Whiteout Noir: 6 Films With Cold Blooded Crimes In Wintery Places

Ward Bond, Robert Ryan, "On Dangerous Ground" (1951).

Murder has a different look atop a crisp blanket of snow

By Paul Parcellin

Winter is upon us, and in many places snow has either fallen or soon will. So it’s time to consider noirs that feature arctic blasts of frigid air and piles of the white stuff. Can’t think of any? Understandable — there aren’t a lot of them.

Snowfall plays a dramatic role in a handful noirs and it’s a surprisingly natural fit. The arresting beauty of a snowy landscape is a natural foil for manmade concrete and steel jungles where noirs are typically set. 

But with beauty comes danger. Those frozen vistas and iced over waterways can be deceptively peaceful settings for robbery, kidnapping and homicide. Thickets of unspoiled nature are apt havens for villains on the lam from crimes committed in the big city. 

What’s more, expanses of wilderness blanketed in deep, heavy snowpack can be as isolating and barren as the sands of the Sahara.

Here are six noirs that feature wintry squalls, the aftermath of punishing blizzards and miles of soft white powder. Tread carefully, and don’t forget to bring warm clothes, good boots and maybe a revolver, too:

Robert Ryan, Ward Bond, Ida Lupino, “On Dangerous Ground.”

“On Dangerous Ground” (1951)

Police detective Jim Wilson is an isolated, rage-filled outsider. He struggles to hold back his contempt for most others and is prone toward violence. Wilson can’t stomach the public’s disrespect for law officers, and as we meet him he’s edging close to an emotional breakdown. 

He regularly pummels suspects held in custody and roughs up anyone on the street who looks remotely guilty of a crime.  His superiors and colleagues notice his mental deterioration and send him away to a small upstate town where he’s to help with a murder investigation. 

The murder case is that of a young girl killed while walking through a lonely field. Her grieving, infuriated father is, understandably, in much greater emotional distress than hot headed Wilson. The shotgun toting dad wants vigilante justice and he takes an instant dislike to Wilson, the big city cop.

Wilson is extraordinarily out of place in this hick town, never more so than when, in pursuit of a suspect, he races through snow covered woodlands in his wing tips, fedora and overcoat. The snow is itself an antagonist that bogs down the city guy. When pursuing a suspect in a car chase over icy, treacherous roads, he slows the vehicle and the other driver gets away, further enraging the bereaved father.

He meets a blind woman, Mary Malden, who lives a fairly isolated life, but unlike Wilson, she’s not lonely. When we see the two together it’s clear that Wilson’s isolation fueled rage just might melt before the snow does. A cop doesn’t trust anyone, he tells Mary. She, on the other hand, must trust everyone.

 For a while it looks like the two of them will get together, but things change when Wilson discovers the identity of the fugitive from justice. Then all bets are off. 

Brian Keith, Aldo Ray, “Nightfall.”

“Nightfall” (1956)

Jim Vanning tries to look inconspicuous as he walks the pavement on Hollywood Boulevard. As the film opens we get a gander at 1950s Hollywood in shots that are like time capsules. When twilight falls the boulevard is aglow with neon and lined with well known nightspots: Musso & Frank, Miceli’s and Firefly, among others. This is about as far removed from a snow covered vista as you can get. Or so you’d think. 

An unplanned and involuntary trip to the putrid Venice Beach oil fields lies in store for Vanning. Then, in a flashback, we’re transported from that industrialized wasteland to a snowy Wyoming campground. The idyllic spot is nestled on the bank of a dazzling frozen lake surrounded by powder covered peaks.

Vanning and a buddy are winter camping when two thugs, running from the law, careen over an embankment and wreck their car. Their very presence despoils the dramatically beautiful landscape. That transgressive acts should take place in such a pristine setting seems to violate the laws of man and nature. 

It’s amid the rolling, snow covered hills of Wyoming that this story of greed, violence and narrow getaways concludes — against a stark white backdrop, far from Hollywood Boulevard and the Venice oil fields.

James Mason, F.J. McCormick, “Odd Man Out.”

“Odd Man Out” (1947)

Snowfall only makes a bad situation worse for Irish Nationalist Johnny McQueen. He’s on the run through the streets of Belfast, dodging police who are after him for a robbery and murder.  He and some allies heisted cash meant to fund further Nationalist endeavors. Johnny suffered a bullet wound and a broken arm. 

Heavy rains pound the streets as he dodges police and seeks shelter. Then the rain turns to snow. If inclement weather isn’t punishment enough, some whom he meets in his Odyssey toward safety offer sympathy and sometimes a bit of help, while others scheme to use him for their own gain. 

He’s the leader of the local “organization” and well known in the community. Many of those who’d like to help him fear retribution. His love, Kathleen Ryan, is one of the few who selflessly provides aid. But it’s a losing battle; Johnny’s wounds make it hard to run and he’s losing blood by the minute.  

Snowfall covers the grimy streets and makes the city beautiful — ironic that the freedom fighter should suffer greatly as the brick and cobblestones are painted a brilliant, angelic white. 

Eugene Pallette, Belita, Barry Sullivan, “Suspense.”

“Suspense” (1946)

This one could have been called “Noir on Ice.” Joe Morgan breezes into L.A. looking like he’s been sleeping under bridges since leaving New York. He gets a job at the ice show, first as a peanut vendor, then he quickly climbs the ladder to a management position. A love triangle develops with him, the ice show star Roberta, and Max, who runs the operation.

The action switches to a hunting lodge in the snow covered High Sierras, which is to say, a soundstage with painted backdrops of snow drifts and icicles. (Yes, it’s a bit cheesy, but this Monogram film looks like a big budget production by Poverty Row standards.) 

Tensions rise when Joe unexpectedly drops in on lovebirds Max and Roberta as they relax at the mountain hideaway. It’s all too much for Max, and he decides to put an end to the flirtations between Roberta and Joe. 

His actions seem to backfire, and here we see what lots of snow cascading down a mountainside can do. But lest you think that those messy little affairs of the heart have been covered up in tons of the white stuff, think again. In noir, there’s always the danger that the past will come back to haunt the guilty. 

Gregory Peck, Ingrid Bergman, “Spellbound.”

“Spellbound” (1945)

Don’t mess with the table linens when Dr. Anthony Edwardes is around. The young psychoanalyst, who happens to be the newly appointed director of a Vermont psychiatric hospital, will be upset. 

Edwardes’s colleague marks a white tablecloth with the tines of a fork and the parallel lines remind him of ski tracks left in the snow. Suddenly, a repressed memory bobs to the surface and Edwardes freaks out. 

Dr. Constance Petersen, a psychiatrist at the facility, notices that Edwardes shows a number of troubling signs, and she suspects the worst. The problem is, she and he have become an item, and things may get … awkward. 

This is a story of deep seated psychological wounds that, irony upon irony, are apt to be misinterpreted by the psychiatric hospital staff. There’s even identity confusion, and as the story progresses we’re less sure of who is who and what thoughts are lodged in the deeper recesses of the staff’s minds. Alfred Hitchcock directs. 

