Imposter noir: 51 films about swapping, losing and faking identities

Olivia de Havilland, 'The Dark Mirror' (1946).

"There is only one plot – things are not what they seem." 

 — Jim Thompson

By Paul Parcellin

Let’s say you’re a character in a film noir. It’s likely that someone who you’re rubbing elbows with is not who they say they are. For that matter, you may not be who you claim to be, either. Or, stranger still, you may be using an alias because you can’t recall who you really are and bad people are trying to do you harm.

Unlikely, you say? Guess again. Noir characters often shed their identities and don new facades. It’s just a matter of faking the paperwork (in the movies, at least).

But there’s a huge pitfall in the identity switching game: Whomever you’re fixing to impersonate may be sitting on a powder keg, and suddenly, you’re in a dangerous game of musical chairs.

Take note that when it comes to false identities, stolen identities, memory blackouts and the like, director Alfred Hitchcock is the ringmaster extraordinaire of it all. Sir Alfred clocks in here with a whopping seven identity switcheroo films. Was he obsessed? You be the judge. Here are 51 films in which identities are stolen, faked and erased from the mind:

“Across the Bridge” (1957)

A wealthy businessman (Rod Steiger) hops a train to Mexico to evade embezzlement charges. Enroute, he steals another man’s identity, but that only complicates matters. Ken Annakin directs.

“The Big Steal” (1949)

An Army lieutenant (Robert Mitchum) accused of robbery pursues the real thief on a frantic chase through Mexico, aided by the thief's fiancee (Jane Greer). Meanwhile, the lieutenant appropriates an Army captain’s (William Bendix) identity. Don Siegel directs.

“The Bigamist” (1953)

A man (Edmond O’Brien) is secretly married to two women, and carefully maintains two separate identities. But he feels the pressure of his deceit. Ida Lupino directs.

“The Case of Charles Peace” (1949)

Businessman Charles Peace (Michael Martin Harvey) leads a double life. By day he's a respected local businessman, but by night he's a professional thief who lets nothing, not even murder, stop him from getting what he wants. Norman Lee directs.

“The Chase” (1946)

A drifter (Robert Cummings) takes a job as a chauffeur, becomes entangled in a criminal scheme, and wonders if he’s losing his grip on reality. Arthur Ripley directs.

“Chase a Crooked Shadow” (1958)

At Kimberley Prescott’s (Anne Baxter)  villa, a stranger (Richard Todd) shows up and claims he is her brother who supposedly died the previous year in a car accident. Michael Anderson directs

“Crossroads” (1942)

A diplomat (William Powell) suffers amnesia and is blackmailed over a possible criminal past. The mystery hinges on whether he’s someone else entirely. Jack Conway directs.

“The Dark Mirror” (1946)

Identical twins (Olivia de Havilland), one good, one possibly a murderer, swap identities to confuse authorities.  Robert Siodmak directs.

“Dark Passage” (1947)

A man (Humphrey Bogart) convicted of murdering his wife escapes from prison, changes his face with plastic surgery and assumes a new identity while working to try to prove his innocence. Delmer Daves directs.

“Dead Reckoning” (1946) 

A soldier (Humphrey Bogart) searches for another serviceman (William Prince) who has run away just before receiving the Medal of Honor. There’s a dark spot on the fleeing soldier's past and Bogart investigates. John Cromwell directs.

“Dead Ringer” (1964)

A woman (Bette Davis) kills her wealthy twin sister and takes her place. But her plan is more complicated than she anticipates. This crime drama is steeped in gothic atmosphere and deception. Paul Henreid directs

“Detour” (1945)

An unemployed pianist (Tom Neal) hitchhikes across the country. Along the way he assumes a new identity and his troubles grow deeper by the hour. Edgar G. Ulmer directs.

“Dishonored Lady” (1947)

A beautiful editor at a fashion magazine (Hedy Lamarr) has a breakdown due to the pressures of her work and her disappointing love life. A psychiatrist recommends that she start life fresh by moving into a smaller apartment and under another name. Robert Stevenson directs

“Foreign Correspondent” (1940)

On the eve of World War II, a young American reporter (Joel McCrea) tries to expose enemy agents in London. Kidnapping, deceptive identities and treason come to light. Alfred Hitchcock directs.

“High Wall” (1947)

A man (Robert Taylor) accused of murder suffers from amnesia and tries to recover his memory and his true identity to prove his innocence. Curtis Bernhardt directs.

“His Kind of Woman” (1951)

Deported gangster Nick Ferraro (Raymond Burr) plans to re-enter the United States with the aid of gambler Dan Milner (Robert Mitchum). Milner is unaware of the scheme he’s taking part in. John Farrow, and Richard Fleischer (uncredited) direct.

“Hollow Triumph” (1948) a.k.a. “The Scar”

A criminal (Paul Henreid) assumes the identity of a psychiatrist he resembles, complete with a self-inflicted facial scar. But his plan has a major flaw. Steve Sekely directs.

“House of Bamboo” (1955)

Planted in a Tokyo crime syndicate, a U.S. Army Investigator (Robert Stack) goes undercover in search of answers in the death of an Army official. Samuel Fuller directs.

“The House on Telegraph Hill” (1951)

Concentration camp survivor Victoria Kowelska (Valentina Cortese) becomes involved in a mystery after she assumes the identity of a dead friend in order to gain passage to America. Robert Wise directs.

“I Walk Alone” (1947)

An ex-con (Burt Lancaster) returns to claim part of a business, only to find the books and identities have been manipulated. Byron Haskin Directs.

“Jail Bait” (1954)

Vic Brady (Timothy Farrell) draws young Don Gregor (Clancy Malone) into a life of crime. He then blackmails Gregor's plastic surgeon father (Herbert Rawlinson) into fixing up his face so he can evade the cops. Edward D. Wood Jr. directs.

