misswonderly3

Mm, not good enough. I'm not convinced by this explanation. I'm more inclined to agree with Vautrin, Yeah, Marie Windsor's "Sherry" seems too smart and too hard to be marrying someone as milquetoast as Elisha Cook's character. Someone like that would want something more than a vague promise that "someday they'd be rich". It's all a little unconvincing, but works for the story. And boy, is that Sherry a harpy! As nasty as they come.

More on The Killing: The two stand-outs in this great cast ( they're all stand-outs, really), are, of course, Marie Windsor and Timothy Carey. As Looney noted, Marie Windsor is fantastic in this; could anyone do straight-out b1tch the way she could? (By the way, why did she marry Elisha's character, anyway? I love the way she compares their marriage to Aspirin !) Also, for no apparent reason, there's a parrot in their apartment. This is fun; the parrot seems to just be there for added weirdness, and it works. (Like, when Elisha falls and drags the parrot cage with him. At least the parrot is unharmed !) Timothy Carey: oh, what a weirdo. I love the way this guy specializes in making strange squinty faces and slurry speech. The moments between him and the parking lot guard are painful; when Nick reveals his true nature, snarling racist insults at the guy, it's shocking. Here you think, "great, it's 1956 and a black guy's interacting in a position of authority with a white guy. There even seems to be some mutual respect." But then of course, Nick ruins it all with his poisonous snarl. You can't feel sorry when he gets it from the guard. Oh, The Killing is so good, I could go on. But I'll just make one more observation: there's a touching scene, just before the heist, where the old guy who's one of the gang and an old friend of Johnny's, suggests maybe they could go away together afterwards, just the two of them, and you realize he has feelings for Johnny. There aren't many gay characters in noirs (although more than you might think), so it's interesting to see this sad little scene.

I agree with Looney about The Killing - it's very good. This was about the fourth time I'd seen it, and it never gets tired. Random thoughts about it: When you watch a heist movie, you notice it's always the little things, the things that even the smartest heist -master couldn't have foreseen, that mess it all up. "The best- laid plans....go aft awry." For instance, poor old Elisha Cook can't resist the importunings of his horrible wife to find out more about the heist. Sterling Hayden's character ("Johnny Clay" - I love that name !) is smart, he should have seen Elisha's weakness and maybe chosen a different race track teller to be in on his plan. He certainly seemed to know what his hard-as-nails wife was all about. You just know when Marie wheedles it out of her poor sap husband that he's in on some kind of robbery that's going to yield big bucks that the whole thing is going to go pear-shaped. Other "little details" that ruin everything: Oh, Johnny Clay, why didn't you invest in a brand new really reliable suitcase? Or at least two smallish carrier bags - also brand new, with good locks. You just know something bad's going to happen with that second-hand bag when he keeps having trouble locking it. Of course the fact that's it's bursting with money doesn't help. But even that might have worked out, had it not been for that obnoxious little dog ( and his equally obnoxious, vacuous owner), who decides to take a run at the baggage car, thus causing the precariously fastened suitcase to fall and release its precious and damning contents all over the runway. Then there's that nice, decent parking lot guard, who makes the mistake of trying to be friendly and helpful to weirdo unpredictable Timothy Carey. Johnny Clay couldn't have foreseen that that particular parking lot, the one with such a good view of the racetrack, would have been closed that day, and that Carey would have to interact with the guard to get him to allow him to park there. Yeah, it's the little details that you can't predict that usually ruin a heist.

Hey, all you Perry Mason fans...there's seems to be such avid interest in P.M., books, shows, actors who played him, etc. etc., why not start a thread dedicated to Perry Mason? And you'd probably get a lot more posters with more factettes, comments, etc., about Perry Mason than just on this thread. There seems to be a lot of love for him.

Are you sure you aren't thinking of "Candy Says", by the Velvet Underground? Now there's a sexually ambiguous song. And a good one.

It's sad that DownGoesFraser aka "finance" isn't on these boards anymore. I know, I started a thread about him a while ago. No need to do it again. Still, every time I'm reminded of him, I think of what an active, even committed, poster he was here. Proud of his brevity, his jokes, his taste in music, and his hometown of Philadelphia. Wonder whatever happened to him?