Cornel Wilde, David Stollery, “Storm Fear.”

“Storm Fear” (1955)

Let’s say unexpected company drops by and a heavy snowfall traps you all under the same roof. It might be fun, sort of. Not so for the Blake clan. Fred, the missus and their young son find themselves penned in with Fred’s brother, Charlie, and a couple of his associates. 

Seems Charlie and his friends just robbed a bank, need a place to hide out and won’t leave. The Blakes’ mountain cabin, under siege, becomes a stage where where family squabbles, resentments and betrayals play out. 

Fred, a struggling writer, is jealous of the close bond between David, his son, and the family’s hired hand, Hank. Charlie seems to develop the same rapport with David. To make matters worse, Fred senses an attraction between his wife, Elizabeth, and Charlie — they were once a couple. 

Benjie, Charlie’s mentally unstable, violent cohort, wants to run off with the bank loot. Tensions rise when the trio of robbers, guided by young David, snowshoe over the mountain and try to make their escape. But a snow covered peak can be a mighty obstacle to conquer, and most city folk aren’t up to the challenge.

What does a Dancer, an Actor, a Magician and a Disenchanted Cop Have in Common? They All Meet in a “City that Never Sleeps”

Marie Windsor, Gig Young, Chill Wills, "City That Never Sleeps" (1953).

A cloud of failure hangs over a handful of Chicagoans whose dreary lives are about to become a lot more dramatic. In “City That Never Sleeps” a would-be ballerina, reduced to dancing in a burlesque house; an out of work actor, his face painted silver, poses as a mechanical man in the burlesque theater’s front window;  and an unemployed magician who uses his sleight of hand skills to pick pockets and commit robberies all figure into the story. 

Thwarted dreams and bitter resignations to less than ideal lifestyles drive the younger generation’s general sense of dissatisfaction. But it’s not just the frustrated show biz types who have a beef with the system. 

Wally Cassell, Mala Powers.

At the center of this tale of woe is Johnny Kelly (Gig Young), a young Chicago cop who’s having an affair with the burlesque dancer, Angel Face (Mala Powers), and plans to resign from the force the following day. The idea is to leave his wife, Kathy (Paula Raymond), and run off with the paramour. But his last graveyard shift turns out to be a doozie and Johnny begins to rethink every wrong footed step he’s set to take.

But before he has any revelations, the otherwise straight arrow law officer decides to get his hands dirty in order to finance his split from his wife and his job. He accepts an offer from a crooked lawyer, Penrod Biddel (Edward Arnold), to kidnap the equally crooked magician, Hayes Stewart (William Talman), and bring him over state lines where he’s a wanted man. Stewart has been getting in Biddel’s hair, and the shady attorney aims to put the pesky prestidigitator on ice.

In a marvelous scene that tells us almost all we need to know about the relationship between the two, Biddel plucks an invisible hair or some other morsel of debris from the sleeve of Stewart’s sport coat and dismissively blows it free from his fingers. Their interactions all go downhill from there.

Gig Young, Ron Hagerthy, William Talman,
"City That Never Sleeps."

The tension between Biddel and Stewart is just the tip of the iceberg. Johnny’s life becomes more complicated by the minute. If his extramarital affair and plans to vacate his wedding vows weren’t vexing enough, Johnny’s family members become entangled in the goings that unfold on this absurdly crazy night: his dad, Johnny Kelly Sr., (Otto Hulett), is also one of Chicago’s finest, and Johnny’s delinquency-curious kid brother, Stubby (Ron Hagerthy), is also on the scene. The senior Kelly’s presence plays a significant and tragic role in the film’s final scenes. 

Yes, there are a stunning number of coincidences in this story — way too many to be at all credible. On this evening, not only is Stubby out aiding and abetting the villainous Stewart, but John Kelly Sr. is also on the beat, patrolling the same mean streets of “Chi Town,” as his son.

Adding to the strangeness of this remarkable confluence of Kelly family members is Johnny Jr.’s patrol car partner on this nerve shattering evening, a sergeant who will only identify himself as Joe (Chill Wills). His voice sounds remarkably like the one that narrates the film’s opening scenes, which is meant to be the voice of Chicago — a rather strange device if there ever was one. 

As they drive together, Joe gives Johnny sound advice about life and codes of conduct, none of which the younger patrolman is in the mood to hear. Might he have listened more closely if he realized it was the city itself offering sage advice? Probably not.

Marie Windsor

A network of love triangles help this heated pot of soup boil over: Biddel learns that Stewart is having an affair with his wife, Lydia (Marie Windsor); robotic man Gregg Warren (Wally Cassell) is smitten with Angel Face, who is in love with Johnny; meanwhile, dancer Agnes DuBois (Bunny Kacher) is sweet on Gregg, but he hardly knows she’s alive.

We learn that the source of Johnny’s turmoil is two-fold: he became a police officer to please his father and he dislikes the job; he wants more money, not because he’s particularly materialistic, but because his wife earns more than he does and that hurts his pride. Successful women in the workplace were a threat to 1950s American men, it seems, and Johnny’s ego is wounded deeply enough to make him want to pull up stakes and head for the hills.

Meanwhile, over the course of his last shift, Johnny delivers a baby and busts up a rigged craps game, returning money to the swindled gamblers. He realizes, with the help of Joe’s words of wisdom, that he’s playing a useful role in the community and that it’s essential that he salvage his marriage before it’s too late.

That’s not the harbinger of doom that many would demand of noir. Some will say it’s not noir, but so what? As Sara Smith suggested in her thought provoking book, “In Lonely Places: Film Noir Beyond the City,” noir can be evaluated by the noir elements it contains, much like the way alcohol is rated by proof. Not all noirs contain all of the elements associated with the genre, and some are more noir than others. Noir or not, call “City that Never Sleeps” what you want; it’s an entertaining crime story.

Now, it’s time to talk about two silly little points from this movie that jump out at me.

First, it’s New York, not Chicago that’s known as the “city that never sleeps,” but I suppose “The Windy City” isn’t a very noir title.  

Secondly, toward the end of the film someone gets shot in a very public space, a hotel room. We’ve all seen this in films and TV shows, old and new. The shooter never seems to expect that anyone will hear the very loud gunfire and call the cops, and in the movies and TV they usually don’t. In “City that Never Sleeps” a shooter reasons that people will probably think it’s just a car backfiring (right, that’s always my first thought). 

I’m not a firearms expert, but I suspect that discharging a weapon inside a public building would attract attention — a whole lot of attention — like firing a cannon or riding a horse through the lobby.

It’s just another one of those “only in the movies” moments that just seems to wash over us without making a dent in the conscious mind. Sure, it’s strange, but I’m willing to give the shooter a pass on this one.

When Noir Got Into the True Crime Game — Docudramas: How True Were They?

Ted de Corsia, "The Naked City" (1948) — just one of the 8 million stories.

By Paul Parcellin

Maybe it was the rigors of World War II that whet the public’s appetite for true crime stories in the 1940s. Returning soldiers, who saw real blood and guts on the battlefield, were less than inspired by movies based on fictional stories, or so the legend goes. They wanted a realistic view of life that matched the bleakness of their combat experiences and the changing peacetime world. 

