The Film Noir Thread! Gats, dames, and cheap hooch welcome.

[Ian Jane]

I dug it too. Thought the makeup job on Steves was pretty cool too. I completely echo your feelings on the ending. It doesn't kill the movie but it definitely brings it down a few notches. It starts off remarkably strong and then sort of peters out and gets all predictable and nice.

[Andrew Monroe]

I took in the new Olive BD of CRY VENGEANCE last night, liked it quite a bit. Director/star Mark Stevens (who was in the excellent THE DARK CORNER) handles both duties capably. He makes quite an impression as the soft spoken but barely controlled disgraced ex-cop who's thinking of murdering the mob boss he (wrongly) holds responsible for his wife and child's deaths. He's constantly on the edge of exploding, and Stevens plays it very believably. The film takes a turn from its early toughness to a story of redemption when it gets to Alaska (genuine locations are used too), somewhat recalling ON DANGEROUS GROUND. The rest of the cast is fine too, with a very unusual role for Skip Homeier as a psychopathic mob muscleman. Like Nicholas Ray's film I mentioned, this film takes a pretty drastic turn away from its hard-boiled beginnings and that's somewhat of a letdown but overall I still enjoyed it. The scene near the end between Stevens and the little girl he's planning to kill is very well-played by both and quite emotional. The Olive BD looks very nice. There's some pretty great hard-boiled dialogue in this too:

drunken floozy in a Hicksville bar: "Gimme a screwdriver."
barkeep: "Somethin' loose?"
barkeep giving his name: "Rusty."
floozy: "So's your sense of humor."





I sure hope we'll get the other noir Stevens directed and starred in, TIMETABLE at some point. It's supposed to be worth a look as well.

[Horace Cordier]

The Film Noir Thread! Gats, dames, and cheap hooch welcome.

Why is there a question mark after Joseph H. Lewis' name on the cover art?

Yeah. Bizarre.

Looks like there is a book in that set. That might explain the price. Course, the book will be in French so unless it is a really nice photo book on classic noir it won't be of much use to me.

[Richard--W]

Why is there a question mark after Joseph H. Lewis' name on the cover art?

[Andrew Monroe]

Holy shit! I love the movie too but no way in hell I'd pay that kind of money.

[Horace Cordier]

The Film Noir Thread! Gats, dames, and cheap hooch welcome.

Huh.

http://www.amazon.fr/gp/aw/d/B00ECCJ...AC_SX110_SY190

Very pricey but it looks like some kind of deluxe SE. I'm seriously considering this based on how much I love this movie. I've also generally had good luck with French Blus like Peckinpah's THE KILLER ELITE and THE BOSTON STRANGLER.

I also noticed that Amazon France also has a Blu of the 1957 NIGHT OF THE DEMON listed as forthcoming.

[Andrew Monroe]

THE SHADOW ON THE WINDOW (1957) - The estranged wife of a cop is at an isolated farm for a secretarial job when 3 thugs burst in to rob the old miser she's working for. They kill the old man and take her hostage - meanwhile her young son who was along with her has been outside playing, he sees the murder through the window and runs off in shock...The cops - including his father - must find the woman before the punks invariably kill the only witness. This very tense little B noir is on the Columbia Film Noir Collection mod set, it's directed by William Asher, who would later do the hep cat crime film JOHNNY COOL. The film is blessed with some outstanding performances, including Jerry Mathers as the little boy, in a state of shock and unable to speak, he plays this well beyond his years. Also good is John Barrymore, Jr. as the violent, unstable leader of the hoods. He's genuinely menacing as he secretly plots to kill the witness while placating one of the gang who wants no part of it. Mixing in procedural as we watch the police desperately try to find the farm and tense bits there as the woman walks a fine line playing for time and looking for a way out. The film moves fast and doesn't waste a scene at just over 70 minutes. Always fun to find these little efficient B noirs.

[Ian Jane]

Covers for those upcoming Kino Blu's...

[Andrew Monroe]

Andrew, I found out there was an Italian DVD of THE SCAR -- alternate title for HOLLOW TRIUMPH -- in excellent quality. Now oop. I'm getting a clone of it. Should I ask for another?

Thanks for the kind offer, Richard. I think I'll wait for now and see if it gets a better release here at some point. Would really like to see this one get a BD release.

[Richard--W]

Wade Williams' shot-by-shot reconstruction of the classic DETOUR (1945) deserves to be rediscovered. It's a labor of love, and I think a good noir in its own right. The material is a bit obvious and shows it age, but if one likes the material, one likes the material. Williams cast the son of Tom Neal in his father's role, and Neal does fine. So does Lea Lavish as the femme fatale originally played by Anne Savage. As I recall Williams even found the original car used in the first film or an identical model. Of course, the remake is not completely the same. Williams segues into color and then back again. The film is artfully shot on a shoestring, just like the original, with fine atmospheric color photography. The actors play the scene while offering additional layers to their characters, the emphasis falls on different things and at different places, and the story builds slightly on what there was originally. This is a worthwhile effort, and it's a shame Williams lost his shirt on it. The film merits a hi-def transfer and a DVD release.

I watched a dark and murky VHS > DVD-R transfer that would look brighter and sharper if I had watched it on the old CRT monitor.

[Richard--W]

Andrew, I found out there was an Italian DVD of THE SCAR -- alternate title for HOLLOW TRIUMPH -- in excellent quality. Now oop. I'm getting a clone of it. Should I ask for another?

[Richard--W]

Glad you reminded me of this film. Yeah it packs a wallop. The VCI disc leaves a lot to be desired. I'll ask around.

[Andrew Monroe]

I don't suppose there's a really nice version of HOLLOW TRIUMPH aka THE SCAR available, is there? Recently revisited the VCI disc that pairs it with THE LIMPING MAN, I'm assuming this is the best one out there. It's nothing to crow about; too dark and there are a few jumps here and there. I would love to have this one on blu-ray. The John Alton LA location photography is so evocative, another one of his masterly shadow symphonies. Joan Bennett and Paul Henreid are so damn good in this film! If you only know Henreid from CASABLANCA you are in for a shock here, he gets to play two roles, both very different from his bland saint in that one. And Bennett is amazingly cynical, she gets all the good lines: "You can't go back and start again. The older you get, the worse things get!" It ends with one hell of a gut-punch, bleak and hopeless as just about any noir.

[Richard--W]

PLUNDER ROAD is an absolute must-own.



Olive Films just announced Edward Dein's SHACK OUT ON 101 (Republic 1955) for September 24 release. Terry Moore stars as a waitress in a greasy spoon on the beach. Fans of MIGHTY JOE YOUNG will remember Terry Moore. She also played Venus in four episodes of BATMAN (1966 and 1967). You haven't lived until you've seen Lee Marvin play Slob, the cook who took the job so he could smuggle government secrets through the diner onto the boats. A damn fine noir with an espionage angle.

[Horace Cordier]

The Film Noir Thread! Gats, dames, and cheap hooch welcome.

Is this the same STRANGER that got that overly DNR'd mess of a Blu on Film Chest?

As for the rest of this recent news I'm pretty excited. Never seen THE HITCHHIKER or PLUNDER ROAD and those'll be day one buys. I first got exposed to Lupino on the TWILIGHT ZONE and I've been a fan ever since. Really interesting and talented lady.