cigarjoe

Cool I guess I'll see if it's a better print than what I have on the DVD

I forgot how good a remake the 1981 version is. It's closer in tone to Visconti's Ossessione than the 1946 Garfield - Turner version. It's also devoid of the Hayes Code constrictions and hit you over the head moralizing. It's a great recreation of the mid thirties and a bit more believable a production in that Joe Colicos is a better Nick Papadakis, and Jessica Lange sizzles as Cora. Jack Nicholson is equal to John Garfield, its a wash there, the only two characters that don't equal or surpass those of the 46 version are Angelica Huston, as Madge (Audrey Totter was great and more effective in a much shorter sequence) and Hume Cronyn was slimier than Michael Lerner as the lawyer. The backstory of Papadakis is more filled in with his Greek heritage, the outdoor locations detailing the various surrounding accouterments of a typical gas station/beanery are more defined, and the interior sets are believable. Gone are the white turban, halter, and shorts of Turner, 81's Cora is less obvious and more down to earth. It's a very enjoyable remake, if you trim out the Angelica Huston's lion tamer excess it would be a 10/10 as is 9/10

Great film, great sad ending with Wesley Park's (Juano Hernández) son Joseph Park (Juan Hernández) standing on the dock waiting for his father who's never coming back.

Not when it included Ossessione

I like all three versions of The Postman Always Rings Twice, that I've seen. Clara Calamai, though is a bit more sexier than Turner or Lange.

Miracle On 34th Street. on Sundance, the colorized version it actually didn't look too bad, they did a good job.

Yea 125th St. What's gone besides the building mentioned is that overhead track signal, a lot of the viaduct was rebuilt and that signal was replaced with more modern stand alone versions.

It's actually still there, it's the Park Avenue viaduct for the Old NY Central RR, now Metro North. It's also seen at street level in The Pawnbroker and as the stone tunnel Tommy runs through in The Window.

Reality (2012) Neapolitan fishmonger gets obsessed about a Big Brother type of TV show.7/10

Brutti, sporchi e cattivi (Ugly, Dirty and Bad) (1976) Director, Ettore Scola, shanty town shenanigans in Via Domizia Lucilla, Rome, Lazio, Italy, 6/10

The Dirty Dozen (1967) about a 7/10, never did figure out how Clint Walker's character died, a screw up in the film.

Odds Against Tomorrow (1959) New York Tail Fin Noir This is one of the great New York Film Noir. This film was directed by Robert Wise director of Born to Kill (1947), The Set-Up (1949), The House on Telegraph Hill (1951), Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956), I Want to Live! (1958), it was based on a novel by William P. McGivern, and the screenplay was by Abraham Polonsky. As one of Hollywood's writers blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Polonsky had to use a front, John O. Killens, a black novelist and friend of Belafonte's, also credited is writer Nelson Gidding. The excellent crisp stylistically noir cinematography (some of it infrared) of New York City and Upstate New York, filled with beautiful monochrome compositions was by Joseph C. Brun (Walk East on Beacon! 1952), Girl of the Night (1960), Who Killed Teddy Bear (1965)) and the jazzy Music was by John Lewis and the Modern Jazz Quartet. This film was one of the first productions from Harry Belafonte's own company, HarBel Productions. The film stars four Classic Noir Vets with a total of twenty six Film Noir between them. Robert Ryan, who specialized in crazed, on the verge of out of control nut jobs. Shelley Winters, the eternal **** in her own mind, who in later years, never seemed to realize she was way past her use by date. Everybody's grandpa Ed Begley. And Gloria Grahame, whose real life bizarre sexual peccadillos rivaled that of even the kinkyest Film Noir. In addition to the above, and also with an excellent performance in his film noir debut is the "King Of Calypso" Harry Belafonte. 10/10 Full review with some screencaps here in Film Noir/Gangster.