Movie audiences, accustomed to the realism of wartime newsreels, liked the immediacy and authenticity of short films featuring real troops engaged in combat and other current events. 

At home, urban crime was on the rise and cities were deteriorating. The spate of semi-documentaries, which at first glance appeared to be as credible as legitimate news sources, validated the public’s worst fears about the decline of urban life while usually offering an upbeat message of hope.

Some of the films of that era that mimicked the look of documentaries include “The House on 92nd Street” (1945), “Boomerang!” (1947), “T-Men” (1947), “Highway 301” (1950) and “The Hitch-Hiker” (1953), to name just a handful. 

Some were merely inspired by true events while others stuck closer to the facts. Often, they were composites of different true cases blended into a single storyline. Most featured voice over narration in some form and they sometimes shot scenes in the exact locations where the real events took place. 

Tom Pedi, Nicholas Joy, Barry Fitzgerald,
David Opatoshu, Howard Duff at police headquarters.

One such composite movie is “The Naked City” (1948), the film that inspired a successful TV series, “Naked City” from 1958 to 1963. In the film, Barry Fitzgerald plays Det. Lt. Dan Muldoon, lead investigator of a homicide division. Short in stature (for a homicide lieutenant, that is; TV’s Columbo being perhaps his lone peer), his eyes gleam with excitement when a clue is unearthed in the case dubbed the Bathtub Murder. His Irish brogue and ironically sharp repartee that accents each scene he’s in is the voice of a Gaelic storyteller more so than that of the jaded New York City cop we’ve seen so many times. In fact, his upbeat manner belies the fact that he’s investigating a hideous crime, the drugging and deliberate drowning of a young woman. 

As the investigation wears on and leads begin to fizzle he’s undeterred and pursues promising angles with zest. It’s as if he has an unshakeable confidence that the perpetrators are bound to fall out of one of the trees he’s shaking. His self-assuredness and lack of cynicism is hard to figure considering the tough environment he’s in and the hardened criminals he’s after.

His counterpart, the young, green homicide detective Jimmy Halloran (Don Taylor) is assigned every shoe leather task that needs doing. He’s resigned himself to a life of diving into haystacks in search of elusive needles, for the time being, anyway. Theirs is a dynamic we’ve seen replayed in countless films and TV shows, but back then it must have had a fresher feel.

Robert H. Harris, Don Taylor as Det. Jimmy Halloran,
doing his shoe leather work.

If you’d guess that the rookie will eventually face off against the story’s arch villain, Willie Garzah (Ted de Corsia), the baddest of bad guys  (at one point, Garzah shoots a blind man’s guide dog), you’d be right. Garzah will outsmart and trap the young detective, putting his life in jeopardy while jacking up the tension in the film’s final moments. It’s, of course, a manipulative  and probably fictional device, but we’re glad to go along for the ride. In fact, it’s one of the film’s more effective sequences.

Voiceover narration by the film’s producer Mark Hellinger, the stuff of documentary-style storytelling, works sometimes. But too often he reaches for comic relief and stumbles, and just plain talks too much. Never mind, the movie looks great and proceeds at a fast enough clip.

Arthur Fellig, A.K.A. Weegee

The title is borrowed from the book by tabloid news photographer Arthur Fellig, better known as Weegee, who, from the 1920s to the ’60s, prowled New York City streets by night and snapped thousands of crime pictures, including the aftermath of many a murder (he also has a cameo in the film). 

Obviously, director Jules Dassin wanted the film to deliver the grubby truth as seen in the lurid photos and screaming headlines of tabloid journalism. We occasionally see visual touches that remind us of Weegee’s work, such as kids cooling off in the spray of an open hydrant. We also get a touch of his signature gallows humor when other youngsters dive off the East River dock only to find a corpse afloat there — innocence of youth, meet the grim reality of big city criminal culture.

Retaining the Weegee aesthetic, the film’s lensman, William Daniels, captures New York City’s tight, claustrophobic niches as well as its sweeping skyline and the odd vignettes of ordinary folks on the street in mock cinema verite fashion. 

A master of black and white photography, Daniels shot 21 films starring Greta Garbo between 1926 and 1939, including “Mata Hari” (1931), “Grand Hotel” (1932), “Queen Christina” (1933), “Anna Karenina” (1935), “Camille” (1936) and “Ninotchka” (1939). In “The Naked City” he somehow makes the gritty urban landscape of 1940s Manhattan lushly beautiful, transforming the grimy sprawl of Manhattan’s underside into a character in its own right. Had the producer dropped a good deal of the film’s voice over and simply let the pictures tell the story the film would be stronger for it. 

Voice over doesn’t get in the way of actors’ performances so much. The film presents Garzah, for instance, as a criminal without redeeming qualities. He places little value on human life and would just as soon pull a trigger or pitch a drunken man into the drink when he feels threatened. His ethos of survival at any cost comes to a head at the film’s climax, being chased by the cops he climbs the Williamsburg Bridge’s steel supporting structure. It’s a setup for the cinematic takedown of a big man, a la James Cagney’s fireball of a final scene in “White Heat” (1949), when the hunter becomes the prey and the prey gets flambéed. Garzah’s end is a good deal less flamboyant, however.  

Ted de Corsia as Garzah
on the Williamsburg Bridge.

It would be a stretch to shoehorn an action sequence like that into a film that’s supposed to be a documentary, of course. Here, it’s OK. It’s what puts the “semi” in semi-documentary. We’re never really sure where and when non-fiction morphs into fiction and vice-versa. We simply must enjoy the film for its entertainment value. Despite its use of documentary film’s look and feel it makes no promises about the reliability of the supposed facts it presents.   

What seems utterly credible, however, is the primitive crime fighting technology we see. Halloran, the man in the field, needs to find a pay phone to call the precinct with critical information about the man he’s tracking down. The desperately inadequate communications system he’s got to work with is responsible for a disconnect that puts the young law officer in trouble. Before attempting to singlehandedly bust the bad guy, Halloran leaves a phone message — yes, a phone message — for Muldoon who is out of the office. The police department desk jockey almost forgets to pass the crucial information on to the lieutenant, so when the junior detective lands in hot water there’s no cavalry there to pull him out. 

Things eventually work out, but that caused me consider this: In pre-cell phone days, screenwriters must have had an easier time whipping up dramatic tension. With tracking and cell phone towers, a law officer is probably less likely to become isolated and in jeopardy. How many plot twists can hinge on depleted batteries and lack of signal? A lot, apparently. Things were just simpler in the old days, but I digress.

As 1940s docudramas go, “The Naked City” is a solid piece of construction with a few creaky floorboards. See it on a big screen if you can — it’s a paean to a New York that has largely been lost to time. 

Noir Must Be Shot in Black and White, Right? Guess Again

Marilyn Monroe, "Niagara" (1953).

Raw Emotions Sizzle When Noir is in Color

By Paul Parcellin

I can already hear the howls of protest over the idea that film noir can be in color, so those who insist that color is verboten in noir will probably want to sit this one out.