Now that's one guy, Vautrin, who definitely isn't gay.

I love this statement ! I experience that very thing, often !

I know Eric already posted that Monty Python sketch here ( hey, Eric, for once I agree with you about something ! we both like Monty Python !), it's very funny, and I don't think it got the appreciation it deserves the first time posted here. So I'm posting it again: By the way, never mind the "Bruce" thing, ya gotta love the Philosopher's Drinking Song: There never was and never will be again anything quite like Monty Python's Flyng Circus.

Thanks, cmovieviewer ! I already congratulated Hibi for remembering the film had Barbara Hale in it, but you've gone one better, you've got the movie title and everything. That's it - Clay Pigeon. I remember, or so it seemed to me at the time of watching, it had a lot of Chinatown settings. (But maybe it just had one or two, but they were especially memorable...)

Oh, you're good ! I looked up Barbara Hale, found her filmography, and from there located the movie I was trying to remember. It was The Clay Pigeon.

I'm afraid this won't be very interesting, because I cannot remember the name of the film, but I know that at some point "Noir Alley" aired a film that had a lot of location settings in L.A.'s Chinatown. (I think it involved a guy who had amnesia? Appropriate I can't remember the name of the movie when it was about someone with a memory problem !)

Right, Hibi baby, I know that. Maybe you didn't see this part of my post: This is what I said: "The murder: Why, oh why, do people in these movies always try to hide their nasty deed, rather than call the police? Because then there wouldn't be any movie, of course.... "as in Edward G.'s case in The Woman in the Window, he feels that even if they believe his plead of self-defence and he's exonerated, his life will be ruined - career, marriage, family, reputation, all down the tubes. All this, and he didn't so much as kiss the girl." Admittedly, my post on Woman in the Window was quite long, and I don't blame you a bit if you sort of missed that comment I made there. As I said, there are many noirs with that theme: the protagonist unintentionally kills someone in self-defence. It's clear to the audience it's self-defence, either kill or be killed. But these guys ( and sometimes girls) never seem to think they'll be believed, or they don't want to risk their reputations (or marriage, or career, or whatever) , and despite their innocence ( innocent in the sense that they did not "murder" anyone, it was self-defence), they act as though they are guilty, and either go on the run, or try to hide the evidence of the killing. And if they did not do that, but went straight to the police, yeah, like you said, there'd be no story. Think of all the noirs we'd miss.😎

Well, I kind of figured she's what used to be called a "mistress". The nasty guy who just lets himself into her apartment (so right there, he has his own key) and gets it in the back with a pair of scissors, after trying to strangle Edward G., is Joan's "sugar daddy". Of course because of the "Code" they couldn't make it too obvious; but it's clear to me that Joan doesn't "do" anything, except let herself be sexually available to her mean but rich "sugar daddy", apparently whenever he wants. And he's the guy who's paid for that fancy apartment, her clothes, everything. Joan's character is, (again, old-fashioned term) a "kept woman". Which led me to wonder if the reason she sort of picks up Edward G. Robinson, stopping to talk and flirt with him while he's admiring her portrait, was because she was tired of her "daddy's" treatment (she says at one point that he never takes her out anywhere, plus, it's clear he's a nasty guy) and was maybe hoping to exchange him for Eddie G. Why else would she have been so friendly to a man who was much older than she was, and not particularly attractive? (Of course what Joan's character didn't realize was that Eddie wouldn't have been much of a sugar daddy, he really didn'dt make that much money as a middling -range professor...) Anyway, we never get to find out if that's what she had in mind, and the story isn't really about that. But it's kind of fun to speculate on this kind of thing...

Mm, I don't know about that, speedy. I posted about the men's club thing a day or so ago, and I mentioned that the surroundings were "elegant yet cozy". Part of the appeal for me with those "gentlemen's clubs" ( and yes, women weren't allowed, but so what, it was a different time....) is yes, the "gorgeousness". But they also were supposed to be warm, welcoming, comfortable - in other words, cozy, a home away from home. The dining room and library are beautiful, I love them. But I'd rather hang out in the lounge. It's smaller and warmer looking, just the place to curl up in one of those chairs with a book and a drink. Or maybe, as they did in Woman in the Window, to have a fun chat with friends. It's got a fireplace and everything.

