Movie review - "Love from a Stranger" (1947) **

 Gaslighting melodramas always work - the husband trying to kill the wife, driving her man, with malevolent intentions. It's all solid stuff.

But it's odd why Eagle Lion wanted to film this especially as it had been done in Britain in 1937. Maybe they wanted a vehicle for a British star - they didn't get one. Unless you count Aussie Ann Richards, who is nice, as Sylvia Sidney's friend, but barely in the film. Indeed, she could be cut out. John Howard, as Sidney's whiny ex, does all the worrying about Sidney stuff.

John Hodiak is the charming psycho husband.

The story lacks a twist. Naive Sidney marries dashing Hodiak. Everyone thinks he's bad, eventually she does too, he is bad. Richards and/or Howard needed to be in cahoots with him.

Eagle Lion provided a decent budget, it's a period tale with costumes and houses by the coast. But it was money wasted. Why not set it in present day America? Differentiate it from the original? You could still make it so no one had a photo of the guy.

Sometimes films like this can be saved by A list actors but the collection here is B list - everyone can act, mind, but they don't have charisma.

Movie review - "Lost Honeymoon" (1947) **

 This is brightly handled with some skilled playing - Franchot Tone was adept at light comedy and Tom Conway livens things up; (Shirley) Ann Richards actually gets a decent role and Frances Rafferty is beautiful and a lot of fun as the other woman.

But the story is so dumb and contrived. Richards was BFF of a woman who was married to Tone during the war in England (this was made by Eagle Lion and I think they were looking at co pros with England) then went back to the US. The woman has died leaving two kids. So Richards takes the kids to the US pretending to be the wife... because... ah... and Tone had amnesia during the war...

It doesn't make sense. Why doesn't Richards just tell the truth? If they'd come up with a better reason for her deception this would've been so much better.

The opening scene is clunky and feels as though maybe it was shot at a later date. More could've been made of Conway finding Richards attractive and Tone and his kds.

In a few scenes Richards flirts and sparkles and it's just like she's back at Cinesound. Rafferty, like Richards, should've had a bigger Hollywood career.

Leigh Jason directs with a nice light touch. I hadn't heard of him before. Just so dumb a story though.

Movie review - "The Hoodlum" (1951) **

 Lawrence Tierney back to being a Bad Apple. His ethnic mother worries about him (the actor plays it as "ethnic type") his brother is a boring you-should-do-the-right-thing type. There's a lot of moralising and not enough action. Tierney steals a girl off his brother and another girl associated with a bank (Tierney played a lot of stud muffins - women were always finding him irresistible). There's some deaths and melodrama (Tierney impregnates his brother's finance who kills herself, the mother dies of a heart attack). The low budget hurts the production value and quality of the support cast. It's cheap and not a lot of fun.

Movie review - "Kill or Be Killed" (1950) **1/2

 Lawrence Tierney reunites with his Dillinger director. Max Nosseck for an Eagle Lion Picture (they also made The Hoodlum) and it's an entertaining low budget Alan Ladd/Bogart type film with Tierney as an engineer in South America who is falsely accused of murder. He falls in love with a married woman and goes to work as an overseer. There's a scene where someone dies and the camera pans around all these villagers while the music plays this Enrico Morricone-style score which is cool. George Coolouris gives the support cast some class.

Not a bad "C" type movie. I think this had some location filming in Portugal? Lacks the polish of something in this genre of a studio "B" but I enjoy junky tales of adventure in the Hollywood third world.

Movie review - "The Great Rupert" (1949) **

 George Pal's first production is a slight oddity. It's more reminiscent of a sentimental MGM film, featuring Jimmy Durante and Tom Drake, both of whom are in this. There's lots of talk of money, so much talk, it gets annoying. 

Everything is a little off. Drake was just that little bit too old by now. He doesn't match that well with Terry Moore who is full of life and vitality though seems too young for him. For me, a little of Jimmy Durante goes a long way.

It's half a musical. Feels as though it wants to be a musical. There's some musical numbers but it's not one.