We all know that noir is usually shot on black and white film, but the luscious hues of those shot in color at times add a new layer of depth to the stories they tell. In noir, color can be a cruel, ironic counterpoint to dark deeds taking place in lavishly photographed settings. After all, what could decimate the postcard-ready beauty of a landscape bursting with leafy greenery than a corpse splayed out amongst the flora?

Conversely, color makes cities appear less shadowy than those in black and white films while lending an urban landscape a brash, unidealized look. If color makes the countryside look luxuriously bountiful, it can make cities appear raw and unforgiving and desert landscapes more forbidding. 

With that in minds, here are some films bursting with color that show us the bleakest of noir worlds: 

Lizabeth Scott, "Desert Fury."

“Desert Fury” (1947)

Broad barren landscapes dotted with cacti, wild flowers and other flora are apt settings for this lush Technicolor noir soap opera that captures the sun-baked beauty of a small Nevada town. 

Film scholar Foster Hirsch notes that “Desert Fury” is shot in the lurid, over-saturated colors that would come to define the 1950s melodramas of Douglas Sirk. As in Sirk’s films, ravishing color sets the stage for emotional conflicts that crackle like heat lightning. 

When gangster Eddie Bendix (John Hodiak) and his henchman Johnny Ryan (Wendell Corey) arrive in town, Fritzi Haller (Mary Astor), owner of the Purple Sage casino, is less than enchanted to see them. She’d been involved with Bendix until he was forced to leave town under a cloud of suspicion over his wife’s death. 

To further complicate matters, Fritzi’s daughter, Paula (Lizabeth Scott), has quit yet another college and returned home to work in the family business. She and Hodiak become an item, with both parties mostly wanting to spite Fritzi.  

This emotional potboiler comes to a head at the site of Bendix’s wife’s death, a bridge on the road to town, an appropriate location to finally put a lid on this tangled affair.

Robert Ryan, "Inferno."

“Inferno” (1953)

Color is used to its best advantage in “Inferno” to show cruel contrasts in starkly different environments, one is the tortuous Mojave Desert landscape, and the other the plush surroundings of an upper crust resort hotel. 

Wealthy businessman Donald Whitley Carson III (Robert Ryan) is stranded in the desert. His leg is broken and his wife, Geraldine (Rhonda Fleming) and businessman Joseph Duncan (William Lundigan) have abandoned him there after a riding accident. 

The two are having a secret affair and Carson’s accident offers them an opportunity to get rid of him and pocket his vast fortune. But neither counted on the stranded tycoon’s resourcefulness. Driven by furious anger, Carson resolves to survive and make the two answer for their crime.

The desert canyon walls are a symphony of stunningly beautiful red rock. We can almost feel the heat radiating from the stoney landscape that threatens to swallow him whole.

The film cuts between the struggling Carson, parched, haggard and covered in brown dust and sweat, and the couple who abandoned him there, who are relaxing poolside, bathed in shades of turquoise and dappled with sunlight. 

Similar cuts reinforce the brutality of the injured man’s plight. As he forages for food, the film cuts to Geraldine enjoying a sumptuous meal at the resort’s dining room. 

Color helps make Carson’s desert prison seem more hellish than it would in black in white. In contrast, the luxurious resort takes on the look of a place where only the very wicked can relax and drink in its pleasures after leaving a man to die of starvation under a blazing sun.

Joseph Cotten, Marilyn Monroe, "Niagara."

“Niagara” (1953)

Niagara Falls never looked more postcard perfect than it does in director Henry Hathaway’s vision of the storied honeymoon retreat. Saturated color abounds in this pristine resort town lacking in any visible scuff marks or blemishes. 

It’s a storybook land carved out of nature, on the surface at least. The only exception is the nasty looking scar on the forehead of George Loomis (Joseph Cotten) after an assailant tries to send him into the churning waters of the falls.

The story is about an unhappy couple staying at a cabin retreat near the famous tourist attraction. Emotionally troubled George and his sexpot wife Rose (Marilyn Monroe) are a most unlikely couple. He’s dour and cranky and she’s bubbling with erotic energy and ever ready to party, even with a band of younger folks staying in the next cabin.

Unsurprisingly, Rose has a man on the side and the pair are scheming to send George over the falls.

Shot in Technicolor, the film’s palette of saturated hues really pops, especially in Rose’s scenes, with her sexy fuchsia dress and luscious red lips. It’s a bit comical that she awakens in the morning in full makeup, her lipstick glistening like a candy apple. Soon, it’s apparent that the perfect makeup and faux sweet demeanor are a false front meant to deflect attention from her marriage on the rocks and the deadly plot she has set in motion.

In “Niagara,” color is used to set the dramatic tone of each scene and to help define the characters. Strategically placed swatches of red punctuate the scenic design that tends to favor deep charcoal blues and forest green backdrops.

 Heightened color is at its peak during action sequences, when chiaroscuro lighting casts deep, dark shadows and saturated colors give the frame a stark, comic book-like appearance.

Rose’s electrifying wardrobe contrasts with George’s gray and oatmeal hued clothing. It’s certain that he’s no match for this ball of fire, and before long someone’s going to get burned.

Robert Ryan, "House of Bamboo."

“House of Bamboo” (1955)

The slightly washed out color in “House of Bamboo” fits well with it’s documentary-like framework, as director Samuel Fuller presents us with a crime story set in post-war Japan that is bleak and rife with gangsters. 

We see a nation struggling to get on its feet after a crushing defeat some 10 years before. The pale, snow-covered landscape under a sunless sky in the opening sequence informs us that this will be an unsentimental portrait of Tokyo and its denizens.

A military supply train is robbed and an American soldier guarding the cargo is killed, setting the stage for the widespread investigation that is to follow. 

Eddie Spanier (Robert Stack), recently released from an American prison, shows up in Tokyo and finds his way into an American gang operating there. Gang leader Sandy Dawson (Robert Ryan), like others of his ilk, is a foreigner exploiting a country decimated by war.

The film’s scenic design hints at the dramatic tensions taking place in the story. A palette of restrained shades, including pale grays, deep earth tones and beige, often fill the widescreen frame. But in a heist scene, touches of scarlet are incorporated into the set and they reflect the violent action that develops.

Likewise, the interior of Dawson’s home is decorated with the same pale tones that contrast with deep red accents that echo the blood that has been spilled during the gang’s exploits. For Dawson, that’s a color scheme that could hardly be more appropriate.  

This article was originally published in the May/June 2024 issue of The Dark Pages. Check out The Dark Pages newsletter at: www.allthatnoir.com/newsletter/

 

 

Feverish Dreams, Persecution Fantasies, Tormented Anti-Heroes: There’s Something About Cornell Woolrich’s Stories that Pulls Us in Like a Magnet — You’d Think it Would Do Just the Opposite

Kevin McCarthy, Gage Clarke, "Nightmare" (1956).

He Murders as He Sleeps!