Odds Against Tomorrow (1959) New York Tail Fin Noir This is one of the great usually New York Film Noir. I have a special affinity for this film, which I'll explain later. It's also one of the films cited in most Aficio-noirdo's lists as one of the last of the Classic Noirs, the other being Orson Welles' Touch of Evil (1958). This film was directed by Robert Wise director of Born to Kill (1947), The Set-Up (1949), The House on Telegraph Hill (1951), Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956), I Want to Live! (1958), it was based on a novel by William P. McGivern, and the screenplay was by Abraham Polonsky. As one of Hollywood's writers blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Polonsky had to use a front, John O. Killens, a black novelist and friend of Belafonte's, also credited is writer Nelson Gidding. The excellent crisp stylistically noir cinematography (some of it infrared) of New York City and Upstate New York, filled with beautiful monochrome compositions was by Joseph C. Brun (Walk East on Beacon! 1952), Girl of the Night (1960), Who Killed Teddy Bear (1965)) and the jazzy Music was by John Lewis and the Modern Jazz Quartet. This film was one of the first productions from Harry Belafonte's own company, HarBel Productions. The film stars four Classic Noir Vets with a total of twenty six Film Noir between them. Robert Ryan, who specialized in crazed, on the verge of out of control nut jobs. Shelley Winters, the eternal **** in her own mind, who in later years, never seemed to realize she was way past her use by date. Everybody's grandpa Ed Begley. And Gloria Grahame, whose real life bizarre sexual peccadillos rivaled that of even the kinkyest Film Noir. In addition to the above, and also with an excellent performance in his film noir debut is the "King Of Calypso" Harry Belafonte. Harry's is a very moving performance of basically a marginally good guy, Johnny Ingram, who has taken every wrong direction through the back alleys of life. Johnny Ingram (Belafonte) He's a cool cat, a musician, plays a bluesy vibraphone in a smoky Harlem night club. A snappy dresser who tools around the upper West Side in a white 1957 Austin-Healey 100/6 runabout. He's a gamblin man. The odds have been against him. He tapped out long ago. A losing streak has him paying the vig on $7,000 to a mobbed up character named Bacco (Will Kuluva). Because of this he's an estranged husband whose wife (Kim Hamilton) threw him out long ago. Johnny is a walking contradiction, he has a girlfriend, but he's also a dedicated father who still loves his daughter, regularly taking her on outings to Central Park, the Wollman Skating rink, and the zoo. Dave Burke (Ed Begley) Ed Begley is Dave Burke, a disgraced NYPD cop. He refused to testify to state investigators and did a year for contempt. He lives alone with his dog in a West Side Drive residence hotel. He's on a downhill slide and wants a bigger piece of the pie before he kicks off. Burke has a plan that he cooked up while on a hunting trip about a hundred miles up the Hudson in Melton, NY. He noticed, while staying in a rented apartment above Kresge's 5 and 10 at the corner of 6th & Warren, that the bank across the street, has a carton of coffee and sandwiches from the Eagle Luncheonette delivered to a small back door, like clockwork every Thursday night at five after 6 PM. The man who does the delivery is a partially blind black man who wears sunglasses. Most of the factories around town pay on Fridays and the bank is is loaded with close to $200,000 in untraceable cash for payroll and deposit money from the stores. A half dozen clerks, a manager with a bad heart and a guard with glasses who's about to retire, stick around to straighten up the books. Most of the rest of the town is home eating supper. He figures you could take it with a water pistol. When the bank guard opens the door, a chain prevents the door from opening all the way and the box containing the coffee and sandwiches is slipped through the opening. Dave knows they can rush the bank then and force the guard to open the door at gunpoint. Earl (Robert Ryan) Dave needs a gunman, and a black man to carry out his bank heist. For the hooligan he recruits Earl Slater (Robert Ryan). Earl is an Oakie, excon, racist bigot, Southern hick. A hard boiled **** of a loser who lives off his girlfriend Lorry (Shelley Winters). For the black man Dave thinks of Johnny. When Earl finds out that he must work with a black man he refuses the job. But after Earl and Lorry have a fight about money, and Earl gets a proposition from his upstairs neighbor Helen (Gloria Grahame), he decides to go along. Earl Slater: There's only one thing wrong with it. Dave Burke: What? Earl Slater: You didn't say nothin about the third man being a ****! Dave Burke: Don't beat out that Civil War jazz here, Slater! We're all in this together, each man equal. And we're taking care of each other. It's one big play, our one and only chance to grab stakes forever. And I don't want to hear what your grandpappy thought on the old farm down in Oklahoma! You got it? Earl Slater: Well I'm with you, Dave. Like you said, it's just one role of the dice, doesn't matter what color they are. So's they come up seven. For their parts in the job Dave is offering them both $50,000. Johnny doesn't want the job at first but serious threats against his family from Bacco and his three dollar bill-ish muscle Coco (Richard Bright) convinces Johnny to go along. Bacco: I'll kill you and everything you own! When Johnny hears the details of the plan, he comes up with the brilliant idea that if he shows up with a slightly larger box of coffee and sandwiches the guard is gonna have to undo the chain to open the door wider, making getting in the bank even easier. They set things up. Dave buys a beater a1951 Chevrolet Styleline De