“Kansas City Confidential” (1952)

An ex-con trying to go straight (John Payne) is framed for a million dollar armored car robbery and must go to Mexico in order to unmask the real culprits. Incidents involving disguise, hidden identity and mistaken identity prevail. Phil Karlson directs.

“Lady in the Lake” (1946)

The editor of a crime magazine (Audrey Totter) hires Phillip Marlowe (Robert Montgomery) to find her boss’s wife. But there’s murder afoot, and the private eye finds himself smack in the middle of it. Identity switching plays an important role in this mystery. Based on Raymond Chandler’s novel. Robert Montgomery directs.

“Macao” (1952)

Nick Cochran (Robert Mitchum), an American exiled in Macao, has a chance to restore his name if he can help capture an international crime lord. Cochran goes undercover while trying to woo the beautiful songstress Julie Benson (Jane Russell). Josef von Sternberg directs.

“The Maltese Falcon” (1941)

San Francisco private detective Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) takes on a case involving three eccentric fortune hunters (Peter Lorre, Sidney Greenstreet, Elisha Cook Jr,) and a compulsive liar (Mary Astor). The object of their quest is a priceless statuette. John Huston directs.

“The Man Who Cheated Himself” (1950)

A cop (Lee J. Cobb) helps his lover cover up a murder and tries to lead the investigation, effectively switching from lawman to suspect. Felix E. Feist directs.

“Ministry of Fear” (1944)

Stephen Neale (Ray Milland) has just been released from an asylum during World War II in England when he accidentally stumbles onto a dangerous underground organization. Fritz Lang directs.

“The Narrow Margin” (1952)

A woman (Marie Windsor) planning to testify against the mob must be protected against potential assassins on the train trip from Chicago to Los Angeles. Richard Fleischer directs.

“Nightfall” (1956)

Through a series of bizarre coincidences, an artist (Aldo Ray) finds himself falsely accused of bank robbery and murder and is pursued by the authorities as well as the real killers. Jacques Tourneur directs.

“No Man of Her Own” (1950)

A pregnant woman (Barbara Stanwyck) adopts the identity of a railroad-crash victim and starts a new life with the woman's wealthy in-laws. But she finds that maintaining her ruse is more difficult than she imagined. Mitchell Leisen directs.

“North by Northwest” (1959)

A New York City advertising executive (Cary Grant) goes on the run after being mistaken for a government agent by a group of foreign spies, and falls for a woman (Eva Marie Saint) whose loyalties he begins to doubt. Alfred Hitchcock directs.

“Out of the Past” (1947)

A former private eye (Robert Mitchum) living under a false identity escapes his past to run a gas station in a small town. But his past catches up with him and must return to the life he tried to leave behind. A gambler (Kirk Douglas) and a duplicitous dame (Jane Greer) await his arrival. Jacques Tourneur directs.

“Seconds” (1966)

An unhappy middle-aged banker agrees to a procedure that will fake his death and give him a completely new look and identity. But it comes with its own price. John Frankenheimer directs.

“Shadow of a Doubt” (1943)

A teenage girl (Teresa Wright), is overjoyed when her Uncle Charley (Joseph Cotten) comes to visit the family in their quiet California town. But slowly she begins to suspect that he harbors a dark secret and isn’t exactly who he seems to be. Alfred Hitchcock directs.

“Somewhere in the Night” (1946)

George Taylor (John Hodiak) returns from World War II with amnesia. Back home in Los Angeles, while trying to track down his old identity, he stumbles upon a murder case that’s gone cold and a hunt for a missing $2 million. Joseph L. Mankiewicz directs.

“Spellbound” (1945)

A psychiatrist (Ingrid Bergman) becomes involved with the new director of the hospital (Gregory Peck) where she practices. But she discovers that her new beau has a dark side. Alfred Hitchcock directs.

“Stolen Face” (1952)

A doctor (Paul Henreid) repairs a female inmate's disfigured face to match the lovely woman (Lizabeth Scott) who left him. He marries the inmate and learns that beauty is only skin deep. Terence Fisher directs.

“Stolen Identity” (1953)

A jealous concert pianist (Francis Lederer) murders his wife's lover, then frames an innocent taxi driver (Donald Buka) for the crime. Gunther von Fritsch directs.

“Strange Impersonation” (1946)

A research scientist (Brenda Marshall) conducting experiments on a new anesthetic finds herself being blackmailed by a woman (Ruth Ford) she accidentally knocked down with her car. Anthony Mann directs.

“The Strange Mrs. Crane” (1948)

Jenny Hadley (Marjorie Lord) settles into a comfortable existence with a new identity as Gina, the wife of politician Clinton Crane (Pierre Watkin). Blackmailer Floyd Durant (Robert Shayne) threatens to reveal her criminal past. Sam Newfield directs.

“The Stranger” (1946)

An investigator from the War Crimes Commission (Edward G. Robinson) travels to Connecticut to find an infamous Nazi. Amid the bucolic countryside, danger lurks. Orson Welles directs and co-stars.

“Tension” (1949)

A meek pharmacist (Richard Basehart) creates an alternate identity under which he plans to murder the bullying liquor salesman who has become his wife's lover. John Berry directs.

“They Won't Believe Me” (1947)

On trial for murdering his girlfriend, philandering stockbroker Larry Ballentine (Robert Young) takes the stand to claim his innocence and describe the actual, but improbable, sequence of events that led to her death. Mistaken identity is a major plot twist. Irving Pichel directs.

“The Third Man” (1949)

Pulp novelist Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten) travels to shadowy postwar Vienna, only to find himself investigating the mysterious death of an old friend, Harry Lime (Orson Welles). The films plays heavily with false appearances and coverups. Carol Reed directs.

