Eagle Lion and Anthony Mann had success turning real life modern day crime stories into film noir about people going undercover, so why not do the same thing for the French Revolution?
Bob Cummings stars as a Frenchman who goes undercover as a prosecutor for Robespierre in order to stop Robespierre appointing himself dictator of France. To this end, he takes on the identity of a real-life prosecutor – who Cummings has killed! Full on – an assassin as hero. The MacGuffin is a black book of names of enemies of France, and there’s various twists with the baddies seemingly busting Cummings, but then being persuaded he’s the real deal and so on.
Cummings is best known for his light comedies and it’s rather odd to see him as a sort of hard bitten tough guy investigator, particularly in his “I’m hurt by you” moments with his ex Arlene Dahl and him killing people. (The goodies in this film are quite ruthless.) But you get used to him and there’s nothing wrong with his performance, it’s just his persona is a bit lightweight.
Mann’s direction is impressive, helped considerably by the great DOP John Alton – lots of great camera angles, and big faces, and brisk pacing. The story has plenty of twists and turns, with a solid basis in historical fact (Robespierre did have a list), and the production details are impressive – although not a large budgeted film, it’s still got these terrific sets and costumes, and even has some crowd scenes. And the cast is strong: it also includes Richard Basehart, Norman Lloyd and Charles MacGraw.
This is a real curio, a combination of film noir, historical movie and gangster film – I can’t think of anything else quite like it.
(NB After making this Mann took DOP John Alton and went over to MGM where they made a semi-documentary film noir with an undercover plot, Border Incident. Then Mann went into the Westerns for which he is chiefly remembered today.)
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