Luxe and installs a souped up engine. They head up to Melton on Thursday, Dave and Earl in the car and Johnny on the bus. Dave and Earl are dressed like hunters, Earl drops Dave off along a road and they spend the day walking the fields with shotguns bird hunting around Melton. Johnny hangs out in town waiting for 6:00PM. At about two hours before six, they all rendezvous down along the crumbling industrial Hudson River waterfront. There, racial tensions between Johnny and Earl flair up again and Dave has to smooth things out. Right before 6:00PM Johnny puts on an apron, a white counterman hat, and sunglasses. He grabs up the fake food order. He's also supposed to get the car keys from Earl but Earl, wanting to be in control, refuses to hand them over. To prevent a fight Dave grabs the keys. Then Dave heads into position outside the cafe, his job is to deliberately walk into the real counterman and knock the box order for the bank out of his hands. Johnny replaces him. The plan goes well, they get into the bank and they stuff the cash into the game bag built into Dave's hunting vest. Dave is spotted, by pure freakish dumb chance, when he leaves the side door of the bank. A cop paying attention see's Dave coming out the door as he was just passing by. The suspicious cop tells him to halt. It all goes Noirsville when Earl starts blasting away from inside the doorway at the cop. The cop returns fire and Dave with the getaway car keys gets shot and is bleeding out on the sidewalk. Noirsville This shot above is a real hoot, here it is 1958, High Bridge on the Major Deegan along the Harlem River and there is a frickin' traffic jam in the same place it's always been at the exit for the George Washington Bridge, you'd think in 60 years they'd fix it. Gloria Grahame The film is cooly knit, with a tight dramatic buildup that is masterfully directed by Robert Wise. The use of the real New York City and the town and environs about Hudson, NY, give the film gravitas and an aura of realism. There are also small vignettes that enforce both the racial biases and Earl's hair trigger temper. A sequence in Dave's apartment building with a black elevator operator whose cordial attempts at civility with Earl result in stone cold silence. Followed by a similar situation with Johnny going up in the same elevator, where the repartee is warm, almost folksy. There is a sequence where Johnny berates his ex wife for hosting a parent-teacher association meeting in her apartment, showing a bit of his own bias against white folk. Another vignette emphasizes Earl's instability. He's in a neighborhood bar knocking back a few, a soldier (Wayne Rogers) on leave is demonstrating some combat moves to a couple of chicks and guys. When the soldier and one of the guys accidentally bump into Earl, it sets him off. He challenges the soldier, and things escalate into violence. Black actor Sidney Poitier's break through roles in the 50s, along with this Harry Belafonte performance as one of three equal rogues, in this particular film was one of the pivotal ones in the way black Americans were depicted in films, reflecting the early trending inevitability of the looming Civil Rights Movement. Ryan nails unhinged wacko, Begley convinces as the slightly befuddled over confidant mastermind. Winters is motherly almost babying Earl along, and Grahame is interesting as a slightly off, neglected, housewife, smouldering with an unfulfilled kitchen sink sexuality who is overly attracted to bad boy Earl. The special affinity I have for Odds Against Tomorrow came after I moved from Montana to upstate New York. I discovered the old riverfront town of Hudson, N.Y., while fly-fishing for striped bass on their annual spring spawning run. Targeting stripers is a nighttime endeavor, and nearby Hudson in the early hours of a foggy morning is the epitome of Noirsville. Hudson had an infamous past. Hudson was a red light city, a wide open town of ill repute, the "Sin Capital of the East." At the height of its bawdiness, in the 1920's and 1930's, Diamond Street was the "main street" of prostitution. It could boast of 15 brothels, and the city in toto of no less than 50 bars. Prostitute totals have been estimated at between 50 to 75, working the establishments. The rates back in 1939 was $2 for a Straight Party, $2 for a ****, $2.50 for a Swallow, $3 for a Half & Half, $3.50 for a Trip Around The World, kinky or unusual stuff was priced on request. All night stays for $15, and the whole house for $300. Things were getting so notorious that the town changed the name of the street from Diamond to Columbia to ward off gawkers. In 1949 a Diamond/Columbia Street Madam made between $20-30,000 a year a Hudson cop made $2,000. You could see where the power was. The end came when Senator Estes Kefauver in Washington, began ratcheting up The Big Heat on organized crime and vice. New York's Governor Dewey in Albany, trying to head off what could be a big embarrassing political scandal, targeted Diamond/Columbia Street for a big showcase raid on June 23, 1950. They shut it all down. Read more about Hudson, NY here, and there is also an excellent book Diamond Street, Hudson, N.Y. by Bruce Edward Hall. Eight and a half years later Robert Wise filmed Odds Against Tomorrow in Hudson. Hudson filled in for the town of Melton, and incredibly quite a few of the films locations haven't changed at all in the almost 60 years since 1959. I'll redo in a new piece an old then and now post that got destroyed in the recent Photobucket image extortion racket. Today with a lot of the old factories gone Hudson has revived itself as a collectables mecca, with quite a few of the storefronts on Warren Street now housing various types of antique stores, and trendy restaurants. Screencaps are from the MGM DVD. 10/10 Full review with more screencaps here: Noirsville