“The 39 Steps” (1935)

A man in London (Robert Donat) tries to help a counter-espionage agent (Lucie Mannheim), but when the agent is killed and the man stands accused, he must go on the run to save himself and stop a spy ring that is trying to steal top-secret information. Alfred Hitchcock directs.

“This Side of the Law” (1950)

A drifter (Kent Smith) is bailed out of jail by a lawyer (Robert Douglas), who hires him to impersonate a millionaire until the man can be declared legally dead and the estate settled. However, the man soon finds out that things are not exactly how they seem. Richard L. Bare directs.

“The Two Mrs. Carrolls” (1947)

An artist (Humphrey Bogart ) forms an attachment with a woman (Barbara Stanwyck) on holiday in the country. As the relationship develops, his behavior and information about his past cause her increasing concern. Peter Godfrey directs.

“Vertigo” (1958)

A former San Francisco police detective (James Stewart), struggling with his personal demons, becomes obsessed with a hauntingly beautiful woman (Kim Novak) he’s been hired to tail. Alfred Hitchcock directs.

“Walk Softly, Stranger” (1950)

An ex-hood (Joseph Cotten) hopes to start a new life under an assumed name in a small town but his past catches up with him. Robert Stevenson directs.

“The Woman on Pier 13” (1949) a.k.a. “I Married a Communist”

Successful, newly-married Brad Collins (Robert Ryan) once belonged to the Communist Party. He’s been living under an assumed identity, but now the party will stop at nothing to use him. Robert Stevenson directs.

“The Wrong Man” (1956)

Manny Balestrero (Henry Fonda) is mistaken for an armed robber and arrested. But how can he prove that he’s innocent? Alfred Hitchcock directs.

There are undoubtedly many more films that deal with identity and impersonation. What would you add to the list, and which are your favorites? Shout it out in the comments section.

‘Pale Flower’: Gambling dens, yakuza and a mysterious woman who lives on the edge

A taste for danger. Saeko (Mariko Kaga), "Pale Flower" (1964).

By Paul Parcellin

“Pale Flower” (1964)

It’s clear from the start that Masahiro Shinoda’s “Pale Flower” isn’t your typical yakuza picture — the kind that’s simmered in the Japanese underworld’s intricate codes of conduct, with a lead character who agonizes over prickly themes such as honor and loyalty. 

“Pale Flower” covers the same slice of society as other yakuza films, but the soundtrack tips us off that we’re in for something different. Avant-garde classical composer Toru Takemitsu’s jagged, dissonant orchestral score is unlike anything we’d expect to hear in a crime film, regardless of its country of origin. It grabs our attention immediately and won’t let go. 

A vision of Japan's underworld

Like Western films of its ilk, “Pale Flower” has a shadowy noir look, nervous edits and dreamy, hallucinatory imagery. It’s a vision of the Japanese underworld as Jean-Pierre Melville or Robert Bresson might have pictured it. 

Saeko (Kaga) and Muraki (Ryô Ikebe) on the streets of Yokohama. 

Much like his European counterparts, director Shinoda, a founding member of the Japanese New Wave of filmmakers, infused “Pale Flower” with a sense of alienation and dislocation, reflecting the aftermath of brutal warfare in bygone times. 

This is a gangster movie and a love story mashed into one, and if that sounds pretty conventional, it is — at least on the surface. But it’s also the story of Japan after World War II, defeated and held under the sway of the United States and the Soviet Union in the Cold War era. 

Audio mosaics of layered, electronically enhanced sound that help define the overall feel of “Pale Flower.” 

There’s a sense of ennui among the citizenry of Yokohama, where the story is set. Clocks keep ticking but time stands still, and denizens of this metropolis seem to exist in a state of suspended animation. Gangster business carries on, but emotional relationships seem stunted. The populace is numb, still recovering from a stunning wartime defeat. Traditional rituals and customs are practiced, but have a hollow ring. 

Defining a mood with sound

The soundtrack reflects that dreamy yet unsettling mood, blending practical audio effects with orchestrated music. Takemitsu didn’t simply compose the score after the film was finished, he took part in the film’s development process, crafting audio mosaics of layered, electronically enhanced sound that help define the overall feel of “Pale Flower.” 

Saeko and Muraki in a game of chance.

In gambling den scenes, a central focus of the film, players shuffle what are supposed to be stiff, almost wooden, cardboard playing cards, known as hanafuda (in this case tile playing cards were used to accentuate the sound). Adding juice to the audio track, an electronically enhanced sound recording of two tap dancers seamlessly merges with the cacophony of clicking tiles. The result is a hypnotic percussion sequence that adds a surreal touch to scenes of drop-dead serious gamblers attending to business. 

Another visually and sonically arresting scene takes place in a shop full of clocks. Their kinetic ticking, like the clicking and clacking of gambling cards, reminds us that clocks move forward, even if life here seems to stand still.

Apart from its rich and varied tapestry of sound, “Pale Flower”’s on-screen action is mostly restrained and many scenes are dialogue heavy. But just as the drama begins to trail off an impromptu car race, nestled between more muted sequences, provides an adrenaline rush. The gasoline fueled competition is more than just squealing tires and revving engines. Like almost every facet of Shinoda’s film, the racing sequence offers rich details about the characters.

Muraki, out of prison and back to gang life.

Saeko (Mariko Kaga), the mysterious love interest of fresh-out-prison Muraki (Ryō Ikebe), has a childlike, giggling manor. But her naive appearance masks her true self. She’s a thrill seeker addicted to danger and risk taking. Muraki, older and hardened to the ways the underworld, is deliberate in his actions and careful in each step he takes. But they bond over a shared sense of despair and boredom. Both lead lives of material comfort that lack intrinsic value. 

Saeko, however, is more of a puzzle ...  we see nothing of her life outside of her and Muraki’s nocturnal wanderings.