Contains spoilers

By Paul Parcellin

When it comes to crafting stories of dread and entrapment, Cornell Woolrich stands out among his peers. His darkest work seethes with feverish, paranoid fantasies. Wrongly accused men, caged on death row or free and living under a stifling cloud of suspicion, are driven to prove their innocence. Visions of the noose, electric chair or gas chamber press on them. As clocks run down, hope of salvation evaporates like dew in afternoon sunlight. 

Cornell Woolrich

Of Woolrich’s distinctive writing style, Film Comment remarked, “Despite all the purple prose, tired rewrites, and preposterous plots that crop up in his fiction, perhaps no other writer handles suspense better, or gives it the same degree of obsessional intensity.” 

His novels and short stories were adapted into nearly 30 feature films, including Alfred Hitchcock’s “Rear Window” (1954), based on the 1947 Woolrich story “It Had to Be Murder,” and François Truffaut’s “The Bride Wore Black” (1968), based on the 1940 novel of the same title, credited to William Irish (a pseudonym of Woolrich). 

In Woolrich’s universe, the accused may or may not be guilty — at times, they themselves are unsure. Their minds may be clouded by narcotics and alcohol, their memories distorted by hypnotic suggestion. Tortured by thoughts of heinous acts they may have committed, protagonists find dark relief from their torments in theC prospect of a quick demise, be it by execution or suicide.

The suffocating claustrophobia of “Nightmare,” a novel by Woolrich as William Irish, is one such story. Adapted at least twice for the screen, “Fear in the Night” (1947) and “Nightmare” (1956), both directed by Maxwell Shane. The two films offer a Kafkaesque marriage of horror and the absurd. Improbable, fraught with coincidences and at times just plain weird, Woolrich’s tall tales resemble the disjointed reality of nightmares. Yet the stifling predicaments and persecution fantasies of Woolrich’s characters are as captivating as they are unsettling.

DeForest Kelley, "Fear in the Night" (1946).

“Fear in the Night” tells the story of bank teller Vince Grayson (DeForest Kelley), who dreams of murdering a man in a room full of mirrors. He investigates and finds that there's ample evidence that he did commit murder. But there may be a shadowy figure lurking behind the scenes.

In “Nightmare,” Clarinetist Stan Grayson (Kevin McCarthy) dreams he killed a man, then awakens to find evidence linking him to his imagined crime. His brother-in-law, New Orleans police detective Rene Bressard (Edward G. Robinson) is skeptical of Stan's story.

A strange looking door key, a button from a jacket or shirt and blood stains on Grayson’s clothes and person are the tantalizing clues he discovers after a night’s slumber. At first he believes that the button, key and blood materialized out of his dream. But in the light of day, the physical evidence that links him to a real murder is undeniable.  

 As the story dips into the irrational, we feel the protagonist’s growing terror as he begins to sense he’s losing his grip on sanity. In this strange and unpredictable world in which he finds himself, he and Bressard discover that the true perpetrator behind the crime, not fate, has set a perfect trap for him.

McCarthy, Edward G. Robinson, "Nightmare."

The opening sequences in both films are mirky and dream-like. Two men fight in a mirrored rooms. A mysterious woman supplies one of them with a sharp instrument and he kills the other and hides his body in a closet. Tracking down the facts is difficult since he can’t recall where the killing took place or how he got there. 

As pieces to the puzzle begin to come together we learn that hypnosis was the motivating force behind the crime. How the fall guy lands in so much trouble is more complex and difficult to swallow. Let’s just say that conspiracy plus coincidences play important roles in the story. 

Woolrich’s plots often stretch credulity to the breaking point, and another filmic adaptation of his story, “Phantom Lady” (1944), comes to mind — any number of others would be apt examples of Woolrich’s offbeat story plots, as well. Similar to “Nightmare” and “Fear in the Night” for its strange and uncanny events, the “Phantom Lady” storyline has an eerie similarity to the subconscious nocturnal wanderings of an unquiet mind. The plot involves a man falsely convicted of murder, and his loyal secretary’s obsessive search to find the woman who can back up the alleged killer’s alibi — a recurring theme in Woolrich’s work. 

Fay Helm, Alan Curtis, "Phantom Lady" (1944).

In the story, two women wear the same fashion accessory — identical chapeaus, a fashion faux pas that improbably helps set the story in motion. Murder and gaslighting follow, and the film boasts one of noir's wildest jam sessions, with hep-cat Elisha Cook Jr. performing an explosive drum solo with erotic overtones.

For the most part, Woolrich’s characters are realistic, ordinary folks, even if the stories that bring them to life display a reckless disregard for plausibility. While the stories may be fantastical, they seldom delve into abstract symbolism — well, not much, anyway. The mirrored room, for instance, is pretty trippy. Instead, we get a mostly straightforward, linear narrative whose weird coincidences might be more disturbing if the story wasn’t so entertaining.

You could say that Woolrich’s flights of fancy show a gutsy handling of the medium by a master at the top of his game. But it’s also notable that his literary output was fairly enormous. He was a writing machine who cranked out numerous novels, short stories and other texts. So, perhaps some of the stranger coincidences, creaky plot turns and major implausibilities were the byproduct of a writer working at a furious pace and hounded by deadlines. Sometimes, ready or not, you just have to get the thing out to the editor. 

Some might say that his work is flawed. But more rational, buttoned-down plots surely wouldn’t be as fun and entertaining as these. His work is pulp fiction that invites us to suspend disbelief as we climb aboard an uncoupled train car speeding downhill toward a perilous turn at the edge of a cliff.

Woolrich wrote about outsiders grappling with insurmountable problems and impossible odds, and likewise his solitary life was marked by tragedy and hardship. After his mother's passing in his mid-50s, he struggled with diabetes and alcoholism. His health continued to decline, and he eventually lost a leg to gangrene. His life was cut short when he died of a stroke at the age of 64 in 1968.

As for “Fear in the Night” and “Nightmare,” both made by budget-conscious Pine-Thomas Productions, Paramount’s B-picture division, DeForest Kelley’s restrained performance in “Fear in the Night” is stronger than that of Kevin McCarthy, who is more on the histrionically cranky side in “Nightmare.” Edward G. Robinson turns in a reliably solid performance in the latter, however, and both films are well worth your viewing time.

Scrapped: The Original Opening Sequence of “Sunset Boulevard” was Even Stranger than the Final Cut, and Audiences had a Peculiar Reaction to It

Erich von Stroheim, William Holden, Gloria Swanson,
"Sunset Boulevard" (1950).

Test Audiences Were Stunned, Amused and Confused

Joe Gillis (Holden), a life cut short.

By Paul Parcellin 

At the start of "Sunset Boulevard," hapless screenwriter Joe Gillis (William Holden) floats face-down in a swimming pool with several bullet holes punched into his torso. He’d been the long-term houseguest of deranged former silent screen siren Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) until, in a fit of grief and jealous rage, she used him for target practice.

She’d hired Gillis to polish a hopelessly disorganized screenplay written by and for the delusional Norma as a vehicle to reignite her long-dormant career. Of course, things didn’t work out that way. By the film’s end, we learn that Norma’s return to the klieg lights is on permanent hold and she’s about to be hauled off to a sanitarium. Meanwhile, cops are fishing Gillis out of the pool with pruning hooks. So much for Hollywood endings.