There's a very cute squirrel who drops money down to the floor below... but really the whole story could have been told without the squirrel. The money could have just dropped. They should have used the squirrel more.

A film that isn't quite sure of itself.  Kind of a nice heart. But I didn't like how that family expected money to rain down. Or how Moore expected her false love interest boyfriend to help her career. Everyone is greedy.

Movie review - "Destination Moon" (1950) **

 Historically important - helped kick off the 1950s sci fi boom. Impressively serious treatment of going to the moon. Impressive effects for the time.

Just dull. Buttoned down. Hard to tell characters apart. There was some wise cracking comic relief guy. Needed a traitor or a woman or something.

There's some camp Cold War era fun with scientists in suits worrying about being beaten in the space race and pitching to industrialists why they should finance moon exploration.

And interest in seeing Woody Woodpecker explain how the technology works - this was "homage-d" in a similar scene in Jurassic Park.

Movie review - "The Amazing Mr X" (1948) *** (warning: spoilers)

A perfectly decent gaslighting-a-widow movie, complete with some stylish photography, an old dark house on a cliff top and crashing waves belog. Lynn Bari isn't entirely well cast as the widow - she's accomplished as always but just seems too inherently sensible for the role of someone losing her mind. She might've been better off swapping roles with the more fragile seeming Cathy O'Donnell who plays her sister.

Richard Carlson is the guy who likes Bari. The film definitely would've been better off had he played someone more evil. Turhan Bey gives one of his best performances as a spiritualist who may be good or bad... he turns out to be bad, but reforming. Donald Curtis is very good as the slimy husband.

Not a classic but a pretty good movie.

Movie review - "Let's Live a Little" (1948) *

Terrible, dim romantic comedy despite starring (and being co produced by) Bob Cummings, normally adept at light comedy... and actually his performance is fine, but it's an incredibly dopey story with unimaginative handling.

It's got an agonisingly weak concept - Bob Cummings is an ad man who is meant to be a misogynist (Cummings is never believable as this) and has romance troubles with his girlfriend (Anna Stein) and winds up being treated by a shrink who's written a book, Hedy Lamarr.

Two European accented women feels weird. No one has a character - struggled to get a fix on any of them. Sten and Lamarr can't play comedy. I love that Lamarr invented blue tooth or whatever it was but she wasn't a comic genius. There aren't any good lines or scenes or a strong support cast... there's some half baked satire of psychiatry.

I never cared about any of the characters or the central relationship. I didn't laugh. It doesn't even look good.

Movie review - "Miranda" (1948) *** (warning: spoilers)

Lively British comedy which made a star of Glynis Johns whose slightly otherworld nature (that betwitching twinkle in her eye, the sing-song voice) probably made her difficult to cast in leads. She is however an ideal mermaid - especially a man-eating one like this one.

Miranda nabs a doctor (Griffin Jones) who falls overboard while on holiday and whisks him off to her cave full of trinkets. She seduces him - I mean they kiss and there's a fade out and it fades up on them holding each other. In old movie speak that's sex - and the guy is married to Googie Withers. She forces him to take her to London, where she covers her tail by pretending to be in a wheelchair, and chases after Jones, his artist friend John McCallum (who she kisses, leading to a fade out as well... so presumably sex) and Jones' servant David Tomlinson.

Maybe she doesn't have have penile penetrative sex with all of them - McCallum says he's never seen her legs. But it still seems intimate - and she clearly shags Jones because she had his baby at the end. It's totally weird to see an old film where a minxy woman goes and seduces three guys and is the hero.

Googie Withers' smug wife walks around wearing stylish clothes and has lunch - no wonder Jones cheats on her. She doesn't seem too upset by it. McCallum's fiancee Sonia Holm seems mostly interested in hats and style; and Tomlinson's girlfriend Yvonne Owen don't match Johns either.

I should add that the acting is very good by everyone. McCallum is a handsome, virile hero who I was surprised didn't become a bigger star in British films (there were so many wet drips running around). Jones is fine and Tomlinson good. Margaret Rutherford is excellent as a nurse.

There is some solid mermaid humour, like Johns talking to the seals at the zoo and eating seafood.