The source of Muraki’s depression stems from the crime that put him in prison — killing a member of a rival crime family. He learns that while he was in prison the dead man’s crime family merged with his gang, so the killing and the time he served had no strategic purpose or importance.

Saeko, however, is more of a puzzle. She seems to come from a family of means, but other than an unexpected, nerve racking encounter between her and Muraki in a public place (others are around so they pretend to be strangers), we see nothing of her life outside of her and Muraki’s nocturnal wanderings.

Their go-to respite, gambling, is the one activity that they enthusiastically share, but it’s not without its difficulties. It’s OK for a woman’s to be in a gaming room as long as she’s there to attend to a male gambler. But a female gambler is almost too much for the yakuza to stomach. The card tables are crowded with tattooed mobsters stripped to the waist, a virtual mountain of sweaty flesh which all but surrounds the delicate blossom as she takes her place with the boys. And she never bats an eyelash.

Stepping up her game

With Muraki speaking for her, Saeko is allowed to step up to increasingly higher-stakes betting. Muraki and her romance is mostly under wraps, almost non-existent you might say. Their shared malaise and gambling den outings are more important than love and sex. Saeko’s fixation with taking increasingly greater risks is sated by Muraki’s mob status, which opens gambling den doors. But he does so with growing misgivings. In her he sees a moth tempted by an open flame. 

Based on an original story by Shintaro Ishihara, the film was scripted by Ataru Baba. Shinoda reworked the script significantly and Baba was not pleased with the result. He decried the film’s dynamic editing and soundtrack, which he felt obscures his interpretation of the story. Also troubling to the screenwriter was the film’s emphasis on nihilism, which was merely implicit in the script he labored over.

But nihilism is indeed the guiding force in “Pale Flower.” Consequently, bored, disenchanted risk-takers will in time face the peril their activities invite. 

A troubling omen appears in the betting parlors when Yoh (Takashi Fujiki), a heroin addict who fled Hong Kong after committing two murders, lingers on the periphery of the gaming tables. He’s like an ever present angel of death who’s come to perch in their roost, casting a shadow that will forever fall over them. 

In the meantime, Muraki’s present milieu is something like that of post-war Japan itself: both are shadows of their previous selves, and laboring to adapt to an inhospitable world. Like Japan, Muraki is unsure of his path forward, but is painfully aware that all things can change in an instant. 

 

‘The Killers’: A much loved noir that’s the spitting image of another American classic

Ava Gardner, Burt Lancaster, ‘The Killers’ (1946). 

By Paul Parcellin

“The Killers” (1946)

Some say “The Killers” is the “Citizen Kane” of noir, but how can that be?

One is a beloved noir, the story behind a brutal murder of a washed up prizefighter. The other, a fictional biography of a media tycoon, loosely based on the life of William Randolph Hearst. It’s like comparing doughnuts with dirigibles, isn't it?

Not exactly. The key to their kinship is the way the two films tell their stories. 

Here’s the rundown on 'The Killers':

The violent death of the Swede (Burt Lancaster) in the first dozen minutes or so of “The Killers” launches an investigation. But it's the preamble to the murder that draws us in. It starts when two hitmen come looking for Swede at the diner he’s known to haunt. 

Charles McGraw, William Conrad, Harry Hayden, ‘The Killers.’

They terrorize the staff and a young customer and announce that they’re going kill the former boxer turned filling station attendant. The customer, Nick Adams (Phil Brown), gets to Swede’s rooming house before the killers do, but his warning to the condemned man is pointless.

“Once, I did something wrong,” Swede tells the youthful Adams. 

The Swede (Lancaster) awaits dark visitors.

Swede doesn’t budge, but instead awaits the inevitable as the gunmen creep up the stairs. He grips the bedpost until the two torpedos burst in and fire. In one of noir's most famous close-ups, we see his grasp on the post release as his life slips away.

Based, in part, on a Hemingway short story

The film is based on an Ernest Hemingway short story of the same title. The opening sequence in the diner is faithful to the book, but the rest of the script is original material. 

The screenplay was written by Richard Brooks and then heavily re-worked by Anthony Veiller and his frequent collaborator John Huston. Only Veiller is credited on the final film. Huston went uncredited due to his contract with Warner Bros.

Everett Sloane, Orson Welles, Joseph Cotten, Ellen Lowe, ‘Citizen Kane’ (1941). 

Hemingway’s part of the story, just the tip of the iceberg, is the culmination of a years-long series of events. The bulk of the film, which explains what led to the murder, owes a lot to “Citizen Kane” (1941). In both strikingly similar films an investigator pieces together the story of a deceased man, around whom a mystery swirls. 

Investigator steps in, post mortem

After newspaper publishing magnate Charles Foster Kane (Orson Welles) dies of natural causes at an advanced age, a newsreel company reporter pokes his nose into Kane’s life, interviewing those who knew him best. 

Swede’s death barely captures the attention of local law enforcement. The only one interested is insurance investigator Jim Reardon (Edmond O’Brien), who needs to find a mystery woman who’s due to collect the payout from Swede’s life insurance policy. 

Cryptic final utterances

Both Kane and Swede utter puzzling last words just before they die, and both films involve a quest to find the meaning of those words. Swede’s “Once, I did something wrong,” contrasts with Kane’s short and sweet one-word finale, “Rosebud.” 

It turns out Kane’s last gasped syllables are packed with delicious meaning and irony (which I won’t go into here lest I dish out two spoilers for the price of one). 

Both stories are told in a series of flashbacks, a noir staple, that we see as each interviewee spills his or her chunk of the story. All of the fragmented, nonlinear pieces coalesce into complete, or near complete, portraits of the two men. 

Witnesses speak, but are they reliable?