For those who’ve never seen the film, that’s hardly giving too much away. Almost everyone has at least heard of the gruesome setup that puts the story in motion. As the film opens, we see the police and a caravan of news reporters speeding down Los Angeles’s Sunset Boulevard toward the scene of the crime as daybreak washes over the City of Angels. Angelenos will immediately sense that this story is fictional – Sunset is all but traffic-free. Even in the early morning hours in 1950, that’s pure poppycock.

Norma Desmond (Swanson)
in a hysterical rage.

But the opening sequence that appears in the final cut wasn’t the first one that director Billy Wilder had in mind. Preview audiences viewed a quite different and even more bizarre opening, and their reaction was not the one Wilder anticipated. 

The sequence in question was quickly re-edited into the version we’re all familiar with. All that remains of the original are a few short clips without sound and some still photos. Consequently, few have ever seen the completed original opening and it appears that no one is sure if copies of the entire sequence still exist.

However, surviving script pages outline the remarkably strange introduction that ended up in the dust bin. It opens with shots of the coroner’s wagon speeding along the streets, delivering the earthly remains of Joe Gillis to the city morgue. 

The body is taken into the sterile facility, toe-tagged, and wheeled into a room temporarily housing other recently deceased unfortunates. But ethereal music fills the air and a strange glow emanates from beneath a bed sheet covering the cold, still dripping wet Gillis. Suddenly, he reanimates, as do his new roommates, who begin to chit-chat among themselves. 

Each has a tale of woe about the circumstances leading up to their demise – a truck crash here, an accidental drowning there. Gillis is a bit of a curiosity to the others due to his Hollywood connections and because he was murdered. So, he begins telling his story, and thus, narrating the rest of the movie from beyond the grave, or in this case, the slab.

Preview audiences in Evanston, Illinois, and Poughkeepsie and Great Neck, N.Y., laughed at the morgue sequence and were unsure whether the film was a comedy or drama.

Enroute to the city morgue.

After the opening credits, when the story moved down Sunset Boulevard and into the L.A. County Morgue, spectators were stunned. Years later Wilder recalled, “When the morgue label was tied on Mr. Holden’s toe, they started to scream with laughter. I walked out of the preview, very depressed.”

The revised cut shows the arrival of police and reporters. Next, we’re assaulted by a complex and eerie view of the corpse that appears to be filmed from the bottom of the pool. From our vantage point, we look up at Gillis and see his lifeless face. The cops are poolside, looking down at the dead man and they seem to be looking down at us, too, as we gaze upward from the depths of Gillis’s watery grave.

Getting that one shot took a good deal of work and planning. First, since there was no swimming pool at the location, Paramount had to dig one. After much experimentation, art director John Meehan set up the shot. At the bottom of a portable process tank, he placed an eight-by-six-foot dance rehearsal mirror.

 After sinking the tank to the bottom of the pool, he placed a muslin canopy behind the police and news photographers, which, shot in black and white, would mimic the dawn sky. With those elements in place, cinematographer John F. Seitz could light the scene effectively in a short time. The camera was set up alongside the pool and Seitz pointed it down at the mirror on the bottom of the tank and filmed Holden’s bobbing reflection. 

According to Meehan, the shot “turned out to be a simple, inexpensive way to get through-water or underwater shots” by removing the need to use expensive underwater equipment. Meehan noted that the water had to be well filtered for clarity and kept at a low temperature of about 40 degrees because at higher temperatures the natural gases that build up in water would cut down on light transmission.

It’s unclear, however, how long Holden, face down in the frigid water, had to keep his eyes open and how he managed to stave off hypothermia.

A grim end for Gillis.

Despite the efforts to smooth over the original segment’s jagged edges and tone down its comedic content, the revised opening still caused a stir. In Hollywood, Paramount arranged a private screening for the various studio heads and specially invited guests. 

While many were appreciative of the film, MGM studio boss Louis B. Mayer was incensed by the cheeky sendup of Tinsel Town. He allegedly shouted at Wilder, “You bastard! You have disgraced the industry that made and fed you.” The outraged movie mogul tried to buy the film so that he could bury it. Fortunately, he failed to do so.

Critical response was positive and box office receipts were good, making “Sunset Boulevard” an undisputed hit. But Gillis’s snappy, matter-of-fact voice-over narration, a sardonic mix of blunt fact, barely restrained venom, and self-deprecation didn’t sit well with all reviewers. 

Thomas M. Pryor wrote for The New York Times that the plot device of using the dead Joe Gillis as narrator was “completely unworthy of Brackett and Wilder, but happily it does not interfere with the success of ‘Sunset Boulevard’.” Taking a more hostile tone, The New Yorker described the film as “a pretentious slice of Roquefort,” containing only “the germ of a good idea.”

According to Sam Staggs in his book Close-Up on Sunset Boulevard, no audience has seen the morgue sequence since 1949, although Wilder did save the footage.

When Sherry Lansing, head of Paramount, approached Wilder about including the deleted sequence as an addendum to the DVD version of “Sunset Boulevard,” he refused. Although Wilder sometimes claimed to hold the missing sequence, he told director Cameron Crowe, “I don’t know who has it now.”

This article was originally published in the Dec. 2023 issue of The Dark Pages. Check out The Dark Pages newsletter at: www.allthatnoir.com/newsletter/

Pop! Goes the Flashbulb: In Noir, Photographers Did It the Old Fashioned Way, and their Pictures Usually Turned the Town, and Crime Investigations, Upside Down

Howard Duff snaps a candid shot in "Shakedown" (1950).

Contains Spoilers

By Paul Parcellin

Lighting and photographic style play an outsized role in crime dramas of all kinds, including film noir. But then there are the noirs and thrillers that put a camera in front of the camera — or to be more precise, they’re films in which a photographer and his or her pictures play a key role in the story. 

It turns out that the camera can perform a number of roles, as recorder of truth, an instrument of deception and blackmail, a shield against assault or a device that uncovers crime that the naked eye wouldn’t notice. 

Holding a camera and press credentials — real or fake — can help get you into places that normally restrict access, be it a crime scene, lavish party or a war zone — and some are a combination of all three.

Here are some films featuring paparazzo whose pictures shake up the status quo for better or worse:

Martha Vickers, Humphrey Bogart, "The Big Sleep."

“The Big Sleep” (1946) 

A camera is a blackmailer's best friends. It can catch a dupe in the act of regrettable deeds and preserve that transgression for ill-gained profit. Private eye Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) is hired to get elderly Gen. Sternwood’s young daughter Carmen (Martha Vickers) out of just such a pickle. 

A blackmailer catches her on film, drugged up and in a compromising position. 

It’s highly embarrassing for Gen. Sternwood. For Carmen? Meh.

The incriminating pictures are taken with a camera hidden inside an Asian sculpture in the home of shady bookseller Arthur Geiger. In addition to handling volumes of Shakespeare and Spinoza, Geiger also maintains a backroom lending library of smut.  

