A cunning serial killer is on the loose and police are baffled

Song Kang-ho, 'Memories of Murder' (2003).
Searching for clues and coming up empty.

By Paul Parcellin

‘Memories of Murder’ (2003)

Bodies are popping up with terrifying regularity in a small South Korean city and the local police force has few clues to go on. Young women are being raped and strangled, their bodies abandoned in little traveled spots, and public hysteria is growing. 

It’s the late 1980s and Korea has not yet emerged from authoritarian government control. Small-town crime fighting methods are, shall we say crude? This wave of murders is not the kind of business the local lawmen are used to handling, and it shows. 

A challenging balance

Director-screenwriter Bong Joon Ho, whose film “Parasite” (2019) won four Academy Awards including Best Picture, infuses “Memories of Murder” with social commentary, police procedure and dark comedy, mostly at the expense of the thread-bare, chronically disjointed police force tasked with bringing a killer to justice. 

A terse, reflective take on the policier, Bong’s 2003 masterwork walks a thin line between mystery and black comedy. It’s a murder investigation in a world that seems to be spinning off its axis, and we’re never sure of where exactly things will land. 

Ko Seo-hie, Song Kang-ho, Kim Roi-ha.

Lead detective Park Doo-man (Song Kang-ho, Bong’s frequent collaborator), and fellow investigator Cho Yong-koo’s (Kim Roi-ha) methods mirror the oppressive regime that’s running the country. They beat and torture suspects to make them confess and occasionally plant evidence. 

Police under pressure

Park, an amalgam of cockiness and pent up frustration, is bedeviled by an investigation that can’t seem to move ahead. Lambasted by his superior, Sgt. Shin Dong-chul (Song Jae-ho), he’s saddled with a woefully understaffed, under equipped department — he has to hitch a ride on a farmer’s tractor to visit the site of a murder. His squad can’t even protect the crime scene from news reporters and rubberneckers who trample and destroy evidence.

Shot in color, the film has the look of a black and white print. Murky blue-gray and pea-soup green tones give the police station interior a gloomy, closed-in look. Even expansive fields, industrial areas and wooded groves seem unkissed by sunlight. If you had to choose a grimy color palette that would give the feeling of hopelessness, this is it.

Kim Roe-ha, Song Jae-ho, Song Kang-ho. Another grim discovery.

Seo Tae-yoon (Kim Sang-kyung), a detective from Seoul, is brought in to jump-start the investigation and he’s soon at odds with Park. Seo knows a thing or two about scientific detective work, while Park works on instinct — he’s convinced that he can spot a guilty party simply by staring into his eyes. His stare-downs are often a prelude to beating confessions out of suspects. 

Seo is disturbed by the brutality Park and Cho regularly dish out to unfortunates, adding friction to his tenure at this backwoods constabulary. Even he, as a newly arrived officer, is mistaken for suspect and handed a beatdown. 

A ray of hope

The detective squad is almost exclusively a boys’ club, but the one woman on the force, Officer Kwon Kwi-ok (Ko Seo-hie), comes up with an ingenious theory, which Park ridicules, of course. But guess which one of them proves to be correct. 

Adapted from the 1996 play “Come to See Me” by Kim Kwang-lim and loosely based on South Korea's first confirmed serial killings, “Memories of Murder” is set in Hwaseong, located on the coast of the Yellow Sea. It’s a city with pockets of industry and vast farmland and many places for a serial killer to stash bodies. As the list of victims grows, suspects are apprehended and questioned with no tangible results.

Kim Sang-kyung, an outsider in the department.

In his desperation Park is willing to accept flawed confessions from several suspicious types, to no avail. As the investigation plods on the detectives’ use of intimidation and brutality backfires when a viable lead that could crack the case is suddenly gone. It’s a shocking turn of events, but it’s doubtful that the local lawmen will change their ways anytime soon.

No easy answers

“Memories of Murder” leaves us with a bag of complex questions. Are the Hwaseong lawmen’s unethical tactics and jaw-dropping violence an outgrowth of their frustration with a barely functional system? Undoubtedly, but their cruel methods can’t be blamed entirely on the authoritarian government running the country. Seo, who comes from the big city, is shocked at the sight of abuses that we can presume don’t go on in the Seoul police department.  

But even Seo, the most rational one of this ragtag crew, has his breaking point when faced with a plodding investigation going nowhere and a sly suspect who just might be the perpetrator. And if Seo can be tempted to cross ethical lines, perhaps we might, too.  

‘The Long Good Friday’: A Gangster Noir That Saw the Future

Bob Hoskins, Helen Mirren, "The Long Good Friday" (1980).

Mobster’s World

Blown to Bits

in an Easter

Wave of Terror


Contains spoilers

By Paul Parcellin

‘The Long Good Friday’ (1980)

As Good Friday approaches it’s fitting that we look at one of the slender number of crime films set on the holiest of Christian holy days. In filmdom, the connection between religious rites and acts of criminal savagery can be jarring (think of the baptism scene in “The Godfather”) and, by some viewers’ standards, just this side of blasphemous. But the marriage of the odious and the sacred often underlines the hypocrisy of those who tread on both sides of the fence.

In “The Long Good Friday,” which saw its U.S. debut 43 years ago this month, London crime kingpin Harold Shand (Bob Hoskins) faces a disastrous Easter weekend as he watches his criminal empire disintegrate. A stubby, barrel chested Tasmanian devil of a man, Harold is about to launch a multi-billion dollar redevelopment plan. The project is designed to revitalize London’s then desolate Docklands property and fill his pockets with more cash than an East End geezer such as he could dream of. 

The idea is to remake himself into a legitimate businessman, more of less, with the help of some startup cash from the New York Mafia, a detail that casts doubt on his grand plans.

It’s 1979 and the Docklands and its surrounding area is depressed after the shipping industry moved on to larger, more suitable ports. With astonishing accuracy “The Long Good Friday” foretells the city’s future after the conservative government redeveloped the property into a sterile haven for the upper classes, a real-life outcome that would line up well with Harold’s planned cash grab.

Harold makes his pitch,
the Tower Bridge looms behind him.