I hadn't seen Woman in the Window for a while, and this time around enjoyed it even more than my previous viewings. Random thoughts: Yeah, cigarjoe, I noticed the n1pple-revealing dress too. As you say, perhaps at the time the film was made, such, er, details would not have been noticeable. Oh well, just adds to Joan's already alluring sexiness. Dan Duryea: Damn, I love this guy ! I love his tall lithe form, what they used to call "a tall glass of milk", although in Dan's case, maybe more like a tall glass of whiskey and soda, with a little poison added for good measure. I love the way Dan always seems gentle, reasonable, at first. He's a nice guy, doesn't want to cause anybody any trouble. He just wants to blackmail them, Hey, a guy's got to make a living. I really enjoy his silky smooth way of speaking; it makes it all the more interesting when he suddenly switches gears and gets nasty. Silky to gritty in a minute. And I really like the way his character suddenly, just out of his bad guy's suspicious intuition, starts to suspect that his drink is poisoned. Joan's character is no match for him, any more than Lazy Legs is in Scarlet Street. I love Dan's combination of smart and ruthless and silky-smooth. The murder: Why, oh why, do people in these movies always try to hide their nasty deed, rather than call the police? Because then there wouldn't be any movie, of course. I'm talking about many, many noir plots, including this one, where someone is being attacked and ends up killing someone. The attacker is intent on killing them, it's either them or the hero(protagonist, if you prefer.) So the one being attacked naturally, when handed a gun or, in this case, a pair of scissors, defends themselves by using the weapon at hand. It's self defence. Yet, of course they always feel as guilty as if it had been outright murder, "the police will never believe us", that kind of thing. And /or, as in Edward G.'s case in The Woman in the Window, he feels that even if they believe his plead of self-defence and he's exonerated, his life will be ruined - career, marriage, family, reputation, all down the tubes. All this, and he didn't so much as kiss the girl. I thought Eddie's comments about how there was much more potential humour in the story than Fritz Lang allowed for was revealing. My favourite noirs are those that are also kind of funny - bleak, maybe, violent, ok, but hey, that doesn't mean there's no room for a little humour, a bit of witty, sardonic dialogue or fun with character bits. We get a hint of it, but I guess Lang squashed most of it out of the final product. Too bad. And I love Fritz Lang, don't get me wrong. Joan Bennett: Oh, Joan, you were so good. I wish she'd been in even more noirs, she was made for this type of movie. I love the way she kind of drawls her lines. In her way, she's as silky smooth as Duryea. You do have to wonder why such a babe would have flirted with someone like Eddie and lured him in for a drink and to see her etchings. Maybe she was tired of her nasty brutish sugar daddy who never took her out anywhere and was thinking of making a switch. (Not realizing that Eddie's professor job wouldn't have yielded much sugar....) We never really find out, because of course the two of them get into trouble almost immediately (as I said, before Eddie gets to so much as kiss her) and the rest of the story is how they try to stumble through disposing of the evidence, etc. It's a little - but just a little - like Double Indemnity, but with Eddie as the Fred MacMurray character, and Eddie's role as the investigator and friend of the guilty guy being played by Raymond Massey. Maybe that's a bit of a stretch, the similarities end there. Hey, anyone notice how this is the second film - both directed by Fritz Lang - where Dan's handling a pair of scissors? Remember how he's playing a tailor ( as a cover) in Ministry of Fear, and he strides around with this enormous pair of scissors in his hands? True, in Woman in the Window he just picks them up for a minute while he's rummaging through Joan's things, but still, it reminded me of that scene in Ministry of Fear. (Also, there's something intimate, creepy, about Dan's going through Joan's personal dressers, touching her stockings, etc. I'm sure it's on purpose.) Anyway, fun movie. Lots more to say about it, but I don't want to be a hog. Oh, the ending...life, what is it, but a dream? (Lewis Carroll)