But his blackmail scheme is just the tip of the iceberg, and the deeper Marlowe dives into this black pool of treachery the greater the number of players he discovers. So sprawling and complex is this mystery that even after hearing the solution you may be a bit confused. I certainly was.

Duff, "Shakedown" — the last shot.

“Shakedown” (1950)

News photographer Jack Early (Howard Duff) blows his boss’s mind with his candid shots of crimes in progress. Turns out his uncanny luck of being at the right place when the action unfolds has little to do with good fortune and a lot to do with inside info. Through manipulations and backroom arrangements he snaps pictures that other photographers miss, making him the newsroom star.

His editor sends him on a near impossible mission to photograph a crime boss who won’t allow his picture to be taken, and the camera clicker makes a deal with the kingpin — then double crosses him. 

The film’s wrap-up sees the slimy photographer set up his camera for a spectacular shot, and it turns out to be his last.

Keep an eye out for Hollywood wild man Lawrence Tierney and an uncredited Rock Hudson. 

Cyd Charisse, "Tension."

“Tension”  (1949)

It doesn’t take a pro photographer, an FBI agent or a blackmailer to shoot a picture that blows a mystery wide open. Sometimes an ordinary “Jane Q. Public” can handle the job.

Shutter bug Mary Chanler (Cyd Charisse) is romantically attracted to dashing salesman Paul Sothern (Richard Basehart). The problem is that Sothern isn’t who he says he is. He’s milquetoast pharmacy employee Warren Quimby, who’s planning to kill his cheating wife Claire’s (Audrey Totter) boyfriend, Barney Deager (Lloyd Gough).

Quimby assumes the fictional identity of Sothern, hoping to get close enough to Deager to do him in. 

He doesn’t go through with it, and his plan backfires after he drops the “Sothern” guise and goes back to being Quimby. Mary thinks he’s gone missing and gives the police a photo of him she snapped as a lark. Before long, the authorities figure out that Quimby and Sothern are the same person, and things begin to look worse for Quimby when Deager turns up dead.

If nothing else, it’s probably a good idea to remember that, in noir, there is no such thing as a harmless photograph. 

James Stewart, "Rear Window." 

“Rear Window” (1954)

Photographs can record information that the untrained eye would not normally see. And strangely enough, the camera can be used as a defensive weapon to obscure an intruder’s vision and stop him in his tracks.

Confined to a wheelchair with a broken leg, photo journalist L. B. "Jeff" Jefferies (James Stewart) wiles away his time watching the goings on visible through his neighbors’ windows. None of it is X-rated, but there’s an undercurrent of voyeuristic impulse on display in this Alfred Hitchcock thriller.

One resident in the unit across the courtyard catches his interest. It’s the apartment that Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr) shares with his wife, and Jefferies begins to suspect that the burly Thorwald has done away with her.

Pondering this, Jefferies pores over photos of the garden and realizes that the camera has picked up something suspicious. A buried object, perhaps? 

Piece by piece, Jefferies and his lady friend Lisa Fremont (Grace Kelly) collect evidence and turn up the heat on Thorwald. His brooding neighbor finally breaks and comes to Jefferies’ apartment intending to silence him for good. 

But Jefferies’s trusty camera comes in handy when he repeatedly fires the flash attachment to temporarily blind the intruder. Flash bulb after flash bulb, Jefferies clicks away to ward off the attack. But like a soldier running out of ammo, his ploy can only stave off trouble for so long and the outcome could be very bad.

David Hemmings, "Blow-Up."

“Blow-Up” (1966)

Here’s another example of a camera capturing the truth and revealing odd details that the eye tends to miss. Sometimes that obscure information can reveal a criminal conspiracy. But no matter how air-tight the photographic evidence may seem, the pursuit of justice can be a futile endeavor. 

Fashion photographer Thomas (David Hemmings) plies his trade in 1960s Swinging London. Occasionally he delves into art photography, a pursuit that unexpectedly plunges him into a sinkhole of doubt and paranoia.  

While shooting landscape photos in a park one day, he photographs a couple lingering there. Upon enlarging and examining the resulting photos he sees a man with a gun and a body hidden among the greenery. He realizes that he’s stumbled onto a crime scene and the lingering couple are likely the victim and a co-conspirator.

Try as he might, he can’t seem to elicit any concern from his peers, all of whom seem to wallow in a haze of pot smoke, aloof and coolly detached from reality. 

When the alleged crime scene photos are stolen, Thomas is left with nothing tangible to persuade authorities to investigate and his efforts hit a brick wall. 

In the park he meets a mime troupe playing a mock game of  tennis with invisible rackets and balls, and he soon becomes wrapped up in watching the faux game. Reality, it seems, is what the majority believe it to be, regardless of any evidence to the contrary.

Joe Pesci, "The Public Eye."

“The Public Eye” (1992)

Freelance news photographer Leon "Bernzy" Bernstein (Joe Pesci) roams the streets of 1940s New York in search of gruesome crime scenes and other tabloid  fodder.  He’s a thinly veiled stand-in for shutter-snapper Arthur Fellig, a.k.a. “Weegee,” whose work is still shown in museums and published in fine art catalogues as well as coffee table books. 

Weegee, so called because of his ability to anticipate when and where juicy photo opportunities would crop up, was not above ginning up a crime scene to make more spectacular pictures. Likewise, Bernzy might move a fedora closer to a corpse for dramatic effect at the expense of fidelity to the truth. But that’s because Bernzy, like Weegee, sees a higher truth in his art — and he does see his photographs as art, not mere junk journalism. 

His aesthetic sense, his nose for news as well as his marketing savvy tell him to go for the dramatic gut-punch and leave the detective work to the coppers. He may have smudged a latent fingerprint here or there, but his pictures deliver the sort of blood and guts shots that leap off the page in tabloid bulldog editions.  

Jake Gyllenhaal, "Nightcrawler."

“Nightcrawler” (2014)

So far we’ve only talked about still photographers, but an exception can be made for “Nightcrawler,” which shines a harsh light on the TV news biz, more specifically, the sleazy, deceptive practices of freelance videographer Lou Bloom (Jake Gyllenhaal), who covers nighttime Los Angeles and distorts the truth to fit what the viewing public wants to see and hear. 

As his career advances, Bloom reveals his utter lack of ethics as he makes a grotesque lunge toward success while trampling the journalistic ideals of even handedness, fair play and above all else, the truth. 

Charles Bronson, "Man with a Camera."

“Man with a Camera” (1958-1960)

This TV crime drama features war veteran turned freelance photographer Mike Kovac (Charles Bronson). Kovac usually snaps pictures for insurance companies, the police and average citizens. He’s known for taking dangerous assignments that others turn down and he often acts as a private eye, to boot. 

His police liaison is Lt. Donovan (James Flavin) and he seeks counsel from his dad, Anton Kovac (Ludwig Stössel). 

When working undercover, Kovac uses slick devices such as cameras hidden in a radio, cigarette lighter and his necktie — shades of James Bond. Better yet, he’s got car phone and a portable darkroom in the trunk for developing film on the spot, as did Weegee. Some ideas are just too good not to copy.