We meet Harold after he touches down in a Concorde, returning from a secret mission in the States. He wastes no time getting down to business, entertaining guests on a cruise aboard his yacht on the Thames. Among the invited are corrupt cops and city officials as well as New York gangster Charlie (Eddie Constantine). With the zest, if not the eloquence, of an evangelical preacher, Harold pitches his scheme to rebuild part of the city in time for the upcoming Olympics (a London setting for the Olympic Games is purely fictional in this time frame). His goal, he says, is to make England a dominant European country again. As he speaks, he’s framed by the Tower Bridge which looms behind him, but as the craft glides onward the bridge recedes into the background and Harold stands alone, proclaiming his grand ideas and giving the impression that perhaps he’s grown too big for his britches. 

Hoskins, as the blustery, violent and highly temperamental Harold, is the very embodiment of a gangland boss. But his inflated sense of self importance, his arrogance and overconfidence are among his greatest weaknesses and are instrumental in his ultimate downfall. He’s a character who can only be matched is sheer hutzpah by Edward G. Robinson’s Rico Bandello, another bullying fireplug who dominates the mob in “Little Caesar” (1931).

P.H. Moriarty, Helen Mirren, Bob Hoskins, Brian Hall

Keeping Harold anchored to terra firma is his girlfriend, Victoria (Helen Mirren), who, unlike Harold, the plain spoken ruffian, is educated and comes from a good middle class family. The role of Victoria was originally written as Harold’s bubble headed slice of arm candy, but Mirren fought with director John Mackenzie, insisting that the character take on a more consequential role in the story, and it’s a good thing that she did. Victoria is Harold’s guiding light, and later when she begins to lose her composure as Harold’s world crashes down around him, we know that things are bad. A side note: The world of mobsters is one that the actress knew first hand. In the scene aboard the yacht, some real gangsters were brought on as extras, and they were all familiar with Mirren’s uncle, who was himself a member of the London underworld. 

A bomb set off in a pub is meant for Harold.

Once Harold’s luck takes a turn for the worse, things come apart in rapid order. He hopes to dazzle the visiting money men, but inexplicably, bodies begin to drop and bombs detonate as he and Victoria try to make nice with the visiting Mafioso, hoping in vain that they won’t notice that something’s terribly wrong. But a bomb in the pub where he and the New York contingent plan to dine is proof positive that Harold’s plans are being swept away like beach stones in a tsunami. The bombings are a clue to who’s behind the mayhem — the story was pitched to producers as “terrorism meets gangsterism.” Incidentally, the pub that’s leveled in a bomb attack was merely a set, but must have been a convincing one because passersby popped in from time to time expecting to be served drinks.

Understandably, Harold’s at wit’s end and means to find out who’s liquidating his close associates and trying to wipe him off of the map. “I’ll have his carcass dripping blood by midnight,” he growls. 

An interrogation in the slaughterhouse.

In one of the film’s more visually arresting and grotesque scenes, he rounds up a band of his associates and dangles them upside down on hooks in an abattoir, hoping to scare the bejesus out of them and learn who’s betraying him (If these are his pals, we’d hate to see what he does with his enemies).

Conditions get worse still for one fellow who endures some stigmata body modifications on a warehouse floor, a scene reminiscent of a real-life incident perpetrated by notorious gangster twins Ronnie and Reggie Kray, who lorded over London’s underworld in the 1960s. The film’s replication of that occurrence is a fitting if shocking development in this Easter tale beset by paranoia and blood letting.

Harold is continually one step behind his mysterious tormentors, but finally learns that, after a series of fumbled actions and misunderstandings, the IRA has put him in its crosshairs. Blinded by his arrogance, he opts to take an ill-advised path to sew up his problems, a drastic move that demonstrates Harold’s delusional thinking.

Although the film was completed in 1980 it wasn’t released in the U.K. until the following year and didn’t premiere in the U.S. until 1982. Britain’s ITC Entertainment originally backed the production, but got cold feet after seeing the final cut. The film’s political undertones and graphic violence prompted the firm to refuse the film a theatrical release. But Handmade Films, the company founded by former Beatle George Harrison, acquired the rights and agreed to distribute it. The delays, however, only served to build the public’s anticipation of its release and helped secure the film’s cult status.

For those curious about the real-life Docklands development project, which became Canary Wharf, the film predicted with surprising accuracy the project which didn’t begin until after “The Long Good Friday” was filmed. Unfortunately for many, much of the housing lost to the developer’s wrecking ball was replaced with high end living quarters and commercial buildings. Opinions on the project’s success are mixed, with some lauding the rejuvenation of the downtrodden docks, and many feeling that the working class was steamrolled over in this bid to create valuable properties and big profits.

While many of the Docklands denizens’ lives were adversely affected over time by the project, Harold’s world falls apart before his eyes, and in a most dramatic manner. As the film ends, he’s trapped in his fancy automobile, framed this time not by the magnificent Tower Bridge, but by the vehicle’s windshield, and he’s behind it, under glass, as it were. There’s no wiggle room for him to get away. Victoria is spirited away in another car and Harold, alone and vulnerable, is in the hands of one of his tormentors (Pierce Brosnan, in his first film role). There’s little else for him to do but ponder his past and try to work out how he ended up at this juncture. He’s been roused from his reverie and his dream may one day be realized, but by someone other than himself. 

Why did Lee Marvin Give the Cops the Finger?

Lee Marvin, as Charlie Strom, a man in a quandary.

One of hitman Charlie Strom's victims didn't try to run and save his own life, and Charlie needs to get to the bottom of it

(Contains spoilers)

By Paul Parcellin

If you’ve seen “The Killers” (1964) starring Lee Marvin and Clu Gulager you might have an unsettling feeling about the film’s ending. I sure did. 

The 1964 movie has little in common with the Ernest Hemingway story upon which it’s based except for the title. Screenwriter Gene Coon insisted that the script should not quote any Hemingway dialog or include any scenes from the 1946 film adaptation starring Burt Lancaster. Director Don Siegel wholeheartedly agreed with Coon’s vision. He wanted to ignore the earlier screen adaptation and create a fresh, original take on the material. 

Also, Siegel had a bitter history with the earlier project. Producer Mark Hellinger asked him to direct the 1946 film, but studio boss Jack Warner forbid the rookie director from helming the project and veteran director Robert Siodmak was hired instead. 