Mind you, there’s good reason to question the reliability some of the witness’s accounts of the facts. Yet both films seem to take those recollections at face value, each building toward a revelation about those cryptic last words both men spoke. 

Edmond O'Brien, Ann Staunton, 'The Killers.'

Reardon figures out what Swede meant about his doing “something wrong.” It isn’t like the Sphinx-like riddle that the newsreel reporter is tasked with unscrambling. He discovers a richly detailed story of Kane, but never finds out what “Rosebud” means, and he gives up, defeated. 

A revealing view of Kane's clutter

But when the camera takes a God's-eye view of the grim cleanup of Kane’s earthly possession, we see the humble object, which obviously held great symbolic importance to the fabulously wealthy media magnate, and occupied his final thoughts. It’s as sad and touching a moment as you’re likely to see on screen, describing the core of the man and what drove him forward in his remarkable life. 

A mountain and a molehill? Perhaps not

The Swede’s story, tragic as it is, isn't as broad in scope as the newspaper mogul’s sprawling, tainted saga. Swede’s gritty tale is a eulogy to a wounded, gullible has-been who was putty in the hands of a gorgeous, evil woman (Kane had his women problems, too). Still, “The Killers” is a top shelf noir that set a standard for the classic era of films like it.

And as it turns out, both Swede and Kane had this in common: Despite living widely disparate lives, both men, once mighty, go out lonely and haunted, not with a clap of thunder but with a whimper.    

Off the Hook: A bedridden heiress glimpses the face of doom in ‘Sorry, Wrong Number’

Barbara Stanwyck, ‘Sorry, Wrong Number’ (1948). Crossed phone lines deliver chilling news to a woman stranded in her apartment.

Post war prosperity,

women’s position

in society go

under the microscope

Contains some spoilers

By Paul Parcellin

‘Sorry, Wrong Number’ (1948)

Barbara Stanwyck plays Leona Stevenson, a woman distinctly different from cold blooded Phyllis Dietrichson, whom Stanwyck portrayed in “Double Indemnity” four years before. Leona is no femme fatale — she’s a femme in jeopardy. 

That alone ought to make us feel sympathy for her, but she’s hard to warm up to.

At first glance Leona is churlish, short tempered and demanding. But she’s also a bedridden invalid, apparently neglected by her businessman husband and left alone in a sprawling New York apartment. Her bedside phone is her lone companion.

One night telephone lines get crossed and she overhears a couple of mugs plotting a murder. It gradually dawns on her that someone's planning to make her the guest of honor at a deadly soiree.

Ann Richards as Sally Hunt. The film's flashbacks are channeled through phone calls.

She tries to tell the police, who take her for a crank, and as the night wears on her worries turn to panic, and finally, terror — Stanwyck’s transition from panic to terror is something to see.

Prosperity and women's place in society

That’s not to say that “Sorry, Wrong Number” is merely a nail-biter or a horror film. Beneath its thriller surface the film turns a gimlet eye on post war prosperity and women’s position in the society. In flashbacks, we get a fuller picture of what led up to Leona's terrifying night alone in her apartment as well as the mores of the times.

It’s the latter half of the 1940s and there’s a paucity of marital bliss among the folks we meet. By all appearances, affairs and marriages of convenience are rife in post-war America, where power, position and money are within reach, and joy is all but a distant memory.

Burt Lancaster and Stanwyck. Husbands order their downtrodden wives around like domestic servants, but that's not the case with Leona.

Here, most everyone is a bully or a victim. Husbands order their downtrodden wives around like domestic servants, while the breadwinner’s job is of paramount importance. Household management and child rearing are undervalued maintenance work that the little lady performs without complaint, or else. 

Henry is the poor son-in-law who’s been shunted off to the back office, pushing papers in dad-in-law’s mega firm, and he’s pissed.

Leona is the exception. When she strong-arms her husband, Henry (Burt Lancaster), into submission, we see how deeply dissatisfied he is with their materially comfortable, yet emotionally vacant life. Leona, the “cough drop queen,” is the daughter of a wealthy industrialist, James Cotterell (Ed Begley), who heads a medical supply and pharmaceutical corporation. 

Henry is the poor son-in-law who’s been shunted to the back office, pushing papers in dad-in-law’s mega firm, and he’s pissed. But it’s precisely because of his vacuity and lack of ambition that he landed where he is. It's unusual to see Lancaster play the emotional and moral weakling, but he makes his journey from average shmo to the pawn of evil men seem credible and tragic.

Lancaster as Henry, a willing prisoner of his father-in-law's fortune.

His type is frequently seen in noir — the unexceptional man who believes he deserves something better. But now, Henry, the seemingly dormant volcano of frustration, is ready to blow his top. Before long he makes foolish choices that put himself and others in harm’s way. 

As he’s making his furtive moves we can almost empathize with him, even if we can’t abide by his actions. His hands are tied, or so he believes, and there’s little chance of getting out of his predicament without taking drastic measures.

Flashbacks conveyed in phone conversations

Back in the present, Leona is prisoner in her bedroom, and only in flashbacks do we see her freed from the constrictions that have left her all but immobilized. The flashbacks, seen from various characters’ points of view and conveyed in phone conversations, reveal her backstory. 

Her mother died giving birth to her, and she was raised  by a well meaning but distant father. You might think that her frustration and pain as a bedridden adult are the source of her sour and demanding personality, but in flashback we see that she’s difficult even at her best.

Stanwyck, Lancaster, Richards. Leona steals her friend's beau at a dance.

She snubs a college friend, Sally Hunt (Ann Richards), whom Henry is courting, and brazenly steals him from her. Later, once they become an item, she browbeats her father into accepting Henry into the fold. 

The old man doesn’t believe Henry’s good son-in-law material, and it turns out he’s right. Henry isn’t really attracted to Leona, but an heiress is an heiress, and he adapts. Meanwhile, her dad is carousing with a lady young enough to be his daughter — no one’s perfect, you see. 

