo), Leslie Bradley (Ted Bailey), and Richard Neilson (Riley) Directed, Written, and Produced by St. John Legh Clowes.
Review:
In fairness, this film is only notable to really get around to covering because of the furor it inspired with contemporary critics of the time. The film is based on two sources: the original book, which was originally written by James Hadley Chase in 1939, and the play of the same name that was adapted by Chase and Robert Nesbitt in 1942. The original production ran at Prince of Wales Theatre in the West End for a brief run that had starred Travers in the lead role. Somehow, the play received better notice than the film eventually proved to have. The film starts with a listing on an "A" [Passed for Public Exhibition to Adult Audiences] rating, which would mean that someone under 12 couldn't watch it. Some of the critiques at the time even mentioned that when decrying the film as "salacious". Actually, let me rewind that a bit, because even the book had a bit of critique at the time for its violence and sensuality, where even George Orwell (essayist, journalist, and famous writer of works such as Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four) made an essay about it. To add on to that, the Chase novel was inspired by another novel involving "salacious" material with Sanctuary, written by William Faulkner in 1931 that involved a kidnapping of a college girl with bootleggers in the South alongside other seedy elements. Incidentally, Sanctuary also had its own film adaptation in The Story of Temple Drake (1933) that had La Rue in the lead role, and a further adaptation of the book alongside its follow-up book was done in later years, while Chase's novel would also receive a further film adaptation with The Grissom Gang (1971) by Robert Aldrich as director. In any case, this was the third and last film directed by Clowes, with the most other notable contribution being his play Dear Murderer (1946), which was turned into a film by others the following year. One alternate title was actually called Black Dice...creative in decadence, surely. Apparently, while the film was a hit with British audiences, it has never been shown on British television.
Look, the book had a blurb on the front that said it was "the toughest novel you'll ever read", so is the film really that surprising? Actually, the real surprise is the fact that the film really isn't that bad. Is it over-the-top and weird? Oh you bet, but that doesn't mean this is exactly horrific in its crime of daring to make a gangster film, albeit one that tries to sell a mix of British and European actors (save for La Rue) as Americans in a New York affair. Was this really something so bad that led to a publication calling it a "sickening exhibition"? Sure, the film tries to sell a kidnapping-turned-romance with a variety of plot twists and lines that are cliché to the maximum effect, but this isn't exactly what I call gruesomely disgusting. With lines like asking to soften up and given one a tumble, it has all the markings of a classic trashy gangster piece, complete with numerous examples of violence and raw energy that don't lift for its ending. What's to hate about this? I don't care for romance films like Twilight, but I didn't exactly call it sickening. If this had been done in the following decade, one would be wondering how similar in tone it sounded to Kiss Me Deadly (1955, which happened to he directed by Aldrich), which had a government commission decrying its effect on young viewers. The crime presented here is how easy this does well at being a B-movie. The acting is a blend of mediocrity, but that seems like part of the charm: La Rue and Travers are stuck in a tawdry script that puts them together: in that regard, Travers does well with her wavering nerves of grace, one that makes for plenty of posh quivers and swoons in a role near the end of her career before retiring. La Rue is fine as well in that tradition of gangster-ese acting that wants to play tender too, one supposes. Others are weird in placement, such as McDermott (a golfer-turned-actor) and his narc-type acting with a character that nearly distracts from the climax, while Molnar's maternal gangster presence is quirky enough to work. Crisham and Green make for good goon folks to go with refined Parke and others. For 102 minutes, what we have is a movie that might as well serve as unintentional parody, with a considerable count of bodies falling in a variety of ways (namely shooting) that nevertheless has a keen appeal to keep watching anyway. It might have been a bit much (or perhaps enough) for certain groups in 1948, but it has a place for itself regardless to be remembered. It is a strange, unusual movie that will make one look back on their noirs and romance and wonder just where this film got all of its weird hang-ups from each genre from.
Next Time: Killers from Space.
Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.