Clu Gulager, as Strom’s fellow hitman, Lee.

Without question, the 1964 version is miles apart from the earlier flick. For starters, it’s in color, unlike Siodmak’s earlier black and white film. But mainly, Siegel’s film is told from one of the two hitmen’s point of view while the 1946 adaptation is seen through the eyes of an insurance investigator played by Edmund O’Brien.

Plus, Siegel’s film focuses on a question that gnaws at hitman Charlie Strom ( Marvin): Why didn’t the victim try to run and save his life? It’s an existential quandary that Strom carries with him and only bubbles up to the surface at the film’s end.

Strom is the consummate professional, in contrast with his less disciplined partner in crime, Lee (Gulager). Strom, the older of the two, maintains his focused demeanor and makes no mistakes until greed enters the picture and clouds his vision.

Angie Dickinson, as femme fatale Sheila Farr.

Surrounded by cops, Strom tries to escape, even though he’s trapped and certain to be captured. He ends up unarmed, so instead of blasting his way out he pulls his hand out of his pocket, aiming his fingers like a pistol and is immediately shot dead. It’s a brutally overpowering ending and it leaves us with another puzzle that flips his question about the victim of the hit, race car driver Johnny North (John Cassavetes):  Why does Strom not only allow but actually invite the police to shoot him?

In a short commentary included with the disc’s special features, critic Stuart M. Kaminsky says that the finger-gun move was a reflex action, but I beg to differ.

Strom is too cool a customer to make a fatal mistake like that. His final dramatic gesture is rooted in the riddle he needed to solve. He wonders why North didn’t try to avoid the angel of death when he and Lee shot him.

John Cassavetes, as race car driver Johnny North.

It’s rumored that North was in on a million dollar heist, and Strom decides to follow the money and perhaps get a piece of it. That sends him and Lee on a quest to find and question those closely associated with the victim. But underneath it all is that troubling question, and beyond the possibility of a big score, finding the answer to it is what most intrigues him.

After untangling North’s backstory, Strom finds the answer he’s looking for.

“The only man who’s not afraid to die is the one who’s dead already,” Strom tells femme fatale Sheila Farr (Angie Dickinson). “You killed him four years ago.” Not literally, of course, but her double dealing crushed him and set him up for murder. She and North planned to double-cross gang leader Jack Browning (Ronald Reagan) and make off with a cache of loot. It’s no wonder Browning hired Strom and Lee to kill North — or did he? Sheila might have had a hand in that.

Ronald Reagan, as gangster Jack Browning. 

As Strom begins to understand Johnny North’s predicament, his time on earth grows shorter. Why did the question get under Strom’s skin? Perhaps he saw something of himself in the victim. 

Strom is a dark, brooding, steely professional. He seems to have no family or friends, save from his fellow hitman. His professional function as a killer is his life and nothing else seems to exists for him. He’s as dead inside as the murdered race car driver and the money is all he cares about. But the nagging question about North’s death won’t let him go. 

Strom traces the money to Browning, and he plans to grab it from him, but it all goes wrong. He’s caught in a shootout at Browning’s residence and all of his avenues of escape are cut off. He’s wounded — earlier, Browning shot him and killed Lee — and tries to get away, but police surround him. His sudden, impulsive move with his hand pointed like a gun draws fire and Strom is taken down, still gripping the money. It could be a suicide by police, or simply an act of defiance. 

Like North, he accepts or maybe even welcomes his fate. Rather than put up his hands and go to prison he chooses to go out in a blaze of gunfire. What does it matter when you’re already dead?

Two Couples Who Murder: “Double Indemnity” Faces Off Against “Body Heat” — And It’s Not Even Close

Left, Kathleen Turner, William Hurt, "Body Heat" (1981).
Right, Barbara Stanwyck, Fred MacMurray, "Double Indemnity" (1944).

Warning: Contains Spoilers

By Paul Parcellin

After I moved to L.A. in 2008, I got together with a Meetup group that was going to see a screening of “Double Indemnity” (1944) at the ArcLight Theater in Hollywood. I was chomping at the bit in anticipation of watching one of my all-time favorite films with a group of cinema enthusiasts. I pictured us moving enmasse to the theater’s cafe after the screening and having a long discussion about the film, going over its finer points, savoring the subtlety of Billy Wilder’s direction, analyzing the screenplay co-written by Wilder and consummate grouch Raymond Chandler. Then there were the performances — Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck and Edward G. Robinson — how great was that cast?!

My fellow viewers were younger than me — let’s face it, almost everyone is these days — ranging from early 20s to around 30 or so. After the movie unreeled we drifted into the cafe. I was set for a stimulating, caffeine fueled conversation about classic film, old Hollywood and the like. But the banter took a dark turn. Not dark, as in noir-like shadows of venetian blinds on the wall. Dark as in, “Who the hell saw this coming?” The general reaction, saturated in Millenial social-media-ingrained ennui, was, “So, like, why is that supposed to be so great?” 

MacMurray as Walter Neff, spilling the details of his crimes.

The film’s opening scenes follow the mortally wounded insurance salesman Walter Neff (MacMurray), who makes his way to the office of his boss, claims adjustor Barton Keyes (Robinson) and records a voice memo on a Dictaphone machine in which he confesses to two murders, that of his paramour Phyllis Dietrichson (Stanwyck) and her husband (Tom Powers). It’s an emotional sequence that draws us into the story leading up to the confession, but the discussion went off the rails from the get-go. 

One young woman in the cinema group in her early 20s opined with incredulity, “Somebody shot him and he goes to make a recording? Nobody’s going to do that!”

Another noticed that MacMurray was wearing a wedding ring and the character he plays was unmarried. “Yeah, I noticed that, too!” another added. (MacMurray refused to remove the ring, and it was visible in that scene).

The conversation went on like that for a number of depressing minutes. I didn’t say a thing. Finally, someone noticed I was keeping it shut and asked me what I thought of the film, and I said I think it’s a masterpiece. That got their attention, but not in the way you’d hope. They looked at me with a mixture of pity, curiosity and annoyance, with annoyance being the dominant reaction. 

Explaining myself, I said that the film is witty, dramatic and character driven. It contains dialog that is the very definition of smart noir repartee. I called the script a marvel and, borrowing Barton Keyes’s description of the insurance scam Neff masterminds, noted that it “all fits together like a watch.”