Uh, ok, I have no problem switching gears and talking about this film out of the blue. 🤨 Why not? This is Noir Alley. However, I have to ask how often you've seen Blue Gardenia, because the whole point is SPOILER that Anne Baxter's character did not whack Raymond Burr with the poker. You'll recall the film goes all sort of blurry at that point; Anne passes out and when she comes to, she can't remember what happened, she just sees Burr's body and assumes she must have killed him. But SPOILER AGAIN as the film eventually reveals, she did not. She is innocent. Remember the spurned record shop lady? She dunnit. So, no, slightly built Anne Baxter did not overpower Raymond Burr, she just lost consciousness. Presumably Burr's character did not turn into Bill Cosby and do anything to her before the record shop lady arrived and put an end to his decadent woman-preying ways. But that's all off-screen, of course.

The Woman in the Window is a fun noir. I love Edward G. and Dan Duryea. And, come to think of it, Joan Bennett. Of course this great cast is reprised in Scarlet Street the following year. Although, of the two, I prefer Scarlet Street, The Woman in the Window is very enjoyable. I love it when Eddie hangs out in his "club". Those old-fashioned men's clubs, sexist though they were, also look kind of nice. Elegant and at the same time, somehow cozy surroundings, lots of comfy leather chairs and books, people bringing you fine brandy ( the drink of choice, I suspect, at these clubs), quiet atmosphere to read or just think (or doze), and the chance of meeting friends and colleagues with whom you can have interesting conversations, about - oh, whatever themes the movie wants to explore. Edward G. was so good; his character in this film is quite a different one from poor old Chris' in Scarlet Street. Yet he's entirely believable in both. Just shows his range. But I'll save the rest of my observations about The Woman in the Window for after its Noir Alley airing(s).

Maybe he's sad that your quote didn't come through ( due to technical issues on Lorna's phone, I think), because your comments here are always interesting and worth reading, and cigarjoe was just disappointed that he missed what you said. Hey, Lorna, get a laptop ! (sorry, not bossing you around...lots of people here post and read on their phones. But I know sometimes that can create technical problems....)

SPOILERS FOR THOSE WHO HAVEN'T SEEN (OR READ) "REBECCA": Ok, you're right, but it's actually more complicated than that. Yes, in the book, technically, Maxim did kill Rebecca. But ! Rebecca wanted Maxim to kill her. She goaded him into it, on purpose taunting him and infuriating him until he lost it and shot her (I think...or did he just hit her and she fell and hit her head....can't remember...) Rebecca had found out that she had cancer. This was a woman who would have found prolonged illness intolerable, she would much rather just die, quickly, before the cancer had a chance to make her ill - and her diagnosis was that it was incurable. But Maxim did not know this, he just knew she'd been to see a doctor. She made him believe she was pregnant, and taunted him that the child was not his, and that he'd have to tolerate raising a child who was not his, but pretending he thought it was to avoid scandal. She deliberately provoked him into killing her ( again, I thought he struck her and she fell and died when she hit her head, but maybe he shot her...) Anyway, the point is, the diabolical Rebecca decided she wanted to die (before the cancer took hold of her), and that the way to do it was to taunt Maxim into killing her. It was very calculated on her part, and, in the sense that she wanted and planned for Maxim to kill her, it was in a way a suicide.

Me too. I like both, but definitely feel that Scarlet Street is the better of the two. And after the airing of Woman in the Window this weekend I'll be happy to provide several reasons why.

Eric, I feel compelled to say that I disagree with pretty much every single thing you say about movies and film directors. Just sayin'.