“Sorry, Wrong Number” favors dialog over movement, yet director Anatole Litvak maintains Hitchcock-like suspense and conjures up a persistent sense of dread about Leona’s fate.

While the most tense and dramatic parts of the story take place in the present, in Leona’s opulent room, flashbacks give us breathing space, taking the action (not that there’s a lot of it) out of the confined bedroom and placing it in the outside world. 

Because it was adapted from a radio drama, “Sorry, Wrong Number” favors dialog over movement, yet director Anatole Litvak maintains Hitchcock-like suspense and conjures up a persistent sense of dread about Leona’s fate. Although she’s difficult and a bottomless pit of need, we stay sympathetic with her as the present threat against her grows. 

But a devastating revelation, seen in flashback, alters our view of the stricken heiress, from pitiful to pathetic with a wisp of malevolence thrown in for good measure. (I’ll avoid spoilers here). 

Harold Vermilyea, Lancaster. Henry's impulses lead him down a less righteous path.

The stunner brings a sea change to Henry’s outlook on his relationship with his wife. The dam breaks, and the years of frustration and rage he’s been holding back begin to rush to the surface. 

He makes unsavory, foolish choices, as noir antiheroes do, morphing from beleaguered trophy husband to unwitting villain, and realizing that his underhanded actions have gotten him in over his head. 

With friends like these ...

His new friends are gangsters and when they try to squeeze money out of him he caves in to their pressure. But what happens next is yet an added layer of irony that he couldn’t see coming, and it makes the story all the more tragic.

 Leona is scheduled to receive an uninvited visitor at 11:15 p.m. and like the grim reaper himself he will work efficiently and leave little trace of his clandestine operations. As the clock runs down, Leona can only hope for a visit from a hero who will save her from this fate. But in her world, heroes are in short supply.

‘Out of the Past’: 13 Signs that Jane Greer is About to Destroy You

Jane Greer, 'Out of the Past' (1947). Dressed in mink and deadly.

Warnings abound,

but the only thing
Mitchum can sputter

is 'Baby, I don’t care'

Contains spoilers

By Paul Parcellin

‘Out of the Past’ (1947)

You can’t say that Jeff Bailey (Robert Mitchum) had no way of knowing what he was in for. A shamus ought to be able to see things that a civilian would miss, even when he’s dazzled by the gorgeous and perfidious Kathie Moffat (Jane Greer). How inevitable was it that love smitten Jeff would step off the edge of a cliff once he met this dame? If the sweet-talking Kathie were a  bottle of cologne her scent would be called “Eau de Damnation.”

Jeff is a former private detective who lives in a small town under an assumed name. We soon learn why he’s gone into hiding. Through a quirk of fate he’s forced to see his loathsome former boss, gambler Whit Sterling (Kirk Douglas), in Lake Tahoe. On his way there, Jeff spills the back story to his girlfriend Ann Miller (Virginia Huston), who comes along for the ride, and we see the story in a long flashback sequence. 

Three years before, Sterling hired Jeff to find his lady friend, Kathie, who’s been missing ever since she stole 40 large from him and left him with a bullet hole ventilating his gut. He survived, of course, and Jeff accepts the well paying gig. (Favorite line of dialogue: Jeff asks Sterling why he doesn’t send his henchman, Joe Stefanos (Paul Valentine), to find Kathie instead of him. Sterling replies, “Joe couldn’t find a prayer in the Bible.”)

 Jeff follows her trail to Acapulco, finds her and then falls for her. Instead of bringing her back to Sterling they begin an affair. 

Of course, it’s all going to go wrong for Jeff and pretty much everyone else connected to him and Kathie. It’s all because he ignored warning signs, some small, subtle, symbolic, even. Others are Jumbotron, skywriter, Fourth of July fireworks huge. 

See for yourself. Here’s a rundown of the warnings that Kathie Moffat is no Rebecca of Donnybrook Farm, and that Jeff ought to get the hell out of Dodge, pronto:

Greer, Mitchum. Out of the clear sunlight and into the shadows.

Her entrance: Jeff waits for her to show up at an Acapulco cantina, and like magic she does. The joint is a dark, cool respite from the blazing Mexican sunshine. Kathies steps inside, as if she were fated to cross that threshold and meet Jeff. As she does, we see her emerge from the brilliant daylight into the saloon’s darkened reaches. She’s at home in the shadows and her innocent appearance will prove deceptive. (Subtle, but telling.) 

A risky bet: Jeff and she meet up again a couple of nights later, and she takes him to a gambling joint where there’s lots of action around a roulette wheel. Is rendezvousing with her a gamble in itself? You bet. She’s a gangster’s on again, off again moll, and said gangster would take a dim view of their fraternizing. 

Greer, in front of a curtain of fishing nets.

Spider and the fly: When they finally have a nighttime canoodling session on the beach, fishing nets are draped all around them. Guess who’s going to get caught in her web. (There’s still time to run, Jeff.) 

Caution takes a holiday: They lay their cards on the table. She knows Jeff has been tasked with bringing her back to Sterling. She denies that she robbed the gambler. “Don’t you believe me?” she asks, her voice dripping with innocence. Love-stupid Jeff responds, “Baby, I don’t care.” (Spoken like a true fall guy.)

Acapulco after dark: Jeff, in voiceover, remarks that he never seems to see Kathie during the daytime, only at night. He doesn’t even know where she lives and won’t follow her to find out, as a detective might. (Hello? Possibly she’s living a double life of her own?)

Greer and Mitchum: Life's a gamble, but the house always wins.