Most of them paused for a nano-second to consider this, then silently dismissed my insightful, cleverly worded summary and began talking amongst themselves. 

A hellish red glow is the backdrop for Hurt and Turner in "Body Heat."

The 30ish guy hadn’t fully bailed on the discussion just yet, and he said he’d seen “Body Heat,” with William Hurt and Kathleen Turner and noticed the similarity between the two movies — “Body Heat” is based on “Double Indemnity.” 

In “Body Heat,” hack attorney Ned Racine (Hurt) kills Matty Walker’s (Turner) husband, Edmund (Richard Crenna), much like MacMurray in “Double Indemnity.” There’s a snag in both killers’ plans, however. In each movie an eyewitness is brought forward for questioning. Both Neff and Racine are present in the same room as their respective witnesses. 

For Neff, a man who saw him at the scene of the crime, and for Racine, a little girl who saw him in a passionate encounter with Matty. The tension has both perps on tinder hooks, but somehow they escape a close scrape with the law, temporarily, at least.

The 30ish guy in the cafe said that “Body Heat” did a better job of depicting that spine tingling encounter with justice, and the “Double Indemnity” version just wasn’t as good. 

Quelling my mounting apoplectic rage, I strongly disagreed, but it was pointless. He joined the discussion with the others about a current super hero film. Case closed.

I resisted the temptation to launch into a heated defense of “Double Indemnity,” realizing that I'd probably sound a lot like the old codger who shouts, “Hey you kids, get off my lawn!” But the encounter also made me think about those two movies.

I’d be the first to admit that Lawrence Kasdan’s “Body Heat” (1981) is a fine film. William Hurt, Kathleen Turner and Richard Crenna, as the unfortunate husband, all put in terrific performances. The script is a tightly modulated work of emotional tension and release, and the twist at the denouement sews up the loose ends ably. 

But better than “Double Indemnity”? I think not.

Ruth Snyder, Henry J. Gray, murderers who inspired James M. Cain's novella.

The film “Double Indemnity” is adapted from James M. Cain’s 1943 novella of the same title. The book is based on a real-life 1927 murder perpetrated by Ruth Snyder, a married woman from Queens, N.Y., and her lover, Henry Judd Gray. They conspired to kill her husband, Albert, and both went to the electric chair at Sing Sing Prison.

Wilder and Chandler crafted a script rich in detail with finely realized characters, including the murderous couple. 

Kasdan crafted the “Body Heat” screenplay, which is rich in twists and turns and includes an erotic encounter between Ned and Matty that could only be hinted at in “Double Indemnity.” But there are big differences between the two that in my not so humble opinion demonstrate why “Double Indemnity” is by far the superior film:

 D.I. — Phyllis and Walter meet by chance; she seems to begin plotting the murder only after their second meeting, when she asks Walter about accident insurance.

Matty has long-range plans in mind.

B.H. — Matty has been playing the long game. She steals and assumes her best friend’s identity, and begins searching for a sloppy, careless attorney with questionable morals. Ned’s name comes up, and she figures out a way to meet him that will seem like a randon encounter — quite a far fetched turn of the plot.

Phyllis and Walter’s meeting is more plausible than that of Matty and Ned. Plausibility is not necessarily the most critical element in a film, but chance and character are all important in "Double Indemnity.” In “Body Heat,” Matty merely fabricates the illusion of a chance encounter to attract Ned into her web of deceit and murder. 

Fate is the big kahuna of film noir, and “Double Indemnity” wins points for its adherence to this existential tenet.

D.I. — “Double Indemnity” has a far greater emotional range than does “Body Heat,” especially in a scene between Walter and Mr. Dietrichson’s daughter, Lola (Jean Heather), that takes place after the murder. Neff’s conscience — yes, we learn that he does actually have one — begins to get the better of him. This is an element that’s crucial to the film’s ending, by the way, but more about that later. 

Phyllis, savoring the moment as her husband is strangled.

Phyllis, however, may as well have Freon coursing through her veins. The depths of her sociopathic personality is beautifully revealed in the gruesome scene in which Neff strangles her husband while she sits inches away from him. The camera cuts away from the film’s most disturbing scene, which government censor would surely demand, to a closeup of Phyllis’s face. She’s not cringing, as any normal person would. Instead, she’s barely able to suppress a smile. 

Wilder’s brilliance shows through here. Rather than waste the cutaway shot, he uses it to give us more information. We see Phyllis’s insanely calm reaction to her husband’s horrible death, but Walter doesn’t see it — he’s busy attending to business. This is the first time in the film in which we have more information than does Neff. His ignorance of Phyllis’s true demeanor allows him to continue on with their plan without reflecting on her abnormal behavior. Later, in voiceover, he says he expected Phyllis might fall to pieces, but is relieved that she’s managed to keep her composure.

Neff and Phyllis, a chance encounter.

Getting back to the disappointing discussion at the ArcLight, I’d answer that young woman’s disbelief that the wounded Neff — Phyllis plugs him before he returns the favor — would take the time to leave a confessional recording, with a clear and simple explanation — the kind that never seems to occur to me in the heat of a discussion:

The reason why Neff returns to record a confession despite the fact that Phyllis popped a cap in his chest, is two-fold.

First, he needs to explain himself to his father confessor, Keyes, who’s about the only one in the film who genuinely cares about him.

Second, he needs to save Nino Zachetti’s (Byron Barr) life. Who is Nino Zachetti? He’s the abusive jerk who’s secretly dating Lola. Neff realizes that Zachetti is the perfect dupe to frame for both murders. Keyes believes Zachetti might be guilty of killing Mr. Dietrichson and that gives Neff the perfect opportunity to keep his trap shut and let Nino go to the chair. 

But he can’t. 

Lola (Jean Heather) makes an unwelcome office visit to Neff (MacMurray)
and his stoic facade begins to crack.

Unlike Phyllis, Neff has a conscience. He’s been fighting off feelings of guilt for killing Lola’s father ever since the day she came to see him in his office. Her appearance throws a monkey wrench into his plan to keep his head down and remain stolid. 