I absolutely disagree with Shutoo's critical assessment of The Happy Prince. I saw it last night, and I loved it. First, unlike Shutoo, I don't feel that a film has to have a cohesive story-line (he says, "the story-telling itself leaves something to be desired".) Nor do I feel that a character in a film, especially someone based on a real -life person, has to "learn" or "change". I got the sense that Oscar Wilde was true to himself at all times. Why does he have to "learn" anything? He didn't do anything wrong, except to happen to live in a time and place that found the idea of homosexuality unacceptable. Ok, yes, he did let the idiotic selfish Bosie ( we can agree on this guy's character !) talk him into initiating a lawsuit against Bosie's father, who'd been the one to draw public attention to Wilde's sexual orientation in the first place. And he definitely had apparently "learned" nothing about how selfish,nasty, and untrustworthy Bosie (Lord Alfred Douglas) was. But other than that, I did not see Wilde in a negative light. I don't think he was particularly "selfish"; I will say he was self-indulgent right to the end, but that's not the same thing. I found the film at all times deeply engaging, and most of the time, heart-breaking. Oscar Wilde's story is a true tragedy, in the most classic sense of the word. He fell from grace; he was someone who flew very high, he was adored and sought after in English Victorian society; he was the equivalent of what would today be called a "rock star". And he deserved all this adulation: his plays were hilarious, and I think, still so today. He had an exceptionally vivid and creative imagination - hence the beautiful children's stories, as well as "The Picture of Dorian Grey". And of course, there's his famous wit - by all accounts he was a fun guy to be around, funny and clever and unpretentious. He had all this, and he lost it all ( as he does say, repeatedly, in the film). Not so much because he was gay ( which can hardly be called a "tragic flaw"), but because he lost all judgement in his infatuation with Bosie. My only criticism of The Happy Prince is that this fall from grace would have been rendered even more affecting to the audience if we'd had a few more flashback scenes of Wilde's glory days, before the trial and his disgrace. I do also feel that, if someone who had no already existing knowledge of Oscar Wilde and his story were to watch this movie, they would not entirely "get it". The film assumes the audience is already aware of Oscar Wilde and the tragedy of what happened to him. One more thing: I love the way the film integrated Oscar's telling of his unusual, beautiful story, "The Happy Prince", into the narrative. It's told in bits throughout the film; we get the profoundly moving ending of the story at the very end, which is also the end of Oscar's life. Anyone who could conceive of and write such a meaningful, poignant story deserves our respect and admiration. Every time I think of Oscar Wilde and how sad the last period of his life was, I am moved.

Well, I'm pretty familiar with The Sniper. I've seen it two or three times, and in fact own a copy ( it's included in a Columbia noir boxed set I've got.) I missed it this weekend as I was away and did not get a chance to watch it. But I watched it earlier this year, so it's still pretty fresh in my mind. This is not a "fun" noir. Some noirs are fun to me; they tend to include glamourous nightclub scenes, witty dialogue, atmospheric settings, things like that. The Sniper is not like that at all. It's very serious, and actually quite depressing. Depressing not only as a story in its own right, but also because, sadly, these kinds of people seem to be around acting out their horrible obsessions more than ever today, much more so than in 1952. It's what they called a "message movie" back then. Clearly the gun man is very sick, psychologically. We see him trying to contact the mental health professional who was trying to help him before he was released from hospital (evidently long before he should have been), but he cannot reach him. No one seems to notice how messed up he is, or care. The message of The Sniper is, we must detect mental illness in this kind of person and try to treat them, certainly keep them under observation, before they lose all control and end up killing innocent people. It is true, the final scene, where we see the killer waiting pathetically for the police to find and arrest him, is very effective. I simply do not know enough about this kind of mental illness to comment as to whether the plea this film seems to be making is the right way to deal with such people. Anyway, just looking at it objectively and not as a social message movie, The Sniper is well-made and well directed, in a "procedural" kind of way. I like Edward Dmtryk, and would expect nothing less than a taut,engrossing work from him. I thought the actor who played the sniper, Arthur Franz, was quite good - it's a difficult role to play, a profoundly sick man with a compulsion to kill, who yet needs to convey at least a modicum of sympathy to the audience. I'd never heard of Arthur Franz before, yet when I looked him up, it seems he was quite a prolific actor, appearing in many movies, including The Caine Mutiny and Beyond a Reasonable Doubt. Marie Windsor makes an appearance here. She's always good; it's too bad we don't get more of her in The Sniper; you feel genuinely shocked and sad when her character is shot by the killer. I think I understand why so few people have posted here about this film today. First, as I said, good in its own way though it may be, it's not enjoyable, obviously because of its subject matter. Second, coming just a week after the horrible massacre in Pittsburgh, the airing of The Sniper would be disturbing to many viewers, and I'm thinking a lot of people may have chosen to not watch the film at this time. Again, I can absolutely understand that.

Noir, schmoir. I just wanna have fun.