Is It or Isn’t It? “Clash by Night” is a Gripping Drama, Alright, But Some Insist It Doesn’t Make the Cut as an Authentic Noir Because It Lacks One Crucial Element

Barbara Stanwyck, Paul Douglas, Robert Ryan,
"Clash by Night" (1952).

Contains Spoilers

By Paul Parcellin

“Clash by Night” has  the look and feel of noir, but not everyone thinks of it that way. It stars Barbara Stanwyck and Robert Ryan, two giants of the shadowy crime dramas of the 1940s and ‘50s that define those dark films. Some might say they make the perfect brooding noir couple.

If that’s not enough to establish the film as noir, note that Fritz Lang, dean of saturnine German expressionist films and American made noirs, directed. The Austrian-born Lang came to America in 1934 and brought the angst and shadows of German Expressionism with him. With an immigrant’s objective eye, he saw beyond the glossy surface of American life depicted in Hollywood films and instead turned his focus to the alienation and desperation seething within common folk. 

Fritz Lang,
master of noir.

He directed noir classics such as “The Woman in the Window” (1944), “Scarlet Street” (1945), “The Big Heat” (1953) and “Ministry of Fear” (1944), not to mention his German expressionist masterpieces, “M” (1931) and “Metropolis” (1927), among many others. Set in Monterey, Calif., “Clash by Night” is about working class people who toil on fishing boats and in a cannery, away from the big cities where noir tales typically unfold. 

Director and film historian Peter Bogdanovich, speaking on the DVD’s commentary track says that, although he’s a fan of “Clash by Night,” it’s not a noir. Unfortunately, he doesn’t explain his reasons for that judgment call. The disc was released as part of a box set called “Film Noir Classic Collection, Volume Two,” and Bogdanovich’s pronouncement must have dismayed the distributor.

What others who doubt the film’s noir pedigree say is that because no one gets murdered it’s not noir. 

Hand to hand combat with the intent to murder erupts at one point, and there’s even a kidnapping, although neither turns into much of an actionable offense.

Even if the film comes up short in the homicide department, it’s got atmosphere galore and conflicted, alienated characters living under a cloud of existential dread, all of which makes it an awful lot like a noir.

The story begins when Mae Doyle (Stanwyck) returns to town after a decade long absence. Her hopes of marrying a rich man and enjoying the good life somewhere far from the fish cannery have turned to ash. She runs into Jerry D’Amato (Paul Douglas), a kindly but unsophisticated bachelor fisherman who wants nothing more than for Mae to be his wife. She warns him it would be a mistake, but Jerry is too smitten to take her advice. 

Meanwhile, his friend, Earl Pfeiffer (Ryan), a projectionist at the local cinema, turns up. He’s the polar opposite of teddy bear Jerry. Earl is arrogant, disenchanted with life and he harbors a hatred of women — he’s separated from his burlesque dancer wife. In his typically sardonic sense of humor, Earl mutters, “Some day I’m going to stick her with pins and see if blood runs out.” He’s joking, of course, but with Earl there’s a fine line between comedy and tragedy.

Earl is attracted to Mae, but she deflects his bravado and thinks he’s a lout. Earl harbors contempt for his so-called buddy Jerry, and it’s obvious to everyone but Jerry, who remains oblivious to the emotional stirrings around him. Mae resents Earl’s condescending attitude toward Jerry, probably because she secretly harbors similar thoughts and feels guilty about it.

She finally agrees to marry Jerry because she wants a safe harbor that will protect her from the uncertainty and disappointments life dishes out. Earl may be the more exciting of the two gents, but he’ll never be the protector that Mae believes she needs. But we know she’ll have trouble sticking to her promise to be the kind of wife that Jerry wants.

Later, Mae’s brother, Joe (Keith Andes), gets engaged to his sweetheart, cannery worker Peggy (Marilyn Monroe), and for a while she shares Mae’s darkest view of marriage, that of being trapped in the small fishing village with nothing to relieve the dullness.

When Peggy’s doubts surface, Joe tells her he’d kick down the door to get her back, and with that her indecision is vanquished — a testimony of true love if there ever was one, she feels.

Marilyn, scandal followed her.

This was Marilyn’s first above-the-title billing, and in her small role she makes a fine showing as the naive but plucky hometown girl. The casting was tough luck for Andres, however. Whenever Marilyn’s on the screen everyone else in the shot might as well be invisible. 

Adding more spice to the mix, Marilyn was the source of a scandal during production. The actress was on loan to RKO from Fox, and during production some nude photos she’d posed for a few years prior came to light. Fox protected her reputation and kept the photos under wraps. But RKO, then headed by Howard Hughes, had no long-term investment in the actress and leaked the story to the press to reap publicity from it. Consequently, reporters mobbed Marilyn and the film’s star, Stanwyck, got the short end of the publicity stick. Stanwyck took it all in stride and continued to perform like the trouper that she was. 

It’s easy to imagine Stanwyck rolling with the punches and getting on with the job, and that same sense of self-reliance carries over to her characterization of Mae. She’s in control and unflappable in the face of temporary agitations. But even Mae has her limits. As the story progresses she stoically resists Earl’s advances. Now married to Jerry and the mother of a baby girl, Mae puts the boorish Earl in his place. She calls him “crude” when he suddenly comes on too strong. “You impress me as a man who needs a new suit of clothes or a love affair and he doesn’t know which,” she tells him. 

Clifford Odets,
poetic dialogue.

The streetwise poetic flair in the dialogue comes in part from playwright Clifford Odets — others worked on the screenplay — whose play was adapted into the movie. Typical of Odets, words coming out of the characters’ mouths are strangely flamboyant and display the writer’s idiosyncratic manner of capturing the cadence of working class speech.

Verbal fisticuffs ensue when Jerry invites Earl to visit the couple, Earl has had too much to drink and is allowed to sleep it off. The next morning, with Jerry away at work, Earl, still impetuous as ever, tells Mae that she and him are alike, “You’re born and you’d like to be unborn,” he says. His gloomy outlook is an apt description of both her and him, and that shared sense of alienation causes Mae to let her guard down. 

Tensions among the three grow stormier like the roiling ocean just beyond their doorsteps, and the film’s occasional cutaways to the briny deep signal trouble on the horizon. Partly shot on location, the film opens with a montage of fishing boats in the harbor, Jerry and Joe hauling in a catch and Peggy laboring in the cannery, in essence we see the community in a nutshell. 

Lang’s career began in the silent era, and it shows in the way he tells stories without dialog. It’s a cliche to say that you can almost smell the air, but this composition of coastal shots have just that effect.

If you’re still in doubt that “Clash by Night” is in fact noir, consider this:

In the absence of felonious behavior — murder, robbery, assault — other forms of anti-social behavior — adultery, violence, betrayal and corruption are at the core of noir. Add to that the sense of existential dread and misanthropy that runs throughout “Clash by Night,” and yes, it is noir, through and through. In the end, it’s the emotions and mood, not the murder that counts.