But Neff can’t bear to send Lola’s boyfriend to the chair after all of the pain he’s caused her by killing her father. Instead, he plans to tell the whole truth to Keyes by leaving him a voice recording he’ll hear the following day. By then, Neff plans to be a free man in Mexico. He can’t explain himself to the cops, for obvious reasons, but Keyes is the perfect recipient of the message. There’s as much apology as confession in Neff’s memo to Keyes. He’s finally contrite for his deceptions and horrible behavior. 

So, the reason why Neff drives like a madman to the office and pours his heart out into a Dictaphone machine is because he feels that he must. It’s the final decent act he can perform in his foolishly wasted life. His confession will prevent Zachetti, whom Neff passionately dislikes, from paying for a crime he didn’t commit. It’s a moral judgment that shows us that, in the end, Neff does have a suppressed sense of morality that finally comes to light. But it’s too late to save him from the debt he must pay for his evil deeds.

We don’t see anything close to Neff’s moral journey in “Body Heat,” which is a clever story with a clever ending. But where’s the emotional and moral conflict? Both Matty and Ned are cold and calculating, with no visible remorse. 

Christian Bale is the killer Yuppie in "American Psycho" (2000).

In a sense it’s the perfect adaptation for its time, the early 1980s, when materialism and consumerism were at full dudgeon. Matty and Ned are like remorseless Yuppies who kill, maybe with a greater affinity to murderous investment banker Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale) in “American Psycho” (2000) than to Walter Neff. 

“Body Heat” is still fun to watch now and then, but I don’t rewatch it like I do “Double Indemnity,” which I’ve seen innumerable times and will probably continue to do so. 

I wish I’d had all of this stuff in mind when I encountered the “Double Indemnity” doubters at the ArcLight. But if any of them are reading this — highly doubtful — I’ve laid out what I should have said. Not a quick answer, but better late than never. 

Fortunately, there’s always the option to rewatch “Double Indemnity” and give it another chance. I hope that they do.

 

Acting Through Clenched Teeth: Quirky Timothy Carey Performed in a Number of Noirs and Neo-Noirs … and Was Kicked Off Almost as Many as He Appeared In

Timothy Carey, “The Killing” (1956).

By Paul Parcellin

Timothy Carey was the kind of actor who refused to fade into the background — even as a movie extra. That cost him a job or two, including one of his earliest acting gigs, an occurrence that would prove all too typical in his professional life. He’d hitchhiked to the New Mexico location where Billy Wilder was shooting “Ace in the Hole” (1951) and managed to get hired as a background performer playing a construction worker trying to free a man trapped in a cave-in. To ensure that his face got into the frame, Carey stepped between the star, Kirk Douglas, and the camera a few too many times and the director issued him pay vouchers and sent him packing.

The experience did not damped his urge to crowd the spotlight. In addition to Wilder, Carey worked with a number of other high profile directors, including William Wellman, Elia Kazan, Stanley Kubrick, Francis Ford Coppola, Brian De Palma, Andre de Toth, and John Cassavetes. How often he made it to the final print is another matter. 

When he did appear on screen, at times he had the curious habit of keeping his teeth clenched when speaking — that’s how the shady characters he often played would talk, he reasoned.

Film critic Grover Lewis said of the actor’s portrayal of loathsome genre heavies, “You could look into his hooded, jittery eyes and sense real danger. Prankster or madman? Crusader or wise guy? The choice was hard to make … ‘  He added, “Carey’s strongest performances offer the kind of mixed signals associated not so much with art or craft as with pathology or the twisted mysteries of DNA.” 

Born March 11, 1929, in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, to a family of Italian and Irish descent, Carey made his way west as a young man to storm the gates of Hollywood. He eventually settled in the working class Los Angeles suburb of El Monte where he and his wife Doris raised six children: Romeo, Mario, Velencia, Silvana, Dagmar, and Germain. 

In 1951, Carey was a 22-year-old acting school graduate making his film debut playing a corpse in a Clark Gable western, but it was his brief, uncredited part as Chino's Boy #1, a member of Lee Marvin's motorcycle gang in “The Wild One” (1953) that began his run of unsavory onscreen characters. Going out on a limb as he usually did, he came up with the idea of squirting beer in Marlon Brando's face — Brando wasn’t wild about the idea.

He played Joe, the bordello bouncer who threatens James Dean in “East of Eden” (1955). Both roles were uncredited.

He was the go-to guy for a certain kind of Hollywood tough character, whether he was an abortionist in “Unwed Mother” (1958), a wino, in a silent walk-on in the Susan Hayward melodrama “I’ll Cry Tomorrow” (1955), a “hulking mental patient” in “Shock Treatment” (1951) or the pool shark South Dakota Slim in “Beach Blanket Bingo” (1965). As the heavy Lord High-and-Low, he menaced The Monkees in the Jack Nicholson-penned “Head” (1968) — Nicholson was one of his biggest fans. He acted in "One-Eyed Jacks" (1961) with Brando and in John Cassavetes's “Minnie and Moskowitz” (1971) and “The Killing of a Chinese Bookie" (1976). 

But it was the role of  Nikki Arcane, the sharpshooter who is recruited by a gang plotting to rob a racetrack in Kubrick’s “The Killing” (1956) that was among his more memorable and disturbing screen appearances. 

Timothy Carey, Ralph Meeker, Joe Turkel,
“Paths of Glory” (1957). 

The following year he portrayed French soldier Pvt. Maurice Ferol in Kubrick’s World War I drama “Paths of Glory” (1957). However, Carey’s outlandish behavior did not amuse his fellow thespians. During filming in Munich the film’s co-star, Adolphe Menjou, complained that Carey had disgraced the company with his behavior. 

“I had a toy monkey with me, and I was walking around with holes in my shoes,” said Carey. Producer James Harris said Carey embarrassed the crew, and that the Germans wanted to throw the whole company out of the country. The real reason for the uproar had little to do with the actor’s toy monkey or the holes in his shoes. The New York Times reported that Carey was found handcuffed and gagged on a desolate road outside Munich. Police said the actor had been picked up hitchhiking and was robbed by two English-speaking men. 

At a posthumous screening of Carey’s work, his son Romeo explained that his father staged the abduction because he was frustrated that Kirk Douglas and other cast members were getting all of the press interviews.