Movie review - "Bedelia" (1946) **

At the end of World War Two, the British film industry had brief dreams of world domination - things went so well for them during the war, with a whole host of new stars, and the emergence of tycoons like Korda and Rank. Rank in particular made a stab at US glory only to come a cropper, although he had his moments (Caesar and Cleopatra, Henry V, The Red Shoes).

Rank would have been particularly disappointed with the reception to this one, which would have seemed it had the elements to break through  - it was distributed by Eagle Lion, a company in which he had money, had Margaret Lockwood coming off The Wicked Lady, featured a Hollywood "name"-ish co star, Ian Hunter, and was based on a novel by Vera Caspary who just had a big hit with Laura.

Caspary's story is great - it's about a man who marries a woman and discovers she has a tendency to knock off her husbands. That's solid, with elements of Rebecca (there's even a bitchy housekeeper), Bluebeard, Suspicion and Leave Her to Heaven. There was no reason this couldn't have made a terrific thriller like Laura with the right casting and handling but it misses the mark.

The cast aren't quite right-  Lockwood is okay and probably would have been fine in a better film but can't transcend her material (she does some decent hysterical acting). Ian Hunter is alright, although he played this ignorant husband role far too often in Hollywood (the Herbert Marshall part), and a really gifted actor could have made something of this. Barry Barnes is terrible in a role that cried out for a Stewart Granger or James Mason, someone with balls not this wet drip.  Anne Crawford is underwhelming in what could have been a neat support role, the girl with a yen for Hunter.

The script also has a lot of problems. There's no emotional undercurrent - we never really feel that Hunter loves Lockwood and aren't sure what she feels about him. Barnes has no emotional connection to the story (why not personalise it? Have him avenging a dead friend/relative and also fall for Lockwood?). Key moments aren't dramatised - we never get the sense that Hunter's life is in danger, Crawford/Barnes are never threatened. The only one you're worried about is Lockwood.

Occasionally there's some effective moments like when Lockwood cracks it or the wind machine cranks up and things get a little spooky. But in generally they stuffed it. Someone should give thought to remaking this.

Movie review - "Gangs Inc" (1941) **1/2 (aka "Paper Bullets")

Unpretentious, lively little C movie which clocks in at barely over an hour, was shot in six days for $20,000 but proved profitable and launched the King Brothers as producers. It shoves an awful lot of plot in its tiny running time - within the first 15 minutes the female lead has seen her former gangster father gunned down, grown up in an orphanage, gotten fired, and taken the rap for her useless boyfriend having killed someone while drunk driving. She becomes an arch criminal after getting out of prison but still has a heart of gold - as shown by her wanting to donate money for a park, and ultimately take down some gangsters.

In case there wasn't enough plot, there's two boys who grew up in the orphanage with the girl, one who is a decent engineer, the other who is a gangster - plus Alan Ladd as an undercover agent being a gangster being in love with the girl's best friend, who has time to sing two songs.

The acting is very strong - Joan Woodbury is solid in the lead, Jack La Rue impresses as the gangster (I wish he'd had more screen time), Alan Ladd is a little stiff but has charisma in the sort of role that would become his bread and butter (he's got the looks and the voice already). (When Eagle Lion re-released it as Gangs Inc - they gave Ladd top billing.)

It's no classic and they really shoved in a lot of plot. Also some key emotional moments are missed - I feel they lack a La Rue-Woodbury love story and the ending is very abrupt. But it certainly moves and to not have affection for films like this feels just plain mean.

Movie review – “Good Time Girl” (1948) **

A bit of social realism from The Seventh Veil team of Sydney and Muriel Box, with Ted Willis contributing to the script and David MacDonald directing. Jean Kent graduates from supporting roles in melodramas to the lead – a 16 year old who goes through a series of misadventures: sacked by a lecherous boss, getting a job as a hat check girl, being pursued by a dodgy bloke who gets her busted for fencing stolen goods, working under a crook (Herbert Lom), falling for a married men (Dennis Price), winding up in a reform school for three years (courtesy of Flora Robson), getting involved in cat fights, falling of the rails when she gets out, being involved in a drink driving accident, joining up with some American deserters (including Bonar Colleano who played Americans in British films for years), inadvertently causing the death of Price (in a ridiculous scene). It’s partly the fault of society, her family (dad hits her) and herself (she has a lot of attitude).