The big question: As his relationship with Kathie and his entanglements with Sterling and other ne’er do wells grow heated, Jeff denies his gut instincts. But in voiceover he asks himself, “How big a chump can you come to be?” (If you have to ask … )

Kathie’s surprise: Jeff’s former partner in the detective business, Jack Fisher (Steve Brodie), who’s now working for Sterling, tries to blackmail Jeff and Kathie. He and Jeff get into a fistfight at a secluded cabin. Kathie’s on the sidelines taking it all in, and just as Jeff begins to take command of the fight she shoots Fisher dead. In cold blood. Jeff is in shock. Now there’s a gal you’d better keep an eye on.

Liar, liar ... : After the brawl comes to a bloody end, Jeff and Kathie decide to split up and chill out for a while. She takes off, then Jeff finds her bank book. Lo’ and behold, she’s got 40 big ones stashed in her account. Just the amount that Sterling accused her of stealing. She swore to Jeff she didn’t take the money. Could she have lied about it? The evidence keeps piling up, but lovestruck Jeff … (well, you know.)

Kirk Douglas, Greer, Mitchum together — awkward!

Back in the fold: The flashback is over and we’re back in the present. Jeff has told his story to his lady love. She drops him off at Sterling’s luxurious Tahoe home. It’s been a while since he and Kathie parted ways, but to his shock and dismay Jeff finds that Kathie’s back once again at chez Sterling and has rekindled her affair with the gambler. Jeff, about to sit down to breakfast on the terrace, suddenly loses his appetite. (Played for a chump again.) 

Guess who!: Jeff reluctantly accepts another assignment from Sterling. This time he’s supposed to grab incriminating documents that could put Sterling in prison. But something seems off. He senses that Sterling plans to frame him for a murder. Unexpectedly, Jeff bumps into (who else?) Kathie. Clearly, she’s knee deep in the whole sordid affair. She says that she and Jeff can start over again as a couple. Despite her traitorous behavior, he seems to buy her story. (Oh, Jeff, what can we say?)

The Affidavit: Kathie claims that Sterling forced her to sign an affidavit that pins two murders on Jeff. She’s really on Jeff’s side, she assures him, it’s just that Sterling has forced her to cooperate with him. (Yeah, right.)

Greer, Paul Valentine. The ole double cross.

Another double cross: Kathie directs henchman Joe Stefanos to follow Jeff back to the town where he resides and kill him. (This one’s hard for Jeff to rationalize). But things don’t go as planned and Jeff cheats a close call with the reaper. 

The truth comes out: Jeff discovers that Kathie has killed Sterling. She tells Jeff that he can run away with her or take the rap for three murders, each of which she either committed or had a hand in. She sums up their made-in-hell relationship: “You’re no good and neither am I. That’s why we deserve each other.”
Jeff might beg to differ, but rather than debate the matter he secretly dials the phone while she’s upstairs packing. They hop in a car and leave. Seeing a police roadblock ahead, Kathie realizes that Jeff dropped a dime on her and she shoots him, then fires at the police. A machine gun rakes the car with bullets, killing her.

On the road to doom.

It’s as if Jeff realizes that the only way to end Kathie’s reign of terror is by sacrificing himself. Earlier in the movie he mutters that he’s doesn’t mind dying, so long as he’s the last one to go. He almost made it, missing the mark by mere seconds. Fair enough. Sometimes being the next to last gets the job done all the same.

The Big Knockoff: 14 Films With Armored Car Heists

Burt Lancaster, Tom Pedi, “Criss Cross” (1949).

Rolling bank vaults

a favored target

of daring hijackers

By Paul Parcellin 

If the movies are any indication, the 1940s and ’50s, especially the ’50s, must have been the golden age of armored car robberies — they were getting knocked over like clay pigeons in a shooting gallery.

A common armored car robbery movie plot: Ex-con, recently paroled, finds a crummy job. Meets a girl. Wants to impress the girl. Gets hungry for a big score. Joins a gang with a big scheme to tip over an armored vehicle. Risks life in prison or death (but what the hell). By showtime no one in the gang trusts anyone else in the gang. Ex-con doesn’t even trust the girl. The robbery goes down. Things go badly.

It’s fun just to see a complex heist plotted out in the low-tech middle of the last century. No closed circuit video, no satellite tracking devices, no cell phones — almost like robbing a stagecoach. Yet lawmen always seem to bust up those carefully laid plans.

With that in mind, here are 14 films from the days when we had a bumper crop of armored car robberies, at least in the movies:

Paul Fix, David Oliver, Irving Pichel, Robert Wilcox, “Armored Car.”

“Armored Car” (1937) 

Police Detective Larry Wills (Robert Wilcox), eager to prove himself, takes an assignment to infiltrate a gang that specializes in violent armored car robberies. The gang appears to have inside information and it might be coming from someone working for the armored car company. Likewise, gangster Tony Ballard (Cesar Romero), who sets up the robberies, begins to suspect there’s a mole in his crew.

George Raft, Humphrey Bogart, “Invisible Stripes.”

“Invisible Stripes” (1939)

Cliff Taylor (George Raft), gets out of prison and is determined to go straight, but finding work proves tough. His younger brother, Tim (William Holden), is in a dead-end job facing financial pressures. Cliff veers back into the dark side, reconnecting with his old associate Charles Martin (Humphrey Bogart), who is set to rob an armored car carrying payroll money. Cliff wants to give Tim enough cash to help keep him out of crime. But his good intentions end up backfiring. 

Humphrey Bogart, Chick Chandler, “The Big Shot.”

“The Big Shot” (1942)

Ex-con Duke Berne (Humphrey Bogart) wants to go straight, but then he reunites with old flame Lorna (Irene Manning) now married to shady attorney Martin Fleming (Stanley Ridges). She wants Duke to help her escape her loveless marriage. Martin uses his legal front to run a criminal enterprise and recruits Duke to take part in an armored car robbery. Duke resists, but caves in to protect Lorna.