Timothy Carey, “The World's Greatest Sinner” (1962).

Equally outlandish was the film Carey wrote, directed, produced and starred in, “The World's Greatest Sinner” (1962), a 77-minute black-and-white feature that was filmed fitfully between 1958-’61 for a total cost of approximately $100,000 and was released in 1963. Carey plays Clarence Hilliard, an insurance salesman who quits his job, changes his name to God and starts his own political and religious movement, promising to turn everyone into millionaires, gods and super humans. Promotional material called it “The most condemned and praised American movie of its Time.” 

It wasn’t in theaters for long, but among the few people who saw it was Frank Zappa, who wrote the film’s score. He called it “the world’s worst film.” However, John Cassavetes held it in higher esteem, proclaiming that the film had the “emotional brilliance of Eisenstein.” Lacking a wide commercial release, “The World’s Greatest Sinner” achieved cult status as a midnight movie in Los Angeles in the 1960s.

It’s worth noting that the roles Carey turned down or self-sabotaged his way out of are as impressive as the ones he played.  He opted out of an offer to play Luca Brazzi in “The Godfather” (1972) and would have been cast in “The Godfather Part II” (1974) had it not been for a prank he played on the big shots. He smuggled a gun loaded with blanks, hidden in a box of cannolis, into a meeting at Paramount and proceeded to blast away at the mucky mucks. Producer Fred Roos was not amused and Carey was dropped from the production. “The Godfather” director Coppola also wanted him in “The Conversation” (1974) but contract haggling put the kibosh on that, as well. 

According to director Quentin Tarantino, Carey auditioned for the role of Joe Cabot in Tarantino's “Reservoir Dogs” (1992). Although he did not get the part, the screenplay is dedicated to him, among others.

In the twilight of his career, Carey saw fewer movie roles, appearing in a film every one or two years, the last one being “Echo Park” (1985).

He died of a stroke May 11, 1994 at the age of 65 in Los Angeles. His body is interred at Rose Hills Memorial Park in Whittier, Calif. 

Timothy Carey, Phyllis Kirk, “Crime Wave” (1953)

Here’s a sampling of Timothy Carey’s performances in films noir and neo-noirs:

Hired as a background actor for “Ace in the Hole” (1951), Carey plays a construction worker helping to free a man caught in a cave-in (uncredited and unconfirmed). He was fired for habitually stepping into Kirk Douglas’s shots.

Carey is uncredited in the role of Johnny Haslett, a psychotic drug addict who is on the run from the police in “Crime Wave” (1953). His performance is manic and unpredictable, displaying what might be the most strident example of scenery chewing ever committed to film.

In “Finger Man” (1955), Carey is cheap hood Lou Terpe, a suck-up to gangster Dutch Becker (Forrest Tucker). The sleazy Terpe disfigures prostitutes under Becker’s employ when they fail to toe the line. He’s dangerous and probably psychotic, which puts him in a league with many other characters the actor portrayed in noirs. 

As sharpshoot Nikki Arcane, Carey plays a significant supporting role in Stanley Kubrick’s “The Killing” (1956). Johnny Clay (Sterling Hayden) masterminds a plot to rob a racetrack as fans watch the ponies make their way around the oval. Arcane is recruited to fire one bullet that will throw the packed stadium into a panic. Carey has never been sleazier, particularly in his racist encounter with a parking lot attendant.


Gangsters meet greasers in “Rumble on the Docks” (1956), one of the few noirs with a rock ‘n’ roll interlude. Carey is Frank Mangus, a gangster’s flunky who helps him lean on a newspaper publisher who prints stories about the mob’s influence on the waterfront. Meanwhile, local teenaged hoods with D.A. haircuts rumble with rivals. Carey displays an exhaustive library of ticks and grimaces. Seated on a sofa he slouches, then throws a leg over a chair back  — he reaches deeply into his bag of hammy scene-stealing gimmicks.  

Carey is Carl Fowler, a violent thug with a grudge, in “Chain Of Evidence” (1957). He’s not above giving an unsuspecting man a savage beating. When questioned by the cops he’s a leather jacketed surly wise guy. A distraught woman whose boyfriend is missing is looking for answers. Fowler growls at her, “He ran out on you, baby.” But he knows different. It’s one of Carey’s more restrained performances.

In “Revolt In The Big House” (1958), Bugsy Kyle (Carey) is the grand poobah of the “big house” until stickup man Lou Gannon (Gene Evans) arrives. Together they work on a plot to bust out. Bugsy is the kind of guy who would stab you in the back — literally.

Jake Menner (Carey) is a mob guy who gets tangled up in Earl Macklin’s (Robert Duvall) plot to seek revenge for the killing of his brother, who made mistake of robbing a mob operation, in “The Outfit” (1973)

Flo (Carey) is one of the gangsters who leans heavily on Los Angles nightclub owner Cosmo Vittelli (Ben Gazzara). Cosmo has just paid off the mob loan he used to buy his club and now the gangsters want to take the joint away from him, in “The Killing of a Chinese Bookie” (1976). And with his 6 foot, 4 inch frame, Flo can be intimidating.

Ben Gazzara, Timothy Carey, Seymour Cassel,
“The Killing of a Chinese Bookie” (1976).

The Key to Marlowe’s Conundrum is In a Can of Cat Food

Elliot Gould, "The Long Goodbye" (1973)

One of my favorite neo-noirs is “The Long Goodbye” (1973), Robert Altman’s adaptation of the Raymond Chandler novel of the same title, published 20 years earlier. Altman’s most drastic alteration of Chandler’s opus is placing the story in the 1970s instead of eight years after the end of World War II, when the novel is set. In doing so the film puts Chandler’s hero, private detective Philip Marlowe (Elliot Gould), in a starkly different Los Angeles. 

Here, Marlowe, the slightly impoverished white knight with a touch of wry wit, doesn't quite fit in. He's an anachronism in a time when private detectives in skinny ties and black morticians' suits are about as unhip as you can get.

His neighbors at the High Tower apartment building in Hollywood Heights are a gaggle of young female hipsters who practice yoga topless on their balcony and run a candle shop on Sunset. The grocery clerk (Rodney Moss) at his local supermarket gets busted in a protest march against police brutality. Marlowe also encounters a shifty psychiatrist (Henry Gibson) running a clinic that’s a cult-like new age treatment center. Still, the intrepid shamus takes his unfamiliar surroundings in stride, shrugging it off with bemused nonchalance. “It’s OK with me,” he says.