High and Dry (1954) Ealing comedy with Paul Douglas, entertaining. 7/10.

High and Dry (1954) Ealing comedy with Paul Douglas, entertaining. 7/10.

High and Dry (1954) Ealing comedy with Paul Douglas, entertaining. 7/10.

Here are some Film Noir and Neo Noir with Ecdysiasts: The Armored Car Robbery, The Big Combo, The Glass Wall, Beyond a Reasonable Doubt, The Third Man, already mentioned Screaming Mimi and Crimson Kimono, Touch Of Evil, The Savage Eye, Two Men In Manhattan, All Fall Down, Satan in High Heels, Shock Corridor, Angel's Flight, Flesh and Lace, Tell Me in the Sunlight, Marlowe, Lenny, Hickey & Boggs, The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, To Live and Die in L.A., The Kill-Off, The Hot Spot, A Rage In Harlem, Sin City, Cidade Baixa (Lower City), Sin City: A Dame To Kill For, and Too Late.

Devil With A Blue Dress (1994) Soul Noir in the City Of Angels Walter Mosley has written fourteen Ezekiel (Easy) Rawlins mysteries to date. I've read about ten of them. Easy Rawlins was contemporary with Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe, and Ross MacDonald's Lew Archer, and Devil With A Blue Dress was Mosley's first novel in the series, and believe it or not, one of the ones I haven't gotten to yet. I suppose it was seeing this film fifteen or so years ago that got me reading the rest of series and I just never got around to picking up number one. It's a crying shame that director and screenwriter, Carl Franklin and star Denzel Washington didn't team up for more of the Easy Rawlins novels, they are quite good, and also quite unique in that Easy ages through time and local historical events as the series progresses, so it's not as if it's too late for another one. White Butterfly from 1992 was a particularly good standout. The excellent cinematography was by Tak Fujimoto (The Silence of the Lambs (1991)), the music was by Elmer Bernstein, with a soundtrack with a lot of soul, that includes performances by T-Bone Walker, Jimmy Witherspoon, Duke Ellington, Roy Milton, Brian O'Neal, Pee Wee Crayton, Joan Shaw, Lucienne Boyer, Bull Moose Jackson, Kay Kyser, Thelonious Monk, Amos Milburn, James Cleveland & The Angelic Choir, Memphis Slim and Night Train International. Enjoy the film, it can take it's place along with Chinatown, Farewell My Lovely, Hammett, Union City, Angel Heart, A Rage In Harlem, The Public Eye, Mulholland Falls, L.A. Confidential, This World, Then The Fireworks, The Man Who Wasn’t There, The Black Dahlia, Honeydripper, and The Killer Inside Me. Screencaps are from the TriStar DVD 9/10. Full review with screencaps here in Film Noir/Gangster and also in Noirsville