 

The treatment is far too serious and sombre to be camp fun a la The Big Doll House, and far too melodramatic and silly to be taken seriously. Kent does all that's asked for her, although maybe she doesn't have the charisma of Margaret Lockwood, or even Diana Dors (who has a small role as a potential delinquent being told this cautionary tale by Robson). The excellent cast also includes future director Peter Glenville.

Movie review – “The Black Book” (1949) ***1/2

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.)

Movie review – “Parole Inc” (1948) **

Another low budget undercover story from Eagle Lion –Micheal O’Shea plays an agent who goes undercover as a parole violator in order to battle parole corruption. That’s not a bad idea for a film – parole boards always appear in crime movies but are rarely the focus of them. 

I’d never seen O’Shea in something before this - he was a comic who enjoyed a brief vogue as a leading man in the 40s (even co-starring with Sonya Henie). It took a while to get used to him at first, his jaunty nature very different from the buttoned down sort of actors who normally play these roles, but I got used to it and enjoyed the energy – he’s like a Grade C James Cagney, but there’s worse things for actors to be. 

Although it’s O’Shea’s film, he is billed beneath some old Universal stars, Evelyn Ankers, who plays the owner of a nightclub, and Turhan Bey (who doesn’t appear until 30 minutes in and has a small role), as her boyfriend. Ankers looks a little bit old here - maybe she was missing the quality of the Universal camera dept. 

There’s none of the semi-documentary flavour of Trapped or T-Men (eg no montage about how hard parole depts work) and the whole film has clearly been made by people who aren’t as talented as Anthony Mann or Richard Fleischer. It’s also weird the whole story is narrated by O’Shea in a hospital bed after having been beaten up. This passes the time well enough but it a long way from “hidden gem” status.

Movie review – “Trapped” (1949) **1/2

The two main producers for Eagle Lion were Edward Small and Bryan Foy. Small enjoyed a big success paying tribute to the Treasury Department with T Men, which presumably inspired Foy to come up with his own tribute. Like T Men it’s the story of an undercover investigator who helps best a counterfeiting ring – although in this case the bloke going undercover is a former counterfeiter (Lloyd Bridges, in an early leading role – young face but the voice is as raspy as ever). Then there’s another twist in that Bridges runs away from his secret service agent – he’s still a baddie. And he sets about trying to reignite his baddie life, including an old flame (Hollywood girl around town and later prostitute, Barbara Payton). But luckily there’s someone else going undercover, a treasury man pretending to be a gangster.

Yet again the goodies are very bland, but this is a taunt, enjoyable little thriller. I liked seeing Bridges as a gangster and there’s enough plot twists – such as the protagonist shifting half way through the film from being Bridges to the cop - to make up for the fact those twists aren’t that original.

Movie review – “Port of New York” (1948) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

T Men paid tribute to treasury officials, the heroes of this one are customs officials. They are fighting drug smugglers in the form of Yul Brynner – in his first movie role and with hair! He’s very effective, the best thing about the movie.

Scott Brady, the bland hero from He Walked By Night, plays the bland hero here – you find yourself longing for Denis O’Keefe! Indeed, all the police heroes are bland, it’s hard to remember them at all – whereas you do remember Brynner, and the guy who plays a Charles Laughton-impersonating criminal.

The biggest surprise comes 60 minutes in when Brady, who has gone undercover, is busted and shot by the baddies, watched by another cop (Richard Hober) – a reprise of the moment in T Men but still something I wasn’t expecting, which is more than you can say for most of the rest of the film. Hober has to go undercover himself for the last section and finally gets his man. I enjoyed the location footage of the New York ports.

Movie review – “He Walked By Night” (1948) ***

Eagle Lion struggled with it’s lack of name stars and material but it struck gold with T-Men, a medium budget combination of documentary realism and film noir expressionism, so they commissioned a series of follow up films. Like T Men, this was shot by John Alton and directed by Anthony Mann (mostly, that is – Mann is actually uncredited.)