The film’s opening sequence finds Marlowe awakening on his bed, fully dressed, as if he’s coming out of a 20-year trance. Unlike the Marlowe we’re more familiar with, this one owns a cat and the kitty is hungry. After a trip to the market in the wee hours he tries to palm off a Brand-X cat food to the discriminating el gato, even putting the stuff in an empty can of the kitty’s favorite brand. But, as any cat owner could predict, it’s no dice. The famished feline isn’t fooled and takes a hard pass.

All of this may seem beside the point of the story, but in a way it hints at what’s to come.

Marlowe on a cat food quest.

Marlowe gets pulled into a murder case involving his friend Terry Lennox (Jim Bouton) who is accused of killing his wife in a most brutal fashion. Marlowe doesn’t believe that Lennox is guilty and he sets out to prove his pal’s innocence. His investigation takes a long, winding path. Along the way he’s hired by a Malibu socialite (Nina van Pallandt) to find and retrieve her alcoholic husband (Sterling Hayden) who’s gone missing, a matter that seems unrelated to Terry Lennox’s woes. But as is often the case in Chandler stories, we learn that the two are directly connected. 

That’s where the can of cat food comes in.

It's a signal that we’re going to see a much greater subterfuge unfold before the ending credits roll. 

Granted, it’s a bit of a trek before we discover who’s pulling the wool over whose eyes. That’s because none of Marlowe’s initial suspicions hit the mark. In fact, the freelance shamus is a few steps behind the LAPD in its investigation. But that’s OK, because part of the reason we like Marlowe is that he’s not the Superman of detectives and his fallibilities make him relatable. He’s driven by a sense of right and wrong and is doggedly determined to seek justice for all who deserve it. It’s those qualities that drive him to stick to a case even after the LAPD give up on it. 

Once Marlowe figures out the final piece of the puzzle his response is shocking. More than a few Chandler fans cried foul. Let’s just say that this Marlowe proves himself to be considerably changed from the one we may be more familiar with. He’s living in a different era and like the world around him, Marlowe has adapted.

But getting back to the cat food matter, Altman said that the sequence points out that “you can’t fool a cat.” Maybe so, but there’s more to it than that. Maybe you can’t con a kitty into eating Brand-X, but you can fool an audience, and that’s the point of it. “The Long Goodbye” does what any great mystery ought to do — misdirect us until its final, rather brutal and controversial reveal. We may know that we’re in for a big finish, but we never want to see it coming.

When Tinsel Town Turns the Camera on Itself

Rod Steiger, 'The Big Knife' (1955).

Face it, scandals make good news copy and the Los Angeles entertainment industry produces a bumper crop of the stuff that keeps gossip writers in business. 

From Rosco “Fatty” Arbuckle to Harvey Weinstein the press has never been at a loss for words when it comes to movie industry playboys who can’t control their libidos. An occasional murder, drug overdose or sexual assault crops up now and then and the public can’t get enough of the lurid details.

The gossip that follows a large public display of dirty laundry is especially enticing because it puts the Hollywood elite in a harsh spotlight that’s different from the radiant glow of positive press-agent-generated fluff that we normally see.

 With Damien Chazelle’s marathon tribute to decadent early Hollywood, “Babylon,” fresh in our collective memories, it’s a good time to consider some of the movies that Hollywood has made about itself over the years. Some of the best are noirs, or noir influenced, that examine the decadence and depravity of the movie making capital of the world.

‘Sunset Blvd.’ (1950)

William Holden

Films noir that savage the entertainment industry got their start with the granddaddy of Hollywood takedowns, “Sunset Blvd.” Young screenwriter Joe Gillis (William Holden) has hit a career dead end and is about to leave Los Angeles. Broke and unemployed, he meets delusional former silent movie star Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) who is self-exiled in her dilapidated mansion and is girding herself for a showbusiness comeback — although the industry wants nothing to do with her. 

“Sunset Blvd.” is a darkly comedic parable of youth obsessed Hollywood, whose older guard preys upon the vitality of the young fresh faces that migrate there with high hopes and naïve understanding of the parasitic society they’ve entered. Norma is a washed-up former star who cannot cope with no longer being the ingénue. She’s hit the half-century mark and there’s no one less wanted than an aging woman in Hollywood.

She latches onto Gillis and puts him to work rewriting a putrid script she scratched out on what we may darkly imagine is parchment made from human tissue. She expects this extravaganza, a retelling of the story of Salome, will be the vehicle for her big-screen comeback. Gillis plays along because he’s at the end of his rope financially and believes he’ll pocket some sorely needed cash. 

But Norma is too sharp for the rookie scribbler. When it finally dawns on him that he has become a fellow inmate in her Gothic nightmare of a home along with her dedicated man servant, Max Von Mayerling (Erich von Stroheim), it’s too late to wriggle free. By the time he gets around to making a run for it, Gillis completes his journey through the depths of Hollywood depravity with an unscheduled dip in Norma’s pool and a couple of slugs of lead in his back. 

‘In a Lonely Place’ (1950) 

Humphrey Bogart

Dixon Steel (Humphrey Bogart) is a former A-list screenwriter whose career tanked. His last hit was before the war. He’s an alcoholic with a hot temper that occasionally flares up into violence. His inner rage, perhaps the result of war related post traumatic stress syndrome, causes him pick fights with the mean-spirited jokers he encounters. 

He gets into a barroom punch-out with a lout who degrades an old, washed up actor who lives from one drink to the next. Turns out the lout is the son of a studio chief, but Steele is far beyond worrying about how the brawl might hurt his career.

Based on the Dorothy B. Hughes novel of the same title, “In a Lonely Place” is a study of Dixon Steele’s insecurities and tendency toward self-sabotage. It’s also an indictment against toxic environments present in the Hollywood studio system. His handlers tolerate Steele’s artistic temperament, all right, and they’d probably be perfectly willing to look the other way and cover up any transgressions. When one of their own uses his star power to take advantage of a woman it’s just business as usual. 