Devil With A Blue Dress (1994) Soul Noir in the City Of Angels Walter Mosley has written fourteen Ezekiel (Easy) Rawlins mysteries to date. I've read about ten of them. Easy Rawlins was contemporary with Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe, and Ross MacDonald's Lew Archer, and Devil With A Blue Dress was Mosley's first novel in the series, and believe it or not, one of the ones I haven't gotten to yet. I suppose it was seeing this film fifteen or so years ago that got me reading the rest of series and I just never got around to picking up number one. It's a crying shame that director and screenwriter, Carl Franklin and star Denzel Washington didn't team up for more of the Easy Rawlins novels, they are quite good, and also quite unique in that Easy ages through time and local historical events as the series progresses, so it's not as if it's too late for another one. White Butterfly from 1992 was a particularly good standout. The excellent cinematography was by Tak Fujimoto (The Silence of the Lambs (1991)), the music was by Elmer Bernstein, with a soundtrack with a lot of soul, that includes performances by T-Bone Walker, Jimmy Witherspoon, Duke Ellington, Roy Milton, Brian O'Neal, Pee Wee Crayton, Joan Shaw, Lucienne Boyer, Bull Moose Jackson, Kay Kyser, Thelonious Monk, Amos Milburn, James Cleveland & The Angelic Choir, Memphis Slim and Night Train International. The film starts with a nice opening credit sequence tracking over artist Archibald John Motley Jr's, "Bronzeville at Night" (1949). 1948 Los Angeles. Wartime aircraft production boom is rapidly ramping down. Easy Rawlins (Washington), originally a Texas native who moved to L.A. for work, is let go by Champion Aircraft. Out of a job with house payments to make, he's scoping out the want ads in Joppy's Bar, a second story booze joint that overlooks South Central Avenue. Easy Rawlins (Washington) While so engaged, a sketchy white acquaintance of Joppy's, Dewitt Albright (Tom Sizemore), makes an appearance. After jawing with Dewitt, Joppy calls Easy over. Dewitt is offering a bill for Easy to find a white girl who goes by the name of Daphne Monet (Jennifer Beals). This Daphne Monet is the fiancee of Todd Carter (Terry Kinney), the sicon of a wealthy L.A. family. He was the frontrunner in the upcoming mayoral race before dropping out. Albright, tells Easy that Carter dropped out because he was concerned about Daphne's whereabouts. She's been known to frequent the West Coast Jazz and Blues clubs of South Central's Little Harlem. It would be much easier for Easy to slip in and out of them than for than a jive **** **** like Dewey. It's "easy" money, and Rawlins jumps at the offer. Though they are not actually named places like the historical Down Beat Club, The Lincoln Theater, The Dunbar Hotel with it's Turban Room piano bar, The Club Alabam, and The Last Word are obviously alluded to in the film. So Easy, lookin' fly, heads out into the South Central hood nightlife. With a bunch of dead presidents in his pockets, Easy's out to see what's crackin' and if he finds a good time while looking for Daphne it's all gravy. At one spot Easy meets with some Texas homeys, Odell (Albert Hall), Dupree (Jernard Burks), and girlfriend Coretta (Lisa Nicole Carson). During the course of the evening Easy finds out that Coretta is Daphne's gal pal. But Coretta ain't tellin' nothin' for free. Coretta (Lisa Nicole Carson) Easy has to cut the rug with her. Cart her drunken boyfriend Dupree home to her crib. With ol' Dupree sawin' logs in the bedroom, where they dumped him, Coretta is gettin' Easy all hot and bothered on the couch. She's pumping him for the skinny as much as he's pumping her. She makes Easy play hide sausage with her "hittin' her hot spot" all night long before she gives him an address for Daphne. It's the address of a South Central gangster named Frank Green, and it's first light before he can dip. So Easy calls Albright telling him he's got info. Albright sets up a meeting at the Malibu Fishing Pier, where Easy gives him the address. When Easy gets back to his house he is arrested by two LAPD **** and hauled downtown. He finds out that Coretta was murdered after he left her crib, and he is the main suspect. After some rough interrogation he's cut loose. While he's hoofin' it home he is followed by a limo. It turns out the car belongs to Matthew Terrell (Maury Chaykin), the remaining candidate in the mayoral race. Terrell asks Easy into the limo. Inside he finds Terrell with a young hispanic boy Jesus. Jesus is supposedly his adopted son. Terrell says he's also very interested in finding Daphne. Easy back at home gets a call from the elusive Daphne. She meets him at the Ambassador Hotel. She needs him to drive her up to an address in the Hollywood Hills to pick up a letter from Richard McGee that got delivered to the wrong address. Getting there they find the place ransacked, furniture tossed about and a dead man. Daphne runs out and drives off in McGee's car. Easy finds an empty pack of Zapata Cigarettes Daphne Monet (Jennifer Beals) When Easy gets back to his place, he finds Albright and his crew of hooligans making themselves at home. It appears that Daphne wasn't at the address. Frank Green moved out a year ago. Thinking they were scammed they are about to do Easy some serious damage, when he tells them about Daphne and the dead man, and about how Daphne took off in McGee's car. Albright buys his story but now he wants Easy to find Frank Green. Easy wants out but Albright tells him he's connected to two murders, and he's gonna do what he tells him to do. Now that they done Easy wrong, he puts a call through to Houston, Texas, and gets his old "crazy as a **** house rat" partner in crime, Mouse Alexander (Don Cheadle), to scoot on out to L.A. to give him some backup. Easy, wanting to know what he got himself into is looking for some answers. He visits Todd Carter. Carter tells him that Albright is not working for him. But now, Todd is interested in the fact that someone is looking for Daphne. He thought that she was hundreds of miles from L.A. Carter tells Easy that they were going to get married but had a fight. He then asks Easy if he thinks he can find her again. Easy asks for a grand. Carter agrees. When Easy get's back home Frank Green (Joseph Latimore) is waiting and a fight ensues. When Frank gets the upper hand and is about to cut Easy's throat Mouse shows up opportunistically and puts a gun to Frank's head. When Mouse shoots Frank it all goes convolutedly Noirsville. Noirsville The film depicts the Los Angeles of the Classic Film Noir Era. It hits pretty much on all cylinders. Good story, with convolutions worthy of a screenplay based on a Chandler Novel. Excellent cast all around. Beautiful cinematography, that evokes a heady atmosphere. Excellent period music. Great soundtrack. Being a heavily visual blog as well as a review/research/noir style ramble, I'm going to notice the visual aspects of a film. It's the main vein of Noir and like miners we follow it and it takes you to interesting films and places. So, One noticeable, slightly off, observation, to me, is the vehicles in the film. I used to own a 49 Chevy Pickup, a 46 International, and 52 Chevy sedan, plus ran a wreckin' yard in Montana, so I seen a lot of these period cars, in natural conditions so I have a feel for how they should look. In this film they all have a shiny new penny look. Living out West for 24 years and sitting under that almost relentless sunshine for three seasons of the year, cars that are parked on the street day in and day out or in rows in a wreckin' yard aren't going to all be that shiney. Paint jobs oxidize in the sun, all the vehicles seem to have showroom/collector car paint jobs and look as if every car in the film is garaged and waxed often. Yea, you can see the two mayoral candidates limos having chauffeurs do the waxing and garaging, and a certain percentage of the cars in traffic, but where are the beaters, the family sedans, the hot rod projects spotted with primer, the low income junkers, the goin' fishin' rigs? But maybe SoCal is a different planet. But it's just me, most people wouldn't notice it. Enjoy the film, it can take it's place along with Chinatown, Farewell My Lovely, Hammett, Union City, Angel Heart, A Rage In Harlem, The Public Eye, Mulholland Falls, L.A. Confidential, This World, Then The Fireworks, The Man Who Wasn’t There, The Black Dahlia, Honeydripper, and The Killer Inside Me. Screencaps are from the TriStar DVD 9/10. Full review with more screencaps here: Noirsville