This one falls into the sub-genre known as “police procedural”, with a great emphasis on realism. The intro claims it’s a true story, with names changed to protect the innocent (adding to the Dragnet connection, Jack Webb’s in the support cast). There is a narrator who talks about the reality of it all, the police are professionals with little private life, there’s a lot of emphasis on “hey look at this neat technological development in catching crooks” (here it’s creating an identikit of the killer – in White Heat I remember it was tracking a car).

Richard Baseheart is good as the brilliant crook, based on a real person – he used to work for the police so knows their procedure; listens to police on the radio; can fix himself up after being shot; is a skilled electronics expert. These sort of showy parts normally launch stars – remember Dick Widmark in Kiss of Death? Basehart never became one – maybe because of subsequent poor choice of material, maybe because he doesn’t have much dialogue and doesn’t really get to interact with anyone. Bland Scott Brady is technically the hero.

Lovely photography and many memorable shots of late night LA – deserted lonely streets, back alleys, the final shoot out in the sewers (reminiscent of The Third Man).

Movie review – “T Men” (1947) ***1/2

Eagle Lion was a short-lived film production company which existed briefly in the late 40s; it never quite hit its straps, but produced some distinguished films including a number of documentary type thrillers directed by Anthony Mann. 

This is a tribute to the treasury department, the section of the government who (were are constantly being reminded) put away Al Capone. Two of them go undercover – Denis O’Keefe and Albert Dekker, neither of them over-loaded in the charisma department. It doesn’t matter so much for second lead Dekker but O’Keefe’s role is surely meant for Alan Ladd or Bogart.

Documentary realism seems to be the name of the game – constant narration, buttoned down hero, location filming (including Chinatown, Farmer's markets). However it also has expressionistic moments, particularly via the stunning black and white photography. It was based on a story by Virginia Kellogg, who also provided the story for White Heat, and its familiar to that in feel – the presentation of the sober, methodical law enforcement up against character acting criminals.

There is unintentional humour when O’Keefe trawls the Turkish baths “looking for a man”. But there are some excellent scenes such as when O'Keefe's partner is killed in front of his eyes and a murder in a Turkish bath. Charles MacGraw makes an excellent henchman.

Movie review – A&C #21 - “The Noose Hangs High” (1948) **

The duo shifted over to Eagle Lion for this one, which has them as cleaners who accidentally lose some gangster money and go looking for it before they are killed. The story premises of Charles Barton movies were always quite strong and this is no exception – it could work as a thriller (indeed, it was: Two Hands). The gangster who is going to kill them (Joseph Calleia, in good form) is actually quite sympathetic – he just has to repay the money himself, and he’s understandably annoyed that a woman who accidentally receives the money (Cathy Downs) has blown most of it in about a day.

A highlight is a scene where Abbott cons a dopey gangster and that gangster then tries to con Costello. And if I’m not mistaken Costello gets Downs at the end (perhaps his hottest chick of all). But this is not one of their better films. By this stage Abbott and Costello films often featured “wah wah wah…” music in the soundtrack, an irritating thing that wouldn’t be shaken for a while. There are too many rehashed routines: "you’re 40 she’s ten", Costello tries to get into gaol and keeps being thwarted, "mudda and fudda", "pack and unpack", "phone booth". There’s no romance – there is Downs but honestly she’s an idiot for wasting the money; they get out of trouble too easily.

Book review – “United Artists: the Company the Changed the Film Industry” by Tino Balio

Brilliant book about the history of UA from 1950 onwards, the Krim-Benjamin era when UA went from near destruction to being one of the leaders in the industry. Written with great skill and research (though it is never dense), it covers the key moments in the studio’s history: the precursor at Eagle Lion, the growth of independent production companies, HHL, Edward Small, Kramer, the Bonds, the Mirisch Company, Woodfall, the 70s with its European influence, the departure of the big five, the debacle of Heaven’s Gate. A great company who’s time passed but which left lessons that can still be learned from today.