When he brings Mildred Atkinson (Martha Stewart), a naïve coat check girl, to his apartment it’s clear that he’s no predator. She’s going to tell him the plot of a novel he’s supposed to have read so that he can decide whether or not he wants to adapt it to the screen. He changes into a robe to get comfortable, which startles Mildred at first until she realizes that he doesn’t have any hanky-panky in mind. She tells him about the book. But as she describes the plot he realizes that the novel is trash and sends her home in a taxi. 

But after Mildred is discovered strangled and left by the roadside Steele’s world begins to come apart. A few friends have a nagging suspicion that he may have done something terrible. His agent, Mel Lippman (Art Smith), is set with an escape plan to Mexico. We can only wonder how many times he’s helped other clients avoid the consequence for their bad behavior.  

When Steele is identified as a person of interest in the murder investigation we see the paranoid delusions that begin to cloud his brain. There’s no telling what’s liable to send him into a rage and as suspicion begins to coalesce around him his erratic behavior increases. His friends wonder whether or not he killed the young girl, and so do we. 

‘The Big Knife’ (1955)

Ida Lupino, Jack Palance

Charlie Castle (Jack Palance) is a movie star under contract with a major studio and he wishes he wasn’t. He lives in big house and has all of the comforts that a load of cash and celebrity can provide. But the film industry is ruining his life. He’s alienated from his estranged wife, Marion (Ida Lupino), who can’t stand being married to a drunken womanizer who has compromised his ideals. 

Charlie would like to quit the business but the snag is that his melodramatic boss, studio head Stanley Hoff (Rod Steiger), won’t let him off the hook. Charlie’s contract is about to expire and Hoff is determined to make him sign another. 

One of main attractions of “The Big Knife” is the three-ring circus Charlie’s living room becomes when all of the hangers on converge like sharks around a drowning man. Hoff, the lead shark, has a conniption when the Charlie balks at signing a new contract. Steiger’s performance as Hoff is, shall we say, over the top, even for an actor known for occasionally chewing the scenery like a chainsaw. 

“The Big Knife” is the story of a corrupted actor who has sold out to the Hollywood machine, gets caught in its gears and is about to be torn asunder. He’s sacrificed his artistic integrity for the monied life of a film star but it’s an empty existence that’s brought him little happiness. But why does Hoff have so much power over the actor? A dark secret lurks in Charlie’s past and because of it he’s doomed to walk the Hollywood treadmill for eternity. 

In movieland, depravity is contagious, and even a naïve palooka like Charlie can’t help but be drawn into it. It’s easy to become corrupted when everyone around you is ethically bankrupt and willing to cover up your embarrassing and felonious transgressions when you land in hot water. And Charlie is in it up to his neck.

‘Barton Fink’ (1991)

John Turturro 

A noir-tinged comedy set in the 1940s, “Barton Fink” tells the story of the titular character, played exquisitely by John Turturro, an up-and-coming playwright with a politically progressive bent — a thinly veiled stand-in for Clifford Odets. 

His socially aware dramas are taking the New York theater world by a storm. But Fink, irritated by the nitwits and hangers on who plague his existence, has high ideals and an even higher opinion of his own artistic merits. Lured to the West Coast by the promise of piles of cash, he has to twist himself into knots justifying his transition from the stages of Broadway to the backlot of Capitol Pictures, his new employer. 

But move there he does, and from his first day in Los Angeles Fink finds himself in a Kafkaesque nightmare. His hotel is extra creepy, the studio boss Jack Lipnick (Michael Lerner) kills him with spooky kindness, assuring him that the writer is king at Capitol Pictures — a deceptive reading of the facts, if there ever was one. 

His next-door neighbor at the dilapidated Hotel Earle, insurance salesman Charlie Meadows (John Goodman), is a too friendly, in-your-face bumpkin with some peculiar habits. Fink meets one of his idols, author W. P. Mayhew (John Mahoney), a thinly disguised William Faulkner, who, like Fink, has been lured to the shores of “the Great Salt Lake” by the promise of riches.

The darkly humorous conceit that runs throughout “Barton Fink” is that Hollywood is hell. Fink failed to read the sign posted at the gates of the city: “All Hope Abandon, Ye Who Enter Here.” It’s a warning that fools ignore, because, after all, they know better.

‘Hollywood Story’ (1951)

Richard Conte

If “Hollywood Story” has a familiar feel, that’s because it’s is based on the real-life murder of film director William Desmond Taylor (1872–1922), a crime that remains unsolved. 

In this fictionalized account of the Taylor case, New York theatrical director Larry O'Brien (Richard Conte) comes to Hollywood to direct his first picture with longtime pal Sam Collyer (Fred Clark). 

O’Brien’s agent, Mitch Davis (Jim Backus), persuades him to direct a film at a disused movie lot that thrived during the silent film era. The director becomes obsessed with a murder of a silent era director, Franklin Ferrera, that happened on the same movie lot more than 20 years before. 

It’s not of the same caliber as the above-mentioned films, but “Hollywood Story” needs to be added to the list when discussing noir’s cold, hard look at the entertainment industry. Perhaps most significantly, it was directed by B-movie maven William Castle, who produced many thrillers on the cheap and promoted them with gimmicks. 

For his film “Macabre” (1958), he came up with the idea to give every customer a certificate for a $1,000 life insurance policy from Lloyd's of London in case they should die of fright during the film. He stationed nurses in the lobbies with hearses parked outside the theaters.

It may not have been promoted with flashy attention-getting hokum, but “Hollywood Story” is, like other Castle films, a bare-bones production, ginned up with cameos by a number of silent film era actors and a few location shots. He knew how to stretch a production budget dollar. 

After O’Brien decides to do a film about the murder he meets resistance from his producing partner, his agent and the deceased director’s heirs who would rather let the matter rest. But then someone fires a bullet at O’Brien, warning him to drop the film. Of course, he doesn’t, and we’re left guessing the killer’s identity until the conclusion.

A forced happy ending tacked onto “Hollywood Story” no doubt calmed the nerves of studio execs and investors who feared a dark wrap-up would result in thin box office returns. Those concerns were probably unnecessary. Few things are more appealing to B-movie audiences than the sight of a Hollywood meltdown, preferably with a hack screenwriter floating face down in the pool.