I thougth he was already dead.

nope haven't seen it

= means I'm pulling your leg.

It's called research and I'm glad he does it. Again research. You well know that only the folks that had been around at that time would have known the convoluted details. You think that Robert Osborn didn't research, sheeesh, what a bunch of dotards. You want the intros to to have footnotes and a bibliography too. Get over yourselves.

The Fat Man (1951) P.I. crime film directed by William Castle. Based on a radio drama of the same name, with J. Scott Smart. It's sort of a rip off of Nero Wolfe but it has a nice cast. Julie London, Rock Hudson, Jayne Meadows, John Russell, and Emmett Kelly. 6-7/10.

Bob le Flambeur (1956) Laissez les bons temps rouler Bob is a player. A high roller. Born with an ace in his palm. Montmartre, 18th arrondissement, Paris. Bob's " hood." Excon. Bank robbery. He's been a well known fixture for twenty some odd years since, among the denizens "de la nuit." He's even quite friendly with the police commissioner Ledru. It seems that long ago a criminal "the Stick" took a shot at him but Bob deflected his gun at the last moment, saving his life. Bob's luck is about to change..... The whole cast performs flawlessly, I was surprised that both Isabelle Corey and Roger Duchesne didn't continue to make more films. This was Duchesne's second to last film, and Corey was only active until 1961. Melville was just hitting his stride, his next film was Two Men In Manhattan. The gorgeous cinematography of the environs around Montmartre was by Henri Decaë, and the interesting score was by Eddie Barclay and Jo Boyer. This film was an influence for Jean-Luc Godard. Watched the Criterion DVD. 8/10 Full review with screencaps here In Film Noir/Gangster pages.