Yvonne De Carlo, Burt Lancaster, “Criss Cross.”

“Criss Cross” (1949)

Steve Thompson (Burt Lancaster) rekindles his relationship with his ex- Anna (Yvonne De Carlo) but she’s married to gangster Slim Dundee (Dan Duryea). Slim finds Steve with Anna, and thinking fast, Steve tells Slim he came to propose a heist. The plan is to rob the armored car that Steve helps guard. Staging the robbery with Slim also allows him to stay close to Anna. But the holdup spins out of control and betrayal and double crosses doom Steve and Anna to a tragic end.


Armored Car Robbery

“Armored Car Robbery” (1950) 


Criminal mastermind Dave Purvis (William Talman) organizes a gang to rip off an armored car outside a Los Angeles stadium. When the heist goes down a policeman is shot and killed. Det. Lt. Jim Cordell (Charles McGraw) vows to bring the killers to justice. Purvis tries to double cross his gang and escape alone with the cash, but Cordell’s dogged police work leads to a final showdown. The film’s semi-documentary style, it’s tight 67-minute runtime and its focus on police procedure and criminal psychology make it a standout among its peers.


Wally Cassell, Steve Cochran, Richard Egan, Edward Norris,
Robert Webber, “Highway 301.”

“Highway 301” (1950) 


George Legenza (Steve Cochran) and his gang operate across Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina, committing a series of robberies and murders. They’re cold-blooded and efficient, leaving a trail of bodies behind as they evade law enforcement. The film’s most intense action centers on the gang’s attempted armored car robbery. Legenza plans it carefully. He predicts that it will be their biggest score yet


Richard Basehart, Marilyn Maxwell, “Outside the Wall.”

“Outside the Wall” (1950) 


Larry Nelson (Richard Basehart), paroled after serving time for manslaughter, is determined to go straight. He takes a job at a rural sanitarium and soon discovers that the facility is being used by a gang planning an armored car robbery. The criminal ring operates under the cover of legitimate medical care, and Larry slowly becomes entangled in their scheme, especially when he falls for a nurse (Marilyn Maxwell) who may not be as innocent as she seems.


Lawrence Tierney, Marjorie Riordan, “The Hoodlum.”

“The Hoodlum” (1951) 


Hardened criminal Vincent Lubeck (Lawrence Tierney) is out on parole after serving a sentence. His straight-arrow brother gives him a job at his gas station, but Vincent, bored with the job, takes an interest in the armored car that makes regular stops at the bank across the street. He sets up a heist, and as the robbery unfolds things spiral out of control. Betrayal and needless bloodshed doom the caper.


John Payne, Lee Van Cleef, “Kansas City Confidential.”

“Kansas City Confidential” (1952)


Tim Foster (Preston Foster), a masked mastermind, plans a precise armored car robbery. To keep identities secret and prevent betrayal, he recruits three criminals — each masked during the planning and unaware of the others’ identities. The heist is executed with military precision, netting over a million dollars. Meanwhile, Joe Rolfe (John Payne), an ex-con working as a florist delivery driver, is unwittingly caught in the aftermath.


Noble 'Kid' Chissell, Jack Daly, Douglas Kennedy, “The Big Chase.”

“The Big Chase” (1954)


Det. Sgt. Dave Welton (Jim Davis) has to put his wedding plans on ice when a tip-off warns that an armored car robbery is in the works. Two-bit hood Benny McBride (Lon Chaney Jr.) is knee-deep in the planned heist that is being set up by gang leader Gus Henshaw (Anthony Caruso). Benny, desperate for money to support his pregnant wife, gets in over his head with the hardened criminals.


Tony Curtis, George Nader, “Six Bridges to Cross.”

“Six Bridges to Cross” (1955)


Jerry Florea (Tony Curtis), unable to resist the lure of fast money, falls in with a Boston gang planning a massive armored car robbery. The scheme includes using the city’s bridges and escape routes to their advantage. A big cash payout is at stake in this tension-filled operation, and it comes off without a hitch. But as the police close in, loyalties are tested.


Max Showalter, “Indestructible Man.”

“Indestructible Man” (1956) 


Ruthless gangster Charles “Butcher” Benton (Lon Chaney Jr.) is a sentenced to “the big sleep” for an armored car robbery in which he killed several guards. After the execution, a mad scientist uses electrical treatments to bring him back from the dead. But the reanimated gangster has become an indestructible killing machine. That’s bad news for the mugs who double-crossed him.


“The Rebel Set” (1959) 


Struggling writer John Mapes (Don Sullivan), angry rebel Ray Miller (Richard Bakalyan) and poor little rich kid George Leland (Jerome Cowan) hang out at a beatnik coffeehouse run by Mr. Tucker (Edward Platt). Mr. Tucker ropes the beatnik trio into a scheme to rob an armored car aboard a passenger train. The gang manages to steal the money, but paranoia, betrayal and guilt rattle the operation.


Herman Boden, Jack Dodds, Mamie Van Doren, Marc Wilder,
“Guns, Girls and Gangsters.”

“Guns Girls and Gangsters” (1959)


Recently released con Chuck Wheeler (Gerald Mohr) hatches a bold plan to knock over an armored car loaded with casino cash during the New Year’s Day money run. Chuck reconnects with his old flame, Vi Victor (Mamie Van Doren), who’s now involved with gangster Joe Darren (Lee Van Cleef). The robbery goes down, but all three players have their own private schemes in mind.

Cameron Prud'Homme, John McIntire, “Naked City, ” Episode, “Nickel Ride.”

Bonus: vintage TV


“Naked City”
Episode: “Nickel Ride” (1958) 

Detectives visit the aging captain of the Staten Island Ferry at the same time that armed robbers are executing a daring heist of an armored car traveling on the ferry.